General RPG DiscussionDiscussion of all RPGs and non-system-specific topics. DM/GM/player issues, settings, etc. Rules discussion belongs in one the forums below.
The last issue. That was quick. We get our first taste of colour on the cover, and the size and price increases again, to 24 pages and $1. A 4fold increase in only a year. I find it amusing that if you put all 7 strategic review issues together, they are still smaller than a single issue of dragon at its heyday (for those of you who are wondering, the largest issue ever is 170 pages long. Which one it is, I shan't reveal yet though.)
They start off by announcing the demise of TSR ( ) and its successors, Dragon, and Little Wars (whatever happened to that? Oh well, I guess I'll probably find out in a while) to be published on alternating months, and their new staff. (Dave Sutherland, oh yes, we're talking iconic here) This is exciting stuff, and I have to wonder how people reacted at the time. Hopefully the letters page will be apprearing soon so I can find out. Anyone who was there at the time, I want to hear your comments as well.
This issue also contains:
Gary explaining the vancian magic system, why he designed it that way, and taking potshots at powergamers and people who don't use the rules as written. He admits that despite attempts to balance them, magic users are probably still the most powerful class in the game, especially once they get magic items. I get the impression I'm going to be seeing a lot more of this. Oh well, I knew what I was getting myself into.
Snark between the various companies at gencon and origins. Ahh, dirty laundry, how we love to see thee aired.
A full page advert. Supplement III eldritch wizardry coming soon, featuring druds, (ha ha, they misspelled the advert) psionics, new monsters and lots of other stuff. Doing this is really giving me a picture of the order the D&D classes appeared.
Stats for lots of TV gunslingers for boot hill. Another thing that would be harder to get away with today, thanks to copyright annoyances.
A comic, Dirt. Simple little 3 panneler. Meh.
Wouldya like to take a survey. There's a $1 store credit slip in it for you. Things weren't that cheap even then so you'd have to spend more money to take advantage of it. Nice work if you can get it.
Gencon 1976, special guest Fritz Lieber. Not surprising, since they're making a game of his books. Still, 2 full page ads in quick sucession, they're really upping the commercial content.
Fiction: What price gold and glory, by Jim Hayes. An unremarkable little encounter tale featuring a werebear and a pixie as the protagonists.
GM advice on town building. This is system free, and the kind of stuff that is still relevant today.
Magical items: The cup and talisman of akbar (no al yet, curiously) staff of the priest kings and the brazen bottle. All familiar to me, and are the sort that seriously change the power dynamics in the game. Give to your players with caution.
Centerfold spread of the Dungeon game store.
More on the conflict between origins and gen con, and about attempts from the established wargaming crowd to marginalize the new pen & paper gaming style. Another case of the more things change, the more they stay the same. And once again there's the air of you can't stop the new ideas. We know we've got something good and are going to spawn lots of imitators oh baby
Finally, a monster I don't recognize. The denebian slime devil. I can see why this one never caught on, as it's basicaly an unkillable comic relief annoyance monster. The catoblepas, I do recognize however, with its weird combination of weak neck and instakill gaze. Goes to show what players and GM's prefer. DEATH BEFORE HUMILIATION!!!
A third page full of adverts.
A boring essay on the use of missile weapons in historical warfare.
Optional rules giving thieves 18% dexterity scores(a la fighters exceptional strength) which give them bonuses to their thieving skills. Another one I've never seen before and obviously didn't catch on. Frankly 18% strength was arbitrary and dumb enough. We don't need it applied to other abilities as well.
Lots of tekumel stuff. Interesting that easily the best setting stuff in the early days is coming from here. Whatever happened to M.A.R Barker?
An essay by Gygax on what constitutes successful gamemastering. As expected it is quite oriented towards competitive play, chastising GM's who let their players advance level too quickly, and encouraging strict enforcement of timekeeping rules. We also get our first estimation of proper advancement time. According to Gary, it should take about a year of weekly gaming to get to name level, and then characters should gain around 2-3 levels a year after that, so overall, getting to 20th level should take around 4-5 years. So yeah, things have definitely got a lot more slanted in the players favour since then. I suppose since they make up more than 80% of the group at any one time, social pressure would make it happen sooner or later.
With the rapid expansion, there's finally room for things to slip between the cracks, and me to see stuff I haven't before. As a result, this issue definitely feels less consequential, despite (or perhaps because) its the last one. But It's a good deal less dull than issue 5, and as the intermediate between formats, it feels significant historically.
