Fantasy Friday: Gygax Day is Tomorrow!

 

 

Well, the big day is upon us at last! Invites are out and are RSVP-ed, the menu is planned. The day's activities will be a lunch of burgers and dogs and for dessert cake! On last week's blog, Ernie Gygax commented, "If you wish the cake to be one that he would have shared it would have had to be a Dribble Cake. Lemon or white cake with a butter cream frosting with bitter chocolate poured over that and refrigerate." And that's what I'm making. It sounds completely delish!

 

 

 

Gamewise, I'm still not sure. I'm leaning toward Swords and Wizardry Complete and running The Endless Tunnels of Enlandin from Dragonsfoot. There's also the possibility that I might just run the classic B2 The Keep on the Borderlands using the B/X ruleset. I might also do a Dungeon Crawl Classics funnel using Paul Fini's DC-1 The Outpost on the Edge of the Far Reaches. Finally, I might decide to run Gary's classic Gamma World module GW1 The Legion of Gold. So many choices, so little time!

 

 

 

Well, that's all until I update the results of the Day on Sunday! Until next time, gentle readers, let the dice fly high!

Fantasy Friday: Gygax Day 2013

 

 

Well, Gygax Day is almost upon us. This year, Gary would have been 75, so it seems appropriate to do a little more than usual. CLD's Friday night games will resume on the 26th, so I'm pushing for at least cake. "Hope it's chocolate for me!" (Thank you, Jeff Gaffigan!)

 

 

The Guardians of the Polar Bear (my home/family group) is planning it to be a bit more elaborate. I'm thinking a party and celebration of Gary, the man who wanted to be know as the man "who really enjoyed playing games and sharing his knowledge and his fun pastimes with everybody else." There will be some grilling...just dogs and some burgers, I'm thinking, some baked beans, potatoes chips and some dips, a cake. And then the afternoon will be spent gaming. I've not decided yet on the game. Keep or Hommlet seems a little too cliched; I might go with Gamma World and The Legion of Gold, my actual favorite of Gary's modules. Or I might run the group through a DCC RPG funnel; not Gary's work, but definitely fun.

 

Hopefully, I can keep it from becoming too maudlin and sappy, as I did in this post: Z is for Zagyg.

 

A report will, of course, follow on Sunday the 28th. :)

 

So, until next time, gentle readers, let's get ready to game like it's 1979!

Fantasy Friday: DCC Goodness Continues

Well, I decided to go ahead and take the plunge. I ordered the DCC RPG this morning (Jeff Easley cover), Sailors on the Starless Sea (a 0-level funnel module), and Emirikol was Framed! because, well, Emirikol is da Man! I also ordered a set of "funky" dice to go with the game and, as soon as I get the Paypal invoice, I'll place my order for all 7 issues of the Crawl! fanzine. I am stoked. I haven't been this excited for a game since December, 1981, at my grandparent's house when I was trying to figure out by weight and shaking if the gift from my aunt was Gamma World or the D&D Basic set. Really! I mean, I love gaming and always have, but this feels...special. It really does feel like 1981 all over again!

 

 

I'm also the type of person who jumps all into something when I'm sold. I've already printed off 25+ 4-person character sheets using Purple Sorcerer's character builder and have installed their app on my smart phone (Droid, of course!). If the initial game goes well (probably next weekend), the plan for next payday is to buy my wife a hardcover rulebook and 4 sets of dice for her and the kids. The kids also seem really interested in this game--they've already been sorting through the funnel characters and picking out their own "best" sheet for the funnel. Nobody appears to have noticed the Caravan Guards or Nobles (short and long sword respectively) among the pile. :) The next payday after that will involve rulebooks for the kids (although I might wait and see when the 3rd printing of the standard rule book will appear ).

 

Hmmm, I was just thinking I might want to pick up either The Ruins of Ramat or The Witch of Westfield from Brave Halfling. I'm considering adapting Hommlet and either of those modules would make for a good funnel in the area. The cleric killed in Witch could be Canoness Y'dey. Hmmm, indeed.

Until next time, gentle readers, let the dice fly high!

Fantasy Friday: Rethinking Goodman Games's DCC RPG

You’re no hero.

You’re an adventurer: a reaver, a cutpurse, a heathen-slayer, a tight-lipped warlock

guarding long-dead secrets. You seek gold and glory, winning it with sword and spell,

caked in the blood and filth of the weak, the dark, the demons, and the vanquished. There

are treasures to be won deep underneath, and you shall have them.

--DCC RPG blurb



These are not Tolkien heroes.

