It was true.
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Alycia would, of course, agree. Or at least agree that’s what she was taught by her father.
Ghost Girl is slowly coming together on Digital. All the artwork for her base character are in place and hopefully over the weekend her variants will too. Then it’s all over but the writing.
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A variety of updates.
First, Ghost Girl is looking good so I’m planning on wrapping up her up for release at the end of the month. If anyone had any suggestions or revisions to the bios I posted before, let me know so I can button those up.
Secondly, I think I’ve finalized the Ghostheart-to-Netherwarden design enough to call that good enough to start redoing artwork. Unfortunately, I also found out that Netherwarden’s primary gimmick (adding new environment cards) doesn’t work-as-written in digital, so I’m go back to rework some of their deck. Since Bill’s thrown a bit of spotlight on them lately, I figure I’ll see if I can incorporate any of that into the cards. (Also it would be very far off, but the Orphean Market was so evocative that I would love to make an environment based off it).
Finally, Unmute/Iconoclast is pretty much wrapped up at this point, so I need to focus on some art there. However, my mind is also drifting off to the next villain deck and it’s going to be a bit weird. First was Netherwarden, a villain who hides behind hordes of minions. Next was Unmute, a villain who takes the fight to the heroes with some limited backup. After that, I want to take a swing at more of an event focused villain, specifically the Christmas Vroytovian invasion. Given the speed I work on things, it probably will be finished up around Christmas, so best to get started soon. While I have a lot of ideas for the event, I know the focus is going to be around the Kaiju Cat. So have a design.
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Notes from @Margie 's read-thru and pondering.
Vyortovia? Is that a thing? She as connections.
Met with the Magus in a (non-real/notional/extra-planar) Gazebo. That’s her safe space where she goes. There are no ghosts there, so it’s quiet for her.
“The Horrified Statisfaction of the Aggrieved Dead” has to be in there somewhere.
The Comb
Reference to the Washington Monument (Sepiaverse), mass graves, where she took control.
Spirit of Solstice:
- Solstice Candle is a relic allowing for true seeing.
- When Charlotte found it in the Magus’ mansion, the Booklins explain it was brought to the manse in the 1940s by a previous Magus.
Thanks for the read through @Margie and @Dave. Comments on your comments. Will probably work on a new revision this week between illustration stuff.
The rebranded Vyortiovia is the Azure Empire, though all the other relevant details are still intact. But definitely an oversight that they don’t get a mention.
I’ll have to go dig through the wiki for pertinent details, because I do not recall this event at all.
The line gets some usage in the card quotes, but I can definitely see about adding it into the bio as well. Can also add in the other details relevant to the Sepiaverse trip with Jason and Summer (and eventually Alycia).
Was it a comb? Because if so, oof, did I screw that up.
Good details here. Thanks. 
M says: “It’s in the cemetery, just before Alycia follows the goons into the Sepiaverse.”
I am informed that hairpin is fine, and comb can be used as a synonym for such.
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Also, as further inspiration for the Yule Cat, Neko was there to help while Margie read:
Margie: “I can’t wait for the Yule Cat to do a head bump.”
Dave: “Against the HHL HQ building.”
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Sixteen months later …
Oh.
Though it’s unclear whether Wally runs so fast because he can’t slow down, or won’t slow down.
Since it looks like Bill has some Rainbow Warrior-adjacent stories coming up, I figured it was appropriate to share some Concord artwork I’ve been working on.
Intended to be a companion to the artwork on Ghost Girl’s A Comfort to Others card, I always enjoy doing things like this where (in a comic book) this would be a different panel from the same scene.
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Since I brought it up previously, I figure I would talk a little more about my ideas for the Christmas Invasion and solicit ideas from the group.
The Basics
There are a lot of ways to present a villain, even more so here were there isn't clearly one villain. To make things seem big, my current plan is to have each side of the villain card represent a different figure from the invasion: on the front side you are dealing with the witch Gryla and the Yule Lads, while on the back side you are dealing with the monstrous Jólakötturinn.
