TBBYANR: Old School Plus

I enjoy Old-School gaming blogs for a couple of reasons. First is most of them like going over the roots of the hobby, talking about how things were not just out of the dreaded "N-Word" (Nostalgia) but more of an academic foray into games and the applications of those games.  Sure the the is a bad signal to noise ratio at times with many blogs covering the exact same ground in the exact same way (and this blog is no exception to that) I am still entertained.   Also the authors tend to be from the same gene-pool as me; metaphorically speaking.  Not that I always want to listen to a bunch of middle aged white guys, but their interests are the same as mine; so if it veers "off-topic" into family, jobs, kids what have you, I don't mind.  In fact most times I am nodding in agreement.

A couple of these Old-School+ blogs are the subject of todays The Best Blog You are Not Reading.

Billy Goes to Mordor
http://billygoes.blogspot.com/

Billy Goes to Mordor has to win some sort of prize for the blog name that always makes me smile.  Plus any blog that can put up a still from Ingmar Bergman's The Seventh Seal and not get all maudlin about it is doing something right.  Around since 2011 and hitting half a dozen or so posts a month you can read through all his posts in a dedicated afternoon.  There are thoughts on D&D, Horror and playing Pirates.  Though I think his notes on Game Design are the most interesting.  Insight on how another guy does his game.
A lot of thought goes into each post and really I think he is just a few dedicated followers (and regular commenters) away from really growing as a blog.  Or maybe it is fine the way it is, but I bet some more followers would be appreciated all the same.

The Disoriented Ranger
http://the-disoriented-ranger.blogspot.com/

Another Old-School blog around since 2011.  This is a solidly OSR blog with links to free resources and notes on his RC based game.  There are a lot of world building articles with his recent ones exploring "Karik Thel - The Island of the Floating Trees" which could easily be used anywhere so very much worth the read.
What got me into his blog was the day we both posted the same Racial Class within minutes of each other, Feline Humanoids vs. Cat Girls (I think it is easy to tell on name alone which is mine).  In truth combining the two would make for a great class!
Like Billy, JD also posts more than just gaming material.

I would encourage you to check both blogs out.

Winners, Losers and the Tomb

Winners
Wow!  What a day yesterday.  All I wanted to do was celebrate my birthday and give out some free stuff. ;)

Well I have emailed the two winners, I am just waiting for them to confirm their emails.  (ok both have gotten back to me!)

So congrats to John Harp and Michael Bolam!  You can thank the d20 and d6 I rolled!

Honestly that was a lot of fun and I need an excuse to do that again soon.

Losers
The big loser of the week is (or will be) Tracey Alley for publishing Mystara books.
http://timbrannan.blogspot.com/2013/06/ugh-do-we-have-to-do-this-one-again-ip.html
http://timbrannan.blogspot.com/2013/06/ugh-do-we-have-to-do-this-one-again-ip_13.html
https://www.facebook.com/groups/mystara.reborn/
I did not set out to ruin her week but seriously folks, IP is IP is IP.

I have seen a lot of comments of "well WotC isn't doing anything with it".  Sorry, but there is no such thing as "Abondon-ware" in fact the Mystara property is alive and kicking with the release of the "Dungeons & Dragons Chronicles of Mystara Game" out next week.
Or even "She is not making a lot of money on it". The amount made (lots, little or none) doesn't matter.  I bought those books (but got a refund) because I thought they were official Mystara books. There are lots of people that would love to make more Mystara products, people that I would love to support.  But they don't make them because they know they are not allowed too.

Of course the other loser in this is me.  I thought I had found a new series to read and instead I have to drag all this out into the light.

The Tomb
The best news though is for my birthday and Father's day I am going to play some D&D with my kids!  YEAHH!

Since it is also D&D day I think a classic is in order.   So Liam and Connor will be headed to The Tomb of Horrors!

