Quote from: ColonelHardisson;312108I always loved Giants in the Earth. While I understand what you mean by saying the characters are often twinked out, my attitude on it is that most of these characters are truly exceptional. Otherwise, why read about them? True, many of the write-ups did, indeed, go a bit overboard, and are obviously a product of sheer enthusiasm for the subject. But this enthusiasm was infectious. It made me want to read books more closely, which is saying something, since I was already a voracious reader.

Most importantly, though, Giants in the Earth introduced me to a lot of books I might never have read otherwise - the one that leaps to mind is Poul Anderson's "The High Crusade," a very fun book with a memorable premise.

The downside to GitE was it often pointed up just how inadequate D&D was at modeling anything but D&D. Too often exceptions had to be made to make these characters fit. I guess I could use my own reasoning and say these characters were exceptional. However, one does have to wonder why characters from the genre that inspired a game were often so hard to stat up in that game.

It's not just that they tend to have exceedingly high stats in everything, it's that they often do so even in the areas that the original source material specifically describes them as deficient in. (and that's not counting the poor life decisions many of them make, that seriously imply low wisdom.) Along with the constant need to break the rules to properly emulate their powers, it's all a bit irritating. They're failing to either properly emulate the character, or produce something that'll actually be useful in most people's games. (you'd need to be seriously high level to viably fight them, and if they were on your side, the danger of them overshadowing the party would be considerable. )

It would probably be easier to simulate a lot of these characters if D&D had Luck and/or Courage attributes (I know saving throws were largely meant to be luck, but they were fixed for a given class/level).

Dragon Issue 66: October 1982

part 2/2

A primer for the language of larceny: A dictionary for thieves cant, so if you want to learn the basics of it and incorporate some of this stuff into your in character speech, you can. Since its only 8 pages, plus a couple of pages on grammar, it's hardly complete. Unfortunately, I suck at learning other languages, so this makes my eyes glaze and brain squeek. You'll have to get someone else to judge its quality and usefulness as a language and shorthand for communicating larcenous acts.

And a second article on languages. The author creates a possible language tree to show how the various D&D languages could be related.

Fantasy philology: And another one, which also gives various eases of learning related languages to your current ones. Like weapon proficiency groups, this may be realistic, but it's also a considerable amount of extra crunch which you only want to use in a game focussed upon the subject.

Old dwarvish is still new to scholars: Another article that gives us some specific details on a fantasy language. The writer steals liberally from tolkien to give us the basics of dwarvish grammar. Which is pretty much as you would expect, given their established personality traits. Meh.

Leomund's tiny hut: This month, Len gives us stats for a load more (almost) natural animals. Compsognathus and euparkia, adorable mini dinosaurs. Vultures and hawks. A whole host of stats for miniature animals, to counterbalance all the dire ones and give low level characters a fair chance. Skeletons for the above. And in a stroke of genius, the carnivorous flying squirrel. Combined with the amusing illustration, this is the best thing he's come up with ever. What's more terrifying than a swarm of these leaping onto you, each taking off a little chunk of flesh and then scurrying away with it? The only thing that's really in the same league are giant space hamsters. I an definitely using these when I get a chance.

Up on a soapbox: Individuals are important, and can make a difference to the flow of world history. While the truth of this statement can be debated in the real world, it should definitely be the case in your games, particularly for the PC's. Otherwise what's the point in playing? So let them rock. Not a particularly exceptional or controversial position, really.

Off the shelf: The coming of the horseclans by Robert Adams is a reprint of the first book in what sems to be the reviewers favourite series. It goes without saying that he wants you to get it.
The iron dream by Norman Spinrad is another reprint. It tells the story of what could have happened if hitler had decided to become a novelist and emigrated to america instead of taking over germany. Which certainly sounds interesting.
Mallworld by Somtow Sucharitkul (now there's a hard name to write right. ) pokes fun at humanities current foibles via extrapolative sci-fi.
The earth-shaker by Lin Carter is another novel in the Prince zarkon series. The liberal stealing from various pulp stories continues.
The wrath of khan by Vonda N McIntyre is of course the novelisation of the latest star trek movie. Of course, the novel format means you get to see inside the characters heads, as well as some stuff that was cut from the final version of the movie. Which makes it a worthwhile complement to the film.
Collected fantasies by Avram Davidson is a collection of whimsical short stories. Can dentists save the world from alien invaders? Stranger things have happened.
Bolo by Keith Laumer is another load of short stories, this one telling the tales of giant, self powered super-tanks and what happens when they refuse to be shut down after the war is over.
Erasmus Magister by Charles Sheffield blends real history and fiction cleverly, making legends seem plausible.
Death, edited by Stuart David Schiff is a compilation of stories from Whispers magazine about , well, you can guess from the title. It goes from comedy to horror, as real deaths do.
Black easter and The day after judgement by James Blish are two books in a series. Bored billionaire unleashes all the demons of hell. Concequences happen. No-one ends up happy. You'd think people would learn from other peoples mistakes. But no. Still, it makes for entertaining reading, and gets praise for the consistency of its science and magic.
Merchanters luck by C.J. Cherryh follows on from downbelow station. Once again, this reviewers favourite gets plenty of praise for its characterization and plotting.

