My latest RPG release… for Pathfinder

Yes, I'm aware that this is not an old school RPG, but it's a damn fine system (objectively speaking, of course).

Five Families: Criminal Organizations for Every Campaign World is a little .pdf I did for Adamant Entertainment. Besides the five detailed organizations, you get rules to create your own and delineate their powers and influence. If you're in the market for an underworld populated by insidious groups besides Ye Olde Thieves' Guild, you should check it out. Works pretty well with D&D 3.5, too.

Wizard World Comic Con Sacramento

Here's one of those exciting projects I mentioned earlier. I will be at the above-mentioned con March 8-9 (that's Saturday and Sunday) in the Artists' Alley section, selling stuff and signing books and posters whatever else you might have. Look for the 300: Rise of an Empire and Watchmen posters near Julie Benz and James Marsters. I will not be in zombie attire.

http://www.wizardworld.com/home-sacramento.html

Look for (semi-) live updates and photos from the convention floor!

The Lexicon, part 1: Overview

What drew me to the Lexicon when I was a dorky freshman exploring a cramped game shop tucked away in Boston's Back Bay wasn't the cover illustration. I was at that time firmly entrenched in the mindset that "fantasy RPG" only meant your standard vaguely-medieval-Europe-but-infinitely-more-tolerant sort of setting. Ideally, someplace where Bilbo Baggins, Elric of Melnibone, and the Grey Mouser could hang out and be buds. But here was a Middle Eastern bazaar with a tiger dude playing kissy-face with a cobra and some kind of dove boy hawking shrunken heads and shards of glass; on the back there's a pygmy tribesman and a guy who looks like Skeletor's cousin holding a lightsaber. There wasn't a proper suit of plate mail or a glaive-guisarme in sight. But the subtitle of the Lexicon was "Atlas of the Lost World of Atlantis." So, I had to crack it open.

You see, I was an archaeology major and this was the Golden Age of Indiana Jones. I was pretty much contractually obligated to check it out, you know, for academic purposes. It turned out, "World" was right. Within its 127 pages is detailed every country on this alternate Earth -- and it should be noted that every place mentioned is based on one that actually existed at one time, or was a place people actually thought existed at one time. What is a little strange is that within the Lexicon they all exist at the same time. A resurgent Atlantis can trade with an an Arthurian kingdom, while Mayanesque and Azteckish folk might find themselves doing battle on the high seas with pseudo-Egyptians.

Still, they managed to cram quite a bit of accurate historical nuggets inside the volume, many of which I encountered in my "Intro to..." classes, and which make for interesting reading to this day. Of course, given that it covers the entire world, most entries aren't super detailed and mainly serve to give DMs hopping off points for their own adventures with general descriptions of flora, fauna, landmarks, and the (mostly) human inhabitants. You won't find any NPCs in the Lexicon, nor any stats besides the costs of goods and services; of course, one of the beauties of the book is that you can use it for any RPG system. There are, however, fairly comprehensive guides to some of the major cities of the world, such as Atlantis, Tang, and Tartessos. I found the book pretty inspirational, such as imaging how a land might have been twisted by an ancient, epic clash between Atlantean sorcerers and Qaddani necromancers, and what treasures might remain to be rediscovered. If anyone's interested, I've found surviving examples of the Lexicon on the web from anywhere from $6 to $185.

I only ended up using a relatively small portion of the world in my own games -- which I did with tons and tons of revisions and unnecessarily meticulous additions of my own. The result was a campaign world I called Alta, and it survived through something like three and a half editions, in one form or another. I'm sure you'll hear more about it than you really wanted to at some point.

One gripe regarding cartography: There's a nice foldout map in the back, as well as more detailed maps of the individual regions at the front of each chapter. For whatever reason, mine had an error where the words and the landforms on the North Sea Region map were flipped 180º out from each other. I ended up making two copies of the offending map, whiting out the words on one and the land on the other, and turning the one with only words into a transparency. I then laid the words over the land the right way and made another copy. Ah, perfection at last. Okay, perhaps that was a little obsessive...

Warpwar

I stumbled across this little gem in the early 80's in the dealer room at one of the few gaming conventions we had in Southern California back then (either Orccon or Gateway; I forget which). It had originally come out during the auspicious geek year of 1977, although the rules booklet makes it clear that it was inspired by old school sci-fi such as The Forever War and The Mote in God's Eye, and not the popular new film by that upstart, George Lucas.

The crux of this Metagaming MicroGame is designing spaceships (and fleets of spaceships) and pitting them against each other in tactical, ship-to-ship combat. Some are "warpships," capable of navigating the warplines that stretch between star systems; others are "system ships," which can't, and need to rely on warpships to ferry them to where the action is. Combat is rather simple and elegant, with no dice involved. Players decide how best to power up beam weapons, missiles, and defensive screens, as well as choosing maneuvering and speed, and then cross-reference the results on a CRT. (That's a Combat Results Table, not to be confused with a Cathode Ray Tube, both of which seem to be going the way of the dodo.) Combat turns involve written orders that are revealed simultaneously, leaving open the very real possibility of both ships destroying each other.

It comes with a little map (with star systems named for places in ancient Mesopotamia, for whatever reason) and a bunch of cardboard chits individually numbered to represent whatever configuration of warp- or system ships you build and assign to them. I always thought it would be cool to play on a big hex-grid battle mat with metal or plastic starship minis.

What I love about Warpwar is how open ended it is. They've essentially given you a humongous box of Legos, and it's up to you to cobble them together in whatever creative monstrosity you desire. Simulate the U.S.S. Enterprise busting through a blockade consisting of Klingon Birds of Prey? You can do that. The Battle of Caprica? The Battle of Endor? The Battle Beyond the Stars? All doable. I even came up with some rules for mixing in ground forces, which were heavily influenced by the vehicles and troops in another classic MicroGame, Ogre (although I called the big guy a "Land Leviathan," with apologies to Michael Moorcock).

Post the First

Herein, gentle readers, thou shalt be mystified beyond thine wildest-- Okay, enough with the olde timey talk. I'm here to write about games. The kind printed on paper. Some old, some new, but mostly the moldy oldies that I grew up with. We're talking RPGs with lead figures -- real lead -- and funny dice. Especially this one. And also some boardgames. But mostly RPGs.

I've spent some 30+ years (Shit, I'm old. How did that happen?) mucking about with such things -- my first boxed set had chits instead of dice, and you had to cut those out yourself. And my first sales as a freelance writer were RPG materials. So maybe, just maybe, I've got some insight to share. Or not. But in any case, looking at this old stuff is pretty fricking cool -- you must think so, or you probably wouldn't be here, right? 

There will be musings on antediluvian magazine articles and art. I'll delve into some truly arcane homebrewed settings and dungeons. You'll find content and rules you can use in your own campaigns, whatever edition they may be. I'll frequently let you in on what our irregularly scheduled old school gaming group is doing. I might even try my hand at producing a webcomic, but as I can't draw worth a kobold turd, it should be quite interesting.

Also, I mentioned that I make my living (such as it is) as a freelance writer. "Of what?" you might well ask. Well, besides the aforementioned RPG stuff and blog entries that run on much too long, I write feature films and "________: The Art of the Film" nonfiction books. I'm currently working on some exciting projects, for which I will provide updates in this, our forum.

I welcome all comments and suggestions. Or nearly all. Let's make this a fun ride, shall we?

ZP