Let's read the entire run

[(un)reason]

Dragon Issue 113: September 1986

part 4/4

Fiction: A difficult undertaking by Harry Turtledove. Hmm. Interesting. This is a fairly well known author. What's he doing in here? They must agree with me, because they let him put 9 page story in the magazine. A dramatic tale of barbarians vs civilization, as they try to outwit one another to break a siege, with strongly defined leads on both sides. It manages to stay serious right up to the end, at which point it lapses into using one of the worst puns ever as it's punchline. Which certainly makes it memorable, at any rate. I'm not sure if I should praise him for that, or groan in annoyance. Eh, even if I can't decide if I like it or not, I'm definitely not bored by it, which lets face it, would be worse.

Easy as 1, 2, 3: Rick Swan! Another of my personal fave authors debuts in Dragon. Unfortunately, my enthusiasm is easily quashed, as this turns out to be another boring NPC creation advice piece. Also, Playing out scenarios and questions for your NPC in your head to determine how they'd react? How very amateur dramatics. You can already see why he fit right in in the 2nd ed era. Keep plugging away, honing that craft. Come back when you're ready to give us something really cool.

One roll to go: Hmm. This is a clever little bit of tableage. Want to streamline the rolling of vast amounts of attacks and saves? Determine the odds, roll percentile dice, and consult the tables to determine how many succeed. Can handle up to 20 rolls at once. How very handy. This is definitely one to note down and use when those kobolds unleash their onslaughts of burning arrows and acid flasks. It could probably be refined (d1000 would only take one more die, and increase the precision hugely, saving time that this method wastes resolving rounding errors. ) but it is a great idea. The math wonk in me definitely approves.

Top [secret] gun: Looks like another movie has entered the public consciousness, and is already producing worthy puns. As you may have inferred, this is about putting fighter planes into Top Secret. A considerably easier thing to do than incorporating nukes, but still a case where the spotlight may be taken by one player, and everyone else has to sit the scene out, or the whole team can wind up dying from a failed roll. So here's a pretty simplified set of rules for flying and air combat. This should keep it from bogging down and taking over entire sessions, allowing you to get back to the espionage. Neither very impressive or utterly crap, this is just another filler article really.

Minimag: Another example of their renewed desire to include random fun stuff to keep the magazine fresh. Here we have a couple of pages of Marvel dioramas built and photographed by Mike Sitkiewicz. How very curious. Once again, this has managed to raise a few smiles, and keep this issue surprising. This is the kind of thing that's cool as an experiment, but I probably wouldn't want to see as a regular feature. I am curious how he managed to get spidey suspended on a thin support like that. Either that thread is stronger than it looks, or there's a hidden wire somewhere.

Cold steel: Gamma world gets another article designed to provide new challenges to higher level PC's. Like the Exterminator, these are a bunch of robots from the past, designed to kick much ass, and now their creators are gone, they simply continue following their programming, causing much inconvenience to anyone who happens to fulfill the wrong criteria. The Cybohunter, the Robohunter, and the Manhunter, each getting increasingly large and deadly (and in the last case, it has lots of ancillary drones, so even if you split up and run away, you're still screwed. ) While nowhere as ridiculous as the giant mecha from issue 101, these are still nothing to be sneezed at, and make considerably more sense in terms of setting integration. With any luck, the cutting down on sci-fi stuff means only the better articles get through, and this is a pretty solid piece.

Star cops: Looks like playing law enforcement has come to Traveller as well, with this set of rules for playing characters both active and retired. While you might not get as much freedom, you'll definitely face a challenging life. You might want to fudge the rolls a little if you're playing active officers, so all the PC's are kept on the same assignments, and no-one gets stuck in a desk job watching the others go off and have fun. You'll pick up a different set of skills to the military guys, but chances are you can still get pretty badass. Another solid but unexceptional addition to the many many career choices Traveler players now have before them. You could have an entire team without duplicating careers once. Which is a good thing from a niche protection perspective. Now all you've got to do is keep track of where all the rules for the different careers are found.

GURPs fantasy. The first supplement, but not the last. Lets get this treadmill rolling. We spent 5 years developing this. Now it's time to make some profit.

Wormy has a troll toll bridge. The rat is not the brains of the outfit. Dragonmirth has lots of things going wrong. Snarf realizes a year has almost passed and he has to get back quick. Good thing he has a spaceship then.

The official AD&D paint set gets advertised again.

Well, they certainly seem to be keeping to their promises. There have been quite a few surprises in this issue, including some very amusing bits. However, they were also right in saying not all of them would be to everyone's taste, and some of them would be by people who don't necessarily know what they're talking about. And no matter how well considered the editorial policy, they can't turn a sows ear into a silk purse. If they don't have the material to work with, they can't make a truly brilliant magazine. Still hopefully they'll continue to find and deliver a few surprises per issue to keep them from feeling like a waste of time.