The dragon's augury: Star Smuggler is a solo sci-fi adventure game. Can you make enough to pay off the loan on your starship before it gets reposessed. You'll have to work fast and take risks. This is obviously in the same vein as the fighting fantasy books, if a bit more complex. The reviewer certainly seems to like it. We'll be seeing plenty more of these in the coming years.

An open letter to rick loomis: Ahh, joy. It's another amusing case of Gary airing his dirty laundry in public. (or quite possibly the same one referred to obliquely earlier) This is amusing. What are we to do with these bickering games companies? Not much we can do really unless we invent time travel, so lets just enjoy the show and see how it gets followed up on.

Friends in high places: A jokey minific from Roger Moore. What is the ultimate source of ultimate power that nothing else in the game can match up to? Read on to find out. And then bitch about it in forums, because it's so unfair.

What's new talks about building your own dungeon in real life. Wormy has lots of arcane language stuff that is diliberately incomprehensible.

Seems to be a lot of articles on recurring themes and series this month. Combined with the continuing real life drama, this makes it most interesting in context, particularly since a big chunk of the issue was pretty dull on its own merits. The average quality definitely seems to be on a downswing at the moment. Lets hope they can pull out of this soon.

Quoten open letter to rick loomis: Ahh, joy. It's another amusing case of Gary airing his dirty laundry in public. (or quite possibly the same one referred to obliquely earlier) This is amusing. What are we to do with these bickering games companies? Not much we can do really unless we invent time travel, so lets just enjoy the show and see how it gets followed up on.

No, it's EGG spleening about GAMA taking over Origins... from AH & SPI. And basically trying to Intimidate GAMA leadership via Rick Loomis. Who has been active in GAMA since the start.

Quite obviously, it failed, as Origins is going  strong, Rick is Again GAMA president, and TSR is gone the way of the Dodo, whilst Flying Buffalo is still doing business.

I suspect the foreclosure upon SPI was an attempt to kill Origins... it failed, since GAMA stepped up as TSR killed SPI. And quite obviously, EGG was pissed...

Quote from: aramis;312316No, it's EGG spleening about GAMA taking over Origins... from AH & SPI. And basically trying to Intimidate GAMA leadership via Rick Loomis. Who has been active in GAMA since the start.

Quite obviously, it failed, as Origins is going  strong, Rick is Again GAMA president, and TSR is gone the way of the Dodo, whilst Flying Buffalo is still doing business.

I suspect the foreclosure upon SPI was an attempt to kill Origins... it failed, since GAMA stepped up as TSR killed SPI. And quite obviously, EGG was pissed...

"AN open letter to Rick Loomis" is, for me, one of the most memorable things Gygax ever wrote. Not for its actual content, but for just how angry Gygax seemed to my 15-16 year old self, over something of which I had no clue. It seemed like it was a big deal, given that such stuff had never really shown up in Dragon before. Looking back on it now, I'm still unclear as to why such an amount of space was justified in being devoted to the matter.  Sure, I get that Dragon was the biggest soapbox in the RPG realm, and that Gary was using it as his own bully pulpit to further his goals in this case, but why was this matter such a big deal to him? This was certainly the high point for his spleen-venting in Dragon; it would not be until he started posting to various internet forums that I would see its like again.

Gygax's stake in the matter was actually quite large.

TSR was probably trying to kill Origins in order to make GenCon significant enough for getting the "big names" (Mattel, Hasbro, Parker Brothers, Milton Bradley, etc) to take notice, and pay TSR for their attendance.

