Coinage in Fantasy RPGs - Why So Large?

 

One thing that has irked me since my early days of gaming was the 10 coins to a pound ratio in AD&D. Even in my teen years it seemed outrageously large, and I vaguely remember an issue of The Dragon from the early 80s discussing such.

Above I have a pic of some Roman coins and a US Quarter. One pound of quarters gives you 80 quarters, so a coin in AD&D is the weight of 8 quarters I (2 bucks of coins jangling in your pocket)

At 10 coins per pound, a gold coin weighs in at 1.6 ounces. That's roughly $3k in today's dollars.

The denarius (Latin pronunciation: [deːˈnaːrɪ.ʊs], pl. dēnāriī [deːˈnaːrɪ.iː]) was the standard Roman silver coin for about 450 years (211 BC to 244 AD). There were 72 denarii to the pound of, though by the end of its mintage that had lighted to 96 to a pound or (and lighter still at the end).

So, 100 coins to the pound isn't a stretch, its historically accurate. Certainly more realistic.

So, why 10 coins to the pound in AD&D 1e? I'm guessing to make retrieving the spoils a worthy effort. I just don't see the need for such heavy coinage and never have.

What are your thoughts?

Further thoughts at tonight's podcast:

https://anchor.fm/tavernchat/episodes/E846---Are-Coins-in-ADD-Too-Heavy-eke117

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Announcing the Old School Gaming Forums - Embeddable Everywhere :)

As many of my readers know, I've been looking to upgrade The Tavern website for a while. Part of that mission was to find a forum provider that was easy to embed in a Blogger powered blog. Why Blogger? Because if it works on Blogger, it will work on ANY website.

But why does it have to work on any website? Quite simply, the concept is to have a forum that can be accessed from any blog or publisher website that joins the community. Just drop a few lines of code into a Blogger widget, drag the widget beneath your posts and Bamn! You are hosting the same forum as a dozen other sites. Literally, all doors lead to the Old School Gaming Forums. :) Yep, that is the direct link, but you can see the embedded forums below the posts on this page.

Want to add the Old School Gaming Forums to your blog or website? Use the code below:

<a class="muut" href="https://muut.com/i/old-school-gaming">old-school-gaming</a> <script src="//cdn.muut.com/1/moot.min.js"></script>

If you add the above to your blog or website, let us know in the comments below. It is kinda baren at the moment, but its only hours old. It needs you to come fully to life.

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Deal of the Day - Monster Stand-Ins (Paper Minis) {Inkwell Designs}

Most of the sessions of Swords & Wizardry Light at various conventions have been with the Mouth of Doom 3d printed dungeon. I learned to appreciate the use of miniatures, which I sorely lack. Pogs are useful but get lost in the 3d terrain. Printable minis would have been awesome and extremely portable, as well as affordable. Normally 9.95, you can snag Inkwell Designs Monster Stand-Ins (Paper Minis) for 1.99. perfect for the frugal DM ;)

Monster Stand-Ins is a PDF of creature miniatures.  Print as many as you need!  Over 350 images (originally 250+) cover all the most common creatures (orcs, skeletons, goblins, etc.) as well as many uncommon creatures such as a devourer, vegepygmies, and sahuagin. Most of the more common creatures come in several versions--get a kobold as a melee fighter, an archer, a shaman, or a buffed-up leader.

The PDF also includes many animals & insects (horses, cats, dogs, lions, bears, bees, bats, rats, etc.) and over different 50 PCs/NPCs.

The back of each creature is a silhouette of the front. Each mini is available with or without a label.

As much as possible, creatures are grouped on pages of similar creatures to make printing easy.  (If you need hobgoblins, you'll likely want goblins.)

Each mini has a front and back on the same side of paper and when folded: Small creatures are 1.25" x 1", medium are 1.5"x1", large are 2"x1.5", and huge creatures are 2"x3" and a few are 4"x3".

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Painting Day (allegedly) at the Game Store

 

News flash: I suck at painting minis.

I've actually done a good, I dare say great, job painting some of my minis in the past, but evidently miniature painting is a perishable skill and my expiration date came and went sometime in the last five years since I last painted something.

I could show you pics of minis I'm proud of, but I'm also lazy and they're roughly stored away in another room, and this post is more about my recent, shitty paint job.

My local comic book store, that has a decent RPG selection, was hosting a miniature painting event and I scored a spot in the event. For better or for worse I also had forgotten about this event and I had a date later that day so instead of painting it in the store, where I could watch a painting video, I took it home to paint where I figured I could use my personal painting "stuff" as well. A bit of a double-edged sword. If I was more skilled, having my own setup to use would have been optimal, but since I'm not.......that painting guide would have been useful.

The kit was $20 and had a Manticore mini, two brushes, and a selection of paints. I do wish there was a painting guide, but the idea was to watch the video........so a URL to the video would have been awesome as well. That way, even in the store I could watch on my phone and rewind/fast forward at my leisure.

One good thing about being at home with the mini was that mine had a severely cupped base, which I could easily fix at home with some hot & cold water before supergluing it to a thicker base of my choice.

I didn't use most of the colors in the kit, choosing to use a few colors and mix on my own. Luckily there was a generous quantity of paint in the pots, easily enough to cover the entire fig with each color if wanted. I think of the Manticore as a top-tier (but not #1) apex ambush predator, so I wanted a more muted color palette than what the picture on the box implied. I did try to do some subtle thinned down coloration using a drop or two of paint and a bunch of matte medium. The main body was one color with this thin opaque darker reddish-tan color on top and a lighter yellowish on the underbelly. I thought it'd look cool to have that color darken and extend to the base color used in the wings and the tail.  I did the same thing with the "veins" on the wings. I think it was a good idea, but I didn't pull it off.

