Showing posts with label community. Show all posts
Showing posts with label community. Show all posts

Wednesday, October 30, 2024

10,000,000 Other Side Fans Can't Be Wrong

 Well, something fun happened just a bit ago, and it was totally unexpected.

10,000,000 Million Other Side Hits

Well, maybe not "fans" as much as I'd love to claim, but certainly, 10 M hits is nothing to sneeze at. 

I am pleased that so many people still enjoy my insane ramblings here. 

I hope the next 10,000,000 hits are just as good as the first or even better.


Monday, October 21, 2024

GREYHAWK - Special Guest: Timothy Brannan on Gabbin #323; Witches & More!

So I didn't watch a horror movie last. So no post last night, but I did do this instead.

I was a guest on Lord Gosumba's GREYHAWK Livestream to talk about witches, Greyhawk, Mystara, and more.  Plus, a special announcement.

Check it out.

I had an absolute blast doing this. Can't wait to get back on. 


Sunday, August 25, 2024

#RPGaDay2024 Desirable Dice

 I have eBay alerts out for various dice sets, but mostly I am looking for original Dragon Dice. You know, like the kind that use to cost about $4 or so at Waldenbooks?

Here is mine, kept in the package. 

Dragon Dice

The markup on them now is about x100 what they were in the 1980s.

Thankfully I also found some new ones from Threshold Diceworks. They are new, resin cast dice, but they look very much like the old ones for a fraction of the markup.


Threshold Diceworks retro Dice

Threshold Diceworks retro Dice

These retro dice were made by Threshold Diceworks. Which you can find on Facebook and their Etsy store. He was taking pre-orders a while back and mine finally came in yesterday and I am very pleased with them!

They compare very favorably to the sets I had with my Expert set, the Dragon Dice polyhedrals, and the sets that came with the Mentzer Basic boxes.

Threshold Diceworks Dice compared to classic dice.

Threshold Diceworks Dice compared to classic dice.

Threshold Diceworks Dice compared to classic dice.

Yes. Those are my Mentzer dice still in a bag and unopened and unmarked.

Threshold Diceworks Dice and Armory dice markers

Now I just need to score an Orange d8.


--

I am participating in Dave Chapman's #RPGaDAY2024 for August. 

#RPGaDay2024



Saturday, August 17, 2024

#RPGaDAY2024 An engaging RPG community

 There are a few I really enjoy.

OSR RPG

https://www.facebook.com/groups/OSRRPG/

The OSR RPG group on Facebook is a great group to find OSR players and developers who are not freaked out by what new games are doing. Plus, this is a nice counterpoint to the "all OSR players are sexist/racist Grognards living in the past."

Puerto Rico Role Players

https://www.facebook.com/groups/puertoricoroleplayers/
https://x.com/PuertoRicoRP
https://tinyurl.com/prroleplayer

Puerto Rico Role Players on Facebook has been a great group. All games are discussed and it has given me a chance to practice my Spanish. And they are very forgiving of my "Pre-School" level Spanish grammar.

Others that are also quite good.

I'd Rather Be Killing Monsters for general RPGs, Movies, TV, and other Geek-related topics. 

RPG Blog Hub for everything happening on RPG Blogs.

Love RPGs for RPG-related topics. 

Victorian Gamers Association for all sorts of Victorian-era RPGs.


--

I am participating in Dave Chapman's #RPGaDAY2024 for August. 

#RPGaDay2024

Monday, July 8, 2024

#RPGaDAY2024 for August

 I know I have been really quiet here for a bit, trying to wrap up everything for Thirteen Parsecs. But I am taking a break to let you know I will be participating in Dave Chapman's #RPGaDAY2024 for August. I have done it in years past and this looks like a good list of prompts.

#RPGaDay2024

Here are the text prompts.