Funnily enough, 1 year to name level and then slowing to a crawl after that is pretty much exactly how all my 1e games always went. Hey, who knew, something I was doing right.
__________________ Currently running: Sufficiently Advanced over Maptool. Soon to change. If you'd like to join in a short 3-8 session campaign for various systems, drop by our forums.
I double-dog-dare you to make your game sound super cool without comparing it to other editions. - paraphrased from Umbran.
Our first case of joke poetry. Names involving geographic features and animals are so easy to parody. How they took it seriously 20 years later in W:tA I'll never know.
Huh?
Quote:
Originally Posted by (un)reason
Stats for lots of TV gunslingers for boot hill. Another thing that would be harder to get away with today, thanks to copyright
You'd see this a LOT in most magazines until mmm the mid-Nineties I think. They did lots of stats for book characters and in the early Top Secret days did stats for all the major fictional spies; Different Worlds did almost an entire issue for stats on the New Teen Titans (the biggest breakthrough comic at the time), and the X-Men.
Quote:
Originally Posted by (un)reason
Lots of tekumel stuff. Interesting that easily the best setting stuff in the early days is coming from here. Whatever happened to M.A.R Barker?
Tekumel was the first 'setting' and had awesome production values for the time, something that oddly enough the main D&D line never got. They had a huge vinyl map of the main city in the boxed set rules! You'll see a lot more Tekumel stuff as time goes on, but it never really seems to catch on with the general gaming populace despite having a fanatical core following - the almost impenetrable language pretty much ensures that, along with the idea that the adventurers are not just wandering seekers after treasure.
M.A.R Barker is still around, and he's written several Tekumel novels (the mass market ones I've read are quite good) and the game has gone through several publisher and such. I'm not sure where it is right now.
Werewolf:the Apocalypse. They did have tendency for characters to adopt native american style names such as flight-of-eagles and sees-in-darkness. This is very very easy to parody. I have personally experienced this, and it makes carrying on a serious game rather hard if people giggle every time you say one of the characters names.
Quote:
You'd see this a LOT in most magazines until mmm the mid-Nineties I think. They did lots of stats for book characters and in the early Top Secret days did stats for all the major fictional spies; Different Worlds did almost an entire issue for stats on the New Teen Titans (the biggest breakthrough comic at the time), and the X-Men.
I know. In a few years we get to giants in the earth. Much twinkitude will be had.
Quote:
Tekumel was the first 'setting' and had awesome production values for the time, something that oddly enough the main D&D line never got. They had a huge vinyl map of the main city in the boxed set rules! You'll see a lot more Tekumel stuff as time goes on, but it never really seems to catch on with the general gaming populace despite having a fanatical core following - the almost impenetrable language pretty much ensures that, along with the idea that the adventurers are not just wandering seekers after treasure.
M.A.R Barker is still around, and he's written several Tekumel novels (the mass market ones I've read are quite good) and the game has gone through several publisher and such. I'm not sure where it is right now.
I remember it got a dual tri-stat/d20 version a couple of years ago after aaaages in publishing limbo. But then guardians of order died, and it's back to publishing limbo again.
So here we are. The prelude is over, the warming up has finished, It's time to begin running this marathon in earnest. At 32 pages and $1.50, they expand yet again. Some terrible color choices here. Pale yellow-green text on bright pinky-orange background does not make for legible teaser text. While the art is better than the last SR issue, there is still extensive amounts of white space on the cover, and the dragon looks somewhat cartoonish. But then again, I seem to remember seeing early 80's books with similar art, so I suspect that style will be with us for quite a while.
It opens with an editorial spelling out their new intentions - to cease being a house organ (which of course they did successfully for over 20 years before WotC swallowed them up again) but instead to cover the whole roleplaying scene. Rates for articles and artwork coming next issue. Another massive historical change is the need for stamped self addressed envelopes. In this era of ubiquitous computers and quick easy copying, we forget that only a few decades ago, you had to make every copy of an amateur work yourself, and often people would send off their only copy to places.
In this issue:
Fafhrd and the grey mouser give their idiosyncratic opinion on roleplaying and the idea of other people playing in their world. A classic of the "pretend that characters are real in another dimension, and the author is merely writing down their stories" trope that would be used by many D&D authors in the future.
Dirt comic continues.
Converting the battle of the 5 armies from the hobbit to chainmail.