Instead of using the wash supplied, which I should 120% should have done, I tried making my own and effed it up so bad. How bad? Yeah I went and tried to wash it off in the sink bad. I got most of it off, dried the mini with a hair drier, and then watered down my wash even more and re-applied. Meh....

I felt rushed, because of my date, but I personally think I needed the pressure or I would probably gotten little more than basing done. 

Overall though I loved the idea of a painting event at a game store and I really hope that this can be a more regular thing. The store gets the traffic, you get a social event with other like-minded players\gms\whatever label you use, and you get to brush-up on your panting skills (pun intended). I've already started getting my supplies together and am setting up a painting desk in my office just for working on terrain and minis.

I really hope WotC keeps supporting this type of thing. I do hope though that they pick a better intro mini to work with. Something with fewer tight spots (that tail) and fewer mold/flash lines. Still, you got to pick a cool mini to get people in the door.

Deal of The Day - Lordling: Fantasy Role-Playing Game for Kids (Goblinoid Games)

I'm a huge fan of youth accessible RPG gaming. My niece is now 9, she was 5 when Swords & Wizardry Light released. When she realized what I wrote she told me: "Uncle, you can use this to teach me to read, and then I can play D&D too!" 

The fact that Lordling: Fantasy Role-Playing Game for Kids was written for kids is awesome. Normally 4.49 in PDF, until tomorrow morning Lordling is on sale for 2.69

Lordling is the baton to hand off fantasy role-playing to the next generation!

It is an introductory role-playing game for kids. Play all of the classic race classes from Labyrinth Lord, but with a new streamlined system perfect for young new players.

Lordling is meant to be used by a mentor to teach young kids how to play role-playing games. It is a self-contained game, but as the players become more experienced it will benefit from using Labyrinth Lord for additional material.

Finally! Your kids are ready to play. But can you handle their imaginations?

Lordling presents rules very similar to B/X, but uses 2d6 or 1d6 for resolution. The overall system is streamlined for kids, but with enough detail that it can also be used as a "beer & pretzels" RPG for adults or older kids.

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The Tavern is Looking for a Web Designer to Design The Tavern 3.0

I know that I've been talking about upgrading The Tavern for well over a year now, and its time for me to admit to myself that I lack the skills and the time to do so.  Hell, I'm far behind on every project at the moment - "knock on wood" I am working on the assumption that further hospitalizations are no longer a thing, and if they are a future thing, expanding The Tavern will ensure things continue smoothly even if I am unable to temporarily participate.

This is what I would like for the next / future version of The Tavern:

• rotating header art
• portability of the web address. currently registered with Google/GoDaddy.
• the ability to host multiple blogs by multiple authors, each with their own feed
• integrate Discord Chat into the website
• add a forum
• possibly a web store
• further features the community may pitch, that are feasible and doable

Note: This is a PAID position for the initial design and a monthly stipend to keep things up and running smoothly. No, I am not made from money, nor do I print my own, but I do want to see people paid fairly for the work they do. Call me Old School.

Email me at tenkarsDOTtavernATgmailDOTcom with Tavern 3.0 in the subject and we can discuss potential web hosts and other such details :)

Shit is becoming real :)

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The Tavern is More Popular in the US than RPG.net - Thank You for the Support!

I was running some websites through the Alexa.com ranking system of web traffic. I was VERY surprised to see that in the US, The Tavern ranks higher than RPG.net (worldwide RPG.net places significantly higher)

The Tavern

RPG.net

I'd like to seriously thank each and every one of you for spreading the word about and supporting The Tavern. There are plans to expand on what you currently get, and with a little luck and a healthy streak, we should have something to show by the New Year. Wish us luck :)

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Humble Book Bundle: Dungeons & Dragons: R.A. Salvatore Showcase

When I was younger, the Cleric Quintet was one of my favorite fantasy series. That led to more Drizzt and R.A. Salvatore's rising star. If you missed the releases or don't want to pay "dead tree" prices, the Humble Book Bundle: Dungeons & Dragons: R.A. Salvatore Showcase is a bargain and then some.

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Frog God Games - 50% off Sale on PDF - Swords & Wizardry Picks

There is just over a week left on the Frog God Games PDF Sale over at DriveThruRPG. While nearly everything for 5e, Pathfinder, Swords & Wizardry, and more are on sale, I'm going to highlight some Swords & Wizardry relevant picks (and one Pathfinder pick that is just a HUGE bargain)

Monstrosities - NOW 7.50 - Probably THEE monster book in the OSR, each entry has an adventure hook.

You can never have too many monsters, and this book is filled with them! No matter what kind of campaign, there are foes galore to stock its wildernesses and dungeons, even the unknown depths of its mysterious oceans. This is a compendium that contains the monsters from the rulebook and many monsters from the First Edition of the original roleplaying game, but there are hundreds and hundreds of completely new beasts. Note: this is a second printing of the original Swords & Wizardry monster book, updated with errata and hundreds of illustrations.

The largest compilation ever of monsters for Swords & Wizardry/0e. If you play the very first edition (0e) of the game, or if you play Swords & Wizardry at the gaming table, this book is a must-have! 186 brand new monsters await, along with hundreds of the older monsters so that they're all in one book.!

