A Magic Item: The Cat's Shade

Although designed for use with OGL Modern (the OGL d20 variant that NUELOW Games produces most of its OGL support for), and appearing in the forthcoming The Three Lives of Fantomah: Book Two, this magical item could be used in any roleplaying game or setting where magic is present. (Text in this post is released under the Open Game License, which means it can be reproduced in accordance with its terms. Copyright 2014 Steve Miller.)

The Cat's Shade
The Cat's Shade is a magical potion that is created from the blood of a cat sacrificed during an evil ritual. When consumed, the user is transformed into a cat identical to the one killed. He or she has all the usual game statistics and abilities of the appropriate type of cat with the following adjustments:
   * Can only be harmed by spells, enchanted weapons, or cats.
   * The transformed character retains his regular Intelligence and Wisdom scores.
   * The character retains all his usual skills and spellcasting abilites. although the cat form may limit the use of them.
   The transformation lasts until the next sunrise after the potion was consumed, or until the user wills the transformation to end, or he or she is killed.
   A sacrificed cat yields five potions. They are sometimes found among the belongings of evil shamans or leaders of demonic cults. There will be 1d3 of such potions present, and the lot transforms the imbiber into one of the follow cats (roll 1d6 to determine which):

   1. Domestic House Cat
   2. Lion(ess)
   3. Tiger
   4. Panther
   5. Leopard
   6. Cheetah

These potions are never available for sale. They can be "commissioned" from shamans or cultists with the knowledge of how they are created, and the price is always performing a service for whatever dark faith they serve. (The time to perform the ritual is three days, which includes capturing the cat, sacrificing it, and creating the potion.)

The Three Lives of Fantomah: Book One is currently on sale. Click here to see previews, or to get your own copy.

The Throw Halfling Feat

Because dwarf tossing jokes never get old...

Throw Halfling [Barbarian, Fighter, Ranger]
Using a full-round attack action, you may throw a willing gnome or halfling at a target within 20+1 ft per Strength bonus. Your BAB is used to modify the roll. If your attack is successful, the target suffers 1d6 points of damage from the impact. If the thrown gnome or halfling makes a successful Fort save (DC15), he or she may immediately perform melee attacks as normal. If the save fails, the gnome or halfling loses attacks for the round. The following round, the gnome or halfling must roll initiative to see when they attack in the initiative order.
   Special: If the thrown character has a Dexterity of 18 or better, his or her Dex bonus is added to the initial damage.
(This feat is presented under the Open Game License. Copyright NUELOW Games and Steve Miller 2014)

Cartoon by Aimo. (Proof great minds think alike.)

A big bundle of NUELOW horror!

Get yourself a last minute Halloween treat with a collection of 20 horror-themed books from NUELOW Games. There are comics, fiction, RPG material... everything you need for a bone-chillingly good time.

Art by Warren Kremer

The products in the bundle feature work by such great talents as Robert E. Howard, Steve Ditko, Joe Kubert, Dick Briefer, Lily Renee, Bill Madden... and many more. NUELOW Games' own Steve Miller either edited or contributed to all the products featured... and as a former key contributor to the Ravenloft horror setting, he knows scary!

The collection is available for $13, which is roughly half off the full retail price of the individual books. So, at least for now, 13 can be your lucky number!

Click here to download NUELOW's A Bundle of Horror, or to read details about each included book.

Coming soon: A baseball-based product by people who know nothing about baseball

"The Royals are going to the World Series!" someone stated.

"Really?" I thought. "All of them, or just Queen Elizabeth?"

The person was, of course, referring to the Kansas City Royals who are going to the World Series for the first time since 1980s. However, I don't usually associate baseball and "Royals," since I wasn't raised in the States. My partner in Things NUELOW, L.L. Hundal, knows even less about baseball than I do. Therefore, we decided that it was time to do a baseball-themed NUELOW Games product. We've already put our ignorance about politics, social justice, and good manners on display, so why not add sports to the list?

Here is a draft of the cover. The product will contain a ROLF! battle scenario, a OGL d20 Modern rules for making a baseball player PC, and an illustrated guide to help those who, like us, don't know a damn thing about baseball. Art will be by Samm Schwartz. We hope to finish and release the booklet in the next couple of days.

Meanwhile, if you feel like checking out some of our other offerings, you can click here to see previews of them all.

Do you need some horror art for Halloween?

Look no further than NUELOW Games' royalty-free art packs for your horror art needs! Each contains a variety of color and black-and-white line art that was adapted from Golden Age comic books. They are released under a flexible license that gives you pretty much permission to use these illustrations in whatever manner you want -- be it to spruce up your website with spooktacular art, or to illustrate that chilling ebook you're releasing.

Stock Art Collection: Cruise of the Dead

Most of the illustrations are provided at a resolutions only fit for digital use. However, they are generally provided in large enough size that if you are a wizard with Photoshop, you may be able to squeeze 300dpi out of them. Each collection features dozens of illustrations (except for "The Mystic" and "Cruise of the Dead" which is are special sets presenting high resolution art by Alex Schomburg and Tony Mortarello respectively). Click here to see the entire selection of NUELOW Games art packs, or click on the individual titles below for details on each set.

Stock Art Collection #2: Dames, Danger & Death

Stock Art Collection #3: Beauties and the Beasts

Stock Art Collection #5: Visions of Beauty and Nightmares

Stock Art Collection: The Mystic

The Spear and Magic Helmet!

Just for fun, here are a couple magic items for use with OGL d20 games (and a host of other RPGs). This text is presented under the Open Game License. Copyright Steve Miller 2014.

The Spear 

This enchanted weapon gives its wielder a+1 bonus to attack and damage.

   Special: The character gains +1 to all Perform (singing) checks when weapon is wielded.

Magic Helmet
This enchanted helmet gives its wearer +2 bonus to all saving throws
   Special: The character gains +2 to all Perform (singing) checks when the Magic Helmet is worn.

The Spear and Magic Helmet
If the character uses both the Spear and Magic Helmet at the same time, he or she has an additional +2 bonus to all Charisma-related skill checks for a total of +5 on Perform (singing) checks.
  Also, once per day, the character can summon ominous storm clouds and cause a lightning bolt to strike and reduce a single non-living small or medium-sized object to ash. The lightning bolt cannot harm living creatures or magically animated constructs.

'The Three Lives of Fantomah: Book One'

NUELOW Games launches a new series with The Three Lives of Fantomah. This three volume series will present the best from the 49-episode run (in Jungle Comics #2 - #51) of a character that started out as the first female superhero in comics, transformed into a standard "jungle girl," and ultimately became the ruler of a "lost civilization."

The cover for The Three Lives of Fantomah: Book One

The book features four stories by the character's creator Fletcher Hanks (known for ultra-powered heroes who kill evil-doers in creative ways) and the first by "W.B. Hovious," a pen-name that various writers and artists produced the series under after Hanks' departure. In addition, it contains some d20 System/OGL Modern rules that are designed to capture Fantomah's unusual nature and development as the series unfolded. If you liked the quirkiness of the Modern Advances and Modern Basics series of products, you want to check this one out, as it makes unusual use (perhaps even abuse) of the d20 System's magic, level, and XP systems.

Click here to see previews or to download your own copy of the book. You can see further previews of the series at the Shades of Gray blog by clicking here.