TheRPGSite

Over on RPGnet, there's a pretty cool thread where they're compiling a list of OSR games.

Thought this was a really cool take on 0e -- much more in line with how I imagine the game than a lot of the clones.  It's nicely organized, integrates mass combat very well, and I'll be damned if there's a detail missing -- this book contains all the little bits, minutiae, and explanation of design intent that I've seen missing from other retro games.

It also uses d6s exclusively, which I kind of like.

http://feysquare.com/?page_id=84

And from the afterward:

QuoteWhile I can’t copy the original material 100%, I hope you enjoyed this product because I really think it’s in the spirit of the old game much more than other products claim to be.

By that I mean TBBB’s take on 0e is closer to the original wargame, which is what 0e was based on, than the usual retroclone take which is “modern role play, stripped out rules.” Despite being the first role playing game, 0e was quite complex but with little to no clarification in the original books a lot can be missed or glossed over. I understand that few people will enjoy the game’s presentation but that’s not the point. The fact that it exists is all I care about.

“0e” is a very different game than the contemporary ones we play today -- there’s a very different style, assumptions, and method of play. In this section I want to address some concerns about the game’s design that are commonly asked by people who grew up on the contemporary editions (like myself). I hope this section will shed new light on the material because I’m proof that it’s not impossible to teach a new dog old tricks.

Kudos to this guy for building his game and sharing it with the world.

Doesn't do it for me as a 0e clone, though. YMMV.

Quote from: Benoist;440980Kudos to this guy for building his game and sharing it with the world.

If it'll get more people interested in the origins of the game (and the hobby), then it's a win for everyone in my book.

QuoteDoesn't do it for me as a 0e clone, though. YMMV.

0e would be pretty boring if everyone had the same tastes/interpretations.  :)

The fact that we've ended up with so many variants for early editions speaks to how inspirational they can be, even if people may disagree on the design specifics.

Quote from: Peregrin;440981If it'll get more people interested in the origins of the game (and the hobby), then it's a win for everyone in my book.

Totally. If some guys pick up his PDF, roll some dice and enjoy it old school, dude, I have nothing to bitch about!

Just curious -- what about this doesn't do it for you in terms of being a 0e simulacrum/clone/whatevs?

Stuff like the use of the d66 (I associate the d66 and d666 with In Nomine Satanis/Magna Veritas, not OD&D). The vocabularity and general tone of the game that just don't make me think of OD&D. That kind of thing. I'm already served by the likes of S&W, Spellcraft & Swordplay and those kinds of games in the clone department, anyway. There's a game for everyone.

The name of this invokes BAD BAD BAD imagery.

Heh, I've put at least that much work into Dark Passages and it didn't get on their list.  I may have offended a few D&D fans over there or something :D

Oh well, Dark Passages (not to be confused with Dark Dungeons) isn't exactly a retro clone.  It's a D&D clone but 'retro' wasn't a factor in designing it.  Even so it does look more like older versions of D&D than newer ones on the surface.  If I ever get around to tidying up and formating the supplement it'll become more aparent that it's more than that, though there's been so little interest that it's not high on my priority list.

There's too many D&D varients at the momement.

You aren't kidding about too many OSR games. More people should just publish supplements instead of entire new games. But I've been saying this for a year now, and have been completely ignored. Most OSR publishers are more interested in the sales of core rulebooks instead of supporting the hobby overall.

Quote from: danbuter;441165More people should just publish supplements instead of entire new games. But I've been saying this for a year now, and have been completely ignored.

I share your feelings.

It sounds a lot like what Spellcraft & Swordplay (Jason Vey's retro-clone) already did, at least in terms of the design goal (sticking with the wargame approach, and using d6 instead of d20). I haven't read the rules yet, so maybe he diverges from that. It will be interesting to see whether it feels like a duplication or whether he's tapped into a different approach to the wargame+d6 interpretation of pre-Greyhawk OD&D from the one taken in Spellcraft & Swordplay.

