WotC Explains that the recent Legacy Disclaimer is only an Early Step

From the WotC Facebook page

Rach and I discussed on the Tavern Chat Podcast earlier tonight

A disclaimer has been added to several legacy titles on our partner distribution sites. We'd like to talk about why we've added that disclaimer, what it means, and other steps that are being taken to address a legacy of ethnic, racial, and gender prejudice in some old products. 

This is an early step and not done in a vacuum. It's not enough to evaluate ourselves. As outlined in our original diversity statement (http://spr.ly/6184GTbpj), we're undergoing the process of reviewing our content and practices and hiring external consultants to review with us. 

These processes take time to implement, and we'll continue to provide future updates. Unfortunately, our disclaimer was added before we were ready to fully communicate the steps we are taking. We apologize for failing to handle this situation with the care and grace it deserves.
Lastly, we want to make it clear that we condemn the harassment or bullying of those raising their concerns about our content, past or present. D&D wants to be an open, welcoming, and inclusive space. Those who do not reflect those values are not welcome in our community. 

Simply put, we messed up and we're sorry. Wizards of the Coast is constantly working to be better, and we have a lot of work to do, especially so in repairing trust with our community. Thank you for continuing to use your voice so that we may continue to make meaningful change."

WotC Issues Disclaimer for Legacy Products on Sale via DM's Guild / DTRPG

I've already covered this in-depth on The Tavern Chat Podcast. I can't believe they STILL haven't corrected "Dungeon & Dragons".

The quoted text is from T1 The Village of Hommlet (1e)

Podcast discussion:
https://anchor.fm/tavernchat/episodes/E765---Bonus-Episode---WotC-Adds-Disclaimer-to-Legacy-Releases-at-DMs-Guild-egemnm

https://anchor.fm/tavernchat/episodes/E766---Rant---My-DD-is-Forever-Damned-egfguh

Youtube:
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCIdpAASpAI7vu-bZx6pP_mQ
"We recognize that some of the legacy content available on this website, does not reflect the values of the Dungeon & Dragons franchise today. Some older content may reflect ethnic, racial and gender prejudice that were commonplace in American society at that time. These depictions were wrong then and are wrong today. This content is presented as it was originally created, because to do otherwise would be the same as claiming these prejudices never existed. Dungeons & Dragons teaches that diversity is a strength, and we strive to make our D&D products as welcoming and inclusive as possible. This part of our work will never end."

There is an affiliate link above. Purchases made via The Tavern's affiliate links support your bartender.

Sale - The Secret Fire (OSR Ruleset)

Secret Fire Games is running a sale on its entire The Secret Fire line of releases. Has it really been 9 years since it was first released?.

Very much OSR. While some part may be disturbing, there are few games that one can fip through for 10 minutes and be filled with inspiration.

Winner of the 2012 Innovative Game Design Award from I-CON 31, THE SECRET FIRE™ uses a unique blend of game design and storytelling to create a fast and flexible original fantasy game system of roleplaying, exploration, and constant danger. Developed by Origins Award®-nominated game designer George Strayton (Dungeons & Dragons, Men in Black, Star War D6, Indiana Jones, The D6 System, The Lord of the Rings, etc.), TSF’s revolutionary “immersion” mechanics (screenwriting plus fantasy RPG game design) to breathe real life into the experience of descending into dungeons, exploring the uncharted wilderness, and saving the innocent from certain doom. 

“A flavor-filled approach to fantasy gaming that puts the mystery and magic back into the dark recesses of the dungeon.” —Monte Cook

Yep, that is an affiliate link above. Support The Tavern.

Kickstarter -Steve Jackson Games' GURPS 2020 PDF Challenge (11 PDFs 3 Bucks)

Can we unlock all twelve PDFs before the clock runs out?

I've been a fan of GURPS since the Man to Man and Orcslayer releases. I actually love the supplements, as they convert to other RPG systems nearly painlessly. This means 11 - potentially 12 PDFs for 3 bucks is something I can't pass up on, and neither should you.

Just 5k away from 12 PDFs :)

The GURPS team, under the direction of GURPS Line Editor Sean Punch, has prepared a dozen different PDFs . . . and this is your chance to possibly grab all twelve of the new PDFs for only $3! 

Starting with the latest expansion to the GURPS Action series (see Warehouse 23), your pledge of $3 secures you a PDF copy of GURPS Action 6 - Tricked Out Rides. This 10-page PDF, written by Sean Punch, is a quick-and-dirty toolkit for adventures where sports cars pack more gadgetry than fighter jets, and miniguns fit behind headlights! 

One new PDF is great, but the project gets more exciting for all of the backers as stretch goals are unlocked. With each unlocked stretch goal (see below), we'll add another one of the twelve new PDFs to your rewards . . . that $3 pledge becomes an even better deal as more backers join the campaign.

I'm an Elitist When it Comes to Some of my Game Gear

I'll freely admit to being a great many things when it comes to gaming, and most of the adjectives (I'm sure) aren't pretty....like me....seriously, why do you think I use these cartoons instead of an *actual* picture of me?

OK, I kid......but what I'm leading up to is the simple fact that I'm a dice snob. I have a ton of dice and I have purchased a wide array of dice.....I do have some cool ones in my collection, but......BUT I generally only game with one brand of dice: Gamescience.

