ENnies Voting is now Open

The annual ENnies awards is now open for voting and as usual, there are a lot of great choices to vote for, or at the very least shop for.

I might get into my picks later on (have to see how long voting is) but for today I want to focus on one particular book and maybe convince you to consider voting for it.

Up for Best Adventure and Best Cartography is Halls of the Blood King for Old-School Essentials. 

I reviewed Halls of the Blood King last month and frankly, I loved it.  So it is great seeing it get some official recognition.  It would be even great if it wins.

It has some serious competition, in particular from the Alien RPG adventure.  But keep in mind that OSE is still largely a one-man operation of Gavin Norman.  Alien and Free League is a more traditional publisher.  So to say that OSE and Blood King are punching well above their weight class is not hyperbole. 

So, if you can make the time, give HotBK a vote for both Best Adventure and Best Cartography.

#RPGaDAY2021 Day 19 Theme

Should be easy to stay on theme today.

Day 19 Theme

If my participation in the Character Creation Challenge in January, the April A to Z Challenge, and this month's #RPGaDAY Challenge, is any indication, I do love a nice theme to work with.

In my blog posts, it gives me a little extra focus and a little extra motivation.  It gives me something to look forward too and apparently, my readers agree.  My hits tend to go up during these times.

This year I am going to be doing my usual October Horror movie marathon and I am considering doing a Lovecraft film fest.  While that has some appeal and something I wanted to do for a while, but sadly many of the movies are not very good.  Not to mention I have seen most of them already.  Kinda defeats the purpose of the Horror Movie Challenge.

I will also be participating in the RPG Blog Carnival for October. The subject, naturally enough, will be Horror.   I have a few other treats for October planned as well, it is practically my holiday.

Other themes I enjoyed recently were BECMI month last year, Troll Week, Van Richten's Guide to Ravenloft, and for a deep cut, Superbabes.

I still want to do a series of Superhero posts including some different approaches to the superhero genre.  I could easily spend a month on that. 

#RPGaDAY2021 Day 18 Write

Today's word is Write. Something I do every day.

Day 18 Write

Theodore Sturgeon, the American science fiction author, once stated that "ninety percent of everything is crap."  This has been come to be known as Sturgeon's law. 

I am not sure about his quantification, but I agree with the spirit of his adage.

Once upon a time, I did not consider myself a good, or even a fair, writer.   I enjoyed doing it for myself, but I never felt I would have anything worth publishing.  But at some point, it became obvious to me that the only way to get better at it was to keep doing it.  Not just do it, but also to get feedback and use that feedback.

These days I like to think that I am much better than I was.  Am I good?  That's hard for me to tell on this side of the keyboard.  I look at things I have written and often think "Wow. That is some good stuff...but it could be better."  Even books I am really proud of, Ghosts of Albion, the first Witch book, I look back on and see things I really would like to go back and "fix."  Not that they are broken per se, just things I would have liked to have done differently.

I am not talking about game design, I am always tweaking that (my "Basic" Monster stat block is a good example), but rather wording.

Blog posts are a good place for me to practice this and to get some feedback.  So if I have over 4,730+ posts up now (with a little over two-score in draft mode) that would mean according to Sturgeon that would mean that just north of 4,200 posts here are "garbage" and only 470 or so are "good."   I would like to think the good posts are a little higher, but again I can't argue with the spirit of these numbers.

Even if over 4,200 of my posts are garbage they did serve their purpose. Sometimes that is just have something to ponder while working something out, a bit of playtest, or at the very, very least, practice writing.   And this is just the stuff you have all seen.  I have a lot, maybe even a near equal amount that has never seen the light of day and may not.  That's fine. 

This is also one of the reasons I like to participate in these sorts of challenges.  While some ideas are easy, others require a lot more thought on how they relate to me. Writer workshops often have work sessions where you are given a prompt and have to come up with something.  This is the same idea only I have a bit more of a heads up. 

Hopefully, after 14 years of doing this blog I am still getting better.

#RPGaDAY2021 Day 17 Trap

Traps seem ubiquitous in D&D. But honestly, I have never cared for them. The same goes for mimics.

Day 17 Trap

Traps.  Back in the early days of D&D traps were everywhere.  Their existence was one of the early reasons for the thief class.  These days the trap finding and removing the role of the thief is somewhat lessened and for me that is fine.  Because honestly I never really cared for traps.

Sure I don't mind them in small amounts and I like to include at least one or two in a dungeon I don't like to go nuts with them.