I have found myself reconsidering the Dungeon Crawl Classes RPG by Goodman Games. I was stoked about this when it was announced; the DCC line by Goodman Games was one of three things good to come out of d20 [the others were Necromancer Games ("Third edition rules, first edition feel!") and Mutants and Masterminds]. But as things progressed, I rapidly lost enthusiasm. First, there were the funny-shaped dice, none of which of I own other than some self-made d3s and a d30. Second, I downloaded the Beta rules and was not impressed with the idea of special charts for spells. If I wanted to play with extensive charts, there's always Rolemaster.

 

On the other hand, there's much in the game to like. Retro 1970's art. Race as class. Gritty feel. The character funnel. Inspiration from Gygax's "Appendix N" in the DMG. But, as I've wrote numerous times in the past couple of years, as I've gotten older, I prefer rules-lite games that are familiar to me, that I can run instinctively if necessary. Swords & Wizardry Complete fits the bill perfectly for me; it is reminiscent of the D&D of my youth in the early 1980's. So, unfortunately, I have fallen into the trap that Richard Dreyfus's character in Rosenkrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead! laments: "The audience knows what to expect, and that is all they are prepared to know."

 

An actor, the opposite of a real person.

 

So what has made me reconsider trying DCC RPG? Well, first off, I ran across a really good blog that details a group running 0-lvl characters through the funnel: Lampblack & Brimstone. That game reads like it was It definitely looks like it plays easier than I thought. Now, admittedly, 0-lvls don't have spells and the like, but the mechanics look like they work. 0-lvl play has interested me since I read the AD&D module C3 The Lost Island of Castanamir back in the day. Sometimes, I lose track of the fact that games are supposed to be FUN! Running the cleric or cavalier every time leads to the quote above. With the uncertainty of who'll make it through the funnel, it could very well shake one out of a rut.

 

The second thing that had lead me to this is the Spellburn podcast. Judges Jim, Jobe, and Jeffrey (the Big J's?) definitely have a great podcast started and they relay a lot of information and clearly have great enthusiasm for the game and its system. Enthusiasm is always contagious.

 

I know at this point that I'm am going to pick this up. Whether it had long term viability, well, we'll see.

 

Until next time, gentle readers, enjoy!

Fantasy Friday: Blueholme

Well, there's another retro-clone out there I'm waiting on: Blueholme. I'm interested in it partly because I just recently read J. Eric Holmes's novel The Maze of Peril and partly because I'm always on the lookout for a simple "D&D" rules system. While my first iteration of D&D to play was B/X Moldvey, I was vaguely familiar with the Holmes version prior to that. There was a copy or two on the games aisle of our local Kroger's grocery store, one of which was open. I could never convince my parents to buy it for me, but I leafed through as often as I could at the store. So, I remember Stone Mountain and the five alignment system graph, and the art even though I never actually played it. Personally, I was always interested in that Domed City on the 7th level and the older me wonders if it has any connection to The Maze of Peril.

 

 

Holmes D&D gets some love from a small but fanatical fanbase; GM Liz of the Save or Die! podcast comes to mind. But there are problems. First, Holmes goes no higher than 3rd level; that's really not conducive to long-term play. Second, there are some oddities that are not really found in earlier or later editions such as the aforementioned FIVE alignment system: LG, CG, LE, CE and N. Or how about the rule that a surprised PC has a chance of dropping whatever's in his hands? Initiative determined by dexterity score EVEN FOR MONSTERS! Third, there's the problem that even B/X suffered from: TSR's marketing changed more rapidly than design and publishing schedules. For example, B/X was supposed to have a Companion book. That volume was scrapped when the decision was made to produce Mentzer's BECMI.

 

So, why the fascination with Holmes D&D, especially if it's "incomplete?" Well, as a transitional/gateway game, it is not tied to concepts that we now take for granted. It's much more flexible. As for the level limitations, that's what the Blueholme project is supposed to address: taking that minimalist ruleset and expanding it out to 14th level. And part of it is also that the older I get, the less I care about detailed rules, much as I like games such as GURPS, Champions, and even AD&D. Let's roll some characters and sling some dice around--I've got some orcs to kill So, yes, I'm definitely looking forward to this game,

 

Until Monday, gentle readers!

Fantasy Friday: The Deed of Pakesnarrion Book I: Sheepfarmer's Daughter

This week's installment of Fantasy Friday takes a look at Elizabeth Moon's Sheepfamer's Daughter.

I was looking around for something to read this week and decided on two books; one is The Idiot  by Fyodor Dostoyevsky, and the other is Sheepfarmer's Daughter (both are re-reads). I have, naturally, read many fantasy novels over the years and have many favorites and just as many loathed titles. I've read most of the "feminist" fantasy authors and generally cannot stomach many of their underlying premises: women are better then men, men are all vicious animals, etc. etc., ad infinitum, ad nasuseam. Fortunately, Elizabeth Moon is not one of those authors.

