Metal/Crust Camping pt II

It started raining so I dug a trench with a bolo machete and strung up a tarp...it's adequate and fits my bedroll.

[non-rpg] Metal/Crust Camping

[non-RPG] "We've got a real optimist over here..."

"Sorry dude who stopped me on the sidewalk of a quiet residential neighborhood at 11 PM on a Sunday night, but I most definitely don't know where you can get weed..."

Another Multiple DM Campaign Thought

Assuming that the DMs involved have a modicum of intelligence and can keep the Viking Hat on while dealing with grasping, wheedling players, there is no reason (assuming that some reasonable, mathematically sound conversion standards are established) that the DMs EVEN HAVE TO USE THE SAME VERSION OF D&D OR CLONE-ESQUE.

As long as the folks involved are reasonable, one DM could run LBB OD&D and another could run Path(math)finder WITH THE SAME CHARACTERS and general setting.

Hell, you could even throw Runequest, Tunnels and Trolls and a ton others in the mix.

Plus using different rulesets provides a DM a rationale for abruptly shooting down "But last week when Monty was DM I could do that!" whinging; "Different ruleset bub, deal with it!"



Just a picture of a pit bull (ish?) on a treadmill being cute; has nothing to do with this post.

Further multiple DM campaign thoughts...

I previously posted an example of a map for a four-DM campaign; but really one does not need such a map for a multiple referee situation.

You could easily enough have one "city" with multiple campaign megadungeons within walking distance (or within or below the city itself).

Now being an obsessive freak I fret about the continuity, territorial and conflict of interest concerns with multiple DMs running parties in the same city ("God damn it Jack!! I invented the Snails Pace Inn and it definitely does not serve mead or have sexy serving wenches; weren't you paying attention when I DMed last week you fucking hack!"), but solutions come to mind:

- the city is just a generic, faceless entity devoid of NPCs, adventure or features; all of the action takes place in the dungeons with players shopping from a list while "in town."

- Only the features invented by a particular DM are available when that DM runs a session ("I understand that you wish to buy spells off of your mentor, but he's on vacation...").

- the city is divided into sections a la post-WW II Berlin with the action taking place in the quarter that "belongs" to the DM running the session ("Four kings?!? What kind of city is this place?!?").

Now any of the above conceits doesn't preclude any of the DMs from introducing their wilderness sandbox to the north-west/ north-east/ south-east/ south-west of "Central City," but they do remove it from being an immediate concern of any of the DMs and allows folks to haul their butts to the dungeon.

Be Prepared!

Seriously, this is just the tip of the iceberg...

Stumbled across This and figured some of you would be stoked on it; a 28-page equipment list including Whiskey (or what I commonly refer to as boar piss).

Some Awesome News Regarding the Swords & Wizardry Monster Book; Attention Artists

NOT the Swords & Wizardry Tome of Horrors Complete, but the 300+ monster book put out by Mythmere Games available Here, with the illustrations free .doc version graciously available Here.

I bought the PDF a while back and I liked it so much that I purchased the softcover; recently out of some OCD need to have my monster books somewhat resemble my AD&D Monster Manual is size and format I've been considering ordering the hardcover version (along with the hardcover versions of Monsters of Myth and Malevolent and Benign, both of which I own the PDF and softcover versions... ...there's also albums that I own in cassette tape, CD and vinyl LP format as well, I'm a real piece of work).

EDIT: Although the Swords & Wizardry Monster Book is sorely lacking in MORALE SCORES and HOARD CLASS; I know they're not S&W rules but come on people, Morale Scores are absolutely crucial for fair DMing!

EDIT II: And as J Random pointed out, NO. APPEARING should be included in the revised edition as well.

