New D&D Minis and Figures

So the universe has decided I need to spend more money on little plastic people. 

Up first, and very near and dear to my heart are new NECA, LJN-style D&D action figures. 

They look great, but I am mostly interested in the Skylla and Kelek figures.  I am quite excited for the Skylla one since she never had a 4" figure release.

I had a Kelek back in the day, this one looks a lot like that older one save that this newer Kelek looks like he has a mohawk.  

So a while back I picked up the Kelek and Skylla D&D Miniatures from WizKids, well their next round is coming out and I am very excited about this one too. And it should be a lot cheaper.

It looks like there will be five characters. Diana, Hank, Eric, Presto, and an unnamed cleric.

Here is our unnamed cleric.

Given the tabard, the mace, and the design I am making the guess that this is Aleena.

Missing are Shelia and Bobby, which kinda sucks really, but not a problem. Thanks to HeroForge.

Click on the images for the HeroForge site.

Of course, WizKids might have another wave. 

My HeroForge Skylla and Kelek compare well to the new WizKids versions.

In any case, these are likely to suck up a lot of my gaming budget.

This Old Dragon: Issue #63

Normally with my This Old Dragon retrospectives, I talk a little bit about the time when the magazine was published.  This issue was out in July 1982. But that is not the time I associate this issue with. No, the time this issue came out for me was nearly three years later in 1985.  On Tuesday I spoke about my bumpy transition from Basic-era D&D (or just D&D as I knew it) to AD&D.  By 1985 I was fully entrenched into the AD&D camp. My previous DM had just gotten a job working nights (a job he had held until 2021!) so I needed a new group. In a tale as old as...well the 1980s...I fell into a group made up of mostly theatre kids and other science nerds. This issue, Issue #63, was in my DM's collection and I borrowed it one day and was blown away.  

I had already been reading Dragon now for a little over a year, but this one packed more punch per page than any issue I had seen to that point.  So. Come with back, not to July 1982, but June 1985 when I borrowed This Old Dragon.

Let's start with that cover. They say never judge a book by its cover and I extend that to magazines. But in this case, this cover only hints at the great material inside.  The cover gives us two bandits, perfect for the class inside. The cover artist was James Warhola and I can't tell you off the top of my head what other covers he may have done, but I love this one. 

In a preview of things to come, the back cover is an ad from Epyx Computer Games for The Temple of Apshai. For a brief moment there I could consider Epyx my favorite game software company. I had played this and later Rogue (the forerunner to Moria-like games) on my Color Computer 3. 

We jump in head first into this issue with our first article from none other than Gary Gygax himself (the first of a few for this issue).  Featured Creatures gives us some new official AD&D monsters for your game.  This is the first appearance of this feature. Up first, the Devas, servants of the good gods of the higher planes. We know that the "monsters" featured here will later go on be part of the Monster Manual II, which might have been the least controversial update to the hardcover line for AD&D.  The Devas here are depicted as just "Good" aligned and can be Lawful, Neutral or Chaotic as needed. 

Gary hits us with more official official content next with The Big, Bad Barbarian.  Or...Gary really wanted Conan and Fafhrd in AD&D (and we will get more of Gary's opinions on Conan later in the issue). This class looks more or less the same as what we find in the AD&D Unearthed Arcana.  The barbarian would go on to get more life in D&D 3 and D&D 5.  While I appreciate this article for what it is (new content is new content!) I was never a big fan of the barbarian.  I can't even recall if I ever had a barbarian character.

Smile! You're on Fantasy Camera covers how Darlene Kay Blanchard (not that Darlene) takes pictures of miniatures. 

Robert J. Kuntz is next with Greyhawk's World where he covers the events and notes from the Eastern and Southern Flanaess.  This is also accompanied by a map from Darlene (that Darlene) of the Bandit Kingdoms.  I love little bits like this to help expand the game world more.

The Other Side fan and favorite Len Lakofka is up with Leomund's Tiny Hut.  His article is about Charisma in Make Charisma Count for More.  It has what can only be described as a rough draft for the Comeliness score that will appear in Unearthed Arcana and how he proposed Charisma should effect psionics more.

With new monsters, new classes, and now this, it is a wonder that people were not screaming about the oncoming publication of AD&D 2nd Ed or even AD&D 1.5 (as we would eventually call it).

Now on to our cover story. Bandits are an NPC class (snerk...ok, whatever you say) to add to your game. The article comes to us from Tom Armstrong and Roger E. Moore. The idea is very sound, Bandits are thieves that rely on strength and ambush instead of stealth. We toyed with the idea ourselves in the few games were both my highschool DM and my Jr. High DM were both in.  I rolled up a Bandit character for myself. No, he didn't look like Burt Reynolds (though that would have been fun).  It was not long though before we discovered that there was some logic to making this an NPC class. The Bandit has some interesting skills, but in a dungeon crawl setting, he takes a back seat to the thief.  Still the class was rather fun to play.

Roger Moore is back with last of the Demihuman Perspective articles, The Humanoids: Goals and Gods of the Kobolds, Goblins, Hobgoblins, & Gnolls. Again much of the material from this series will end up in Unearthed Arcana, though not this article in particular.  I used this article to help formulate some of my ideas about goblins and how Hobgoblins are different from Bugbears.  The only one I was not happy with here was the gnolls. I was already moving my gnolls to be more demonic.  I had read at some point (likely the Wildlife Treasury Cards we used to get; used the Vampire Bat as a bookmark for my Expert Book) that hyenas are led by an alpha female, so I figured gnolls had to be matriarchal.  This is something that others had grabbed onto as well since I now see it all over.  

The section continues with a few gods for each of these creatures and the Shoosuva the demonic undead gnoll. 

My Dragon goes from page 32 to 49.  So something is missing.  Checking my Dragon CD-ROM (and this rather meta for this issue, more later) I see it is an adventure named Chagmat by none other than Larry DiTillio.  The adventure is for six to eight characters of 1st to 4th levels. Now by my own rules I can't review this piece because it is not in my physical copy.  So...moving on. 