 

According to Moon herself, The Deed grew out of a conversation she overheard among some D&D players about how to play a paladin. Her internal response was "That isn't how a paladin would act." And thus the idea for The Deed was born. It was, like Lord of the Rings before it, initially conceived as a single novel, but, publishers being who they are and not believing the public has the ability to read a large novel, chopped it up into a trilogy. It still works as a trilogy, but it was republished as a single volume eventually.

 

There is the standard fantasy trope of a humble farmchild who rises from obscurity to become a great hero, endures a fall, but rises triumphant in the end. What sets The Deed  apart from other fantasy stories with a female warrior protagonist and a female author (of the 1980's and 1990's) is that Paks acts like a real person and is also a good lens through whom to view her world. Coming from a small backwater, it's not forced or contrived whenever she comes across something that she's doesn't know or hasn't experience like dwarves or the politics of the southern city-states.

 

In line with being a real person, Paks does not see herself as better than anyone else, male or female. Her gender and character are not defined by her sexuality; she is neither man-hater nor Lesbian nor sex-kitten. And thank God for that! Too many authors seems to think that human sexuality is the be all and end all of character definition. Paks enjoys the simple things in life and is good friends with Saben, for example, but not bed-partners. She also possesses a certain simplicity herself: why break up perfectly good furniture looking for hidden treasure?

 

Paks is also quite pragmatic. She accepts things as they are. she does have that inner dream of one day leading armies or somesuch, but it does not affect her perception of the day-to-day realities of soldiering. This first novel (part?) in the story lay the groundwork for what is to come in later portions and her character never really changes. she is a sheepfarmer's daughter who is destined to become a paladin in the service of Gird. Most of Paks's character and pragmatism comes in no small part from Elizabth Moon herself, who was was an USMC officer. How much of Moon is in Paks is known only to the author herself. Sufficeth to say, Moon does capture the feel of military camaraderie quite convincingly.

 

One thing that is disputed is how much of D&D, and more specifically Greyhawk, with the serial numbers  filed off is present in Pak's world. St. Gird is obviously St. Cuthbert and Falk could be Hieroneous; the Webmistress is obviously Lloth. The second part, Divided Allegiance, has even more obvious parallels. while opinions may vary, there is more a case of homage than anything else. The characters and the deities and the setting all have things that set them apart from the standard D&D fare--wizards that can heal and produce healing potions, for example. The story plot itself is "the hero who rises from obscurity" plotline. What makes any story unique is the characterization of the cast and ability of the author to weave the story and make it entertaining. In that, Elizabeth Moon succeeds superbly.

Fantasy Friday: Throne of the Crescent Moon (book review)

Throne of the Crescent Moon by Saladin Ahmed, DAW Books, ISBN-10: 0756407788.

 

I picked this book up, well, not a whim, but I was going through a book store trying to find something that was interesting but not derivative of Tolkien or Moorcock or anything else. This one caught my eye. Even as a kid, I've loved "Arabic" fantasy such as the film  The 7 Voyages of Sinbad and in D&D the second gazetteer of the Known World, The Emirates of Ylarum. I was never nonplussed by the inclusion of Azeem in Kevin Costner's Robin Hood: The Prince of Thieves. As a budding historian, I read the Qu'ran in 1992 or so, well before 9-11 and gloried in Francisco Gabrielli's Arab Historians of the Crusades. In fact, when I went through my crisis of faith while in the Army during the winter of 1988-89, al-Islam was one religion I seriously considered; it even made the "short list" along with Roman Catholicism, Greek Orthodoxy, and Judaism. So, when I saw this novel and read the cover and thumbed through it, it went in the basket.

 

A little background as well. The author is a native of Detroit which is always a plus for me; friends thinks it's strange that a 6th generation Texan such as myself would love Detroit so much, but there it is! Ahmed has written several well-received short stories, a collection of which is sitting in my Kindle, waiting for more leisure time. This is his first novel, but it is nominated for both the Nebula and Hugo awards. The author's website is located at: http://www.saladinahmed.com/wordpress/

 

Some more random thoughts before I delve into it, though. My campaign world of Erda/Kith-Kanan has (of course!) a semi-Middle Eastern area in it named "the Land of the Five Prophets." It is built around the ruins of the ancient Aegyptian Kingdom and religion, a false worship that centered around Shaitan in his aspects of Set and Anubis. The Five Prophets arose at the same time and led the way of the people back to the worship of the One, called the Merciful and Compassionate and never specifically named by them. The players that I've had in Erda over the past 26 years have never directly dealt with the area, but it is in my copious notes and backstory. So, yes, I will tend to look at this novel through "gamer" eyes.