I have copies for every version of D&D (well 1st to 4th) so I am not sure which system to run it yet.  1st ed is the obvious choice, but the boys are playing 3e now and their 1st ed characters are only 1st level.

I am expecting it to be a lot of fun!

Tempting Fate and Pay What You Want

So Evil Hat has released their two new Fate game and also released a new model of how they would like people to pay for their games.

Fate Core System and Fate Accelerated Edition are now out.
And YOU decide how much you want to pay for them.

Think Fate Core is worth $20 (at 308 pages that is a steal for a core book) then pay 20.  You only want to pay 5?  Pay 5.

It is an interesting concept really and I am curious on how it will work out.
Tenkar has listed a number of OSR Pay What You Want books including the very popular Teratic Tome and his own Minor Magiks & Miscellaneous Arcana Volume I.

I can't wait to see how all of this plays out really. I think it will be a success.  You may say but won't people pay less than what you should be charging? Sure, but I think there will be more people buying. Honestly which one is better? Five people paying $5 for a pdf or 50 people paying a $1 for it?  And you will get people that believe in supporting authors and game companies, so they will spend $10.

How about you all?
Would you do "Pay What You Want" for you books (game or novels or otherwise)?

Threshold Mystara Magazine

I am a big fan of Mystara, aka The Known World from the "Basic" versions of D&D.

So I am very pleased to see on the Piazza that there will be a Mystara fan-zine.
http://www.thepiazza.org.uk/bb/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=10361 and
http://www.thepiazza.org.uk/bb/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=10610&start=0

Details on Threshold are here:
https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B9ThpIUzMhtLRF85WFJNNnpqZW8/edit

Don't know if I have anything yet I want to contribute, but I'd love to find something uniquely Mystara.

OSR Distribution CD-ROM?

So I was posting this comment over at Once More Unto the Breach!:

I have run plenty of demos in my time.
The thing about running a demo game is if you are good then the players will want to go out buy that game. If I do it in a game store (my prefered place to run demos) then I like to take them to the product.

The problem with the OSR is that often the product is not there. I have taken books before and sold them at cost, but I am not a retailer so it's an as-needed/as-I-think of it thing.

I suppose what would be nice is if had permission to redistribute the free OSR books on a CD. Maybe build some nice interface and have the PDFs.

Pop in the CD-ROM and it runs on any machine.

Hmm. That sounds like an idea.

And that got me thinking.  What about a FREE OSR distribution CD-ROM?
We put on the most popular free products that we have the permission to use, build a front end (HTML) that has the links to the PDFs on the disk and then links to the various sites and links to whatever else.

Each game would need some promotional "Ad" copy written.

The idea then is we, you, me, whomever demos the game then gives out copies of this disk to the players.

Off the top of my head I think we should include:

• Basic Fantasy
• OSRIC
• Swords & Wizardry
• Labyrinth Lord (Free versions)
• Lamentations of the Flame Princess (the free versions that out there)
• Spellcraft & Swordplay (Basic version)
• Microlite74
• Matt Finch's Quick Primer for Old School gaming

There could be and should be more.  Plus I want to state right now I have not sought permission for ANY of these yet.  This is just a crazy half-baked idea, but it is one I have done before.  In the pre-WiFi, pre-HiSpeed, stuck in the dial-up days of the Internet I put together a lot packages like this, so I have a pretty good idea of what I want to do.

Would anyone be interested in such a thing?
Would anyone out there be interested in contributing to something like this? (Free PDFs to redistribute not money!)

Don't Forget about Oklahoma

I have seen the damage tornados do close up.  It's not pretty.
So our thoughts are with Oklahoma, but thoughts alone are nothing.

DriveThruRPG makes it easy to donate money to the American Red Cross.

This one of my favorite charities along with Doctors Without Borders and The Trevor Project.

I like donating through DriveThru because it is easy and it sends the message the gamers care.

I know you had that $5 set aside for new book or something like that. Let's be honest, the economy sucks, you might need that 5 for parking or food or rent.  But right now I have more than the people of Moore, OK do so I gave what I could.

