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Post by bigjackbrass on Apr 13, 2019 7:40:00 GMT -6
Fans of the Moldvay/Cook boxed sets might be interested in the Old-School Essentials Kickstarter which got underway yesterday. Within a couple of hours it had funded and by this morning had passed the targets to unlock all of the stretch goals. Previously known as B/X Essentials this is a very well edited and reformatted version of the old rules, aiming to be as faithful as possible to the originals but with the errors corrected and the layout made more logical. I was impressed enough when I saw the paperback copies of the first edition to pick them up at the UK Games Expo last year, but the Kickstarter covers both a single volume edition and a boxed set of separate hardbacks. The books are properly bound and sewn too, so no flimsy print-on-demand stuff. In terms of format and attention to detail this one hits all of the marks for me. |
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Post by Vile Traveller on Apr 13, 2019 10:28:04 GMT -6
I don't do many Kickstarters, but I'm in for the book, the box, the advanced add-ons, and Winter's Daughter.
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Post by bigjackbrass on Apr 13, 2019 12:30:47 GMT -6
I don't do many Kickstarters, but I'm in for the book, the box, the advanced add-ons, and Winter's Daughter. I bought a copy of Winter's Daughter when they offered a pre-order a while ago and it arrived today. Nice little adventure and an excellent book (I got the limited hardback version which, like the Kickstarter volumes, is properly sewn and printed on a lovely cream paper). Bodes well for the physical quality of the new edition rules. |
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Post by amjeerih on Apr 15, 2019 10:26:42 GMT -6
Vile,
I don't do many either. (Yours is one of the very few other exceptions, by the way.) But this was too good to pass up in my opinion.
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Post by geoffrey on Apr 16, 2019 6:57:52 GMT -6
Thus far 947 backers have pledged $65,877. Wow!
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Post by aldarron on Apr 27, 2019 14:07:29 GMT -6
Yeah, B/X is a popular ruleset for good reason. Other than the prettiness factor though, I wonder if anyone who knows has a reason why someone should prefer this over Labrynth Lord?
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Post by Vile Traveller on Apr 27, 2019 20:00:21 GMT -6
Yeah, B/X is a popular ruleset for good reason. Other than the prettiness factor though, I wonder if anyone who knows has a reason why someone should prefer this over Labrynth Lord? In a way I think the prettiness factor is secondary to the "technical" content. Lots of people have already seen Gavin Norman/ Necrotic Gnome's B/X Essentials (you can get the editable no-art files on DTRPG), and they are really one of the most accurate-to-the-source retroclones I have ever seen. If anything they are even better-organised than Moldvay, and that's high praise coming from someone who sees Moldvay as the gold standard in RPG writing. Having the option of booklets as well as a combined rulebook is a great idea (I might have to steal this for BLUEHOLME™ in future years!), especially at the table where people can have their own spell books, etc. Labyrinth Lord is a fine game, I'm actually reading my KS copy of the Advanced LL rulebook at the moment (though having the AD&D stuff next to the D&D stuff has got me thinking that the AD&D stuff really is weaker). In LL there are lots of little changes, and of course it goes up to 20 while OSE sticks with the original 14 levels of Moldvay, Cook, and Marsh - again, I tend to think nowadays that topping out at 14 makes for a more reasonable game world. Also, LL for some time has felt like Dan Proctor/ Goblinoid Games has really lost interest in it in favour of his other products, and new 3rd party publications are rare. OSE seems like a breath of fresh air. I think Dolmenwood and Gavin's back catalogue speak for themselves, so it looks like there will be plenty more to come from his stable. That reminds me, I don't actually know whether he has any plans for 3PP to use OSE. |
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Post by aldarron on May 3, 2019 11:33:41 GMT -6
Yeah, B/X is a popular ruleset for good reason. Other than the prettiness factor though, I wonder if anyone who knows has a reason why someone should prefer this over Labrynth Lord? In a way I think the prettiness factor is secondary to the "technical" content. Lots of people have already seen Gavin Norman/ Necrotic Gnome's B/X Essentials (you can get the editable no-art files on DTRPG), and they are really one of the most accurate-to-the-source retroclones I have ever seen. If anything they are even better-organised than Moldvay, and that's high praise coming from someone who sees Moldvay as the gold standard in RPG writing. Having the option of booklets as well as a combined rulebook is a great idea (I might have to steal this for BLUEHOLME™ in future years!), especially at the table where people can have their own spell books, etc. Labyrinth Lord is a fine game, I'm actually reading my KS copy of the Advanced LL rulebook at the moment (though having the AD&D stuff next to the D&D stuff has got me thinking that the AD&D stuff really is weaker). In LL there are lots of little changes, and of course it goes up to 20 while OSE sticks with the original 14 levels of Moldvay, Cook, and Marsh - again, I tend to think nowadays that topping out at 14 makes for a more reasonable game world. Also, LL for some time has felt like Dan Proctor/ Goblinoid Games has really lost interest in it in favour of his other products, and new 3rd party publications are rare. OSE seems like a breath of fresh air. I think Dolmenwood and Gavin's back catalogue speak for themselves, so it looks like there will be plenty more to come from his stable. That reminds me, I don't actually know whether he has any plans for 3PP to use OSE. I was under the impression (mind you a decade old impression) that LL differed in only a handful of places in any meaningful way and that for IP reasons. I take it that LL is more different from B/X than that? Just curios. Also, I just stumbled across /basic-and-expert-rpg-sets-remastered which looks cool and all but confuses me yet again since it is by Pacesetter games - which used to be, and as far as I know still is, owned by Dan Proctor/LL. |
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Post by Greyharp on May 3, 2019 17:20:53 GMT -6
Also, I just stumbled across /basic-and-expert-rpg-sets-remastered which looks cool and all but confuses me yet again since it is by Pacesetter games - which used to be, and as far as I know still is, owned by Dan Proctor/LL. The kickstarter is by Pacesetter Games & Simulations, owned by a fella called Bill Barsh who, in the past at least, has been active on the Acaeum forum. I always thought it a bit off that Bill would use the Pacesetter name because it seemed to me to create a misleading connection to the original company, or at least cause quite a bit of confusion.
That confusion is all the greater because Dan Proctor purchased the copyrights and trademarks to the real Pacesetter brand and logo, making Goblinoid Games official for all things Pacesetter.
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Post by aldarron on May 5, 2019 15:27:37 GMT -6
Ah that explains that, and yeah it was confusing. Thanks Grey.
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Post by bigjackbrass on May 6, 2019 1:49:44 GMT -6
Under a week to go and the total is a hair below €100,000! Quite an astonishing performance.
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Post by fourkindsofcheese on Nov 21, 2019 11:07:02 GMT -6
I got my copies today - one box containing the hardcover digest-sized books and two rules tomes one of them the limited leatherette version. It's one heck of a product, the layout makes it a piece of cake to find things.
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Post by libertad on May 9, 2020 17:03:51 GMT -6
I recently picked this up as a PDF about a week and a half ago. It doesn't really give me anything I haven't already seen, but the artwork and layout are top-notch, and makes for a good alternative retroclone to show new players given that Labyrinth Lord has kind of fallen off the radar, and LotFP and Swords & Wizardry rulesets aren't as appealing options to various circles for a host of reasons I won't get into here.
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