With 2 major cons, neither was "big enough" to get the big guys to spend significant money on either. Further, Origins attendance was pretty much expected of TSR, despite their competing con.

Dragon Issue 67: November 1982

part 1/2

84 pages. Another personell change this issue, as Jake is off to crystal publications. Instead of promoting upwards like they have in the past, they airdrop Mike Cook into the job. (wonder what changes he'll make) Poor Kim. Guess he's stuck with his editing job for a while longer. We also get another second class mailing thingy (illegible again. ) Can someone help me with that?

In this issue:

Out on a limb: Not a lot here this month. One letter pointing out an error in the weapon proficiency system a couple of months ago. And another from Len complaining about nebulous sages (good, someone realized how silly that was at the time) and the inconsistency in levels of realism between articles, and calling for more editorial rigor. Kim reminds him that most of the stuff in here is explicitly optional, and people should be able to pick and choose. If we tried to make everyone play the same, they'd just go and play other games.

TSR wants a japanese translator. Apply now! Interesting. Looks like they want to expand into the asian market.

From the sorceror's scroll delivers us more Official AD&Dtm spells. Once again, we get a load of future staples such as Melf's acid arrow, grease, stoneskin and Evard's black tentacles, plus quite a few forgotten ones like ultravision, run and cloudburst. We also get plenty more comments about events in general. They're improving their dice, so we get decent translucent colored ones rather than the horrible little blue uninked ones. We get some more talk about the minute long melee round, and how each attack is an abstraction of events over that time, justification of his hatred of the conan film, and lots of other little tidbits. thrown in without any apparent pattern other than what was on his mind at the time. Once again, this is pretty interesting stuff, and he's as entertaining as ever to read. Whether it improves the game, or just makes wizards even more powerful compared to other classes, is another matter altogether.

Features creatures is in an elven mood this month. We get the Grugach, or wild elves, and Cooshee, aka elven dogs. Plus another elven subrace that thankfully never made it into common use, the valley elf. I guess that name just has too many wrong connotations for people to put into their games without players having giggles. A far more serviceable contribution than his celestial creations.

Spy's advice: What is wrestling value ( A stat that we dropped in 2nd edition. Don't worry about it. Use your regular HtH rating)
Can you conceal an uzi (With a trenchcoat!)
What are the Xp costs for the tech bureau (see below, and refer to issue 45 for more detail. )
Why isn't the british secret service listed (it is. You just need to look under its proper name, not its nickname. )
Do you only get bureau bonuses if you are of the right bureau (usually, yes)
Should the admin figure out XP before or after the mission (after)
What are your odds of picking pockets (compare surprise values and roll. Here are the odds of them spotting you)
Who is james pong (One of the PC's from my own game, originally. He's a 6th level Killer. Watch out)
Which dragon issues have top secret articles (here's the list)
why does some big ammo have less stopping power than it's lower category. (because after a certain size, it starts going straight through you. Oooh, matron. )  
Is J.B in Dr Yes James bond (maybe)
Why do silencers weaken guns (because they reduce the blowback and bullet speed, thus making them less accurate. Concealment comes at a cost.)
How do you determine skiing chances. ( Its an area of knowledge. Roll against it like any other)
Whats the difference between regular and fragmentation grenades (Damage. Mainly we just want to make a fun game. We can't be bothered to include dozens of realistic varieties of grenades, with their own varieties of specific injury. )
What does X for weapon speed mean (That's a mistake. It should be VS. Or possibly XX )

Souping up the spider: 11 new varieties of giant spider for your pleasure. With a whole bunch of clever different hunting methods, these guys really don't get enough credit. Monsters like this are an excellent reason why adventurers should travel in parties. One person on their own could easily get webbed up and eaten with just a moments carelessness. After all, your attributes don't scale in OD&D, so if you can't cast spells or reach your weapon, you're screwed. Who's gonna cut you loose, baby?

The deities and demigods of greyhawk: More official stuff from Gary, as he promised. We get Heroneous and Hextor, the rival brothers of martial discipline. Mmm, slashy . Iuz, the withered demonspawn. And St Cuthbert, the ascended mortal who seems to take on the evangelical christian role in Greyhawk. More stuff that would continue in much the same form editions later. We also see the start of giving clerics of specific gods special abilities to differentiate them, which is nice. Of course, at the moment, there is absolutely no balance between them, which isn't so good. Still, it's pretty interesting to see another bit of D&D canon start. I wonder how it'll develop in the next few issues.

