In other words, it’s time that we had an art contest. Wow us with your own sense of wonder given visual form.

How does this work? First, think of something that is tied to magic that you simply must illustrate and then illustrate it. We’re making the overall focus of this contest very broad so that you have room to play. You can choose whether you use pencils, inks, watercolors, pixels — as long as you can scan the image in (or convert it in the case of digital format) and send it to us in a jpg file, we are happy. Your submission will be evaluated by a panel of industry professionals and by the fans. As with other contests we’ve done here on the Kobold Press site, fame and prizes play a part in this again. (More on that in a bit!)

So, what do you need to do? First, read all the stuff beyond the jump, then start letting those artistic talents of yours take over.

Contest Entry

Here’s how it works: To enter the contest, your art submission MUST…

• ADDED May 15 2013: Have been created in the previous calendar year.
• Be sent to the Kobold Artistry II Contest at miranda(at)koboldquarterly(dot)com no later than June 2, 2013, by noon PST.
• Be submitted as a jpg attachment.
• Read Kobold Artistry II Submission [insert illustration's name] in the email’s subject line. Your full name and contact information should be in the body of the email (not in your attachment).
• Be at least 300 pixels wide, but no more than 1MB in size. (If you win, we’ll ask for a print-quality version of the file, so hold on to that original artwork!)

Judging

All submissions that meet the criteria will be entered in the contest and be judged by us, the Kobolds, and our guest judges on originality, artistry, and uniqueness. The 5 best pieces of art will be published here on koboldpress.com and be voted on by the public. Of those 5 art pieces, the one with the winning votes will become the 2013 Kobold Artistry winner.

So who’s judging? We have a trio of extremely talented and wise judges: Wolfgang Baur, artist Terry Maranda, and art director Marc Radle. Take a look at their bios below.

Wolfgang Baur is the founder of Kobold Press, its publisher, and general go-to kobold. He enjoys the Gothic style in architecture, the Venetian style of rampant mercantilism, and the Dutch style in gardens and hydroengineering. For adventures, he’s an omnivore. Wolfgang is the author of the Midgard Campaign Setting, the Dark*Matter setting, the Kobold Guides to Game Design, and a smattering of other RPG titles dating from the days when TSR walked the earth. Wolfgang lives in an impenetrable set of warrens near Kirkland, Washington.

Marc Radle is a professional graphic artist and designer by trade. He also does lots of freelance illustration, graphic design, writing, and game design for various RPG companies. Marc’s very first professional RPG game credit (for illustrations, logo design, and graphic design) came in 1994′s Aria: Canticle of the Monomyth from Last Unicorn Games. He is currently the Art Director and primary graphic designer for Kobold Press.

Last year’s winner of the Kobold Artistry contest, Terry Maranda can be found in the mostly frozen wastes of Montreal, painting furiously with his nose to the screen, a digital pen in one hand and warm coffee in the other. During the day, he works as a lead artist in the video game industry, but at night he delves in to the darker side of his craft, designing battle-ready swords for Darksword Armory as well as illustrating tabletop RPGs, creating adventuring characters, viscous beasts, arcane items, and maps of distant lands for White Wolf (Exalted Series), Storm Bunny Studios (Rhune World), and BlackStar Studios (Shadowland). He also now creates denizens for the massive world of Kobold Press’s Midgard. Our Kobold Artistry II contest image (above) is Krik, Terry’s winning entry from last year’s Kobold Artistry contest. You can learn more about him at his website.

Prizes for the 2013 Kobold Artistry Winner

The winning artist will receive a cover commission from Kobold Press, plus be interviewed for the Kobold Press website (more on that later). All five finalists will receive a gift certificate to the Kobold Store.

