Oriental Adventures

Yesterday we gathered to continue our OA campaign. We are five guys, four are married and three got small children. We get together maybe 3 or 4 times in the year, if we're lucky. It's more like a social reunion in which we hang out, catch up and roll some dices. As we waited for everyone to come, one of the guys commented about playing with his 8 years old son, so I mentioned some blogs he could check out and read about other dads' experience.

Later while having some pizzas, one of the guys made us notice that we begun this campaign back in May of 1994! That's 16 years ago! Since all of our characters are level 6, our party must have the worst campaigning time-level achieved ratio ever. It's not that we care about it, but we laughed heartily at the thought and I took mental note to comment it here.

Don't let the trolls win

It's sad to see two very interesting RPG-related blogs to go down in a few days. I'm talking about Michael "Chgowiz" Shorten's "Old Guy RPG" blog and Christopher Brackett's "A Rust Monster Ate My Sword" blog. The former has been taken is off-line by its owner and the latter won't be seeing any update for the time being.

I specially didn't referred to those blogs as "OSR-related" because they covered many other, equally interesting, topics. I very much respect the reasons that each one had to made their decisions. Maybe I don't agree but I respect them and hope to see both online soon. And if not, others will come forward and pick their flags to carry on.

Gary Con II

I've just realized that tomorrow Friday starts Gary Con II (March 19 - 21) and it made me get green with envy for all of you attending. No seriously, I wish everyone there good gaming and hope to read many cool stories in the blogs I follow. I hope some day to attend and share a game with some of the people I know from here, the Google Wave game, Canonfire! or the Greychat. Happy Gary Con! I'm still green... Bleh...

What to put in a portable hole?

Last session, one of my players (Fede V.) decided that Falquian, his figher/mage-slayer, while in the city, will stock the portable hole he had gained the previous session. But he didn't tell me and we didn't do all the roleplay of the "shopping & buying"; he just made the list and anounced he was done. The dialogue was something like:

Player: "That's it, all we need is in the portable hole."

DM: "W-what? All right, read me the list."

Player: (reads the list aloud)

(everyone laughs)

DM: "You mail me that list, I'm gonna put it in the blog!"

And so here it is:

a freestanding bookshelf (already there)
a worktable (already there)
a comfortable cot (already there)
3 barrels of dried food (already there)
4 barrels of fresh water (3 were already there)
1 barrel of oil
5 bedrolls
5 winter blankets
5 cold weather outfits
500 ft. of hempen rope
10 lbs. of soap
a shovel
a miner's pick
a crowbar
100 trail rations
5 sacks (empty)
2 iron pots
flint & steel
2 tents
firewood (for some days)
a small steel mirror
3 manacles
50 iron spikes
10 wooden stakes
10 everburning torches
a grappling hook
a 10 ft. wooden ladder
a portable ram
a sledge
20 flasks of holy water

I don't know if all that fits in a portable hole and didn't do the math, but since I liked it so much I allowed it. As I recently read here, saying yes is more fun.

Finnaly!

Last friday when I got home there was a note from the postman that they had a package for me at the post office. Since they don't work on weekends, and I couldn't go on their office hours, today my wife went to get it. So, I came from work and there it was on my desk, a perfectlly bound cardboard box from Lulu and a post-it from her that today dinner was on me. I finally have in my hands the Labyrinth Lord's Advanced Edition Companion from Goblinoid Games! The binding and printing of the book are of great quality. The artwork is so old-school, I love it. Enough, I'm off to read it and plan my next capaign. Uh-oh, wait, I have to make dinner. :-)

D&D 2010 Season

Yesterday after several tries our group finally got together to start the Dungeons & Dragons 2010 season. It's the final leg to end the Expedition to the Ruins of Greyhawk module. I guess that by playing a couple of times per month we'll be finishing it around mid-year. There was no combat during the first session, only a couple of dices were rolled for some checks, it was all role-playing. It was a change of pace after several sessions of dungeon crawl and they were all longing for some time in the city. They did plenty of things, from selling loot, to buying equipement, enchanting items, interrogating a prisioner, following leads, information gathering, scrying a potential enemy, sending a message to Mordenkainen informing him about their plans and asking for advice, even communing with Boccob for guidance. By the end of the session they were ready to go back to the Castle.

Read An RPG Book in Public Week

Tomorrow ends the first "Read An RPG Book in Public Week" of the year. It's a curious event to promote the hobby. Click on the image above to find out more about it.

Two years...