Monstrosities was created with the generous help of the Swords & Wizardry internet community, as you can see from the list of unusually brilliant authors whose erudition and eloquence grace these pages. The book’s successes are due to them, whilst any errors or failures in the transcription of their noble work are doubtless my own.

Tome of Adventure Design - NOW 6.30 - My go-to book for inspiration when I'm looking to design a new adventure.

A fantasy adventure game, at its very heart, is about developing an open-ended "story" of the characters. The referee is in charge of the fantasy world, and the players direct the actions of their characters in that fantasy world. Neither the referee nor the group of players has complete control over what's going to happen, and the result is an evolving set of surprises for both the referee and the players. Unlike the players, as the referee and creator of the game world, most of your "work" is done ahead of time. To some degree or other, you have to create the groundwork for the adventure before the game starts. Even though no battle plan survives contact with the enemy - and if you're an experienced referee you know exactly what I mean - the game has to start ... with a starting point. This might just be a vague set of ideas, or it might be as complex as a set of maps with a detailed key and well thought-out encounters for the players to run into.

The Tome of Adventure Design is organized as a series of "books," each one providing resources at every step of the way. The vast majority of the content of each book is made up of random generation tables that we created over a quarter of a century (sigh) for our own use. It shoud be said up front that these are tables for deep design - in other words, most of them are too long, and contain too many unusual or contradictory entries, for use on the spot at the gaming table. There are already many excellent books of tables for use on the fly; the tables in these books are different. They work best as a tool for preparation beforehand, providing relatively vast creative resources for browsing and gathering, rather than quick-use tables designed to provide broad, fast brushstrokes. Our shorter tables tend to d - eliver cryptic results designed to shock the reader's creativity into filling in the gaps, whereas the longer tables are unusably vast for easy random generation, being designed to shock the reader's creativity into operation by presenting a sea of possibilities.

The Lost City of Barakus - NOW - 10.00 - I had a blast running this for my old gaming group. So much fun.

The Lost City of Barakus, designed to take characters from 1st to 5th or 6th level (or higher), is as much of a campaign setting as an adventure. Detailed within these pages is the great, bustling metropolis of Endhome, the Penprie Forest and Duskmoon Hills located north of that city, and, finally, the huge dungeon that is the Lost City of Barakus. Within all these areas are many adventures, NPCs, and locations for the party to explore, interact with and conquer. How and in what order the party chooses to take on the various challenges before them is entirely yours (the GM’s) and the players’ choice.

Stoneheart Valley - NOW 8.00 - Three classic Necromancer era adventures make for a nice micro-setting and an excellent campaign kickoff.

Finally, welcome to the World of Necromancer Games! From Bill Webb and Clark Peterson's home campaign comes the old-school setting of The Lost Lands: Stoneheart Valley. For over a decade, fans of Necromancer Games and Frog God Games have been asking to see the world behind the adventures. And at long last, here is where it all began, in the Stoneheart Valley near the town of Fairhill. This mini-campaign was originally presented to the fans of Necromancer Games in three separate modules: "The Wizard's Amulet", "The Crucible of Freya", and "The Tomb of Abysthor". Frog God Games has taken the full series from the 3E version plus supplemental material previously available only online, and converted it all to the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game system and the Swords & Wizardry Complete ruleset.

Razor Coast (PF) - NOW 3.00 - Yes, the Pathfinder version is far cheaper than the S&W version. My God but this was a fun read. Three bucks? Snag it!

Razor Coast is the long anticipated Caribe-Polynesian flavored, Age of Sail swashbuckling RPG campaign envisioned and designed by Nicolas Logue. It is applauded for its ambitious and original design, its epic flavor and its lurid, full-color art – including a cover by the award winning Wayne Reynolds. Logue tapped a team of veteran designers to help develop and write Razor Coast, including Lou Agresta, Adam Daigle, Tim Hitchcock, and John Ling.

“Razor Coast isn’t just an adventure,” according to Agresta, Razor Coast Project Manager, “it’s part setting, part adventure path, and part toolkit to build your own unique campaign. It’s non-linear. It’ll never play the same way twice.”

“We filled it with corrupt municipal Dragoons, dastardly smuggling rings, weresharks – lots of weresharks, desperate naval battles, oppressed tribes craving heroes, witches, cursed islands, legendary treasure troves, an impending apocalypse or two, demon pirates, retired assassins, undead worms, gator men, failed heroes waiting to be redeemed, dark conspiracies brewing in the oceans depths, vengeful ghosts…oh – and mutating cannibal pygmies. Who doesn’t like those?”

Bill Webb's Book of Dirty Tricks - NOW .75 - That's right, Bill Webb's Book of Dirty Tricks is a mere 75 cents. If you pick up nothing else, you should be grabbing this :)

This fun little tome is a GM utility for use during regular play when either too many good things happen to the players due to luck or just whenever the GM feels they need a little push to remind them that success is fleeting. 

Dirty tricks are intended to create great players. That is and should be the only reason a GM springs such things on them. It also has the effect of creating a great game, where even mundane tasks cannot be taken for granted, and boredom is rare.

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Deal of the Day - Mike's Dungeons: The Deep Levels (OSR)

Sometimes all you want to do is dungeon crawl like we did back in 1984. Back when we didn't worry about what went on outside the walls of the dungeon. Backstory? Setting? NPCs? Bah!