What D&D Character Am I?

Latest internet toy. http://easydamus.com/character.html

I Am A: Neutral Good Human Wizard (6th Level)

Ability Scores:
Strength-13
Dexterity-10
Constitution-13
Intelligence-19
Wisdom-13
Charisma-12

Alignment:
Neutral Good A neutral good character does the best that a good person can do. He is devoted to helping others. He works with kings and magistrates but does not feel beholden to them. Neutral good is the best alignment you can be because it means doing what is good without bias for or against order. However, neutral good can be a dangerous alignment when it advances mediocrity by limiting the actions of the truly capable.

Race:
Humans are the most adaptable of the common races. Short generations and a penchant for migration and conquest have made them physically diverse as well. Humans are often unorthodox in their dress, sporting unusual hairstyles, fanciful clothes, tattoos, and the like.

Class:
Wizards are arcane spellcasters who depend on intensive study to create their magic. To wizards, magic is not a talent but a difficult, rewarding art. When they are prepared for battle, wizards can use their spells to devastating effect. When caught by surprise, they are vulnerable. The wizard's strength is her spells, everything else is secondary. She learns new spells as she experiments and grows in experience, and she can also learn them from other wizards. In addition, over time a wizard learns to manipulate her spells so they go farther, work better, or are improved in some other way. A wizard can call a familiar- a small, magical, animal companion that serves her. With a high Intelligence, wizards are capable of casting very high levels of spells.

Find out What Kind of Dungeons and Dragons Character Would You Be?, courtesy of Easydamus (e-mail)

NG? Ok. I guess I am more socially-aware than I thought. Wizard of course makes total sense. Not sure how they got to 6th level, but that is fine. Human. Sure. I'll take that.

Petty Gods

I sent my submission over to Greg Gorgonmilk for his resurrected Petty Gods project.

I can't wait for you all to meet Nox, the Goddess of Near Darkness and her minions Syla and the Fyre Fae.

Updates

Hey all!

First off, been out of the loop a bit.  Was on vacation all week. Great time.
Here are some random updates.

1. Dwimmermount. Looks like it is getting published afterall.  This is a good thing and I give Tavis and Autarch kudos for pulling this one out of the abyss.  Looks like James though has shut down shop over on his G+ plage. https://profiles.google.com/jmalisze/about. No idea yet what that might mean for Grognardia.

2. Swords & Wizardry.  Tenkar is hosting a Swords & Wizardry Appreciation Day. http://www.tenkarstavern.com/2013/03/the-s-w-appreciation-day-line-up-hits.html
It is set for April 17.  That is also "O" day.

3. A to Z blogfest.  Tomorrow starts the A to Z blogfest.  I am so not ready for it!  I am doing Demons and know what I am going to post each day, just nothing is written yet.

4. Petty Gods is also back from the dead thanks to Greg Gorgonmilk.  He has really taken the ball and ran with this one! http://gorgonmilk.blogspot.com/

5. Witch Awareness Month.  I am going to participate in this one as well.  Just not sure what I am going to do yet. http://witchawarenessmonth.wordpress.com/

6. Majus draft available now. http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1895361773/majus-a-magic-noir-pacesetter-game  Doesn't matter that the KS is not done yet or even how much you put into it.  Get your draft now.

You all probably know all of these anyway.

Anyway great to be back.

Blogging Contract

Blogging is not writing. Not really.  Sure there are a lot of similarities but there are plenty of subtle differences.

When writing an RPG book I have an audience in mind. That is a nebulous audience that I may or may not interact with.  I don't know who bought every copy of The Witch or Ghosts of Albion or Buffy.

I do have the chance to get to know each and every reader here via the comments section.  I post, you comment, I reply.  There is a social contact at work here.. You are not expected to reply, but I write my posts hoping that people will.