I do believe dice can be lucky or unlucky and in general I am superstitious when it comes to my dice. I have lucky charms and once I even had my dice cursed and had to do a lot to remove said curse. Now I *know* that most of these beliefs are probably BS and most of my experience in the matter is anecdotal. I also know that run-of-the-mill dice have their flaws. When I was taking Statistics in college I did a few stat experiments where I rolled all of my then-normal (ie. not Gamescience) a few hundred times and recorded the results. Sure enough, my "lucky" dice had an abnormally high distribution and the "unlucky" dice had an abnormally low distribution.

Now I used to run into "Col." Lou Zocchi pretty much every year I went to Origins. Great guy, will talk your ear off for 20' and you'll enjoy most every second of it. He'll gladly go over his spiel about how Gamescience dice roll true compared to "regular" dice, and I believe every bit of it. Everything jives with my personal experience and when I replicated my stats experience I got a pretty equal distribution of numbers, not unlike the experiment done over at the Awesome Dice blog.

Somewhere in my house I have a metric butt-ton of GS dice from when I played HackMaster 4th Edition. I needed a LOT of d4's and d6's for my DS Invoker, between penetration dice and the fact that I just did a lot of dice-worth of damage. My current dice set, pictured below, is what I've been using for the last couple years.....mostly because those other dice are MIA, most likely in a box somewhere.

You'll note that I have basically two sets of green dice, four different d10's and a couple d30's. One set of green dice was a gift for my birthday (maybe my 40th?) from Barbara Blackburn. Anyone who knows Barb, except for Ken Whitman, knows she's a freakin sweetheart, so I'm using the hell out of those dice. I bought the second set because I rolled a lot of pairs of dice for the new HackMaster game....which is why I also have the four extra d10's, so I can roll a d 1,000 (red, orange, yellow, & blue).

Now those d30's...those are near and dear to me for sure. Some of you might know I do some d30 stuff. I have a few d30's, but not like these. I'm not quite sure how the whole Gamescience company sale from Lou to whoever owns it now went down...I heard he got it back at some points, but I really don't know squat about it. I just remember that Lou was selling older dice he had made and Gamescience had a separate dice selling booth at the con. Anyway, I went to Lou to buy more dice that I didn't need and I wanted some more d30's. Unfortunately he was all out, not just of his convention stock, but everything he had & would ever have. The live dungeon folks had come through and bought him out. I was pretty bummed, but not much I could do.....I BSed with the Colonel for a while and wished him well.

Two days later as I'm walking the hall seeing if I could find any last-day-of-the-con deals, Zocchi stops me at his booth. While he was packing up he happened to find two.....2! more d30's. These were no-kidding his last two d30's. The green-ish one was a normal dice, but the yellow....the yellow was very old, one of his earliest designs. Instead of being numbered 1-30 it is number 1-10 three times, with one set having a "-" and one a "+".

Most of my dice are inked with a permanent marker, but the d30's are "inked" "old-school" using a black china pen, which is essentially an adult art crayon.

Kickstarter - Path of the Vanished: A 5e & B/X RPG Campaign

Thousands have vanished... do your heroes have what it takes to defeat the mysterious Raiders?

A little background. I've known Bill & Ben Barsh since the first NTRPG Con I attended, Ben, the younger (and taller Barsh) will be contributing to The Tavern and the Tavern Chat podcast later this summer. He also has the best hair in the OSR.

I'm a big fan of settings and campaigns. Rarely do I use them as is, but as a source of inspiration they are priceless. Path of the Vanished is 20 bucks in PDF, 45 in HC Print plus PDF.

Path of the Vanished is a campaign-style adventure that finds the adventurers on the trail of the Raiders. Produced in four distinct sections, the first part of the campaign finds the player characters traversing the ruins of an ancient city, swallowed in darkness, which is sinking into a near impenetrable swamp. Beyond the city, the player characters discover a road leading to massive building looming over a white beach and swaying palms. The building, used by the Raiders, holds a clue that leads the adventurers to the mythical, yet entirely real, floating island city of Sanctuary. Used by pirates, black market merchants, and other undesirables, the island is made of metal and segregated into seven sections. In one of those sections the Raiders have set up base from which their ships terrorize the coasts. However, thousands of people are still missing and the path forward leads to a distant island that is home to crumbling buildings of some ancient race of star-worshipers. Little else is known of the race but their ancestors, or seemingly so, prowl the island in a primal state. For what reason would the Raiders take innocent people to such a place? 

Path of the Vanished is designed for starting characters of approximately third level. It has two rule system options; the Fifth Edition (5E) version of the world's first fantasy role-playing game, and the BX Role Playing Game. The 5E version will take characters from third level to tenth level as the campaign progresses. BX characters will start at approximately third level and will most likely complete the adventure series at sixth or seventh level.

• 120+ pages of adventure
• Rules for the 5e or BX RPG rules system
• Full color interior (art and maps)
• New magic items
• New monsters
• And more pending stretch goals!!

State of The Tavern - The Watchmen, Tavern Chat, YouTube and More

It’s been a busy start to the summer.

Last week I put out an open call for volunteers to work on a town watch / city guard supplement for fantasy themed RPGs. The response has been overwhelming. I’m attempting to pt together a game plan, so if you are waiting for further directions, I am working on it. Slowly, but being worked on.

The Tavern Chat Podcast is on fire. For the month of June, it averaged over 430 downloads per day. A serious thank you to all for spreading the word. It is appreciated. I’ll be opening the door to paid sponsorships on a case by case basis for now. If it is well received I’ll put a more formal policy in effect. Yes, this means you can sponsor an episode or a number of episodes, to advertise your new release, kickstarter project, blog, podcast, YouTube Channel or what not. Think of it as sponsoring public radio but with f-bombs. ;)

Email me at tenkarsDOTtavern at that gmail thing with “Tavern Chat” in the subject for further details.

