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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 bigjackbrass on Apr 7, 2019 9:46:31 GMT -6
"What bothers me: if you are invisible, can you see yourself?"
Anyone who was genuinely invisible wouldn't be able to see anything at all, so for game purposes we might as well be generous and favour the players by letting the PCs see themselves so they don't do something daft like knock over a lamp or fall downstairs because they can't see their feet. Personally I wouldn't let them see their own reflection, though, if only so I could mess with them when introducing vampires into the game.
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Post by bigjackbrass on Mar 16, 2019 4:10:20 GMT -6
fatdragontom, what are you looking for in the game that you don't get from using the original game and Greyhawk supplement? Not trying to be argumentative, I'm presuming that something is missing from that option for you. I'm guessing that he wants to run a LBB+GH game and wants his players to have easy access to rules without them all having to track down the originals. They are still available as PDFs, however.
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Post by bigjackbrass on Mar 16, 2019 3:08:54 GMT -6
fatdragontom, what are you looking for in the game that you don't get from using the original game and Greyhawk supplement? Not trying to be argumentative, I'm presuming that something is missing from that option for you.
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Post by bigjackbrass on Feb 18, 2019 10:58:17 GMT -6
Forget the lantern, just fight with a lightsabre.
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Post by bigjackbrass on Feb 10, 2019 3:01:33 GMT -6
Will this issue contain the final level of the megadungeon? Is there really such a thing? Allan. Every active dungeon needs an area where the delvers find shovels, picks, carts and props, all the signs of ongoing construction. There's always room for more 😁
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Post by bigjackbrass on Jan 16, 2019 8:20:56 GMT -6
I believe that there is one called Dungeonesque, but unfortunately I know little about it other than comments on forums expressing disappointment that it doesn't tailor the rules to match its old-school presentation.
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Post by bigjackbrass on Dec 31, 2018 11:24:16 GMT -6
This quote from Douglas Adams comes to mind at such times:
"I've come up with a set of rules that describe our reactions to technologies: 1. Anything that is in the world when you’re born is normal and ordinary and is just a natural part of the way the world works. 2. Anything that's invented between when you’re fifteen and thirty-five is new and exciting and revolutionary and you can probably get a career in it. 3. Anything invented after you're thirty-five is against the natural order of things."
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Post by bigjackbrass on Dec 24, 2018 4:38:23 GMT -6
The original dice TSR used, and many of the (few) early alternatives, were terrible dice. I've read that they were not originally even intended for use as dice, but were educational supplies. They had random air bubbles and were made from a soft plastic. For a friendly game they were fine, of course, but anyone with an obsession for precision would have rejected them.
Gamescience dice, I think, need to be viewed from that angle, not measured against later products, if you want to understand how vastly superior they seemed. I like them and think they stand up well against modern competitors, but early entries into the field really did tend to crack, chip or wear heavily and were not always balanced; Gamescience dice were better than that.
The sideshow barker claims and presentation? Well, that's just Lou Zocchi. Enjoy it as entertainment.
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Post by bigjackbrass on Oct 1, 2018 1:40:49 GMT -6
Cool. You would think that huge East-West cultural differences would make a pseudo-Mediaeval fantasy RPG much harder for them to fathom. Then again, I'm no expert. The more, the merrier, as they say... Japan's martial and chivalric period lasted rather longer than in the West, so I don't think they'd have trouble grasping the essence of it; and of course it's not like the game ever went into great detail about society and setting prior to the deluxe edition. T&T also drags in creatures and particularly weapons from all sorts of cultures (your average weapons list for mediaeval fantasy rarely includes Indian punch-daggers or the sharks teeth terbutje sword of the Gilbert Islands), so in some ways it was probably more obviously open to a foreign audience, just as the inclusion of the famously humorous spell names have license to people to let their hair down and not take it all too seriously. And let's not dismiss the dearth of other games available in Japanese at the time.
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Post by bigjackbrass on Sept 29, 2018 16:48:14 GMT -6
T&T is popular in Japan?!? That's new to me. It's been a favourite over there since at least the eighties: I saw the edition they had then, which was based on the 1986 Corgi paperback. And if you mention T&T in a hashtag on Twitter it will likely get a lot of retweets and response from Japanese fans.
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Post by bigjackbrass on Sept 25, 2018 10:56:58 GMT -6
Hm, seems as though they have magnets on the back, so actually turning them into balanced dice is going to require a bit of work... Might be fun trying it, though.
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Post by bigjackbrass on Sept 12, 2018 10:44:56 GMT -6
If you're finding that regular crayons don't do the trick then shop around for Staonal crayons, designed for marking rubber and other difficult surfaces. Various colours available, although not the full spectrum of regular Crayolas.
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Post by bigjackbrass on Jul 14, 2018 12:05:52 GMT -6
C&S second edition was probably the game we played most in college (Call of Cthulhu the only real challenger) but I didn't see the original edition until many years later. On the whole I think the revision was very worthwhile.
Despite holding onto the books since then I've never run it. These days I doubt I could handle the investment of time and the bookkeeping; but what magnificent memories that game gave us!