Mike's Dungeons: The Deep Levels allows you to game like the old days. Normally 2.99 in PDF, until tomorrow morning it is a mere 1.49.

MIKE'S DUNGEONS: THE DEEP LEVELS includes 39 dungeon levels that take 10th-level characters up to 14th level.

DETAILS, PLEASE?

This is a massive dungeon of 39 hand-drawn levels, for character levels 10th through 14th. It was made with Moldvay/Cook's 1981 Dungeons & Dragons rules, but it can be used with other versions of the game.

WHAT IT IS NOT:

These dungeons are not for collecting, not for reading, not for gazing at, and not for displaying on your coffee table. It has no art, no stylish formatting, no production values at all. If you aren't going to use and abuse this in a game, there's no reason to buy it.

WHAT IT IS:

The word for this is FUN. These are the dungeons you could have made when you were 12 years old, but were too lazy. It is a no-nonsense dungeon for playing D&D. You don't even need to study it beforehand. You can run it on-the-fly.

YOU CAN PREVIEW ALL 39 LEVELS.

You read that right. You can freely preview every single page of this book. It's like you're flipping through this in a bookstore before you make your decision to buy.

The price comes to less than 8 pennies per level for the PDF, and a quarter per level for the print+PDF option.

Fight on!

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Some Personal Experience with one of the KenzerCo D-Team

If you've been reading my ramblings here at the Tavern for the last couple of months you've got to have learned by now that I was a fig HackMaster player and used to volunteer for the folks over at KenzerCo.

I really considered the D-Team (Development Team) at KenzerCo as friends and when you're doing things for friends, working conventions and doing all the extra stuff I did really didn't feel like "work"....until it did and unfortunately that soured things for me. I could easily blame KenzerCo and if I layed everything out some of you may very well do so as well, but I clearly have to shoulder some of that blame not matter what.

I really try not to live with regrets and be accepting of the past that I cannot change, but one regret I have comes with souring my relationship with Steve Johannson, one of the D-Team. I'm not 100%, but I'm pretty sure Stevil from Knights of the Dinner Table was based on Steve Johannson and even though I think the character is an asshole, I lovingly called Steve "Stevil". This Stevil was also a character and could easily come across as an asshole, but in reality he was a great guy who had some awesomely epic rants. You'd be talking to him about something and BAM!, he'd go off on some long tirade sounding like Grandpa Simpson, but without (much) malice.\

One time when visiting the KenzerCo office, which was a hole-in-the wall small warehouse with a conference room and some odd office space (most of the guys worked from home 90% of the time), we we talking about printed modules and I mentioned I had a couple older ones that were in good shape except for some highlighting I had made. Stevil started just going off on how pristine printed adventure modules were an abomination.....an affront to gaming in general. Adventures were meant to be used and abused, dog-eared, and marked-up......basically giving up their "lives" in creating a great gaming session and memories that will last a lifetime.

For all the years volunteering for KenzerCo and with personal visits, etc., I actually had limited gaming experience with the D-Team. I wrote a tongue-in-cheek adventure for GMs at Origins one year and Stevil bellied up to an otherwise full table to play. Instead of playing an "appropriate" PC and overbalancing that table he decided to run a NPC torchbearer....a halfling IIRC. Now I was too busy GMing another table, but I remember seeing Stevil sitting on the floor, barely able to look over the table, his hand held high as he asks one of the PC's, "Do you have enough light?" At another Origins I actually got to play in a Roll-n-Run adventure (you quick roll up 1st level PCs and go on an adventure). Stevil rolled up a Magic User, which is usually considered a bit of a waste for this type of game. Since this was HackMaster 5th Edition you could (at an expensive cost) have your Magic User take a pole-arm for a weapon. For the rest of the game Stevil's Mage loved the spell he called "Cast Spear", which was of course just him using the spear like a really shitty 1st level Fighter. I also got to play at his table at GaryCon (2013) during a Sunday morning pickup game. We ran a few encounters out of the Temple of Existential Evil......I remember enjoying the game, but since it was Sunday morning at a Con...details will be lacking. I do remember the group had a barbarian so poor he had nothing but his weapon....yep, running around "adventuring" nekkid. To throw the guy a bone Stevil threw in as "loot" some nasty, used underwear just so the barbarian wouldn't be completely naked.

Well actually I did play in another of Stevil's games at GaryCon. He had a rough shell of an adventure seed that he ran a group of us through and towards the end of the adventure my Halfling Cleric saved the life of another PC using a particular spell. When that happened Stevil just freakin lit up and he had to stop and tell the rest of the D-Team what I had just done. These guys play together on the regular and when they wrote the new edition they pretty much all thought the spell I had used was pretty much useless and he/they were surprised to see if actually used for once, much less that it worked! After the game Stevil approached me with the idea of me writing/fleshing out the adventure and then he could edit it. Evidently he had the idea, but not the time to do the leg-work. I was elated at the opportunity to write a "real" adventure and went so far as to churn out a map, add art, and even do the cover. There was a drowning mechanic I wrote up, as the adventure required one. Stevil had a better mechanic and had to do some reformatting, but the adventure ended up largely as I wrote it. He even kept the title and cover (but he did change the font for the authors on the cover, which is the only change I didn't care for).

