Loviatar No. 2 Progress Report: A Finished Cover

I went with a pale gray for the cover. I had no real reason other than it was next in line in the packet of cardstock I bought. A few pennies can be saved by buying your own cardstock, then taking that to Office Max or Staples. The young lady at the Staples where I used to go would often ask me questions about my zines. She had no idea people still played games like D&D. On one occasion she said that she read one of the zines while it was slow. I didn't have the guts to ask her what she thought of it. What if she hated it?

     For the back cover I went with one of my favorite faux D&D ads of all time. Your Dad Was A Level 22 Necromancer. Classic!

     The map I was working on yesterday is all scanned and laid out. I just need to key the entries and Number Three Pigeon Street is good to go. I really enjoyed writing it. The place just came alive in my head. While the material takes place in Baldur's Gate and uses Pathfinder mechanics, it's exactly how I'd run the Freecity of Haldane, as far as NPC personalities and tone are concerned.

     There are six blank pages still staring at me. I have two weeks to fill them and I may need all of that time. Part of me wants to launch a World of Darkness series that goes through the fictional city of Santa Fina, where I ran a chronicle for about a year. I'd present the city from the perspective of the Kindred, which is how I originally viewed the city before it became dominated by the Changelings.

    Then I get conflicted and start looking at my bookshelf. I see GURPS, Twilight 2000, Star Frontiers and my mind starts swimming. It's hard because when writing a  zine, you really have to care about what you're writing. Since you are paying for the printing  it up front , you don't want to spend money on garbage, then ask people to reimburse you via subscriptions and trades for said garbage. It's just time, money and goodwill that's being wasted.

    It's also easy to get caught up with the idea of what might people like to read. That's a bad road to go down. If you start writing a zine based upon what you hope people will like, you aren't being true to yourself and again, you may find yourself writing garbage. Instead of trying to express yourself, you're trying to sell issues. Yuck.

    I love zines. They force you to mean what you say and to say what you mean.