Announcements
| Update: December 29th, 2022 |
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Yes, for the first time in nearly 20 years, DragonSpawn is back online. Since Hasbro has decided to do exactly what TSR did back in the mid-nineties and utterly destroy the community, it feels like it may be time for DragonSpawn to make a comeback. So I dug deep into the archives, and restored the web page. I guess we'll have to wait and see what happens now. |
| Update: June 25th, 2001 |
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Hey! I'm back! No, I haven't died, gone
away, or given up on DragonSpawn. However, I have had another child,
I have been working non-stop, and I have been running around like a
typical chicken with missing cranial sections. In case you haven't noticed, or if this is your first time here, the whole web site has finally gotten its long-delayed makeover. I've been working on this off and on for a couple of years now, and I finally had a day where I couldn't get connected to work, and I had to do something... I guess we'll have to see if that review on the RPG Archive site goes up now... |
| Update: July 13th, 1998 |
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Hey! You should see the great review we
got from the RPG Archive site! Ninety-one out of a possible one hundred!
Not bad for our not so temporary, interim web design. Check it out under
the "Related Links" item on the main menu. |
| Update: March 7th, 1998 |
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Fixed all the links that broke when
Microsoft changed the location of their Word Viewer program. I
wonder how many people's web sites that screwed up... |
| Update: December 10th, 1997 |
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Look, no apologies. This is just a quick update to the FAQ section which has finally been filled in. Every Question has an answer and so on. There have been some modifications made to the Game Player's Guidebook which will hopefully be posted soon. Update announcements will be made on that page. The first month of the Monster of the Month contest garnered no entries, so there is no winner. Oh well. On to next month. |
| Update: November 1st, 1997 |
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As ususal, I should probably start this
announcement with an apology. Instead, I'll simply say that my life
is just as busy as it's ever been, and I just have to put DragonSpawn
on the back burner when things get tight.
Of course, the first thing you should notice around here is that "here" is not "here" anymore. That's right, we've moved. Why? Was my ISP charging too much, or giving me bad service? Nope. However, I am now 1100 miles away from my old ISP, and calling long-distance to get my E-Mail didn't make a whole lot of sense. So, since we moved, I decided to re-vamp all of the web pages and hopefully make the site a little bit better. So, what do you think? Has the site improved at all. Please send your comments to [expired email address] and let us know what you think of the new web pages. Second, for those of you who think the Catalog of Dangerous Creatures is a little bit thin, with only two monsters in it, we are starting the Monster of the Month competition. This is a competition to see who can come up with the best original monster to include in DragonSpawn. Monsters should be put in game terms, as described in the Catalog of Dangerous Creatures. Each month, we'll be choosing a new winner, who will have their name spread in glory across the top of the Monster of the Month Winners page. Please take a look and read the guidelines to find out more. Sorry the prizes aren't better, but what do you expect when we don't make any money on this thing. |
| Update: October 29th, 1997 |
| The Announcements page has been updated (in fact, its been added) to the new style of the DragonSpawn home pages. In addition, the Kroth comments have been added to this page. |
| Update: October 14th, 1997 |
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An Open Statement on the Name: Kroth To Whom it May Concern: First of all, let me make it clear that I have no affiliation with any satanic groups, in fact, I am an ordained minister. I was raised UCC and confirmed to the church at the age of 14. I do not condone violence of any kind (save in self-defense), and I find the actions of the Pearl High School students to be deplorable. I have watched the story unfold on CNN and on the Internet, and I am disturbed that the media is looking for a convenient scapegoat other then the perpetrators on which to blame their crimes. Fortunately, I don't think you'll get the answer you are looking for from me. Two years ago, I began writing a role-playing game to be distributed for free across the Internet. That game is called DragonSpawn and is available in its most current form at https://dragonspawn.naujok.com. I wrote the game in response to a rather draconian enforcement of copyright policy by the TSR corporation in which they banned any works relating to their product, the Dungeons and Dragons™ role playing system, from the Internet and generally stifled the creative atmosphere that had been harbored. The DragonSpawn system is still relatively incomplete two years later, due to a lack of free time to work on it. Within the game, Kroth is the name of the imaginary world which is used for examples in the rules for DragonSpawn. The name is, as far as I know, a made-up word which has the same general sound as Earth. I made the name up so long ago, more than 10 years, I really don't remember how I came up with it. If the word Kroth has any other meanings, I am totally unaware of it. Any links to any "Satanic Verse" are totally unintentional and I am unaware of any "Satanic Verse" whatsoever. (Except, of course, the book by Salaman Rushdie, which I have never read.) I have, however, seen several letters from role-playing gamers who live near Pearl, on various mailing lists, in which they are literally afraid for their lives because of the "witch hunt" mentality which has taken hold in the area. If there is anyone to blame for these misguided youth, the first place to look, beyond the youths themselves, is the parents that allowed such misguided and corrupted ideas to be fostered in their children. Jeffrey R. Naujok [expired email address] All information on this page is Copyright � 1997, BlackStar Internet Consulting and Jeffrey R. Naujok. All Rights Reserved. Fair use is hereby granted to any media outlet to reprint all of the above statement, without modifications. Any other use must be approved by Jeffrey R. Naujok at [expired email address]. Failure to abide by these terms will result in civil procedings. |