 

[(un)reason]

Dragon Issue 114: October 1986

108 pages. Hmm. Rather risque cover this month. That veil was totally added on afterwards to sell this pic to a family friendly magazine! I call shenanigans. On the plus side, they're taking halloween seriously this year. But will we be scared? That's the important question. And if so, in what way? Visceral horror? Looming dread? Fear for the future of the hobby? We shall see. Turn the page, open the door, and lets hope the giant bees are friendly.

In this issue:

Letters: A letter from someone who fears the coming of 2nd ed. Will you keep it compatible with the old edition? Can we return our old books for a reduced price on the new ones. David Cook takes the mic to assure everyone that 2nd ed will be as similar as possible, only with the crap bits no-one uses anyway taken out, and the rest better organized. A promise he can probably say he kept.
A letter from someone confused about psionics. Activating a power counts as your attack, maintaining it doesn't. Makes sense, doesn't it?

Holy crap. Someone impersonated Roger Moore at comiccon and managed to fool the entire convention, to the point where he got on panels and answered questions about TSR. Now that's chutzpah. And then he sent a letter telling TSR he'd done this and asked for a job, for doing it so well. Now that crosses the line into full-on insanity. Roger officially apologizes for everyone confused by this. Could people not do that. It's not going to get you a job here, and may well get your ass sued. Ahh, geekery. This is like ripping the hair and clothes off your favorite boyband member if they get too close. It will not endear you to them. Still, it's amusing for the rest of us to read about. Even funnier than their editorials about the satanic D&D rumours, and Arthur Collins' mum writing in to complain.

Forum loses it's definite article. Why do they keep doing that?
Fr Patrick J Dolan has complicated feelings about making gods in the game fightable. Well, being a priest, he would. He comes down with a compromise. While portraying the supreme god as anything less than almighty would be disrespectful, angels, and most gods from other pantheons are not generally portrayed as so, so PC's should have a chance of tricking or beating them. This can still lead to fun games. And also puts his faith above everyone else's A rhetorical win all round.
Jeannie Whited keeps playing D&D despite the sexism. Well, sorta, as her character has special powers, and the whole game is houseruled to unrecognisability anyway. The point is, she's having fun and hopes other girls aren't put off just because the official rules are stupid.
Joseph Maccarrone thinks putting a hit location system in D&D is stupid. Hit points are not purely a matter of physical toughness. Someone subscribes to the narrative model then. You'll be fighting a losing battle against some of the official writers for a while then
Mark Nemeth thinks that the new typeface and way of heading articles is ugly. Also, how could people want less realistic articles? Everyone wants their games as realistic as possible! You must have read the survey wrong! Uh, yeah. Riiiiiight. The editors will just look at you and shuffle slowly away.
Andy Parris thinks that the rules for two-weapon fighting are completely unrealistic. You can so parry with the off-hand weapon. Yes, but is it balanced? Do you want to see the rise of Drizzt in every campaign?

Witches again. This is the fourth time, not counting the reprint in the first best of. It has been quite some time since the last time, but really, why do it again. Last time was pretty solid. This isn't even that different from last time. Some abilities have been added, others slightly reduced in power, and the formatting is probably better this time around. (apart from the spell table. They really have got to check test printings. I know all too well the pain of what lines up perfectly on the screen coming out wonky. ) Still, is it really that popular? Do they not have enough good new submissions? Is this a response to the recent flare up of sexist accusations, an attempt to pander to their female readers? In any case, this is 12 pages of reheated rehash. A very unsatisfactory start indeed.

Grave encounters: Oh yeah, it's Halloween time. That means spooky articles. Although there is very little spooky about 3 pages of tables. (500 pages of tables full of disturbing entries, a la FATAL, is another matter altogether, of course. ) On the other hand, these are very cleverly done indeed. Tables for random encounters in graveyards. The trick here is that they are sorted not only for degree of corruption, but also time of day, and phase of the moon as well. So adventurers can choose just how brave they are by when the venture into the graveyard, scaling the challenge in a more naturalistic manner. This is a very well done set, both conceptually, and in terms of formatting. I would have no objection to using these at all.

 

[(un)reason]

Dragon Issue 114: October 1986

part 2/4

Traveller: 2300! New state of the art edition! Oh, this will result in flamewars.

The elven Cavalier: Like the barbarian cleric, it seems we have another example of forbidding something resulting in people creating a whole new class to fill that void. So yeah, the elven cavalier, the exemplar of the idea of mounted bowman, riding through the forest, singing tra la la lally and ing any evil creatures who intrude on their land right up. As is far too often the case with fan-made elf stuff, they gain rather more powers than they sacrifice, when compared to their human counterparts. This is a definite sign of their new commitment to immediate cool stuff over game balance. I find myself pretty much obliged to disapprove. You carry on at this rate, and all the races will have access to every class, ( ) only slightly different for each one, requiring tons of annoying checking to keep track of the differences. And don't even try and sell me the idea that purely fluff based roleplaying hinderances balance out mechanical advantages. I may have fallen for that when I was 15, and the swashbuckler from the complete fighters handbook was all the rage, but I'm not falling for it again. I call twinkitude! Get out of my sight!

Turtlemania rages on! Palladium pimp their primary line at this point strongly.

