Interview with the Prince of Nothing

 

Prince of Nothing is a colleague, collaborator, and friend of mine.  Upon hearing of his OSR Kickstarter The Palace of Unquiet Repose, I suggested an interview... and he agreed.  

His blog is called Age of Dusk.  Without further ado, let us begin!

What misfortune led you into this racket?  Another way of saying it, how did you get your start in roleplaying games?

I started playing when I was about 14. Me and my friends were all addicted to Baldur's Gate and Baldur's Gate 2, and one day I read it was based on D&D so we bought a 2e DMG and player handbook and just dove into it headfirst. I stopped when I went to college, then picked it up again after a few years and got into the OSR again via blogs. My entryway was Grognardia and then nothing but YDIS for the first two years. My first review was a scatching takedown of ya boi's RPGPundit's Arrows of Indra and that's where I sort of got the taste for what I do. I figured I wanted to do something like that, only (marginally) more constructive. The rest is legend, wreathed in obscurity. 

Do you prefer to GM or play?  Why?

GM. I have a short time preference and my knowledge of RPGs is beyond that of mortal man. It's too easy for me to see the man behind the curtain, and there's only a few master GM's that I genuinely enjoy playing under for prolonged periods of time. When I GM I am constantly engaged, I do weird voices for all my NPCs. I get a kick out of entertaining people and I get a rush from challenging them. There's a sort of paternal pride you get when you run some noobies through a lethal OSR game and by the end they are sly, cautious, meticulous and precise. "My fighting force," I say in my best Captain Lorca voice during the session end.

How do you currently feel about the OSR?

Everyone is very keen on declaring that the OSR is dead for the umpteenth time but I suspect that's mostly wishful thinking. "The OSR was mostly Google Plus hangouts and conversations." Self-congratulatory revisionist nonsense. Look at all the fucking kickstarters for pete's sake! DCC is still going strong, Lotfp pulled out of its nosedive, B/X Essentials is the new hip thing and its a dog-fight on who gets to be the next trendy hipster arthaus emmy-magnet game, with a toss-up between Mörk Börg, Troika! and even less palatable alternatives. The ethos of the OSR, modules not stories, actual play, emergent gameplay, simple character creation and high lethality have risen and we shall not see an end to them in our lifetimes.

OSE 100k kickstarter ffs!

Tell me about the adventure you've written, what's it like, what was your inspiration, goals, and how did that come about?

Red Prophet Rises? I wrote a fairly positive review about a submitted adventure for a man called Malrex with a little-known publisher called the Merciless Merchants. We talked and I gave him some tips on the use of language and he asked me whether I wanted to collaborate on a little module called Khazra's Unending Blöt. I was in between jobs so I said fuck it, why not? I fell in love with it immediately. It was rough, uneven and some of the parts didn't quite gell. I rewrote it from the ground up, magnified all the good parts and turned them up to eleven. The result is a motherfucking masterpiece of Sword & Sorcery. It's a term that gets tossed around left and right but few people actually get what it's about. It's Conan the Barbarian (the movie!) meets Mad Max on peyote. Brutal Violence in a stark environment. An Evil High Priest presiding over Sacrificial Duels to the Death. Naked Berserkers covered in ritual scarring, their battle cries transformed into metallic roars by their bronze bull-masks. Prisoners you can free, procedures in case you are discovered, places to hide. 

Since I read Tenfootpole.org religiously I combined that with an insane focus on usability so everything is legible, easy to use during play, there's helpful patrol schedules, effective layout etc. etc. My inspiration was my love of Sword and Sorcery, R.E. Howard, Karl Edward Wagner, Fritz Leiber and definitely some Warhammer Fantasy. It's included in the higher reward tiers so if you sign up you can check it out alongside my new adventure.

You've been reviewing OSR adventures for awhile now, what are your top five and a brief reason why for each?

Obviously I would include Cha'alt in there but since it can only be rated in Zulkiers it stands on its own as an entirely separate category. I'd put some TSR classics like Tomb of Horrors in there no problem. But you wanted OSR: 

5  - Better then Any Man by James Raggi - It's what you get when Raggi actually gives a shit. Historical fantasy, apocalyptic scale, brutality, an insect cult, a city under siege and its all a fucking sandbox, the madman. By far the best thing he has ever done.

4 - Slumbering Ursine Dunes by Chris Kutalik - A pointcrawl that feels like a slyly homo-erotic version of Jack Vance doing his best Eastern-European fantasy impression. I can't do it justice, it's just so charming and weird and it can only exist in the OSR.

3 - Thulian Echoes by Zzarchov Kowolski - Genius take on a time-travel adventure. You play a bunch of idiots dying in a dungeon, and then your actual players find their diary and get to play the dungeon again, but their actions in the past change the dungeon in the present. Genius. 

2 - Mines, Claws & Princesses by Steven Oswalt - I am a sucker for the classics and this nails it on all fronts. Oswalt channels Patrick Stuart in creating a Wagnerian Epic where our heroes must beat the shit out of a dragon. Everything is infused with a teutonic splendor. Pig-faced orcs, crow spies, talking animals it's EXACTLY what I want from my games. 

1 - Many Gates of the Gann by Guy Fullerton - It's deep. The environment can be manipulated and flows together in a way that other modules simply do not accomplish. The way the dungeon flows, the different factions, the hints, the easter eggs. It just betrays such a deep comprehension of the fundamentals of dungeon design. That's what I wanna be when I grow up, I say to myself, when I read that. On the level with the old TSR greats. 

You've been working on something new and just launched a Kickstarter to fund it, give us the scoop on that.

