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Avalon Hill Tries a D&D Boardgame: Betrayal at Baldur’s Gate

Avalon Hill Tries a D&D Boardgame: Betrayal at Baldur’s Gate

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Betrayal At Baldur's Gate-small

I’ve been fascinated by the D&D Adventure System cooperative play games, which include Temple of Elemental Evil, Castle Ravenloft, Legend of Drizzt, and Wrath of Ashardalon, because apparently they can all be used together in one giant uber map of fun. (I don’t know for sure, of course, because my copies are all still in shrinkwrap and buried in the basement, but I think that’s the general idea.)

There’s been a pretty consistent drumbeat of releases in the series, including two others just this year, Assault of the Giants (February 15, 2017) and Tomb of Annihilation (October 18, 2017) — so much so that it sometimes seems that Wizards of the Coast has wholeheartedly embraced the industry’s shift away from tabletop RPGs towards board games by gradually turning D&D into a top line board game brand. I don’t think their board game releases outnumber their RPG supplements for 2017, but it’s probably getting close.

I heard plenty about Assault of the Giants, and ordered a copy over the summer, and I’ve seen a lot of recent chatter about Tomb of Annihilation. But October’s other D&D board game release, Betrayal at Baldur’s Gate (October 6, 2017), took me completely by surprise. In fact, I’d probably still be blissfully ignorant if I hadn’t seen an Oct. 3 Facebook post from Games Plus  (hat tip to Arin Komins for the link).

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Modular: Tabletop Terror in the Tomb of Annihilation

Modular: Tabletop Terror in the Tomb of Annihilation

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Tomb of Annihilation-smallAs the season of ghosts and ghouls is upon us, it’s a good time to have a terror-filled gaming experience. The most recent Dungeons & Dragons 5th edition adventure book, Tomb of Annihilation (Amazon), provides a good framework for a unleashing undead horrors upon a group of innocent fantasy adventurers.

Tomb of Annihilation is set in the land of Chult, an Africa-inspired continent setting in the Forgotten Realms. The players begin in a thriving metropolis, Port Nyanzaru, in which adventurers can race dinosaurs for fun and profit. As they move deeper into the jungles of Chult, investigating a powerful death curse that affects resurrected people throughout the world, they eventually come upon an ancient temple that is under the sway of a powerful archlich. Along the way, the players will interact with tribal shamans, zombie dinosaurs, and flying monkeys.

This isn’t the first 5th edition adventure that fits well thematically with a horror-based mood. Curse of Strahd (Amazon) re-invents the gothic horror of the Ravenloft setting, while Out of the Abyss (Amazon) explores demonic enemies spreading throughout the Underdark. The collection of deadly dungeons Tales of the Yawning Portal (Amazon) contains the chapters Dead in Thay and Tomb of Horrors.

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The Expedition Into the Black Reservoir: A Dungeon Adventure at Greyhawk Castle by Gary Gygax

The Expedition Into the Black Reservoir: A Dungeon Adventure at Greyhawk Castle by Gary Gygax

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The Expedition Into the Black Resevoir Gary Gygax

The early days of D&D have been chronicled many times, in Shannon Appelcline’s excellent Designers and Dragons books, Michael Witwer’s Empire of Imagination, David Kushner and Koren Shadmi’s Rise of the Dungeon Master: Gary Gygax and the Creation of D&D, and a rapidly growing corpus of gaming history texts. When an era you lived through in your teens now has its own shelf in the history section, you’re getting old.

Still, there are plenty of unchronicled tidbits of gaming history out there, and I stumbled on one this weekend. In 1974 Gary Gygax, strapped for marketing cash for his just-released adventure game Dungeons and Dragons, agreed to contribute two articles to issue 12 of El Conquistador, a Chicago small press magazine devoted to play-by-mail Diplomacy leagues and general wargaming, in exchange for a full-page D&D ad. The first article was “Postal Brotherhood,” a short piece on play-by-mail gaming, a pastime that was already dying (and was fully dead less than two decades later).

The second was vastly more interesting: a four-page story that’s believed to be the first Greyhawk tale ever published.

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Modular: A First Look at Elite Dangerous Role Playing Game

Modular: A First Look at Elite Dangerous Role Playing Game

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256 New COREBOOK Mockup
Clearly a labor of love

Yes, you read that right!

Elite Dangerous, the current incarnation of the granddaddy of all immersive video games, now has its own tabletop roleplaying game, and I’m sitting here with a review copy.

The problem with the video game is that, even with the new ability to land on airless worlds and trundle around in AFVs, it’s essentially space exploration on the radio. You don’t get to land on the worlds with interesting cultures and brawl with gangsters or tread the mean streets, or avoid being the main course at a barbaric religious ceremony. A tabletop roleplaying game has the potential to supply those missing experiences. But does the franchise really need its own game? (As you’ll see, “Yes, actually.”)