There are two ways to deal with the cards to make both sides feel different: one is to remove certain cards from the villain deck depending on what side the villain is on. I’m already doing that with Unmute, so I feel like I will do it the other way: have the cards do different things depending on what side the villain is on. For instance:
Thunderous Footsteps (one-shot)
Front Side: Each hero target deals themselves 2 psychic damage. Each player discards a card.
Back Side: The Jólakötturinn deals the hero target with the highest HP 5 melee damage and each other hero target 1 sonic damage.
I’ll likely come up with different keywords for these (like Frost Witch for the front side and Kaiju Cat for the backside) but that’s the basic idea. Not all of the cards will do something like this, but I figure it will add some additional flavor for it to show up in certain places.
Gryla and the Yule Lads
We didn't actually deal with Gryla and her Yule Goat, but I figure we have enough info to make some informed guesses: there is a fog of sleep hanging over the city while the Yule Lads kidnap children.
To represent the kidnapped kids, I’m thinking I’m going to have some double-sided cards with one side representing either a Yule Lad or their bag of children and the other side representing a freed teen hero. It would look something like:
Kidnapping Sack (HP: 10)
When this card would be destroyed, flip it instead.=============================
Kid Kelvin (HP: 6) Ally, JHHL Hero
When flipped to this side, move this card to one player’s play area without an ally already in it. This card counts as a hero target.
Reduce damage dealt to hero targets in the same play area as this card by 1.
Still need to come up with a full like of allys, which is proving harder than I had imagined. I have two criteria in mind: first they should be teen heroes present in the first half of the game and secondly they should be someone I’m not already planning on putting in another deck so that they don’t conflict (it would be troublesome if you freed an ally A10 while also playing as the hero A10, especially in digital). Unfortunately, Bill is making it much more difficult with his Phase Two stories. Currently, I have the following characters as non-eligible for this:
All of the Menagerie (for obvious reasons)
The Irregularators (with a single exception listed below)
Super Chica
Nono
Hot Mess
Snowman
Agent 1337
Yeah, I would love to have hero teams of the Irregulators and the Agents of AEGIS.
Now there is one member of the Irregulators I don’t have plans for a hero deck: the shapeshifting Animal. There are two reasons for this, I don’t have a really strong bond with the character because they’re a bit of a blank slate and SotM already did a hero deck (The Naturalist) who has a similar enough gimmick to how I would build them that I don’t want to cover old territory.
There are also members of the JHHL to mine, so my current short list of allies are:
Animal
Kid Kelvin
Stingray
Ninjess
I would like to add a fifth character so that there are one ally for each hero in a 5 player game, but I’m sure I’m missing some other options that aren’t immediately obvious.
As for the villains, there are fifteen Yule Lads listed in our notes but as a standard villain deck is 25 cards and I don’t want over half of that taken up by samey targets, I’m going to need to prune that list or come up with something else (like teaming each of the Yule Lads with a partner for 7 total targets).
Current plan is to trigger the villain flip around either defeating a certain number or Yule Lads or by freeing a certain number of allies. I am less inclined about that second one, as I want the allies to be an optional (but very helpful) objective that you can blow past. Still thinking through specifics.
The Jólakötturinn
This one is a bit more straight forward. While the front side is going to focus on defeating Yule Lads and freeing allies to help you later in the game, the back side has one goal: Survive.
I’d originally toyed with the idea of heroes needing to defuse the bomb from the Oakland Cemetery present in the following session while also surviving the attacks of the massive Kaiju Cat, I don’t know how I would do it without it being an alternate target to punch or just a random bit of extra work (like each turn pulling a random card from a deck that has wires and if you cut all the required wires in the right order, you defused the bomb and win). So for now, I’m going to focus on “punch large cat.”
So theses are my current ideas. Still have a ways to go but its a starting point. Thoughts? Opinions?
God dammit me, stop that shit
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So you have some options here. One is to just not name them, and this is probably going to be easiest. Instead, you can give them adjectival descriptions, e.g. “Self-Centered Hero” or “Ice-Powered Hero” for Kid Kelvin.
I’d probably keep it simplified, and if anything, have a bomb inside a huge Christmas-wrapped gift box appear as a card or art cameo or something. The game wants you to burn down villains, so conceding to the medium is probably a good move here.