The Man, Myth & Magic ad is interesting since it lists all sorts of Hobby Shops that carry it.  My FLGS is not listed here since it will not open for a bit, but one jumped out at me because it is a.) close to my home and b.) an address that I recognize.  Sure enough The Compleat Gamer in Palatine, IL used to be a game store. Now it is the home of Nancy's Pizza, one of the three pizza places in the Chicag- land area to make the claim of inventing the Chicago-style deep crust.  I mean I used to live just 8 mins away from Games Plus my FLGS, but to have this one here too?  What a treat that would have been.

Ed Greenwood is next with Plan Before You Play. Seems like obvious advice to me but then again right now I have 43 years so of experience. That's 20 years more than Ed was in age at this point, not to mention experience.  BUT I will say this. If nothing else doing these "This Old Dragons" over the years has given me a greater appreciation for the work and scholarship Ed Green brought to the early days of the game.  Gary might get all the glory in this issue, but Ed is here just quietly turning in good material every month. 

An ad/notice from the RPGA.

Gary has a couple more articles discussing the Games Fair 82 convention in London. I should compare this to what White Dwarf was saying at the same time.

There is a mini-section next starting with some Phil Foglio art about Computers in D&D.  Micheal Brian Bently is up first with Computers Games Have a Way to Go.  He talks about how computers for simulating D&D games are not there yet. While the article is interesting as a historical perspective, I don't think the author, or any of us really, knew then how fast computer technology was going to explode.  There are typically two types of software commonly discussed in and around D&D circles; the DM's assistant and the immersive RPG experience type.  By 1986 the DM I had borrowed this Dragon from and I had already written a piece of software for the TRS-80/Tandy Color Computer we called "BARDD" that handled many of the tasks needed to simulate combat.

In fact it was this very computer:

I can only imagine what I would have thought of Skyrim back then!

Speaking of computers even not more than 15 years or so later would Dragon see another breakthrough in computers when Wizards of the Coast released the Dragon Magazine CD-ROM, the same one I mentioned above.  Unfortunately, it was because of articles like this one from Micheal Brian Bently that would be the reason we never saw any updates.  Why?  Because Micheal Brian Bently retained the copyright on his article (as was his prerogative) and TSR and thus WotC did not own it and could not reprint it. 

We get a note on Dragon's Policy on Programs. 

The Electric Eye from Mark Herro gives us two BASIC programs for Top Secret.  Developed for the TRS-80 Model I, Level II BASIC it should be usable by the Apple II or Atari 400/800.  I know from personal experience that the BASIC interpreter shipped with IBM XT machines at the time was a bit different and all programs would need tweaking to your particular machine. Don't even try it on an IBM PC Jr.

David Nallo has an interesting article on coinage with historical examples in For the Sake of Change. We played around with different coinage ideas a bit back then.  I tried to set up a silver-based economy vs. a gold-based one at one point after a discussion in history class about the US using a Silver standard in its early history. But in the end it never really made that much of a difference in the day-to-day lives of adventurers. 

Gary is back one more time in his role as a film critic in A Couple of Fantastic Flops. He reviews and rather hates the new Conan the Barbarian movie and The Sword & The Sorcerer.  We get more about the D&D movie coming out in 1984 or 85 and it is going to be better than Star Wars or Raiders of the Lost Ark!

We end with What's New? with Phil and Dixie talking about computers in RPGs and Wormy.  Dragonmirth has some comics. One, titled Charisma Roll has a player dreaming that the rolls will give him "Richard Chamberlin, Robert Redford, Harrison Ford..." but the dice are thinking "Ernest Borgnine."  Now I am going to say this, after the article we had from Len I would say Ernest Borgnine had a very high charisma. He was a funny, likable guy with a wonderful personality.  

In the end a pretty solid issue of Dragon punching WAY above its weight class here.  The material introduced here is still being used today and it is all good stuff.

Review: Xanathar's Guide to Everything (D&D 5e)

Less of a full review but more along the lines of reveiw/my thoughts on what was essentially the Unearthed Arcana of D&D 5th Edition.

Why this particular book now?  There are a few of the classes that I am considering back-porting over to B/X era D&D that my kids have expressed an interest in playing.  I may or may not post those.  They are not OGC and I have no plans to even "file the serial numbers off" to try an post them.  Sometime I do things just for me or for fun.

Xanathar's Guide to Everything

2017, Hardcover. 192 pages. Full-color covers and interior art. 

I called this book the "Unearthed Arcana" of D&D 5 and that is more or less on point. Much of the material here appeared in the pages of the online version of Unearthed Arcana.

The book has a wide variety of tools for Players and the DM and all are listed as being optional. This was published in 2017 so there is no hint here of anything that might be "5.5" or "5r" related.

The book is divided into an introduction, three chapters and two appendices.

Introduction

This covers what the book is about, and its origins from the online Unearthed Arcana. Wizards of the Coast has worked to get the layout of their D&D 5th ed books to be one of clean efficiency.  Maybe not as much as say Necrotic Gnome has with OSE, but still really nice.  For example their Table of Contents fits on a single page.

We get a (tiny) bit of background on who Xanathar is. Not being a huge FR fan I did not know but figured it had to be the same beholder from the 1st Edition AD&D Waterdeep and the North.

There is a page on "The Core Rules" which is really nice to have. There are ten rules that cover most situations.  These are all from the PHB and DMG, but nice to have them repeated here.

Chapter 1: Character Options

We start with a listing of the 31 new subclasses for the twelve base character classes.  Now before someone start screaming "rules bloat" these are not subclasses in the way that AD&D 1st Ed meant them.  These are archetypes of the main twelve classes. So for example the Cleric has the Life and War domains (among others) in the PHB now gains the Forge and Grave domains here.  Each subclass is tailored to the main class. So with Clerics they are "Domains" for Bards they are "Colleges" and Warlocks have "Pacts."   So they are more like the AD&D 2nd Edition Kits.  Both in good and bad ways. There is not much power creep yet. 

This chapter covers about 65 or so pages, so a third of the book. Each main class gets some details that worked for any subclass of that class (Bards get more instruments, clerics have more details on their temples for example). There are a lot of classes in this book. I am not going to get into every subclass here. But I would like to point out a few.

