Free Map Friday (on Saturday)

I had this set to post, but forgot to actually schedule it, so Free Map Friday is now Slightly Delayed Free Map Saturday.  I was going through my old papers and came across this outdoor map for one of my Castles & Crusades campaign from many years ago.  Sadly, it's not nearly as entertaining as the player made dungeon maps from the same campaign. :-)

The map isn't complete, as my intent was to add cities and adventure sites as we went.  I've done some maps recently with Campaign Cartographer, and while it produces very nice results, I'm still a fan of hand drawn maps.

Weird Adventure Wednesday

Weird Adventure Wednesday has rolled around once more.  This week's installment takes place in that time honored trope of fantasy, the maze.  I'm not sure whether the goal of the adventure should be to strike the gong, or not though.  I'll leave the decision up to you.   ;-)

Weird Adventure Idea:

On a misty day you have a chance meeting with a morose beggar near a rushing river.  The beggar recounts to you an ancient legend that 2 weeks journey to the south, within the Harrowing Chasm of the Doomed Mage, stands the Maze of the Sorcerous Cosmos.  It is believed that there is hidden the Bewitched Gong of Contamination.  But beware, for the beggar cautions you that it is alleged the Sighing Scaly Horror of Skulls feasts upon all who go there!

If you enjoy Weird Adventure Wednesday, be sure to check out:

1,001 Weird and Wacky Adventure Ideas

and

1,001 More Weird and Wacky Adventure Ideas

Miniatures Monday

This week's Miniatures Monday has an evil warrior bent on slaughter, charging from the concealment of the forest!

The miniature is a Black Legionnaire  #02465 from Reaper Miniatures.

Fantasy Hero Complete

The new Fantasy Hero Complete

The week before last, my Kickstarter reward for the Fantasy Hero Complete Kickstarter arrived in the mail.  Ive got to say that I was pretty happy to see it as I have some very fond memories of Fantasy Hero.  My first introduction to Fantasy Hero, and to Hero Games was...yikes! 27 years ago in college when it looked like this:

The original Fantasy Hero

I still remember my first character.  He was a thief armed only with a stiletto, which only did 1/2 d6 damage, although that damage was armor piercing.  He set of a trap involving a statue holding 2 dice that ignited a bunch of oil in a crypt we were exploring.  Fortunately, he managed to avoid taking any damage...the rest of the party was not so lucky.  I seem to recall that the troll warrior took the brunt of the damage.  :-(

The new edition (available for $10 in PDF form from rpgnow.com) follows the trend of the previous Champions Complete, by including everything that you need in one book, removing the need for the mammoth two volume set of Hero System 6th Edition.  Everything old is new again I guess, as back in the day, Hero games published complete rule sets for each of the genre's that they supported.  We had Champions for superheroes, Justice Inc. for 20s and 30s pulp, Danger International for modern spy games,  Star Hero for science fiction, and of course Fantasy Hero for Fantasy.  Hero Games eventually merged everything into the Hero System, and put out this lovely tome:

Champions Deluxe

Sadly, the original printing had a tendency to fall apart, so most everyone needed to hole drill their pages and put them in a binder, but the game was great, and did a nice job of merging the enhancement that had appeared in each of the stand-alone games.  A number of sourcebooks were published for the Hero System, and eventually (and much to my surprise), we got my favorite version of the game, Hero System 5th Edition.  Essentially, 5th edition merged and cleaned up a lot of the material from the previous edition sourcebooks and gave them a home between two wonderful black covers.

The lovely 5th Edition

5th Edition got a revised and expanded hardcover which added a lot more material, but eventually, Steven Long, who was now the caretaker of the Hero System  decided that it was time for a 6th Edition.  6th Edition made some changes that not everyone was fond of, principally the removal of figured characteristics.  While I wasn't fond of losing figured characteristics, I think that I missed the black book cover more.  Electric blue just isn't really my speed.  Also, renaming Disadvantages to Complications seemed rather unnecessary In any case 6th Edition published a gorgeous Fantasy Hero supplement, but the books that you needed to carry back and forth to a gaming session were now rather backbreaking.

Hero System 6th Edition

So now we have Fantasy Hero Complete which slims things down to 262 pages.  It provides a good treatment of character creation and combat, but doesn't provide much in the way of spell examples.  I suspect that we will see a spell supplement much like we saw the Champions Powers supplement to Champions Complete.  Of course you could use Champions Powers with Fantasy Hero as well. The artwork is sparse, but decent.  Overall I think that the book falls somewhere in between an introductory book for Fantasy Hero, and a book for Fantasy Hero Veterans who don't want to lug around a ton of books.  If you are a complete Hero System newbie, you may be better off picking up a copy of the Hero System Basic Rulebook, which I think is a great starting point.  If you're a Hero System veteran, or if you're looking for more examples, you may be better served by sticking with the full-bore 6th edition and the original 6th Edition Fantasy Hero supplement in  PDF (available at rpgnow.com) .  This isn't to say that it's not a good book, just that I think it falls into a bit of a middle ground in terms of who it's good for.