Implicit in that is one of control.  I try to keep my posts interesting to my known audience.  This is one of the reasons I have different blogs.   I control what I post.  You control what you reply with, but ...I also control your reply. See I can delete any reply I don't like.  But I don't.  There are few good reasons for that.

I don't because it is dishonest. Having people disagree with me is a great way for me to learn something new.  I have lost track of all the things I have looked into because some one said "no. you are wrong."

I don't because it violates the social contract we have.  You put yourself out there, those were your thoughts.  I may not agree with it, but that doesn't give me the right to shut it down.

I also don't, and lets be honest here, controversy and conflict means more hits, more audience and hopefully more people reading my stuff.  Not fake controversy, people can see that a mile away, but real and honest.

A natural extension of that is I will also not delete old posts.  I don't see the point. You may want to go back a read something I posted in 2010. Great!  I will leave it there.  Even if it something I don't agree with, like or otherwise grok anymore.

I have been seeing too many cases of people taking down posts, editing posts to put themselves in better light. Sorry folks, between Archive.org and Google cache people can find anything that was posted given time, so don't try to change history.

I'll remove a post of your own if you ask me to. I'll delete multiple posts if looks like you were fixing a typo or something. I'll delete spam.

That's my contract with you.
Your contract with me is not post anything to make be doubt this choice! ;)

Gothridge Manor Giveaway

One of my favortie blogs, Gothridge Manor, just hit 1,000 posts!

To mark the occasion they are giving away an OSR bundle to one lucky commentor on today's 1,000 post.
http://gothridgemanor.blogspot.com/2013/03/1000-posts-osr-mega-bundle-giveaway.html

Included in the bundle is my own OSR book "The Witch".

Go on over, comment and maybe you will win this mega prize bundle!

The Best blog You Are Not Reading!

Next week I'd like to run a week long features of "The Best Blog You Are Not Reading".

I have run this in the past, off and on, but I really want to get some focus on some blogs that I enjoy that you may not know of yet.  I have five ready to go but I also wanted to give you all the chance to send me your recommendations

Preferably the blog should be newer and/or have only a few subscribers.  Alternately it can also be one that is far outside the normal reading you usually do.

Yes of course you can choose your own blog.

So let me know in the comments below and I'll take a look.  If I like it I'll mention it next week!

The Rise and Fall of Grognardia

Content Warning: Pre-coffee navel gazing.

A couple of interesting posts this past week on the subject of James, Grognardia and Dwimmermount and how much a reputation can take before it is trashed beyond repair.

The posts are here and you can read them at your leisure if you haven't already.

• http://www.tenkarstavern.com/2013/03/wayward-kickstarters-dimming-of.html
• http://gorgonmilk.blogspot.com/2013/03/is-this-post-grognardia-era.html
• http://talesofthegrotesqueanddungeonesque.blogspot.com/2013/03/devilmount-arise.html
• http://www.tenkarstavern.com/2013/03/i-finally-have-dwimmermount-er-i-mean.html
• not to mention all of http://yourdungeonissuck.wordpress.com/ 

Let's use Gorgonlilk's term and say this is the post Grognardia era. What does that mean (whether true or not, or descriptive or not) to the OSR blog reader in general?  

Well. We certainly have lost a voice, a cheerleader as it were.

And he was very vocal.  

Here is something I found interesting,  The daily visits to Grognardia are still about 1000 a day.   Not too shabby for a site that has not been updated since November really (and one post in December). 

Many people came to his site and then found the rest of this corner of the internet, but now I feel that many are going to his site only out of morbid curiosity.  

On one hand really, he is only late on a project.  If that were a crime then 80% of the gaming industry would be guilty of that.  On the other hand though he is on the line for nearly $50k, no communication and no paid free-lancers.  Which is some cases could be a crime.   While I have seen people and companies come back from worse PR problems, it hasn't been very many.

In those cases there is a lot of goodwill usually between the person/company and the community.  I think that the goodwill is being burned up here.