Quote from: (un)reason;312527Features creatures is in an elven mood this month. We get the Grugach, or wild elves, and Cooshee, aka elven dogs. Plus another elven subrace that thankfully never made it into common use, the valley elf. I guess that name just has too many wrong connotations for people to put into their games without players having giggles. A far more serviceable contribution than his celestial creations.

For those who don't know, the Valley Elf appeared in module S4: Lost Caverns of Tsojcanth. They weren't used in the adventure itself, but in the rather substantial rules supplement that was something like a proto-Unearthed Arcana. The Cooshee also appeared there.

The Valley Elf would return in a fairly prominent role in module WG12: Vale of the Mage, which was really a setting sourcebook. The name was unfortunate for the time period in which it appeared, because it distracted from the fact that these elves were a departure from the D&D paradigm. They were a taller, much less friendly type of elf. The only downside, which could be ignored pretty easily, was that they were close allies and servants of the ruler of the Valley of the Mage from the Greyhawk setting. As far as I know, there was never a really good explanation as to why they were so closely aligned with the Mage, who was often characterized in a way that made him seem pretty uninteresting to me.

The Grugach were even more interesting - a xenophobic elf race, much more wild and capricious than the elves we were used to seeing in D&D. Unfortunately, they never really made an impact anywhere else in D&D, although I think there are echoes of them in the way Birthright's elves were portrayed, and in the elves of 4e.

Quote from: (un)reason;312527The deities and demigods of greyhawk: More official stuff from Gary, as he promised. We get Heroneous and Hextor, the rival brothers of martial discipline. Mmm, slashy . Iuz, the withered demonspawn. And St Cuthbert, the ascended mortal who seems to take on the evangelical christian role in Greyhawk. More stuff that would continue in much the same form editions later. We also see the start of giving clerics of specific gods special abilities to differentiate them, which is nice. Of course, at the moment, there is absolutely no balance between them, which isn't so good. Still, it's pretty interesting to see another bit of D&D canon start. I wonder how it'll develop in the next few issues.

This was one of my favorite Greyhawk articles. It brought to life an aspect of the setting that had never really been addressed before. It was interesting to see Iuz, as there were few, if any, instances of stats for any comparably powerful Greyhawk personality showing up anywhere else that I know about. St. Cuthbert was equally as interesting to me, as there was little revealed about him beyond the description of a church in the Village of Hommlet (module T1), and a mention or two in the 1e DMG.

Dragon Issue 67: November 1982

part 2/2

An extensive set of articles on the astral plane takes the crucial center spot this issue. 13 pages of general stuff on the description and physics, plus a 5 page mini adventure. This makes me very happy indeed. Because I'm a huge planes fan, and because it's such a big part of this issue, I'm going to break it down into it's subsections.
The preface gives us a basic description. Silvery weightless place with conduits, psychic wind, occasional bits of debris. Not that dissimilar to later developments, apart from the lack of dead gods.
Astral encounters is still a bit vague, as they still don't have many creatures to populate the place with. Again, the chances of meeting a god passing through are rather higher than later fluff would indicate. Most of the creatures will be rather powerful, but that's ok, as you'll probably be pretty high level too if you're there.
Astral traveling reiterates the common ways to get there. Will you project, or go there bodily? Either way, you don't need to worry about food, drink, sleep, aging, etc, because time passes at the rate of one day per thousand years. But it does catch up after you leave, so be prepared.
Encounter checks and the psychic wind elaborates on the chances of running into trouble. This should have been condensed with astral encounters, as this positioning is not very good organization.
Movement and combat establishes the intelligence powered flight that people in astral space use to get around. Watch the wizard doesn't leave everyone else behind. Fun stuff, because it requires very different tactics to be successful in to regular battles.
Magical alterations is mostly a list of spells that don't work, (druids in particular are rather screwed) but there are also some ones with weird effects. This eats up a lot of space, as they tackle every spell individually, rather than giving general formulae organized by school and stuff, as they would later in planescape. This could definitely do with some refinement.
Fedifensor is the module. Recover a powerful magical sword from a githyanki fortress. Just another day for seasoned adventurers. This one involves a lot of luck, as if you roll badly, you may might meet a demon prince or greater titan along the way, while the final fortress would be a walkover for anyone strong enough to face down things that powerful. Don't think attacking everything you see head-on is the best course of action.
I've quite enjoyed this, as it feels familiar, but is still noticeably missing several elements that would be crucial to the later planescape portrayal. It's nice to know which bits were part of the original conception and what's changed since then. And as this is one of the few planes that's survived to 4th edition fairly unscathed, it can't have been bad. There's certainly already room for plenty of adventures here. Now all we need is a good set of articles on the ethereal and outer planes. Sometime soon, hopefully.