I definitely agree that the wargame interpretation is different from what's done in Swords & Wizardry, which is definitely based on the actual books rather than on extrapolating Chainmail as an alternate development. For myself, and this has been my difficulty with other Chainmail extrapolations as well, I haven't ever seen the CM system work particularly well in the figure-by-figure combats that characterize an RPG. (edit - mainly because it's too lethal for my tastes, not because the mechanisms fail in any objective sense, but wargames tend to have "live" or "die" resolutions and don't translate well from that without losing the wargame feel in the process)

It will be interesting to see what's done differently than in Spellcraft & Swordplay:
http://www.rpg.net/reviews/archive/14/14037.phtml (RPGnet review by Matt Slepin):

QuoteIt is in this light that I review Jason Vey’s new game Spellcraft & Swordplay (hereafter S&S). This game is largely an emulation of the original, three little booklets plus Supplement I: Greyhawk. What makes it really intriguing and, insofar as I know, unique, is that it also attempts to reach even further back to the progenitor of the game, namely the Chainmail rules for medieval miniatures. In the introduction, Vey states that he designed the game to occupy a sort of middle-ground between a retro-clone and a nostalgia game. I’m not entirely sure what that means; possibly he sees S&S as too different from OD&D to be a true retro-clone, but too similar to be a nostalgia game. I’m not sure that this is the case—without trying it, I believe that I could run the Temple of the Frog or In Search of the Unknown under S&S with no more appreciable conversion work than if I did so using Swords & Wizardry.

*Note: Spellcraft & Swordplay isn't the same as Swords & Wizardry - yes, I know, the names are really similar, which makes for confusion when they're discussed side-by-side.

Quote from: danbuter;441165You aren't kidding about too many OSR games. More people should just publish supplements instead of entire new games. But I've been saying this for a year now, and have been completely ignored. Most OSR publishers are more interested in the sales of core rulebooks instead of supporting the hobby overall.

I wrote Dark Passages for two very specific reasons.  One was to illustrate what I believe an introductory D&D rule book should look like and contain.  The other was to lay down clearly what I see the core game at the heart of D&D to be.  So it's more of an essay (or rant) on D&D from where I sit.  The supplement would cover the other classes and races as well as the class*, race, and spell building rules.  I got a start on a retro clone of Battle System 2e but I don't know if it would fit in the supplement.  Ideally I'd want Battle System to be fully linked into the realm management rules so they might form a third supplement.

Oh well, there's a dungeon and wilderness area detailed at the end of Dark Passages that might be useful with other versions of D&D anyhow.

*Incidentally the class building rules also handle multiclassing.  You just deduct the overlapping abilities from the XP cost for the classes.

Quote from: danbuter;441165You aren't kidding about too many OSR games. More people should just publish supplements instead of entire new games. But I've been saying this for a year now, and have been completely ignored.

There has been a staggering number of modules and other supplement published in the last few years, many multiples of what TSR + JG put out over similar time periods. It makes a lot more sense to count those rather than to tell people what they shouldn't be doing, especially when a lot (but definitely, I agree, not all) of those publishers are also publishing the resources you want to see. I put together a list (still a work in progress) of what's out there, and it runs to something like 20 pages. That includes the descriptions, so I don't know what it would be single spaced, but probably 5 pages at least. LOTS of stuff.

QuoteMost OSR publishers are more interested in the sales of core rulebooks instead of supporting the hobby overall.

I don't think publishers are much interested in sales numbers at this point, just because any new clone is going to sell very, very few copies. The older clones sell copies, and newer retro-type games like SWN sell copies, but a specific brand-new clone isn't likely to get any measurable traction in terms of sales.

They're not, I agree, written to support the hobby as a whole - I think the motivation is to support the hobby of that single niche-within-a-niche: Holmes Blue Book extrapolated to higher levels, OD&D with a wargame spin, etc. The new publishers are hobbyists who are focusing on their game of choice, and that's what hobbyists do, for the most part. Very few hobbyists focus on "the hobby as a whole," they focus on their particular hobby as they play it.

But your comment doesn't really make sense - in terms of saying what people should NOT do - when the publication and free-distribution rate of supplements is staggeringly larger than at any time in the hobby's history. Very, very few of those modules aren't compatible with anything else - it's the same as it always was - the older D&D versions are almost totally compatible in terms of the usability of resources.

I don't think it's fair to say that it's a bottom-line motivation that clouds the picture for these people.

I think it has more to do with the idea of creating your own meaningful set of rules and sharing them with the world. So there's a vanity press aspect to it (this is not necessarily a bad thing - there's always vanity involved with a labor of love), along with a passion for a certain aspect of the game (wouldn't that be cool if instead of this you had that...), with just little thought given to the way these ideas would actually benefit the hobby the best (i.e. producing another retroclone is the default attitude, instead of publishing a supplement for an already existing clone).