  1. First RPG bought this year
  2. Most recently played
  3. Most often played RPG
  4. RPG with great art
  5. RPG with great writing
  6. RPG that is easy to use
  7. RPG with 'good form'
  8. An accessory you appreciate
  9. An accessory you'd like to see
  10. RPG you'd like to see on TV
  11. RPG with well-supported one-shots
  12. RPG with well-supported campaigns
  13. Evocative environments
  14. Compelling characters
  15. Great character gear
  16. Quick to learn
  17. An engaging RPG community
  18. Memorable moment of play
  19. Sensational session
  20. Amazing adventure
  21. Classic campaign
  22. Notable non-player character
  23. Peerless player
  24. Acclaimed advice
  25. Desirable dice
  26. Superb screen
  27. Marvelous miniature
  28. Great gamer gadget
  29. Awesome app
  30. Person you'd like to game with
  31. Game or gamer you miss
  32. Alternative - Amazing anecdote

There is also an alternate version from Skala Wyzwania. who I do not know but seems to be a name in the Polish RPG scene. Here are her prompts.

Skala RPGaDay

Text version of the alternative campaign:

  1. Runes
  2. Forest
  3. Demonology
  4. Cosmos
  5. Fairies
  6. Portal
  7. Forgotten City
  8. Experiment
  9. Heroes
  10. Steampunk
  11. Invasion
  12. Parallel Worlds
  13. Zombie
  14. Awakening
  15. Genetics
  16. Dungeon
  17. AI
  18. Curse
  19. Hologram
  20. Battle 
  21. Disaster
  22. Interdimensional Space
  23. Ritual
  24. Antique
  25. Mutant
  26. Tattoo
  27. Shapeshifting
  28. Mimic
  29. Knight
  30. Trap 
  31. Dragons

Each day roll d10 to go with the prompt:

  1. Describe a Monster
  2. Create an NPC
  3. Write a Bulletin Board Quest
  4. Invent an Item
  5. Write a legend or rumour 
  6. Create a random table
  7. Create a simple mechanic
  8. Present an idea for a Random Encounter
  9. Write an Eavesdroppable Dialogue
  10. Draw!

I am not sure if I'll do just Dave's, both, or a combination.

In any case, it should be fun.

Wednesday, April 3, 2024

#AtoZChallenge2024: C is for Critical Role

 One of the biggest cultural phenomenons to come out of modern D&D has been the success of Critical Role. It was successful because of D&D 5th Edition and, in turn, made D&D 5th Edition more successful.

What is Critical Role

Critical Role Cast
The voice actor players.

It is a streamed "actual play" Dungeons & Dragons 5e (for the most part, more on that) game. Each session is about 4+ hours long (resulting in over 2,000 hours of content) and features a group of voice actors: (top L-R, picture above) Sam Riegel, Taliesin Jaffe, Marisha Ray, Dungeon Master Matt Mercer, and (bottom, L-R) Liam O'Brien, Laura Bailey, Ashley Johnson, and Travis Willingham.

They began just as a group of friends (Travis and Laura were either already married or dating, Matt and Marisha were dating) playing a D&D 4th Edition and then a Pathfinder game.  When D&D 5e came out, they moved over to that. You can even see some rule confusion in the early episodes.

Vox Machina
The characters. Can you match who is who?

They soon became wildly popular. How popular? Well there is an Amazon series based on their first campaign ("Vox Machina"), there are several books about and by the Critical Role team, their Gen Con shows are sold out months in advance, and they also sold out Wembley Arena back in October of 2023. A live event to watch a bunch of friends play D&D, and they sold out a space that had previously seen sold-out shows of the likes of Led Zeppelin, Genesis, David Bowie, Queen, The Who, The Grateful Dead, and more.

While they were not the first online Actual Play D&D streamers, they are the biggest, and they made this into not just their own genre of entertainment, but they have been making an absolute ton of money. 

There are three campaigns featuring different groups of characters. Campaign 1 featured the above characters in Vox Machina. Campaign 2 was their big breakthrough campaign featuring the Mighty Nein. This also introduced Laura Bailey's character, Jester Lavorre, the tiefling that inspired a thousand cosplays

There have also been four published books for the D&D 5e game.

Critical Role books

The cultural phenomena that is Critical Role has not been without some critics. There are those that complain that they are not really gamers. Or that they are not really playing. Or that the "Mercer Effect" has ruined what people expect from D&D.

