This Old Dragon: Issue #156

It's April 1990.  I am a Junior in University at this point and working on my very first psychology study (I compared incidents of violent imagery vs. sexual imagery in heavy metal and rap videos.  Conclusion: they both love sex. Gave me a solid appreciation of rap and hip hop).  Twin Peaks is on the TV for the first time ever. On my play list though is the newest Sinéad O'Connor album "I Do Not Want What I Haven't Got". I even skipped Calculus to go get a copy of it and an extra one for my then best friend (and now my wife). What I didn't have and didn't want though was This Old Dragon Issue #156!

Ok. I didn't own this issue at the time. I knew about it of course. I believe, in fact, I am sure I first saw it at +Scott Thorne's Castle Perilous.  I didn't know how good I had it then, to be honest.

Does it feel like I am avoiding the issue? Yeah. I am.  It's an April Fools issue and not at all one of my favorite ones. Let's get into because there are some seriously nice gems later on.
The cover. Daniel Horne does some great work. This is not one of my favorites, but it is one is funny.  Besides, haven't we all made this joke or some form of it before?

Letters.  Ok, these are all fake letters in an attempt to be funny.  Yeah. Not so much really.

Ad for Dungeon magazine.  Man, I loved Dungeon.  Maybe when I am done with this I could something with Dungeon.

First up in the April Fools section is Not Necessarily the Monstrous Compendium. A collection of "funny" monsters.  Ok, some are fun and I would use them in a crazy adventure like an Expedition to the Barrier Peaks or something with a lot of mutants.

A cool ad for I.C.E.'s Cyber Space game.  Was anything more 90s than that?  Cyber Punk vampires maybe.

Razznarock! is an adventure.
Yet Even More [Gods Forbid] Outrages From the Mages is a Pages From the Mages spoof.

It's not that I don't like humor in my games, it's I just don't find these all that funny.

The Game Wizards covers the newest in computer games.  Mechwarrior from Activision, Champions of Krynn from SSI/TSR and Sword of the Samurai from Microprose.   This is less of a review and more of a "coming attractions".

Another ad, this one from TSR itself, from their book department.
They sponsored a Writing Workshop!  Looks kind of interesting.

I wonder if anything came of this?

Speaking of the book department. J. Eric Severson is up with Novel Ideas, featuring three new Forgotten Realms novels: Iron Helm, Horselords and the Wyvern's Spur.  Again this is half preview, half advertisement. In the 90s novels were TSR's big cash cow.  I personally never read any of the Forgotten Realms books (well, till this year) but I bought and read every single Ravenloft novel printed.  Hey some of those Ravenloft novelists went on much bigger and better things, P. N. Elrod, Christie Golden, Elaine Bergstrom, Tanya Huff and newcomer on the scene, Laurell K. Hamilton.  More on that when I cover those issues.

Other Side favorite Vince Garcia is up with Can You Swim? Juggle? At the Same Time? a new skill system for D&D.  Now this is for the D&D game. The BECMI version, not the new AD&D 2nd Ed game that had a skill system.  Like everything with D&D it is simple and easy to learn.
It is no where near as complicated as his magnum opus Quest of the Ancients might later imply.

Dale A. Donovan is up with the Marvel-Phile with a bunch of villains I have never, ever heard of.  They seem to be based on Alice In Wonderland.

Wrestling with Style is Greek wrestling adapted to AD&D by Janne Järvinen.  It seems to mostly be based on the Illiad, which of course is fine.  At this point I had read the Illiad about two years ago, but damned if I remember any of it.

Let see, a ballot for the Origins Awards for 1989.

Sage Advice is split by a program for the Gen Con Game Fair for 1990.

The whole thing is still really small.

TSR Previews has the "must buy" items for March and April 1990.

Characterization Made Easy: A little personality goes a long way for all characters comes to us from Scott Bennie and is a guide for giving your character some more personality. At three pages it is not exhaustive, but the tips are nice especially in what is essentially a Pre-Vampire the Masquerade world.

Interesting note.  All the adds on these pages for companies in Great Britain.  Made me wonder at first if I had a British edition of this magazine, but my CD-ROM version matches it.

Through the Looking Glass has some great horror minis to show off shading techniques.

Convention Calendar has a lot of cons to hit for the Summer of 1990.

Ken Rolston is next in Role-Playing Reviews.  There is something to notice here first.