The Bard College of Swords is the spiritual descendent of the AD&D 2nd Bard kit known as the Blade; aka the moment I knew 2nd Ed Power Creep was happening.  The Blade Kit sucked. The fiction for it sucked and the NPC they used as their iconic Blade REALLY sucked. The College of Swords Bards are also called Blades. Their AD&D 2nd ed origins are very plain, BUT there is none of the power creep and thankfully the edgy NPC "Dark" is also gone.

Grave Domain Clerics are the other side of the coin of the Life Domain Clerics.  Where the Life Cleric (PHB) tries to preserve life, the Grave Domain Clerics make sure the dead stay at rest. They are the "good" option of the Death Domain Clerics (DMG).  Cleric Domains have their origin in 2nd Ed and were expanded greatly in 3rd Ed.

Fighters now have an Arcane Archer subclass (known as a Martial Archetype here). This is the 5e update of the 3rd Edition Prestige Class.   Monks (Monastic Traditions) get a Way of the Drunken Master and a Way of the Kensei. Paladins get new Oaths. Rangers get new Archetypes including the Gloom Stalker, a Ranger adept at working in dark places but my favorite is the Monster Slayer.  Rogues get the Mastermind and Scout Archetypes.

The Sorcerers are next.  Their subclasses are known as Arcane Origins, or essentially how you became a sorcerer. In addition to these are some tables on various supernatural marks (think witch mark) and other weirdness due to your bloodline. The one I wanted to convert is the Divine Soul. You have a bit of divinity in your blood.  I would convert these as a B/X Magic-user and allow them to have some free cleric spells based on their divine blood. Cure Light Wounds and Bless for Lawful for example.  Their Charisma would need to be high, like 14 and that would be their Prime Requisite ability too.  While they get the spell for free, they can only still cast it once per day. At the 14th level, they gain their Otherworldly Wings.  There is also the Shadow Magic Sorcerer. This feel like it is from the Shadowfell Player's book from 4e. 

Warlocks also get new marks and new invocations. There is a Celestial Pact for people that want to play "good" warlocks.  Before anyone dismisses this idea remember that Aleister Crowley had a pact with an angel he called Aiwass and believed was his personal guardian angel to who he made invocations to every day. 

Wizards have Arcane Traditions that more or less equated to "Schools of Magic."

The next section of this chapter covers a variety of character background ideas such as origins and life events with lots of random tables. Like an Old-School collection of random tables.  ALL of them are also perfectly adaptable for use in ANY version of D&D.  They remind me a lot of the tables from the 1st Ed AD&D Unearthed Arcana.  

There are some new racial feats, but unlike 3e or even 4e, 5e is not feat centric. You can even have a character that never takes a feat at all.  These are largely mechanical rule manifestations of possible background ideas.  Have weird eyes? Ok, you have weird eyes, jot it down on your sheet. Do these weird eyes do something special? Well, you might need to take a feat for that then.

Honestly, I did not see anything in this chapter that I could not easily convert to an earlier edition of and D&D. 

Chapter 2: Dungeon Master's Tools

This chapter covers a wide variety of topics but mostly expands on material already in the DMG. Topics like Falling, Sleep, Tying Knots, Adamantine Weapons, and Tool Proficiencies are all discussed. Lots of tools. 

Spellcasting gets a bit of special treatment here. The area of effects on a grid is detailed. d6s are used as visual aids to show how to set up on a grid. 

Some more detail on building monster encounters is also discussed, including single and multiple different types of monsters. There is an eye towards balance, but there is no requirement to do so. The only real advice is "avoid monsters that can drop a character in a single hit."  I have seen more than a few TPKs in D&D 5e. 

Again we are treated to what I can only describe as pages of old-school-style random encounter tables. 

There is also a section on Traps that while not quite as gleeful as a Grimtooth product, will still make that Chaotic Evil DM smile. How much?  One trap has a save DC of 20 and does 24d10 damage.

There is a discussion on downtime and the reason why my youngest bought this book, magic item creation rules. More magic items are also detailed.

Chapter 3: Spells

This last full chapter covers new spells. About 30 pages worth. The spell economy of 5e is different. There are no Cure Light Wounds, Cure Moderate Wounds, and Cure Serious Wounds spells for example. There is only Cure Wounds and it is a low-level spell for Bards, Clerics, Druids, Paladins, and Rangers.  IF you want a more powerful version you cast it at a higher spell level. So instead of a 1st level spell, it is treated as a 5th level spell for example. This means less print space is needed for spells. 

Appendix A: Shared Campaign

This covers working on interlinked campaigns and working details out.  Not everything you need to know is here, some more could have been written, but it is a great start.

Appendix B: Character Names

This section is just tables and tables of names. Various cultures (English, French, Egyptian, and more) as well as other nonhuman ones ( Elf, Dwarf, Dragonborn, and more).  The nonhuman includes a personal name and a family or clan name as well.  I did notice that two Tieflings from "Brimstone Angels," Farideh and Havilar, are listed under the Dragonborn names.  Why? Well their adoptive father Mehen (51-52 on a d100) was a Dragonborn so he gave them Dragonborn names. 

So. I picked up this book for the various subclasses, but found a wealth here for many of my other D&D games.

I would say that most of this book is easily adaptable to any version of D&D you choose to try it with.  The exception might be 4e. There are some seriously interlinked mechanics there.

Xanathar's did quite well for a splat book and was even listed as one of Publisher's Weekly best-selling books for December of 2017. 

Despite his name and picture on the cover there is not a lot of material on Xanathar himself outside of the sidebars.  Wizards would later do a much better job with Tasha in her book.

The art is amazing as to be expected.  The layout is a step up from the Core Rules and shows what the design team has learned in the last few years.

You can see bits and pieces of D&D's DNA from all editions here, though this is largely true for 5th edition in general. 

D&D Edition Wars: Why CAN'T I Play a B/X Paladin?

It's June and I have mentioned that it is D&D month around here. 

The natural question then is, "Which D&D?" All of them! "Even that one?" Yes. Even that one.

I was going through a bunch of material I need to review and Review (reading for my own benefit vs. a full review) and it got me thinking about a bunch of topics.  Should I play more Castles & Crusades? What should I do with all this Pathfinder stuff? Where did my copies of Dungeoneer's and Wilderness Survival Guides go? (seriously. where are they??).

