I’ve been quietly working away on an idea for Mausritter—a fantastic tabletop roleplaying game by Isaac Williams—for longer than I’d like to admit! And recently decided to take the plunge and submit it for consideration to Mausritter Month a group collab project led by Isaac, Games Omnivorous, and Exalted funeral. To my surprise, and delight it was accepted and you can go and see the teaser page here if you so wish. I hope to bring the realm of Rinn to life in November in zine form!

First draft

Rinn has a number of factions within its giant walls and one in particular will have a zealous band of brutish mice at its disposal (all will be revealed in due course!). I am working with an extremely talented artist—Ste Topley—who I have had the pleasure of knowing for a very long time now. I gave Ste an outline and he came back with an early sketch of some suitable brutes. We shared some notes on a rough dress code for this band of miscreants, as well as the weapons they would carry. You can see the intial sketch below.

An initial sketch of a band of brutish mice zealots.)

Final artwork

I have to admit I thoroughly enjoy seeing the emails from Ste land in when I know there is finished artwork in there. The quality of the artwork blows my mind every time I see it. You can see in the final artwork below some of the final notes that we decided upon. There will be a chequered motif throughout the garb of these mice, that ties in to the heraldry of their faction. The covering over the eye is deliberate and ties in directly to the core tenet of their faction also. And finally, they will carry blunt weapons (unlike in the sketch) as they are not a murderous force, but more of an iron fist to bend other mice to their will. I hope you enjoy this critter as much as I do, I think Ste has done a phenomenal job here.

And if you’re interested in learning more about Rinn, just pop over to the Backer kit page and follow the campaign!

An initial sketch of a band of brutish mice zealots.)