Fiction: King of the cats by Gillian Fitzgerald. Ahh, romance. What a wonderful thing. But where fae are involved, it never turns out well for the humans involved. A nicely mythical feeling little story.

Loyal readers: More talk from Gary. He comments on the various character classes he's thinking of developing, and the feedback he's received upon them. He once again strongly rejects the idea of anti-paladins, and talks about demoting the monk to an optional class. On the plus side, they're considering making a full oriental variant of D&D with all new classes. Yay. More foreshadowing. Another thing that it'll take them years to actually get round to publishing, but that's interesting in itself. On the negative side, he introduces one of the dumber mid 1st edition optional rules. Comeliness. Separating physical attractiveness and social skill and presence is not an inherently bad idea, as the WoD system shows, but doing so in this kludgy way mid edition just turns the two into even greater dump stats, given how few are the number of things that they are used for. What was he thinking?

Poker, chess, and the AD&D system: A fifth piece from gary this month (whatever happened to his promise not to write too much and monopolize the magazine? I guess the same thing that happened to their promise to always cover a wide range of games. ) Once again, he reminds people that the AD&D rules are official, and owned soley by TSR. If you add to, subtract from or alter them, you are no longer playing an Official AD&Dtm Game. On the other hand, I as the creator and head of the company, can create Official AD&Dtm Material as I choose. It is a duty I take on with a heavy heart, and a determination to make the game more fun for you, loyal readers! This is primarily him commenting on and justifying the recent stuff such as barbarians and devas, and their oddities when compared to the standard rules. All of this was well thought out! You can rely on my judgement! I roll my eyes. He really really needs an editor who'll say no to him.

The role of books: Lew gives us a group of big reference books containing the catalogue of myths and fairytales in condensed form. Any one of these contains enough plots to keep you going for centuries, if you file off the serial numbers and mix them together. Of course they're probably not easy to find these days, and the internet is more comprehensive than even the thickest book can manage. But there's a lot to be said for editorial oversight. You'll have to decide for yourself if you can search out stories individually and tolerate reading it all on a screen.

Reviews: Trollpak is a runequest supplement, giving us plenty of detail on the Uz, as they call themselves, including makng them available as PC's, plus a bunch of different adventures based around them. Readable, comprehensive, and not forgetting the gloranthan sense of humour. Just be careful not to overpower the PC's, especially when using them in large groups.

Wormy gets back home and has to defend his horde. What's new gets Sooooo close to doing sex in D&D this time before being interrupted.

So it looks like we get to see the seed of the plans that would eventually grow into  Oriental Adventures. Probably the biggest variant made on 1st edition AD&D, showing how you can completely rework the classes and monsters while keeping the same basic framework. This is rather a divided issue. On one hand we have tons of cool stuff on the planes, and several other good articles. On the other hand, Gary is continuing his unchecked rampage through the magazine, adding on stuff all over the place seemingly at random, while insulting anyone who gets in his way.  What is up with that? I seriously hope they'll start putting more freelancer articles in again soon.

Quote from: ColonelHardisson;312579The Grugach were even more interesting - a xenophobic elf race, much more wild and capricious than the elves we were used to seeing in D&D. Unfortunately, they never really made an impact anywhere else in D&D, although I think there are echoes of them in the way Birthright's elves were portrayed, and in the elves of 4e.

Yeah, Forgotten realms and Dragonlance both had wild elves, but they took rather different roles in the setting. Interesting, that.

Quote from: (un)reason;312760Yeah, Forgotten realms and Dragonlance both had wild elves, but they took rather different roles in the setting. Interesting, that.

It shows how little impact they had, that I can't for the life of me remember anything about either. In Birthright, while I guess they weren't really "wild," the followers of Rhuobhe Manslayer were a hostile presence haunting the woods and forests. The Grugach Gygax presented in the article we're discussing were even more distinct, and while they obviously had a place in Greyhawk, they never got the attention they deserved.