This got me thinking about the various editions and edition wars.  I want to share the story of my first skirmish in the never-ending edition wars, but first I want to talk about the latest side battle in it and my point of view on this in general.

D&D Edition Wars

I am not sure if this will be a regular feature or not.  Typically I avoid edition wars and find them remarkably pedantic to be of any actual use. Don't like a particular edition? Fine. Don't play it.   BUT every so often something bubbles up that takes my notice and I want to comment on it.  The latest one comes to us courtesy of Stranger Things.

If you have not seen the new Season 4 of Stranger Things, please do. It is back to form and good drama.  Sure there are a LOT of characters now and no one is getting the spotlight for very long, but the last episode of Part 1 did a great job of tying together many of the seasonal arcs to set us up for the epic finale.  

They also get to play some D&D.  There is a bit where they deal with the Satanic Panic of the 80s.  I would talk about that now, but I have done that already and most recently back in April. So no real need for me to do that. But in the same milieu of edition wars we are getting some nagging from older gamers like myself complaining that Erica Sinclair's character should have been a Thief and not a Rogue. Well. That is technically correct yes. It was supposed to 1986 and the Rogue does not come into play until 1989. Lots of people are claiming this is a mistake.  Here is my point of view on that.

The Duffer Brothers did not make a mistake. 

Look in the very next scene of their game Dustin (played by the wonderful Gaten Matarazzo; seriously this kid is going to be a hell of an actor someday) drops lines about Vecna (the focus of their game and the season) having been destroyed by Kas. They already mentioned the lack of an eye and hand.  This is not deep lore to us, but to the causal viewer, it is.  And that's the thing. This show has to appeal to all viewers. Those that know D&D but mostly the vast majority that do not.  Here is her line.

"My name is Lady Applejack, and I'm a chaotic good, half-elf rogue, Level 14. And I will sneak behind any monster you throw my way, and stab them in the back with my poison-soaked kukri."

Remember the character is Chaotic Good (which we all understand) and supposed to be a heroic character.  IF she had said "Thief" it would not have the same level of understanding to the causal viewer as "Rogue" does.  Han Solo was a rogue. Robin Hood was a rogue. The normies get what a rogue is. A thief is someone who steals. Yes, yes, it has a different connotation in D&D but that is not the majority of the audience.  I posit that the Duffers knew exactly what they were doing. 

It reminds me of when my main character at the time was a Paladin.  I'd explain to others, who I was trying to get into the game, that my character was a Lawful Good Paladin. Which would ALWAYS be followed by "what's a Paladin?"  Eventually, I gave up and just started saying "Knight."  This is the same thing.  Also it is a nice segue into my next section.

Why CAN'T I Play a B/X Paladin?

The 80s were an amazing time for a lot of reasons. Even in my small home town there were multiple independent D&D groups and clubs happening all the time.  I got invited to a game by a friend one evening. This had to have been either very late in Jr. High I am guessing summer of 82 or 83.  In any case, I was going with my regular DM, he got to play for a change, and a bunch of people I never met. The DM called me ahead of time and asked if I would be willing to play a Lawful Good Paladin. I said sure! I was already playing a Lawful Cleric in my other game so this seemed like a good fit (and it was, but more on this).  Now is the time to be pedantic.  See I was playing a "Lawful Cleric" as in B/X D&D. My regular DM played AD&D and we ran our games as an unholy mix of the two. Not uncommon from what I know now and we had a lot of fun. My first experience with D&D was Holmes Basic and the AD&D Monster Manual.  My new DM just told me to bring my Expert book.

Well...that was a mistake. I brought my Expert D&D book to an Advanced D&D game and you would have thought I had brought a D&D Coloring book instead with the reactions I got.  Thankfully my DM was still cool about it, even if the other players held their noses in disgust.  

Nowadays of course people talk about their B/X days with pride and fond memories. Especially me.  But that was a contributing factor to me not picking up the BECMI sets when they came out soon after.  I was all in on AD&D from that point on.  No "kiddie" D&D for me! 

That was the first salvo in what I would later come to know as "The Edition Wars." There were many skirmishes between the Basic and Advanced folks back then. Nothing major, I can recall though.  The next battle was fought over the fields of "Unearthed Arcana" and then the "Proficiency Battles" connected with Dungeoneer's and Wilderness Survival Guides (seriously, where the hell are mine??) 

I still have my Paladin from that game. He went on to great glory in the Bloodstone series. I would also roll up my own paladin later, he was the son of my B/X Cleric. 

Now thanks to the OSR scene I have a lot of options to play a B/X Paladin.

If Johan II was my Advanced D&D Paladin and son of D&D Cleric Johan I. Then maybe I need to make a Kara Foke II as an OSE Paladin, son of Kara Foke that AD&D Paladin I played so long ago. 

Monstrous Mondays: Faerie Lord, Scáthaithe, The Umbral Lord

I have been in a bit of a creative slump here lately. By "lately" I mean the last few months.  I do want to get my various monster books done though.  So here is a guy been rattling around in my brain now for a while.  I am combining a couple of different ideas here that I have wanted to explore for a bit.

Faerie Lords

I have been working on a number of Faerie Lords for the Basic Bestiaries and the High Witch book.  These lords provide a number of interesting background NPCs and are also the various Powers that both Faerie Tradition Witches and Fey Pact Warlocks can honor/serve.   I have already detailed a few here, Titania, Queen of Faerie, Nicnevin, Faerie Queen of Witches, the Queen of Lies, and the Prince of Beasts.

My focus lately has been building the court of Nicnevin (also known as Nic an Neachneohain).  Hers is not a court of deep intrigues like Mab's or Titania's, but a powerful court all the same. Since those Courts are typically (if somewhat incorrectly) described as the Dark and Light courts (more properly Winter and Summer) I need a few independent "Shadow" Courts.  Nicnevin is the Queen of the Autumn Court.  Not a major court to be sure, but still powerful.  

Shadow Elves

There are more than one "Shadow Courts."  Last year I did a big series on Shadow Elves and various other shadow fey.  I was trying to come up with a good idea for Shadow Elves in my world and I looked to the Shadow Elves of Mystara and the Shadow Fey from Kobold Press and even into the ideas of the Shadowfell from D&D 4th Edition.   This lead me to do an adaptation of Kobold Press' The Dusk Queen.  But she is PI so I won't be using her in my books, save for maybe as a special guest in my home games. 