As for saying what people should and should not do, I'm personally not saying that people should stop producing their own games altogether. I think, however, that there are projects that could have better served by taking on the form of supplements to existing clones rather than being their own separate games (like for instance 2e clones which could have taken the form of specific supplements to OSRIC), as well as there are projects which really need to be their own games to benefit everyone best. It depends on the particulars of the projects, to me. It's worth to think about those kind of things before automatically defaulting to the production of "yet another retroclone."

Retooling an existing rule set is one of the easiest forms of game design.  To make a good supplement you need to have ideas of your own.

Really, I generally put work into my own games but Dark Passages was more of a drawn out online rant in any case.  Don't get me wrong, if I had the money to package it right and put it on the shelves in stores I would, likely ahead of my own designs.

But then 'properly' would involve proper artwork, a couple sprues of modular plastic figures (by Kev Adams or Tom Meir), and thick cardboard scenery.  Enough toys that even the hardcore D&D fanatics might buy the box just for the other contents.

Quote from: Benoist;441182It's worth to think about those kind of things before automatically defaulting to the production of "yet another retroclone."

Okay, granted that I'm not a good example since Swords & Wizardry is one of the oldest clones out there, so the proliferation hadn't happened yet, but ...

I would agree with this except for one thing: I, for one, prefer to have my game in one book rather than flipping back and forth between two. That's also a consideration - it's definitely why there are three versions of Swords & Wizardry - it would have been a heck of a lot easier to just do supplements, and probably have made more money, too, but I really hate divided rulebooks and didn't want to inflict them on other people. If I'm going to do it, I'll do it right, and that's the way I think is right.

 But I still think I would have done the separate complete books regardless, just because of my preference for not using a primary and supplementary rulebook side by side. I didn't like Unearthed Arcana way back in the day, and if I were actually planning on playing something rather than using it as a book of ideas for mining, I much prefer not to have my rules split up.

Quote from: David Johansen;441184Retooling an existing rule set is one of the easiest forms of game design.  To make a good supplement you need to have ideas of your own.

If you don't have ideas of your own, is your work worth sharing?

As it applies to retroclones: if you don't have specific ideas on how to emulate a set of rules, what makes the core experience of a specific set of rules you want to emulate, and instead go for the broad retooling, doesn't that say something about your own design process, that maybe you aren't that clear on what you are trying to achieve in the first place?

Well, in my own case I think I was pretty clear about the whys and wherefores.  On the other hand I don't know if I'll ever get around to organizing the supplement even though it's 90% writen, because I've got too many of my own ideas sitting half finished on my hard drive and I don't see the retro-clone thing as having much of a point in the saturated market.

There's also the fact that I'm an infamous anti-D&D troll working against me :p

But I think for the guys who are fans that want this specific second edition AD&D varient or the other "I say, has anyone retro cloned players option books yet?"  Their preferences are specific enough to exclude the other efforts.

What I think we can hope for is that now that these retro-clones exist their creators will move on to supporting them rather than moving on to retro-clone something else.

Quote from: Mythmere;441185Okay, granted that I'm not a good example since Swords & Wizardry is one of the oldest clones out there, so the proliferation hadn't happened yet, but ...

Yes. I keep on citing 2e clones as examples, but I don't mean to target any specific game, by the same token.

Quote from: Mythmere;441185I would agree with this except for one thing: I, for one, prefer to have my game in one book rather than flipping back and forth between two. That's also a consideration - it's definitely why there are three versions of Swords & Wizardry - it would have been a heck of a lot easier to just do supplements, and probably have made more money, too, but I really hate divided rulebooks and didn't want to inflict them on other people. If I'm going to do it, I'll do it right, and that's the way I think is right.

Okay. That's a good point. I had not thought about the all-in-one-book aspect of it. That's a fair consideration.

One thought that comes to my mind is whether that consideration emulates OD&D, though. Since you had the three LBBs in the first place, not one book, and supplements to the game afterwards, it seems that thinking in terms of all-in-one-book and have three different versions of OD&D that way is more of an AD&D mindset than an OD&D one, in the sense that the Advance game was supposed to take all the materials scattered throughout the game, supplements and periodicals to be the unified standard moving forward. Do you see what I mean?

