@kyonshi How did the dynamics change in the "Return to" scenario they did many years later, I can't remember.
I do remember Keep feeling very organic and a good structure for adventuring around, with that sense of "go, return, develop" which is very lacking in most official scenarios.
I've never had an issue with Keep, just some very thematically ossified DMs playing it.
The Doom of Blackwinter has befallen the town of Ethan's Vale, and now threatens to overwhelm the whole of the mortal realms! Only a few brave souls can stop the awakening of Winter's Heart!
The Doom of Blackwinter is now available for Old School Essentials and Zweihander.
This online player reference for #WolvesUpontheCoast by Luke Gearing condenses just the rules most relevant to players.
Rules have been rewritten for easy reading, and can be browsed a mobile-friendly website. A PDF booklet and full-page size form fillable PDF character sheet for the system are also available. #OSR
It's interesting how the dominant #OSR title seems to change every so often.
A few years back, the default starter game was Lamentations of the Flame Princess, then it shifted to Old School Essentials, and now I get the impression that it's shifting to Dungeon Crawl Classics.
Not really sure why this happens... Lamentations had the Zak S thing but OSE haven't messed up and I don't get the impression that DCC has suddenly started doing noticeably better work.
@kevin@Taskerland Yeah, I agree, it's more OSR-adjacent that OSR (so more of a proto-NSR), and don't get me wrong, DCC has plenty of fans and a great, very supportive community - I'm just not seeing it breaking outside those established communities.
A lot of people point nowadays to Shadowdark. To me, Shadowdark seems more like a simplified DCC with lots of influence from the OSR and 5e (at it's heart, DCC is clearly an off shoot of 3e).
@Tim_Eagon@kevin@Taskerland what I like of DCC is how I can use it in other games. My go-to is Crawford’s Without Number System. I can do 1-2e, Babylon 5, or Shadowrun using it probably better than any of those original systems but it’s still more OSR than contemporary I’d say.
Shadowdark is what I’d call a cross-trainer; enough old-school to hold the interest of grognards with enough advantages of contemporary game design to bring in the noobs. If C&C is 3e done right, SD is 5e done right.
It‘s Birthdaychristmas - managed to buy five complete TSR era #adnd boxed sets (#Ravenloft and #Darksun) plus a pile of fragmented setting material on eBay for 170 EUR which is a good price since some of the English language 2nd ed material is hard to come by in Germany. Boxes were sent to my partner‘s flat since I’m in Italy right now. Best thing: my gf recorded a long unboxing video for me, so that curious me could check how complete the treasure was I found on the internet 😍 #osr#ttrpg
#dnd#ttrpg#osr folks: I'm looking for a good supply of maps that would work for a long-forgotten city in a steaming jungle. I really just want the maps - I can make a normal dungeon map myself, but I'm less confident in above-ground ruined cities.
Any suggestions? I'm looking at Ruins of Adventure and Dwellers of the Forbidden City (gonna grab the pdfs online) but if you can think of anything that fits the bill please let me know!
OSR funktioniert nämlich im Grunde so wie Scooby Doo. Falls jemand so jung sein sollte, dass er oder sie nicht weiß, was Scooby Doo ist, dann hier in aller Kürze eine Erklärung. Die Freunde Velma, Freddy, Shaggy und Daphne bilden zusammen die Gruppe Mystery Inc. Dabei werden sie von ihrem sprechenden Freund Scooby begleitet, der insbesondere zu Shaggy ein enges Verhältnis pflegt. Gemeinsam lösen sie geheimnisvolle Fälle, bei denen es fast immer um Monster geht, die sich dann doch als verkleidete Menschen herausstellen.
Was hat das jetzt mit OSR zu tun?
Das Entscheidene ist weniger, was die Mitglieder von Mystery Inc. tun, als wie sie es tun. Gerüchten folgend gelangen sie immer wieder an Orte, an denen es angeblich spukt oder ein Monster sein Unwesen treibt. Und obwohl die Gruppe ungefähr 200 Mal am Ende der Folge festgestellt hat, dass das Monster in Wirklichkeit der alte Clifford Jones war, der Mieter vertreiben will, um das Land günstig zu erwerben, geht Mystery Inc. doch immer wieder davon aus, dass es sich DIESES MAL doch um ein echtes Monster handelt.