FINALLY. Okay, so after Red Prophet Rises elevated Merciless Merchants to greatness Marlex was like WE GOTTA DO ANOTHER ONE. I'd made some setting posts here and there about my own S&S setting, the Age of Dusk, set in the Lands of Autumn in a time aeons in the future, when the gods are dead, horrors of ages past prowl the arid wastes howling for blood and man has but little time left until the Final Night. I on occasion will write hooks or adventure seeds for it but there is a huge difference between a blog post and a publication. To get me to actually do anything you need to either A) hide my stash of goverment heroin which you very cleverly did when I collaborated on Cha'alt (no really I am not even mad, I am impressed!) or B) be some sort of cross between Mother Theresa and the Furies and that's what Malrex did when he became my producer in chief. 

For two fucking years we collaborated on PALACE OF UNQUIET REPOSE, a batshit insane grimdark S&S meatgrinder where our heroes will descend into the depths of the earth to raid the vaults of Uyu-Yadmogh, long-dead (or is he?) Archmage and Devourer of Children. The end result is finally done. Now we need money for art. Because there are gods watching over me granting my every prayer in my bid for dominance of the OSR we managed to snag James Vail (author/artist of Xas Irkalla, google it) and Chris Cold, two brilliant artists, to do the art for palace. It's been 2 days and we are at 3k, we funded in 13 hours. People know its going to be genius. Malrex keeps fainting and having to be re-animated when he considers how many module writers will have to burn their laptops, knowing they can never eclipse a masterpiece of such terrible splendor. I haven't stopped screaming since we launched the kickstarter, summerian death-chants and Celtic Frost Lyrics. Throw away your Death Frost Doom little Timmy, Uncle Prince has got you something spiffier.

Tell me about your work on that thing you called... Cha'alt, was it?

Cha'alt you say? This all started with a skirmish in the comments section of Bryce's tenfootpole blog where you felt you were poorly treated [He's talking about Dead God Excavation, which has a 4.5 star rating on DriveThru] and I took it upon myself to give your work the treatment it deserved. I also ended up shooting it in the face, but it was the beginning of a spree of VS reviews, some of them very nice. 

One day I woke up, ready to take my much needed insulin shot, and it was gone, and you'd left a piece of paper with purple letters cut from magazines, spelling out what I needed to do to get it back. Classic Venger. I think you were in a bit of a rut but if anything Cha'alt showed everyone that you still had the chops. I was on the team to get you back in shape, hell, I was the team. That meant no more breakfast, lunch AND dinner at Wendy's. Exchange that purple truck for a purple bicycle. We tried to do the Empire Strikes back thing with the Yoda training montage but I don't know how a grown man is supposed to climb in a backpack and that somersault over a tree ended up just pitching us both in the swamp. I don't think we made it very far into that obstacle course. Sometimes I still wake up with nightmares of inhaling bog water.

In all seriousness. I think the best thing I did was reinforce the notion of adding an extra layer of interactivity to all of the encounters in Cha'alt. A lot of your stuff is creative but it would just appear and sit there. With my sage advice, everything in Cha'alt is doing something, interacting, or has something going on beyond combat. That's what allows it to work even if you run it Arcade style. Those playtesting sessions were a blast! Nomad made it all the way to the end.

If RPGs were outlawed, what creative thing would you be doing instead?

Probably some combination of level-design for Doom or Thief, wargaming and writing. Also I would be starting up forlornly at the night sky, yearning for elfgames, dreaming dreams that I know are undoubleplusgood. 

What RPG thing do you see yourself working on in the future, 2 or 3 years from now?

I have a trilogy planned out for this one, all focused on the evil deceiving Tzyanese. The whole thing is that they know they are damned and are searching for a way to escape that. The first is Palace of Unquiet Repose, where you follow a wizard who has looked for a personal method of salvation (and failed horribly). The second is a project called Vaults of Oblivion, where you go into an extraplanar stronghold where a group of renegade Tzyanese have been breeding for evil and magical ability to countless aeons until they are no longer human. The third will tackle the biggest thing yet, a hexcrawl leading up to the Weapon, the gnostic WMD that killed the gods and is killing the world. Pretty excited. 

Save vs Death

While listening to RPGpundit review one of my recent collections in his video (below), I felt compelled to set the record straight on something...

Pure luck is a dyed-in-the-wool old school concept.  You roll the dice and have x% chance of good, bad, or ugly.  Like anything else, relying solely on luck can be overused. 

Do you know why something like Save vs Death is old school?  Because the idea of initiation is ancient. 

Not everyone will make it.  Some things aren't about preparedness, skill, inborn talent, or - they come down to the luck of the draw... in other words, divine favor.  If characters roll well, that means the Gods have given their blessing and certain individuals may continue to prosper.  If a particular roll goes poorly, characters die. 

The world is cruel, Gods capricious, and fate makes its own choices.  That's just the way it goes!

VS

p.s. For comparison's sake, here's Endzeitgeist's review of Player's Handbook like a Fucking Boss and his review of Play Your Character like a Fucking Boss.

p.p.s. For the sake of completeness, here is RPGpundit's review of How to Game Master like a Fucking Boss.

Proper Procedure

Wasn't sure how to word the title.  "Procedural" can describe a host of play styles, so perhaps "modern procedure" is what I'm railing against? 

Basically, I enjoy roleplaying through a situation or interacting with the game world as if I were my character and actually present in that fantasy realm or starship or loathsome cult's temple.

I know that skill checks and insight rolls are popular nowadays, but there's something awesome about living through your character, carefully skulking down the dark hallway and feeling around with your ten-foot pole. 

Reducing a conversation, room search, or investigation of an unknown substance to a die roll just seems to trivialize the importance of such things.  How can one immerse themselves in a particular genre if everything boils down to rolled dice and modifiers?  Even attacking monsters should occasionally have some narrative component, right?

I'd like to hear about your own experiences with this.  Did something during a game either bother or excite you?  Did you experience one end of the spectrum and it caused a reaction?  Comment with a story!