A decidedly arcane method of determining odds of success at a general task based on your attribute. Yeah, I can see why this one never caught on, compared to the simple roll d20 under attribute, possibly with modifiers, that most of us used.
Putting superscience into D&D: No real discussion of logistics or the cool issues that could arise from this here. Essentially just an excuse for jim ward to give us a load of *cough*magic*cough technological devices with a vague backstory about atlanteans. Hey, its a trick that'll work three decades later in Mage. Don't knock it.
Some discussions on language in D&D. Does feel very dated, and suffers somewhat from the humans are the only race with different languages problem. Features a cleric who was granted the ability to speak Were-St-Bernard, but who has never actually met a Were-St-Bernard to speak it too, which says it all really.
Fiction: The search for the forbidden chamber by Jake Jaquet. The trope of wizards with metaawareness continues in this silly little tale, featuring a recyclosarus, and whole load of other references and in-jokes.
A 4 page spread of tournament rules for Gen-con 9 by Len Lakofka.
Bullettes! Another monster that barely changed at all throughout editions, Cause what's not to love about a shark that can burrow through the ground with its fin out and then leap out and rip you to shreds. Plus it doesn't have any mechanical kinks that need nerfing, just straightforward combat skills.
Hints on mapping wilderness areas. Another thing that seems to have reduced in focus in recent years, but is still good advice that is still valid now.
An expansion for illusionists by Peter Aronson, bringing them up to 14th level and 7th level spells. Introduces those lovely annoyances color spray, phantasmal killer and dispel exhaustion, among others. Now you know who to blame.
Expansions for Royal armies of the hyperborean age, and Dungeon!
Pimping for "Classic warfare", "Citadel", and "White bear and Red Moon".
Fiction: The Gnome Cache by Garrison Ernst. The first piece of fiction set in Oerth, and immediately I learn some stuff about it I never knew before. Ends on a too be continued, and I'm already interested in seeing what happens next, how Greyhawk developed while it was still young and vital.
An attempt to convert LOTR elves to D&D. Sylvan elves are common and magically nerfed, sindar are equal to standard D&D elves, while Noldor are twinked out. As you may gather, there is no attempt at balance at all.
The number of adverts continues to increase, but more welcomingly, the amount of fiction has as well. With the use of articles by freelancers, the tone definitely feels a lot more diverse. There is a quite substantial quotient of silliness, and it's obvious that many readers found the tropes of the day as lampoonable as we do. The days when things like the ecology of monsters and realistic ramifications of spells on society would become discussed are still some time away.
It opens with an editorial spelling out their new intentions - to cease being a house organ (which of course they did successfully for over 20 years before WotC swallowed them up again) but instead to cover the whole roleplaying scene.
They go on-again, off-again about this. For several years you'll get some gaming articles on non-D&D stuff, then it'll dry up, then there will be some more until it finally stops well before WoTC even exists. You might get an occassional small article about another game but you'll never see anything extensive and never a mention of anyone that could have been considered a major competitor. It could simply be that no-one ever sent in an article on GURPS or Vampire or Harn or any of a number of things.
Fiction: The Gnome Cache by Garrison Ernst. The first piece of fiction set in Oerth, and immediately I learn some stuff about it I never knew before. Ends on a too be continued, and I'm already interested in seeing what happens next, how Greyhawk developed while it was still young and vital.
Don't tease me like this. What did you learn?
__________________ Currently running: Sufficiently Advanced over Maptool. Soon to change. If you'd like to join in a short 3-8 session campaign for various systems, drop by our forums.
I double-dog-dare you to make your game sound super cool without comparing it to other editions. - paraphrased from Umbran.
The strategic review 7: April 1976
Finally, a monster I don't recognize. The denebian slime devil. I can see why this one never caught on, as it's basicaly an unkillable comic relief annoyance monster.
"The Denebian Slime Devil" is a reference to the original Star Trek series, episode: "The Trouble with Tribbles".
Ah, lots of good stuff can be found over the years in Dragon. I still have a word document with a list of my favorite articles of all time. Interestingly, while 3e is my favorite edition of the game, my favorite Dragon articles are generally from 1e and 2e (my favorite 3e articles are almost exclusively the Demonomicon and Core Beliefs).