Das ist sehr intelligent und definitiv besser, als das eine Mal, wo es wirklich ein Monster gibt, nicht zu glauben, dass es eines gibt. Und obwohl die Gruppe immer wieder davon ausgeht, dass es DIESES MAL ein echtes Monster gibt, ist sie weder von Fähigkeiten noch von der Ausrüstung irgendwie in der Lage, es zu bekämpfen. Stattdessen gibt es die für Scooby Doo ikonische Weglaufszene, in der die Gruppe die Gegebenheiten der Umgebung nutzt, um dem Monster zu entkommen, es abzulenken und letztendlich zu besiegen. Insbesondere Shaggy und Scooby werden dabei oft extrem kreativ und nutzen Verkleidungen, die sie am Ort des Abenteuers finden.
Das ist im Großen und Ganzen genau das, was von den Spielenden bei OSR erwartet wird. Natürlich ist es bei Scooby Doo oft sehr klamaukig aber auch das finde ich persönlich in Ordnung, wenn es denn im Kontext der Aufgabe Sinn ergibt.
Also überlegt mal, statt Philotomys Betrachtungen und die OSR-Fibel zu lesen, einfach ein paar Folgen Scooby Doo zu gucken. Am besten zusammen mit dem Rest der Spielgruppe.
I've had my account bridged to BS for almost two weeks and I finally got a follower over there. Hey Magic Sky Publishing! Thanks for the follow, but you have to bridge your account to Mastodon or join us over at dice.camp (plenty of left wing #OSR fans over here btw) for us to actually interact.
Gleich geht es los mit #Shadowdark. Ich leite einen kleinen #Hexcrawl in einem Sumpf. Mit Echsen- UND Froschmenschen! Mal sehen, wie es läuft. #pnpde#osr
Ganz prinzipiell: warum sollte mensch ein System aus diesem Jahrtausend spielen, welches das Spielgefühl der 1970er Jahre vermittelt, anstatt ein System aus den 1970er Jahren?
Ich mag bspw. #DCC und #Shadowdark sehr gerne, aber das ist eine der Fragen die ich mir durch meine Beschäftigung mit #ODnD aka #0e und #SwordsAndWizardry schon stelle.
@tintenteufel In my case (were I interested in regression to the '70s) it would be because the old rules were written and communicated badly. We've learned a lot about game design since then, meaning systems can be more coherent and easy to follow, and standards of writing have improved, meaning actually understanding the rules is easier.
So you can have easier rules, better-communicated, that bring back the desired feel.
Issue 3 of Wanderer Bill’shttps://lkh.sdf-eu.org/wandererbill/grenzland/ just landed in my mailbox yesterday, with, among other things, an NPC class written by me (“The Anointed of Abyssal Slaughter”). It mostly was me combining the given topic of the issue with an interest in NPC classes a while ago.
The ‘zine also contains a one-page dungeon by Alex Schroeder (“The Crown of Neptune”), a game report (“Schiffbruch”), rules for sailing ships (“Salt’n’Tar”), and another scenario (“Eingekerkert”), the latter three all by Wanderer Bill. The ‘zine is a mix of German and English, and you can get it for the phenomenal price of free at the website.
(he does have a few more physical copies for 7 Euros left over though)
The original game Fantasy Wargaming: The Highest Level of All (or just Fantasy Wargaming in some editions) was a 1981 book by Bruce Galloway, a clear variation on Dungeons and Dragons, based on Galloway’s home rules. Unlike it’s competition it was not afraid of using actual historical concepts like astrology and occultism in it’s descriptions, although it also was written so densely it was hard to make sense of it in any shape or form by someone not already familiar with roleplaying games. And, well, it was called Fantasy Wargaming.
Which made this a problem, as the game was published both in the UK and the US by mainstream publishers obviously trying to break into the nascent TTRPG market. The most available version was most likely the one published by the Doubleday Science Fiction Book Club, which made the game available to many people who did not have any experience with roleplaying games before.
Unfortunately one has to say, as the game’s size (300pgs) and conceptual denseness made parsing the book quite a feat, meaning if people used this as an introduction to roleplaying, it might not have been very successful.
The Story of Fantasy Wargaming goes into this, and into the development of the game. It could have been a bit more thorough and a bit more critical, but for what it is it’s a nice look into the environment that created it. And well, it’s free.
(I learned about this book from an episode of the Vintage RPG Podcast which had the author on and talked about this project. Well worth a listen)
@zdl@gmkeros.wordpress.com@gmkeros.wordpress.com If I remember correctly, a lot of FW seemed to be riffing on C&S specifically. I may or may not be remembering correctly.
@edheil@gmkeros.wordpress.com@gmkeros.wordpress.com I've read it. I've read (and played) several editions of C&S. I have no idea. The writing in Fantasy Wargaming was just that bad.