Unfortunately this was our only collaboration because initially I wasn't reimbursed for my work and since I was unemployed, taking a few days "off" to do unpaid work wasn't something I could afford to do. I HIGHLY suspect that in the end Stevil gave me $100 out of his own pocket to pay me for that adventure. I'm not really playing HackMaster anymore (but would like to!) and now that I have a good paying job I could afford to flesh-out more of Steve's ideas......

.....but unfortunately Steve passed away a year ago this weekend. Yes, I intentionally "buried the lead" (pun NOT intended, although I think he'd like that one), but I've been thinking of Steve lately and miss him more than I expected to. His "hands" were intimately involved in so much of my favorite gaming memories, basically anything involving HackMaster or Knights of the Dinner Table.

I appreciate getting the opportunity to share this here and hopefully someone here will tear off that shrink wrap on some saved adventure and start making some notes in the margins in preparation of running their home group in a dice-slinging session. You can always bag it and protect it for use again in the future.......

Reminder - The Tavern in its Various Incarnations is a Neutral Ground

The US Presidential Elections are a month and a half away.

Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsberg just passed.

Social media is going to be on fire.

The Tavern will not be joining the drama.

Fact: Ginsberg's closest friend on the Supreme Court was Justice Scalia, a staunch conservative and Ginsberg's ideological opposite. How could that be? Because their friendship was based on commonalities, not differences.

We are gamers. We are geeks. That is our commonality. That is what we stress here at The Tavern. We do not discuss politics or social issues. Sure, such issues exist, but there are more appropriate venues for such discussion. It isn't here. Not the blog, not the Discord, not the Facebook Community nor the MeWe Group.

Social media ensures that discussions on any sensitive subjects that are even tangentially touching upon politics or social issues will devolve into a dumpster fire at best.

Being a Neutral Ground does not ensure that you, personally, will not be offended by subjects, content, or discussions that may arise. My personal neutrality means that the politics of personalities does not influence what I do or do not cover.  I am remarking about the relevance to us as gamers, I am not covering their politics. 

I am, however, certainly swayed by personal attacks on myself. If your tactic is such in the hopes of me sending traffic your way, you will be sorely disappointed.

Game on dude! Game on! 

Need to Update the Free OSR Pages - Suggestions Welcome

It's been a long time since I sat down and went through the Free OSR Lists on the right side of this page to see what is missing and what has dropped off.

If you have a moment, I ask that you check out the links. You might find stuff that you don't have. Heck, you might find stuff that I don't have listed. If that's the case, drop a link or two in the comments below.

Here are the links to the pages:

Free OSR Rulesets - Fantasy 

Free OSR Rulesets - SciFi 

Free OSR Rulesets - Other (needs entries)

Free OSR Adventures

OSR Resources (needs entries, and I can already think of a few)

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State of the Tavern Keeper - Doc, Doc, Goose!

I could really use a do-over for 2020. Three hospitalizations, and yet still no Covid - knock-on-wood. 

The latest hospitalization found that my left carotid is fully occluded - blocked. Needless to say, the result of this was more doc appointments and tests. Here's the summary:

The right carotid has fully compensated for the blocked left carotid. The left carotid's blockage is almost certainly due to radiation treatment for Hodgkin's 14 years ago. Low blood pressure and dehydration (I fainted) was the reason for the hospitalization. Days of testing revealed I was overmedicated for a healthier heart than expected. The carotid blockage was bonus knowledge.

The blockages in my heart that were revealed with my hospitalization in May for Congestive Heart Failure were likely a consequence of chemo and radiation treatment for Hodgkin's. The damage was not new. The first hospitalization, back in March, for pneumonia and sepsis, apparently put the heart muscle in a weakened state of shock. The 4 stents I received for my CHF seem to have woken the heart muscle up, and the heart is now working strongly enough that it would not now be considered CHF - although I believe once diagnosed it is always a threat.

I've lost about 25 to 30 pounds from my "convention" weight with a goal to lose at least another 20. Anything I can do to help the heart I am willing to do.

In the last two and a half weeks since my latest hospitalization, I've had 9 days of doc visits and medical testing. Things are finally slowing down.

I am behind on everything. Torchlight. The Watchman Project. Fireside Chats on the podcast. Chores and projects around the house. You name it, I'm behind on it.

I'm hoping this weekend to start climbing out of that hole, but it will take time. At least, things are looking up, healthwise. All that and I knocked my A1C down by 3.2 points - which tells you how out of control it was.

I thank you all for the support. It really has given me strength.

Onward and upward - Tenkar

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Tome of Adventure Design now available from Amazon (Matt Finch)

There's no secret that I'm a huge fan of Matt Finch's Tome of Adventure Design. I have it in the multi-volume set hat Matt self-published in addition to two printings in hardcover from Frog God Games. I've used it to design adventures multiple times as well as posted the process here at The Tavern.

Now you can grab the out of print Tome of Adventure Design via from Amazon, in either softcover or hardcover. The Softcover is 34.99 and the Hardcover is 49.99.

Issuing ToAD and other out of print Frog God releases on Amazon is huge, especially for fans across the pond or across the world, as it avoids the outrageous American postal rates.

A fantasy adventure game, at its very heart, is about developing an open-ended "story" of the characters. The referee is in charge of the fantasy world, and the players direct the actions of their characters in that fantasy world. Neither the referee nor the group of players has complete control over what's going to happen, and the result is an evolving set of surprises for both the referee and the players. Unlike the players, as the referee and creator of the game world, most of your "work" is done ahead of time. To some degree or other, you have to create the groundwork for the adventure before the game starts. Even though no battle plan survives contact with the enemy - and if you're an experienced referee you know exactly what I mean - the game has to start ... with a starting point. This might just be a vague set of ideas, or it might be as complex as a set of maps with a detailed key and well thought-out encounters for the players to run into.

