A winner is me! :D
I'll be doing a rewrite this weekend to better organize the material and clarify some rules - and I'll continue working on it as playtesting identifies and irons out the bugs.
This was a game I felt good about even before I learned the results. And the Ronnie is going to be a real shot in the arm in terms of available resources and prestige. So I'll state it out loud and commit myself: I want to refine Deathbird Black and take it all the way to publication.