__________________ "The designers of the newest edition built so much reliance on rules right into the game, to make it easier to play. As one of those designers, I occasionally think to myself, 'What have we wrought?' " -Monte Cook
" If the DM has to make a lot of judgment calls, the game is more difficult to learn. However, it's my belief that it's also more satisfying." -Monte Cook
"Don't let rules replace good DMing skills"- Monte Cook
Mainly the big cosmological stuff. That oerth and earth (and urth and yirth, as they will mention later) are all alternate timelines with relatively recent divergences on a cosmic scale. It's another instance of how much closer the various worlds were at that point. They thought very little of crossing over between boot hill, gamma world and D&D, and we get plenty of examples of that. A far cry from later products (3rd ed ravenloft suffered particularly badly from this) where due to licencing issues, they couldn't even mention stuff from other D&D settings, and had to dance around the issue where those crossovers had been important in the setting's history.
Quote:
Originally Posted by amysrevenge
lol I wonder who wrote under that name. :P
Yeah. It's not like Gary to normally be shy about taking credit for the things he did.
Another step upwards in production values takes place here, a full color cover, and the first internal color art as well. Along with that, the confidence of the editorial staff seems to be growing. They've found a basic formula, and now they're refining it. Quite a few of the regular features are still missing, but they're putting more articles that span multiple issues in now, with the expectation that people are buying multiple successive issues to get the full story. Which means those bugbears Continuity and Metaplot begin their slow growth into the monsters that would entwine their tentacles around and inside the 90's, violating so many peoples play experiences, here.
In this issue.
A formal arena fighting system for monks. Essentially an entirely different system of combat based around selecting a sequence of fighting moves (6 in a row, which reminds me of burning wheels scripted combat.) and then consulting a table which makes certain moves effective or useless against other ones, rock paper scissors stylee, and seeing how each sequence turns out. This is basically its own self contained minigame, and looks like it could be quite fun, as it involves far less luck than regular D&D combat, but more ability to second guess your opponent, and is a lot more tactical. I'd definitely like to try it sometime.
The second installment of The Gnome Cache and the conclusion of the Search for the Forbidden Chamber. The contrast between these two stories is quite striking, when looked at in succession and shows that people were already playing the game with very different tones.
Hints for dungeon construction, with a particular emphasis on traps and tricks. Adventurers should never trust magic items in old-school games. You never know when one of them is going to explode or curse you with something embaressing.
Fiction: Shadow of a demon by Gardner F Fox. Some very old skool (and rather mysogynistic) swords and sorcery, with some wonderfully florid prose. A real guilty pleasure to read. Their habit of continuing articles several pages becomes really irritating when reading in .pdf, however
Some stuff on Queztalcoatal and aztec culture. Completely systemless, and rather dry.
Remorhaz! With classic Erol Otus artwork! Another iconic weird D&D monster gets its start here.
Finally, a new class that never caught on. The alchemist. That perennial problem of being too dependent on downtime and components makes them ill suited to adventuring (although someone really could do something that does for alchemists what indiana jones did for archeology, as seeking out rare formulae and components is a very adventurable process) and so that is quite understandable.
More Dirt.
A weapons specialisation and two weapon fighting system. Oh yes, another optional rule granting additional powers with no drawbacks. Not that it really balances fighters in comparison to all the amazing things spellcasters can do at high levels. But we've got to give the fighter players some choice to keep them from getting bored. Otherwise we'd lose our meat shields, and that would be no good now, would it .
An advert for Gods, Demigods and Heroes, billed as "The Last D&D Supplement!?!" (Ahahahahaha!!!!! ahem) Already feel like your're scraping the bottom of the barrel folks? Fear not. You will scrape many a barrel more before your time is up.
Lots of good fiction in this one, but the rules stuff isn't as well integrated as in previous issues. Still not a lot of actual setting, just whatever is nececary for the adventure.
It opens with an editorial spelling out their new intentions - to cease being a house organ (which of course they did successfully for over 20 years before WotC swallowed them up again) but instead to cover the whole roleplaying scene.
Quote:
Originally Posted by WayneLigon
They go on-again, off-again about this. For several years you'll get some gaming articles on non-D&D stuff, then it'll dry up, then there will be some more until it finally stops well before WoTC even exists. You might get an occassional small article about another game but you'll never see anything extensive and never a mention of anyone that could have been considered a major competitor. It could simply be that no-one ever sent in an article on GURPS or Vampire or Harn or any of a number of things.
And shortly after WotC, there were a lot of angry letters about non-D&D articles, people would be mad about the 1 Alternity article that would show up each issue. WotC finally switched it to all-D&D with issue #274 because I think there was a lot of popular demand for it to be all D&D at that point.