Many kinds of money: Economy, economy, you will be the death of me. A simple currency, based on metals of the highest purity? Such as simple idea could never be allowed here. For if a government wants to control the economy, they must maintain control of the money. And the best way to do that is to separate it from real, objectively measurable things like the gold standard, and create a currency based purely on fiat, trickery, and demand, who's only value is what people agree it's value is. Slightly trickier when you have magic that demands specific values of specific objects (or at least, specific quantities.) and even tricker when you have magic that provides an objective assessment of an object's value that isn't index linked to the local markets. Anyway, the point that this article is making is that having gold, silver, copper, etc pieces that are all exactly the same size and weight, accepted everywhere, is incredibly unrealistic. Oriental Adventures has proved popular enough to prove that gamers are capable of accepting the concept of multiple currencies in their fantasy. So go for it. Put in as much complexity to this as you think you and your players can stand. Remember also that counterfeiting is a rich ground for adventures, on both sides of the law, so you should consider that as a plot hook as well. One of those articles I both approve of, and am wary about actually using, as it could wind up being very dull if done wrong. Eh, I wouldn't be doing this if I didn't like a challenge.

The ecology of the Remorhaz: Welcome to our third collaborative ecology (lest you forget, beholders and centaurs also got co-written.) This is not particularly epic, but does have plenty of depth, creating a creature that probably could just about exist in the real world. Of course, making it's metabolism work realistically does involve nerfing it a bit, but unless your players are the sort who like hit and run tactics and harrying their enemy into submission over long periods of time, this is unlikely to be an issue. And if they do try tactics like that, you probably ought to be rewarding them for doing so anyway. There's plenty of stuff here for those who like to capture creatures or harvest them for their organs. Another solid bit of ecological work here.

Combined generation: Ahh here we see one of the reasons they decided to do a new edition. Due to the not particularly brilliant organization, looking up all the tables for character generation has grown increasingly unwieldy as new supplements are introduced. Of course, compiling them in a magazine article may not be the best way to fix it, but they've had the idea, and by gosh they're going to do it, because the page count needs padding at the last minute. Or something, because this feels very much like a filler article, with it's word count and shape edited to fit around the number of adverts. Meh.

Class struggles: Welcome to another rehash. Training to gain levels presents a substantial problem at low levels. You also need to be able to train yourself at higher levels, otherwise it would become impossible to to advance and the state of knowledge would gradually degenerate over generations. It also suffers from D&D's ridiculous union carteled price fixing. This is one case where I have always ignored the rules as written, and the game has not suffered from this at all. This alternate system is slightly more generous in general, but also divides costs up so you have to determine the price for each ability separately. It makes some rather dubious decisions, such as escalating costs for weapon proficiencies (how are they to know what level you are? ) which abilities count as innate, and even the levels at which proficiencies are gained. So yeah, I disagree with both the premise and many of the specifics of this article, and do not intend to use it in any form. Bleah.

 

[(un)reason]

Dragon Issue 114: October 1986

part 3/4

It's a hit, but where?: A second hit location system in quick succession? What is this? Alternatives month? At least this one only adds one roll to your attacks, and even then, only sometimes. But is still pretty unsatisfying in other respects, (it really isn't that hard to hit someone in the eye. I could do it as a kid, and I definitely didn't have any class levels) not giving enough detail on what effects losing a limb has. It does get kudos for including hit location tables for flail snails and wolf in sheep's clothings. These humorous touches make it more interesting reading but don't change the fact that this is yet more rehash I have no desire to include in my game. How very tiresome.

A recipe for espionage: Once again we are confronted with the problem that far too many GM's, presented with Top Secret, just throw the characters into the same old dungeon crawls, reskinned as warehouses and secret bases, where the characters engage in the same old killing and taking of stuff, only with firearms instead of fireballs. And as ever, it's up to the magazine to show them that this is badwrongfun, and they ought to be constructing their adventures more like a James Bond movie, with witty banter, spectacular locations, and actual information gathering being important. The writer weaves visuals that strongly evoke the feel of an 80's tv show, with the camera panning over a beautiful landscape full of shiny houses with expensive cars parked in front of them while a saxophone plays. They attend expensive parties, get picked up by their spymasters to receive assignments in private jets, and use mobile phones the size of bricks and laptops the size of suitcases with pride. They can play it episodic or go for extensive undercover missions. They get assigned bizarre tasks with awkward conditions as part of their training and testing. They can get captured and forced to deal with their enemies maniacal whims, fighting against leopards in nothing but a loincloth. This is entertaining, and often rather silly stuff, that definitely shows the influence of the TV shows and movies of the era. I have no objection to this, although I would urge caution. Don't want to overdo the gonzo, do we.

Robotech coming soon! Another palladium licence. Can this outshine TMNT? We shall see.

Dungeon once again offers you a bargain starting subscription price. And does so with another rather funny advert. They seem to know what they're doing here.