While reading more about the Shadowfell, the mortal world, and the Feywild for D&D 4 and 5 I came up with an idea of my own.

Just as the Mortal World (the Prime Material) intersects with the Shadow World (Shadowfell) and the World of Faerie (Feywild) they also intersect with each other.

So less this:

And more this: 

Excuse my lack of artistic ability here.

All three worlds intersect.  The intersection point of the Mortal and the Faerie is already detailed in many D&D books as the Feywild.  The intersection of the Mortal and Shadow is the Shadowfell.  The Shadowfey is the intersection of the Realms of Shadow and the Faerie Realms independent of the mortal world.  This is the area I am working on.  This is the home of the Umbral Elves.

Last Bits

Among other things I also needed a Faerie Lord, or at the very least a high level Faerie/Elf to be the father of a particular character.  I needed to have that character spend 13 years "stuck" in the faerie realms while she was getting instruction by her "faerie godmother" (Nicnevin).  And finally, I needed to develop a group of Elven Cavaliers for various reasons.  This particular group of Cavaliers is linked to witches and witchcraft.  Essentially they are the Elven Cavaliers from Dragon Magazine #114 tied more closely to the witch class that appears in the same issue. 

I also wanted a character that recalled the B/X Elf class that used sword and spell with equal proficiencies. 

Putting all of this together a new Faerie Lord emerges.

Scáthaithe, The Umbral Lord
Faerie Lord

Frequency: Unique
Number Appearing: 1 (1)
Alignment: Neutral [Chaotic Neutral]
Movement: 120' (40') [12"]
  Fly: 240' (80') [24"]
Armor Class: 2 [17]
Hit Dice: 13d8+52*** (111 hp)
To Hit AC0: 6 (+13)
Attacks: Sword +2 x3 or by spell
Damage: 1d8 +2 x3 or by spell
Special: Attacks three times per round, darkvision, harmed only by cold iron and magic weapons, 30% magic resistance, Wizard spells (12th level) 
Languages: Common, Elven, Sylvan, Giant, Abyssal
Size: Medium
Save: Magic-user 13
Morale: 12 (NA)
Treasure Hoard Class: U (VI) x10, See below
XP: 5,150 (OSE) 5,300 (LL)

Str: 16 (+2) Dex: 18 (+3) Con: 20 (+4) Int: 20 (+4) Wis: 16 (+2) Cha: 24 (+5)

The Faerie Court of Autumn is ruled very loosely by Nicnevin the Faerie Queen of Witches.  Her sometimes consort and Cowan is a being known in court as the Knight of Swords. He is also known as Scáthaithe ("skaw-he"), the Umbral Lord.  He is the melancholy lord of the Shadow Elves. 

Scáthaithe appears as a tall (7') tall elf-lord.  His skin is pale with an almost bluish tint to it. His hair is long and black and often tied back.  His eyes are bright green and his pupils are slitted like that of a cat's.  He wears the armor of a knight and carries a long darkened sword he calls "Moonblade."  He is often astride a black warhorse with large black wings.  The barding of this warhorse makes it at first appear to be some dark unicorn but is more akin to the pegasus.

When not in the court of the Witch Queen he will be found with his six sons, the Umbral Knights, patrolling the lands of the Shadowfey.  His sons act as 8-10 HD versions of their father. Their role is to patrol the Shadowfey and keep intruders out. This includes mortals and creatures of the outer planes.  Elementals can be found here if they have the leave of the local lords or ladies. 

Scáthaithe will attack intruders to the Shadowfey with both sword and spell.  He will use a long-range spell, such as magic missile to start with and then switch to his sword which he can attack three times per round.  He can cast spells as a 12th level magic-user.

The Umbral Lord has a keep deep in the Shadowfey, Scáthchoimeád where he resides with his sons. He had a Lady, his sons' mother, but that was long ago and he never speaks of her.  Presently he has taken up with a young human witch. It is also rumored that he is the son of a great lord of the Summer Court and a great lady of the Winter Court, possibly even Oberon and Mab. 

Scáthaithe as a Witch/Warlock Patron:  By agreement with his Queen Nicnevin, Scáthaithe does not take on witches as part of the Faerie Tradition. Though he can be invoked by these witches through Nicnevin.  He does however work as a Patron for warlocks. He can be used as a Fey Pact Patron and is particularly well suited as a Pact of the Blade warlock.  His warlock can manifest a dark sword similar to his one Moonblade.  He is also favored by half-elf warlocks who see themselves as being a member of two different worlds and also being of neither; like a shadow.

It's STILL June!

 I know. Redundant.  A few things.

1. I was spending some time going through old posts and I have a bunch of dead links, more or less dead pages, and the like.  So I was thinking a site redesign might be in order.  Nothing confirmed yet.

2. Have you been OUTSIDE yet?  I don't about where you are, but here in Chicagoland it is GLORIOUS! I am thinking of moving my work laptop out to my patio and working there the rest of the summer.

Hardening a few more plants

3. I have an Itch.io profile now.  No idea what I am going to do there.

4. Stranger Things. Watch it. Now.

5. I promise this will get back to D&D.

6. Seriously. Go outside.

It's June!

The last couple of months has been really busy here at the ole' Other Side. I went from the "April A to Z"  right into SciFi month.  I think June is a great time to get back to the bread and butter of this blog; D&D.  Plus watching Season 4 of Stranger Things has really put me back into the mood.

June was always a great D&D month for me.  While in school it meant summer break. After I got married and had a house it was the month when the planting season was mostly over.  My wife has always had a huge garden (+2,000 ft², that's a lot for the burbs) so in April and May, every weekend is spent outside working.

I have to admit that of late I have been in a sort of creative lull.  Oh I am still picking at the various Basic Bestiaries and I am collecting art for them. My goal/plan/desire is NOT to do a Kickstarter for it. So I am collecting and buying art as I can.  I have not done much if anything on the High Witchcraft book. I have been sorting through the 800+ spells I have written over the years and trying to figure out which ones need to be used.  Both of these projects will be generic OSR, so not tied to any one rule system. I will use my own Compatibility Logos on them.  But the ideas have not been flowing really at all.  Oh I have picked some Fey Lords and a few different types of Angels (both are also discussed in the High Witchcraft book) but that is about it really.   You may have noticed that outside of NIGHT SHIFT I have not produced anything during Covid-Times. You also may have noticed the uptick in reviews here vs. new content.