The Tavern Chat Podcast is also available on YouTube, which should allow for close captioning for those with hearing deficiencies or who simply prefer using YouTube. The link is here: https://www.youtube.com/c/ErikTenkar/

On the blog side, Chris Stogdill has been added as a regular contributor on Sundays. Later this summer, Ian and Rocky from Silver Bulette Publishing will be offering weekly content through The Tavern. We may have further surprises as the summer progresses :)

As always, you support is greatly appreciated - Tenkar

Kickstarter - Metallic Tome: A Sourcebook for OSR Games

Metallic Tome is a sourcebook for old-school role-playing games; it's inspired by heavy metal music.

Rafael Chandler embodies the spirit of the OSR like few others. I'm thrilled the headbanger has returned to his gaming and musical roots with the Metallic Tome Kickstarter. And to think there are only 3 days left to back it! As little as 10 bucks for the PDF.

Everything that metal bands warned us about in the Eighties has come to pass: 

Pollution chokes our seas, nuclear war has destroyed our cities, and worst of all, guitars are illegal. The fanatical evangelists who run our planet created an army of robotic drones who police us with cyber-technology. Conformity is the law! Surveillance satellites monitor our every move. With no one to stop them, corporations have run wild, developing grotesque mutations that walk the streets, preying upon unsuspecting humans. 

There is only one thing that can save us: METAL. 

As radioactive pegasi soar through blood-red skies, adventurers seek glory in the Suburban Wastes and the Grim Northern Forests. Cyborg dragons bellow on top of shopping malls, and the sky is full of laser pentagrams.

Addressing Accusations Made by Gail Gygax about your Humble Bartender during her Latest Rants

Sadly, today Gail Gygax went off the rails in regards to the Will Luke Gygax recently filed in a Wisconsin Court. Apparently, Gail never filed a will when Gary passed (this was surprising) and Gail is lashing out to defend her source of income - selling Gary’s gaming collection.

In the midst of her often disjointed comments and accusations made about Luke Gygax and his siblings on Facebook yesterday, she laid the following at my feet:

and then this as a follow up:

As I’ve stated in the past, I joked that Gail would trademark the “C” word if she could. This was in reference to Gail trademarking “Gygax” and filing a legal action against the “new” TSR for publishing their gaming magazine under the Gygax name.

I never threatened to throw bricks at Gail during Garycon or at any other time. I am quite sure I made jokes about Gail and her infamous bricks (a bad joke about burning rubber bricks was one of them) that she has been threatening to sell for years - Paul Stromberg will apparently be selling bricks for the Gygax Memorial. I won’t be holding my breath.

I've never been invited to, attended, or paid to attend a VIP dinner or anything similar, at Gary Con or any other convention for that matter. I never gave or paid Gary Con, Luke, or any other Gygax family member or convention staff member $1,000. Hell, Luke and I have never conversed in person.

Oh, and the first sentence is total bullshit too. If a "counselor" thought someone was in danger to be killed and did not refer it to the police, they'd be risking their license. If it was referred to the police and they took no action, it was groundless.

Can I be an asshole? Most assuredly. Have I been a burr in Gail's ass regarding the Gygax Memorial Fund? Guilty. Have I done any of what she accuses me of above? None whatsoever.

Edit: I didn’t want to address this, as I believe Gail is unwell, but there are a number of people on Facebook and elsewhere that believe her accusations without question.

Questions Regarding Gail Gygax and the Gary Gygax Will

One of The Tavern regulars submitted the following questions regarding the Gary Gygax will Gail Gygax is disputing:

1) What does Paul Stormberg have to gain by alienating the Gygax family (minus Gail) by pushing through with these auctions?

2) It is known that Gary owned the original PHB painting and Paul Stormberg the original DMG painting. Where are these paintings now? If they were sold, who was the selling agent? (Rumor is that Australian Banker and TSR collector living in Hong Kong, Matthew Kodor owns both of these items. It is further rumored that he paid in access of $100k apiece for these paintings).

3) When Gary died Wisconsin required probate for all estates of $50k or more. There have been a number of Gygax auctions run by Paul Stormberg on Gail's behalf, was an access of $50k raised?

With the reported numbers on the animation auction running at over $40k it certainly looks like the physical assets of the estate alone (without valuing the IP) was well in excess of $50k.

4) Why does Paul Stormberg feel that these auctions need to be pushed through without pause? Is there a contract, memorandum, or letter of agreement binding him to complete these auctions?

5) If Gail has sold the original PHB painting and other, unique assets can it not be argued that her actions greatly diminish the overall value of the estate? Selling these items prevents the family from ever monetizing these items as well as diminishing Gary's legacy.

Case in point, the animation cells up for auction were hand-selected by Gary, in his very unique role with the D&D cartoon, as items to have and pass down via his estate. There is no finer single collection of animation cells from the cartoon. Is Gail acting in the best interest of the trust, Gary's legacy, or even herself?

6) Paul Stormberg has moved his auctions to his own bidding site, where there is no transparency. What other items might be up for sale that have not yet been discovered? Might this represent a final looting of Gary's estate?

The IP legacy of Gary Gygax has been squandered since his death. The longer the wait for the release of materials based on his IP, the more the value is diminished. Gary's fans are aging, and a majority of them now are in their late 40s and by the 20th anniversary of Gary's death, a large number of them will be in their 60s.