Quote from: Mythmere;441185But I still think I would have done the separate complete books regardless, just because of my preference for not using a primary and supplementary rulebook side by side. I didn't like Unearthed Arcana way back in the day, and if I were actually planning on playing something rather than using it as a book of ideas for mining, I much prefer not to have my rules split up.

That's interesting that you're talking about Unearted Arcana, as opposed to the OD&D supplements: I had not read that part before I wrote the previous paragraph.

Quote from: Benoist;441188it seems that thinking in terms of all-in-one-book and have three different versions of OD&D that way is more of an AD&D mindset than an OD&D one,

I don't know about that, I think it's a post hoc ergo propter hoc view of the scattered rules of OD&D, but that doesn't make it necessarily invalid, just poor-quality evidence.

The question is related to design goals, and how (as mentioned) they need to be there in order for the "product" to make sense -- that "collect and organize" approach was specifically one of my design goals. Keep the rules, but make them more easily accessible to a later-generation gamer by organizing them in a more modern format instead of having them scattered. OSRIC was focused more on preservation, but with Swords & Wizardry I approached it more as tool for easier use.

To a large degree I took that direction because unlike OSRIC, the OD&D rules aren't easily gotten any more. Hence, Swords & Wizardry was much more likely than OSRIC to see use at real gaming tables, and to be used as an intro for unfamiliar players. That being the case, I did indeed restructure the organization of the rules, while keeping the rules themselves as unchanged as possible. I'm a big fan of the OD&D rules, but not so much of the organization and the presentation of those rules in the original books.

It occurs to me that the games that get supported will be the ones people are still talking about a year or two from now.  I may have to rething putting Dark Passages on the back burner.

A few years back I did that with Galactic Adventures because there were so many percentile sf games coming out.  As it turns out, more than half of them merely fizzled or never came out.  Who knows where I'd be now?  Raking in mad money I must suppose :D

On the other hand, at the moment I'm back on Galaxies In Shadow.  Yes, Incandescent could use finishing and support too, but discussion of Kryomek got me wanting gritty, dark, and dirty sf and Incandescent doesn't go there.

There's a reason why Labyrinth Lord is selling well. It is one of the few games that has a lot of supplements in print.

Quote from: danbuter;441206There's a reason why Labyrinth Lord is selling well. It is one of the few games that has a lot of supplements in print.

This might be the crux of the whole thing. OSRIC, LL, and Swords & Wizardry are cited as the "big three" in almost any discussion of retro-clones. I often think that it's purely due to the fact that they are the earliest three, but you've made a really good point -- they are also the three games with tons of supplemental material from the original publishers and/or third-party publishers.

It might, following your observation, be the fact that OSRIC, Swords & Wizardry, and LL have reached a certain critical mass of support products.

Maybe modules are part of the picture. Many modules are published with direct compatibility references to OSRIC and LL. How about S&W? Are there many modules for it? There are a bunch from Mythmere Games, Frog God Games and the Tsar series... there's Knockspell, too... what else?

Consider if you were interested in getting into an OSR game, but had no strong inclination towards one. You pull up RPGNow, Noble Knight, or a similar site, and then look at the listings. When you click on OSRIC, LL, or S&W, you get a full page of stuff. Lots of adventures and even some settings. That leaves a much better impression than if you only find the rulebook, and nothing else.

Otherworld Miniatures is even going to be doing official Labrynith Lord figure packs.

http://z9.invisionfree.com/Otherworld_Minis/index.php?showtopic=189

I guess personally, my problem is that while I respect some of the core elements of D&D's rules there's never been an edition that I liked very much.  They've all got irredeemable faults that can't be patched by simply ignoring things like level limits.

Quote from: David Johansen;441231I guess personally, my problem is that while I respect some of the core elements of D&D's rules there's never been an edition that I liked very much.  They've all got irredeemable faults that can't be patched by simply ignoring things like level limits.

That, is why you fail. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fLrpBLDWyCI) ;)

Nah, I fail because I'm easily distracted by shiny ideas and seldom finish anything to the point that it's polished enough to sell.

Heck, I even got distracted by rewriting a dog like D&D for a couple months ;)

Quote from: David Johansen;441231I guess personally, my problem is that while I respect some of the core elements of D&D's rules there's never been an edition that I liked very much.  They've all got irredeemable faults that can't be patched by simply ignoring things like level limits.

I've come to realize that I'm such a perfectionist that there will never be a game I will ever be completely satisfied with.

So I've learned to just enjoy them for what they are, warts and all.