Additional Rules

1. The contest is open to all.
2. One entry per person. The entry must be your own work, which has not been published previously, is not being considered for publication by any other publisher, and is original and does not infringe upon any copyrighted material.
3. All entries become property of Open Design LLC. ADDED May 16, 2013: Artist grants Open Design LLC the right to publish the submitted art on the Kobold website as part of this contest. Winner grants Open Design LLC the right to publish the winning image in the Kobold Press newsletter and in similar promotional and publicity uses.
4. By entering this contest, you authorize the use of your name and likeness without additional compensation for promotion and advertising purposes in all media.
5. This contest is subject to federal, state, and local laws where applicable.
6. Open Design reserves the right to withdraw or terminate this contest at any time without prior notice.
7. All decisions of Open Design LLC and the judges are final.

Last year’s contest was amazing in terms of the talented artists who submitted their artwork, and we are looking forward to seeing the creativity that comes from our vastly talented Kobold Press audience this year.

A quick note before we announce the winning spell, though. The contest polls showed a very CLOSE race among the spells, which was exciting and fun. Clearly, we had some excellent finalists — and that made it hard for the voting public to pick a clear winner.

Now, on to the actual announcement. The winning spell in the Lost Magic contest is portal jaunt by Jeff Lee.

Congratulations, Jeff, and thank you for entering portal jaunt in this fun contest! Jeff will receive a copy of the Complete Kobold Guide to Game Design and a $20 gift certificate to the Kobold Store, and the winning spell will be printed in an upcoming Kobold Press release.

So that you can easily read this spell, we’re reposting it beyond the jump!

Also (and again), many thanks go to those who entered the contest, to the judges who chose the finalists, and to those who voted on the finalists and made this such an interestingly close race! We enjoyed the entire process — especially the interactions among those following this contest.

Portal Jaunt

By Jeff Lee

School conjuration (teleportation); Level sorcerer/wizard 3

Casting Time 1 standard action

Components V/S/F (A small brass key)

Range medium (100 ft. + 10 ft./level)

Effect one door becomes a portal to another within range

Duration 1 round

Saving Throw none; Spell Resistance no

By touching a door or gate with your focus, you turn it into a one-way portal to another such door within the spell’s range. This spell works with any crafted door, doorway, archway, or other artificial opening. It will not work with natural or accidental openings such as cave entrances or cracks in walls. You must be aware of your destination’s location or have line of sight to it. Upon completion of the spell, the door touched opens, revealing a shimmering image of the location beyond the door designated as the destination. You may then step through the door, emerging instantly out of the destination door. Alternately, you may allow one other willing creature to pass through the portal instead. Anything you carry moves through the door with you, including other creatures, willing or unwilling. For purposes of the spell, any locks, bars, or magical effects such as arcane lock are rendered ineffectual for the spell’s duration. You may only travel to a side of the door you can see or have physically been to in the past (divination effects such as clairvoyance count as seeing). Once you or a willing creature passes through, both doors then shut, ending the spell. If you or another creature do not move through the portal within 1 round, the spell ends.

Before we jump into the entries, we here at Kobold Press thank each and every person who made a submission to this contest! Without your creativity and your willingness to formulate rules to reflect what you imagine, contests like these would not be nearly as much fun to have as they are! Many thanks also go to the judges, and we also thank you, in advance, for voting.

There’s now a forum thread open for discussion. And just beyond the jump are the five finalists, presented in alphabetical order by spell name.

Devouring Shadow

By Sam Harris

School transmutation Level sorcerer/wizard 4, witch 4

—Casting—

Casting Time 1 standard action

Components V, S

—Effect—

Range close (25 ft. + 5 ft./2 levels)

Target one corporeal, living creature

Duration 1 minute/level (D)

Saving Throw: Fortitude negates; Will partial (see below) Spell Resistance: yes

Upon the casting of this spell, the target creature’s shadow sweeps over and envelops the target. The target’s physical body and all worn and carried equipment are fully consumed by its shadow, which retains the size and general shape of the physical body, but in two dimensions.

While in shadow form, the target loses all extraordinary, supernatural, and spell-like abilities, and may not speak, attack, or cast spells. The target gains DR 10/magic and becomes immune to poison, sneak attacks, and critical hits. The target’s material armor (including natural armor) becomes worthless, though its size, Dexterity, deflection bonuses, and armor bonuses from force effects still apply.