VS

Delving Deeper Into Old School

Prompted by the possible acquisition of Star Frontier trademark(s) and/or intellectual property, there was a discussion on g+.  Particularly, I want to focus on the exchange between myself and +Pierre Savoie.

What this blog post is about is the slippery notion of "old school" which fits right in with the "old school renaissance" or OSR.  Indeed, we've all thought about, read about, or talked about what defines the OSR.  I've done it myself.

But if we go back to the origins of the OSR - old school itself... what do we find?  Clearly, there's a division.  Two separate camps that occasionally believe themselves one and the same.  The first I'll define as primordial; the second complex (I tried not to use any language bias, either praising or putting down the respective sides).

For examples, I'll go with Basic D&D for primordial and AD&D for complexity.  In the above linked Star Frontiers g+ thread, falling damage was mentioned as a possible litmus test for old school.  Ah, yes... but which old school are we talking about?

Ironically, the falling damage that seems the most "narrative" or "story-game" appears more old school to my eyes.  Is that because we've come full circle?  Have RPGs evolved so far into the future that we're nearly back at the beginning?

Yet, many gamers believe that sophisticated mechanisms and extensive rules make old school what it is.   There are certainly more examples of complex RPGs than AD&D.  Not being as familiar (I'll plainly admit, I'm not a fan of complexity in my RPGs), what other advantages does this style of old school have over simpler systems?

I liken this division (having a number of striking similarities) as the difference between old and new testament in the Bible.  We call early RPGs - such as 80's D&D - old school as if it's all the same.  However, in some ways, those two camps - primordial and complex - couldn't be further from each other.

Do they get at the same things but with different approaches?  Or do they each have completely separate goals?

VS

Trinity of Awesome Returns!

Yes, I have a new Kickstarter called Trinity of Awesome Returns!  Like the previous Trinity of Awesome Kickstarter, you get three PDF scenarios, one for each genre/system.

I like the format because I love fantasy, sci-fi, and horror, just as I love Crimson Dragon Slayer, Alpha Blue, and The Outer Presence.  Providing consistent support for each of them is important to me, and this gets the job done three-at-a-time!

These adventures are beginning to take shape.  I'm organically molding them into what they are destined to become, a little at a time.  So, it's an exciting process.  Can't wait to show you the finished product... probably sometime in July.

In the meantime, please do what you can to help promote Trinity of Awesome Returns!  Without you guys, there's no project at all.

Thanks,

VS

Call of Cthulhu session report

I finally got to game again (tentacle fist-pump)!  This was last weekend.  The twins are over 2 months old now and things finally settled down enough where I could organize a monthly session of roleplaying.

I gave the players their choice of games, a variety of stuff that I already had and knew how to run.  The first voters chose Call of Cthulhu.  Figures, that's the one game that can't be GMed on the fly.  I had little time to prep, probably a total of 2 hours.  That was barely enough time to read through a scenario, let alone take notes and consider changes.

I decided to just create a new scenario from scratch.  One hour spent creating the basic framework the night before and another hour fine-tuning it the day of.  Below is a quick rundown of what happened.

If you're interested in my Call of Cthulhu hack, check it out.  It effectively cut our character creation time and effort in half.

The characters were an odd assortment from the 1920s - gangster, archaeologist, journalist, occultist, etc.  I read over the motivations in Trail of Cthulhu.  When I came to the entry for "ennui," I braced listeners for my ignorance on how it was pronounced.  Minutes after learning that it was pronounced "on-wee," I purposely referred to it as quinoa... which made everyone laugh.

It began with a ski trip to the Alps organized by The Outdoors Society - a Miskatonic University club.  The PCs were on the ski trip for a variety of reasons.

After the obligatory warning that something ominous might happen (a comet was seen overhead last night), the PCs were settled into the ski lodge, either socializing or retiring for the evening... when some kind of starship landed a mile away.

These icy shoggoths with tentacles shambled out of the ship, attempting to grab a human specimen from one of the many onlookers.  That specimen just happened to be the party's Austrian bodybuilder.  There was a struggle, a second alien, and a couple of NPCs getting melted by a milky discharge that came out of their tentacles.

Luckily, all the PCs made it out ok.  The aliens decided to cut their losses and flew away in their ship.  However, the force from their departure caused an avalanche!  Two of the PCs were buried in snow.  Thankfully, they were buried out in time and all returned to the lodge.

A year later, each of the PCs receive a telegram inviting them to Herr Zandyke's castle in Austria.  Herr Zandyke being an alumni of Miskatonic and generous donor, everyone attended.

Upon arrival, the celebration was in full swing.  About 50 attendees were present and all wearing fanciful masks.  One was a peacock with shimmering blues and greens, but also suckered tentacles hanging from where the mouth should be.  Another was a demonic spider with bulbous scaly head and membranous sacs inflating and deflating as the mask wearer breathed.

Each of the PCs was being wooed to join a certain faction and wear a particular mask pertaining to that faction.  Unfortunately, I didn't have time to work out the intricacies of these factions, but I want to flesh that out in the near future if I run this scenario again or self-publish it for The Outer Presence.

Regardless, the PCs ended up below the castle on the shore of a subterranean lake.  At the center was a small outcropping of rock, a grotto which contained something of great value.  Each PC was given a ceremonial knife and locked down there for an indefinite amount of time.

Deep Ones came for those who stayed on the shore and another Deep One protected the grotto from those who tried to swim to it.  One loss of sanity was so great the character went temporally insane. A swimmer almost drown; being at zero hit points from a vicious claw attack, he fell unconscious before reaching the rocks.

Luckily, the occultist swam over to save him before he drowned.  Meanwhile, the others were trying to break through the door in order to get back into the castle.  Thanks to the bodybuilder, they managed it.  Taking out a couple of cultist guards, stealing a car, and engaging in a high-speed chase / firefight.