As I've said elsewhere, some of my non-RPG playing friends have been screwing around with Nethack since they were 15/16 years old.  It uses a system loosely based on OD&D.  It's an open project that some people do as a hobby.  But not once have I ever heard any of those people bitch about anything in Nethack.  They just accept the game for what it is, despite the fact that the game is horribly deadly and uses an RPG system that is considered "outdated" by both video-game and tabletop designers.

Most people?  Most normal people just play the game.  If it's fun you keep playing, if it isn't, you don't.  It's only us crazy forum-goers and self-branded geeks who obsess over the details, the "broken-ness", keeping our checklists of "improvements" (or faults) over each subsequent edition and re-release of a game.

I think David J is just someone who was probably weaned on games other than DnD and to whom its conventions aren't the natural boundaries of the FRP genre. Having started with T&T and MERP I'm in the same boat. DnD in any incarnation has always seemed rather weird, arbitrary and frustrating, much as I've tried to like it...

Quote from: Benoist;441219Maybe modules are part of the picture. Many modules are published with direct compatibility references to OSRIC and LL. How about S&W? Are there many modules for it? There are a bunch from Mythmere Games, Frog God Games and the Tsar series... there's Knockspell, too... what else?

For Swords & Wizardry, as far I can think of from the top of my head
Modules in Knockspell:
-Emerald Isles I and II
-City of Vultures
-Tower of Mouths
-Operation: Unfathomable
-The Crossroads

Free Standing Modules
-Spire of Iron and Crystal
-Tomb of the Iron God
-Ice Tower of the Salka
-Splinters of Faith 1 (It started with a chicken)
-Splinters of Faith 2 (can't remember title)
-Splinters of Faith 3 (can't remember title)
-Splinters of Faith 4 (can't remember title)
-Ursined, Sealed and Delivered
-Fane of the Fallen
-Vile Worm of the Eldritch Oak

Magazines:
-J. Slater's Land of NOD magazine
-Fanzine dedicated to S&W WhiteBox is coming out in April as the new form of ODDities magazine.
-Knockspell Magazine (not dedicated to S&W but has lots of S&W and uses S&W stats)

Swords & Wizardry is also getting some additional traction from being published by Necromancer Games (S&W Tome of Horrors expected in Summer) and by Bill Webb's new Frog God Games (which has got a planned release of at least one Swords & Wizardry Module per month).

Modules to be Released within a month or two
-Jungle Ruins of Madaro-Shanti
-Splinters of Faith 5
-Saga of the Northlands 1 (Vengeance of the Longserpent)
-Hex Crawl Classics
-New Swords & Wizardry module line from Bill Barsh of Pacesetter Games
-The Hollow Mountain

Variant-version game supplements:
-Ruins & Ronin
-Hideouts & Hoodlums

Other Materials
-S&W Monster Book (published)
-S&W Tome of Horrors (Necromancer Games planned for Summer)
-City Encounters (temporarily off the table while being revised for Frog God Games)
-The Swords & Wizardry Companion (3rd party supplement)
-Eldritch Weirdness Books 3-1

Plus, there are a few blogs, although the largest of these is theRavyn's Beyond the Black Gate.

Quote from: The_Shadow;441306I think David J is just someone who was probably weaned on games other than DnD and to whom its conventions aren't the natural boundaries of the FRP genre. Having started with T&T and MERP I'm in the same boat. DnD in any incarnation has always seemed rather weird, arbitrary and frustrating, much as I've tried to like it...

Actually I started with my cousins in 79.  They gave me their Holmes Basic Set and I took it home with me.  Tried to play it, got everything wrong at first, went on to play with friends who got everything wrong and a DM* who killed me off twice a session while my other friends got handed levels like candy.   Believe me, he may have had the books but what he ran was nothing like D&D.  Pure narrative fiat without ANY actual reading of the rules.  His idea of a brilliant adventure was being stuck on a waterslide with a crossbow and shooting at monsters along the side for a whole session.  I kid you not.  And yes, I branched out, I got Tunnels and Trolls and then Villains and Vigillantes, Runequest, The Traveller Book, Warhammer Mass Combat Roleplay, and James Bond 007.

And I have played every edition and version of D&D for at least one session.  To be fair I only played 4e for one session with the second worst DM I've ever seen.  I still think 4e is a better design than 3e but still hampered by D&D's legacy issues.  Certainly not as good as T&T 5 or RQ2 were THIRTY YEARS AGO.  The other versions of D&D including 3.0 and 3.5 have seen at least half a dozen sessions.