Guilty as charged: Top secret gets a second article this month. Sometimes, you get caught by the enemy, and have to be tried for the crimes you commit in the course of your job. Sometimes, you capture the enemy, and will have to serve as witnesses in their trial. And sometimes, you rebel, or get turned into a scapegoat and wind up imprisoned by your own side. And if you mess up, then the agency may well deny your membership, and even it's own existence, and hang you out to dry with the mundane police. Anyway, there's plenty of drama to be had in this scenario, so lets introduce a few optional rules, spin it out a bit longer and allow for a bit more nuance, shall we? Another one I quite approve of. Courtroom drama is a rich ground for roleplaying that doesn't get nearly enough attention, when it's perfectly designed for it, especially LARPing. I'd love to get a chance to play around in that genre for a bit. This would of course involve having players who don't slaughter everything and refuse to negotiate at all, forcing you to kill them instead of surrendering if it looks like they're going to lose. Eh, that's not that rare these days, is it?

The marvel-phile: Rather a long, and slightly nostalgic marvel-phile this month, as we head up to the moon, to see the Inhumans and their stats. Black Bolt, Medusa, Maximus, Crystal, Gorgon, Karnak, and Triton. While they have tremendous powers that have interesting parallels to their mythical namesakes, they are also curiously vulnerable to disease, pollution, and the other mundane unpleasantness of the earth, which prevents them from living down here long term. They are rather morally ambiguous as a whole, having been both good and bad, and riven by internal conflict. Plenty of interesting plots can be hatched involving them. Jeff also gives us some more info about the differences between the old game, and the new Advanced version. Like OD&D to AD&D, this is really just expansion and clarification rather than a major change. You won't have to do tons of relearning. You do get to define your place in the world better, with more info on contacts and base building. Even editorial screwage can't get Jeff down. He'll just chatter about everything, including his personal life. His star is still very much in the ascendant. Once again I've enjoyed reading his contribution to the magazine.

 

[(un)reason]

Dragon Issue 114: October 1986

part 4/4

The dungeoneers survival guide. The first proper AD&D book without Gary at the helm. We still haven't heard anything about that, he's just stopped appearing in the magazine. How very worrisome.

The immortals set. Just in time for christmas. Are you ready to go cosmic! Awesome. Now you can finally win D&D for good.

The role of computers: This month's main review is of Wizards Crown, another adventure game. Explore the world, get stuff, and advance your characters to win back the titular wizard's crown. Make sure you save it frequently, otherwise you may find yourself suffering massive amounts of frustration, because it's a big and tricky game. Ahh, the differences between computer and tabletop RPG's, where this kind of thing is expected. Unlike the first few reviews, this is a game I didn't already know about, so it was interesting on that level. But on another, the novelty is wearing off, and this column is starting to feel like business as usual. I suspect we'll have some dull issues for this as well before it comes to an end.

Running guns: Battletech gets an article this month. As ever, nice to see them covering games they have not done previously. As is often the case, this article tackles something ignored in the main books. Humanoid mechs get all the glory, while boring things like tanks, missile launchers and PPC's get ignored, even when they do actually play a significant part in the battle. Just like the trenches and the planes in WW1. So here we have three new vehicles statted out for your enjoyment. Will they be the crucial tipping point in your fight, or merely cannon fodder? One of those questions I can't answer due to unfamiliarity with the system. Still, as with revenge of the nobodies, and heroic mortal exalted games, getting to see the world from a slightly lower down perspective than the PC default and face the consequences can make for very interesting gaming. So I think I'll give this one a thumbs up.

High-tech hijinks: Our final article is only sorta a sci-fi one, despite being in this section. It's about putting high-tech devices into your fantasy world. Fitting, given Blackmoor is just being released in a new version. Do you want them for a brief crossover (and if so, how will you take them away after the episode is over) or do you want them here for good? Who made it, when and why. And the critical question of how powerful it should be compared to magic and how you differentiate the two. This gives us some pretty specific answers to these questions. Needing batteries and repairs is a good way to take them out of player hands after a bit, weapons should be more powerful than regular ones, but not ridiculously so, buying and selling them should be a bitch, and magitech and bombs should not be allowed. Ok then. Seems pretty sensible. This is not entirely a good thing. Quite a number of games, from shadowrun, to rifts, to d20 modern, will merge magic and technology integrally in the future and be successful, so this advice seems rather dated. Take a few more risks. It's not going to kill you, and if it kills your game, you can just start a new one. Balance is not essential to fun.

Wormy gets to see his horde of new recruits. Dragonmirth plays with our expectations again. Snarf finds claiming the throne is not as simple as he'd hoped.

MERP is once again on the back cover with a new edition. And yet we've never seen an actual article for it, despite years of press. What's up with that? You'd think that given how much of D&D is derived from it, someone would at least try. Are the approvals people a bunch of s, as has often been the case where the tolkien estate is involved?

Not a very good issue at all, with a ridiculously high degree of recycled material, particularly in the D&D bits. The articles covering other games are rather better, especially the top secret ones, but as a whole, this still leaves me unsatisfied. It also demonstrates that covering multiple systems really does make it much easier to maintain interest, as even if you tackle similar topics, the rules and setting quirks means they manifest differently in each game. How will they solve this problem? Believe me, I'm very eager to find out too.