To those critics, I say, "Do you remember exactly when it was when you let fun die in your life?"

Look. The hobby space that D&D occupies now is not the same as it was in the 1980s. This is a good thing. 

People can watch Critical Role and enjoy it without rolling any dice of their own. They can watch the show and then think, "Hey, this looks fun. I want to try this." They can cosplay Jester, Keyleth, or FCG. They can enjoy the Amazon Prime series.

For me, it is all great fun. I started watching the old streams (still on Campaign 1!), and I enjoy them. They have also given me ideas for my own games. Between Campaign 1 and "Stranger Things," there is a whole new generation of D&D fans out there. Yeah, so sometimes I get 20-year-olds excited to tell me all about Vecna (the BBG in both), but hey, they are excited.

The Future

Critical Role has been a huge money maker...for Critical Role. It should not surprise anyone that the Powers That Be at Hasbro (the current owners of Wizards of the Coast and D&D) wanted in on some of that action. So last year in January, Hasbro/WotC wanted to put out some new guidelines on what various creators can do with D&D material, essentially walking back on 23+ years of access and goodwill.  Well, people naturally were angry.  It was enough that I even stopped using the very permissible Open Gaming License to produce my own works and spent most of 2023 working on solutions. Others did the same. One of those solutions for the Critical Role team was to build their own RPG that they controlled and had all the rights to. It is a very good idea.

They began with an actual play series and a new game called Candella Obscura. It is a quasi-Victorian, horror-themed fantasy game, so you know I am interested! I have not played it yet, but we have the hardcover and it looks fun.  You can try it out for free with their QuickStart Guide

Daggerheart and Candella Obscura

Their newest game is called Daggerheart. It is still being playtested, and I discussed it a while back. Will people leave D&D 5 for it? Well, there is some indication that D&D 5 sales dipped in 2023. Was that because of Wizards of the Coast's series of PR blunders or because D&D 5R (One D&D) is due out at the end of this year, and sales ALWAYS dip after these announcements? Hard to say, but it's likely a combination of both. But in any case I wish Daggerheart and the Critical Role team nothing but the best and hope they are wildly successful.

Even if you don't like Critical Role. The Stream, the Amazon show, their D&D 5e content, or new games, you have to like the attention they have brought to this hobby. Even if only 1/10th of the people drawn into this stick around for other games, that is more than we had before.

Tomorrow, I'll talk about a topic that is very near and dear to the hearts of many gamers. Dice!

The A to Z of Dungeons & Dragons: Celebrating 50 years of D&D.


This is also my first entry of the month for the RPG Blog Carnival, hosted by Codex Anathema on Favorite Settings.

RPG Blog Carnival

Monday, March 11, 2024

Blogging A to Z 2024 Theme Reveal

 It is that time of year again. Time to reveal my theme for the annual Blogging A to Z challenge.

This is the year I have known what I would do for a long time. Since it is the 50th Anniversary of Dungeons & Dragons and I am spending the year celebrating, for April, I am doing the A to Z of Dungeons & Dragons.

April A to Z blogging challenge 2024: A to Z of D&D

Granted, this might not really be much of a "challenge" for me, but I hope to inform and maybe even get some people into this weird little hobby of ours.

Who knows. Maybe I'll learn something new myself.

Catch all the other A-to-Z-ers doing theme reveals this week here: https://tinyurl.com/mv4nhbmj 

The main Blogging A to Z website is here:  http://www.a-to-zchallenge.com/ 

AtoZChallenge theme reveal 2024 #atozchallenge


#AtoZChallenge 2024

Friday, February 2, 2024

#FollowFriday for #FollowFebruary

 I have been blogging for a long time. 16 years, 17 when April hits. Prior to that, I had a website, The Other Side, that I started mainly as a means to teach myself HTML and, later, PHP.  To point is I consider myself up on top of what is happening in my little nook of the Internet. It's not everything, but I am generally not surprised by things.

Simon Bunny
This picture has nothing at all to do with this post. I just love it. Simon Bunny is now 6.