 

Rasheed the Dervish appears to be a standard 1E monk that uses a double-forked sword. The young female shapeshifter, I can see as a DragonQuest shape-changer as a lion rather than a tiger. There is an alchemist and a healer. the ghul hunter's magics are low key and fit the setting; not sure how I would classify him; maybe as a DragonQuest Namer or possibly a Star Mage. The "Ancient Egypt" of the world is "Kemet." I chuckled because I've read Kmt, the journal of ancient Egyptian archaelogy since the late 1990's; Kmt is the ancient hieroglyphic name of Egypt. I must call mine K'm't now!

 

The novel centers on Doctor Abdoulla Makhslood, the last of the ghul hunters. Ghuls are apparently magical creations similar to golems made through necromancy that binds elements and death beetles (scarabs?) into a living form; they are slightly different from the haunted "vampires" that haunt charnel houses in Middle Eastern folklore. Accompanied by his protege, Rasheed the Dervish, Abdoulla uncovers a plot that threats the jewel of the lands, the great city Dhamsawaat, his home. Of course, the ghul hunters and his other practitioner friends are somewhere near the bottom of the social totem pole and are seen as charlatans and hedge wizards by the social elite. It's hard not to give any of the plot away, because it does some really neat twists and turns. The atmosphere is evocative and believable. It is also derived from tales such as Sinbad and the like. This is definitely not Tolkien-derived.

 

I give this book 5 polar bears. It is more than worth the time to read. It is the first of a trilogy and, to be perfectly honest, I've not had more anticipation for a series release since I read Harry Turtledove's Videssos Cycle in high school.

Fantasy Friday: Maze of Peril

The Maze of Peril, John E. Holmes, NY: Space and Time 1986, 147 pp., ISBN 0917053052.

 

This is a fun, little read by one of the legends of old-school gaming, 1LT John Eric Holmes, M.D. It is obviously a D&D novel with references like "You're just a second level wizard!" and the two protagonists Zereth the Dark Elf and Boinger the Halfling, both of whom just scream "race as class" in their presentation.

 

The plot is straightforward and simple. Bardan the Dwarf and Boinger the Halfling enlist the aid of Zereth the Dark Elf in an expedition into the Underworld proposed by Murray the Mage. While in the Underworld, the party finds a temple to Dagon and loot the golden idol of the deity while fighting weresharks! The dwarf is killed. He is buried on their return to town, but the body goes missing.

 

Stealing a scrying crystal from Ebeneezer the "the great and terrible," the party locate the dwarf, apparently now a zombie and, pursued by the aforementioned Ebeneezer and a flesh golem turned to stone, return to the Underworld to rescue the dwarf. This is not Tolkien by any means, but it is entertaining and fun to read.

 

Two things are of note. First, the town of Caladan is fairly metropolitan. In addition to the normal demi-humans and the fact that no one pays any mind to a dark elf, there are also centaurs, serpentmen, and satyrs in the city. The Green Dragon Inn's serving girl, Sunna, apparently has no problem romancing with the hobbit also. This is a nice breath of fresh air from places like Hommlett; can you tell me how many non-humans live in Hommlett, hmm?

 

Second, religion is not really defined either. That shouldn't be surprising, really, if one examines fantasy literature closely. However, we've become used to the idea of fantasy worlds having elaborate polytheistic religions. So, what are the religions? Well, the worshippers of Dagon are Deep Ones. The cleric and paladin (or cavalier) that appear in the second half are obviously Christian. Based on comments by them, there are also Satanists ("devil worshippers") that are feared. There is mention of the fact that the elf worships a "pagan moon goddess." The halfling swears several times by both Mitra and Crom, deities from Robert E. Howard's Conan stories.

 

So what does this mean? Well, Holmes obviously had no problem presupposing Christianity as the 'Lawful" Church/Religion. In a way, it makes sense. Most players should have a basic understanding of Christianity and can act good. There is a tradition of this in modern fantasy and swords and sorcery. While never explicitly mentioned as Christian, there are nuns in Hawk the Slayer and the entity that resurrects Voltan could well be the devil. In Dragonslayer, the village priest, Brother Jacopus, leads his congregation to confront the dragon, denouncing it as the Devil.

 

All in all, The Maze of Peril gives us some insight into the type of games that Holmes probably ran. We can also extrapolate other ideas from the content after correlating it to other data. For example, in OD&D, the equipment lists did not have holy symbols, but crosses. Information like that can be gleaned an utilized, even if it is supposition to some extent.

 

Finally, the novel is an excellent tribute to one of the early geniuses of our hobby. While long out of print, there was a reprint a couple of years ago. I recently purchased an original copy in NM/EXC condition for about $13 with shipping. As I said, not Shakespeare, but easily in on par with Howard or Lieber. Pick it up if you see it.