I don't know.  What do you all think?  Can James still pull himself out of the abyss and comeback?

Is there an OSR Oprah he can go to, sound contrite and get forgiveness?

Friday Updates

Well it seems to be a race now between Feedly and NetVibes.  The Feedly intetface is nicer and faster, NetVibes adds a lot of nice social networking features.

As many of you know I am participating in the A to Z challenge again this year.  I am also working as an Ambassador for the challenge.  This means I'll be going over sites and encouraging them to post, comment and the like.
You can read about that here, http://tossingitout.blogspot.com/2013/03/meet-arlees-to-z-ambassadors-part-1.html

I also joined D.L. Hammons'  Blogging Blitz. This is an ongoing blog-fest to drive new visitors to your site.
I plan to use it in conjunction with my own "The Best Blog You are Not Reading" feature (which I am way overdue on) to get the word out on some cool, but under read blogs.

Here is the code to sign up!

Well. This sucks.

So many of you are getting the news today about Google Reader.
Google plans to sunset the application in July 2013.

http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2013/03/a-second-spring-of-cleaning.html
http://support.google.com/reader/answer/3028851
http://googlereader.blogspot.com/

And this for exporting your data.
http://www.dataliberation.org/google/reader

I am not sure what I will do about reading blogs, I have grown rather attached to Reader.
I suppose there are many other cross-platform solutions, so I suppose I better start looking.

So what do you all use to read your blogs with?  I am on multiple computers and OSes.

ETA: Here are some ones I am looking at.
http://www.bloglines.com/
http://theoldreader.com/
http://www.newsblur.com/
http://likehack.com/

Creative Batteries need recharged

Don't you hate it when your creative batteries are running low.

I have been starring at the same doc file since Thursday and maybe added 200 words to the whole thing.

What do you all do to recharge?

Cover Me

I was reading the good old Facebook this morning and noticed this picture of author Joanne Brothwell's new book and the cover of another book by Loren Manns.

The books are of course not related outside of both in the modern paranormal genre. But I thought it might be fun to imagine one.

This is not uncommon for many indie and newer authors to use stock art for covers.   Sometimes you can even find them.  It is interesting though to see what a difference Photoshop makes.

It even happens in our publishing.
Here is a cover of a game you might recognize, and it's doppelganger.

 

Obviously mine and one called Magic & Miracles for the D6 system.  In this case though both of us are using the famous John W. Waterhouse painting.  I make no excuses for that, I love the Pre-Raphaelite style.

I'll have to go over this alternate version of the witch in detail.

I know they say you can't judge a book by it's cover, but sometimes you can use that cover for some fun!

The Foundations of Geek: A Blog Challenge

Jason Vey over at the Wasted Lands has issued the following Blog Challenge,
http://wastedlandsfantasy.blogspot.com/2013/02/the-foundations-of-geek-blog-challenge.html

The idea is a cool one honestly so I am going to participate.

My earliest memories are of horror movies.  Specifically Hammer Horror and the old Universal Monsters.
I could not have been much older than 4 and my first memories are of Dracula.  I used (and still do) love old Dracula movies.  From there things only got more interesting.

Some of my favorite TV shows growing up were Kolchak: The Night Stalker, the Twilight Zone and the Outer Limits.  Moving into the 80s it became Tales From the Crypt, Tales From the Darkside and Monsters.

At one point in time I could claim I had owned every movie that featured Dracula.

It should be no big surprise then that my games all had a horror bent to them.

My foray into pure fantasy lit was limited to be honest.  I read, and loved, Tolkien.  But that lead to the darker fantasy of Elric and the Eternal Champion and then into horror; specifically Lovecraft.  I never turned back.

I enjoy horror, I love all the tropes and the cliches to be honest.

The difference really between fantasy and horror for me is the power levels between the villain and heroes.  If the heroes have some expectation to survive (even if they don't) then that is fantasy.  If the heroes have no expectations to survive (even if they do) that can be horror.  I do like overlap though too.