But really, if I hadn't gotten into playing Warhammer a decade ago, and played many miniature wargames since, I don't think I'd even think D&D had a decent game at its core.  I'd just hate it outright.

Quote from: danbuter;441165You aren't kidding about too many OSR games. More people should just publish supplements instead of entire new games. But I've been saying this for a year now, and have been completely ignored. Most OSR publishers are more interested in the sales of core rulebooks instead of supporting the hobby overall.

And some of the people producing old school and retroclone games aren't really interested in sales as the games are free. Microlite74 Version 2.0 has had over 7000 free downloads in the 18 months or so it has been out -- and this is without any presence on DriveThru/RPGNow.  Microlite74 is a very minor player in the retroclone "market" but I know of a good number of M74-based campaigns actually being played, so it's a success from my POV.

I don't do modules for it because I can't write a decent module. I run sandbox and my attempts to write standard adventure modules over the years have all been failures -- probably because I don't run games in a module manner. But it doesn't really matter. A module for ANY old school game -- TSR original or retroclone -- can be used with M74 with little conversion beyond changing the ACs to ascending. I don't see the need to produce special "Made for use with Microlite74" modules.

You may be seeing some Microlite75-based campaign settings, however. Two publishers have mentioned that they may use customized version of M75 as a rules appendix for their settings as this would allow them to sell the settings as complete games. I'm all for it. That's why my M20-based sets of game rules are all open game content.

Quote from: RandallS;441346You may be seeing some Microlite75-based campaign settings, however.

Very cool. Any sneak peeks?

Microlite is good stuff.

Hi all,

>Modules to be Released within a month or two
>-Jungle Ruins of Madaro-Shanti
>Variant-version game supplements:
>-Hideouts & Hoodlums [snipped]

Wow, two mentions in one thread!  

If I may jump in and take this thread back to its original subject, I'm curious -- and suspect -- about the legality of games incorporating Chainmail elements.  The Brown Book in particular, from a quick skim, looked like it contained a lot of material almost verbatim from Chainmail.  How is that protected by Open License...?

~Scott "-enkainen" Casper

Quote from: Benoist;441133Stuff like the use of the d66 (I associate the d66 and d666 with In Nomine Satanis/Magna Veritas, not OD&D). The vocabularity and general tone of the game that just don't make me think of OD&D. That kind of thing. I'm already served by the likes of S&W, Spellcraft & Swordplay and those kinds of games in the clone department, anyway. There's a game for everyone.

D66 = Old Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay, not those sub-par and undersold games you're talking about.

I don't know one person who picked up either of those.  Or even looked at them.

Quote from: Mythmere;441217This might be the crux of the whole thing. OSRIC, LL, and Swords & Wizardry are cited as the "big three" in almost any discussion of retro-clones. I often think that it's purely due to the fact that they are the earliest three, but you've made a really good point -- they are also the three games with tons of supplemental material from the original publishers and/or third-party publishers.

It might, following your observation, be the fact that OSRIC, Swords & Wizardry, and LL have reached a certain critical mass of support products.

The retro-clones have largely followed the course of open source operating systems specifically Linux distributions. Many of the most popular distributions are that way because of they were among the first AND developed a community around them to support them.

But as Ubuntu Linux showed it is possible to come in later in the game if you have a leader with a vision and willing to do the work to build a community. So the big "three" may be a big "four", or a big "five". Also there are formerly popular distributions that fell off the radar because their leadership faltered and the community dissipated.  However because it all based on open source other people took what unique about that distribution and carried it on to one of the other big ones or forged ahead with their own.

What it means for the OSR that the Classic D&D family will continue to be supported although the constellation of companies and authors will change.

Quote from: RandallS;441346I don't do modules for it because I can't write a decent module. I run sandbox and my attempts to write standard adventure modules over the years have all been failures -- probably because I don't run games in a module manner. But it doesn't really matter. A module for ANY old school game -- TSR original or retroclone -- can be used with M74 with little conversion beyond changing the ACs to ascending. I don't see the need to produce special "Made for use with Microlite74" modules.

I am working on that issue. I don't believe the tournament style "dungeon" i.e. a map with keyed locations written up is the only way of presenting useful adventuring material for a referee to use. That it is possible to write and sell a "sandbox" adventure that resolves around a specific situation without a predetermined course of events or an end.

