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Post by Merctime on Sept 11, 2014 11:13:31 GMT -6
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Post by kesher on Sept 11, 2014 12:42:16 GMT -6
Nice! I keep meaning to pick up another one--my first had coffee dumped on it while filming THAC0: The Movie
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Post by tetramorph on Sept 11, 2014 15:53:16 GMT -6
I have it, but have never played it.
Now I should take it out and dust it off!
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Post by Nerzenjäger on Sept 12, 2014 2:59:38 GMT -6
Outdoor Survival has a notoriously bad reputation amongst wargaming circles. I suggest you dump the game and keep the maps, it is most famous for being used by the OD&D crowd than for actual play anyways.
Advice for European enthusiasts: Buy the game for cheap on eBay, pay the full (but very low) price for it and let the seller throw away the rest of the game to save on shipping for the maps.
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jdjarvis
Level 4 Theurgist
Hmmm,,,, had two user names, I'll be using this one from now on.
Posts: 123
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Post by jdjarvis on Sept 12, 2014 12:47:35 GMT -6
I used to like the actual game but it is brutal on players it usually is a game of seeing who dies last. For solo-game play it was pretty good decades ago.
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Koren n'Rhys
Level 6 Magician
Got your mirrorshades?
Posts: 355
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Post by Koren n'Rhys on Sept 12, 2014 13:01:51 GMT -6
[THREAD HIJACK] Nice - I haven't seen THACO yet, and didn't realize it was on YouTube! And apparently so are all three of "The Gamers" movies. I only saw the original one. Guess you found me something to watch tomorrow night while I have the house to myself!
Thanks Kesher! [/THREAD HIJACK]
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Post by Porphyre on Sept 15, 2014 9:14:09 GMT -6
I used to like the actual game but it is brutal on players it usually is a game of seeing who dies last. For solo-game play it was pretty good decades ago. I own one copy, buit used it only as solo play for now. I can't say it was tons of fun.
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Post by xerxez on Sept 15, 2014 17:25:05 GMT -6
I own this and it contains interesting facts about, oddly enough, outdoor survival.
It was intended to teach outdoor knowledge through game play but the best place to learn that is out of doors!
I "ruined" my set because I painted seas on the map, and giant lakes, creating islets and separate landmasses. I turned the map into my personal game/story setting I use in my D&D campaigns. However, I love it and many players have said they liked it, although they thought I made the whole thing and I'm like, no, I didn't build this or do the hexes, just painted in and scripted names of cities and woods and mountains,. etc.....the old hex scale no longer works now though.
I have some old cannibalized board games and Ive kept the game boards because I want to make dungeon terrain on them. You can use wetted paper towels and glue to form in outlines of walls and rooms, it adds some definition but still allows you to fold the board, but you could just as easily paint on the features.
As an aside, I also do this with old record album covers.
When I go to the record store and sample old records from the dollar bin and one turns out to be a stinker, it goes in the recycle bin and the cover gets turned into a folding dungeon map. You can adorn the face and back with illustrations of the locale and story elements and take out the album sleeve at least the cardboard ones, and cut it in half and make it part of the map. You just butt it up against the map inside the cover. And there are always novelty album sleeve and cover designs that allow you to specialize...I have one album that had some giant heavy paper pages in the cover and this allowed me to actually create a two level dungeon--I have half of one level on the opening pages and half on the records sleeve. Simply turn the page, flip the album sleeve, and you are in level two! And they are to scale with miniatures! I am still embellishing this one with runes, illustrations, and fantastic stampings. It is actually the map of Menegroth from a M.E. Atlas.
The really neat thing about this is that you can tuck your dungeon key and your illustrative aids into the jacket and presto, you have safe, sturdy but thin storage for your dungeons. And you don't actually have to make the dungeon to scale with minis...you can use one or two album covers as a DM's screen with your maps facing you and some b*tchin fantasy decoupage on the outside.
And Kesher, I forgot or never knew you were behind THACO. That's really cool man, good job.
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Post by kesher on Sept 16, 2014 6:50:55 GMT -6
xerxez: thanks! Though I wouldn't say I was behind it; just in it. My friend Bill (who plays the DM in the movie) wrote it, originally as a play for the Minnesota Fringe Festival, and then adapted it to make the film. In the stage version, I played the DM, and he played the tardy player (with a series of reflective monologues about geek culture.) I was just happy to be involved! AND NOW, you need to make a separate thread and post some pictures of the ridiculously awesome maps you just described...
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Post by Merctime on Sept 16, 2014 7:31:05 GMT -6
AND NOW, you need to make a separate thread and post some pictures of the ridiculously awesome maps you just described... Here, Here! Please do, man!