Eventually, the PCs evaded the cultists and flew back to the United States.

It turns out that 3 of the players had never played Call of Cthulhu before.  So, it did my RPG fanatic heart good to pop a trio of tentacled cherries!

VS

p.s.  For the record, "69" was rolled 5 times over the entire evening.

Personalized D&D

At some point, I'm going to run D&D again.  It's going to be old school and awesome!

This here blog post will stand as a record for all the stuff I'm thinking, the stuff I want in it and want out of it.

Why can't one play a certain edition or version straight out of the box?  Well, in this day and age, a GM can pick and choose the things he likes.  This is 2017, after all.

We don't need another retro-clone, just a list of preferences.  Here we go...

My Personalized D&D

• I shouldn't have to mention this; it should be common knowledge... the foundation upon which all traditional RPGs are built, but these are strange times.  Rulings over rules.  The GM is a benevolent king who may do as he pleases.  Whatever the book says is merely a guideline for me to follow, discard, or warp to my own godlike will.
• I want races and classes - quite a few of them, like assassin, illusionist, monk, etc. but nothing too "out there" or silly.
• I want level limits for demi-humans and who knows what else (gotta love stereotyping!).
• I want those flavorful names PCs get at each level.
• I want 3d6 in order (one re-roll in exchange for some kind of drawback - like a dark secret).
• I want ability score prerequisites in order to qualify for certain classes.
• I want players to start with multiple 1st level characters, the majority of which most likely get slaughtered within the first couple sessions.
• I want to go back to the Law, Neutral, and Chaos alignments.
• I want individual Experience Point charts by class and XP bonuses based on higher, class-relevant ability scores.
• I want XP to come from monsters defeated, challenges overcome, suffering endured, and treasure spent/used.
• I want decent ability score modifiers that make a difference in play.
• I want some kind of Honor score or rating, borrowing the concept from Hackmaster and twisting it to my liking.
• I want those funky individual saving throws like wands and death-rays and shit... just cause they're a ridiculously nostalgic throwback.
• I want to encourage the use of hirelings, henchman, and retainers.
• I'm pretty sure I want to use the advantage/disadvantage mechanic in 5th edition.
• I want ascending AC, naturally.
• Rather than use feats and skills, I'd rather have a few basic class-based abilities and everything else described / roleplayed as it comes up in play.  If it's ability score dependent, then roll under to succeed (2d6 for easy, 3d6 for average, and 4d6 for the really hard stuff).
• I want to use my critical hit random table in The Islands of Purple-Haunted Putrescence
• I want the players to either choose or roll for their characters' adventuring motivation (found in Liberation of the Demon Slayer).  Any background besides that is up to the player to provide at any point - before, during, or after the first few sessions.
• I want to focus on exploring a (mega)dungeon with occasional wilderness and urban dalliances.
• I want this to be a long-term campaign that goes from awkward, fumbling peasant to noble lord holding a vast domain.
• I want the campaign to begin fairly medieval-ish, becoming increasingly non-standard, weird pulp science-fantasy as it continues.
• I want the campaign world to get fleshed out as need be, rather than writing everything out ahead of time.  Many things will be improvised!
• I want the campaign to be a sandbox instead of linear scenarios.
• Not sure what I want to do with magic, but I'm considering using the mercurial table for spells in the DCC rulebook.
• I want to go "middle of the road" with magic items - not too stingy, yet not overly generous [see below].
• I want this to be a weekly game, around 4 hours per session.
• I need it to be face-to-face.  Virtual roleplaying is for one-shots!
• This campaign is going to have a name.  I'll come up with something later...
• As mentioned previously, I've decided to go pro.  So, I'll be GMing for cash.

_____

Magic Items

If it's magical, then chances are that it only exists below ground - with all the monsters, traps, and strangeness.  

Magic items are either kept or taken into subterranean depths because of their inherently chaotic nature.  All sorcery is tainted with darkness, as taught to wizards by demons, devils, and foul abominations too blasphemous to name.  Magic items, everything from a +1 sword to the wand of Orcus, has been either forged by infernal beings or touched by them.

Magic items found in dungeons and such places are subtly cursed and likely to exert a Hellish influence.  In fact, I'd like to cultivate a medieval Hellraiser kind of eldritch bloodbath aesthetic the farther one goes into the dungeon.

This is as much thinking as I've done for the setting.  Below is the sort of random table I might roll upon when a new magic item is discovered.

Magic Items (Forged by Demons)

1. Allows the one possessing the magic item to communicate with all infernal races.
2. The one possessing the magic item shifts alignment one step closer to Chaos.
3. The magic item requires the shedding of blood to function (innocent blood increases the item's potency by half again as much.
4. The magic item is intelligent and speaks - continually advising the item's possessor on "the best course of action."
5. Cumulative 1% chance per day the magic item's creator takes control of the one who possesses it.  This domination lasts 24 hours and the cumulative chance resets after demonic possession.
6. This magic item allows its creator to see and hear what's happening around the item.

______________

This is all subject to change, of course.  I've got oodles of time before anything like this can actually take place.  Reading Grognardia has had a powerful affect on my mind.  

Anyway, thanks for reading and feel free to comment with your preferences, or tell me what you think about my own.

VS

Like a Pro

So, I was thinking more about the whole GMing for $$$ thing.  Eventually, it's going to be mainstream.  The GMs who have their shit together will eventually have to "Tony Robbins the fuck up" or get off the pot.  Evolve or die.

Once I get back to regular gaming (hopefully, autumn of 2017), I'll make some moves to monetize.

But for now, all I've got is talk... and plans.  But mostly talk.  Someone brought up the "unethical" word a couple of days ago.  Not that they thought charging players was unethical, but they wondered if I thought it might be.  I don't.  However, that got me thinking.