 

[(un)reason]

Dragon Issue 115: November 1986

part 1/4

108 pages. Looks like another class special. This time, it's thieves turn, with 6 articles devoted to them. Wait a minute, wasn't the last class special in issue 104 also a thief one? And in 84, they did two cleric specials with nothing else between, in issue 85 and 92. This isn't very symmetrical. What are the editors thinking?
We also get to see their sales figures again. And it looks like the slow decline has been taking place in earnest. With an average of 108,000, but a latest issue figure of only 101,000, that means they've been losing an average of over 1,000 readers per month this year. Were you one of those people? (Given my current level of enthusiasm, I might well have been one of those people if I was reading at that time. ) Lets hope they can stem that decline. But lets not be too pessimistic. There's still plenty of cool material there. Along with the D&D thieves, there's also quite a bit of top secret material again, which is pleasing.
Also notable is Kim's abrupt departure, leaving Roger in charge of two magazines at once. Can someone fill me in on the behind the scenes stuff that led to this? Lets hope that doesn't result in even more slipshod editing over the next few issues. Looks like having barely recovered from the last big shakeup, there's going to be some more in the near future. This is morbidly interesting.

In this issue:

Letters: The introduction of a computer column has obviously resulted in a lot of mail for them, mostly positive. They've printed five of them, with a mix of questions and suggestions. This means it's future is pretty much assured for quite some time. Roger is surprisingly cagey in response to this, not wanting to promise anything he can't deliver. Curious. At least something's going right around here. You ought to capitalize on that.

Forum: John M Maxstadt makes another appearance, this time complaining about last month's cover, and the general amount of cheesecake in the art. It's demeaning to women, it's bad for the hobby, and it's just plan embarrassing to explain to my nongamer friends. Woe, woe and woe some more.
Paul Astle doesn't know how to stop players from abandoning your game in search of more munched out ones, but he has some advice on how to please the people still here. Even one-on-one games can still be fun if done right. Don't get discouraged. If you don't even try, you're definitely going to lose.
David Howery thinks that a second edition is a good idea, but making stuff from OA part of it is not. He also thinks that doing profiles on the staff members that include photos is a good way to stop impersonators. You're going to be pretty happy then.
Raymond Chuang has some thoughts about the interesting hassles PC's could face setting up a business. Any business with a wizard can massively outperform it's competitors, which may cause economic troubles and union unrest. Also, magical byproduct pollution can cause all sorts of hassle. Both are pretty good plot hooks, really.

Lords of the night: Thieves guilds. Huh. What are they good for? Quite a lot actually. Organized crime has quite substantial benefits. Training, specialized equipment, gossip and info, meeting new people, fencing your ill-gotten gains, infiltrating the legal system and making sure members don't get in too much trouble when caught. It's no wonder that to be a successful thief, you need to be in one, especially with AD&D training requirements being what they are. Here's another nice but unexceptional worldbuilding article that deconstructs things like demographics, how these organizations are created, joined and maintained, how they differ, how they will usually be the same, and how they relate to the world in general. Not that fascinating to me now, but one to bookmark for when I actually get the chance to build another gameworld.

A den of thieves: So, you've reached name level, and now you want to set up your own thieves guild. Congratulations, and good luck, you'll need it. Vince Garcia (now there's a name that sounds like a mafioso boss in itself) gives us lots of cool advice on how to make the life of a character trying to set up an organization interesting. While obviously focussed on crimelords, the lessons from this can be applied to other classes with a little conversion as well. Political maneuvering, constructing a proper hierarchy, with chains of command, specialist groups, and all that jazz. Raising money, dealing with the other local power blocs, breaking away from your current guild, this is all very solid stuff. It's also backed up mechanically with lots of tables, which alter the types of followers you get, and the odds of having run-ins with the law. Far better than the first article, this would definitely be of great use in actual play, not just worldbuilding, expanding the domain management system for rogues, and helping you zoom out and experience months of politicking in a session. And you ought to know by now I'm very much in favour of that. Are you ready to play D&D, Godfather style? Yes, I'm talking to you. There's nobody else here, so I must be talking to you.

Space/fantasy gamer is back. I didn't even know they were gone. What's up with that?

The art of climbing walls: Vince returns, (but gets his last name misspelled) to give us one of those really zoomed in examinations of an aspect of the game. How exactly does climbing walls work? Thieves are not spiderman, able to just scuttle up sheer walls using their fingers. You need ropes and grappling hooks and tiger claws, and other fun little implements to have a decent chance on smooth surfaces with no handholds. He alters the probabilities for climbing slippery surfaces quite substantially, and generally makes things a bit trickier. This is one of those fiddly little articles that suffers because even if it may be an improvement, the annoyance caused by looking it up when you're in mid play balances that out, especially if you try and use lots of them, from different issues. Same old problem.