| Update: April 3rd, 1997 |
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First, an apology. This whole thing has
been on the back burner for a while as I've tried to finish other
projects and schoolwork (my last six credits!) I know that there are a lot of you out there that really want to play DragonSpawn, and I can't wait until the time comes that I can start answering esoteria about games in progress. The Game Player's Guidebook, which receives the most hits, is highest on the list of priorities, so for those of you waiting for the Game Master's guidebook, I'm afraid your wait won't be ending soon. The Game Player's Guidebook, however, has received a pair of updates, one in January, and one today. I have been finding odd minutes to type some of the material, vital to game play, into the document in piece-meal fashion. Generally, they are short and less detailed then the final material will be, but they provide many of the missing pieces to start playing a game. The major exception is the combat rules, which I still need to type in. Have patience, it will be soon. In addition, the Game Player's Guidebook is now available in native HTML format for all of those people out there without access to a Wintel machine. Thanks to the magic of Word 97, which now includes a "save to HTML" feature. By the way, if the formatting is lousy, send all your complaints to billg@microsoft.com... ;) Finally, as some early warning, the web site will most likely be moving sometime between now and the end of July. I hope to have stub pages to redirect anyone who comes to these pages after the move, but I'm not sure exactly what's going to happen yet. This is all due to my personal move to a different state. Soon I'll be cavorting among the aspens of Colorado, instead of the Cryptosporidium of Milwaukee. In the meantime, I'd like to personally thank everyone who wrote in with a question or comment, it was much appreciated. And I'd also like to thank everyone who has visited the site. We have met and surpassed the 3000th visitor, and we have had over 1200 visits to the Game Player's Guidebook page. Thank you again for your interest in the DragonSpawn role playing system. Please feel free to leave as many comments as you'd like. The address to send comments to is [expired email address]. |
| Update: October 14th, 1996 |
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First, an apology. I told a few people who
wrote in to ask, that we would have a new version of the Game
Player's Guidebook available on the fifteenth. It appears now,
that it isn't going to happen. But have faith gentle readers, you are
not forgotten. There has been some progress made. Soon, there should be enough information in the guidebook to actually begin a session of DragonSpawn. That means all the stats detailed, some of the skills filled out, and monetary systems as well as equipment and other useful things. Not to mention the little details, like how to conduct combat. In the meantime, I'd like to personally thank everyone who wrote in with a question or comment, it was much appreciated. And I'd also like to thank everyone who has visited the site. We have had over a thousand hits in the last month and a half, which is pretty good, considering we only had 300 hits in the previous six months. |
| Update: August 29th, 1996 |
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After spending the summer doing such mundane
things as working for other people, and making money, I've spent the
last week monitoring the traffic here at DragonSpawn to see if what I
was doing was really being noticed. The answer seems to be: Yes. As such, we are going to start putting newer revisions of the manuals onto the web site as they become available. Hopefully by about January you will have the "beta versions" of these manuals available for your perusal. Thank you for your interest in the DragonSpawn role playing system. Please feel free to leave as many comments as you'd like. The address to send comments to is [expired email address]. |
| Update: March 29th, 1996 |
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Starting on March 26, 1995, the staff of BlackStar Publishing has
begun the task of compiling DragonSpawn, a new fantasy role playing
system. DragonSpawn is unique in the gaming community because it is
the first complete adventuring system which is available for free to
anyone in the world via the Internet. It will also be the only freely
available system distributed in a form that is immediately publishable
with the quality of other role playing systems which can cost US$30 or
more. As the game of DragonSpawn evolves, it will be available for download from the DragonSpawn Web site. This will allow the players of DragonSpawn to have the ability to immediately comment on changes in the game, even before it reaches its final form. DragonSpawn tries to improve on the standard fantasy genre by introducing several new and innovative concepts in role-playing. Outdated and cumbersome systems are done away with, while those that work have been kept and improved upon. One of the major differences is the absense of character classes. By allowing players to devote their training into whatever area they want, they can build characters with varied abilities and unique personas. But don't think that this opens the door to blatant Monty Haul munchkinism either. The system is carefully balanced, so that a character will have to work long and hard to gain many abilities. Remember the old saying, "Jack of all trades, master of none." The various attributes have been expanded upon as well. No longer will there be arguments over whether a problem is more related to strength or manual dexterity. DragonSpawn defines seperate scores for categories like Brawn, Agility and Coordination. This additional detail makes a character truly take on a defined quality that no other system can match. So keep an eye on the DragonSpawn site. Big things will be happening soon. |