My friend and day-job co-worker Richard Ruane pointed me in the direction of something going on on Itch.io.  Itch.io is an RPG PDF storefront similar to DriveThruRPG but catering more to the Indie crowd.  All I know about it is the prices of the PDFs are usually twice to three times what I expect to pay on DriveThru, but whatever.  The thing he pointed out to me was the OSR June Jam. 

https://itch.io/jam/osr-june-jam

I have never participated in a Design Jam for RPGs before. I have done plenty at my day job. So I thought I should give it a go.  

This sounds like a fun idea really, and I do have two completely brand new ideas I could do with this. I will talk about them later since I am looking into some details now. But a hint for one is "Halfling Folk Horror."

It is hosted on Itch.io but I have to look at my contract with DriveThruRPG since I think I signed exclusivity. I don't know yet.  Submissions are due at the end of the month so that gives me 28.5 days to get it all in.

I will also use my Compatibility Logos above for these, but my target system is likely to be Old School Essentials Advanced Fantasy and/or Advanced Labyrinth Lord.   Though there are some logos on the site they recommend.

Maybe this is something I need to shake off the cobwebs in my brain.

In the meantime check out all the empty space on my Itich.io profile: https://timsbrannan.itch.io/

Sci-Fi / Traveller Month Wrap-up

I can't believe we are at the end of May now.  My plans had been to do a Sci-Fi month featuring Traveller but also doing some other games as well.  The month got away from me and as I started my deep dive I decided to focus more and more attention on Traveller alone. And that is ok. This is something I have been wanting to do for a long time.

I do feel bad I did not get to Starfinder or the Expanse RPGs. I also wanted to review The Lucanii Drift adventure.  I am sure I will get to those sooner or later.

Here is a list of all the Traveller posts I made in May.

• Mayday, Mayday! This is the Free Trader Beowulf... (Introduction)
• Review: Classic (Basic) Traveller
• Review: The Traveller Book (1982)
• Review: The Traveller Adventure (1983)
• Review & Retrospective: Traveller Board Games
• Review: Traveller Starter Edition (1983)
• Review: Traveller Alien Modules (1984 - 1987), Part 1
• Review: Traveller Alien Modules (1984 - 1987), Part 2
• This Old Dragon: Retrospective, The Traveller Articles
• Review: 2300 AD Traveller: 2300 (1986)
• Review: MegaTraveller (1987)
• Review: Traveller: The New Era (1993)
• Review: T4 Marc Miller's Traveller (1996)
• Review: Traveller20 (2002-2007)
• Review: Traveller Main Rulebook (2008)
• Review: T5 Traveller5 Core Rules 3-Book Set (2015)
• Review: Mongoose Traveller 2nd Edition (2016, 2022)
• Review: Traveller and Cepheus SRDs

There is much, much more I could have done. There is 45 years worth of Traveller materials out there and I only scratched the surface.

I do want to thank everyone that came by and commented, shared their own interactions with the various rule systems, gave me advice and corrections.  You helped make this a better series.

I suppose the natural question to ask is "Which edition(s) will I be playing?"  I think it is a toss-up between the Classic 1977 Traveller and the new Mongoose Traveller.  Both seem like they will do everything I want. 

Next May I am thinking of doing Star Trek RPGs. Focusing on the FASA and Mōdiphiüs versions but also looking into the Last Unicorn Games and Decipher versions as well as the various versions of Starfleet Battles.  It would have been great to do that one this year given all the Star Trek we have had on TV of late, but Traveller really had to come first.  Maybe one day I'll do Star Wars.

Moving into June where I want to get back to some D&D!  (Stranger Things is back!) I also want to get more monster book reviews in.  

Soon after that, I have something special planned I am calling "100 Days till Halloween."  So keep an eye out for that.

Monstrous Mondays: Spelljammer Monstrous Compendium for 5e

Getting back to my Monstrous Mondays with a review of a Monstrous Compendium, but this is a new Monstrous Compendium for 5th Edition D&D. 

This might very well be the new format for monsters for D&D 5.5/5r.  

Monstrous Compendium Vol One: Spelljamer Creatures

Wizards of the Coast released this free in PDF format and on DnDBeyond.  

Inside are 10 new (to D&D 5) monsters.  They are,:Asteroid Spider, Clockwork Horror, Eldritch Lich, Fractine, Gadabout, Goon Balloon, Nightmare Beast, Puppeteer Parasite, Star Lancer, and Yggdrasti.  They range from CR 1/8 to 15. 

It is a fun little sampling, a nice appetizer till we get some proper Spelljamer materials later this year.

What I find interesting is the switch from Wildspace to the Astral Sea. Personally, that is what I wanted to do back in the 2nd ed days, but the point became moot when I never got my Spelljammer game off the ground, literally and figuratively. 

So I am really looking forward to the new setting this summer.

--

This is my, rather late, contribution to this month's RPG Blog Carnival.  This month hosted by Rising Phoenix Games. Check out all the posts about Spelljammer from this month.

Review: Traveller and Cepheus SRDs

Ok. I will be honest this is much less of a review than it is an overview/analysis of the various Traveller and Traveller like SRDs and OGLs. 

Mongoose SRD

Mongoose, back in 2008 released the first version of their Traveller RPG and a version of a Traveller SRD with an Open Gaming License. This covered their First Edition game.  Later they updated it 2nd Edition.  At some point (I am not sure when really) they also created the High Guard System Reference Document and Mercenary System Reference Document.  This covers an awful lot of Traveller. 

My understanding is there is a Compatibility License though I did not find any details on it, but that is fine.

Much like the d20 SRD there are a few different copies out there.  These are the ones I have referenced the most often.

