Journeys Through Magnamund

You come to the top of the rise and settle your back against a bare pine. The lands you came from are shrouded in mist yet a map exists in your heart of the journey you have taken so far, the twenty or so milestones you have passed to make it here, not to mention the many side quests. As you reflect, new thoughts come to you, dark secrets of the Pentad. The mists grow cold. You shiver, and summon the voices of friends to warm your nerves. It will be time to move on again, soon, so you take what respite you can to celebrate your achievement.

It took 20 adventures and just as many dead Darklords to finally make Naar curse. August and Jonathan do not deliberate on what the swear word was, instead choosing to use this episode to delve into greater mysteries of the universe. For the first time, we go into details about the Planes of Light, unveil how Naar got a hold of the Moonstone, and reveal what Naar's equivalent to the Sommerswerd is. This episode is a straight hour of lore, a start-to-finish gauntlet of answers to some of Magnamund's best kept secrets.

Cast your mind back to a time when gamebooks and Lone Wolf were selling in the millions of copies. In this time, Hugo award winner John Grant/Paul Barnett was given the task of turning the Lone Wolf franchise into a novelized series. What emerged from this was an entirely new take on the Lone Wolf experience, both diversive and innovative. Today, August, Jonathan, and Shane dive into the first book of the series, exploring its themes, the poly-cosmos, and why we are excited to see it coming back into print.

The penultimate book in the series, Light of the Kai, is due out this spring. And so the podcast welcomes for the first time Ben Devere and Vincent Lazarri, co-authors of books 29-32, to discuss this finale, the writing of it, and what fans can expect. Consider this a preview of Book 32! For those who want to limit spoilers, we broke the conversation down into three sections, each with an increasing number of spoilers ("mechanical", "broad story", and finally "some specific story" elements). We offer easy places to jump off the spoiler-train whenever you like and craft your own adventure fear-free in this episode of Journeys Through Magnamund.

August and Jonathan's final words about Rockstarn contain spoilers for characters and events that occur in the latter half of the video game, while providing answers that a sequel never got to. But these are not just our last words -- Joe Dever's voice ends this game, and while it isn't the final tale that he got to tell in Magnamund, this was his final narration.