Dragonlance wild elves were always being repressed by the other two subraces as part of their aesops about the good guys frequently being jackasses too. I remember one story about a half-breed hiding her wild-elf heretage. I'm currently drawing a blank on stories or adventures involving FR wild elves too.

Course, in Athas, all elves are wild elves by the standards of any other elf.

Dragon Issue 68: December 1982

part 1/2

104 pages. Another extra large christmas episode. Nice. After more than a year of 84 pagers, I was starting to wonder when there would next be a size increase. The cover's nothing much to shout about this time, however. Oh well, hopefully the contents'll make up for that.

In this issue:

Out on a limb: A contrasting pair of letters, as is their wont, one praising the language stuff in issue 66, and asking for more of it, and more attention paid to it in official modules; and the other saying that actually putting fantasy grammars and vocabularies in is a waste of space, and too much attention to pointless detail that hardly anyone will actually use in a game. Ahh, the usual can't please everyone problem. No getting around that one.
A letter on the great how illusions should work debate, adding their own opinions and houserules.
A letter rubbishing the idea that all clerics should be forbidden edged weapons, regardless of alignment or their deities creed and culture. We have to break out of the medieval european mold.  
A letter pointing out how inconvenient digging the right bit of equipment out of your pack is in the heat of battle, and the effect this has on wizards trying to cast from their spellbook. If you take that into account, you'll find it's not unbalanced at all :rolleyes:

Featured creatures gives us lots of fungal, er, fun this month. Ascomids, phycomids and basidronds. Some seriously freaky looking and acting things. I suspect that like bug and deep sea fish based monsters, this may be another case of things based on reality being stranger than ones just invented wholecloth. In any case, these are worthy additions to the D&D dungeon ecology, fitting in perfectly with the array of slimes, oozes and things like gelatanous cubes and carrion crawlers. Take them out from a distance, because otherwise you'll get gunk all over you.

Be a two-fisted fighter: Roger Moore turns his eye on two weapon fighting, one of the more problematic little tricks in the game. This is mostly clarifications and semi-official houserulings, not really adding much to the rules as a whole. It points out just how dangerous high dex characters are if they choose to become two weapon fighters, as they nearly double their damage output. Thanks for that, roger. Now every unimaginative twink'll want to play one. (the smart ones, of course, will keep on playing wizards and druids.) I suppose it would have happened sooner or later, he just helped it along. Are the crimes of the proletariat the fault of the proclamations of the elite? Did this open the door for drizzt and his clones? Is it way past midnight, and I'm reaching for things to say to finish this issue off? Who can say.

The gen con mini's competition this year gets a good looking over. They give us the winners and runners up in the various categories, and show us photos of the dioramas. The legibility of the photos still isn't perfect, but is an improvement on most of their attempts in earlier magazines.

Up, up and away: Looks like TSR has another new game to promote. Dawn patrol is actually a new version of Fight in the Skies, a game that has been mentioned in this magazine a few times. Obviously, they think the new edition is a substantial improvement. No great surprises here. I'll reserve judgement for a more impartial review.

Beg, borrow or steal: An article for Barbarian Prince, of all things. Which is pretty cool really, given how much they've ossified in recent issues. This gives you a load of extra options for making a little money, most of them on the larcenous side. Well, Glenn does enjoy his shades of grey. I rather like this. It adds lots of options without reducing the danger, and gives me lots of clues as to how the rules work in play. Which does a far better job of selling me on the game than the straight promo piece above. Anyone know if this is available in pdf anywhere?

Thrills and chills: Ooh. This is cool. (literally) Adventuring in the ice age. A rather harsher environment than usual, given that getting hold of enough food is trickier, and there are huge swathes of technology that haven't been developed yet. Just surviving is an adventure in itself, given the creatures out there in a D&D world. The author really does play up the degree of hardship involved, expanding on the cold rules, and giving us a whole new set of encounter tables. If you liked dark sun, and gritty survivalist fantasy in general, this should be fun to play with.

