#RPGaDAY Day 23, Coolest looking RPG product / book

#RPGaDAY Day 23, Coolest looking RPG product / book

Not really sure.  There have been so many.

I loved BESM 3.0 when it first came out. Colorful and really captured the feel I wanted.

I loved the way the Dresden Files RPG looks too.

But for my money the coolest RPG books are still WitchCraft and the 1st Ed. Monster Manual.

These two books fill me with all sorts of geek-related joy.

Kickstart Your Weekend

With record numbers of families hitting Gen Con this year this next Kickstarter is not a huge surprise.

The Baby Bestiary by Andreas Walters
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/metalweavedesigns/the-baby-bestiary

Infant and young versions of classic monsters.

This is exactly something my kids would have loved a couple of years ago and it would make a great gift to a younger gamer.

The art so far looks great. They are offering a book, a calendar, desktop wallpapers and post cards.
They have 3 weeks left and are already funded. So check them out.

#RPGaDAY Day 22, Best Secondhand RPG Purchase

#RPGaDAY Day 22, Best Secondhand RPG Purchase

In one of my many moves during college and grad school I lost a milk crate's worth of my 1st Edition books.  I lost most of my modules, some Dungeon magazines, my Basic and Expert Sets and all my 1st Ed Hardbacks except my Deities and Demigods.  I still had all my 2nd ed stuff, Ravenloft and some of my modules.

At first I was not too bummed out.  I had 2nd ed and I was kind of getting out of D&D.

A few years later I saw some near mint 1st ed books on eBay.  My wife saw them and told me to get them.  Must have been something in the water because no one bidded on them.

I got a PHB, MM, DMG, and a FF all for about 60 bucks.  At the time I called it a steal and I still do!

Cosplaying Drow

I am not sure what everyone thinks about this, but there is a good post on Cosplaying Drow.

http://blackroleplayersorganization.blogspot.com/2014/08/cosplaying-drow.html

I know there are some people out there reading this that are not going to "get it".  And to be honest my understanding is academic at best.  I belong to the power class. I am a well off, hetero, white male in a hobby predominated by white males. But that doesn't mean I don't have empathy or understanding.

To me a universally despised race that is inherently evil being depicted as dark skinned seemed to smack a little too much of racism or white-privilege at the least.  I have prefered to make my Drow pale skinned like the monstrous Morlocks from H.G. Wells.  Though I am also happy with purple or pale blue Drow (no offense to Scottish people).  

No I don't see this as reverse racism since like most Irish descendants I tend to be more pale pink than anything else.  My wife who has more Ukrainian in her background tends to be more reddish.

What are your thoughts?
I happen to agree with the original poster.  It is not how some other might see things, but how the people who have been harmed might.

#RPGaDAY Day 21, Favourite Licensed RPG

#RPGaDAY Day 21, Favourite Licensed RPG

Is this even a question? ;)

Ghosts of Albion is my baby. I will write other games, I might even write batter ones, but Ghosts was like nothing else.

I also enjoy Buffy, Elric, Call of Cthlhu (that is sorta licensed), the various DC Comics RPGs and more.
I'll also admit that d20 Star Wars is my favorite version of that game, but I like all versions of Star Trek.

Owl & Weasel Wednesday #6 July 1975

Owl & Weasel #6 from July 1975 will be forever immortalized as the "Dungeons & Dragons" issue.

Page 1 of the issue describes the game we all know so well and it is interesting to read something like this; the game as something new and different.  The editors admit they are already obsessed with it and there is even a dragon on the masthead, making the issue temporarily Dragon, Owl & Weasel.
The article is continued later in the issue. Steve Jackson describes the contents of the box, 3 "little" books and not thousands of pieces.  Though he adds that he thinks $10.00 is "too much" to pay for the game.  Some things never change really. Jackson concludes calling D&D a "modern classic".

Moving on in the issue. The Letters page has a letter complaining about the lack women in gaming.  Again some things never changing.

Later on Steve Jackson discusses the costs of D&D. Again the $10.00 price tag is mentioned, but also $5.00 for Chainmail and "at least" $2.50 for dice.  Minifigs are also mentioned with several genres mentioned.   Additionally Games Workshop reports that they will be selling D&D in at least three weeks.

Page 11 is the second part of Percy Kenyon's coverage of Mah Jong. Interesting and more complicated than I realized. I mean I new Mah Jong was a strategy game (and not the solitaire version found on lots of computers) but I guess I didn't think about how detailed it was.

The back page features a TSR price listing of what will be soon available in the U.K.

The enthusiasm in this article abounds. Sitting here comfortably on the other side of nearly 40 years (and after the largest Gen Con on record) it is easy to forget that once upon a time this hobby of ours was new. Not just new, it had a start and that start is documented here.   I am not trying to sound all sappy here. I am big proponent of always looking forward, but sometimes you have to look back to see where you have been.  Sometimes it doesn't amount to much, other times the difference is so striking that it leaves you somewhat agape or stunned. This is one of those moments.  Sure some of the actual words said are even the same (it costs too much, where are the women?) but these are the first times they have been said and that is something important.

Not sure what the next issues will bring, but for me I am looking for that joy of discovery of a new thing.  But I guess that is what it is all about all the time really.

eta: The middle pages

#RPGaDAY Day 20, Will still play in 20 years time…

#RPGaDAY Day 20, Will still play in 20 years time…

Well.

I have been doing it this long (35 years) another 20 sounds reasonable.
Plus I could be retired then and really be an old, pain in the ass Grognard.
I could yell at the new kids and tell the how we used to do it back in the day.

Plus RPGs seem like a good way to keep your mind sharp and that is important in your later years.
It also looks like RPGs will still be around then too. Gen Con and D&D5 are both doing quite well now and there were a lot of small children there ready to take the hobby into the next generations.