• https://www.traveller-srd.com/
• http://www.travellersrd.com/

Cepheus SRD / Engine

Back in 2016 Jason Kemp released the Cepheus SRD which emulated Traveller. Personally, from a game design point of view, I rather like it.  He took the Mongoose Traveller SRD and then did something I really like, he took other SRDs to get the desired effect.  Here are the various SRDs from his Section 15 of the OGL of the Cepheus Engine RPG:

Open Game License v 1.0a Copyright 2000, Wizards of the Coast, Inc.

High Guard System Reference Document Copyright ©2008, Mongoose Publishing. Mercenary System Reference Document Copyright © 2008, Mongoose Publishing.

Modern System Reference Document Copyright 2002- 2004, Wizards of the Coast, Inc.; Authors Bill Slavicsek, Jeff Grubb, Rich Redman, Charles Ryan, Eric Cagle, David Noonan, Stan!, Christopher Perkins, Rodney Thompson, and JD Wiker, based on material by Jonathan Tweet, Monte Cook, Skip Williams, Richard Baker, Peter Adkison, Bruce R. Cordell, John Tynes, Andy Collins, and JD Wiker.

Swords & Wizardry Core Rules, Copyright 2008, Matthew J. Finch

System Reference Document, Copyright 2000, Wizards of the Coast, Inc.; Authors Jonathan Tweet, Monte Cook, Skip Williams, based on original material by E. Gary Gygax and Dave Arneson.

System Reference Document Copyright 2000-2003, Wizards of the Coast, Inc.; Authors Jonathan Tweet, Monte Cook, Skip Williams, Rich Baker, Andy Collins, David Noonan, Rich Redman, Bruce R. Cordell, John D. Rateliff, Thomas Reid, James Wyatt, based on original material by E. Gary Gygax and Dave Arneson.

T20 - The Traveller’s Handbook Copyright 2002, Quiklink Interactive, Inc. Traveller is a trademark of Far Future Enterprises and is used under license.

Traveller System Reference Document Copyright © 2008, Mongoose Publishing. Traveller is © 2008 Mongoose Publishing. Traveller and related logos, character, names, and distinctive likenesses thereof are trademarks of Far Future Enterprises unless otherwise noted. All Rights Reserved. Mongoose Publishing Ltd Authorized User.

Cepheus Engine System Reference Document, Copyright ©2016 Samardan Press; Author Jason “Flynn” Kemp

He also used the T20 and Modern d20 OGC for this. Very clever.

This was released as the Cepheus Engine RPG in 2017. It is a complete RPG, but still mostly an SRD in an RPG cover. That is fine since it's goal is not to be a game but to be a resource to make material for other games.  To continue my rather awkward D&D analogy this is all 100% OSRIC; both in form and function.

In 2021 Stellagama Publishing released the Cepheus Deluxe RPG.  Which is an RPG based on the Cepheus Engine.  Extending the analogy further to point of self-referencing, this is the Swords & Wizardry of Traveller. At least in function.  

Of these, I have the Cepheus Deluxe in POD and it compares favorably to the OSR offerings for the D&D clones. It also compares well to the Classic Traveller line.

Review: Mongoose Traveller 2nd Edition (2016, 2022)

We are coming to the end of my journey with the Traveller rule system. Not 100% at the end, but getting there.   Today I want to talk about the newest, 2nd Edition of Mongoose Traveller.  This edition is an update to the Mongoose Traveller from 2008. Again it coexists with the T5 Traveller from Far Future Enterprises I reviewed yesterday.  The only thing I can liken it to is the coexistence of D&D 4e and Pathfinder 1st Edition. Though which one is which is a matter of opinion.

Traveller 2nd Edition was first released in 2016.  A revised update was released in 2021 and called the "2022 Edition."  Both are the same rules though the 2022 update has a few improvements in layout and editing.  For this review I am just going to consider the 2022 version and notes from the 2016 version. 

Traveller Core Rulebook Update 2022

PDF. 266 pages. Full-color covers and interior art. Bookmarked and hyperlinks table of contents. 

Traveller is experiencing a renaissance of sorts. We live in time where old-school games are really popular, sci-fi is having a new golden age (have you seen all the Star Treks we now have?) and Traveller is riding that wave.  The new Traveller is best seller on DriveThru with the 2016 version a Mithral bestseller and the 2022 version a Platinum bestseller as of this writing.  I also know my FLGS sells the books hand over fist. One of the reasons I wanted to do my deep dive into Traveller now was because of all of this.

So how is the 2022 Edition?

In a word it is gorgeous.  

Mongoose, back in the early d20 boom, earned a bit of a reputation of a "spaghetti publisher" as in "throw a plate of spaghetti against the wall and see what sticks."  As time went on their reputation improved. These days they get a lot of credit for not just having solid books, but also serving the d20 bust.  Though some less than perfect editing sneaks in. The 2016 edition seemed to have this problem; at least that is what I have read online.  Both books had high-quality color art, there are some pieces in the 2016 edition I actually like a little better, but in general, I am pretty happy with what I see.  Happy enough to wish I had grabbed the physical books when I was last at my FLGS. 

What about the rules?

The book is similar in many ways to Mongoose 1st Edition, but enough differences in layout and organization.  For the first time, the designer did NOT try to invoke the feeling of old Classic Traveller.  This is a GOOD thing.  To attract new players they needed to make this a new game.

Introduction

This covers the various reasons why you might want to play Traveller and the different ways to play. I was hoping that among the examples of Star Trek and Starship Trooper they would include the most British of all Traveller shows, "Blake's 7." Which always was my goto example. 

There are some suggested books to read such as Traveller Companion, High Guard, The Third Imperium, and more.  I don't have those so I can't comment on them here.  What it does tell me that this version of Traveller is set in the Third Imperium. So that is something to look forward too. 

We get some game and dice conventions and descriptions of the Tech Levels.

Traveller Creation

Character creation is next as expected. This follows much along the lines of all Traveller versions. You roll your six abilities/characteristics.  We are back to our standard six from Classic Traveller with the same point spread and averages. The CCP is still here too.

You pick your background skills and then move to the next phase. There are good flow charts for character creation and the character sheet is annotated.  You go into your pre-career (aka school) and then move to your career. 

Like the first edition, careers are laid out with face pages so everything you need for a career is at a glance.