With the changing currents in the gaming industry, what will be left? What reason is there for not having released Gary's materials commercially, while squatting on trademarks and never using them?

Questions to ponder... Tenkar

Tabletop.Events acquired by BoardGameGeek

Full announcement below:

Link to the original post

So many of you helped to bring us back from the brink via the Con of Champions. Thank you! Without your support Tabletop.Events would have gone dark at the end of April.

Con of Champions allowed us to keep Tabletop.Events online, albeit at a severely reduced budget, until the end of 2020. Beyond 2020 though was always still up in the air. So much depends upon what happens with COVID-19 and the rise of virtual conventions.

All along we said we would continue to look for alternative sources of revenue, and we have. We’ve considered over a dozen different options, but found that one option made the most sense. We should hand the reigns of Tabletop.Events over to a larger entity in the tabletop world; someone who has the resources to ensure a very bright future, and BoardGameGeek (BGG) has exactly those means.

Effective immediately, BGG will assume control of Tabletop.Events. However, the Tabletop.Events staff will remain on board helping TTE to grow under new leadership. We will spend the remainder of the year transitioning technology, adding features, fixing bugs, answering questions, and hosting conventions, just like we always planned to do. But with BGG’s support, we can now confidently say that we can continue to do those things into 2021 and beyond as well!

If you run conventions using Tabletop.Events, you can now proceed with your planning knowing that TTE will be here to serve you no matter what.

If you attend conventions using Tabletop.Events, you can sign up knowing that the conventions you attend have a strong and stable platform from which to grow.

Thank you for allowing us to serve you. Thank you for loving what we created. We look forward to serving you far into a very bright future.

Not Erik Story: My 1st Kill (HackMaster 4th Edition PC Kill....I'm not a monster)

I'm still in my computer files trying to locate some older gaming "stuff" of mine and I came across my kill sticker sheet, or at least my old HackMaster 4th Edition kill collection.

HackMaster 4th Edition was kind of adversarial between the GM and the party, but not really. It was more of a "for show" kind of thing that was played up in not only some of the source material, but in the Knights of the Dinner Table comics.

Sure, there were definitely some "Killer GMs"  in the wild, but that really doesn't have squat to do with the game system. The game is crunchy, requires a lot of dice, and can be just as lethal or non-lethal as the next game. I think there was this implanted idea of the adversarial GM more as a tool to keep the players in line. Encumbrance was pretty important, as was not having a PC loaded down with too much magic. Knowing that their PCs could be facing an encumbrance or magic item audit, and the disastrous consequences of failing one......well that helped keep PCs in check and helped with some game balance.....

.....don't even get me started with the player coupons! Part of the joke/not a joke aspect of the game....

I think Jolly Blackburn started the tradition of keeping track of PC deaths with kill stickers on his GM shield. It was his way of rubbing failure in the faces of the rather successful (in general) development team (D-Team) at their weekly game sessions. Eventually he published his system of keeping track. Skull colors denoted perma-death or if the PC was resurrected, while the background told the methodology of demise. Strings of chained skulls meant that multiple PCs died in the same adventure/session, and eventually a couple of symbols were added to show if the death was part of a total party kill (TPK) or death at a tournament. Players would be much more likely to over-extend their PCs at a tournament, which could lead to a TPK. I think eventually most groups would do their best to designate a "sole survivor" just to deny the GM a TPK.

I personally added the chicken sticker, based of of Sir Robin's shield in M.......you know, you should get it already......this was to show that somebody "bravely ran away" and quit the adventure just so I couldn't get a TPK. Deny me a kill!!!! I know I later added another symbol to denote a PC purged their honor to avoid a death (like the spineless coward they were!)

This is an older kill shield set because I redid the graphics with a more comical skull, but I doubt I have many more deaths on my most recent set....should I find it.

Color/Text Codes:
White Skull = perma-death
Blue Skull = the PC was resurrected
Red Background = PC was killed by his party (fratricide)
Black Background = Death by monster
White Background = "Miscellaneous" Death
Green Background = Death by Trap
T = Tournament Death
X = Total Party Kill

I wish I could recall the story of each death, but really it's just the 1st one I remember. My brother-in-law was playing with us and he really wasn't into playing RPGs. It was clear it was going to be his first, and last, session. He was playing a bard and it is important to note that one of my other players had a Druid with the cling quirk. It just made sense the Druid would be clingy to the most handsome (HackMaster has a Comeliness stat) and Charismatic PC in the group.

The party had done well figuring out what was stirring up the local goblins and found the evil low-level mage that was using a found wand to lord control over them. Just prior to the BBG (big bad guy, ie. Boss)  battle, when the BBG has a moment to soliloquy, the Bard just walks over and says something to the effect of, "Sounds great, I do hereby pledge my fealty to you..." I sure as hell did not see that one coming. Of course the battle kicks off immediately because the Druid attacks the Bard because, "If I can't have him, then nobody can...."

Ah.....good times. The main party did prevail, killing the Bard, the Mage, and any Goblin foolish enough to stick around....and I got my 1st kill.