The transformation is traumatic, and the target may move only 5 feet per round, as a full round action. A successful Will save allows the target to move and act normally for the remainder of the effect. The target may attempt this Will save each round until successful. The target’s movement rate is otherwise unchanged, but it cannot burrow, climb, fly, jump, or swim (though it can move across the surface of a body of water). The shadow is functionally two-dimensional and can slip through the tiniest cracks, but it cannot manipulate objects or activate items. The target receives a +10 bonus to Stealth checks.

When the spell effect ends, the target reemerges from its shadow, along with all its equipment. Upon emerging, the target is fatigued. This spell may not be cast in an area of total darkness or on a creature not in contact with its shadow (e.g., a bird in flight).

Dire Servitude

By Ryan Rice

5th Level Wizard Spell (13th Age)

Ranged spell

Daily

Special: When casting this spell, make one attack roll that targets both MD and PD.

Target: One nearby enemy with 160 hp or fewer.

Attack: Intelligence + Level vs. MD and PD.

Hit (MD): The target is confused (hard save ends, 16+).

Miss (MD): The target is dazed (save ends).

Hit (PD): The target is transformed into a large, horrific demon (hard save ends, 16+).  All of its possessions are subsumed into the new form.  As a demon, the only attack the target can make is the following at-will double claw attack (in all cases, stats for “the demon” refer to the target of this spell in its original, untransformed state).

Special: The demon makes two attack rolls against the same or different targets.

Attack: The demon’s basic attack roll vs. AC.

Hit: 1d10 × (the demon’s level) damage.

Miss: Damage equal to twice the demon’s level.

Miss (PD): Damage equal to your level.

Note that the attack roll for this spell can hit both defenses or neither, or it can hit one defense but not the other, resulting in either a confused enemy in its original form or a monstrous demon in full control of its own actions.  Furthermore, the saving throws for the two effects are separate, which can lead to similar situations as the spell wears off.

7th level spell:  Target with 250 hp or fewer.

9th level spell: Target with 400 hp or fewer.

Faerie Ring

By Stephen Rowe

Faerie Ring
School transmutation; Level druid 5, witch 6
Casting Time 10 minutes
Components V, S, F (a natural dirt, wood, or stone altar)
Range Touch
Area 40-ft. radius emanating from the touched point
Duration 2 hours/level
Saving Throw see text; Spell Resistance no

This spell saturates an area with the primordial power of nature and the fey, which causes arcane magic and the passage of time to become erratic. Whenever any arcane caster casts a spell within (or into) the bounds of faerie ring, roll on the following table to determine how the caster and the spell are affected. Arcane casters possessing the fey creature type, humanoid (elf) race, or the fey sorcerer bloodline may roll twice and take the more favorable result.

It is dangerous for mortals to dwell within the faerie ring for long periods of time. For every full hour that passes within its bounds, living creatures that do not possess the animal or plant type are aged 1 year (Fortitude negates). This aging includes all physical signs that time has passed, such as hair and nail growth. If the creature reaches its maximum age, it dies. Death from this effect is treated as death from old age for the purposes of raise dead, or similar effects. The aging caused by faerie ring has no effect on any spell durations or conditions affecting the target.

Faerie ring can be made permanent with a permanency spell (minimum caster level 13, cost 12,500 gp).

Necromancer’s Ripost

By Ben McFarland

School necromancy; Level Destruction 8, Undead 8, Sor/Wiz 8

Casting Time 1 standard action

Components V, S, M (jade and onyx dust worth 500gp.)

Range Close (25 feet + 5ft./level)

Area of Effect  20 ft. radius + 5 ft./2 levels

Duration Instantaneous

Saving Throw Fort, Special (see below); Spell Resistance no

You cause a number of corporeal undead to explode in a burst of vile, acidic pus, killing them instantly. The spell affects 1d4 HD worth of undead creatures per caster level (maximum 20d4). Creatures with the fewest HD are affected first; among creatures with equal HD, those closest to the burst’s point of origin are affected first. Undead you command with the Command Undead feat receive no save. Other undead receive a Fortitude save, or suffer 2d6 damage. Those destroyed by damage still explode.