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So while I work on the Christmas Invasion stuff, some of the latest story stuff in Phase Two has gotten me interested in trying to put together a Quill Compound environment deck. Before I focus on mechanics, I wanted to take the time to gather up a list of things think of when they think of the Quill Compound: tropes, peoples, aesthetics, and themes. My current list looks like this:
- AIs/Ghosts in the Machine
- Super Tech
- Warehouse full of secret tech/artifacts
- Rogue nanites (See Menagerie #30)
- The Conversation Pit
- Brigand, the Quill family’s dog
- Cosmos Jones
I could add in other elements (the Quill Disc) but I feel like elements that are quintessentially Jason should stay in his deck (for instance while the Q-Disc and the Jason’s nanites should show up only in comics/stories/games that Jason is in, things like Brigand, the AIs, and the rogue nanites could still be affecting folks who are at the Quill Compound for whatever reason).
I’m sure there’s some things that could easily be added to this list I’m overlooking, and that’s why I’m polling the hive mind to see what other things people think of when they think of the Quill Compound.
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Strictly from a play perspective, I’d look at things like:
- visiting dignitaries or scientists
- dangerous lab experiments in progress
- aggressive security system
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See now I need to figure out the Menagerie-verse version of this scene. 
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This is the stress test lab for new Quill inventions, the way they ram cars into walls for safety testing. Quill devices and inventions are routinely put through machines that try to smash, grind, or pulverize them. Hard hats are required in this space.
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While I put together a color pallet for the inside of the Quill Compound (I’m really liking the design of the Cornell Tech campus to help inspire the exterior of the compound) I figured it was time to designs for some of the related characters. As always, input and opinions are welcome.
First up is Jason’s dog, Brigand. Since Brigand is a Cardigan Welsh Corgi, it’s not difficult to make a design for him: make a little loaf and give him a tuxedo and lil socks.
Probably made his head a little too big, makes him look more puppyish than @Dave described him. Hopefully the final versions will look a bit better. I also expect that given the description of Brigand’s modified intellect, I imagine he’s about as smart as Ein from Cowboy Bebop (minus some light hacking) but I could be off.
Next up is Cosmos Jones. Not a lot of detail on her other than some casual mentions here and there, so I could be completely off her. I designed her to just be a general warehouse worker for the Quill Compound, so dressed for utility and a high visibility vest. Other than that, can’t say much.
Leaving the Quill Compound, I had a sketch sitting around for Nono for a while that I decided to slap some quick colors on. She sees like she would dress in bright colors, making her even more at odds with Alycia’s secret agent vibe. Only detail that isn’t visible here is that in keeping with her visual source, I have her being tall, about a head taller than most of the other girls and about as tall (and taller in some cases) as the boys from Gardner Academy.
As a bonus, I also tried thinking about how the description boxes in a comic version of the Agents of AEGIS would look when Nono took her brain drugs, thinking that would be a more long term feature of the character (and it could still be, Bill’s always surprising me with these stories). Very subtle, but I figure it would start much more obvious and then lighten up as the drug ran its course. Or maybe the other way around? There’s value in both options.
Finally, mostly because I didn’t want to post in two different threads, my take on Pyrrhus Chin. Given than Alycia described his expressions as “looking into a mirror” I tried to draw his face as close to how I draw Alycia’s as possible. Familial resemblance perhaps or maybe some reasons, don’t know Bill’s playing close to the vest still.
I also tried to make him resemble Alycia from the painting in this card as close as possible to make the “you have been replaced vibes” as strong as possible.
Not sure what the next thing I’m going to work on is going to be (my interest comes in spurts and stops these days) but hopefully it will be some bad approximations of architectural drawings.
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I used Zalgo text to represent the degeneration, so it’s nice to see some thoughts on how it’d appear visually 
Alycia told her no more, but SNOWMAN pocketed the patches. What could that mean…?
Let’s just say I can be very flexible about how Pyrrhus Chin looks.
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Given my current suspicions, I’m not horribly surprised by that answer.
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