EDRPG 256 Book Spread 1
Well written, beautifully illustrated

Frankly, I half-expected Elite Dangerous Role Playing Game (EDRPG) to be a cynically put together I can’t believe it’s not Traveller-lite (please don’t send round lawyers with pulse lasers) with a detailed trade mini-game. Instead I found myself reading what’s clearly a labor of love that emulates a different corner of the Star Punk genre, and does so with an emphasis  — in the core rules — on what you do when you’re not trading. It’s also loaded with material pitched for beginner GM’s, but — again in the core rules — assumes some familiarity with the computer game; not disastrous, but  confusing if you haven’t played Elite seriously in four decades (I’m told there will be free material on the website to help with this).

Given Elite Dangerous has 2-3 million players, and a cult of enthusiasts who enjoy the “shared” part of “shared escapism,” Elite Dangerous Roleplaying Game promises to be an instant modern classic. It’s a good thing, then, that the game mechanics are elegant, but more refined than innovative, which is what you want in something obviously intended as a workhorse to support happy years of sandbox gaming.

Let me unpack some of that.

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Support an Exciting New Magazine of Sword & Sorcery: Tales From the Magician’s Skull

Support an Exciting New Magazine of Sword & Sorcery: Tales From the Magician’s Skull

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Tales from the Magician's Skull-small

Here’s the best news I’ve heard all month: Goodman Games, publisher of the excellent Dungeon Crawl Classics line of old-school RPG adventures, has launched a brand new magazine of Sword & Sorcery, Tales From the Magician’s Skull. The editor chosen to helm this groundbreaking project? None other than our very own Howard Andrew Jones. Here’s Howard with the scoop.

A gong shivers…
The mists part to reveal a grisly object lying upon a mound of rubble, a browned and ancient head with one glowing, malefic eye…
It speaks, in a voice of cold command: “Silence, mortal dogs! It is time now for
TALES FROM THE MAGICIAN’S SKULL!
Goodman Games [has launched] the Kickstarter for the exciting new sword-and-sorcery magazine inspired by Appendix N. I am mightily pleased to be the magazine’s editor, and I’ve had a blast assembling it with Joseph Goodman. We’ve been working together for almost a year, and I’ve got to tell you that the result is GLORIOUS. Just check out that Jim Pavalec cover.

The first issue, with stories by James Enge, John C. Hocking, Chris Willrich, Howard Andrew Jones, C.L. Werner and others, truly is a knockout. The Kickstarter funded in less than 24 hours, and continues to gather momentum. Make a pledge, and make sure you get your copy of the the first issue of what’s sure to be one of the most important magazine launches of the decade. And check back here this week for a 3-way interview with publisher Joseph Goodman, Howard Andrew Jones, and the grinning skull itself!

Diplomacy and Trade in the Vastness of Space: Among the Stars by Artipia Games

Diplomacy and Trade in the Vastness of Space: Among the Stars by Artipia Games

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Among the Stars-small Among the Stars-back-small

I’m still processing all the treasures I brought home from the Games Plus Fall auction on Saturday. Things move fast at the auction, and you frequently have to make a snap decision to make a bid, or lose your chance forever. So more than once I raised my bidding card while thinking “What the heck is that thing?”

That was the case with Among the Stars, a peculiar board game/card game hybrid… that I ended up winning for $16. It wasn’t until I took it home that I was able to puzzle out exactly what it was. (And truth to tell, I’m still not 100% sure. But Amazon has it listed for $69.99, so whatever it turns out to be, my copy was a bargain.)

I expected it to be another 4X game (explore, expand, exploit, exterminate), but it’s quite a bit more original than that. Play focuses on construction of a vast station in space, and there doesn’t appear to be any exploration or combat at all. Several sources refer to the game as 7 Wonders in space, but that doesn’t really help me much, as I’m not familiar with 7 Wonders either. Best I can puzzle out, Among the Stars is an essentially conflict-free game of competitive trading and diplomacy in space, as players strive to build a space station in a galaxy crowded with alien life.

It was a 2015 Origins Awards nominee for Best Card Game. Here’s the description.

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The Past Remembered

The Past Remembered

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oie_945629XusRtgBBLast week I attended the funeral for my friend Densel’s wife, Sheryl. As these things tend to, it spawned a reunion of friends who don’t see each other anymore. Densel was a major hub of roleplaying on Staten Island, and our love for our friend, and each other, grew from our meeting together to play Dungeons and Dragons. Only in recent years have I learned that while he was gaming with me and my group, he was moonlighting with other groups all across the Island. He is single-handedly responsible for more people playing D&D on Staten Island than any other person I know.