This is quite helpful really.  The careers supported in this core rules are Agent, Army, Citizen, Drifter, Entertainer, Marine, Merchant, Navy, Noble, Rouge, Scholar, and Scout.  There is an extra "career" that of Prisoner. Possibly to do that epic Stainless Steel Rat or Farscape adventure.

Various benefits and of course mishaps occur, leaving you with extra cash, some property or medical debt. 

There are some Skill Packages now.  There is a push here to get all the players and characters working to gether to make sure there is cohesion. 

We then get some examples of Alien species. The Aslan and the Vargr. 

Skills and Tasks

This chapter is combined as it really should be.  The system is basic which is what you want.  The character rolls a 2d6 and need to get greater than an 8 to succeed.  There are various Die Modifiers added and the Target number (the "8") can be be altered depending on the task difficulty. There are example throughout which works well.  An "Impossible Task" for example would require 16 or more rolled on the check.  There are also levels of success and failure. So if the roll is missed by -6 that is an "Exceptional Failure."  A roll of 6+ over the target number is an "Exceptional Success."

The amount of time spent on a skill check can alter the results and there are opposed checks as well. 

The rest of the chapter covers all the skills, their specialities and descriptions.

Combat

Combat is a always separate and it is a special case of a skill check.  What I do like about this system is that combat can rely on STR or DEX as appropriate and is not hard-coded like say D&D. For example Initiative can be modified by DEX or INT.

The combat phase is broken down into Significant, Minor, and Free actions.  You can do one Significant and one minor action per round or three minor actions.  You can perform anynumber of Reactions or Free Actions as permitted. What can be done in these actions is detailed. Attacking an opponent is Significant action, as is giving orders (Leadership). Minor actions are things like aiming, reloading, changing stance. 

Damage is discussed and it is very deadly.  

Encounters and Dangers

This combined the old Encounters and Animal Encounters chapters of Classic-era Travellers. There are all sorts of environmental dangers, diseases, high and low gravity situations, radiation, falling and so much more. Hmmm. Maybe best just to stay on your homeworld.  To quote Leonard McCoy from the 2009 Star Trek movie "Space is disease and danger wrapped in darkness and silence."

Animals are discussed and even a few examples are given. 

NPCs are also presented with the ubiquitous d66 tables of quirks, motivations and more that Traveller fans love. 

Equipment

Covers the economy briefly and plenty of things to spend your precious few credits on. The list here is not highly different.  What is different here is the new level of art added to the lists.  Descriptions of arms and armor are paired with great color art of these items.  More than that there are tech items, medical equipment, computers, and survival gear.  Various toolkits are also described such as Planetary Sciences and Psionicology Toolkits.

And of course guns.

Each bit of equipment comes with a TL rating.

Vehicles

Cover most moveable craft that are not Starships. Each one gets a TL rating, an associated skill needed to operate, speed factors, crew/pilot and of course cost. Nothing is free in the Imperium. 

Spacecraft Operations

A mostly alphabetical listing of everything (mostly everything) that can go on in a ship. 

Space Combat

Similar to other versions and the combat chapter above. This details how ships can fight including movement, targeting, and firing phases. Along with damage and reactions.  The chapter is not large but remarkably detailed.

Spacecraft Construction

I think I would have put this chapter before combat.  Mayb put combat after Common Spacecraft.

Distinctions are made between interplanetary and interstellar spacecraft.  Like character creation, there is a helpful flowchart. 

Common Spacecraft

I rather love this chapter. This lists all sorts of spaceships with their details and a full color picture and some deck plans. This is also laid out so many of the ships have all their details on the facing pages. 

Many of these ships are found in previous versions of Traveller too. So it adds a nice bit of continuity to it all. 

Psionics

Stuck near the end is psionics again. There are talents and powers and the Psion Career.  I have always liked the Psionic powers section in Traveller, but this one really makes me want to play one.  The Careers are all numbered 1 through 12 with the "Prisoner" at 13 (Navy for example is 8).  The Psion career is appropriately numbered "X."

Trade

Covers basic trade between the worlds/systems/colonies.  There is a huge d66 list of Trade Goods to be used by Referees. 

World and Universe Creation

This chapter feels more like Classic Traveller than the others. Sadly no equations to apease the math geek in me but a lot of information all the same. The section is not huge and I a sure there are additional books for more worlds out there.  But there is enough here to get you started.

Index

The index is comprehensive and hyperlinked.

Unlike previous versions of Traveller there is no included adventure here.

--

Ok. What can we say here at the end?  Or in other words who should buy this Traveller and what does it have over other Editions/Versions?

Who Should Buy This?

Much like D&D is synomous with Fantasy Roleplaying, Traveller is synomous with SciFi Roleplaying.  IF you want to try science fiction out then for me the obvious first step is to see what Traveller is doing.

Traveller 2nd Ed 2016 vs. 2022

Both corebooks are still on the market now.  They are the same system.  I have both and while the rules are largely the same the organization of the 2022 version is much better.

Classic Traveller vs. Mongoose Traveller 2nd Edition

Ah. The old-school vs. new-school debate. We live in a time where not only you can get new Traveller in print you can get old Traveller in print as well.  Which one should you play?  I think the choice comes down to experiences.  Both games really let you play the same game. Both games are fun. Both games take on some basic assumptions but largely leave the rest of the universe to your imaginations.

IF you started with any version of Traveller and enjoy that, then stick with that, but certainly check this one out.  IF you have never played any version of Traveller before then the Mongoose 2nd Edition, 2022 version is the one to get.  You can buy it at DriveThruRPG or your FLGS.

Mongoose Traveller vs. FFE Traveller

We owe a lot to Far Future Enterprises for getting all the Traveller books from 1977 up to today scanned and added as a PDF to both their website and to DriveThruRPG.  That is a huge debt we owe them.  However, I can't exactly recommend Traveller 5 over Mongoose's version. There might be content in the FFE Traveller 5 that I could port over. But I think to show my appreciation for what they have done, I'll keep buying the older Traveller materials.

In the end, for me, Mongoose Traveller 2nd Edition is, right now, the best Traveller I can buy. 

I'll make an effort to grab a print version the next time I am at my FLGS.  Right now there is no Print on Demand version for the 2022 edition.

This would be the nominal end of my Traveller reviews, but not so fast. There is still a THIRD way to play "Traveller" that is active and in print today.