From the sorceror's scroll gets a new, more dignified header, and gives us lots more official high level spells, including quite a few named ones such as Otiluke's telekinetic sphere and Mordenkainen's disjunction. The length of each description is considerably longer than in previous entries. We also get to find out who played the various named wizards that made the spells, which is neat. As in the last issue, we get quite a few spells that would become staples of play, such as chain lightning, contingency, and teleport without error, but also some that didn't, including a whole range of spells for dealing with extraplanar creatures such as binding, truename and dolor. This is pretty useful stuff, that once again boosts the power and versatility of wizards quite a bit. And thankfully, his spleen seems vented after last months outburst, so he stays on topic this time. What a relief. We wouldn't want to spoil christmas by fighting, would we?

Leomund's tiny hut also gets a pretty new colour header. He introduces the cloistered cleric, the wimpy non-adventuring variant who stays at home healing people and copying books. So your characters can be ordered around by people who's asses they could kick no trouble, with the threat of withholding their magical healing and training. :sigh: We don't need this, the game doesn't need this. Still, at least we get some new spells out of the deal, which is always useful. As ever, you've got to seriously filter lens output for the useful bits, because big chunks of it are not, and some are actively detrimental to your fun quotient.

The adventure is yours! Not a very good pic as they advertise the basic and expert sets, with very two-dimensional looking characters. If you were feeling uncharitable, you might suspect them of mispromoting it, because the high-ups want AD&D to sell better than BD&D.

What's in the water: The fiend folio forgot to put expanded tables for underwater encounters. So its up to the magazine, as usual, to cover for their mistakes and omissions. What a job to have. This is pretty much as you'd expect, lots of tables, plus some expansion on the aquatic versions of various monsters. Not that interesting, but you'd miss it if it wasn't there. After all, in a long running game, chances are you'll spend some time adventuring underwater.

Weather in the world of greyhawk: This month centerpiece is a strange one. A detailed system for determining what the weather will be like, based upon your latitude, terrain and time of year. Which I guess will work for any roughly earth sized and structured world. They've certainly put plenty of research into it, with citations and a bibliography. And Gary approves. So even if it might be a bit dull, all the really dull stuff's already been done for you. Just roll on it and enjoy the results. Or decide on weather based on plot. Or completely ignore the weather, as far too many of us do. The choice is yours (or at least, your GM's), as ever.

Quote from: (un)reason;312992Beg, borrow or steal: An article for Barbarian Prince, of all things. Which is pretty cool really, given how much they've ossified in recent issues. This gives you a load of extra options for making a little money, most of them on the larcenous side. Well, Glenn does enjoy his shades of grey. I rather like this. It adds lots of options without reducing the danger, and gives me lots of clues as to how the rules work in play. Which does a far better job of selling me on the game than the straight promo piece above. Anyone know if this is available in pdf anywhere?

For free right here.

Dragon Issue 68: December 1982

part 2/2

Gaming by mail can be nice: Yeah yeah. You would say that, wouldn't you. A rundown of the pro and cons of PbM games. As we have seen, this has a lot in common with modern MMO's, apart from the massively slower response times between turns, and corresponding effort you need to put in to keep the game going.   They can also get pretty expensive, especially if you start privately corresponding with other players. Still, at least you're in no danger of being glued to your computer for 20 hours solid. Sorry, I'm afraid that you can't tempt me with this one. I have no craving for another nonproductive time-eater in my life.

Deities and demigods of greyhawk: Several more familiar faces are introduced to us, plus a couple of unfamiliar ones as well. Celestian, Fharlanghn, Ehlonna,  Pholtus and Tritherion. Once again, clerics worshipping them get extra benefits, ranging from a single extra spell to a whole array of neat tricks. Ahh, power creep. Pretty soon, no-one'll want to play a standard cleric. I'm divided by this. One on hand, inflation is bad, especially as clerics are pretty powerful already, but on the other hand, properly differentiating clerics mechanically is cool. Oh well. They solved the problem eventually. I just need to get through the next 18 years.

The dragon's augury: Robert Plamodon gives us a review that is technically one of High fantasy, but is actually more focussed upon the solo adventure that comes with it, plus the idea of solo games in general. Which is certainly a topic that deserves examination, as the Fighting Fantasy series gains popularity, and plenty of other companies try to get in on the market as well. How do you ensure that they retain interest through multiple plays, and keep the reader from cheating? Several other books and their quirks and merits are also mentioned. Whatever happened to these? Another genre killed by the rise of computer games. Still that's quite a few years in the future, and hopefully we'll be seeing more reviews in the meantime.
Borderlands is a runequest supplement. It gives details of both the area, and 7 scenarios for the players to adventure in. It gets plenty of praise for both the quality of its writing and visual design. Once again Glorantha beats Greyhawk in terms of  setting depth, character characterisation and integration with the rules.
Elric: Battle at the end of time, is a strategy game based loosely on the novels. While it does have quite a number of features that emulate it's source material, it still leaves the reviewer cold, feeling it lacks depth and direction. Try harder next time guys.