What are some borderline unethical situations or "gimmicks" as I like to call them, involving the professional GM trade?

Venger's Professional GM Gimmicks

• Make your RPG have to do with some kind of cult.  That would make the players either cultists or unwitting (semi-witting?) pawns of the cult.
• Similar to the cult idea, root your campaign in one or more prevailing religious mythologies - like the party has been chosen by Jesus Christ to destroy demons laying waste to The Holy Land.
• Let everyone think you're dying of cancer (my apologies to anyone currently dying of cancer - seriously, that sucks).
• Involve politics - yeah, you thought the whole Jesus and cancer stuff was dirtying your soul.  Nope, political pandering is even worse.  My lawful evil, half-orc paladin/illusionist does not believe in gun control, motherfuckers!  [Starts shooting]
• Advertise your game as "better than therapy," because it's illegal to claim that gaming is actual therapy or that you are a real therapist (unless you are one).  Hey, it probably is better than therapy and a hell of a lot cheaper.  I might actually use this one down the road.
• Ever heard of men's rights?  Yeah, your game could be a gender thing.  Although, I'm not sure why you'd want to deprive yourself of female company.  Since it's 2017, why not an all-girl gaming group?
• Further players' continued education with High Gygaxian, simple math, and amateur dramatics!  Not for actual college credits - but players can still put it on their resumes.
• Hook all the players onto the crystal meth (preferably the blue kind) that you cook in your desert-bound mobile home.
• Pass yourself off as some kind of celebrity.  Not an RPG celebrity... cause that's just pathetic.  You've got to be famous for being famous, like you regularly update some stupid blog or make terrible videos.

I'm sure that you guys could add to the list.  So, go ahead.  Let's get unethical together, borderline or otherwise.  And then let's get paid!

VS

Remembering Grognardia

I try to remember that ideas are cheap, but player interest is often priceless.  For some, it can be a hard lesson to learn, but once understood, it more than repays the time and effort spent acquiring it.

~ James Maliszewski

I was going to title this blog post, "Looking Back," but it's really going to focus on the OSR blog of OSR blogs, back when the OSR was just becoming a thing - Grognardia!

I was tuning in a little later than most of the original OSR folks - early 2013.  That's just after Grognardia "went dark."  I probably read about a dozen of +James Maliszewski's posts.  They were good, but by then James was mostly reviewing products or talking about the Gygax foundation / memorial / statue or whatever it is (was).

Grognardia was a bit intimidating and maybe it was my assumption that James and similar folks into the old school ways were "fundamentalists" when it came to D&D.  Perhaps I had heard some negative things about the Dwimmermount Kickstarter or "OSR Taliban" from +Kasimir Urbanski (RPGpundit).

I'm not sure what it was exactly, but I never went that deep into Grognardia... until recently.  Everything from his unsure trials with old school mechanics, DM style, and campaign setting (a megadungeon) to his love of "pulp fantasy" to theorizing about what made D&D so awesome back in the day.  Some of our experiences are eerily similar, others are just really interesting (like his assumptions about 4th edition D&D based on pre-release announcements).  But there's real knowledge, experience, and understanding in many of those older posts.

Here are just a few favorites of mine:  Pulp Fantasy, Gary Gygax 1979, Dice as Oracle, Rough Edges,  Old School Culture, and My Megadungeon: Dwimmermount.

Speaking of Dwimmermount, I'm very interested in buying / reading / running this campaign in the near future... when I start GMing again, of course.

Dwimmermount was James' rejection of "modern" D&D for some kind of primordial version - to see if he could implement the old ways and capture that nostalgic vibe from the 70s and early 80s.  Not merely because he wanted to re-create the past, but he was seeking a return to the much-more-satisfying roots of our beloved hobby.

I started blogging about old school gaming stuff shortly after James stopped.  Here's my first post from March 14th, 2013.  It was shortly after that that I self-published my own crash course in old school fantasy roleplaying experimentation with Liberation of the Demon Slayer.

VS

Vault's open - come on in!

The S'rulyan Vault is officially here.

As I was explaining to someone only an hour ago, this product is mostly about the maps.  It's big, it took a long time to make, and costs are what they are.  The dungeon even comes in two different colors - old school blue/white and a golden brown parchment hue.

The PDF is meant to be the icing on the cake.  That doesn't mean I'm not extremely proud of the PDF, though.  I am.  I think it turned out really well and I'm excited to hear feedback from gamers who use my guidelines and random tables in their dungeon.

But yeah, this isn't a fully formed mega-dungeon with fleshed out encounters.  The meat and potatoes of it is up to the GM.  I merely provided the salad, appetizer, bread, and dessert.  The actual entree itself is not included.

So, keep in mind that you're mostly paying for the large, high-resolution map files that can be blown up to 34" x 44" at a professional print shop.

The PDF is 20 pages of neat stuff that will add depth to the dungeoncrawl that YOU create, whether that's mostly on-the-fly or with a few hours of campaign prep depends on what kind of GM you are.

If you have any questions, please let me know!

VS

Recent Recognition

Here's a little sneak preview content from my upcoming O5R project, Alpha Blue.

This is where I was recently interviewed by Shane Ward.

The Outer Presence received another favorable review.  As did Revelry in Torth and The Islands of Purple-Haunted Putrescence.  He also reviewed Descent into the Candy Crypts quite unfavorably, but that might be because he's never read Crimson Dragon Slayer, where awesomeness to the point of stupidity takes precedence over serious dungeoncrawling.

Anyway, that's the news!  Thanks for reading, folks.

VS

99 Crimson Balloons

I was in an Italian deli / sub shop today, grabbing lunch for myself and a crew of people.  So, I was standing there waiting for sandwiches to be made for about 15 or 20 minutes.