The review is copyrighted by the author.   This comes up every so often when people ask whay can't Wizards do another Dragon CD-ROM (well, Blu-Ray ROM now) collection?  OR (and this is my least favorite) since TSR is gone all those old Dragons are in the public domain (no. they are not.)
In this case this little copyright hits on both of those.  WotC, just like TSR before them, does not have the rights to this article.  Sure they printed the first Dragon CD-ROM and they got into a LOT of trouble for it.
Also. If you are reading this right now the Dragon copyright will not "expire" till long after you are dead.  Sorry. I don't make the rules.

So back to the reviews.  These focus on City and Urban adventures.  Now I LOVED playing in cities at this time so this review was heaven-sent.  I grabbed Greyhawk Adventures: The City of Greyhawk and I totally ignored the Forgotten Realms: City System.  I should have gone the other way around.  Though both products have their positive and negative aspects.

The Role of Computers gives us a proper review of Champions of Krynn, saying it is the best AD&D computer game yet!

There are few pages missing from my issue so I turned to the CD-ROM to find that some barbarian had cut out +Bruce Heard's first installment of Voyage of the Princess Ark!  I think I am going to take one of my "This Old Dragon" days and do a retrospective on this.  I have been dying to see it all together in one place as a whole for some time now.  Alas for toady though I can't talk about it since it breaks my rules.  If it is not in the magazine I can't talk about it.

Missing is the first page of the Ecology of Behir. This would have been fun when my players ran into one recently.

Dragonmirth has a bunch of comics complete unfamiliar to me.  Well, I guess I know of Yamara and The Twilight Empire, but I really don't know anything about them.

So the April Fools stuff aside, this turned out to be a fun issue.
While it was published back in the Halcyon days of 2nd ed, it did not contain a lot of 2nd Ed material.  The Greater Behir was notable.

Even at 27 years old this Dragon, for some reason, still feels newer to me.  Maybe because I never owned it back when it was new or maybe because it was out in a time when I was not playing so much I don't attach a lot of nostalgia to it.

What are your memories of this issue?

Review: The Wicked Cauldron

Troll Lords has been putting out some quality products since the 3.x/d20 boom days.  This includes not only their own "house" system, Castles and Crusades but also some 3.x material back in the day.
Well now they are dipping their toes into 5th edition and I could not more pleased.

This past Gen Con I picked up their 5th edition version of their adventure A3 The Wicked Cauldron. I already had the C&C version and I wanted to see how they compared.  Especially since D&D 5 really has a lot of ideas that C&C started with.

The Castles & Crusades version is 24 pages and designed for 3-5 characters of 3rd to 4th level.
The Dungeons & Dragons 5e version is 40 pages (larger font) and for 3-5 characters of 3rd to 5th level.

I am reviewing the print and pdf versions.

The premise is a fairly simple one.  There is a ruined ziggurat in the Barren Woods that is the home to many foul things. It also has a long and evil history and currently is home to one of the fabled Witch Queens.  The PCs must investigate and stop her.

The adventure itself is particularly original, but that doesn't make it less fun.  There is a good balance of overland and dungeon exploring, plenty of new monsters to fight, a threat of an ancient evil.  Given that this module is coded "A3" should give you an indication it is part of a larger series, and it is.  It can be played as part of Troll Lords "A" series that began with "Assault on Blacktooth Ridge" and "Slag Heap" and continues in other Airhde products and adventures.  But it can also be played as a stand-alone adventure.
The adventure is very reminiscent of the old Basic adventures of the early 80s, especially B2 and B4.  In fact, it is almost a perfect mix of these two classic adventures.  So in the nostalgia department, it gets a perfect score from me.

My biggest issue with the PDFs and the Print versions are the maps are fairly small.  I can redo them on my own and larger, but having something I can print out or read easier would be nice.

The 5th edition conversion is good and really, C&C is so close to D&D5 as to almost make the conversion unnecessary, but still I did enjoy looking through both to find the subtle differences.  The most interesting changes were to the Witch Queen herself.

The Witch Queen, Neb–Eprethat, is the central figure in this adventure and stopping her is the main goal.  In the C&C version, she is a Lawful Evil 5th level human cleric/wizard.  In the D&D 5 version, she is a Chaotic Evil 6th level human cleric.   In both cases, she could be better served as a witch.