 

[(un)reason]

Dragon Issue 115: November 1986

part 2/4

Honor among thieves: Ahh, here's another unsurprising article. Although they make their money breaking the law, any successful thieves guild must have some code of it's own to keep things from falling apart. Even if they never formalize it, stuff like no squealing, no lying about your hauls, double agents will have their membership terminally revoked, and no going after people with "relationships" with the guild is pretty much going to happen anyway. And many of them do dress it up in formal oaths and pledges to make things absolutely clear to dumb n00bs, and give standardized punishments for breaking them. And then they're just a few steps away from becoming law enforcement themselves, Pratchett style. Funny how they do wind up becoming just another accepted part of society, with their own training system and accepted path of advancement. In the real world, far too many criminals are criminals because of mental illness, poverty, or inability to get a good above board job, you can go up and down in people's esteem based on what you've done recently rapidly, and any code they have is honored in the breach as much as the observance. Almost make you want to live in a D&D world. The math on the economics may not add up, but it makes perfect sense on it's own terms, there's a place for everyone, plenty of opportunity for you to advance your station, and the people who get into power do on the whole deserve it and have worked for it. Anyone else think so? Or is this another sign I've been doing this for too long and going mad?

Getting up in the world: A second article in quick succession on climbing? I guess that given the evidence of the last couple of issues, they really have made a conscious decision to present multiple differing views on a topic. Well, I guess embracing the rehash and trying to turn it into a positive thing is one way to deal with it. This one also turns it's attention to non-thieves climbing ability. One good thing about the new Non-weapon proficiency system is that it does allow other classes to at least try things they really should be able to do. The problem is that it has inconsistencies with previous writings on the subject. Should you try and reconcile the two lists of modifiers, or treat them as independent subsystems and apply one or the other. Lots of tedious rules minutinae, in other words. It is however, interesting that this one was obviously written after the first one, by people which had read it. That kind of co-ordination between their writers is pleasing, and definitely something I could stand to see more of.

Tools of the (thieving) trade: Mr Garcia continues to prove that he is the don of all things larcenous, examining the tools thieves need for their other abilities, the penalties they suffer for going without them, and how they can improve their odds further by spending a little more. Ninja outfits to improve your stealth skills face paint, hearing cone (with protection from ear seekers, of course.) drills, 10 foot poles for springing traps if you aren't willing to risk disarming them the subtle way, and all sorts of other fun. Which doesn't come cheap, but such is life. As once again, the same writer is taking the reins, this ties in well with the other articles, building on them without too much overlap. While the individual articles in this month's theme haven't been exceptional, they have been very well tied together. We haven't seen them try stuff like this for over three years, in the psionics special. You need writers who are active, and get their stuff in early, so the other writers can work on the idea and produce further material to make this work. And someone with the ambition to co-ordinate it all. If this is what having Roger as an editor means, then it will be a welcome change to the last few years.

Hammer of thor, spear of zeus: Hello to another power-up to the class that least needs it. Giving clerics the option of learning a weapon appropriate to their deity seems like a pretty reasonable idea, if a a mild power-up. Giving them not only access to a new weapon, but the ability to multiple specialize in it to indefinite degrees, gaining an extra +1 to hit each time; on the other hand, makes them almost the equal of fighters in terms of attack progression, while still having all the spellcasting of clerics. Definitely an option that has the power to mess up a game at higher levels. Exercise caution about allowing it in your game.

Sharper than a serpents tooth: Sssssnakeses. Looks like this is this month's realistic biology contribution. The nature of their senses, biology, methods of attack, and 12 new sets of stats, which are generally more powerful than the original entries. This is probably a case where the writers like what they're writing about a little too much. Still, like spiders, they do provoke instinctive fear in people, making them great for a little horror gaming. Mix some of these variants with your yuan-ti, and people'll never be sure what's going to strike at them when they open a door. Another competent but unexceptional article.

Airs of ages past: Harps! Now there's an unexpected topic for elminster to turn his eye too. All 9 items in this article have a common origin, the lost city of Myth Drannor. Well, elves have always been fond of music. In addition to the various cool magical powers they possess, Ed also proves he knows what he's talking about when it comes to the technical aspects of music. Either he's already a musician, or this is another case of him putting a whole load of research in for accuracy in minor technical details that most people wouldn't notice. These are as flavourful as ever, with Jhantra's harp a particular favorite of mine. In any case this is another great entry that is both entertaining reading, and full of things I'd love to incorporate. Music is a big part of mythology, (often the medium for telling it as well) and it probably gets less airtime than it deserves in roleplaying. While incorporating it into your game and not being horrible cheesy may be a challenge, it's one that amply pays for itself if you succeed.

 

[(un)reason]

Dragon Issue 115: November 1986

part 3/4

There's something on the floor: And it's not a crawling pit. This is some quick and dirty old skool tableage, designed to provoke paranoia in your players. The floor should be the one thing you can always rely on, right? If the ground beneath your feet is unstable, everything else is definitely going to be messed up. Muahahahaha. Be it just an unusual appearance, or something that actually has a mechanical effect, having things happen to the ground beneath their feet really forces players to think, as the usual methods of fighting the enemy aren't going to work here. And since it's all on a random table, you can insert this easily into your endless dungeon building kit. The specific effects are both inventive and well organized as well, making this one I'd take great pleasure in using on my /victims/ players. Two thumbs up.