The Tome of Adventure Design is organized as a series of "books," each one providing resources at every step of the way. The vast majority of the content of each book is made up of random generation tables that we created over a quarter of a century (sigh) for our own use. It shoud be said up front that these are tables for deep design - in other words, most of them are too long, and contain too many unusual or contradictory entries, for use on the spot at the gaming table. There are already many excellent books of tables for use on the fly; the tables in these books are different. They work best as a tool for preparation beforehand, providing relatively vast creative resources for browsing and gathering, rather than quick-use tables designed to provide broad, fast brushstrokes. Our shorter tables tend to deliver cryptic results designed to shock the reader's creativity into filling in the gaps, whereas the longer tables are unusably vast for easy random generation, being designed to shock the reader's creativity into operation by presenting a sea of possibilities.

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New PWYW - Guildhall Goods (Frugal GM)

In case you've missed it, the Frugal GM has been offering quality RPG resources at rock bottom prices for a while. His latest is Guildhall Goods, which is available for Pay What You Want pricing.

This short location set-up is designed to act as a loose framework for you to tweak & toss into your current campaign and everything listed here is a suggestion for use only. Several details, especially those on this page, are deliberately vague in order to make integration easier. Use as-is, or slice & dice the information given to suit the needs of your game.

The idea behind this Tweak & Toss is that a frontier location has a market that has been around "forever". This market also offers services for adventurers that join up as members of the "Guildhall". 

I was having some PDF production issues, so instead of my normal half-page sized PDFs that should be booklet printed, this product is a full page landscape print that is designed to be folded in half. That puts the map of the building on the inside spread and you can easily just print off that page if it helps, but it comes at the expense of easier navigation through the document on a tablet or other screen.

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Kickstarter - OpenQuest 3e (d100 System)

I'm a huge fan of OpenQuest. I jumped on the earlier editions when they released, and its one of the few non-old school D&D derived rulesets I feel comfortable with.  Needless to say, I'm backing for the latest edition, but this time I want a signed copy ;)

OpenQuest is a straightforward, easy to play D100 role-playing game.

Inspired by the tremendous D100 rulesets put out in the late 1970s and 1980s,  OpenQuest uses the Legend SRD as a base and includes innovations from more recent indie RPGs to give it a modern edge.

The first edition of OpenQuest came out in Summer 2009. This version of the game refines and updates the text of the game, making it more straightforward to use than ever before. 

You can back for as little as 13 bucks for the year PDF & POD.

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Gareth Sharka Releases - Star System: Every Star A Destination - Still No Far West update over 12 Months Later

 Ah, sweet, sweet Gareth. No time to work on Far West. Time, however, to work on and release Star System: Every Star A Destination. 24.99 for PDF, 24.99 in Print, 24.99 in Print plus PDF.

BACK INTO THE BLACK...

The writers and editors behind some of your favorite releases for the greatest space-fantasy RPG of all time return to the D6 System!

Former West End Games Star Wars Creative Director Eric S. Trautmann assembles an all-star bullpen of veteran D6 System writers, including:

Bill Smith (Line Editor, The Star Wars Roleplaying Game.)

Peter Schweighofer (Editor, The Star Wars Adventure Journal.)

Timothy S. O'Brien (Pirates & Privateers.)

Drew Campbell (Cynabar's Fantastic Technology: Droids.)

Gareth-Michael Skarka (D6 Space: Ships.)

Michael Kogge (Star Wars Adventure Journal.)

Wayne Humfleet (Heroes & Rogues.)

...together again to bring you an anthology of eight brand-new D6 System-compatible space-fantasy adventures.  Each scenario is ready to be dropped into any existing campaign, or used to launch a new one!

Visit scenic Tekazzil, home to a royal society that views laws as optional and profit as king; slog through alien jungles in search of an ancient artifact... and the lunatic who hopes to find it first; battle octopoid pirates above the gas giant Arx; try to survive an ancient ghost ship trapped in a ruined sector of space; witness the fearsome might and utter horror of a planet of bureaucrats; avoid being caught in the fatal crossfire between vicious university academics; battle for survival against a brutal race, long believed to be extinct; and join a rag-tag fleet of xenoecologists as they attempt to preserve a pod of galactic leviathans...

The galaxy is vast and unforgiving... especially on the edges of known space.  Out there, a willingness to risk it all can be the key to survival. Every flight means danger, every landing field, starport, or orbital base can be the line between life and death.

EVERY STAR A DESTINATION

PDF and Print Edition are the same price -- and if you order the Print Edition, you get the PDF for FREE! Included with the PDF are a set of bonus files with all of the handouts, references and templates, ready to print.

This adventure anthology is the first of Adamant Entertainment's new line, STAR SYSTEM, a series of epic space-fantasy releases intended for use with any game using the classic D6 System. Follow Adamant on Twitter (@adamantent) to stay informed about new releases! (but not Far West. Never Far West)

 

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Deal of the Day - GM's Miscellany: Eventures (5e)

Some of the best GM resources are offered by Raging Swan Press. Today's Deal of the Day is GM's Miscellany: Eventures for 5e. Seven adventures that focus on roleplay and social skills, so even if you are an OSR gamer, it shouldn't be hard to convert these to the system of your choice. Normally 9.95, GM's Miscellany: Eventures (5e) is 3.98 until tomorrow morning.