There is no D&D5 witch class (yet) and I am not ready to publically reveal my C&C witch class.  But I can give her a try in my Basic-era Witch.  Though given that she supposedly worships and honors the "Horned One" she could be a D&D5 Warlock too.  In fact a warlock (as per D&D5) makes a lot of sense.

Neb–Eprethat - Witch Queen 
Chaotic Human Witch (Malefic Tradition), 6th level
The Witch stats

Strength:	11		Death Ray, Poison	11
Dexterity:	14		Magic Wands	12
Constitution:	12		Paralysis, Polymorph or Turn to Stone	11
Intelligence:	16		Dragon Breath	14
Wisdom:	14		Rods, Staffs, Spells	13
Charisma:	18

Hit Points: 20
Alignment: Chaotic
AC: 1
Dagger +4, Multiattack (allows 2 attacks per round)
To hit AC0: 18

Occult Powers
Familiar: Toad (multiple familiars)

Spells
Cantrips (7): Alarm Ward, Daze, Detect Curse, Object Reading, Open, Spark, Warm
First (3+2): Bewitch I, Cause Fear, Command, Minor Fighting Prowess, Sleep
Second (2+2): Biting Blade, Enthrall, Evil Eye, Hold Person,
Third (2+2): Bestow Curse, Continual Fire, Fly, Ghost Ward


She joins the ranks of the other Witch Queens that I have been gathering.

• Lady Kyleth, from Saga of the Witch Queen
• Feiya, Pathfinder Iconic Witch
• Maleficent for Basic Games
• Nuala, from Ravager of Time
• Elvyra, Queen of Witches from Quest of the Ancients
• Koliada, The Winter Witch
• Iggwilv, The Witch Queen of Perrenland

Can't wait to run this under my War of the Witch Queens campaign.

A to Z of Witches. Q

Q is for Queen of Witches

I have talked about and around the Queen of Witches many times here.  It is one concept that you will see in almost all my games.  I have talked about it for Basic D&D, Ghosts of Albion/Buffy and even 3rd Ed/Pathfinder.  I even began this challenge with Aradia, the first Queen of Witches.

But what is a Witch Queen or a Queen of Witches?

In my games the Witch Queen is the most powerful witch of any given tradition. She would control many covens and their leaders, the high priestesses, report to the Queen and her Court.

The last season of American Horror Story: Coven gave us an idea of what Queen of the Witches would be like.  We had a Witch Queen, called a Supreme, and a Voodoo Queen.  It certainly gave me some ideas of what could happen when rival queens interact.

One point I have made in my books, but never really elaborated on was the fact that there is only one Queen of Witches per Tradition.  With magics like longevity and Timeless Body a powerful Witch Queen can reign forever...or at least a really long time.

I would say in traditions that are closer to nature, Craft of the Wise and Classical, the Witch Queen steps down after a number of years in favor of younger sharper minds.  In evil traditions, like the Demonic, Mara or Malefic I would say the Witch Queen is usually killed.  Other traditions might vary. I can see a Family or Gypsy Tradition doing either, depends on what they need.

I came up with the idea of a Queen of Witches from a lot of different places.  Most obvious was the well trod ground (for me) of the Sisterhood of Karn.  They were Gallifreyians! They were witches! Perfect really.

A member of the witch court and her Queen

I also thought Witch Queen had a nice sound to it.  Clerics had already laid claim to High Priest/ess so I felt something different was needed.  Plus there were already Faerie Queens and courts and Vampire Queens, it made sense.
Plus I was doing most of this writing in the 80s so this had some influence as well:

This was the hot stuff back in 81!

I have a few Witch Queens detailed out.  Interestingly enough my Witch Queen for the Voodoo witches is a Witch King, a character I have been using for years, Bone Man.  He is not a particularly nice guy, but as a character I really like him.
Another character familiar to Greyhawk fans is Iggwilv she is the Queen of the Demonic Witches and maybe one of the more powerful Queens in my game.  I think as a nod of respect to Vince Garcia and his Quest of the Ancients I might name my Queen of the Faerie Witches, Elvyra.




Supernatural AtoZ

Skylla: Quest of the Ancients

I am posting this as part of the RPG Blog Carnival for November: The Past Revisited hosted by Campaign Mastery. This is a sequel to all my Skylla posts and my Quest of the Ancients posts.

Quest of the Ancients is one of those games I keep coming back to.
Not for the game itself mind you, but for the witch class.  Author Vince Garcia's love and devotion to the witch is equal only to my own and it shows in his game.

