Kickstarter - Swords & Wizardry Complete Revised Rulebook

Swords & Wizardry (White Box plus Supplements) is one of the original three retro-clones, including OSRIC (AD&D 1e) and Labyrinth Lord (B/X) (others may include Castles in Crusades in this discussion but I see C&C as more "proto" retro-clone).

One of the major changes Swords & Wizardry made from its source material was whittling the number of saving throw categories down to a single save number.

I am, personally, a great fan of Swords & Wizardry in all of its flavors - White Box for its streamlined ruleset, Core for its expanded rules while keeping the classes to the core four, and Complete for being, well, essentially "complete". 

Matt Finch and his company, Mythmere Games, are kickstarting Swords & Wizardry Complete Revised Rulebook, which is essentially the 5th printing of S&W Complete and the first to not be released under the OGL, but most likely the upcoming ORC license or something similar. 

The S&W Complete Kickstarter has already hit $50k in funding in less than 12 hrs. Now that's impressive!

Looks like I'll be adding another printing of Swords & Wizardry Complete to my collection :)

For anyone who's completely unfamiliar with the game, Swords & Wizardry is a tabletop fantasy roleplaying game. All the rules are in this book, and all you'll need in addition are a set of gaming dice (20 sided, 8 sided, etc.), paper, and pencil. Many people also play with miniatures, but they aren't necessary.

Swords & Wizardry is one of the oldest of the Old School Renaissance ("OSR") games, originally written in 2008, with a large following throughout the world. Hundreds of adventures have been written for use with the system by multiple publishers, and these are still compatible with this version of the game.

The game is much more "rules-light" than most fantasy roleplaying games, so it's fast and easy to learn the basics and start playing.

Swords & Wizardry contains a full set of 9 character classes, all the rules you need to play, including all the monsters, spells, and treasure tables.

The game rules of OD&D are similar to the B/X rules, so this game can be viewed as an "advanced" version of the B/X rules in many ways.

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Kickstarter - Tome of Adventure Design Revised (Matt Finch)

A system-neutral sourcebook for designing fantasy adventures, usable with 5e D&D and other fantasy roleplaying tabletop games.

This is where I talk about connections, and there are many. I've known Matt Finch, the man behind The Tome of Adventure Design for years. With Matt's permission, I organized the first Swords & Wizardry Appreciation Day (with about 130 blogs participating - those were the days). It was Matt that gave his blessing and backing to me putting together Swords & Wizardry Light and later Swords & Wizardry Continual Light. Swords & Wizardry has been my go-to OSR ruleset since I found it, and the original Tome of Adventure Design (ToAD) is probably my most referred to book when designing and naming adventures.

Matt just launched a new Kickstarter for the Tome of Adventure Design - Revised. Will this now be known as ToAdR? ;)

So, what do you get with ToADR?

• Matte Finish Hardcover
• Smyth-sewn binding (stitched in signatures)
• 500+ pages
• Printed with black and white interior
• Thousands of micro-prompts to jump start your imagination
• Over 400 random generation tables
• Printed in the USA

Tome of Adventure Design offers a comprehensive method for designing an adventure all the way from the starting concepts to the finer details. Just as with creativity, it’s not a linear method: starting points can include a mission, a villainous plot, a location, or a new monster, but tables are provided for all of these common inspiration-points. For obvious reasons, the highest level of detail is provided for subterranean dungeon adventures, but a wealth of tables are also provided for cities and settlements, planar adventuring, and wilderness adventuring.

If you want to ask Matt questions, tonight's Talking Crit LiveStream at 8 PM Eastern will feature Matt Finch as our Special Guest. You'll need to be subscribed to the channel for at least 20 minutes before you can post a comment or question (that's to combat the spambots). Link below:

The Tavern is supported by readers like you. The easiest way to support The Tavern is to shop via our affiliate links. DTRPG, Amazon, and Humble Bundle are affiliate programs that support The Tavern. 

You can catch the daily Tavern Chat podcast on Anchor, YouTube, or wherever you listen to your podcast collection. - Tenkar   

Kickstarter - City of Jordoba: 3D Printable Terrain by Otus and Lovecraft (and Matt Finch)

I think I've gotten to the point where I need a 3d printer because of Kickstarters like this. Yes, Fat Dragon has had some amazing 3d printable terrain Kickstarters, but the City of Jordoba: 3D Printable Terrain Kickstarter is pushing me over the edge. Damn you Matt Finch and Company. Damn You!

