Monday, January 17, 2011

Props: Adventures and Zines I plan on using in my Greatholm Campaign.

Well, it's Martin Luther King Day and I can't get squat done.  The problem with living off the government teat (My income streams are pretty much the State of Pennsylvania and the Veterans Administration right now) is that you have to deal with government hours.  So, what is there to do but head on down to the Cheeky Monkey Coffee House and try to read and write some stuff.  Last night, Mrs. Higgipedia and I sat at the local Perkins so she could get some of her reading done while I went through a lot of my PDFs to see what I might use for my Greatholm Sandbox.  It gave me a great chance to look through a lot of wonderful things made by the OSR Community.

Skull Mountain, by Faster Monkey Games.  I plan on having two megadungeons on the island.  Skull Mountain will be one of them (The other one might end up being The Lost Caverns of Tsojcanth).  I'll have to tweak it a bit to make it a little more "weird," but that shouldn't be too much of a problem.  I must confess, I never went to their website before.  I'm glad I did, because it turned me on to the $2 PDFs they put out covering Gems and Jewelery, which I plan on snapping up as soon as I get paid.

Blood Moon Rising, by Small Niche Games.  I talked about this one briefly when I talked about folk festivals.  It's nice because it allows the PCs to participate while the events unfold.  A lot of open choices there and hooks to bite on.  I might try to work The Inn of Lost Heroes into my game as well. 

Death Frost Doom, Hammers of the God, Three Brides: No Dignity in Death, and Tower of the Stargazer, all by Lamentations of the Flame Princess.  These are the ones I own.  I'll likely pick up The Grinding Gear when I get paid and A Stranger Storm when it becomes available.  I get pretty brand loyal when I find something I really like.  I've liked the reviews and play journals for Death Frost Doom.  Seeing Beedo's write-ups about his game has me thinking that Greatholm would likely be toast if 13,000 undead started coming down the mountain.  What I've read of Three Brides looks wonderful.  Tower of the Stargazer was a fun time with my brother back in October.  I loved the playtest of A Stranger Storm.  I am a geek for James's stuff, as it fits exactly what I want out of my game.  Of course, finding players who fit that mold might be more difficult...

I also went through a bunch of zines for things to use.  I'm trying to keep house-rules to a minimum, what with my existing Arcane Magic idea and plans for some tweaks to Alignment and Psychology and two potential new classes I've been mulling about in my head.

Encounters, Jesse Walker's zine from Australia, is quite possibly the best LOOKING D&D fanzine on the internet.  The content is as great as the layout.  There are three issues available for download and the fourth should be out shortly.  It would certainly behoove you to check out Encounters.  Footprints and OD&Dities continue to put out some good stuff in them as well.

Anyway, it's given me some stuff to think about and work on.  If you aren't already checking some of these out, I recommend you do so.

4 comments:

  1. A philosophical issue I have with many current role-playing games is that they do not trade in the way traditional zines do. Aside from game zines, there is still a thriving underground of perzines, music zines, DIY efforts, food zines, etc. The currency for those zines is - and has always been - a stamp, a trade, or two bucks tucked into an envelope.

    Granted, the print quality is rather low, but it's the exchange of ideas and the flow of snail mail that is important. I don't know why rpg zines never embraced the larger zine culture's way of doing things.

    Enjoy the day off. I know I am. ;)

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  2. Actually, I take that back. I"m sick of having "issues." Let people write how they may and distribute in any manner they see fit.

    Good Lord, I can't get out of my own way some times.

    Game on, brother.

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  3. Christain, your paper zines rocked!

    Before the ipad, my RPG bathroom reading was limited to paper, and that paper pile was mostly yours. I mean this in a good way ;)

    LotFP stuff is really good. You may need to tweak it a bit to make it fit the way you want, but thats the same will all adventures.

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