I reviewed the game a while back.  I figure it is close enough to *D&D that I should give my Skylla a try.

Skylla

Level 7, human Witch

Armour rating: 1
Tactical move: 10'
Stamina points: 18 (Die: d4)
Body points: 10
Stats: St 9; Ag 11; Cn 10; IQ 15; Ch 12; Ap 12: Lk 7
Attack 1
Dmg: 1D4+1 (dagger) or by spell
Ethics: E
Size: 5'4", 130#

Witch Abilities
A: Create Focus (Demon skull helm)
B: Additional Combat Skill Slot (4 total)

Skills (150 points)
Animal Handling: 25%
Herbalism: 40%
Nature Lore: 40%
Read & Write (Elvish): 45%

Spells
Rank 1: Beguile, Helping Hands, Light Ball, Magic Dart, Read Magic Script, Unlock
Rank 2: Discern Magic, Fire Darts, Fire Tounge, Net, Night Sight, Witch Wand
Rank 3: Charm, Electric Arc, Sheet Lightning, Witch Knock
Rank 4: Lirazel's Globe of Invulnerability, Staff of Absorption

Very interesting.  Her combat is not quite as good and it's harder to learn new languages.  But she gets a lot more spells.

Review: MegaTraveller (1987)

It is 1987.  The year I graduated from High School and my first year in University.  I knew about MegaTraveller, anyone that read Dragon Magazine even as infrequently as I was then knew about it.  But again it is not a game I played.  I do recall seeing it* played at a local con (SIU had a bunch of them) but (and this is the asterix) I could not really tell if it was Classic Traveller or MegaTraveller at the time.  They had a lot of cool spaceships on a black hex map.

I would not actually read MegaTraveller until the late 1990s.  I was working on my Ph.D. and commuting all over Chicago.  I found a local library that would honor my U of I Chicago library card and they had a copy of the MegaTraveller Player's Manual.  I can't recall my impressions of the time all that much, just a memory of being on the commuter train and reading it.

Rereading it now I find the rules are largely similar to Classic Traveller.  I know some clarifications and changes have been made but I am not qualified enough to pick them out. 

The thing that is most obvious is the setting.  The Emporer has been killed along with all his heirs and his assassin is claiming the throne.  And so are about half a dozen or more people.  So the empire has fallen and this is called the "Time of Rebellion."   Does Traveller have...Star Wars envy??  I am sure that is not 100% true.  

I have NO data to back this up, but my perception is that MegaTraveller was a hit. I think it appealed to people that wanted to play but not have to get into 10 years worth of back product.  In many cases my D&D analogy extends here with MegaTraveller as AD&D 2nd Edition.  The Jim Holloway art certainly helps that along. 

My understanding is that MegaTraveller came as a boxed set. With Players's and Referee's books. Today you can get them as PDF via DriveThruRPG or from Far Future Enterprises.  I will be considering the PDFs from DriveThruRPG for these reviews.  It is nice to have these now after so many years.

In general, the scans are ok to good.  Some attempt has been made to clean them up, but they are obviously scanned from printed products and not the original files. They are OCR'ed and have bookmarks.  The scans look fine on my PC and on my iPad, but I don't think they would work well for Print on Demand yet.

MegaTraveller Players' Manual

PDF. 108 pages. Color covers, black & white interior art. 

This book covers everything the player needs to create a character, including Basic and Enhanced options, learn about the core mechanic (and the Universal Task Profile), skills, combat, and psionics. 

Reading through this I do get the feeling that this is a cleaned-up and updated version of Traveller.  While I can see the larger changes, the subtle ones are less clear to me.  My impression is that a MegaTraveller character could operate in a Classic Traveller game. 

Layout and rule-wise there are a lot of clarifications. For example, Page 9 details Task Resolution and the Universal Task Profile.  This would be called setting a difficulty level in other games.  There are the levels of difficulty and what you need to roll over (3, 7, 11, and 15) which is different (slightly) than the "just 8 or better" of Classic Traveller.  Rolls can also be altered by skills, risk, time, and other factors.  This page gives a great overview and the first place I see a real improvement.  Now my understanding is that many of the rules here came about in various publications, both books and supplements from GDW (Merchant Prince and Mercenary seem to be prime sources here) as well as periodicals.  IT IS POSSIBLE that by 1986 people were playing with rules that resembled this.  This the codification of all of those rules.