6th Edition Fantasy Hero Supplement

I'm happy with the book and very happy to have supported the Kickstarter, but will I play it?  Alas, probably not as a regular campaign.  These days gaming time is precious and it's hard to justify the time spent creating characters when we only have maybe three hours a week to game.  Rules light rules the day nowadays with less reading and more playing.  I can see running a one-shot game with pre-generated characters though.  It's good to see Hero still around after all of these years.  Happy adventuring!

Fantasy RPG Heartbreakers - Everybody's got one, even me

     About eight years ago, when it seemed like everyone was doing their own retro clone or home-brew RPG, I decided that it might be a good idea to write one too.  There may have been some gin or bourbon involved in this decision, but it seemed like a good idea at the time.  I wrote the first draft and then lost interest.  In truth, I lost the files too, except for the PDF that I had for some reason uploaded to my Google Drive account.  A few weeks ago, I came across that file buried in a long forgotten directory, and had a good chuckle while reading through it.
     Now, I'll be the first to say that I've never been a "rules guy".  I don't really have much of an appreciation for a well crafted set of rules, or for cleverly designed mechanics.  I'm more interested in an interesting setting and just having fun.  If it's a good story and someone tells me roll high for something good to happen and roll low for something bad to happen, I'm generally OK with that. :-)  Having said that, my game has no setting information at all. It's just the rules, and it clocks in at a whopping 19 pages including character generation, combat, spells and a handy character sheet.
     I've never even play-tested this thing, and I don't expect that I ever will, as I own quite a number RPGs that are actually both good and playable.  The game has little practical application beyond perhaps what not to do in RPG design, but I had fun writing it, and figured that I would throw it out as a cautionary tale to other would be game designers.
     Without further ado, I present to you the 2008 version of Crossbows and Codpieces.  It's a 2d6 system, and the spells were inspired by the wacky spell names from Jack Vance's Dying Earth.  I just really hope that nobody ever casts Alem's Unsightly Canker on me. ;-)
     So, who else has one languishing in some long forgotten folder that they would like to share?

PS:  I actually forgot to include a codpiece on the equipment list too. :-(

R.I.P. Terry Pratchett

So far with Leonard Nimoy, and now Terry Pratchett, it's not shaping up to be a good year for fantasy and sci-fi. :-(

Weird Adventure Wednesday

On a bleak evening you cross paths with an unassuming rat catcher in the trade district.  The rat catcher tells you a rumor that 21 days journey to the east, beyond the Foul Pools of Perversion, lay the Fiery Boneyard of the Soul Hunters.  It is whispered that buried there is the Disintegrating Blade of Endless Pollution.  But beware, for the rat catcher tells you that it is believed the Immortal Knight of Loathing enslaves all who dare enter that place!

In Honor of Chuck Norris's 75th Birthday

Far Away Land Premium

The premium edition of Far Away Land has arrived, and it is gorgeous!

Miniatures Monday

A fierce Barbarian stands at the entrance to a dark cave.

The original wash on his flesh made it look too much like the leather he is wearing.   In the end, all of the flesh areas needed a complete repaint and a lighter wash.  Overall I'm pretty happy with how he turned out.

Iron Kingdoms

Last night we returned to the Iron Kingdoms.  Our characters are in the employ of the Illustrious Brass Anchor Trading Company, where we provide muscle to protect against pirate raids and the like.  Our home port is in the city of Korvis, and we found ourselves investigating a series of mysterious break ins at some of the Illustrious Brass Anchor Trading Company's (IBATC) warehouses.  The curious thing was that nothing was stolen, and all of the crates that had been broken into had been in the warehouses for nearly a 100 years.  So clearly someone was looking for something specific in dead storage.  My Doom Reaver Voldrag did his best Columbo impression, but to little avail.

Voldrag's Character Sheet

Our first stop was to talk to one of the warehouse managers, a tattooed fellow named Relvenik.  Despite his awesome faux goatee tattoo (the faugh-tee), he didn't have much insight into the crimes.  Fortunately the city elf in the party discovered the marks of a grappling hook high up on one of the windows, so a least we knew how they criminals had gotten in.
We decided to try our luck at a bar to see if we could pick up any rumors related to the crimes, but beyond finding an odds sheet for betting on which warehouse would be hit next, we came up empty.  Fortune was with us though, and we were awakened by our old friend from the Korvis City Watch, Sargent Hill, who informed us that another warehouse had just been robbed.  Our party sprung into action and once my Doom Reaver remembered to put on some clothes, we were off to investigate.  This, time, careful searching paid off, and not only were we able to determine that it must have been a rather large group that robbed this particular warehouse, but Voldrag was able to follow some blood drops to a crate in which he discovered a partially naked dead man.  This wasn't just any dead man though, he was a member of the city guard, and his missing uniform meant that one of the guards with us was likely an enemy!  Sure enough one of the guards made a break for the door!