Anyone adjacent to an undead creature destroyed by this spell suffers 4d6 acid and force damage (Reflex save for half) from the “splash.” Those damaged by this splash effect must make a Fortitude save or suffer the effects of a strength-sapping poison. (Fort DC as spell; 1/round for 6 rounds; Initial: 1 Str Drain, Secondary: 1d2 Str dmg; Cure: 1 save)  Those immune to poison from other sources ignore this effect. Those adjacent to multiple exploding foes suffer splash damage from each exploding creature. Undead destroyed by this splash effect do not explode.

Undead casters may use this spell without risk to themselves; the primary and splash effects do not affect the caster. This spell may be cast through a scrying effect.

Portal Jaunt

By Jeff Lee

School conjuration (teleportation); Level sorcerer/wizard 3

Casting Time 1 standard action

Components V/S/F (A small brass key)

Range medium (100 ft. + 10 ft./level)

Effect one door becomes a portal to another within range

Duration 1 round

Saving Throw none; Spell Resistance no

By touching a door or gate with your focus, you turn it into a one-way portal to another such door within the spell’s range. This spell works with any crafted door, doorway, archway, or other artificial opening. It will not work with natural or accidental openings such as cave entrances or cracks in walls. You must be aware of your destination’s location or have line of sight to it. Upon completion of the spell, the door touched opens, revealing a shimmering image of the location beyond the door designated as the destination. You may then step through the door, emerging instantly out of the destination door. Alternately, you may allow one other willing creature to pass through the portal instead. Anything you carry moves through the door with you, including other creatures, willing or unwilling. For purposes of the spell, any locks, bars, or magical effects such as arcane lock are rendered ineffectual for the spell’s duration. You may only travel to a side of the door you can see or have physically been to in the past (divination effects such as clairvoyance count as seeing). Once you or a willing creature passes through, both doors then shut, ending the spell. If you or another creature do not move through the portal within 1 round, the spell ends.

Vote Here

If you are, it’s time to show us what you’ve got! The contest has already gained entries—but does it have yours yet? If not, please do take a look at the Lost Magic Contest rules and send us your entry before the deadline expires on March 29, 2013, at noon PST.

Let’s see if you can help us add a greater sense of wonder to campaigns by providing us with your best shot at spell design. We’re accepting entries that use the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game or 13th Age system. A panel of industry professionals will pick five finalists from these submissions, and the voting public will choose the winner from among those five. That person will receive a prize designated beyond the jump.

Cast a dark spell. A dangerous spell. A miraculous spell. A spell that feeds the flame of great storytelling and instills awe to those who witness it—and brings a greater sense of fun to the gaming table. We want to see if you have what it takes to bring us the best lost magic out there so that we can share it with the gaming world.

Long have the hallowed halls of the clergy and the research libraries of arcane lore seen spells both divine and arcane in design shimmer with power and might. But are all the spells known?

We think not.

In fact, we believe many more await discovery, and that’s where you come in. Yes, you.

Lost Magic is a contest brought to you by Kobold Press, and it promises to enrich campaigns with more magic—magic designed by some of those who choose to enter. If you wish to show the world your mighty arcane or divine spellcrafting abilities by using the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game or 13th Age system, write and submit a spell that has no more than 500 words.

A panel of industry professionals will pick five finalists from these submissions, and the voting public will choose the winner from among those five. That person will receive a prize designated beyond the jump.

Who can enter?

This contest is an open call contest! The two rules systems we will take pitches for are 13th Age and Pathfinder RPG. You can flavor your spell to suit the Midgard Campaign Setting if you wish, but it’s not required.

Now, you have the basics, right? What do you need to do next? First, read all the stuff below, then start writing your spell!