Character creation, both basic and Advanced/Enhanced are covered.  This is largely similar to what I saw in Classic Traveller (CT) except I did not see anywhere where you can die before mustering out.  The tables have been expanded to include military and non-military careers including Scouts and Merchant Princes.  Even the example is a Doctor now. 

Skills are detailed and this list seems to get larger with each new edition.  What I like about MegaTraveller is that skill advancement is right after this section and much clearer. 

Character creation and skills take up half the book.

SIDE NOTE:  A lot of the tables and other character creation details (like character flowcharts) are set to one page or two pages.  So printing out material from your PDF is easy.  I can take a page with me to know what my character needs to do to advance for example or keep a list of all the skills with me.  Page 9, the UTP is a prime example of this layout feature.

Combat comes up next.  Again not a surprise since combat is an important part of Traveller.  I don't think I expressed this before, but maybe MegaTraveller makes it more obvious, but combat looks like it is a deadly affair.  Again, no practical experience here, but going through the numbers I am surprised I did not notice it before.   There are charts of weapons and damage, but not the catalog of guns we found in Traveller 2300. 

The last dozen or so pages cover special rules, like mapping and special types of combat.

At the end, where it always is it seems, is the section on Psionics.

Throughout the book, there are little boxed texts that give some more background on the fallen Imperium.  Little bits of history and background to add flavor.  This new time period is the big deal with this edition. 

The inside cover maps of the Spinward Marches and the Third Imperium look like they were taken from a previous version of Traveller.  The Imperium map is dated 1115 and this game takes place in 1116 and beyond.

MegaTraveller Referee's Manual

PDF. 108 pages. Color covers, black & white interior art. 

The Referee's Manual opens with the various factions vying for control in the Imperium.  Just a page, but it really set the tone for me. I can see how this would be a great game to play with the various factions working with and against each other for ultimate control while the PCs work whatever angles they can to either get more power or just stay alive.  I was skeptical of change when I first read it, but now re-reading it many years later I am very excited about it. 

This book covers similar territory as the Players' book, save from the game master's perspective.  Again I am drawn in by the parallels of the format and layout of this game as AD&D 2nd Ed. which will hit the stands in another 2 years.  I am not suggesting TSR copied GDW but instead that this was something that was a logical extension of many 2nd Edition games released around this time. 

There is a longer breakdown of Tasks and resolutions here that makes me happy to see. I never ran a Traveller game, but with this book I think I could.

Star System and World Creation is next including a discussion on world profiles. It is detailed, without being overly so, and will get any Ref going on world creation.  It doesn't have the same feel to me as the Classic Traveller section doing the same thing, but I think that is fine.  Lots of tables here and no equations to solve.  Kinda miss that. 

Sections on Animals and Encounters are similar to their Classic Traveller counterparts.  Detailed enough to keep you going for a while  

Trade and Commerce cover the next 10 pages.  Again, brief but enough to start. I imagine that entire books can (and maybe have) been written on this topic. I also imagine that this is an area where the Imperium's fall would also be a prime place for adventures.  Smuggling cargo, protecting shipping lanes, getting something like medical supplies to another part of the system but other factions want to stop you or steal what you have?  Yeah, lots of ideas.

Craft Design and Evaluation cover the next 34 or so pages. More craft seem to be available to the MegaTraveller character/group than the Classic Traveller ones. If this review is late in posting it was because I was making starships again.  With CT I like system building more, here I like starship building more.

This is logically followed by Starship Combat. 

We end with a couple of stellar maps. 

Reading through these now I kind of lament not getting in on this fun back then.  Classic Traveller with all its supplements, and add-ons, and alien modules, and board games seemed like a steep hill to climb.  I erroneously felt MegaTraveller was the same way.  Just looking through was DriveThruRPG and FFE have on their sites it doesn't seem to be that much to me know.   It is still far more than want to buy right now and far more than I'll ever play, but it is nice to know it is all there. 

More Notes

It appears that MegaTraveller, in addition to being a pencil and paper RPG was also a couple of video games, as if my Traveller Envy wasn't enough already. MegaTraveller 1: The Zhodani Conspiracy and MegaTraveller 2: Quest for the Ancients were released in 1991 for the Atari ST and MS-DOS systems and in 1992 for the MS-DOS and Amiga systems respectively.  These might be fun to try and find for the retro-gaming computer I built over the winter. 