That 80's classic "99 Luftballons" song by Nena came on the radio.  Obviously, I know the English version, too - "99 Red Balloons".  Undistracted, I really listened to the song - even though I couldn't understand anything other than "luftballons", which means air-balloons, basically.  You gotta get those syllables where you can.

Anyways, I decided to actually read the lyrics online just a few minutes ago.  I was shocked to find a deeper message than just watching a bunch of balloons (probably red) floating up in the sky.

Apparently, the idea for the song came from the guitarist who noticed balloons being released into the air.  As he watched them move toward the horizon, shifting and changing shapes like an alien spacecraft, he wondered what might happen if they floated over the Berlin Wall to the Soviet sector.

                                        "99 Red Balloons"                              

You and I in a little toy shop
Buy a bag of balloons with the money we've got
Set them free at the break of dawn
'til one by one they were gone
Back at base bugs in the software
Flash the message: "something's out there!"
Floating in the summer sky
Ninety-nine red balloons go by

Ninety-nine red balloons
Floating in the summer sky
Panic bells, it's red alert
There's something here from somewhere else
The war machine springs to life
Opens up one eager eye
Focusing it on the sky
Where ninety-nine red balloons go by

Ninety-nine decision street
Ninety-nine ministers meet
To worry, worry, super scurry
Call the troops out in a hurry
This is what we've waited for
This is it, boys, this is war
The president is on the line
As ninety-nine red balloons go by

Ninety-nine knights of the air
Ride super high-tech jet fighters
Everyone's a super hero
Everyone's a captain Kirk
With orders to identify
To clarify and classify
Scramble in the summer sky
Ninety-nine red balloons go by

As ninety-nine red balloons go by

Ninety-nine dreams I have had
In every one a red balloon
It's all over and I'm standing pretty
In this dust that was a city
If I could find a souvenir
Just to prove the world was here
And here is a red balloon
I think of you, and let it go

So, I decided to come up with a spell tribute.  Even though I earmarked this for Crimson Dragon Slayer (even the album came out in 1983!), I believe any OSR game worth its salt could find this usable.

99 Crimson Balloons

Also known as 99 blood balloons or spheres of blood, this spell of the fourth level was crafted by the bloodlust sorcerer Chang Xikurr during his time imprisoned in the ultra-zone.

Upon casting this spell, the wizard summons exactly 99 spheres filled with a dark red substance - they are actually filled with blood... demon blood!  The spheres rise into the air quickly and burst soon after (the very next round).

When they reach a certain height, the spheres explode, dousing everyone within a 30' radius of the caster in the blood of demons - which makes them fight and kill and war as if Hell itself were goading them on.  Not only do they act like demons, but they begin to resemble them also... horns, crimson flesh, cat eyes, hooves, claws, forked tongue, sulfuric stench, tons of back hair, the whole nine (or ninety-nine) yards.

The blood's effect lasts 3d6 rounds.  Mechanically speaking, those sloshed with infernal gore receive an extra attack each round - but only if the player describes his character's violent escapades graphically.

After the bloodlust has subsided, there's a period (2d4 rounds) of wistful reflection where nothing but moping around and gentle weeping can be accomplished.
___


If you like this, use it and tell us what happened!

VS

Cavern of Carnage & CDS errata

I got a chance to run Crimson Dragon Slayer again last Saturday afternoon.  It's only the fourth time I've tried it out (second if you count having the completed rulebook in hand).  Luckily, we all had a great time and it was a lot of fun.

Here's the cast of characters...

Ronnie Von Blitzkrieg was a heavy metal (hair metal, actually) bard.  Yeah, Crimson Dragon Slayer doesn't actually have a bard class.  So he was basically a warrior who used his axe like a guitar.  For rolling 3d6 in order, he knocked it out of the fucking park.  Besides an 11, his lowest score was a 13.  He wanted to play a pixie fairy princess - with a beard.  So, a bearded lady or drag queen sort of deal.  Our input led to Ronnie's beard being longer than he was, as pixie fairies are only 2' tall.  Basically, the player wanted to live his dream of being in the video game Brutal Legend.  I'd never heard of it, but the concept sounded cool.

Emerald Ice rolled again on the name table to arrive at Emerald Ice Panther.  I had forgotten about his incredibly powerful magic trident that his character found at the end of last game.  We had some fun thinking about this reptilian warrior wearing the skin of his enemies (or anyone with nice looking skin, really).

Death Ultra was another recurring character.

Lastly, we had Panther Asphalt, an infernal elf wizard.  Here's the last session for those who want to get caught up.

Because I've been so busy with my paternal leave from work (that's where I get a lot of my free time at the computer) and whipping The Outer Presence into shape, I let the No Escape from New York writing fall by the wayside.  Though I still held out hope that several amazing ideas would fall out of my brain - until the morning of game day when I realized it was not going to happen (not satisfactorily, at least).  Luckily, I remembered that Crimson Dragon Slayer comes with an introductory adventure at the back of the book!  And it should be vaguely familiar since I wrote it.  Bonus!

We got through almost the whole thing in 4 hours (that included creating 2 characters).  Recounting the entire session would be exhausting for writer and reader, so I'll just post the highlights...

• Ronnie has costume changes in-between sets.
• Exploding damage = actual explosions!
• Ronnie acquires a magic sword then adds that to his axe-guitar to create a two-handed, double-necked guitar (axe and sword) with codpiece attachment and cup holder.
• A Rubix Cube with seven colors should probably have seven sides.  Oops.  Guess that means it's a 7-sided cube with extra-dimensional properties.  yeah, that's the ticket!
• Panther Asphalt pushes over the Tardis to find a leather glove with the fingers cut off (fingerless glove) called Glove of the Five-Finger Death Punch.  It does 5d6 damage!
• The tangerine dream explodes thanks to Panther Asphalt's purple lighting spell.  Then it explodes again and something else randomly explodes behind it... because explosions are awesome, as well as, METAL!!!
  