Luke Gygax Statement re: Sale of Gary Gygax Estate Items at The Collector's Trove

The following is from Facebook and is shared without comment:

Luke Gygax:
Heads Up Collectors: Gail Gygax is auctioning items that may be part of my father’s estate through Paul Stormberg and the collectors trove- his business. There is a legal action filed to open probate and recognize the Last Will and Testament of my Dad that I was only made aware of late last year. Gail is contesting the Will because it leaves some items to my siblings, Ernest Gary Gygax Jr. Elise' Gygax-Cousino Heidi Gygax Cindy Gygax, including the rights to his legacy after Gail passes away. Currently there is nothing illegal about Gail selling the estate items in auctions but in my opinion, it is immoral. If you agree please don’t bid on them. And I let Paul know about this months ago as well.  So he is choosing to do this with full knowledge.

and:

Luke Gygax:
For full disclosure there are questions as to the ownership of the property being auctioned on behalf of Gail Gygax. Paul is aware of the questions and although not illegal it is morally questionable. There is an action in Walworth county to open probate and execute the Last Will and Testament of Ernest Gary Gygax initiates by my siblings minus Alex. It is being contested by Gail because it leaves items to us and she doesn’t want to part with anything despite what the will says.

http://thecollectorstrove.com/the-trove-news/

https://anchor.fm/tavernchat/episodes/E754---I-Find-Some-Overlooked-Details-in-the-Current-War-of-Wills-of-the-Gygax-Estate-eg0sdl (Observations)

Frog God Games Sale - 35% Off at the Webstore

Yoked from the Frog God Discord Server

***__35% Off__*** everything on the webstore! Use code **June-Bug-2020** at checkout. https://www.froggodgames.com/ **Offer Ends July 1st**. *Excludes subscriptions and The World of the Lost Lands*. @everyone

Looking for Current / Retired Former LEOs to Crowdsource RPG Material

Publisher’s Choice Quality Stock Art © Rick Hershey / Fat Goblin Games 

I've been asked over the years to produce a supplement for Swords & Wizardry / OSR rulesets dealing with Town Watches, City Guards, and the like. I think to produce such with other LEOs that are gamers would not just be fun to do, but could fill a hole in many fantasy campaigns.

Want to participate with ideas, art, layout, or the like? Email me at TenkarsDOTtavern at that gmail thing with "Town Watch" in the subject and we'll see where this goes :)

Free - After the Bomb® Map Pack

For the price of free, the After the Bomb Map Pack is a pretty cool assortment of maps for Palladium's After the Bomb RPG and other post apoc RPGs. Seriously, how often does Kevin give away anything for free? ;)

It was recently pointed out that the map on page 1 of the original After the Bomb® sourcebook was left out of the After the Bomb® Second Edition RPG, so we thought we would grab all of the maps from the sourcebooks and make them available for everyone. Enjoy!

There's an affiliate link above. Although this is free, anything you might buy with it ould put some coin in The Tavern's coffers. 

Kickstarter -The Book of Dungeon Encounters, for use with Fantasy RPGs

A collection of 100 different dungeon encounters that gamemasters can use with almost any fantasy roleplaying game.

I've been a huge fan of Phil Reed since damn near the turn of the century. I remember subscribing to his email list of GM tips WAY back. His recent Kickstarter releases have been well done and affordable. Heck, you can even back The Book of Dungeon Encounters for as little as a buck and still get a ton of content.

The Book of Dungeon Encounters is a 48-page 8.5" x 11" saddle-stitched book that is packed with 100 different dungeon encounter ideas. These are for use with almost any fantasy RPG, especially old-school RPGs that use square grids for combat, though imaginative gamemasters will no doubt find ways to adapt everything detailed within these pages to any system, including those that use hexes for combat maps.

The book is presented as a giant d100 table, giving the gamemaster 100 different encounter ideas that can either be randomly rolled or selected to construct a dungeon. 90 of the encounters are presented as descriptions only -- no maps -- and range from low-level fights against dungeon beasties all of the way to strange gateways that lead to other worlds. 

Ten of the encounters include square grid maps that were created using the SkeletonKey Games 2e Adventure Tiles. (Please see below for more information.)  

Regardless of how you use the encounters in the book, all of them exist for two reasons:

• To give the gamemaster the tools necessary to run a dungeon adventure with little to no prep time; just grab some stats from your favorite book of monsters and mix in the ideas in this book and you're ready for freeform dungeon crawls!
•  Inspiration! Maybe an entry doesn't meet your exact needs, but each one will help drive your creativity and give you ideas. As always, change everything within the book to fit your tastes and needs!

Bundle of Holding - Tunnels & Trolls

Sometimes Bundle of Holding really knocks it out of the park. The Tunnels & Trolls Bundle of Holding is definitely one of those times. I happen to be a HUGE T&T fan, so I MAY be biased in its favor ;)

For just US$9.95 you get all thirteen solo adventures in this revived offer's Solitaire Collection (retail value $53) as DRM-free .PDF ebooks:

• A fun 64-page manga-style set of Tunnels & Trolls quickstart rules, produced by T&T Adventures Japan (where T&T is big) and presented here in English translation. A perfect intro to the game, this booklet gives all the rules you need to play the solos in this collection, plus a solitaire and two gamemastered scenarios.
• Four starting T&T solos: Battle School, Sea of Mystery, Sorcerer Solitaire, and the first solo RPG adventure ever published for any game, Buffalo Castle.
• Three mid-level T&T solos: Agent of Death, Naked Doom, and Sewers of Oblivion.
• Three killer T&T solos: Arena of Khazan, Deathtrap Equalizer Dungeon, and perhaps the most fondly remembered of all the solos, Michael A. Stackpole's City of Terrors.
• Goblin Lake Deluxe (previously presented in our November 2016 Old School Revival 4).
• New in this revival! Elven Lords Deluxe, Mike Stackpole's 1990 follow-up to City of Terrors, in an expanded edition with new art by Liz Danforth. (If you bought this offer during its original run, you automatically receive Elven Lords too.)

