A fantasy adventure about food, community, and spaghetti wizards for 5th edition.
Latest Updates from Our Project:
ACT IV FINISHED
11 months ago
– Sun, Jun 04, 2023 at 12:47:32 PM
Hey folks!
I have been waiting so long to write THIS update.
I wish it was a heck of a lot earlier, but you know what they say about the best laid plans of mice and kobolds.
After working on this story for two years, and struggling with the worst chronic illness a writer trying to fulfill a Kickstarter could get, Act IV and the FINALE of Fat Magic are in the bag.
I finished writing the main adventure on May 5th, just a few days after the previous update, but I decided to save all the juicy deets for this update.
Since then, I have been reviewing and fine-tuning each act, a process that I finished about…10 minutes ago? Meanwhile, my incredible editors have been hot on my tail, editing all of Act II and III in a single month.
Act IV will be edited this week, after which we will be all be working together to assemble the disparate elements of the book - subclasses, magic items, monsters, and art - so we can pass everything off to our design goblin, Amber.
The team has been singularly focused on getting the adventure completed, so there’s not much in the way of additional updates this month. I took a trip to Texas where I spent my whole time eating and working on Fat Magic the book. That’s about it.
I’ll have a bunch of new art next month and some serious book updates. Stay tuned, spice goblins.
Cheers,
Shane
LOCKING ORDERS
12 months ago
– Sun, May 07, 2023 at 12:21:13 PM
Hey donut goblins,
Before we get to the usual stuff, I’ve got a BIG REMINDER for y’all. Backerkit orders will be locked on May 8 and we will charge cards on May 9. If you need to change your order or update your card, now's the last chance.
Progress update
I am BLASTING through the final act of Fat Magic. The page count for ACT IV currently sits around 43 pages and I’m expecting the entire thing to be about 70-75 pages. At this clip, the Final Act will be done and dusted before the next update.
Once that’s taken care of, we can move on to editing and layout. To help speed up this process, we’ve brought on an additional editor. El Haney made games for Hunt a Killer for four years before leaving to make their own stuff. They were also one of the original playtesters of fat magic, so they know this game inside out.
Art Update
This month, I’ve got some new art from Carlos (@CSPstuff) featuring one of the Leftonburner Boiler Plates and his partner, the gourdsman Jack. The Boiler Plates are the force guarding the enormous city of Lefton Burner, who recently received a gift of 50 autonomous pumpkin guards from the Critical Alliance.
They’re best friends.
That’s it for this month, folks! Gunna keep these short and sweet and focus on writing until we hand off to design.
Cheers,
SC
Order Locks and Refreshed Art
about 1 year ago
– Sun, Apr 02, 2023 at 12:09:18 PM
Hey folks,
We got a bunch of hot and tasty updates this month, including writing updates, new art, and important information about locking your backer kit orders.
Lock It Down
With writing production approaching completion, we plan to lock Backerkit orders on May 8 and charge cards on May 9. This is a reminder to log in to your Backerkit to double-check your info and ensure it's all up to date. Next month’s update will hit your inboxes with a last-minute reminder a few days before the lockdown date.
ACT IV Progress
Despite an ass-knocking encounter with COVID, writing has continued to pick up the pace, and ACT IV is growing larger and more ridiculous every day. Lefton Burner is an enormous city with countless places for your players to hang their hats, but here’s a small selection of possible headquarters to whet your appetite.
The Wolf Den.A three-story tavern in the Mariner’s lunch decorated top to bottom with wolf paraphernalia, sigils, murals, paintings, and a big yellow moon hanging over the front door. Rumor has it the bar owner was offering room and board in exchange for work, though Fingerfood heard that the positions were filled a few weeks ago.
Gertrude Muttonpaw is a former gruyere wolf once bound to the baron of Caketown. She came to Lefton Burner when the Baron disappeared and started The Wolf Den with money she made selling heirlooms pilfered from the Volauvent estate. A few weeks ago, The Old Friend turned up on her doorstep, and she provided them with a job and a place to rest over the tavern.
[Editor’s Note: The Old Friend is a hometown friend that will be custom created by your players at the table. They will appear at multiple points throughout the adventure.]