Here’s how it works:

To enter the contest, your submission MUST…

• Be 500 words or less. All longer submissions are automatically disqualified.
• Be sent to the Lost Magic Contest at miranda(at)koboldquarterly(dot)com no later than March 29, 2013, by noon PST.
• Be submitted as a doc, docx, or rtf attachment.
• Have Lost Magic Submission [insert spell name] in the email’s subject line.
• Include your full name and contact information in the body of the email (not in your attachment!).
• Is a spell—no incantations or runes or other spell-like game mechanic.
• Be designed for Pathfinder Roleplaying Game or the 13th Age system.
• NOT include any references to Golarion, Thedas, or other settings not published by Kobold Press. Any such entries will be immediately disqualified. You may refer to elements from the Midgard Campaign Setting.

So, are you ready to reveal lost magic to the waiting world?

Judging

All submissions that meet the criteria will be entered in the contest and be judged by us, the Kobolds, and our guest judges on originality, effective writing, and fun. The five best submissions will be published on koboldquarterly.com in April and will be voted on by the public. Of those five submissions, the one with the winning votes will earn bragging rights for having brought to the world a powerful, interesting, or useful piece of lost magic. The winner will be announced in April.

So who’s judging? As ever, we have a trio of extremely talented and terrific judges: Wolfgang Baur, Amanda Hamon, and Wade Rockett. Please take a moment to learn more about those who will judge whether your spells are puissant enough to make the cut!

Wolfgang Baur is the founder of Kobold Press, its publisher, and general go-to kobold. He enjoys the Gothic style in architecture, the Venetian style of rampant mercantilism, and the Dutch style in gardens and hydroengineering. For adventures, he’s an omnivore. Wolfgang is the author of the Midgard Campaign Setting, the Dark*Matter setting, the Kobold Guides to Game Design, and a smattering of other RPG titles dating from the days when TSR walked the earth. He has served as a judge for the RPG Superstar contest run by Paizo Publishing (three times), but doesn’t seem to have learned his lesson yet! Wolfgang lives in an impenetrable set of warrens near Kirkland, Washington.

Amanda Hamon is a freelance game designer for Paizo Publishing and a freelance designer, developer, and editor for Kobold Press. Her work has appeared in several Adventure Path installments, the Pathfinder Society scenario Fortress of the Nail, Animal Archive, Midgard Legends, and New Paths 3: The Expanded Elven Archer, among other publications. Her upcoming work includes contributions to Dungeoneer’s Handbook, Fey Revisited, Dragons Unleashed, Quests & Campaigns, and several others. She spends her days as a writer/editor for a Big Ten university and her nights immersed in worlds that are both weird and wonderful. Amanda lives in Indiana with her husband and their many (nonmagical) pets.

Wade Rockett is a writer, editor, and public relations professional in the game and technology industries. If you’re reading this you have definitely seen his work: for more than four years he’s written and edited countless Kobold Press ads, flyers, blog posts, store copy, announcements, back cover copy, news releases, Courier articles, and more. His writing has also appeared under his byline in Kobold Quarterly, Tales of the Old Margreve, and Midgard Preview. Wade is an occasional freelance editor for Dungeons & Dragons and does promotional work for Pelgrane Press and Fire Opal Media’s new game 13th Age. He lives in Tacoma, WA, with his wife and 2.75 cats and is currently working on Secret of Warlock Mountain, a campaign setting for Robin D. Laws’ Hillfolk DramaSystem game.

Prizes for the Lost Magic contest

The winning spell designer will receive a copy of the Complete Kobold Guide to Game Design and a $20 gift certificate to the Kobold Store, and the winning spell will be printed in an upcoming Kobold Press release. All five finalists will receive a copy of the Player’s Guide to the Wasted West (loaded with magic and the lost notes of mages who dared too much!).

Additional Rules

1. The contest is open to all.

2. One entry per person. The entry must be your own work, which has not been published previously, is not being considered for publication by any other publisher, and is original and does not infringe upon any copyrighted material.

3. All entries become property of Open Design LLC.

4. By entering this contest, you authorize the use of your name and likeness without additional compensation for promotion and advertising purposes in all media.

5. This contest is subject to federal, state, and local laws where applicable.

6. Open Design reserves the right to withdraw or terminate this contest at any time without prior notice.

7. All decisions of Open Design LLC and the contest judges are final.

So, now you have all the relevant information to enter this contest. What lost magic will you bring into this world of ours?