So I was...well, surprised when a recent call for blog sites on a recent social media post turned up dozens of blogs I had never seen or read before.

My effort then for February is to follow and interact with more of these "new to me" blogs and expand out to more. Also, I want to get my own readership up a bit. Granted I know I am niche flavor inside a niche market. It might be likely that I have appealed to everyone I am going to. But I guess there is that off chance that I have not. I'd like to find those people, I'd like them to find me. 

The ultimate goal, of course, is to are new ideas to read and new things I have considered. This is D&D's and RPG's 50th anniversary, I have been active for 45 years of that. Even then, I don't pretend to know it all. I mean, think you know games? Go to Gen Con one year and be amazed at all the stuff you know and how much more you don't.

What can you do?

Simple! Recommend me a new blog. Recommend an old one you really like for me to read. Let's expand our circles of community.

Wednesday, December 6, 2023

Person of the Year, 1492 DR

 Never let it be said I am not up with the times.

Shadowheart

Goofing off instead of doing term-end work. No disrespect to Taylor Swift. Well deserved, really.


Tuesday, November 28, 2023

Looking Ahead to 2024: It's Always Sunny in Baldur's Gate

Image by Freepik
Image by Freepik
I have yet to talk much about my plans for 2024; it is a big year for D&D. It is the 50th Anniversary, a new edition (well...5.x or 5R) is coming out, and there should be a lot of nostalgia and navel-gazing.

Incidentally, 2024 is also the Year of the Dragon.

Tentatively, I am looking at the following "theme months."

January will be part of TardisCaptain's New Year New Character challenge. Mine though will be delving into some of my favorite characters since I started playing D&D.

April is the A to Z Challenge, where I will write about D&D and its history.

May is Sci-Fi month and I'll do a deep dive into Gamma World, Star Frontiers, and the d20 Star Wars. I'll also looking into games with a solid D&D connection with me. 

June has typically been Basic-era month where I focus a lot on B/X, BECMI, and OSE/LL. I really want to be sure I do that this year.

August is Dave Chapman's RPGaDAY month. I pretty much do this one as is. But I might focus on D&D more than other games. 

October is "horror" month for me. I want to focus on Ravenloft. All my horror movies will also all be connected to D&D in some way. Either movies from Appendix N authors or horror movies that mention D&D or fantasy/horror. I'll start putting together my list soon.

Additionally, I have something else fun planned throughout the year that I am keeping close to my chest for now.

But the big thing for me next year is going to be my year-long exploration of the Forgotten Realms. 

New Forgotten Realms

The Forgotten Realms and Me

I was never a Forgotten Realms fan. I dismissed it in the 1980s as an "upstart," ignored it in the early 90s, and actively disliked it in the late 90s. But it seems my ire was misplaced. Around the time the 3rd Edition Realms book came out I was beginning to soften my stance. By the 4th Ed era I was considering moving a campaign to the Realms. In the 5th Ed era I made it official, more or less.

Honestly, my coverage of Ed Greenwood's work in the pages of Dragon magazine changed my mind. 

These past few months, I have been playing the hell out of Baldur's Gate 3, and my desire to play in the Realms has only grown. 

To this end, I have amassed a small collection of Forgotten Realms books. Nothing special, just ones that I have come by easily either at game auctions, Half-Price Books, or as in the books pictured above, Print on Demand from DriveThruRPG. So I will go over them in detail throughout the editions.

I'd like to run a Realms-based game someday, but I am still figuring out what edition to use. Part of me thinks I need to do it in AD&D 2nd Edition since that was the edition that was the most "Realms" to me. 

The Forgotten Realms to me was always viewed through the eyes of a character, whether that was Elminster or Drizzt or whomever. Likewise, I am going to look into the Realms through the eyes of a new character. Presently I am leaning toward my half-elf sorceress Sinéad. I know I want use someone that has magic, and someone that I can tie to the rich lore of elves in this world. She is also one of two characters I had specifically created for the Realms in all my years of gaming. I think I owe it to myself to actually give her a spin someday.  However, my wife reminded me the other night that Keller the Silent Monk might also be fun.