This GM’s Miscellany presents seven eventures ready for your campaign! Use them as a change of pace from the same old dungeon crawls and wilderness expeditions or as an opportunity for role-playing and urban exploration.

Eventure are akin to a normal adventure, but do not (normally) feature violence or physical challenges. Instead, an eventure focuses on the use of social skills and role-play to resolve the challenges, or events, therein. Eventures are an excellent change of pace and can be used as filler between adventures or as situations in which characters who have invested in social skills can shine. They are also perfect for players who enjoy role-playing.

GM's Miscellany: Eventures comprises the following eventure

A Day Out at the Circus

A Day Out at the Executions

Five Night at the Scythe

Four Nights at the Orc's Head

Night of the Masks

Raisa's Auction Most Wondrous

Where There's a Will

The eventures in GM's Miscellany: Eventures are suitable for any level characters and can be used with any size group. While they are designed for the Ashlar campaign setting they are easily adapted to virtually any GM’s campaign.

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19 Years Later, I Would Still Do It All Again

19 years ago today, I went to work remarking to myself what a beautiful day it was. 

19 years later, I’ve survived cancer that was certified 9-11 related, and most recently Congestive Heart Failure and a blocked Carotid Artery, both likely due to chemo and radiation treatment I received to combat cancer.

I do not regret my actions that fateful day. Being a first responder is a special calling, and even those that take such a job for the salary or pension benefits find themselves putting their lives at risk to protect their fellow human beings on a daily basis, not just 9-11. The risks to their lives are both immediate and long term. They take those risks so you don’t have to.

I feel blessed to be alive and hold each day as special. But for the grace of God, there goes I.

52 Copies of Swords & Wizardry Continual Light Sold as DTRPG Deal of the Day - Thank You!

 Just want to give a quick but huge "Thank You!" to the community for the support given to our very own Swords & Wizardry Continual Light. There were 52 copies sold and I am truly humbled.

I've spent the past two weeks knee-deep in doctor appointments and medical testing, this after nearly a week in the hospital. To say I'm far being where I wanted to be creatively nearly halfway into September would be an understatement. Work will recommence on Torchlight #1 next week, with the aim to release by the end of September.

Alright, I need to get ready for Tavern Chat on the Discord server at 9 pm. 

Again, thanks :)

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Deal of the Day - Swords & Wizardry Continual Light

Today's Deal of the Day is The Tavern's very own Swords & Wizardry Continual Light. Normally 3 bucks in PDF, for the next 24 hours it is only 1.20. Woot!

If you like old school RPGs but want a streamlined package, Continual Light was created with you in mind.

You remember, don't you? The sounds of battle heard through the clatter of dice? The shuffling of character sheets? The war stories shared with fellow campaigners?

There is a longing in the soul of every adventurer and though it sometimes fades to a whisper, you still hear it. Swords & Wizardry Continual Light marks your return to fantasy roleplaying - or if you're curious what fantasy gaming is all about, this is the perfect introduction.

This book, a twenty-sided die, and a few six-sided dice are all you need to return to the table, recall those halcyon days of heroism, and forge brand new legends! Welcome back!

What is Swords & Wizardry Continual Light? It is a streamlined version of the Swords & Wizardry rules many of you already love. You will recognixe some White Box and some Complete, but its all Swords & Wizardry.

It covers four core classes (and a bunch of optional ones), four races, seven levels of play (and optional rules to keep the game going after seventh level), magic items, spells, monsters and more - all in about 17 pages of rules.

Suiable for introducing new players to old school gaming or reintroducing a lapsed gamer, pefect for pick up games, convention play and yes - even campaigns.

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Kickstarter - The Complete Curse of Roslof Keep Campaign (1e & 5e)

 I've been a fan of Scott Taylor / Art of the Genre for a number of years. The individual modules have classic TSR era styled cover, and the art and writing are simply top-notch. Probably the best of the adventure arcs is the Roslof Keep series. The Complete Curse of Roslof Keep Campaign Kickstarter put that story arc into a single hardcover book.

With the success of our first Roslof Keep campaign in 2015, there was little doubt that we would revisit the concept of Mithelvarn’s Labyrinth at some point in the future. So came The Curse of Roslof Keep mega-dungeon in 2018, and after two years, 6 full Folio adventures, 9 campaign adventures, 6 mini-adventures, and a setting gazetteer, the full width and breadth of this new high level dungeon was realized. Now, for the first time, ALL of the various odds and ends of the massive campaign will be housed in a single place, The Curse of Roslof Keep ‘orange spine’ hardcover! Some things within have never before seen print, and all 128 pages will be dedicated to characters levels 10-17. So, we hope you will join Art of the Genre as we ‘complete the OSR circle’ and render another AD&D-inspired hardcover right out of the 1980s, with an incredible cover by our final member of the ‘four TSR artistic horseman’ Clyde Caldwell. 

What is within these pages? This 6 level mega-dungeon is rendered in both 2D ‘blue’ hex maps, as well as full 3D artistic rendering, and is complete with 6 full size modules, 9 smaller campaign addition modules, and 6 bonus mini-adventures as well as the Rogues Guide gazetteer for the setting proper. You will find new monsters, deadly NPCs, and all manner of dungeon crawling wickedness, all for characters in the teen levels of experience, and rendered mechanically in both 5thEdition Dungeons & Dragons and classic Advanced Dungeons & Dragons formats.