This is not your ordinary "fantasy city" -- it's built on sword & sorcery fiction, not on "high fantasy." Sword & sorcery fiction - the heart of D&D - isn't really set in the worlds of Tudor and Gothic architecture. For example, Conan strides through realms that are mostly akin to the Fertile Crescent and Africa -- nothing like Merry Olde England. Fafyrd and the Grey Mouser swagger around in cities based on Alexandria, Tyre, and Seville. This is the realm of the Black Company, not the the Fellowship. Not only is sword & sorcery fiction "based" outside of Western Europe, it takes imaginary versions of these places and adds the strange, the weird, and the alien. 

Who better to portray the strange, the weird, and the alien than famed D&D artist Erol Otus? For our fantasy city we've teamed up Erol Otus as a concept artist, Iain Lovecraft as the sculptor and designer, and Matt Finch as concept artist and designer. Our objective -- to offer a swords & sorcery city that's different from anything else out there. 

Cult following? Yeah, pretty close. Erol's work on early D&D art includes the cover of the Basic Set and the famous Cthulhu Mythos section of Deities and Demigods that TSR removed from the book in later printings. He has, let's say, a reputation for weird, phantasmagorical imagery, which made him perfect for what we wanted to do with this Kickstarter. We got Erol to do a lot of the concept art upon which this Kickstarter is based, with contributions from Matt Finch. Iain Lovecraft's well-known work as a 3D sculptor/designer is, of course, present throughout. 

Tonight - 7 PM Eastern - Matt Finch LIVE with Jason Hardy, MeWe's Product Director

Looks like MeWe wants to accommodate gamers on its platform.

I'll (Matt Finch) have Jason Hardy, MeWe's Product Director talking with me on my youtube channel tonight at 6PM Central time (7 PM Eastern). In last night's panel-discussion show I assembled a set of questions and comments from the live chat, but if there is a topic you would like me to address with Jason on tonight's show, feel free to post it. The live chat will also be enabled during the show tonight. This is our chance to give MeWe an organized presentation of what the G+ gaming community wants and needs from MeWe if they are going to become the go-to location for tabletop gaming communities. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jzf_mcgjo_0

Announcement - Uncle Matt's D&D Studio Launches Tonight 830 Eastern / 730 Central (Matt Finch Livestream)

Yep, tonight Uncle +Matt Finch is launching his new Youtube channel, Uncle Matt's D&D Studio. The opening piece is above.

Its been a heavy week in the OSR and Matt plans to lift some spirits. Additionally, there will be the announcement of a new project from Matt which I am excitedly looking forward to. The project that is, cause I know what it is and I'm trilled to be able to do what I can for it and the OSR at large. How's that for stirring some interest?

In any case, here the link to Matt's new channel - click it and subscribe!

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCwQ6cSVDLklOoQ8VSMsxp5Q

edit - Matt will be fielding questions over at The Tavern's Discord server on the uncle-matts-dnd-studio text channel

here's the link: https://discord.gg/Cm4mBS

OSR Video Collection - Adventure Design Part 1: Meaningful choices in D&D (and other RPG) adventures (Matt Finch)

There are plans in the works to do much more than I'm starting to do (not my plans mind you), but I'd like to start highlighting Youtube videos (and other videos) that would be of interest to regulars of The Tavern and the OSR at large. Feel free to add links in the comments of this post.

I've shared links to +Matt Finch 's videos before, but Matt's latest kicks off a new series - Adventure Design.

Matt makes some very good points about meaningful choices when designing adventures - commercially or for your personal table. It made me feel good that I was already following most Matt's advice when I put together Beneath the Battered Dwarf Tavern.

The link to Matt's Youtube channel is here.

You can chat and / or talk about Matt's videos at the Official Frog God Games Discord Server - https://discord.gg/kXjt3J Its also the official home for Swords & Wizardry on Discord.

Looking to yap about Swords & Wizardry Light or just general OSR chat? Drop into The Tavern's Discord Server - https://discord.gg/fReGmuD

We don't bite and neither do the Frogs ;)

Matt Finch Breaks Down the OGL (YouTube)

Thinking of publishing under the OGL? Well, none other than our very own +Matt Finch has a series of YouTube videos explaining the license for the common man. For example, someone like your bartender ;)

Matt doesn't provide legal advice but her does break down legal definitions and the wording of the OGL.

Two parts are up. Part 1 is the first one, Part 2 is the second one.

Matt Finch is Doing a Series of Youtube Videos About old School Gaming

If you haven't met and spoken with +Matt Finch face to face, his new YouTube series is a decent substitute.

As I post this, Matt has three videos uploaded with more to come.

Do yourself a favor - watch the videos. They are short, informative and its Matt. I could listen to Matt all day ;)

Link to Matt's Youtube Channel