In any case, 2024 is going to be a busy year of posting here and I am looking forward to it.

Thursday, November 2, 2023

October RPG Blog Carnival Wrap-up

RPG Blog Carnival

 October was my time to host the RPG Blog Carnival. This year my topic was Horrors, Gods, and Monsters. For this, I did a lot of postings about my Black Forest Mythos set of gods and monsters.

I did not get through all my Gods and Monsters so I am going to keep on going.

But there were others that participated as well.

The Ideocron of The Oracular Somnambulist had Spooky Scary Skeletons! with tables to make your skeletons more spooky and interesting.

Codex Anathema always has good stuff. Their entry covered "Horrors, Gods and Monsters" AND they helped me practice my Spanish. ¡Gracias!

Sea of Stars gave us a new monster, the Thornkin.  You know I love new monsters.

Seed of Worlds expands on their petty gods with d8 natures of this quasi-godlike entity. Tables for your OSR (or really any) game.

Stuffed Crocodile, one I have been lurking at for a bit for their Dark Eye content, gives us a new monster, Wiedergänger. This one will be a lot of fun to use!

Finally, we have V Donnut Valley. We get a monster and a god.  Not to mention that they are hosting the November Blog Carnival, Let’s Party! Festivals and ceremonies! I will certainly have to find something for my group of gods here.


I hope you enjoyed all these entries and the ones I did! Looking forward to participating again next year.



Wednesday, September 13, 2023

Scooby-Doo Day, the Hex Girls, and Earth-27

 On this day in 1969, I turned 3 months old. I didn't know it then but that same morning a new cartoon that would stand the test of time premiered. Scooby-Doo hit the airwaves on CBS on Saturday morning, September 13, 1969, at 9:30 Central time. It would later go on to several spin-offs, merchandise, movies (both animated and live-action), and give us some iconic characters.  To a kid obsessed with Hammer Films, Universal Horror Movies, Dark Shadows, and the Twilight Zone, it became something of an obsession to me. From my "first" witch to the Hex Girls, it is hard to overstate the effect this show has had on my games. 

So today is a good day to bring back the Hex Girls into my discussions here on the ole' Other Side. 

I have been wanting to do something more with them for a bit to be honest. They are just silly fun. I am going to try to get some stats up for both Tim Knight's (btw, check out his version of my Teen Witch Taryn!) and Pun Issac's respective games. 

I was online looking up some new information and/or art for the Hex Girls when I encountered the Earth-27 wiki. I was not disappointed at all.

Thorn Luna Dusk

This is a crazy site. First, I LOVE all their detail and their desire to throw everything into a blender and hit frappé. There is a solid mix of DC Universe, Scooby-Doo, and even Supernatural here. There are bits of Lucifer and a lot more. Honestly, it would take a long time to dig through the whole thing. I am speaking from experience because this was the rabbit-hole I went down one night and it was all great stuff.

First, I love the art and attention to detail here. This is all just fun stuff. And obsessive on a level I can really appreciate.

However, I could not help but notice something. There is a lot of "canonical" information about the Hex Girls that comes from this blog and my RPG write-ups of them. 

I can see how really. Back in 2013 (sheesh over 10 years ago!) I posted about how some details from here made their way into the Wikipedia entry on the Hex Girls.  Compare that old link to the current one, and you will see the information is now gone, as it should be.  Gone, but never forgotten.  Earth-27 adopts it all wholesale and then expands on it.

Some things I think are obvious; Luna is very obviously bi-racial to me. Their "real" names are taken from my blog with notable exceptions of Thorn's Sally McKnight (from the show) and Dusk's "Muffy St. James."  They keep that, but mention her real name is Margaret and she is just called Muffy. Ok. That's cool. I like that. 

Mind you. None of this bothers me. In fact, I think it is really cool. There are certainly some big improvements in what they have done over what I have done. Plus, they have a "user agreement" to share information, and it is not like these characters are "mine," really. So, in that spirit, I say share and share alike.  There are certainly some ideas they have that I can back-port into my own games. I love the art for example and the character sheets for the characters are a lot of fun. And, sure, let's go with "Margaret 'Muffy' St. James, AKA Dusk." And their mentor is none other than Elvira. So yeah, how can I say no to any of this?

