Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="(un)reason" data-source="post: 8697125" data-attributes="member: 27780">Polyhedron Issue 111: September 1995part 5/5The Raven's Bluff Trumpeter: The newspaper continues to be one of the most interesting parts of the newszine, once again bringing us metaplot developments that you could have got involved with at the time. Melissa Eldarin's term as Lord Speaker is expiring, so it's time for another election contest. Will she win it again, or will a plucky challenger take her place? Submit your applications and then come to Winter Fantasy next year for another big series of challenges that will test your brain, heart and wallet.It's also all-change in the underworld. Anton Paere was found dead in an alley, literally backstabbed by some unknown assailant. Forensics later revealed that he was actually killed by magic, then stabbed as a red herring. Now there's the predictable turf wars to see who winds up new top dog of organised crime. Will Raven's Bluff wind up a safer and less corrupt place in the long-term as a result of this, will they use it as a springboard for interesting new adventures and give PC thieves a chance to make their marks here or will it turn out to be a big fakeout like Ambassador Carrague's death, and he'll get raised or turn out to never really have been dead at all as part of a diabolical master plan? After all the knightly stuff last issue, it would be nice if they catered to morally ambiguous PC's a bit more as well, but I'm not holding my breath, with the code of conduct and whatnot.City in Transition: New network co-ordinator Scott Douglas gives us a state of address. They've changed and added quite a bit in the past year, adding three new Living settings, with a 4th coming next month, and done a lot to Raven's Bluff, but there's still a number of big plans they haven't managed to get around too yet. On top of the revised character creation rules, knighthoods, and laws we've just seen, they're also planning on revising the author submission rules, adventure judging guidelines, adding mage guilds so they have a social group to rival the knightly stuff, creating downtime rules so you can continue to develop your character between conventions and doing more big metaplot stuff involving Raven's Bluff getting into a war, which should provide some dramatic tournament adventure possibilities for a year or two. This just reinforces my impressions from last issue. Like TSR in general, their ambitions continue to grow even as sales slip, and they'll keep on adding more spinning plates to the show until they overreach themselves and it all comes crashing down. If this year has upped the amount of drama, there'll be even more next year. :rubs hands:Join Us!: Another bit of low content promotion as they remind us that club memberships exist, and there are real benefits to having one. Hell, even without the RPGA bit, a formalised gaming club still has plenty of merits in terms of helping finding the kind of game you want and pooling resources, saving you money and making sure one person isn't stuck GMing until they burn out. When you add in the RPGA benefits of discounts at selected stores, exclusive contests and opportunities to playtest unreleased material, the deal looks even better. Can't argue with their logic, but can't work up any excitement either. Another of those things you have to print every year or two for the sake of the newbies. Another issue filled with very interesting Living City and general Forgotten Realms material, but as soon as they step out from that, it's just the same old basic advice and low content promotional bilge. So let's move on, and see how many of the stated plans they manage to get done before TSR bites the bucket, as the clock is counting down at what seems like increasing speed.</blockquote>

Verification