It's been two years now since Gary Gygax left us. I'll never forget what I felt that day, it was a mix of sadness and frustration. Sadness for the loss and a state of emptiness that comes along. And frustration because I never had the chance to meet him at a GenCon or other convention. The chance to have a picture taken with him or having some book autographed by him. That day I promised myself to some day visit Lake Geneva. It'll be a sort of pilgrimage to the origins of D&D. To finish this humble homage I found a phrase somewhere some time ago that I think abridges this day's feelings: "Gary, you're critically missed."

Photo by Alan De Smet

One Page Dungeon: Dungeons of the Forsaken Abbey

Here is a link to my sumbission to the One Page Dungeon Contest 2010. It's called "Dungeons of the Forsaken Abbey" and it's based on an actual homebrew adventure we were playing not long ago. Hope you like it and wish me luck!

Azincourt

I've just finished reading "Azincourt" a novel by Bernard Cornwell. He's my favorite writer of the historical novel genre. So far I've read the Grail Quest (Harlequin, Vagabond and Heretic) and the Saxon Stories (The Last Kingdom, The Pale Horseman, The Lords of the North and Sword Song) series. Now I'm waiting to get my hands on "The Burning Land", the last one published (but hopefully not the last to be written) of the Saxon serie. Cornwell masterfully entwines a fictional storyline with historical facts to create a literary masterpiece. All the research made by the author is evident in every detail described and one feels transported to the time depicted. A book worth reading.

Drawings (5)

This one's inspired in the old Dragon magazine. I don't remember clearly, but I think it was drawn sometime during a gaming session. I miss that magazine...

Drawings (4)

This is a quick scketch that I called "Champion" and it portraits an old character that one of my actual players used in another campaign. The character's name is Elthanas, an elven cavalier and Prince of the Gamboge Forest, which I mentioned in an old post here. The visor of the helmet is the beak and wings of a raven (or at least that was the intention) which was his coat of arms that can be partially seen on his shield. He's weilding a flaming sword.

Drawings (3)

Here goes another one. This was inspired by the ranger in the Unearthed Arcana and it was the portrait for one of my characters (Finloss).

Drawings (2)

Continunig with the serie of "artistic" posts, here goes another one. This one is called "Knight in dungeon" and, as yesterday's, are inspired in the books of "Prince Valiant" which belonged to my father and I literaly devoured as a kid. More to come soon.

Drawings

As I hoped here, on 2009's last post, I'm now starting to post material from one of my hobbies: drawing. I'm not a professional artist, so don't expect too much quality (I wish I had more time to better my skills). Anyway, here goes the first one and it's called "Archer". ;-)

Labyrinth Lord Advanced Edition Companion Available!

Even though as a member of the Labyrinth Lord Society I've received in advance a special preview (no artwork) of the Advanced Edition Companion, I also bought (juat a couple of minutes ago!) the hardcover edition from the print shop at Lulu and made use of the Groundhog Day coupon code ("SHADOW") toget a 15% off. (valid until Feb 3). Between printing (10-15 days) and shipping (7-12 days) it'll take a while to get down here, but it's worth the waiting. I hope it comes right in time for the start of my new "Old School" style campaign I'm planning for this year. Can't wait to have it!

Design A Dungeon Room Contest 2010 fail

It was a really busy week and weekend with some friends (all fellow players of World of Warcraft online ) coming from abroad (Argentina) and I completely forgot about the deadline! I was really excited about this contest and had some ideas to submit. Well, maybe next time...

One Page Dungeon Contest 2010

It looks like another instance of the One Page Dungeon Contest has been set in motion by Alex Schroeder, one of the judges of OPDC 2009, as we can read in his wiki/blog. The best of luck to him and the would-be judges!

Design A Dungeon Room Contest 2010

This cool initiative can be found at Robertson Games website. The idea is to create a dungeon room following the Old School style. It can contain an encounter with a creature, an NPC, a trap or trick, etc. You can check the judges and prizes here. Last year experience with the One Page Dungeon Contest was great. I had a lot of fun creating the dungeon and really liked the format, so I guess I'm going to use it again for this contest. I'll be posting it here as soon as I have it ready.

D&D in Google Wave 2

The AD&D 1e/OSRIC campaign on Google Wave I'm in is going really well and I'm having a lot of fun playing it. Everyone posts everyday and some several times a day. This is a key aspect of the game. This enthusiasm made give it a try as a DM so, as we're in a summer break in my 3.5e campaign, I set up a wave for a one-on-one side adventure with one of my players. We did PBP style and online gaming, using a wave for the action and another one for maps, references and character sheets. It's been a great experience so far, with both the player and DM enjoying the game.