It's a good thing that I didn't because I came across This on the Swords & Wizardry Forum:

"I have been putting my re-writes of the monsters into my draft of the S&W Monster Book, and the urge is coming upon me to get illustrations and new monsters, and upgrade the book. Not a second volume, but an upgrade (the cost of the bigger, complete book would not be measurably more than buying a second volume, so might as well do a combined one for convenience). We'd do basically what we did for the first printing, a group project of monster-writing. I might even be able to get contributions from one or two of the D&D celebs that I've hung out with a lot at NTRPGCon. No guarantees on that, but I think a couple of people might be persuaded to chip in a monster or two.

Has it been long enough since the initial release of the monster book for this not to piss off people who bought the first one? Keep in mind that a second volume would cost only slightly less than what I'm thinking of doing here. I think. I haven't run the numbers on the lulu calculators, yet, but that's what I'm assuming. The key here is getting more illustrations, too...

... the S&W Monster Book, only with a new set of monsters to be generated the way we did last time, with people posting their monsters on the board, group comments, me editing, and so forth, and also getting more illustrations (the paucity of illustrations in the monster book is its big flaw). This would be a Mythmere deal, not a Frog God deal, so it would be done through lulu."

I'm pretty jazzed about this bit of news; I'll be able to get my titty-grabbers on a bigger, badder hardcover version of the S&W MB and this is a great opportunity for all of the talented artists and monster-makers out there in OSR land to get their work in an awesome book.

Also, if you don't LOVE this song you're a fucking asshole ;)

Four DM Campaign

The below is a doodle I came up for a four-DM campaign.
EDIT: And by that I meant as an example of the idea I had, not an actual real campaign map & dungeons.



The idea is to facilitate a multiple DM campaign w/o concerns regarding continuity errors, territorial violations, etc.

The conceit is that there are four relatively distinct regions that divide the campaign wold into four equal quadrants; each serves as the sandbox for games run by one of the four DMs, with players running their characters in the multiple regions.

I placed a megadungeon in each region close to the center of the map so dudes from different regions could easily access them.

[OD&D Houserule] Beat The Wretches!!

Many times in literature and cinema an aristocrat will have his footmen beat an uppity wretch with their canes to teach them to respect their betters; sometime a bunch of rough labourers decide to teach some hoity toity type slumming in their tavern a lesson in class-hatred with chair legs and axe handles.

In bog-standard OD&D that presents a conumdrum; obviously the intent of such actions aren't to kill the victim, but mechanically that's how things would play out. As well, in actuality beating someone unconcious often results in the unintentional death of the beatee.

Here follows a houserule I came up with to respresent such hilarious brutality:

- When a  not-entirely-lethal bludgening intrument is used to attack, the damage dice are used to represent "subdual damage" (temporary damage that only renders the target unconcious at 0 or less hit points); however if the damage die results in a natural six result the die is thrown again and the resultant roll is applied as actual real damage.


Obviously it is no great feat to use this houserule with non-OD&D versions of the game; I just came up with it while musing about OD&D and Small But Vicious Dog.

(Somewhat inspired by sundry posts on The Vaults of Naogh and the atrocious movie Sweeny Todd)

Don't Mourn the Death, Celebrate the Life.../Motorhead

I agree that it's disapointing that Christian pulled the plug on the always inspiring Destination Unknown, but I'm not going to wail and moan...

...as I'm sure the dude will return. Christian has nuked his blog before and he came back. Chicago Wiz nuked his blog and he came back. Scott Driver nuked his blog and came back. Sean Wills nuked his blog and he came back. Generally the only casualties of these episodes is the awesome content lost when a blog is nuked.

THERE IS NO ESCAPE CHRISTIAN....YOU WILL BE BACK! MUHAHAHAHA!

Planet Algol Apocalypse World Hack PDF Download

Here... http://redboxvancouver.wordpress.com/2011/07/04/world-of-algol-pdf/

By Red Box Vancouver maver & stalwart Johnstone. Although it's not canon (as it ventures into giving humans special characterics due to ethnicity apostasy ;) ) Johnstone freaking GETS IT. Dig his awesome photoshopped(?) Algol race thumbnails and try and spot the celebrities...