__________________ "Y'know, I think my favorite thing about being a hero of destiny is that it gives you all kinds of narrative justification to just slay any ol' jerk who gets in your way." -- 8-bit Theater
"i did not serve with napolean in his artillery. but i did play wargames with him and his men." -- diaglo
At last! We have a table of contents! Hooray hooray caloo calay! Truly, advancement is made of things that seem utterly obvious and indispensable once you have them. We also have the first letters page actually containing letters from the public, not just more stuff from Gary. However, as a result of these letters they decided that the amount of fiction was too high in the last couple of issues, so they're going to cut down. Have we already seen the high watermark in terms of systemless fiction ratio in Dragon?That was surprisingly quick, since its only been 4 issues since the first story. Or will it creep up again? We shall see.
In this issue:
An article of the death of War of the Empires, a play by post (that's snail mail, not internet message board, just to be absolutely clear) that died abruptly when the creator lost interest and simply stopped answering messages. (an all too familiar tale.) and his attempts to revive it. A reminder that many things we take for granted required huge amounts of effort to make work back then.
Our first Women in D&D article. This one is disastrously laughable. Typical of the time, there are no roleplaying notes at all, merely a load of tables detailing how female characters differ statistically from male ones. Attractive female characters get "seduction magic" regardless of class among other things, (including the potential for ugly witches to scare their target to death when they try and use it) which I think says it all. Yeah, they'd never have got away with this one even 10 years later, let alone now. Include in your game at your peril.
The search for the gnome cache continues.
Birth tables for D&D. No, not that kind, don't giggle, although given the previous article I wouldn't have been surprised at that. This is just for random generation of social class, siblings, parents occupation and other mundane stuff for people who can't be bothered to make a background themselves, or want to leave it up to chance. Nothing wrong with it, but not particularly brilliant and detailed either.
Comic: The adventures of Finieous Fingers and Fred and Charly by JD. Considerably larger and more detailed than Dirt, but still a pretty simple self-contained premise. We've still got a way to go before we get demented metaplot and in-joke filled stuff like Yamara.
Wargaming world, a collection of miniatures reviews. As I remember seeing those when I was reading first time round, I presume this also becomes a regular feature.
We're starting to get international DM listings in Mapping the Dungeons. Which I guess is significant.
The letters are interesting. We have our first case of fan copying being stamped down upon, (and the resultant outrage) and a tremendously long and pedantic letter about the unbalancedness of an article in a previous issue. Already business as usual then .
6 new classes, including 2 joke ones: Healers, Scribes, Samurai, Berserkers, Idiots and Jesters. In addition, they expand on dwarves abilities and abilities to enter classes. A good reminder of just how low demihuman limits were at this point, even compared to 2nd ed AD&D. The classes are typically wonky, with the healer unable to do any healing until they get to 3rd level, but able to raise dead from 3rd level up as well, Scribes having a monopoly on spellbook copying, which forces every wizard to pay them exorbitant amounts if they want new spells, and Berserkers having a requirement of an intelligence less than 9. These could definitely have done with some more playtesting and consideration of their ramifications on the world.
Dirt continues.
As you may have gathered, there is a lot of crap in this issue. Fortunately, it's still entertaining crap, that wouldn't make it into future books (as dragon continues to expand, I expect that this will become the norm, and its the stuff that does influence future canon that will become noteworthy.) and so only cause problems for the kind of groups that throw every optional rule in there for the hell of it. And the format continues to grow ever more familiar.
Your three historical events: Fineous Fingers' first strip, the first 'women and gaming' article, and the first but not last bare-boobie picture.
The letter from Scott Rosenberg in Out on a Limb is just beyond funny. He wants to cut and paste tables from the books into a more convenient format, then sell the resulting product, and can't understand why this ticks off TSR. He cites the 'Xerox Revolution'. Funny how he's twenty years ahead of 'information wants to be free' meme.
One thing I like reading are the ads. Back then if you didn't go to conventions the only way you'd ever learn about a products existance was through the pages of The Dragon or (later) other magazines. Right now, we see the first Judge's Guild stuff, which I think makes them the first real third-party publisher. It's not even 'City State of the Invincible Overlord' right now, it's just a map billed as 'above-ground dungeon'
The letter from Scott Rosenberg in Out on a Limb is just beyond funny. He wants to cut and paste tables from the books into a more convenient format, then sell the resulting product, and can't understand why this ticks off TSR. He cites the 'Xerox Revolution'. Funny how he's twenty years ahead of 'information wants to be free' meme.