Quote from: Blackhand;443775D66 = Old Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay, not those sub-par and undersold games you're talking about.

Sub-par?

(1) You're probably thinking of the American In Nomine instead of the game I am talking about, In Nomine Satanis/Magna Veritas, i.e. the original French game, which is a French Classic and a brilliant role playing game. It also uses the d666 and d66 exclusively with its mechanics. As for you associating it with Warhammer FRP... good for you, I guess?  

(2) Calling games like Swords & Wizardry and Spellcraft & Swordplay "sub-par" just tells me you have completely different tastes than I, which is fine, but also assume that your tastes are inherently superior to mine, which just prompts me to tell you to go play some 40K and get lost. You don't like those games. OK. Cool story, bro.

Quote from: Blackhand;443775I don't know one person who picked up either of those. Or even looked at them.

And? Why should I care? I haven't seen a single guy play Warhammer FRP in twenty years. Should you care? *shrug*

I knew WFRP used D66 a lot. I've never heard of this French RPG you're talking about. Probably the same for a lot of other people here.

That's totally cool with me. But jumping from one thing to the other and calling the games I'm talking about sub-par and all? Whatever! I was talking about me, myself, and I concur! I associate the d66/d666 with INS/MV. Period. The end. Others might associate it with something else. We have different game experiences and associations. OMG! A shocker, I know! :D

With the non-stop influx of retro-clones, I'm considering making a Forge-style story game called "Old School [Tent] Revival" where players take on the role of an evangelical game designer who tries to amass followers to the yet another retroclone he created.

It will have rules on holding a 4e burning bonfire, talking smack on the Internet, game store to game store evangelizing, and (most importantly) giving a good old-fashioned tent preaching (with the phrase "I feel the Gary Ghost power!" being a common component) where you get bonus dice for speaking in [alignment] tongues.

I can't decide if it should be more competitive (each PC has their own retro-clone to push) or cooperative (they are all soldiers in the "Army of Gary" against the demons of 4e).  

The first expansion pack talks about how to make the game more deep by introducing the optional setting of the time of the Great Schism, when Ryan Dancey nails copies of his D&D 3e rule update ideas to the Temple of Gary, causing acts of heresy and sedition to emerge.

heh...today I started retro-cloning GURPS first edition.  :D

I know it's a really bad idea, but I loved first edition and feel things went badly off the rails around the time of GURPS Space first edition and have never really recovered.

Quote from: jgants;443802(with the phrase "I feel the Gary Ghost power!" being a common component)

I like a number of the retroclones, but that line is fucking awesome.

People are still edition warring on the Legends & Lore thread, heh?

We should just have an edition war subforum.
Really- because by and large that is what the RPG forum is right now- and it's fucking boring.  Obviously Edition wars attract enough traffic to have their own subforum. It would be refreshingly honest, if nothing else.
With a subforum threads that go that way can be forked, and people who play the game in question might actually be able to talk to one another about it without getting distracted.

Quote from: Aos;443808We should just have an edition war subforum.

Sounds like what RPGnet did with D&D. Meh.

Cool story bro, but the D&D forum is hands down the best thing about RPG.net.

Dragonsfoot used to have an EW forum, but it went from "I don't like your favorite edition of D&D" to "Your favorite edition sucks" to "you suck" and worse, so they closed it.

However, nobody here is afraid to tell anyone else here they suck (for example, I think AM sucks), so it's probably not as much an issue.

Down the civility!  Up an EW forum!

:D

Quote from: Benoist;443807People are still edition warring on the Legends & Lore thread, heh?

My bad, I just wanted to make a joke about yet another retroclone being made (well, and mock story games) not promote edition warring.

Quote from: jgants;443834My bad, I just wanted to make a joke about yet another retroclone being made (well, and mock story games) not promote edition warring.

It's cool, mate. :)

Quote from: Aos;443808We should just have an edition war subforum.
Really- because by and large that is what the RPG forum is right now- and it's fucking boring.

I'd talk about the games I'm running/playing, but right now that's the Burning Wheel (GMing) and Mutants & Masterminds with a Japanese myth/wuxia/fantasy feel (playing), so I don't think the reception would be very warm, if I got one at all.

I'm also planning to run The Whispering Vault and Trail of Cthulhu (using a Masks conversion), but again, those games seem sort of out of the park for this forum.  Well, Trails only partially so.