And if you pay more than the threshold price of $20.22, you'll level up and also get this revival's entire Gamemaster Collection with ten more titles worth an additional $53:

• The latest and greatest version of the rules, the complete 386-page Deluxe Tunnels & Trolls core rulebook (2015), plus the Deluxe GM Screen (both previously in the OSR 4 offer).
• Monsters! Monsters!: The 1976 First Edition of Ken St. Andre's standalone spinoff game, based on T&T, that lets you play the monsters, guarding your dungeon home from so-called heroic intruders.
• Adventurers Compendium: An 88-page collection of nine solo adventures and three gamemastered scenarios unearthed from Sorcerer's Apprentice magazine.
• Four classic T&T gamemastered scenarios: The Complete Dungeon of the Bear, Dwarf World, Seven Challenges of Kartejan, and Uncle Ugly's Underground Doom.
• New in this revival! Vault of K'Horror, a looting expedition into a tomb of ancient vampire lords. (And the original September 2018 customers get this one too.)

Speaking Dwarven at the Table......WITHOUT a Scottish Accent

One of the things I do regularly, but probably not often enough, is to go through my digital files and try to clean things up. These days with storage becoming cheaper it's too easy to simply ignore the inevitable bloat of directories and files.

So I'm looking at my directory of PC files....if I'm not using a digital PC sheet I'll often scan my physical sheets every level. Then I can use "old" PCs for NPCs or if a pick-up game comes along and the GM goes "the group needs a 3rd level Magic User...." I'm good.

Anyway I'm in this directory and I found a word document entitled "Dwarven Slang", which kind of cracked me up. As a player in a 5th Edition HackMaster game I had a Dwarven Fighter named Balen.....

......don't sweat it, this isn't really a PC story. Two of those in a row is a bit much.....

5th Edition is crunchy AF, especially compared to the average OSR game, and Balen had a terrible grasp of the Common/Human languages. I can kind of relate because while I know tidbits of multiple Human languages, they get all jumbled up in my head and at best I can speak a phrase or two.

In-game I got this. One thing I did was assign a language to Balen.....I mean a real-world language. I thought that Icelandic was a good choice and since he had such a low ability in "Common" he wouldn't be able to speak the same language as the other PCs, but he'd understand a bit more....kind of like me with German or Spanish.

To this end I made a small custom Icelandic/English dictionary so at the table I could use Dwarven, er Icelandic to a little "point & talk" when dealing with the rest of my home group. Simple stuff, numbers, nouns mostly, but the crown jewel of my RPG linguistics were phrases (idioms) and swears.

Balen the Dwarf (commissioned from Tina Bongomo)

I don't know how many of you have spent much time in another country dealing with another language, but I was fortunate enough to have served overseas in Germany and a few other countries. One thing that always fascinated me when it came to the language barriers were idioms and swears. A lot of things technically translate, but don't actually translate in practice. For example I briefly had a Dutch girlfriend and I said something about someone "taking the short bus to school". Most all Americans got right off the bat that I insinuated that someone was slow/stupid/not to bright. My gf, knew what a school-bus was, but a short school-bus? No clue. Later on that trip I heard her swear and I was straight-up shocked because the literal translation was what I'd argue is the strongest swear possible here in the US (and no, I'm not going to repeat it), but in Dutch was basically the equivalent of saying "shit".

I loved learning Dwarven/Icelandic swears.....my favorite was basically telling someone to "Fuck off" but I think the literal translation was "Go to the asshole!" I wish I remembered the actual phrase, but alas I could only find my Dwarven Slang list and not my dictionary or Dwarven Swear list.

Dwarven Slang (really idiom) List:
Aagh pissa e sko sin (to pee in his shoes: only works for a while)
Al-jeort rasgat (absolute butthole: adorably cute)
Ekki-oop e nos al-ketti (not enough to fill a cat’s nostril: small amount)
Av tefla viv pal-vaan (playing chess with the pope: taking a shit)
Rasgat e bala (butt in a tub: nothing or next to nothing)
Tea-oo dropar (ten drops: a cup of normal sized coffee)
Oondin tuska (wound-out rag: exhausted)
Av-hafa ekki ge-erst svo fraig (Having not been so famous)
Ens auk itla ge-erdur helot-ur (like a poorly made object)
Av stok-va oop a neff si-er (to jump up one’s nostril)
E-ek to khan e bakri-el (took him to the bakery: kicked his ass)
E-ek ska see-na pie-er-I e tavo heymana (I’ll show you the two worlds: kick your ass)

The cool thing is when doing something like this......it doesn't matter so much if you get your pronunciation correct as long as you are consistent.

COVID-19 Economic Injury Disaster Loans and Advance (repost from Bat in the Attic)

Rob Conley asked me to share the following, as it is very useful for the self publishers among us. You can read Rob’s original post here: http://batintheattic.blogspot.com/2020/06/covid-19-economic-injury-disaster-loans.html

The Covid pandemic has caused severe economic disruption which impacted businesses across the United States including those involved in publishing the tabletop roleplaying industry. Particularly hard hit are those of us who make a lot of our sales from conventions. I am personally am out a significant amount of money as result of Garycon being cancelled and North Texas Con being held on a restrictive basis. But my plight isn't hard as others impacted by Covid-19.