The more things change, the more they stay the same.
Would quoting the Book of Ecclesiastes here be considered a breach of the no-religion rule?
__________________ "Y'know, I think my favorite thing about being a hero of destiny is that it gives you all kinds of narrative justification to just slay any ol' jerk who gets in your way." -- 8-bit Theater
"i did not serve with napolean in his artillery. but i did play wargames with him and his men." -- diaglo
Your three historical events: Fineous Fingers' first strip, the first 'women and gaming' article, and the first but not last bare-boobie picture.
You know, I never even noticed that one. But then, it was years before I noticed the blatant nipplage in the illo of Morgan the basic set fighter. My mind is insufficiently dirty.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Orius
The more things change, the more they stay the same.
Would quoting the Book of Ecclesiastes here be considered a breach of the no-religion rule?
Just give us a chapter/verse reference so we can look it up ourselves.
Our first themed issue, this expands to 36 pages. As you may have noticed tekumel's setting detail has shown to be easily the best available in a game (well, it was still a small field) at this time. The people back then noticed it as well, and the editor goes as far as to call it "superior to middle-earth in matters that concern gamers". Which may be hyperbole, but hey.
This issue contains:
Reports submitted to the petal throne. We see our first case of attempting to integrate peoples campaigns into a larger universe, and the inherent problems that generates with continuity, particularly when some GM's are "overly generous" with advancement. (M.A.R's opinion on this is pretty similar to Gary's, the players should have to work hard for every level they get, and the journey is more interesting than the destination, as high level characters acquire responsibilities with their power that make further adventuring difficult ) He concludes that the simplest solution is to consider all campaigns equally valid parallel universes.
From this point we get lots of adventure hooks and setting detail, presented as reports to the petal throne, and the emperor's reaction to these reports. Which is an interesting way of doing it, and makes it easy for GM's to turn them into adventures. Pretty good stuff overall.
Metamorphosis Alpha! TSR's first science fiction RPG starts here. Vat grown Androids have inflitrated the human tribes. They could be anyone, including the leaders. Only pink fuzzy balls can detect the interlopers and ensure the freedom of humanity! There's a bit more depth than that, but yes, this is a silly setting. Lets not go there. (cue camelot)
A random encounter table for tekumel.
The battle of the temple of Chanis. More dense, information heavy stuff combining setting overview with in character narration to give you an excellent snapshot of an event and the culture that surrounds it.
Monsters for Tekumel. The inscrutable, hermaphroditic, shapechanging Mihalli, and the Viragga, which are essentially organic squid/tank hybrids with lots of tentacles. As with other stuff, a lot more attention is placed upon their behaviors and place in the world than contempory D&D monsters.
An update on the joke monsters described in SR3. Beware the ring of wedding and Bi-labial fricative. Really. Don't say you weren't warned.
Fiction: Roads from Jakalla by Jerry Westergaard. Nice to see some tekumel stuff that isn't by M.A.R, as his distinctive tone does get a bit dull in large quantities.
They said Dirt was cancelled for space reasons in the editorial, and yet here it is. Guess there was a bit more room at the last minute than they expected.
Wargaming world: Lots of staple low level D&D monsters this time around.
A recommended reading by Gary Gygax. Poul Anderson, Tolkien, Lovecraft, Vance, Weinbaum; you ought to know the score by now. Go read them. It'll explain a lot.
Finieous fingers & fred & charly continues to entertain.
Magical Eyes for Tekumel.
The temple of Vimuhla for tekumel. A detailed set of photographs of its construction as a miniatures battleground. This suffers from the poor resolution of the .pdf scans, preventing me from looking as closely as I'd like. I suspect this problem will become more frequent in later issues as the amount of higher quality color artwork increases. Which is a shame.
After this issue, I definitely have a decent idea of what the setting of tekumel was like. Which is a lot more than can be said for greyhawk. Whatever happened to it? When and why did it descend into its current state of publishing limbo. Hopefully I'll find out as I read onwards.
) and its successors, Dragon, and Little Wars (whatever happened to that? Oh well, I guess I'll probably find out in a while) to be published on alternating months, and their new staff. (Dave Sutherland, oh yes, we're talking iconic here) This is exciting stuff, and I have to wonder how people reacted at the time. Hopefully the letters page will be apprearing soon so I can find out. Anyone who was there at the time, I want to hear your comments as well. 
Linear Mode
And yet another word from our sponsors