I hope to use some ideas here (within their implied permissions of course) and see what it can do for my games. I know there is a lot more to explore.

Links

Tuesday, September 12, 2023

RPGs are Now Mainstream, example #254

 I want to share a few books with you today. Not reviews, but I do want to talk about them.

Most everyone reading this blog likely knows about this book.

Grimtooth's Traps Too

The Grimtooth Traps books were not official AD&D books, but nearly everyone back in my gaming groups in the 1980s had one or access to one.

These next two are less well-known.

Book of Encounters

They are the Game Master's Book of Random Encounters. The large hardcover (brown) we got my son for Christmas from Amazon. The smaller green "magazine" style one I bought last week. At a grocery store in South Carolina.

All three books share the same origins and goals. They are third-party products designed for "any RPG" but obviously for their respective current editions of *D&D. They fill a niche market of DM's tools, so a small number of people will buy these. 

The biggest differences?

For the Traps Too book, my then-DM and I had to drive to Springfield, IL, to get it. It was 35 miles away, and then we had to go to a store downtown (Black's Hardware) because our regular D&D stores (Waldenbooks and B. Dalton's) didn't carry this.

I found the magazine Gamemaster's Book of Random Encounters in the periodical rack in the checkout line at a grocery store next to copies of People, Us, and whatever holiday cookbook magazine America's Test Kitchen was selling.

This is just one more example of how ubiquitous RPGs are getting. 

Hell, even at my sister's funeral people from a side of my family I barely know were talking about how great Baldur's Gate 3 is. (Spoilers. It is great.)

Sometimes, it is easy to forget how great we have it now. Sometimes it is easy to forget how scarce or rare things used to be. 

We are really in a Golden Age of RPGs now and sometimes it is nice to sit back and soak it all in.

Thursday, September 7, 2023

Knight City: Trials of the Teen Witch!

 I love shared universes. I love shared multi-verses. But anytime I can see a collaboration of various creatives to bring new life to something old or bring to life something new, then I am all for it.

Last week, I shared how both TTim Knight over at Hero Press and Pun Issac over at Halls of the Nephilim brought to life my evil villain, The Refrigerator for their respective Superheroe universes. 

I'll play a little in their sandboxes, too and bring over one of my iconics to their worlds. Today I am visiting Knight City with one of my favorite superheroes Taryn, the Teen Wtich.

Tim is using a modified version of Villains & Vigilantes. I am not 100% clear on all his house rules, but I can't go wrong with a by-the-book super. 

Taryn "Nix" Nichols
Taryn and Mojo, created in ePic Character Generator

To recap, Taryn is the teen daughter of my witch Larina. I wanted a character specifically for supers that had a magical background. My comics reading through the 1980s was largely Teen Titans and X-Men (so...like everyone else) and I wanted a character that would fit into those sorts of tales. 

Her father is a faerie lord, and his relationship with Taryn and Larina is...complicated. He will feature in other plots, but I am working hard NOT to make this a Trigon-Raven retread right now. Scáthaithe would not really be interested in taking over the Earth. Bringing more magic to it? Yeah, that might work. But really, I think his issue would be for Taryn to stay in the Faerie Realms.

While I always considered Taryn a Millenial/GenZ girl, she is named after "Taryn" from the Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors. Which is my favorite of the series. She is pretty much equal parts Raven from Teen Titans, Sabrina the Teenage Witch, and Kiki from Kiki's Delivery Service. She has a thing for flying fast and dating guys with fast Japanese motorcycles.

This is an update/revision of her Mighty Protector stats.