The Scene in the Warehouse

 Our trusty steamjack LOgear managed to harpoon the fleeing man, drag him back and knock him out with a warhammer.  We were quite fortunate that the man didn't die, and when he recovers sufficiently, we intend to question him...

To Be Continued.

Weird Adventure Wednesday

It's weird Adventure Wednesday again!  This week's adventure idea takes place in a labyrinth, with a rather curious looking foe.

On a cloudy night you are confronted by an excited soothsayer on an overgrown footpath.  The soothsayer declares to you that 3 weeks travel to the south, deep beneath the Blasted Wilderness of Tribulation, lies the Crimson Labyrinth of the Blistering Eyes.  It is thought that there is hidden the Throbbing Casket of the Eternity.  But beware, for the soothsayer informs you that it is said the Floating Deathgazer of Skulls slaughters all who dare to enter that place!

Dark Tower Tutorial Video - Vintage Board Game (1981)

As, it's been cold and snowy, I've really felt like breaking out Dark Tower and having a go at claiming the magic scepter.  I've been toying with trying to make a video of an entire game to post.  In the mean time here is my tutorial video from last year.

So I've posted a lot about Avalon Hill's Magic Realm, but now I'm going to talk a a bit about one of the games that I actually played in the early 1980s, Milton bradley's Dark Tower. I played this probably more than any other game between 1981 and 1986 and loved every minute of it. If you aren't familiar with the game, here is a video of the game in actual play. It doesn't show the full game, just the demo for learning how to play, but it gives a decent feel of the game.

I got this game for Christmas in 1981, and at the time I'd never even heard of it, but my parents must have figured that since it had all of the things that I was into (wizards, dragons, etc.), I was bound to like it.  In fact, I loved it.

The goal of the game was to circle the board, searching for the three magical keys and gathering an army so that you could lay siege to the Dark Tower and recover the magical scepter from the Tyrant King.  All the while you had to contend with getting lost in the trackless wastes, fighting marauding brigands, deadly plagues, a capricious warlock, and of course, a fire breathing dragon.

You could visit the bazaar to buy warriors and food.  You could visit ruins and tombs in search of treasure.  You could even visit the sanctuary for assistance if things went wrong for your expedition.   All the while, the tower in the center controlled what happens through the magic of 1980s computer technology.  The game truly did live up to its billing as "A FANTASY ADVENTURE BORN OF ELECTRONIC WIZARDRY".  Here are a few other pictures of the game.

The Dark Tower in all its glory

A closeup of the kingdom of Brynthia

For anyone who is interested, there is an Android version of the game available as well as an online flash version.  Enjoy!

UPDATE:  James Merrill provided a link to another flash version of Dark Tower with very fancy visuals.

Miniatures Monday

Deep in the heart of the forest, a grizzled ranger stoops to check the trail of his quarry.

1,001 More Weird and Wacky Adventure Ideas

It has finally arrived!  After over a month of development and editing, the next version in my series of Weird and Wacky Adventure Ideas is finally out.  Some of the improvements that you'll see in this new edition are more illustrations, new places and items, better variability in the descriptions, and the addition of guardians to protect all of those mysterious "treasures" that are hidden about.  Also, at the end of the book, I have added three new d100 tables to allow for quick generation  of Insane items, Dwellings of Doom, and places of Peril for those times when you don't need an entire adventure idea.  As a bit of time went into actually reviewing each of the adventure ideas and making edits to make them either more wacky, or more consistent, I toyed with the idea of trying to sell it for $0.50, but in the end, I decided to release it for free. (Donations of course are always accepted, but not expected).

The PDF version can be downloaded from here.
The ePub version can be downloaded from here.

I hope that people find as much enjoyment from reading and using this as I had creating it.  Happy Adventuring!

I have been asked about making donations, so I'm including the following links.  As I've said, while donations are greatly appreciated, they are absolutely not expected, but should you feel the desire to send a few coins my way, they can be sent to:

Google Wallet:  jrl755@gmail.com

or

Paypal: jrl755@hotmail.com

Also, don't forget to check back at this blog every Wednesday for a new adventure idea on Weird Adventure Wednesday. :-)