Tenkar's Tavern

Friday, April 19, 2019

Sale - Castles & Crusades Print plus PDF - Starting at 10 Bucks

Some examples are shown below.

Link to the Castles & Crusades sale page

Thursday, April 18, 2019

News - DriveThruRPG Partners with Astral Virtual Tabletop

I consider this interesting news for multiple reasons. I'm surprised that DriveThruRPG is teaming up with ANY Virtual Table Top. They don't produce games, they distribute games. Secondly, I've never heard of the Astral Virtual Tabletop. Obviously, I don't know every of the existence of every VTT on the market, but I would have expected a more well known VTT to be part of an announcement like this. That being said, Astral appears to be well along in development - Tenkar

Astral Virtual TableTop is the easiest way to create, host, and play tabletop roleplaying games. Astral has partnered with DriveThruRPG to launch a new experience that makes running tabletop roleplaying games immersive, simple, and fun for both Game Masters and players. Use Astral to play with friends online, or as a helpful tool around the gaming table. Play any tabletop roleplaying system in Astral by importing and sharing your favorite titles purchased through any DriveThru site, including DriveThruRPG and Dungeon Master's Guild.

All accounts come with a ready-made starter template, tokens, audio files, and a helpful guide to help you get started. Use Astral for free, or level up to a Pro plan to unlock automation tools and 10,000 assets (designed by Mythic Portal Games) that come with every Pro account.

Wednesday, April 17, 2019

Reminder - Tavern Chat Tonight - 9 PM Eastern

Barrel Rider Games is now linked with Gallant Knight. Fantasy Grounds is releasing an AD&D 2e ruleset I expect those will just some of many topics tonight during the live Tavern Chat hangout at 9 pm Eastern.

Tavern Chat is held weekly on the Tenkar's Tavern Discord Server, each Wednesday night.

Talk, listen, ask questions, chew the fat. It's all good. You never know who may turn up :)

https://discord.gg/PqSkRc3

News - Fantasy Grounds has just released Officially Licensed AD&D 2E modules for the PHB, MM, DMG and N1 Adventure

I received the following from Doug Davidson (Fantasy Grounds) via the Tenkar's Tavern Facebook page:

Fantasy Grounds just released officially licensed AD&D 2E modules for the PHB, MM, DMG and N1 adventure.

We added a 2E ruleset to all Standard and Ultimate licenses where people can enter their own data if they don't want to buy the preloaded module content we sell.

https://www.fantasygrounds.com/store/?sys=27

I would have preferred 1e or B/X but this is a heluva good sign that there are more classic rulesets in the works. Notice that the adventure converted to Fantasy Grounds is N1 - a classic AD&D 1e adventure.

Interesting times!

edit - From a comment of Facebook:

There is a free extension that makes the 2e ruleset a AD&D ruleset.
You actually get the rules engine (automation) free with the program. You need to buy the books to get the content, but you could enter is all yourself if you wanted to.
DCC also got an official ruleset the same day.

Why "Swords & Wizardry?"

Believe me when I say I have them all in dead tree format. I have OSRIC in full size, trade paperback and the Player's Guide. I have LL and the AEC (and somewhere OEC, but I can't find it at the moment). Obviously I have Basic Fantasy RPG. Actually, I have the whole available line in print. Way too much Castles & Crusades. We all know my love for the DCC RPG. I even have Dark Dungeons in print, the Delving Deeper boxed set, Astonishing Swordsmen & Sorcerers of Hyperborea (thank you Kickstarter) (edit) BOTH editions of LotFP's Weird Fantasy and will soon have some dead tree copies of the Greyhawk Grognards Adventures Dark & Deep ~~shipping shortly~~ in my grubby hands awaiting a review..

I am so deep in the OSR when I come up for breath it's for the OSR's cousin, Tunnels & Trolls (and still waiting on dT&T to ship).

So, out of all that, why Swords & Wizardry? Why, when I have been running a AD&D 1e / OSRIC campaign in Rappan Athuk am I using Swords & Wizardry and it's variant, Crypts & Things, for the second campaign? (Actually, now running a S&W Complete campaign, soon to be with multiple groups)

Because the shit works.

It's easy for lapsed gamers to pick up and feel like they haven't lost a step. I can house rule it and it doesn't break. It plays so close to the AD&D of my youth and college years (S&W Complete especially) that it continually surprises me. Just much less rules hopping than I remember. (my God but I can run it nearly without the book)

I grab and pick and steal from just about all OSR and Original resources. They seem to fit into S&W with little fuss. It may be the same with LL and the rest, but for me the ease of use fit's my expectations with S&W.

Even the single saving throw. That took me longer to adjust to, but even that seems like a natural to me now. Don't ask me why, it just does. Maybe it's the simplicity of it. At 45 48, simplicity and flexibility while remaining true to the feel of the original is an OSR hat trick for me ;)

Swords & Wizardry Light - Forum

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