I agree, that'd be best.

Wow, that's a blast from the past.

It was kinda-sorta based on other SPI games, like Citadel of Blood and big board/wargame that I had but don't remember.

Combat was just a little too complicated for my taste, with crippling injuries.

The magic system was flavorful, but not particularly useable. If I recall correctly, getting any real use out of it required selling your soul, which gave you 7 years before collection...and even then, you could generally do better with a club.

I think you're referring to Swords & Sorcery, the boardgame. Citadel of Blood may have had some of its setting elements drawn from S&S (both were designed by Greg Costikyan), but I'm not aware of any connection between Dragonquest and those games.

The one connection between DQ and any of SPI's boardgames that I can recall (other than Arena of Death)  is that they published DQ stats for some of the characters and setting elements which had been developed for Albion: Land of Faerie. David James Ritchie wrote both DQ and A:LoF. Among his many credits was another a game that got published in Ares after TSR had taken over, called Omega War. That also had a cool setting that could use an RPG treatment; sadly, I just learned that Ritchie passed away a few years ago at 58.

Well, I could be wrong, it has been 30 years, after all...but it does seem like there were a few spell names and such that were shared in the games.

Now I'm wondering about ways to make Dragon Shadowed Lands more Dragon Questy.  I think the experience levels are too built in an explicit.  I guess since a level is 1000 experience points and 100 % points to distribute and skills and blocks can be increased by three per level you could go with a 10 experience points per skill point and double the cost every three points.  It's a bit cludgy but it gets rid of levels.  Currently experience rewards halve for every level they are below yours but levels cost 1000 experience points.

Oh well, I guess it's always going to be more C&S and Rolemaster really.  I suppose I could use smaller type, case numbering, and shaded text boxes in a three column layout.  Sometimes it's the look and feel of the thing and Dragon Quest did have it's own unique look and feel.

Arena of Death Ares issue 4 specifically says it is set in the world of DragonQuest. It is though a tactical board game and was sold seperately I believe. DJ Ritchie designed that. That same issue had an addendum to DragonQuest itself for the option of a quicker combat resolution system.

Citadel of Blood states characters and setting are from Swords & Sorcery. By Smith and Simonsen.

I see, I was confused--Costikyan designed Deathmaze, which is pretty generic setting-wise, and Deathmaze was the basis for CoB. I thought DM was a harmless dungeon-crawler, but CoB was the only Ares game I got rid of. Clearly my feeling wasn't widely shared.

AoD was indeed sold separately but it basically reproduces the DQ 1e combat system with just a rules framework added to provide a gladiatorial-campaign context.

One difference of detail that isn't often remarked is that AoD (and I think 1e but I'm not going to check right now) includes a bunch of non-Western weapons such as odachi in place of "two-handed sword". 2e has a more "traditional" set of medieval-fantasy-RPG weapons.

Well my copy of 2nd ed arrived today.
First thought: my, that's thin, that's not going to take too long to read.

My copy of 3rd ed is slowly getting to me from the USA.

I'll report back.

Quote from: tzunder;786904Well my copy of 2nd ed arrived today.
First thought: my, that's thin, that's not going to take too long to read.

There are a lot of subtleties to digest, though.

QuoteMy copy of 3rd ed is slowly getting to me from the USA.

I'll report back.

I never saw that. I find it more interesting that TSR published it in the first place, than that they omitted some colleges. I gather they also added some, and am curious about those.

OK. Reading dragon quest 3e. I am confused by character gen for a giant. It seems to refer one to the giant stats in the bestiary but doesn't explain how to make use of those stats in character gen. Help?

I'm pretty sure you're just allowed to spend points to buy stats in the given range.

However, and oddly for a *very* prescriptive game text, it doesn't explain that in 3e, it just makes a reference to the giant stat block and no explanation.

I shall have to ask for more help from DQ grognards.

I am enjoying reading it, it's quite straightforward, but clunky in bits but quite playable so far.

The designers probably considered it self evident.

Given that they didn't consider anything else self evident (it's one of the most preachy over explained rulesets I've read) I doubt it.

It seems likely that explanatory text got cut at some point.

Another possibility is that it was an idea that never got blind-tested before publication. A copy editor may have glanced at the section references and merely confirmed that they existed and seemed relevant, without asking the questions a player new to the work does.

Without some modifying rule, Fatigue for a player-character would simply be derived from Endurance.