What's "nuts?"  Tomb of Horrors always struck me as excessive.  

Back in the 80s traps were all the rage, with Grimtooth's Traps as something of the gold standard.  Back in Jr. High I got my then DM a copy of one of the Grimtooth's Traps books, Traps Too, I think. Big mistake. I got characters trapped in something he had added to the A Series, he never made it out alive.  I let my kids know this when we played the series. I suggested if they found maybe his body was still there and they could loot it!  Sadly (or luckily) they never found him and I honestly could not recall where the trap was added.

Today the traps of choice are Mimics.  

Like traps, I never used a lot of mimics. They are great once, but then after that, they lose their appeal to me.  

In a 5e game, my lack of desire for traps is no big deal. The thief/rogue class has a lot more to do than be the trap finder/trap remover.    But in my War of the Witch Queens, which is a D&D B/X game, I really should have more. 

#RPGaDAY2021 Day 16 Villain

Having a hero is great, but a hero is only as good as the villain they battle.

Day 16 Villain

Villains are great.  I have talked about villains and big bads, and all sorts of bad guys over the years. 

Who have been my favorites?

Yoln, the Shadow Reaper & Hand of Leviathan

Yoln, the bad guy so nice I used him twice.  He was a human general that rose up through the ranks to become a Pit Fiend and the general of Hell's Army in the Dragon Wars from my 1st Ed AD&D game.  He was defeated there and cast out of Hell into the Astral where he was recruited by the Mad God Leviathan where he became the big bad of my Buffy RPG campaign, the Dragon & the Phoenix.  Is he really dead now?  Who knows. He might be back someday.

But after that I decided that no big bad of central villain would work for Season of the Witch.

Cult of the Dragon

The cult that gave my first campaign with my kids so much trouble. 

Come Endless Darkness

My favorite villains though are demons.  In my interconnected Come Endless Darkness the demons are overtly the bad guys with Lolth and Grazzt giving the Order of the Platinum Dragon so much trouble.  Demogorgon is behind all the cults in the Second Campaign.  And Orcus is challenging all the characters into my Into the Nentir Vale campaign.  But all are being deceived by Asmodeus, with the help of Grazzt.  Asmodeus in turn is being deceived by Tharizdûn.  In the end, Tharizdûn hopes to reign supreme with the devils under his control and the power structure of the demons destroyed.

War of the Witch Queens

My newest campaign deals with the death of the ruling Witch High Queen and the power vacuum that creates.  The villains of this piece are Kalek and Skylla.  I talked about their involvement last year's #RPGaDAY.  I am also thrilled to see that they are getting new minis for the next D&D 5e book.  That set also includes the fan favorite, Warduke.  Maybe I should add him in for nostalgia's sake.

Looking forward to that set as well as all my players coming up against all these great villains.

#RPGaDAY2021 Day 15 Supplement

Today's word has gotten me thinking about what are my favorite RPG Supplements.

Day 15 Supplement

RPG supplements are kind of an odd thing.  Some very much have the feel of "leftovers" or things that were meant for the core book but for one reason or another they didn't quite make the cut.  

Others do feel like a very nice addition to the game they are supporting.

Back in the earliest days of my gaming, I did not really see supplements as something "Extra." Indeed the marketing worked well on me I and I often saw this or that book as somehow "required" to play.  I have naturally relaxed that attitude a bit.  I have all the major hardcovers for AD&D 1st ed, but I stick mostly to the cores for AD&D 2nd Ed and D&D 3rd Ed.  4th Edition is somewhat different, but I do have a "core" I stick with. Same as Pathfinder.

The first real supplement that I ever bought was for a game I didn't get to play all that much, but the supplement was worth every penny I paid.  That would have been Chill Vampires for 1st Ed (Pacesetter) Chill.   It really changed how I played vampires in my games so much that when Ravenloft finally came around later I was already using character sheets for my main vampire villains. 

Another one that also had a huge impact on my games was Original D&D's Eldritch Wizardry.  

Demons. Druids. Psionics.  It was everything my Basic D&D game was missing that I wanted. I didn't care all of this was in AD&D, that cover and those pages just called to me. I am impressed that it is back in print. Well, Print on Demand anyway.  I hear the PoD copy is also rather nice.

Sword & Sorcery & Cinema: Sarah Douglas Film Fest

I was working on an adventure for War of the Witch Queens this past week and I was thinking that my Witch Queen in this adventure had a lot in common with Queen Taramis from A Witch Shall be Born and the Conan the Destroyer movie.   I did my digging and discovered that yes, the look/vibe I wanting in my next Witch Queen (loosely based on Methyn Sarr from Barbarians of Lemuria) was based on Queen Taramis AND surprisingly enough "Lyranna" from Beastmaster 2: Through the Portal of Time.