Taryn Nix, student and crime fighting witch
Teen Witch
Taryn "Nix" Nichols

Power Level: 6
Age: 17; Ht: 5' 3"; Wt: 114lb; Gender: F
Basic Hits: 3
Side: Good

STR: 9
END: 12
INT: 15
AG: 12
CHA: 17

Hit Points: 7
Power Points: 48
Carry Capacity: 110 lbs
Basic HTH Damage: 1d3
Healing Rate: 0.9/day
Move: 33"

Damage Modifier: +2
Accuracy: +1
ATT: +2
DEF: ??
PSYCHIC DEF: ??
Detect Hidden/Danger: 12% / 16%

ABILITIES/POWERS

WITCH BOLT: Power Blast, Range 54, 1d20 dmg
TELEKINESIS: 540 lbs 
FLIGHT: 108 MPH
HEIGHTENED SENSES: Detect magical auras
MAGIC SPELLS: Takes a full action to prepare

GEAR

Broom. Prop, needed to fly.

Cat. Her black cat is named Mojo.

LEGAL STATUS: Minor of the United States with no criminal record.

What is Taryn doing in Knight City? No idea! Maybe Tim will let me know!

Thursday, August 31, 2023

The Blizzard of Summer 2023!

One of the best things about blogging and writing about games for so long is I have gotten to meet so many really great people and made some really great friends.

Two such are Tim Knight over at Hero Press and Pun Issac over at Halls of the Nephilim. Both are great guys, and we all have many intersecting interests in RPGs, comics, and movies.  So it is no real shock then when we decide to go over and play in each other's sandboxes.

Over the summer, they graciously allowed me to use two of their iconic characters, The Acrobatic Flea and The Web Archivist, for The Wasted Lands.

Now they have returned to honor and built versions of my misanthrope villain, The Refrigerator, for their own respective supers games, along with tweaks to make him work in their worlds. 

The Refrigerator

Both are great takes on my villain, and I love the additional little details they have both added. 

What is the point of having an iconic character if you can't share it?

#RPGaDay2023 FAVOURITE RPG of all time

 This is a tough one. I have had so many favorites over the years. Each one representing a different point in my life and gaming.

Favorite RPGs

Most of these will be known to readers here.

Basic (B/X) D&D - not the one I started with that would be the Holmes Basic, but the one that got me deep into the hobby.

AD&D 1st Edition - This is the one I played the most in those early days. The Monster Manual was my gateway drug to RPGs coming from Mythology.

Chill 1st Edition - This was either my first or second RPG after D&D (tied with Traveller) but it was my first horror RPG, and it spawned everything after.

Call of Cthulhu - Not my first Horror RPG, but one of my favorites. Really set the bar on what a horror RPG should be.

Masque of the Red Death - not an RPG by itself, and a bit wonky, it did something I always wanted: it brought my AD&D 2nd ed rules to Gothic Victorian Earth and Horror. Ravenloft brought some of this earlier, and both were my game of choice throughout the 90s until D&D-burnout set in and I went to my next big thing. 

CJ Carella's WitchCraft - I can't overestimate how much this RPG changed things for me. The world was close enough to that of Chill, Call of Cthulhu, and Masque of the Red Death that my ideas for those games gained new life under Unisystem. I loved the game so much I pestered the publisher, Eden Studios, to let me write for them. The result was my next favorite.

Ghosts of Albion - while this might be self-serving, it is my favorite for a reason. Everything I wanted in a Unisystem game is here. Victorian era, magic, horror, and Unisystem. I would have happily written for Unisystem for ever if I could have.  Which leads me to my last one and the top of my list.

NIGHT SHIFT Veterans of the Supernatural Wars - Again, a little self serving but NIGHT SHIFT is everything I have ever wanted in a game. It combines the best mechanics of all the games above along with a play style I love and in a world, or more to the point worlds, I enjoy.

If I only get to pick one, then it will be NIGHT SHIFT.

NIGHT SHIFT

I have had the luxury and the privilege to work on a great number of RPGs over the years. Some of which were dream jobs and dream games. I consider myself lucky. But of all of those, NIGHT SHIFT is not just my favorite game, favorite rules, and favorite setting; it was also my favorite writing experience. Only Ghosts of Albion and my various Witch books come close.


Thank you, Dave Chapman for hosting this again! I had a great time.