I did and still do enjoy Sci-Fi.  More in the 70s and 80s than today I think.  I grew up on Star Trek and Star Wars and for the longest time The Next Generation was my favorite show.  My biggest sci-fi love though then as now is Doctor Who.

Doctor Who has been great for me since it includes so many genres. I can get horror, sci-fi, adventure and fantasy all in one package.

Even today, I find myself going back to the well as it were.  I get to watch the old Hammer Films on DVD or Blu-Ray now and the extras are more than worth the price.

What are your Foundations?
http://wastedlandsfantasy.blogspot.com/2013/02/the-foundations-of-geek-blog-challenge.html

April Blogging A to Z

Good Morning!
We are half-way through February now and I wanted to talk to all bloggers in our little corner of the internet about April.

The April A to Z challenge is coming up and I would like to encourage you all to join.

http://www.a-to-zchallenge.com

But join with a purpose.  Last year I did a review of RPG games A to Z in an attempt to attract more people to our hobby.  This year I am working on a new idea for a monster book.  So all my posts will eventually be put together and published.  Either for free or for sale depending on the amount of art I have to buy for it.

Presently there are over 700 participants and it is expected there could be as many as four times that amount by April 1.  This is a great way to get exposure to you, your blog and our hobby.

The sign-up page is here: http://www.a-to-zchallenge.com/p/2012-to-z-challenge-sign-up-list.html

I am joining a team of ambassadors to help others with the challenge and basically be a cheerleader.
http://tossingitout.blogspot.com/2013/02/ive-got-team-arlees-atozchallenge.html

http://tossingitout.blogspot.com/2013/02/ive-got-team-arlees-atozchallenge.html

I also want to be your, or more accurately, OUR cheerleader and ambassador too.  I think we have a fantastic hobby here and one that should be shared.  Between the free games and the material offered by all of us on our blogs there are thousands of nights and weekends that people could fill for the price of dice.  Since I am not a high school kid anymore playing in friend's basement,  I focus more on "family game nights", but what ever your group looks like we can pass that on to others.

So please. Consider joining up and share with this this very eclectic group of people our love for this little hobby of ours.

More Mykal Lakim

So there is more going on in the saga of Mykal Lakim.  I am probably giving this guy more attention than he deserves to be honest.  I am also aware that by doing so I going to inevitably send someone to his site that sees his stuff and buys it.  If so then I just ask that you come back here to let me know what you honestly think of it.  If you hate, tell me why, if you love it, also tell me why.

Wil Hutton over at Aggregate Cognizance has also been following this drama and has a number of posts on it. http://rivetgeek.blogspot.com/search/label/mykal%20lakim.

There is also this thread over at White Wolf talking about it.
http://forums.white-wolf.com/default.aspx?g=posts&t=67770

The new claim (new to me) is that Lakim is now saying that White Wolf ripped him off.
No. Really.

Wil Hutton has also been doing some digging into his posts over at Wikipedia.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Contributions/Mykal_lakim
and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Mykal_lakim
In particular all the pages he created for his own games and their near immediate deletion.  That's not the issue really, RPGs get deleted all the time from Wikipedia.  It's the drama he brings after the fact.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:Articles_for_deletion/Vampire:_Undeath_v.1
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:Articles_for_deletion/G.A.M.E (love the "P.S. White Wolf blows)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:Articles_for_deletion/Dark_Phoenix_Publishing,_Inc.

And this rant on users' pages:
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk:Nishkid64&direction=next&oldid=190786257
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk:Alexf&diff=prev&oldid=393979249, i love how all his "fans" will be boycotting Wikipedia.

Why bring all this up?
Well obviously this guy has some stones on him if he thinks he an stand up to White Wolf or that Wikipedia cares about his temper-tantrum.

I think the only reason that WW has not sued the guy is because he is too small for them to have noticed yet.