Muttonpaw believes that the end of the curse is merely the end of a gruyere wolf’s obligation to the Volauvents and that it’s possible to reconnect with the gruyere wolf inside through introspection and meditation. The Old Friend can provide a place to crash for a night or two, but if they want to stay any longer, they must pull their weight around The Wolf Den.
Resurrection.An underground goth club in the Sweetmeat with a secret entrance behind the hot dog carousel in the Huckleberry Sardines convenience store on Gumdrop Road and Filth Street. Rumor has it the club is run by “dead types.”
Resurrection is run by an organization of vampires, who have sworn off non-consensual blood drinking, known as The Society. The perks of joining The Society include ethically sourced bottled blood, a community with strong familial bonds, and not being turned into a pile of dust the second you enter the city.
The Mermaid's Better-Looking Sister.A high-concept seafood restaurant experience with magic light shows and tanks of sparkling water filled with clockwork fish. Rumor has it the owner is a reckless spender and will be out of business in a matter of weeks.
Trans triton Mia Saltfish runs the Mermaid’s Better-Looking Sister with the care and abandon of a person seemingly incapable of conceptualizing fear. Or Taxes. Mia built her tavern in the Salmon Ladder using a chest of gold she swiped from her ex-wife, the dread pirate fire genasi known as The Flaming Bones of Regret. Mia will exchange room and board for anyone willing to help her keep her tavern from going out of business.
The Slotted Spoon.A rundown tavern set in a rickety shack in the Marrows. Rumor has it the owner has come down with a strange condition that makes it difficult for him to open his business.
Grouchy halfling Durum Coldoven has been having trouble running his bar since his ex-wife Monica turned him into a loaf of bread. Several mice will attempt to make off with Durum when the party enters the tavern. Durum doesn’t like company but he has an empty room in the back of the tavern for anyone who helps him get his life back on track. His ex-wife would like an apology for neglecting their relationship for the bar.
Bottom of the Ninth.A sports bar in the Sweetmeat owned by a retired cheeseball player. Rumor has it the bar owes a serious amount of money to the Toffee Knockers street gang.
Sam Rennet was a promising young cheeseball batter who destroyed his career with alcohol and violence. Now ten years sober, Sam runs a bar splattered with cheeseball paraphernalia from his glory days. He borrowed money from the Toffee Knockers to start his bar but has been unable to keep up with payments. Now they are threatening to take his bar away and lock him in a whiskey barrel filled to the brim with caramel.
Act I Art Refresh
Those of you who read the Act I PDF have seen the gorgeous placeholder art drawn in pencil by our editor Hannah. We’ve since had that art redrawn by the amazing Kinley (@Kinley_R_Art) to bring it closer to the style in the rest of the book. Feast your peepers on this eye candy.
Frankie grows into a full weenie goblin, capable of wielding a sword and shield.
Nothing but vibes.
The baby is its hat.
Pasta-sheet record player. All killer, no filler.
Salt licorice crows and gummy worms.
That’s it for this month! I’ll be back at the beginning of May with more updates and to remind you about the order lock.
Fancy Maps, Broken Hearts, & the Big City
about 1 year ago
– Sun, Mar 05, 2023 at 10:18:56 AM
Hey there, snack goblins!
This update is going to be a quick one. With my focus on finishing the book, there’s not much in the way of updates except “writing is happening.” That said, I have some specific updates on the format and flavor of ACT IV, new maps drawn by one of my favorite D&D map artists, and I want to give a shout-out to my friends at Cloud Curio, who just launched their first Kickstarter.
Act IV: Boiling Point
The final act of Fat Magic will take your players to Lefton Burner, the capital of the Bouillabaise. An immense black cauldron surrounds the once-great city of Lefton Burner. The colossal pot-bellied walls rise like a black onion over the sprawling farmland, announcing the city as an indomitable force with a penchant for a bit of theater. Only on its sea fairing side does the pot-bellied barricade give way to the natural world, spilling out through an enormous crack in its belly onto the capsicum red waters of Ye Olde Bay.