OD&D is also in the running, and I'm sure that would get a much more positive response than the other games, but that depends on whether my work schedule lightens up at all, as I haven't had a day off in about a month and a half.

So there's plenty of stuff I want to talk about, and plenty of games I'm getting ready to play, but given the reactions to certain types or brands of game here, I always question whether it's worth it to post a new topic.

Quote from: Benoist;443800That's totally cool with me. But jumping from one thing to the other and calling the games I'm talking about sub-par and all? Whatever! I was talking about me, myself, and I concur! I associate the d66/d666 with INS/MV. Period. The end. Others might associate it with something else. We have different game experiences and associations. OMG! A shocker, I know! :D

Yeah, you went through all that trouble to tell me off and everything.  "Cool Story Bro", but you belong to a minority there.

Moreover, you seem to think you belong to the aristocracy of RPG's with your French flavors that no one else seems to like.  

But you just keep fucking that chicken!

Quote from: danbuter;443798I knew WFRP used D66 a lot. I've never heard of this French RPG you're talking about. Probably the same for a lot of other people here.

Yep.  +1.

Quote from: Aos;443811Cool story bro, but the D&D forum is hands down the best thing about RPG.net.

Also true.  +1 Credibility Attack.

Quote from: David Johansen;443803heh...today I started retro-cloning GURPS first edition.  :D

I know it's a really bad idea, but I loved first edition and feel things went badly off the rails around the time of GURPS Space first edition and have never really recovered.

? GURPS went off the rails with 1st edition Space?

Quote from: Blackhand;443866But you just keep fucking that chicken!

Dude. I don't give a shit about your problem with me. YOU keep on fucking that chicken. :D

That chicken is a whore.

Quote from: Aos;443888That chicken is a whore.

Looks like a nugget in the shape of a donut, too.

Quote from: Aos;443888That chicken is a whore.

Last guy to fuck it has to eat it.

Quote from: misterguignol;443890Last guy to fuck it has to eat it.

How's it's forehead look?

Quote from: thedungeondelver;443900How's it's forehead look?

Sloppy.

Quote from: estar;443884? GURPS went off the rails with 1st edition Space?

Yeah, around then, there was a shift in focus and rules approach around that time that was the start of the long slow slide that led to things like GURPS Vehicles.  Aliens was a bit later and you got things like claws that are only as good as a short sword costing 15 points (same as being wealthy) being entrenched in the rules for the next twenty years.

It's when GURPS went from being simpler than HERO to far more detail oriented and complex.  IRRC the new autofire rules with the four round burst table first appeared in Space.  Autoduel was still doing 3 rolls to hit and Space was only three or four years later.

Space also revisited the GURPS Humanx approach to starships and ship to ship combat which I've always thought was a terrible cop out.  I wanted tactical ship to ship combat though in hindsight the best thing that could have been in there is the Space Opera Combat System from GURPS Lensman and GURPS Compendium 2.

It's the period where the range of skills and advantages expanded to the point where the stat to points balance got screwy and you suddenly had to have Legal Enforcement Powers for 15 points to play a knight.

Mind you, in spite of having started at least a dozen campaigns and giving away around 24 basic sets I never managed to get a GURPS third edition campaign to last more than three or four sessions.  First edition was cleaner, clearer, and tighter and while some good things have been added many other things were simply a mess.

I've pretty much given up on any retroclones and went back to the source:
http://www.mediafire.com/?5f4mztgpverxt94

or

http://blog.retroroleplaying.com/2009/09/grey-book-od-compiled.html

Are they canon/in print/the gospel? No, and I no longer care about any of that. Makes life easier...

EDIT: sorry...Steven J. Ege's The Gray Book in the second link now points to a dead link.  I'm sure there are other methods of finding it.  Read the comment from "Traveller" down the page.

The second link was taken down (the Gray Book link).

Quote from: kregmosier;443958I've pretty much given up on any retroclones and went back to the source:
http://www.mediafire.com/?5f4mztgpverxt94

or

http://blog.retroroleplaying.com/2009/09/grey-book-od-compiled.html

Are they canon/in print/the gospel? No, and I no longer care about any of that. Makes life easier...

EDIT: sorry...Steven J. Ege's The Gray Book in the second link now points to a dead link.  I'm sure there are other methods of finding it.  Read the comment from "Traveller" down the page.