Tag Archives: Schlock Mercenary

Announcements

On Boundaries…

The current storyline has some people wondering if I’m “taking a page from Mass Effect,” or perhaps [insert popular SF here.]

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For the record, I’ve played about 60 minutes of Mass Effect, and didn’t love it. I moved on to other games.

I am, however, familiar with Fermi’s Paradox, and have extensively explored the solution sets, none of which are particularly optimistic. Those sets look quite a bit different if they are constrained by the canon of the Schlockiverse, but not so different as to be internally inconsistent.

What this means is that yes, among a hundred thousand readers, somebody will definitely be able to correctly guess key plot points. Science has been grinding on this stuff for decades.

But I’m not borrowing from anybody else’s fiction for this. I’m going whole cloth from the science. What THIS means is that despite the likelihood that 100,000 Schlock Mercenary readers can generate a speculation set that contains actual plot, I’m still going to surprise you.

But only if I shut up now.

So, you know, speculate among one another, but not here (comments are closed,) and for the love of hull integrity, please show some respect for a different boundary, and do NOT ask ME about this stuff.

Announcements

From the Department of Finally He Gets Around To It

Last year I commissioned a bonus story for Force Multiplication. The story was written by Sandra Tayler, and illustrated by Natalie Barahona, and it was supposed to be lettered by me.

Well, now it’s finally getting lettered by me.

FM-Bonus-P1-LetteredSAMPLE

This is a story from Bristlecone’s past. You’re looking at about 1/3rd of the 2nd of ten pages, so one thirtieth of the whole thing.

The story will appear in the print version of Schlock Mercenary Book 12: Force Multiplication, which will go into print as soon as somebody finishes lettering this stuff, and then makes a cover, and then does a bunch of other little things. So… gimme a bit, yeah?

Announcements

A Week of Feeling Famous

On Monday my friend Rodney posted “Hiding from the Mariachi” to the web. I linked to it, but neglected to mention that it was the first of a five-part series of blog posts that were kind of sort of all about me (except for the one which was all about Sandra, and which says a thing which indisputably the most important thing said during the entire series.)

Here are the links to the full set:

Take care with the Photo Essay: It has spoilers. The new maxims aren’t spoilers, so you can dive right into that post, no worries. It probably can’t compete with The Force Awakens for folks’ attention, but at least you can tell your friends about the maxims without making anybody angry.

I like this series of interviews and essays because yeah, they’re about me, and my ego doesn’t really get tired of that, but also because Rodney’s essays are always insightful, and having that insight aimed my direction is cool. I encourage you to read the stuff he’s written that is NOT about me, because frankly, that’s where he really shines.RodneyMBliss.com has all of it.

Announcements

Taking Calendars off the Calendar

To quote Professor Farnsworth: “Good news, everyone! Bad news!”

We will not be producing a Schlock Mercenary Monthly Calendar for 2016. The 2015 calendar sold well enough with other merchandise to not be an outright loss, but the books and slipcases were what carried last year for us.

This year we’re looking at the Planet Mercenary production schedule, and we simply cannot justify taking time out to make a calendar when the project for which we’ve accepted money in advance is not yet complete.

We’re also delaying our print run of Schlock Mercenary: Force Multiplication until after we’ve got Planet Mercenary queued up for print. This hurts a bit more, because not having a new book out in time for Christmas shoppers is the very definition of “leaving money on the table,” but again, having accepted money in advance for a thing that is not yet finished, I cannot in good conscience spend time on other projects—not even profitable ones.

There’s an update over on the Planet Mercenary Kickstarter page if you’d like more details on how that project is going. The salient point? It’s keeping me busy enough that the only other business activity I can justify is the daily updates on the comic. The movie reviews? Okay, I can’t really justify those, except to say that going out to see a show helps refill the well on the other stuff, and I might as well tell you how the show went.

This morning was spent on Mayhem cards for Planet Mercenary. This afternoon I have a week of comics to pencil and ink. This blog post is happening in the cracks, and the crack is swiftly closing…