The ecology of the harpy: Looks like we have another musically connected article this month. Harpies may have beautiful voices, but they are nowhere near as aesthetically pleasing as a well crafted harp. When you consider that they're also cowardly, bickering creatures who'll turn on the weak amongst their own numbers, they definitely don't make the case for music being a great unifier.
For a second time, we also have a case of the writing being handled by multiple people, with a freelancer contributing the first bit of fiction, while Ed provides the footnotes, with assistance from Elminster. The change in tone between the sections is quite noticeable, but that's probably a good thing. We get plenty more details on their lifecycle, tactics, and modifiers you can apply to the saves against their abilities. This is both interesting in itself, and as part of their new trend towards collaboration, on a historical level. After all, most RPG books these days from the big companies have a whole load of developers, writers, editors, art people, etc listed, to the point where you can't really put a single name on the spine. Whereas most of the early D&D books do. (and it is frequently Gygax, even when it's made obvious that others contributed quite a bit inside.) Another change that's definitely worth noting and pondering. After all, most fiction books aren't written like that, it's more the purview of textbooks and guides to things. What do you make of this?

Elven armies and dwarves at arms: We return to another recent subject, that of more detail in our follower tables. This time it's demihuman fighters that get the badass strike teams. All the new racial variants from UA are covered, including the dread forces of the valley elves. (which do not include any stubby gnomes, curiously) Generally, these are fewer in numbers, but more individually powerful than their human equivalents, as demihumans are usually at least 1st level. No great surprises here, as long as you are familiar with D&D's implied setting. As with the previous ones, I find it hard to complain about the extra complexity introduced here, since you only get to use it once a PC's career, and you really want to make a big deal out of it. Still, I would have preferred it if they'd tackled other classes first, before going back to ones they've already done before.

Door number one, door number two, or: Hmm. More rehash. We've already had an article on doors, by Ed and Elminster, no less. Thankfully, this writer doesn't try and compete with that in sheer brilliance, but instead goes for quantity of ideas, giving us 50 brief tricks you can pull with your doors. Just the thing to put in your random dungeon design tables, just for extra sadism. Suspect everything. More quick and dirty old skool fun.

Stayin' alive: There's no resurrection in Top Secret. So you have lots of incentive to not die. Last month they gave lots of general GM'ing advice. This time it's players turn to get a general how too. This is both the usual character building advice, and lots of tactical advice for actual play. From first equipping for a mission, to scouting, to conflict, to the cleaning up of loose ends afterwards (and believe me, you want to do that, or it will come back and bite you in the ass) there are lots of ways of increasing your odds of success. Some of them are metagame considerations, while others are applicable to any system, and indeed real life as well. Apart from the strong emphasis on trying to play the game in a genre appropriate way, with recurring characters, romances etc, this is pretty standard, if with rather more width and depth than most of these pieces. Above average in terms of craftmanship, but nothing really leaps out at me.

GURPS autoduel: Roleplaying in the setting of car wars. Well, it's a good test of the universal part of it's name. If all it really does well is fantasy or modern day, they might as well not bother.

The role of books:Lords of the middle dark by Jack L Chalker (boo hiss spit) gets a fairly middle of the road review. It has his usual disturbing penchant for minding his female protagonists, and spends a lot of time in worldbuilding to the detriment of advancing the plot. As you may gather, I'm rather less fond of Mr Chalkers work than this reviewer, and from the sounds of it, I'd hate this one just as much as the books of his I have read.
The A.I Gang books (various authors) are a series of computer/ spy adventure books. The science is pretty loose, but then, this is high action pulp adventure. You don't expect realism from james bond, do you? Aimed at younger readers, these seem like the kind of thing that might have drawn people to gaming, back in the 80's.
The find your fate books are another set of multiple choice adventure books. These particular ones star the Dr Who crew. These very much bear the mark of bulk-written tie in products, with wildly uneven quality of writing and characterization. David Martin's one pleases the reviewer. Michael Holt's one most definitely does not. Same problem as gaming fiction, really.
God game by Andrew M Greeley has the author doing exactly that, inserting himself into the story as the god of a computer controlled world. How very meta and prophetic. He uses this device to pose complicated philosophical and theological questions with a directness most books cannot, while maintaining a strong edge of humour. Sounds really rather tempting to me.
Flight to thlassa mey by Dennis McCarty is written with dialogue in shakespearean blank verse, amazingly. That must take a lot of crafting. This elevates it above the generic fantasy it would seem to be from the cover, giving it both depth and a very distinctive flavour. This is an excellent example of how borrowing and incorporating the right ideas in the right way can make a work seem fresh.
The throne of scone by Patricia Kennealy steals liberally from another source, this time celtic myth, to create the kind of mythic tinged sci-fi that would not be unfamiliar to stargate viewers. The maxim about sufficiently advanced technology being indistinguishable from magic is out in full force here, in another bit of epic storytelling.
Merlin's Booke by Jane Yolen is a loosely connected set of short stories about guess who, the legendary archmage. Each takes a different perspective and tone, combining prose and (pretty good) poetry. This shows that by weaving together multiple, sometimes conflicting accounts, you can create a real seeming overall picture of something. Touch magic, pass it on.