• A wizard's bones were desecrated, a dove decapitated and blood drunk from its neck (I have absolutely no idea why, but I wrote it down in my notes... so, yeah).
• Everyone was hell-bent on saving the hottie about to be sacrificed by demons - except for the infernal elf.  Inter-party battle!  Yay, my game mechanic for recovering bonus dice works!!!
• Ronnie whips the dirty, stinking primitives into a mosh pit with his monstrous riffs.  Not hard as they had already been injected with Satanic LSD.
• Skeletal mermaids!  Did they have seashell bras?  If not, could one see the skeletal remains of their mermaid boobies?  That's for the Dragon Master to decide.
• Everyone rolled surprisingly well on their death saving throw, so even though the party was annihilated by explosions and horrendous damage, no one died.  ;)
• The demonic frost titans were awakened by Ronnie and his orders were these: Go forth and spread the word of metal to all the lands.  Thus the holy word of metal perforated the consciousness (and eardrums) of Thule.

Yeah, it was a wild time.  It helped to have great players who were game for super-gonzo shenanigans.
___

Also, there's the small matter of errata...

Crystallines get racial Hit Points of 1d12.

If you score a critical hit, instead of increasing your next attack by 1d6, you can increase it by 2d6.  One in the hand is about the same as two in the bush.

If a spell needs a willpower saving throw to resist the effect, how is it done?  

First, determine how many d6s should be rolled by looking at the target's willpower.  Let's say the target's willpower ability score is average (assume it's average unless you know otherwise), that's 2d6 (if the target had an above average willpower, they'd roll 3d6.  If it's below average, then 1d6, etc.).  They roll their dice pool of 2d6 and the Dragon Master will interpret the results as they will.  For instance, a "1" saving throw result might mean the target takes double damage.  With a "2" or "3", it's just a regular failure.  "4" could be half damage.  "5" is a successful saving throw - no damage.  Perhaps a "6" leads to being immune to that spell cast by that wizard.  Multiple "6's" could be the spell bounces back on the wizard who cast it.

I'll keep adding to the list if people have questions, clarifications, or errors they want a ruling on.

Thanks for reading,

VS

Talk to me about 2300 AD

I've got a few RPG blind spots.  I'm probably not alone in that confession.  It happens.

A new acquaintance, +Erik Alfkin, mentioned an old school, hard science fiction RPG called 2300 AD.  Despite gaming heavily throughout the 80's, I knew almost nothing about the game, except for recalling a few of the covers.

That made me curious... why was that?  Why did I go out of my way to avoid it?  Must be the same reason I never wanted anything to do with Traveller.  Well, almost.

You see, I really don't like numbers.  For me, mathematics is the worst of all forms of communication.  The title of 2300 AD is, you guessed it, pretty much all numbers.  Additionally, it's easy to tell that the game is hard sci-fi.  Science-fantasy, space opera, sci-fi with humor?  Yes to all three.  Back then I just assumed serious science fiction was dry as unbuttered toast, and anything that looked like it might be boring was ignored.  But at least some of the art was good.

Traveller didn't have the numbers but where were the space ships, lasers, robots, and women in silver bikinis?  Yeah, it lost me as well.  And for similar reasons.  I don't have much experience with the Star Trek RPGs (owned the old Tom Baker boxed set Doctor Who RPG but never got beyond character creation), and a few others.  Man, if there weren't lightsabers, psychotic computers, or scantily clad ladies, it just never got on my radar.

Looking back, it's a shame.  I'm sure I would have had some great games and memories of those sessions to this day.  Just another case of bias, ignorance, and judging books by their covers.

To rectify the situation, I'm going to see about acquiring 2300 AD because the research I did earlier today makes it sound really cool.  I assume the 2nd edition is where it's at (even though I'm not a fan of the artwork), but I could be wrong.  Anyone want to talk about their own sci-fi RPG experiences in the 80's (or earlier/later)?  Want to make a recommendation?  Comment below!

VS

Crimson Dragon Slayer reviewed by The Escapist

Another review, this time by The Escapist magazine.  Very cool.  Here it is.

I'll be coming out with a followup book to CDS soon.  It will contain a little more of everything... and a character sheet.  ;)

VS

Geek Native review of HtGMlaFB

Geek Native was kind enough to review How to Game Master like a Fucking Boss over here.  

TL;DR: Venger comes across as an old school, myopic sexist but also seems to know how to run a fantasy roleplaying game.  So, take that for what it's worth...

VS

Third Wave of Draconic Magazine

Alright, I think I've got enough articles to call this wave #3.  Let's see what I've got for you...      

• Kodarr the barbarian speaking his mind in the weekly column Kodarr's Kommandments
• A super-quick zero-level character generation method for 5th edition D&D
• My review of Delving Deeper RPG
• An article by Chris Bell on why Vampire: the Masquerade Storytellers should always make use of the prelude
• My review of Fantastic Heroes & Witchery retro-RPG along with an interview with the author
• Hidden benefits of a high charisma.  Go ahead, be a dick.
• An article on GMing better, focusing on missed opportunities
• Benoist Poire's rebuttal to John Wick's blog post regarding chess, RPGs, game balance, and other topics
• Lastly, a brand new column by the fan-fiction crossover king: Edgar Phillips Reitman!

Please check it all out here.

VS

p.s.  Only 3 days left to fund the Revelry in Torth kickstarter.  FYI, just added a $3,000 stretch goal and posted an update yesterday showing off another piece of artwork.  Please back this project if you're interested in old school sword & sorcery adventures in a strange desert world of endless darkness.  And share the link!