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Deal of the Day - Kuf (OSR Modern Day Horror)

 A modern-day horror RPG built on an in OSR chassis? I think I may need to Frankenstein this :)

Kuf is normally a 9.99 but until tomorrow morning its on sale for 4 bucks.

Kuf is a Gnostic modern day horror RPG that is built on top of the rules light Knave OSR-system, modified with extended rules for stress and harm to support a more gritty mode of play.

The characters are weirdos and outsiders who are pulled into a maelstrom of terrifying events.

Includes rules for gaining experience from studying magical texts and interacting with strange beings, ritual magic and how to travel beyond the barrier that keeps us trapped in this world.

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We Need More Above Average Gamers

I'm back from my last business trip and decided to hit up my local game store and pick up more miniatures that I definitely don't need, mostly because I can and because I'm gearing up for my winter shut-in project(s), which will be setting up my painting station and working on my bazillion minis.

As a side note, I somehow effed up my back on this trip, enough to warrant an ambulance ride to the ER and missing a couple days of the trip writhing in near-constant pain. Not mentioning this for sympathy (multiple shots and pills helped immensely), but to put into context some things I was thinking with regards to gaming.

Might be a stretch here, but please bear with me.......so I'm pretty much laid-out on the floor unable to do much more than roll around and moan. While I wasn't straight-up frightened, the feelings of helplessness reminded me of the last time this happened in much worse conditions (situational and severity) and I remember thinking...."Whelp, this....this is how I die."

A few hops, skips, and jumps in thinking and I'm imagining my folks going through my stuff and thinking, "Holy fuck Chris has a shit-ton of these little unpainted plastic miniatures. What the hell was he planning on doing with all this stuff?!" I guess it's better than it might have been had I been in my 20's and they could wonder on just how much I spent on all this porn.....

......I kid. In my 20's my military buddies and I had a mutual agreement to scrub our porn collections before the military sealed and packed off your personal possessions, so that wouldn't be a problem.....

Longs story short, I realize that I'm the only gamer in my family, so all my gaming stuff is....well, just "stuff". There's nobody to relish getting my books and minis to use in their own game, and I've come to the conclusion that I/We need more gamers, and not just "average gamers", but "Above Average" gamers.

What's an Above Average gamer? Well odds are you would qualify as in my experience the average gamer plays one RPG, probably with the same group of friends they've been playing with since high school. They don't go to conventions, they don't try other games, and they generally don't do "other" gaming stuff......

...which is a bit of a shame because these days being a dork/geek/nerd is somewhat cool and a lot of people are into what I would think of as "ancillary" gaming stuff. Movies are a great example. How many people love Lord of the Rings, but would never even think to play MERPs (Ok, that one I get...) but with the mainstream popularity of the Marvel movies and the popular Marvel based video games (the Lego games come immediately to mind, but the AAA Title Marvel Avengers just came out this last week), but have these fans been exposed to the classic Marvel Super Heroes RPG?

In my family my mother just loves pretty much any TSR paperback that has been printed. Dragonlance, Forgotten Realms, Icewind Dale.....you name it, she's probably read it, but never once has she picked up and slung dice, much to my chagrin.

Now as far as my family goes, all my fault. I've picked up some D&D starter sets before, but maybe I should've started with the Dungeon board game, or even some other board games to whet their appetite. I missed the boat, pure plain and simple.....

.....but these days we have a golden opportunity with all this COVID-19 stay at home mentality. With kids/families spending more time at home indoors, we have a captive audience. Playing RPGs can be a family-friendly cost effective form of entertainment and depending on the game even educational!

One game I HIGHLY recommend for trying out with younger kids is Dungeonteller Fantasy RPG from Blue Boxer Rebellion. Honestly I'd just buy/download everything that Blue Boxer Rebellion has for Dungeonteller, but I'm biased. All you'll need for dice is a butt-load of d6's and the mechanics are kid friendly, quick & easy to boot. Make sure you download the free extra character classes.

This is one way we can help start growing new gamers, but that's just a start for average gamers. For Above Average gamers we need to take the basic/average gamers and start exposing them to the larger gamer culture. Get them playing one game and then try out some other games, try different genres. Introduce them to Zines....bring them to conventions. Hell, even just making some tweaks to your normal game is a good start! If you have a mini-heavy game, try playing more "Theater of the Mind" or vice-versa.

I'm just spit-balling here, but the basic idea is that I think we need to not only grow the fan base for RPGs in general, but we need to "close the loop" and bring RPGs not only more into the mainstream on a personal level, but to broaden our shared experiences. Most of us play because we really enjoy it and getting to share that with friends and family, now and even after we're gone, is important. I think we should all be looking for opportunities to create some Above Average gamers.

Now excuse me as I look online for D&D plushies for my Great Nephew (1st of his generation in my family).







Last Second Idea Edit!
Actually I've an idea........comment to this post the name and relation (something along the lines of "Titus my Great Nephew", don't need to be too specific) of someone you'd love to introduce to RPGs and I'll pick one at random to hook up with a fair bit of Dungeonteller Fantasy RPG kit. I'll make a selection next Sunday, which will give me a week to reach out to Doug Anderson and make sure he gets paid and figure out the logistics. Worst case I'll just send a gift card for DTRPG you can use to pick it up.

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