GURPS Traveller

GURPS Traveller was released in 1998 for GURPS 3rd Edition.  It covers the same time span as MegaTraveller, but there was no rebellion.  I guess the idea was to preserve the feel of Classic Traveller. 

I like GURPS well enough, but I have stated before that GURPS has no soul to it; at least not to me. IT's too bad really since I do enjoy a good Universal game.  Their supplements have always been top-notch though. I have never been so happy to spend money on game I know I won't play.

D&D40 Bloghop: Day 21

Day 21: First time you sold some of your D&D books--for whatever reason.

Not sure when the first time was.  I do recall though a great 2nd ed purge around 1997 or 1998.  I had a ton of books and I wanted to get things down to the bare essentials.  This also corresponds to the time I was getting out of D&D.

I remember selling some items at the local Game Plus Auction, but I also sold a more significant amount on Ebay.

This was right before the Dragon magazine archive went for sale so I unloaded my old Dragons for a decent price. I sold all my 2e splat books.  My best sell was a near mint Complete Book of Necromancers. I had bought it for $15.00 and it was then being sold at $18.00  I made $83.00 on it.

I almost always regret selling my games and have often bought them back.  I have owned over the years 3 different copies of Chill and Quest of the Ancients, two copies each of BESM, Vampire, Mage and various Star Trek games. There are more.  Interestingly enough I recently picked up a copy of the Complete Book of Necromancers at Half-Price books for $9.00.  That is the same price as the PDF.

Noble Knight Games is really Awesome

I love my FLGS. I do.  I would rather buy from them for just about everything.
But every once in a while I find something somewhere else I want and I go with that store.

9 times out of 10, I get what I want.  But sometimes I take a risk and it doesn't pay off.
But then sometime the company I buy from makes it right and everything is great again.

Recently I have been going on about Quest of the Ancients.  I have a 1st Edition but not the 2nd Ed.  I saw Noble Knight Games had one for sale at a great price so I grabbed it.  Normally I wouldn't have, QotA is fun, but it's not great and I have the 1st ed.  Getting the 2nd ed would only be worth the satisfaction of my curiosity.  If I had seen at the store, I would have just spent a couple minutes flipping.
So I bought it anyway, knowing the risk.  And I ended up with a 1st Edition.

I contacted them and they bent over backwards to make it right. They didn't have a 2nd ed in stock, but they were completely awesome with want I did get.

I had ordered from them in the past and ALWAYS got great service and exactly what I wanted.  This aberration did nothing to make me think less of them.  Just the opposite, it made think more highly of them and I am more likely to order from them in the future.

I have a great local game store that can get me anything.  But those are planned purchases or stop in at the store and impulse buys.  Noble Knight is great when I am browsing on the net, come across a game I have never heard of or had forgotten about and then go over and see what it would cost.  If I like the price then I can get it.

So if you are unlike me and don't live within easy distance of a fantastic game store, then please give Noble Knight Games a look.

Character Creation Challenge: Looking Back and Forward

And that is done!

I managed to get through the 31 Day New Year,  New Character creation challenge. It was quite a bit of fun.  In fact, I might continue this on the 1st of each month.  I still have plenty of games to cover.

For the record, here are all the characters created this past month.

• NIGHT SHIFT: Sabrina Spellman
• Dark Places & Demogorgons: Taryn "Nix" Nichols
• Dungeons & Dragons, Original Edition: Deirdre
• Dungeons & Dragons, Basic Edition: Áine nic Elatha
• Advanced Dungeons & Dragons, 1st Edition: Rhiannon
• Advanced Dungeons & Dragons, 2nd Edition: Sinéad and Nida
• Dungeons & Dragons, 3rd Edition: Rowan McGowan
• Dungeons & Dragons, 4th Edition: Eireann
• Dungeons & Dragons, 5th Edition: Taryn, Celeste, Cassandra, Jassic, Sasha, and Áedán Aamadu
• Quest of the Ancients: Sarana
• Pathfinder 1st Edition: Labhraín
• Pathfinder 2nd Edition: Oisín
• Castles & Crusades: Fear Dorich
• Spellcraft & Swordplay: Runu and Urnu
• Astonishing Swordsmen & Sorcerers of Hyperborea: Xaltana
• Blue Rose1st Edition, True20: Marissia
• Blue Rose1st Edition, AGE Edition: Seren
• 7th Sea, 2nd Edition: Gwenhwyfar
• DragonQuest 1st Edition: Phygor
• The Dark Eye: Katherina
• Keltia: Siân ferch Modron
• Yggdrasill: Lars son of Nicholas
• Fantasy Wargaming: Marie Capet
• Dark Ages Mage: Lowis Larsdottir
• Chill 3rd Edition: Megan O'Kelly
• C. J. Carella's WitchCraft RPG: Fiona
• WITCH Fated Souls: Alexandria
• The Great American Witch: Amy Nakamura
• Mage 20th Anniversary Edition: Brianna
• Mutants & Masterminds: Scáthach the Shadow Witch
• DragonRaid: Solomon