I was flat-out impressed at how many people got 20 right, and floored that a few got 21 correct, but only one team got 22 castles right out of 23 possible. Complete answers, castle locations, and winners are after the jump!

Our winners are Georg and Helga, who got all but one castle! Congrats to you, and your prizes will be on the way soon.

Castle List

1. Castle Grayskull (fictional)
2. Himeji Castle (Japan)
3. Neuschwanstein (Germany)
4. Malbork Castle (Poland)
5. Castle Kronborg (Denmark)
6. Hearst Castle (United States)
7. Swallow’s Nest, near Yalta (Ukraine)
8. Bran Castle (Romania)
9. Framlingham Castle (England)
10. Mafra National Palace (Portugal)
11. Mauterndorf (Austria)
12. Pena National Palace (Portugal)
13. Burghotel Ehrenburg (Germany)
14. Cite de Carcassonne (France)
15. Windsor Castle (England)
16. Trakai Island Castle (Lithuania)
17. Corfe Castle (England)
18. Castelo dos Mouros (Portual)
19. Agra Fort (India)
20. Belvelly Castle (Ireland)
21. Kyburg (Switzerland)
22. Warwick Castle (England)
23. Woodland Park Castle (United States)

Thank you to everyone who participated, I quite enjoyed this tour of military fortifications and royal residences. I hope you enjoyed it, too, and I hope to do another one down the line.

If you like that idea, please email me your own favorite castle pictures (that have not appeared online!), and we’ll go Castlespotting again!

I’ve enjoyed the Castle of the Week contest on the Midgard Facebook Page so much that I’ve decided to take it to the big time here on the Kobold blog.

Your challenge: Identify the most castle pictures from the set of 23 images below between now and Sunday, March 3, with a winner to be declared on Monday the 4th, GM’s Day. A few will be laughably easy. Others will be mind-crushingly hard.

To the winner goes ETERNAL GLORY, as well as THESE PRIZES (all in PDF):

• Zobeck Gazetteer
• Dark Roads & Golden Hells planar sourcebook
• New Paths: Expanded Spell-Less Ranger
• New Paths 2: Expanded Shaman
• New Paths 3: Expanded Elven Archer
• Courts of the Shadow Fey (Pathfinder or 4E version)
• The Monsters of Sin Monster Bundle

The losers will be EXILED TO ANTARCTICA, so I can wrap up THAT CONTEST TOO.

(Not really. But the Antarctica Challenge IS STILL UNMET.)

Here are the castles. Email your guesses to koboldpress@gmail.com with the Subject line “Castle Contest.” Tally-ho!

The 8 Simple Castles

You can probably recognize a few by sight; these are famous castles, historical castles, fictional castles of note, or those with a distinctive character. I believe they are entirely solvable by the diligent scholar of military architecture.

Castle #1

Castle #2

Castle #3

Castle #4

Castle #5

Castle #6

Castle #7

Castle #8

12 Harder Castles

This is a set of images that might be a little harder to crack. Some are famous castles, some fairly obscure. The images are all there for inspection, and some contain clues for the sharp-eyed, but don’t be surprised if some of these prove quite elusive.

Castle #9

Castle #10

Castle #11

Castle #12

Castle #13

Castle #14

Castle #15

Castle #16

Castle #17

Castle #18

Castle #19

Castle #20

The 3 Impossible Castles

These… Well, we can say that they are certainly castles. And they are very hard to identify indeed. One’s a model of a castle (and we’d like the name of the castle that it models). One’s just a very small piece of a much larger castle. And one is — how shall we say this — largely invisible, as befits a fairy castle of its nature. We expect no one to figure these out, but there they are. Tiebreakers, possibly. Or sheer villainous villainy.

Have at it, and if anyone names two of these three, a Special Prize shall be awarded!

Castle #21

Castle #22

Castle #23

The contest ends Sunday, March 3. Good luck!

Congratulations, Maurice, on your success in Round 1. Onward to Round 2!