Leftonburner is a city built on the backs of its workers, a monument of civilization carved with sweat and blood and vegetables shaped like tiny hammers. The city’s working-class district, The Marrows, was once the beating heart of Lefton Burner. They used to say, “if you could swing a carrot, you could make it in Lefton Burner.” Today, overcrowded tenements and dilapidated wrecks choke the winding streets of the city’s oldest burrow.
Of course, Lefton Burner is not without its wealth and opulence. You’ll find plenty of that in Salmon Ladder’s colleges, the Wintergreen’s banks and financial institutions, and the Sweetmeat’s markets. Even the Mariner’s Lunch has some cash to throw around since Amaretto Blacktea took over the Salt Guild.
Act IV is the least structured act in Fat Magic. Armed with the information they’ve learned in ACT II and III, your players will be dropped into a massive sandbox to explore and do what they please. They’ll need to find a place to hang their cloaks, rig an election, meet the spirit of the city, and (hopefully) save the world. Maybe they’ll go up against the Knights of Mint, rob a bank, or befriend a secret society of vampires. It’s entirely up to them.
Much of last month’s writing has been spent fleshing out that world, so it feels alive and full of things to do and places to go. Places like Smelly’s Deli, Cafe Austere, and the Devil’s trashcan.
Smelly’s Deli. Goblin proprietor Yurga Cornmush serves up a sandwich that tastes as good as it stinks. Smelly’s sandwiches are stacked high with cured meat, aged cheese, pungent pickles, and slatherings of Smelly’s secret sauce. Just one of these sandwiches improperly wrapped has evacuated an entire hospital ward with its potent yet appetizing aroma. Food critic Misha Gildenberry once compared eating a Smelly’s sandwich to getting smacked in the face by a sweaty sock stuffed with rotten meat, desire, and the entire works of ogre playwright Gurgle Mouthwash.
Cafe Austere. Austerity is the guiding philosophy of every decision at this subdued fine dining establishment. From the lean and simple menu to the rugged handmade furniture, Chef Antoinette Bonk has crafted a truly humbling experience just steps from Gimlet Street. The only component of Cafe Austere that strays from this philosophy is the price. A single bowl of peasants' soup and rye bread will put you back $65.
The Devil’s Trashcan. Probably the most famous high-concept eatery in the world. Chef Donkeysauce’s first restaurant is notorious for its outrageous, magic-infused stunt dishes. From the Singing Meat Mountain of Complicated Lies to the Shrinking Glazed Donut Waffle Taco, each dish screams for your attention. Note: The Screaming Exhibitionist Salad is no longer on the menu.
Once the city has been fully fleshed out and polished, I’ll be moving on to the major events of ACT IV, namely the election, the search for the ancient lipidator, Titan Arum, and the show-stopping finale.
Broken & Sleeping Hearts
This is my friends at Cloud Curio’s first-ever crowdfunding project! Broken Heart of the Castle and Sleeping Heart of the Garden are homebrew-ready, system-neutral adventures full of exciting story beats, intriguing NPCs, fascinating locations, and menacing threats.
The Kickstarter contains two stories, one of which I wrote a long time ago. This is an existing story I had in my back pocket and hasn’t interfered with the production of Fat Magic. In fact, in a roundabout way, it’s been a huge boon to the book. I’m forgoing payment on this project in return for some maps for Fat Magic drawn by the incredible Kyle Latino and inked by the fabulous Amber Seger.
You might know Kyle from his youtube channel, Map Crow, where he dispenses invaluable advice for drawing D&D maps and creating new and inspired versions of classic monsters. Amber (also running the Kickstarter and writing one of the stories) is a veteran TTRPG graphic designer and artist, and is doing the layout and design for Fat Magic!
You can see a WIP sample of their work together below:
Broken & Sleeping Hearts was funded in just 48 hours, but you have about seven days left if you still want to support them. For $30, you get a hard copy of both my story and Ambers.
That’s it for this month’s bag. I’ll be back in April with production updates and fresh art.