During the early days of the pandemic, Congress passed a bill that made the entire United State eligible for disaster relief. This includes small businesses. You can read for yourself the various options the small business administration has for disaster relief here.

One of the things offered is the ability to apply for a emergency grant and a loan. When I saw this being made available in March I immediately applied. Then I didn't hear anything for a long time until the middle of April. The Small Business Administration approved my grant and sent me a $1,000. Which was slightly more than I was asking for. As near as I could tell the SBA simply looked at how many people were involved and multiplied it by $1,000. In my case that was one. The SBA will approve grants of up to $10,000.
Keep in mind these are grants not loans that have to be paid back. It not free money either. You have to have filed taxes either as a corporation or using a Schedule C profit or loss from business attached to your personal income tax form.

Now I didn't write about this because shortly after I received the money the SBA closed the application process for all business other than agricultural. Apparently the flood of applications was so great they they fear the program would run out of money without fulfilling the ones they had.

The good news they reopened the program for all small businesses.
If your publishing or game business was impacted you can apply here.

The process doesn't end with the grant. Eventually they will send you a loan offer. Again appears to be based on the number of people involved. However this is a loan that has to be paid back over 30 years at 3% interest. So keep that in mind if you get into this part of the process.

Hope this help and stay safe. I wasn't expecting much and was pleasantly surprised to have received the grant. I feel this will help many of us who have lost sales as a result of the pandemic.

Kickstarter - Cat's Cradle: A Fantasy Town for 5e and Other RPG Systems (Frog God Games)

This is one of the reasons I am very happy to be associated with Frog God Games: 

PPA Loan and COVID-19  We’re using the proceeds of a PPA loan to employ our writers and artists on an immediate basis, which lets us keep paying them at normal levels despite a bad market. For this reason, we’re following the unusual procedure of offering a Kickstarter before the work itself is completed. The books will be printed at the Arizona printshop we use for Indiegogo projects rather than in China, which allows us a much faster turnaround to backers. Most of the initial legwork has already been done, and the project should be almost completed by the time the Kickstarter ends, with the exception of layout and some of the art orders. To the extent the Kickstarter generates any profit — which isn’t guaranteed in this market — we will continue turning the profit around to new projects, to generate as steady a stream of work-flow as we can.

 That is good looking out.

So, what is the Cat's Cradle Kickstarter?

Cat’s Cradle stands at the intersection of a caravan and river route, which brings in mysterious travelers, unscrupulous grifters, and -- quite often -- dangerous villains. The Kickstarter includes a town sourcebook for Cat's Cradle, the adventure Eye of Itral, and Fortune Hunters, a book of town-oriented NPCs.

Humble Bundle - Maps Extravaganza (ProFantasy Software)

I own the Campaign Cartographer software from my Windows days. Sadly, I never had the patience to learn the software. With the pricing of the Maps Extravaganza Humble Bundle I might have had more patience ;)

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Indiegogo - By Dawn’s Early Light (5E, PF & S&W)

I’ve been enjoying the Frog God holiday themed releases. They are very readable and playable, which seems to be a rare combination. By Dawn’s Early Night is their latest, obviously themed for July 4th.

It is midsummer, and the remote mountain village of Ilgaardd is preparing to throw an epic celebration to honor the anniversary of its independence from the tyrannical rule of Killoran the Red. While most of the villagers are happy with the new leadership and are excited about the prospect of hosting a major event, droves of raucous outsiders, bitter loyalists, and an unprecedented heat wave are causing tensions to mount.  You have been hired by the local sheriff to keep the peace. To do your job, you will have to contend with rowdy villagers at each other’s throats and a towering force on the cusp of raising its haunted form high above the Village Green! 

Inspired by (dangerous!) early American traditions of lighting bonfires to celebrate Independence Day, the characters are the only hope that Illgaardd will remain standing by dawn’s early light.

The characters are hired by Jax Blueskin, chief constable of the remote village of Ilgaardd, to keep the peace during the village’s Independence Day celebration. The characters must contend with increasingly rowdy villagers only to discover a nefarious plot devised by Killoran the Red, the village’s presumed-to-be-dead former ruler. If not stopped, this plot will unleash a force so terrible that the village — and possibly the region — may be utterly destroyed. By Dawn’s Early Light is a short adventure for 4–6 low-level characters.

We are on schedule to deliver the PDF by July 4th to light up your Independence Day!

New “Old” in Print - Guide to Hell (AD&D 2e)

This might be one of a handful of AD&D 2e releases I do not own from back in the day. I remember how 2e did away with demons and devils, and the 2e Guide to Hell brings back devils - and Hell. Go figure ;)

Diabolical threats lurk everywhere in the world of the AD&D game. Heroes who fight evil on the Prime Material Plane may contend with forces whose power rises from the depths of Hell. Adventurers who travel to Hell meet devildom on its own terms and risk not only their lives, but also their everlasting souls.  

Guide to Hell is a comprehensive look at the nature of devils, ways for heroes to battle them, and the twisted geography and politics of the Nine Layers in the AD&D game. The decision to "go to Hell" should never be made lightly—but once it is made, this book will give the DM everything he or she needs to make the experience memorable for all the heroes... at least, those who survive. 

Four new PC kits: the Devil Slayer, the Thaumaturgist, the Inquisitor, and the Hellblade A devil-fighting organization adaptable for any campaign New spells and magical items with a diabolical twist Advice for DMs on integrating the infernal into their campaigns Full statistics on the Lords of the Nine, the rulers of the Nine Hells The secret history of Hell and the Dark Lord of Nessus, Asmodeus Statistics for all major devil types, plus a new devil created especially for this book at least, those who survive.