The first time I met Densel was when his friend, Desmond, brought him to Boy Scouts to play violin for us and join our troop. He was a six-foot-four, sixteen-year-old black kid and I was a five-foot-four, eleven-year-old white kid. Though five years older than I, we hit it off. What really connected us were the three wildly illustrated pamphlets he brought on a camping trip: Dungeons & Dragons, Greyhawk, and Blackmoor. One of his older brothers had gone to school in Wisconsin and brought the game back to Staten Island with him. When we saw Densel reading them, a couple of us younger guys asked him what they were. When he asked if we had read Moorcock or Tolkien and we said yes, he then asked if we would like to play a game where we could be knights and rangers. Without hesitation, we said yes.

We didn’t play the game properly. Mostly, it was just us talking about the characters we wanted to play and then Densel talking us through adventures. It didn’t matter that I wasn’t really learning the game; I was hooked by the idea of roleplaying. The illustrations from those original books are a major part of what I believe fantasy should look like. The thought of getting caught up in playing someone like Elric or Aragorn blew my eleven-year-old mind.

Densel aged out of scouts and I didn’t see him again for a couple of years. I was still finishing grade school and he was getting ready to enter college. It was then that I started playing D&D for real with my immediate circle of friends. Both my neighbor and I got the boxed Basic Set for Christmas. For two years we played relentlessly; and I mean relentlessly. For anyone who played the game in that first flush of its popularity in the late 1970s, you know what I mean. Every free weekend was spent playing, and the days between designing dungeons and drawing maps. Soon I was building up a shelf of hardcover Advanced D&D manuals. Almost any money I earned or got as a gift was plowed into the game.

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The Subtle Art of Game Speculation

The Subtle Art of Game Speculation

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Starcraft the Board Game-small

I collect a lot of games. They’re not all winners. For example, I stupidly purchased not one but two copies of the massive StarCraft: The Board Game from the clearance section of a toy store in 2007. I thought my kids — who were gonzo for the Blizzard computer game at the time — would show a least a little interest, but they never did. Just because a game is heavily discounted doesn’t mean it’s a good buy. I kicked myself for making a dumb impulse purchase, and stashed the games in my basement.

Flash forward a decade to today, as I’m sitting in the front row of the Games Plus Fall auction in Mount Prospect, Illinois. It runs over four days, but the Saturday auction is reserved for science fiction games and RPGs. There are thousands sold to collectors and enthusiasts from all over the Midwest. And what to my astonished eyes was one of the most hotly sought-after items? StarCraft: The Board Game, which is apparently both rare and highly desirable, at least in good shape. The first copy to be offered up, a perfect copy still in the shrinkwrap, caused a frenzy of bidding, and sold for $112. Not bad for a game I paid $30 for in a discount bin ten years ago.

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Modular: Starfinder Alien Archive — Clark Ashton Smith meets Douglas Adams (with visuals by Ray Harryhausen)

Modular: Starfinder Alien Archive — Clark Ashton Smith meets Douglas Adams (with visuals by Ray Harryhausen)

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256 Starfinder Alien Archive
Starfinder Alien Archive — due  October 18th
256 Kurtzhau the GM
“Kurtzhau,” 13, our local Starfinder GM

Though writers are notoriously not always the best parents, I’m a Good Dad right now. I got us a preview copy of the forthcoming Starfinder Alien Archive — it’s due out October 18th.

Kurtzhau, my 13 year old son who’s currently GMing the game for his mates, rates it as “Awesome.”

I concur.

80+ new aliens (depends on how you count), 20 playable races (some delightfully nuts ), lots of alien tech, each entry a rich adventure seed in its own right and rules for building your own NPC aliens.

Lovely illustrations. Good writing. And it’s got a sort of creative gravitas. Nothing here is throwaway.

Take the Void Hag.

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Modular: Starfinder Under the Hood – Character Creation

Modular: Starfinder Under the Hood – Character Creation

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256 Starfinder CoreWhen playing Dungeons & Dragons or other fantasy RPGs, have you ever wanted to play a space wizard? A gnome with a jet pack? Or a fighter with a flaming laser sword and a force field?

These options are all available to you in the new Starfinder RPG (Paizo, Amazon). Paizo has built the new science fantasy game to explore the distant future of their Pathfinder universe. Though I’ve been excited about it for over a year, since it was first announced, I’ve only just gotten the opportunity to play a full game of it.

So now that the game is more than an abstraction … now that I’ve actually rolled the dice and taken some damage … does it still hold up like I was hoping? Honestly: Even better.

But rather than just singing the praises of the game (which I’ve and others have already done here and here and elsewhere), I’m going to dive a bit deeper into how the game is similar – and different – from the Pathfinder game that we know and love.

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