 

[(un)reason]

Dragon Issue 115: November 1986

part 4/4

When only the best will do: Top secret continues to come off well from the dropping of the Ares section, with a second article this month, full of gun pr0n. Heckler and Koch are one of the biggest weapons companies in the world, producing great weapons used all around it. You know, fetishising a particular companies weapons is like doing so for Katanas just because they're japanese. I am rather suspicious of this article, and suspect there may be power creep in the stats therein. Hmm. Is this also going to be a new trend of the Moore years?

The teasing for traveller 2300 last issue is elaborated on. Just like movie trailers. Vague one, more specific one, big one with "In a time" gravelly voiced narration showing all the really cool bits.

Profiles: Roger Moore, aka Rogar of Mooria, is of course our first subject this month. He is neither a barbarian or a clone, nor does he resemble a potato. He is, however, an ex army boy, and started writing while still on duty, during his many dull hours. Somehow, he managed to become our second most prolific and reliable freelance contributor, proving juggling multiple jobs like this can be done. (so there, JD Webster ) And once again, he is going to have to do a ridiculous amount of work, as Kim's recent departure has resulted in him becoming head editor of both Dragon and Dungeon. Will he hold up to having two full time jobs as well as he did having one plus a highly active sideline? His run lasted many years, so I assume so. It's going to be interesting seeing how his leadership changes the magazine over the next few years.
Bill Larson is one of our book editors. One of the older members of staff, he doesn't seem to be that much of a D&D player, but has had a long and interesting life. (although after editing the Trixie Belden Mystery series for 15 years, anything would seem interesting.) Once again, the amount of lighthearted humour seems to be on the rise again. Not sure if that's the because of the writing or the change in editor.

TSR previews is back again, and hopefully this time will be remaining the right way around. D&D is getting M3: Twilight calling. As with the previous master level books, the universe is at stake. Guess who has to save it, again.
AD&D gets RS1: Red Sonja Unconquered. Visit Hyboria. Meet interesting people, kill them, and then wonder where you're going to put their stuff when you're wearing nothing but a chainmail bikini. One cleavage can only contain so much.
Our adventure gamebooks are up to number 11, Clash of the sorcerers. The trilogy comes to it's exciting conclusion. Will you triumph, or fail?
Marvel gives us two books this month. For the solo players, we have The Wolverine in Night of the Wolverine. So important they had to put his name on there twice. If you can find a friend to fight against, you can play Fantastic 4 vs Dr Doom in The Doomsday Device in their 8th one on one gamebook. Dr Doom has created a giant robot. Can you guess who has to stop it? Yeah, it's like that. They aren't very subtle with their titles.

An interstellar armory: More bits and pieces for your star frontiers space battles. Armor, forcefields, lasers, tractor beams, bombs, anti-missiles, mines, cloaking, all pretty generic sci-fi stuff. I'm pretty sure we've seen most of these in the magazine before, and I'm surprised that they aren't in the books anyway. In any case, this is a load more not very interestingly done recycling. If you don't have counters to basic tricks like this, you're never going to become an advanced space general.

The marvel-phile: Rather a short article this month, as Jeff gives us the stats for Terminus, who is essentially a ridiculously powerful intergalactic scrap merchant. Seems about the normal level of ridiculousness for a fantastic four villain. Still, destroying the world is no laughing matter, and he certainly has the potential to do that. He's already been killed once, but we know that's no obstacle here, and someone else out there might have a similar giant robot body. Another pretty formulaic entry here, that shows up just how many hidden lands full of weird stuff the Marvel earth has. Are your PC's powerful enough to face a guy like this?

Wormy faces an insidious threat from his miniatures ranks. Dragonmirth catches tigers with velcro. Everything hangs in the balance for snarf.

The rolemaster companion makes the game even more comprehensive and flexible! Buy it now, etc etc.

Looks like collaboration is definitely on the up this month, along with power creep and humour, and recycling is still pretty common. Course, it's too early to say for sure what this change in leadership really bodes for the magazine. You can't make an accurate graph from a couple of points of data. Still, overall, this has been a pretty interesting issue, with both good and interestingly bad articles (as opposed to the more frequent dull, but not so bad as to be interesting ones) Maybe the golden age of the magazine is over, but that certainly doesn't mean there's nothing happening. If anything, there's more stuff going on than ever, so one story can't hold everyone's attention and become legendary in the same way. Just keep telling myself. I only have to read the bad bits once, then I can use the good bits again and again. Not a very poetic mantra, is it? Doesn't have to be. Just has to keep me going.

 

[LordVyreth]

You better hold out. The Moore era is arguably my favorite one, though that may be the nostalgia talking. Though I've been getting more excited as the pieces fall into place. Moore, the Lessers...this is a few comics strips and a fantasy Star Trek equivalent away from being the magazine I started Dragon with.