31 Games, 38 Characters.  Not too shabby really.

Many of these characters will find some life again in my War of the Witch Queens.

Quest of the Ancients Follow-up

I totally caved.

I bought the 2nd Edition copy of Quests of the Ancients.

I plan on reviewing it, coming up with characters and then maybe, just maybe, come up with a bunch of adventures for it based on Stevie Nicks songs.

Maybe I have been doing too many curriculum edits this week.

Watch this space.

Character Writeup Page updated

So I have something like a 1000 things to do, but to help clear out my head I updated my Character writeups page.
http://timbrannan.blogspot.com/p/characters-and-builds.html

They are sorted by character or property. One day I really need to sort them by game system too.

Until then here is a list of the systems I have used to stat up these characters.  Maybe there is something you like here.

4th Edition Dungeons & Dragons
AD&D  1st Ed.
Adventures Dark & Deep
Adventures in Oz RPG
Amazing Adventures
Astonishing Swordsmen & Sorcerers of Hyperborea
B/X Companion
Barbarians of Lemuria
BASH
Basic D&D
BECMI + Glantri Gazetteer
Big Eyes, Small Mouth (BESM) 2r
Big Eyes, Small Mouth (BESM) 3.0
C. J. Carella's WitchCraft RPG
Cartoon Action Hour, Season 2
Cartoon Action Hour, Season 3
Castles & Crusades
Chill, 1st Edition (Pacesetter)
Chill, 2nd Edition
Cinematic Unisystem
Cortex
Cortex Plus (Smallville)
DC Adventures
DC Heroes (Mayfair)
Dirty Nellie
Doctor Who: Adventures in Time and Space
Ghosts of Albion
Icons
Marvel Heroic Roleplay
Meddling Kids
Mutants and Masterminds, 2nd Edition
Mutants and Masterminds, 3rd Edition
OVA
Pathfinder
Quest of the Ancients
Savage Worlds
Spellcraft & Swordplay
Superbabes
Supers Unleashed
True20
Victoria RPG
Victoriana
Villains & Vigilantes
Witch Girls Adventures

40+. Not too bad.
Would love to throw a few more into that mix.

If you throw in my Willow & Tara page then I can add these too:

C.J. Carella's WitchCraft
Amazing Adventures
BASH!
Big Eyes, Small Mouth, 2ndEdition
Big Eyes, Small Mouth, 3rd Edition
Big Eyes, Small Mouth d20 (and SAS d20)
Call of  Cthulhu
Cartoon Action Hour, Season 2
Chill
Cortex
d20 Modern
DC Heroes (Mayfair)
Doctor Who Adventures in Time and Space
Fudge / Now Playing
Icons
Kult
Macho Women with Guns (Original and d20)
Marvel Heroic Roleplaying (Cortex+)
Mutants and Masterminds, 2nd Edition
Mutants and Masterminds, 3rd Edition
OVA
Savage Worlds
Slasher Flick: Director's Cut
Superbabes: The Femforce RPG
True20 / Blue Rose
Villains & Vigilantes
Witch Girls Adventures
World of Darkness (old)
World of Darkness (new)

Any system you would like to see me try next?
Any character you would like me to try next?

Got that feeling again...

That "I have too many games and I need to get rid of them to make room for more".

It usually ends in remorse. I end up selling something I wish I had held on to.

While I am not  parting with my 4e collection (just yet) I am thinking of getting rid of one or two of the basic sets that were out for 2e, Quest of the Ancients (I have 2 copies) and maybe SuperBabes.

A few other items from the recent Free RPG day.   No idea just yet.

I have a game auction I normally sell these things at, but that is not till October.