Cheers,
Shane
Pact of the Celebrity Chef 👨🍳RELEASE👨🍳
about 1 year ago
– Sun, Feb 05, 2023 at 04:23:49 PM
Hey there food goblins,
This is the big one. The release of the most anticipated subclass, the Pact of the Celebrity Chef Warlock. It’s bigger and better than I could have hoped, with stunning art by Carlos Sánchez Polo (@CSPstuff) and beefy mechanics by Lex Kim Bobrow (@titanomachyRPG). Before we dive into the main course, let’s whet our appetites with a cheeky little production update.
Production Update
OGL News
Pact of the Celebrity Chef Warlock
In the Footsteps of the Charcuterie Titan
Things have started looking up since my diagnosis, and production on the book is picking up steam again. Act III is officially done, dusted, and sent to my editor – it's going to be an absolute doozy. I’m going to divulge some of the spicy details of ACT III here, so if you’re hoping to go into this adventure with clear eyes and a full heart, skip straight past this section.
🍔FOR DM EYES ONLY🍔
Act III takes place in the red wasteland of the Sopressata desert, halfway between Caketown and the capital of Leftonburner. Players meet with the Van Folk, a nomadic community of food truckers who share a special bond with the magical machines that ferry them across the red dunes.
Art by Jess Kuczinski (@AngryArtist113)
The food truckers open their campfire to the players and offer them a ride to Leftonburner in exchange for helping them investigate the destruction of the Boba Tea Oasis. Their investigation may lead them to a strange town of Melonfolk, the Fondue Pits, and inside the belly of the Charcuterie Titan.
Art by Elijah Forbes (@paintedturtleco)
The Charcuterie Titan is a colossal food construct formed by Lev, a member of the dimension-hopping Franchise. Lev used his advanced understanding of all magic to split his consciousness across thousands of pieces of cured meat, aged cheese, and dried fruit, forming the Titan as a weapon of destruction. Within the Titan functions an entire society of charcuterie people, all of whom contain a fragment of Lev’s splintered mind. And if that wasn’t confusing enough, every single one of these creatures is named Lev.
The party can stop Lev by attacking his real body in the left eye of the titan. But if they sabotage the Titan’s five core body systems first, they can slow the progress of the beast and weaken Lev before the battle.
Art by Kinley Raftery (@Kinley_R_Art)
🍔FOR DM EYES ONLY ENDS HERE🍔
OGL News
If you’ve been keeping up with the OGL news, you’re probably sick of hearing about it. But if you missed it, here’s a recap: Wizards of the Coast planned on changing their third-party license, which would have sucked for us. After backlash from the community, they walked back their proposal and released the fifth edition SRD into the creative commons.
It was touch and go there for a while, but now we’re in the clear. Fat Magic will be released as planned, as 5e compatible. We are, however, discussing shifting future projects to an alternative system or adapting elements of FM to Pathfinder 2e. All this is up in the air right now, but no major decisions will be made until your book has shipped.
Pact of the Celebrity Chef Warlock
We’re finally releasing the celebrity chef warlock class, and it's a huge moment of relief for me. Since we announced the game, there’s been a lot of buzz around this subclass in particular, and more than any other, I think of it as representing the project as a whole.
Yes, it’s a silly food-themed magic subclass. Yes, it references real-world celebrity chefs. But there’s much more to it than cheap jabs. With this subclass, we tried to create a vessel for the earnest love of food and the allure of the celebrity chef. But we topped up that vessel with the complicated feelings we have for the commodification of rage, abusive work environments, and the complex relationship between food and capitalism.
Your mileage with this subclass’s themes may vary. Much like Fat Magic in general, those themes are there to engage with if you wish to. But if not, it can just as easily be a silly food-themed magic subclass. Lex Kim Bobrow (@titanomachyRPG) did an incredible job with the mechanics. There is a staggering amount of choice and variety baked into this class. And Carlos Sánchez Polo (@CSPstuff) absolutely killed the illustration of Three Aspects and their dirtbag orc chef.
That’s all for this update. There’s only one act left to write and then your books will be on the way. Once the big important stuff is done and dusted, I have at least one great one-shot idea set in the universe that I’d like to write. That will be a few months away yet, but I will say it’s inspired by a classic Muppet plotline.