You've always got a chance: Ahh, using attribute rolls as a catch-all for anything the rules didn't cover. It's been a couple of years since we've seen that suggested. And it's still the best solution that doesn't involve ripping the system apart to implement a proper skill system. Nothing particularly controversial or innovative here.

Off the shelf covers tons of books this month. Obviously they want you to have plenty of options to spend your money on.  
Voyage from yesteryear by James P Hogan tells the story of the conflict between the first and second wave of colonists at Alpha Centauri.
Confessions of a crap artist by Philip K Dick is not an autobiography, nor does it have supernatural elements. It does, however have an intricate narrative that shifts points of view in a clever way, and is highly recommended.
Light on the sound by Somtow Sucharitkul tells another story of mans inhumanity to other creatures and each other in the pursuit of precious things. Which may be a grim topic, but that doesn't make it a bad read.
Crystal singer by Anne McCaffrey has no tentpegs. But is does have lots of crystals. And the usual large cast full of conflicting motivations.
The darkling by David Kesterton has more crystals. While it includes lots of pulp adventure tropes, the characters are not two-dimensional heroes and villains.
The white plague by Frank Herbert is of course the story of how a mad biologist wipes out all the women. Lots of grim drama full of social commentary ensues.
Shadows of sanctuary, edited by Robert Lynn Asprin is a third collection of stories from the thieves world setting. They get some pretty big authors in to flesh it out, so the quality is quite high. More evidence that there were plenty of authors already aware of and approving of RPG's (or at least, willing to learn and write about their settings to get some money )
The battle of forever by A.E van Vogt is a reprint of one of his old books. No further details are given, apart from it supposedly being a classic.
Outpost of jupiter by Lester del ray is another reprint. Solid pulpy fun rather than anything deep and philosophical, it still provides good light entertainment the reviewer.
Psycho II by Robert Bloch is the long awaited (and much demanded, thanks to the movie) sequel, revealing what happens next after Norman Bates' release. Lots of social commentary takes place as he notes the insanity of modern liberal laws and social policies. Oh, and we mustn't forget the tabloids either. Seems like another case of things have changed less than people think they have.
The last man on earth, edited by Isaac Asimov & co, is a compilation of short stories  bout that very topic. I think I've actually read this one, and yeah, it is a pretty tight collection.
Clique by Nicholas Yermakov tells the story of a future where anyone can look how they like, and the resulting rebellious underground that develops in response. As with much speculative fiction, this is merely the macguffin that drives the human drama.
Journey to the center by Brian Stableford is a story of people exploring an alien planet, and the weird things they find along the way.
The best from FANTASY & SCIENCE FICTION, edited by E.L. Ferman is the 24th compilation from the magazine. Not just fiction, this also collects essays and scientific articles as well, with plenty of commentary from the editor to tie it all together. So you get plenty of education with your entertainment.
Strange eons By Robert Bloch Is the one where Cthulhu gets nuked and it doesn't stop him. :rolleyes: A bit of a power-up from his first appearance, where a steamboat puts him off long enough for the protagonist to get away. That's the problem with pastiches. They can wind up being overly reverential of the source material.  

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Wormy harks back to it's very first issue, as it's riddle time again. What's new helps relations of gamers shop for them this christmas. Dragonmirth is fairly amusing this month.

Lots more adverts at the end. In fact, this seems to have been a very ad heavy issue in general, even above the general upward trend at the moment. I guess it's important for sales to really push these things at christmas.  

While not as bad as some of the recent issues, all in all, this year has been the first one in which they not only haven't improved substantially in size and quality, but actually got worse in some respects. Which is a bit worrying. They definitely don't have the innocent enthusiasm that they used to. Even if the meteoric rise is over now, hopefully they'll figure out how to gradually refine things and pull upward again next year. After all, there's still a long way to go before they reach the production values of their last few years. Lets hope the quality to drek ratio isn't too low these next few years.