OSR defined

The trouble with defining the OSR is that it's not one thing but three!  In fact, that's what gives it such power.

Behold, the trinity...

1. OSR is a sign or badge of compatibility with early D&D.  From a marketing standpoint, products labeled OSR should be more or less usable with original/basic D&D, AD&D, 2nd edition, 5th, and possibly even 3rd and 4th if one doesn't mind a little conversion work, scaling things back, etc.
2. OSR is a style of play that lends itself to guidelines not scripture, DIY, non-standardization, wild-eyed anything goes creativity, freewheeling spur-of-the-moment improvisation (I'll give it a 1 in 6 chance of happening), and player-character determined campaigns, while avoiding character optimization, rules bloat, and roll play vs. roleplay.  Additionally, death can come at any time.  While GMs shouldn't be "gunning" for PCs, save or die is not uncommon.
3. OSR is an aesthetic.  The movement sprang from nostalgia of the 1970's and 80's: art, literature, sex, themes, attitudes, adventures, worlds... everything from an earlier period of tabletop gaming (when many of us were in or near adolescence).  That which is considered classic, vintage, retro, and old school is sometimes called OSR even though it bears little resemblance to D&D.  The Call of Cthulhu RPG, for example.  

So, it's little wonder that confusion crops up when someone talks about his version of OSR and that particular definition is at odds with another's conception.  Presumably, the more a thing (book, illustration, game mechanic, etc.) conforms to the aspects above, the more OSR it's believed to be.  Yet, that doesn't mean lesser OSR things (relatively speaking) are not OSR or part of the OSR movement, just that a smaller consensus of appreciation exists.

As always, feel free to agree, disagree, throw a brick through my virtual window, etc.  Comment, please!  I want to know what you think.

VS

p.s.  Yes, I'm still trying to successfully fund my Revelry in Torth kickstarter.  Every little bit helps.  Thanks!

Old School... something or other

Funny, I was thinking of the topic for this blog post halfway through my vacation.  Then I get back and read Tenkar's Tavern and RPGPundit's blog to find out they're talking about something similar.  But let's not put the horse before the cart, guys.

For a few weeks (this was about three years ago), I was fuzzy on what it meant - not realizing that would be a hallmark of the OSR itself up until the present.  I believe I kept calling it Old School Revolution.  Then, a month or so later I guess someone clued me in to the word Renaissance.  Intervening years have brought up Revival, Rules, Roleplaying, and probably a half-dozen others.

Maybe it's me.  Yes, it could very easily just be me, but I can't get past the fact that we don't have a universally recognized name.  I mean... it's the name.  It's in the title, for godsakes!

Let's not even get into what the OSR movement means to an individual, let alone the world before we hammer down what the "R" refers to.

I assume there's at least a little bit of consensus out there in cyber-land.  Most of us have come to the OSR later than when it was forged.  At most, a small handful was there actively participating in its origin discussion.

I don't care if we go with their original intent or pick something else.  It would be nice to have something to say when people ask - without being "corrected" by the blogger down the street.  You know, an actual definition of what those letters represent.

On the other hand, it could simply remain a revolving door of "r" words.  Nothing set in stone, subjective, flexible, do as thou wilt shall be the whole of the law.  But if that's the way it's going to be, I think it would be great to have a consensus on that direction.

Obviously, we're not going to get 100% on anything.  We're human, after all.  Nevertheless, I believe it's time to look that "r" square in the eye, deal with it, and move on to greener pastures.  Agree, disagree, just want to put in your two cents?  I want to read what you have to say, so comment!


VS

p.s.  Yeah, I'm not sure why I chose that particular image to adorn this blog post.  It came up in a google image search for "Old School Renaissance".  The box is from 1981 and I remember owning it or a similar set with those little plastic figures.  Ah, good times...

Unorthodox

The subject of this blog post came from a Kickstarter question: "Does this support 3.5?"

"This" refers to the next adventure I'm writing, Revelry in Torth.  "3.5" refers to that late-middle period of Dungeons & Dragons which helped propel the Old School Renaissance into existence.  Indeed, 3rd and 4th editions practically forced nostalgia-fueled grognards to become a like-minded community, continually hashing out what is and what isn't OSR while enjoying the melange of overlapping and polarizing tastes it has to offer.

After a little back and forth, I gave his query two different answers.  In the way that Revelry in Torth will include Hit Dice, Hit Points, Armor Class, etc... yes.  It's "supported", meaning compatible.  However, beyond that, no.  3.5 is not just like OSR, O5R, or anything calling itself old school.

Aside from a few conversion issues, there's something else at work here, a deeper issue.  Where 3.5 tried to standardize the game.  I and the OSR go in the opposite direction - non-standardization!  My aim is to make things as unfamiliar and strange as possible, while staying within the loose confines of D&D's core principles.  NPCs and monsters will have special abilities and powers and various game mechanics; however, they will not resemble the rigid and bloated stat blocks of 3.5.

3rd edition, like 4th, is a different animal than original D&D, AD&D, 2nd edition, and now 5th. The majority already know this.  Gamers like myself don't want hardwired rules for everything and everything to be explicitly stated in the rules.  We want grey areas.  We want room to do our own thing, to explore the weird and wild game flow just as player-characters might explore a subterranean environment.  It's not just about the mechanics.  It's a totally different style of tabletop fantasy roleplaying.

The early editions focused on improvisation, collaborative storytelling, and interacting with the unknown rather than rules knowledge and character optimization in order to "win D&D".  I can only hope that 5th edition carries on that unorthodox tradition, that feeling of apprehension when facing a stairway leading down to the next level of the dungeon.

So, those looking for "a proper conversion up to 3.5" will be sorely disappointed in the vast majority of OSR, O5R, and similar products.  Yes, the extra GM prep is an issue but, more than that, they are aesthetically antagonistic.


VS