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Post by bigjackbrass on Jul 2, 2018 8:49:13 GMT -6
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Post by bigjackbrass on Apr 20, 2018 1:20:08 GMT -6
Grimtooth's Traps has a number of these. I like the simple examples of misdirection, where players actually choose to step into the trap, thinking they're playing safe: there's a spike-filled pit in the corridor, with only a narrow ledge down each side... but the illusion is the pit which is really solid floor, and the trap is the spring-loaded ledges ready to slam them into the ceiling. Likewise, two pits in a row, where the first is perfectly visible (or perhaps sloppily camouflaged) but the second is under the illusion of a solid floor, tempting characters to jump over the first one to "safe" ground...
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Post by bigjackbrass on Mar 4, 2018 13:02:08 GMT -6
Absolutely my favourites, particularly the 20+ dice which are numbered 1 to 0 and +1 to +0 to make it easy to use them as a d10 or a d20. I've had some Gamescience dice for over thirty years and they still don't show any wear.
Like any plastic they take colour better if you wash them with detergent before using paint, marker or crayon on the numbers.
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Post by bigjackbrass on Jan 13, 2018 13:42:50 GMT -6
It's been a while since I read much straight fantasy. What has been holding my attention lately are Brian Stableford's translations of French romans scientifique, stories contemporary to the English scientific romances, published in anthologies by Black Coat Press. Rather more typos than I'd like, but the translations are lively and sharp, the stories well chosen and most enjoyable.
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Post by bigjackbrass on Jan 10, 2018 11:34:00 GMT -6
It's arrived in mist-shrouded Yorkshire! Looks great at first glance; I'll settle in for a better look through latest in the evening. Thanks for putting it together and dealing with the Kickstarter so well.
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Post by bigjackbrass on Aug 3, 2017 4:52:55 GMT -6
Would there be any purpose to a clone? As I see it the reason for such a thing is so that people can play an out-of-print game, perhaps allowing them to produce new material too.
Empire of the Petal Throne is not out-of-print. PDFs are available at a fairly low cost, with an updated PDF apparently due shortly (subject to the Foundation's glacial pacing). Surely a clone would be little more than a way to get the game without paying for it? The rules are fundamentally early D&D after all.
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Post by bigjackbrass on May 12, 2017 2:00:23 GMT -6
There were quite a few in the UK. Before Corgi issued it as a mass-market paperback, Chris Harvey published Tunnels & Trolls fifth edition as an A5-sized boxed set; the first UK edition had been an A5 booklet, so for many people it was surprising to see the larger American format.
Fighting Fantasy, Advanced Fighting Fantasy and Maelstrom also went the small paperback route.
The Dungeons & Dragons red box from 1983 was also briefly published as a rather chunky paperback in the UK. That version is not common and can be quite expensive if you find one these days.
For something more modern, try Ancient Odysseys: Treasure Awaits! from Precis Intermedia. It's aimed at new players and is available as a single volume paperback or a compact boxed set.
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Post by bigjackbrass on Apr 9, 2017 7:53:31 GMT -6
"Maester" pledge levels for the hardback are almost gone Less of the "almost" now I've finally remembered to check the Kickstarter
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Post by bigjackbrass on Dec 28, 2016 12:08:10 GMT -6
... I'll be painting minis for along time to come! My girlfriend backed the Conan Kickstarter and keeps suggesting I might enjoy painting the hundreds of minis included 😁
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Post by bigjackbrass on Dec 26, 2016 16:53:33 GMT -6
I bought a copy of the Lost in R'lyeh card game for my girlfriend, but my own gift was only obliquely game-related: Megastructure: Urban Futures of the Recent Past by Reyner Banham.
It's a terrific book about a very specific school of speculative architecture, particularly prominent in the 1960s (the book was published in 1976: it's out of print and absurdly hard to find at an affordable price; I'd been hunting for a copy for years). The gaming connection comes via Marcus L. Rowland's wonderful Forgotten Futures RPG, which features it in the bibliography. It's a brilliant resource for science fiction and alternative history gaming.
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Post by bigjackbrass on Dec 8, 2016 7:44:32 GMT -6
A seller with no feedback is quite unusual for a sale like this.
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Post by bigjackbrass on Nov 9, 2016 3:06:03 GMT -6
I'll admit to being puzzled by this release. An incomplete system, considered a bit old-fashioned even when it was first released and never a big success. Is there a demand for it? Can't really see it advancing participation in Tékumel gaming in any meaningful way.
When they released the sourcebook it made sense - it's the essential core of Tékumel knowledge - but then again the version they released was an uncorrected copy of the Gamescience edition, without the missing text restored. It pains me to say, but even as a fan I'm thoroughly underwhelmed with the way Tékumel is being handled at the moment.
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Post by bigjackbrass on Sept 9, 2016 5:02:10 GMT -6
You're most welcome, although I can take no credit as it was @dailydwarf who found it. He did try to reply personally, but couldn't register with the forum.
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Post by bigjackbrass on Sept 9, 2016 3:23:05 GMT -6
I checked with White Dwarf guru @dailydwarf from that there Twitter and he suggested the following:
"Pretty sure this is Plague From the Past, issue #69"
Checking my PDFs I'd say this is correct.
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Post by bigjackbrass on Sept 9, 2016 3:02:27 GMT -6
I'll be interested to know what you think of Ben Hur, which was written in a fairly old-fashioned style even for its day and is a very Christian story.
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Post by bigjackbrass on Sept 9, 2016 1:28:26 GMT -6
If you want to emphasise the age and distance of some levels to the current civilisation, consider how different things like Brutalist and Rococo architecture are. Relatively unadorned constructions with sleek, spare lines would be quite exotic to the typical Tsolyáni.
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