RPGaDay2023


Wednesday, August 30, 2023

#RPGaDay2023 OBSCURE RPG you've played

 I have a soft spot for Obscure RPGs. But I think one of my favorites, warts and all, is Lee Gold's "Lands of Adventure."

Lands of Adventure

The game has some flaws, but it is such a fun concept and a great idea. Plus, the art and design are fantastic. 

I reviewed it a couple of years ago but have only played once or twice since then. It really is an old-school gem from the ancient days of Dragon Magazine.


RPGaDay2023


Tuesday, August 29, 2023

#RPGaDay2023 Most memorable ENCOUNTER

AD&D Lich

Ah. This one stuck with me as the most memorable encounter.

It would have to be the first time I encountered a Lich in the AD&D 1st Edition days. I think it was the summer of 82 or so.

The DM read the monster's description, and she decided that it had all these new spells because it was a former high-level magic-user. She played the monster as we would have today, but back then, that was kind of a new thing. Not only that she had poping in and out of the Ethereal Plane more or less at will. 

Needless to say it kicked our 6th to 7th level asses. That lich kicked our asses.

While I was annoyed, I later looked back on it and thought about how well she had done with it all. 

So yeah, freaking Liches are dangerous.

Since that day, my undead have all been way more powerful. 


RPGaDay2023



Monday, August 28, 2023

#RPGaDay2023 SCARIEST game you've played

 Scares do not come easy to me anymore. I consume horror movies like most people watch sitcoms (and laugh as much), nearly all my non-D&D games are horror and a fair amount of my D&D ones are as well.  So for a game to REALLY scare me, it has to be special. And it is usually NOT due to the rules being used.

Case in point. My online games from 2006 to 2009 that I called "Vacation in Vancouver."  I played it starting with WitchCraft and then moved over to True20 (a game not known for its horror).

True20True20 Adepts Handbook

The hook was that members of Vancouver's supernatural community were going missing.  Long story short, there was this entire underground where vampyres, demons, and witches were getting together and engaging in all sorts of lewd sexual acts in exchange for essence.  After a while, even open acts of magic were considered acceptable.

The game, though was not really about sex or even depravity (there was a lot of sexual slavery going on and it was hard to know who was using who), but about addiction and losing yourself.

A couple of characters had to be literally pulled back from the edge.

As a role-playing experience, it was intense.  There was not much combat, to be honest.  Part of that was out of choice (the characters were investigators, not thugs) and part out of necessity (combats online can be dull, even in Unisystem).

The game ended like many others, not with a big finale but gradually dying off.

The mystery of where all the supernaturals were going was solved, but not the one of the demonic sex trafficking. The demons never actually killed anyone. In fact, they seemed to be concerned for the welfare of the Gifted and Lesser Gifted in their "care".  And there were plenty of volunteers for the demons, too, since the exchange of Essence was pleasurable for both (but only humans can 'regenerate' Essence).

There were some very interesting games, though, that came from all of that.  It was one of those rare RPG moments where the bad guys might have won, and there was nothing the PCs/Cast could do about it.  While the game was fun and provided some of the best pure Horror roleplaying I have run in a long time, I am just not sure how it could even be revisited.

RPGaDay2023


Sunday, August 27, 2023

#RPGaDay2023 Game you'd like a new EDITION of...

 This is a two-fer for me. There are two games I want to see a new edition of and I hope that once again they are the same system.

I would love to see a new edition of Mutants & Masterminds AND a new edition of a DC Comics RPG.

DC Adventures and Mutants & Masterminds

I started with M&M back in 2nd Edition and I loved it. Such a great game.

When 3rd Edition came out I grabbed the PDFs right away and was going to pick up the print versions, but Green Ronin also had released the DC Adventures game that used the same M&M 3rd edition system. So I got all of those books.

I'd love a 4th edition of M&M and wonder if it couldn't move a little closer to their AGE system.

I also want a new DC comics RPG. I know there is a new Marvel game out and yes it looks great, but I have always been more of a DC guy.  I also want to buy more Green Ronin stuff.


RPGaDay2023