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Post by xerxez on Sept 16, 2014 16:07:41 GMT -6
Yeah Kesher and Merc , Ive been wanting to post them on my blog along with my abbey model I built but I keep procrastinating the finishing touches. But I will...I have a week off next month and those are some projects I plan to finish and start more. On the abbey I built a to-mini scale paper mache model...plenty of room on the outer base for combats and now I just need to make maps I envisioned for it's interiors. It has three levels plus tower rooms and my vision was to have three illustrated maps laid out so that even when the party is split up in the abbey I can keep a constant visual for everyone--the abbey is kind of a starting place in my campaign and a lot of NPC introductions and preparatory clue gathering takes place there and I envisioned the maps letting me run separate encounters there smoothly and in a way that keeps my players engaged. I ran this campaign once, just finished, and now I need a new group of players cause I wanna run it again and fix all my mistakes...having the model was something I wish I'd had in the beginning.
As to THACO, I was very amused and entertained by it and I love such DIY films! I love the creativity and drive of this gaming community--my favorite part in THACO was when he got busted with the GURPS stuff...that was funny. And the part with the D4. I know a guy who got upset in high school when his gaming group all got sloppy drunk so he scattered all the d4's throughout the deep carpet in the house cause many were in their and left-next morning people stepped on em like caltrops and cussed him savagely. : )
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Post by machfront on Sept 27, 2014 21:56:31 GMT -6
Totally unaware of the game's connection to OD&D a buddy of mine gave me his unplayed copy of Outdoor Survival back in '86 or '87. I still have it. Imagine my surprise when I later learned of this lousy game's importance (as it were).
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Post by Porphyre on Sept 28, 2014 6:18:28 GMT -6
I think that the very concept of "random encounter" exists in OS.
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Post by Finarvyn on Sept 29, 2014 4:06:33 GMT -6
Like many others, I have owned the game for decades but never played it. I have it for the map.
On the other hand, I've had a friend play it several times as a solo game. He seemed to think that the rules for getting lost were sort of absurd, if I recall correctly. (It's been decades since he borrowed, played, reported back.)
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Post by coffee on Sept 29, 2014 6:04:10 GMT -6
It came about as a challenge. Jim Dunnigan, of SPI fame, was bragging to Tom Shaw of Avalon Hill that he could probably design a game on any subject. Shaw said, "okay, design one about surviving in the wilderness." That became Outdoor Survival.
According to Dunnigan in his book "Wargames Handbook".
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Post by dizzysaxophone on Sept 29, 2014 12:20:49 GMT -6
Own it, but have never played it. Like Fin, I pretty much bought it for the map, which is essentially useless now since I got that beautifully made watercolor Outdoor Survival map from Adventurer Conqueror King Battles Kickstarter.
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Post by keith418 on Oct 6, 2014 14:29:54 GMT -6
This is my favorite map to use in D&D, period. Once I tried it, I couldn't conceive of using anything else, ever again.
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Post by dizzysaxophone on Oct 8, 2014 13:39:28 GMT -6
Just started running a hexcrawl using the Outdoor Survival board last night. I've always wanted to do so, so we'll see how it goes.
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Post by Merctime on Oct 8, 2014 18:30:08 GMT -6
Just started running a hexcrawl using the Outdoor Survival board last night. I've always wanted to do so, so we'll see how it goes. Dude, that's awesome! Hehe... Well it is to a guy like me, who's never done that either! Hope you have lots of fun, and would love to hear about it here, dizzysaxophone!
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Post by Starbeard on Oct 10, 2014 10:15:11 GMT -6
I picked up a copy of the game as I started collecting OD&D stuff specifically because of the connexion. It was the map I used for my OD&D hexcrawl campaign (and will still use, now that it looks like I've once again got a couple of suckers willing to try OD&D).
I have to admit, I actually really found myself enjoying the actual board game as it comes, and even went online to download a few house rules documents and scenarios, trying those out. Handled as a game, it is unbalanced, lacking in meaningful player input, and without nuance; handled as a simulation, where you as a player are simply the hand of fate watching your little dude's inescapable spiral toward death from starvation and bear mauling, then it can be pretty fun, and creates some interesting narratives.
I actually pilfered the food, water and health rules from OS for my hexcrawl, which I recall working pretty well.
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Post by rastusburne on Oct 11, 2014 1:21:32 GMT -6
Personally I've never felt the urge to own it. If I want a wilderness hex crawl I'll draw up my own maps, and I find the core rules for OD&D comprehensive enough without the addition of another vaguely connected product.
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