• Four new PC kits: the Devil Slayer, the Thaumaturgist, the Inquisitor, and the Hellblade
• A devil-fighting organization adaptable for any campaign
• New spells and magical items with a diabolical twist
• Advice for DMs on integrating the infernal into their campaigns
• Full statistics on the Lords of the Nine, the rulers of the Nine Hells
• The secret history of Hell and the Dark Lord of Nessus, Asmodeus
• Statistics for all major devil types, plus a new devil created especially for this book

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Deal of the Day - Adventures Dark and Deep Players Manual

I used to love the What If? Comic book series from Marvel Comics. It gave alternated futures for events that may have happened. I see Adventures Dark & Deep as the “What if Gary Gygax hadn’t been forced out from TSR, and AD&D 2e had followed Gary’s previews as shown in Dragon Magazine at the time?”

Joe Bloch does a great job following the hints that Gary left us.

The Adventures Dark and Deep Players Manual is normally 9.95, but until tomorrow morning it is 4.97 in PDF.

The Adventures Dark and Deep™ Players Manual contains all the rules you need to create and run a character; character classes, races, spells, rules for combat, equipment, social class, skills, and much more.

The Players Manual is the first core rulebook for the Adventures Dark and Deep™ game, an expansion and revision of the original 1st Edition rules that defined the role-playing hobby for a decade. Based on the original plans for expanding the game, Adventures Dark and Deep™ gives you new character classes like the jester, savant, mystic, and mountebank; new spells; a new combat system; new monsters; rules for weather and natural hazards; new magic items, and tons more. And it's all compatible with most old-school games, so you can use it with all your old and new adventures, settings, and supplements.

If you liked 1st Edition, you'll love Adventures Dark and Deep™.

Yep, there is an affiliate link above. Keep the taps flowing at the Tavern by using our affiliate links.

Not Erik Storytime: The Time I Won a Four Hour Tournament in Under Ten Minutes

So far here at the Tavern I've talked a LOT about tournaments, mostly because I have a lot of experience with them. Playing, writing, organizing, etc. One of the things I liked about tournaments, especially HackMaster tournaments, is that they were both competitive and cooperative. You really have to cooperate with your teammates and your party is competing against the parties at the other tables. If it was a single round adventure even better because there really weren't any losers. You got to play and have fun. If you were playing one of your home PCs and he/she/it died, that kind of sucked, but that's a good thing, right?

Seriously, and I don't know why more people don't instinctively get this, but you should get a little upset if your PC dies and that is a good thing because that means you cared and were invested. Nothing ventured, nothing gained......

...anyway I'm at this low-level, pretty sure it was a 1st level only, tournament game running my Double-Specialist Invoker. I'm not going to go all fanboy nerd and talk about my awesome PC because those details don't matter to this story and I'm not really that kind of loser trying to bore a captive audience with a PC stor.....oh shit, I guess I am that kind of loser. Screw it...in for a penny....

...ok, back to the tournament. This was actually the second tournament for this PC, I just hadn't played this guy in a single home game yet so he was just shy of the experience required for second level. For the most part my PC was on the same level as the others that were rolled up just prior to the adventure.....well technically we were on the same level, but my guy had that other adventure under his belt.

The GM starts reading us the set-up into flavor text for the adventure and I start to get a bit worried because I'm sure I've heard this before.....I think I've played this adventure before so I can't play it again per the normal tournament rules. I inform the GM and luckily he tells me it's ok because this is actually a new adventure based on an older one and after the initial flavor text it's all going to change. Sure enough the next paragraph is new and the setup for this adventure is that a local farmer hasn't been heard from in days and we're sent, by the local Sheriff, to specifically find the farmer and protect his property (It was assumed he and his farm were in danger).

The party makes its way to the farm a bit out of town and find the farmer in his home pretty much scared shitless. Evidently some "monster" got into his barn earlier in the week and he just boarded everything up and hid out in the house. He hasn't gone out to check on all his animals in the barn in three or four days......he agrees to come outside to the barn and I ask the fighters to remove the bar as I toss in a small fireball.

Of course the farmer just loses his shit because we're going to set fire to his barn and all his precious animals. Seriously?! You haven't feed any animals in days and shut them up with an unknown monster? Yeah, the animals are effing toast already dude, quite your bitchin.

But the barn!............Oh for fuck's sake!

I ask the farmer how much the animals are worth. As he hems and haws I up the question to the barn, and then just how much for the whole damned farm? The GM, assuming that all the players are running fresh PCs on their 1st adventure, spits out a figure from the farmer of 600 Gold Pieces , which should be more than what the entire party can scrap together.....

"SOLD! Do you want that in gems or gold coins?" Unlike the other PCs I have loot from the 1st tournament, in the form of coins and 100gp pearls.....

The party escorts the farmer back to the town to be dropped of with the Sheriff. My PC hands over a small pouch of pearls. We're not even 10' into this four hour tournament and I get an inordinate amount of pleasure in informing the GM that we just won the tournament: all objectives met, no PC deaths, three hours and fifty minutes early......the task at hand was to find the farmer and save/secure his property. His property was safely in not only his hands, but the hands of the Sheriff.

Now if the rest of the party wants to come back to my farm and help me with a little pest problem.......

....and that is the story how my 1st level DS Invoker won a tournament in less that 10' by buying the farm.