Both were played by the exquisite Sarah Douglas. 

So I figured I would have to do Sarah Douglas film fest since she plays a witch in both movies.  

Beastmaster 2: Through the Portal of Time (1991)

Nearly a decade after the last Beastmaster movie we rejoin Dar in his battle against evil.  This time against his own older half-brother Arklon. The camp is WAY high in this one. Sarah Douglas plays Lyranna which sounds a lot like my "Larina" (but mine was 5 years before this).  Lyranna has a lot of language and speech that makes her sound like she is from L.A. from the late 80s.  There is a reason for that since she has been studying the land of "LA" where she has learned about a Neutron Detonator that she will give to Arklon, in exchange for ruling with him.

While she has the portal open Kari Wuhrer comes racing through in her red Porshe.  The poster showing the scene has a solid "Back to the Future" vibe to it. 

Ok. I am going to say this. Kari Wuher gets on my nerves. She is not so bad here, and she is actually supposed to be annoying here. 

Let's be honest. This is not a good movie.  I give Marc Singer a lot of credit here. The movie all around him is campy as all hell and he is playing Dar straight.  His earnestness from the previous movie holds over here. 

Wings Hauser chews up scenes as Arklon.  I can't if he is good at camp or bad. In any case, it works for him and this role.  Sarah Douglas is great, but I was inclined to like her anyway.  Even Kari Wuher was a lot of fun in it. 

The movie is not good, but it is fun. 

Conan the Destroyer (1984)

This is the second, and less well-liked Conan movie.  I personally thought it was a lot of fun. I had been a fan of Grace Jones since her Nightclubbing album so I was looking forward to seeing her in this.

This movie was also the second time I became aware of Sarah Douglas. I thought she was fantastic as Ursa in Superman and Superman II, and she was exceptionally great here.  Well. At least I thought so then.  I STILL think she was great, to be honest.

Queen Taramis (only a princess in the Howard story) gives Conan a quest to escort the Queen's Niece, Princess Jehnna, played the ever-lovely Olivia d'Abo in her first movie, to restore the horn of the dreaming god Dagoth (played by none other than André the Giant).  Sounds vaguely Lovecraftian. Jehnna is naturally a virgin.  Hey pro tip, girls who sleep around never get sacrificed to Elder gods. 

Going along with Conan is the Queen's guard Bombaata played by the NBA and College Basketball Hall of Famer, and future best-selling author, Wilt Chamberlain in his only film role.  I am sure you have all seen the photos with Arnold standing next to Wilt and André before.  Shared by Arnold himself, he commented that he had never felt so puny before in his life.

There is a cool scene with Conan in a room full of mirrors and a creature that swear influenced Hordak.  The creature was neat, the scene however seemed really silly. Made even sillier now with such memes as this. 

Among other actors, the immortal Tracey Walter appears as Malak. I swear this guy has been in everything. How many thieves started swallowing gems because of this movie? The equally prolific Mako is here as Akiro, sounding like a gruff Iroh. 

Our virgin is captured. Found. Captured again. Put in jeopardy. And set to sacrificed.  

And like all sacrifices go awry, the angry god kills the one summoning him, this time Taramis. 

So will a fun little romp it is worse than I remember but not as bad as I feared.   I remember that is felt more "D&D" than the first movie did and pretty much every gamer I knew had gone to see it.

Gaming Content

For me,  I can use Lyranna as Queen Taramis as a nice bit of history for my own version of Queen Methyn Sarr.  She starts out as a witch, finds a ruler whom she seduces, and then ultimately betrays and takes his kingdom as her own.  Not 100% original, but it fits with the pulpy feel I want. 

Plus it will give me something to start from.  Though given tonight's movies I wonder if I should rename her to Methyn Sarah.  Doesn't sound quite as evil does it?

Links

• Lyanna on the Moviedatabase and The Female Villains Wiki
• Queen Taramis on The Female Villains Wiki and the Villains Wiki
• A Witch Shall Be Born, Text and Audio

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Tim Knight of Hero Press and Pun Isaac of Halls of the Nephilim along with myself are getting together at the Facebook Group I'd Rather Be Killing Monsters to discuss these movies.  Follow along with the hashtag #IdRatherBeWatchingMonsters.