Dragon Magazine Issue 146: June 1989
part 3/5
The dragon's bestiary gives us yet more actual dragons to put our players up against. Of course, they still use the 1st ed rules, because we haven't seen the new ones yet, and they probably have to clear out the slush pile anyway. Oh well, they're perfectly compatible mechanically, so it matters little. Just means people are likely to use the old articles and sourcebooks with the new corebooks for a while.
Cobra dragons have the scary hood of their namesake. However, they have the full complement of limbs, plus a venomous bite that still has substantial effects if you succeed your save. Thankfully, they don't have any magical ability, so they're easier than most to outmaneuver. As usual, be very wary, for they may still have traps and allies.
Obsidian dragons have the unusual and rather awkward distinction of not being immune to their own breath weapons. They are exceedingly powerful spellcasters though, so they can probably memorize spells to help with that. Since they also run the gamut of good and evil alignments they're also more likely to fight each other than usual. This could definitely be used to build interesting plots.
Gray Dragons (Not to be confused with The Grey Dragon, from issue 62
) are smarter relations of white dragons. Their favoured tactics run towards immobilising the enemy, and picking them off one by one, which can definitely make for some unpleasant battles. Again, I believe some evil laughter would not go amiss.
Rainbow dragons continue Greg Detwiler's attempt to fill in the neutral evil part of the draconic alignment spectrum. They're talked up as scary, but really, without an AoE breath weapon, they're probably not as dangerous overall as Reds. Power isn't just in the numbers, you know.
Drakken are little three headed dragons. Has some wizard been trying to mate hydra with dragons again? :shakes head: In any case, they're not very bright, so they're more mid-level pests than the culmination of an adventure. Interesting to note that this completes a symmetry of having one dragon type intended for each current campaign world. They seem to be consciously trying to differentiate them in that respect. I suppose they are still relatively similar compared to what's to come.
Minidragons are another load of cute little things that can serve as pets both to proper dragons and people. They're pretty tough, but not that smart. Since we just had a whole article on this kind of thing earlier, it seems a bit odd to plonk these ones in here.
Snarfquest characters are lost throughout the issue. This is what happens when you go out of dimensions. It makes a dreadful mess. Now where have we seen that before? Growf growf.
The New ecology of the dragons: Is that like the new adventures of He-man? Because that came out around this time, and sucked. No, it's merely another less direct teaser that dragons are about to get a quite substantial upgrade with the edition change. Tail attacks, swoops, kicks, wingovers are in, Breath weapons are more frequent, subduing is not quite out, but no longer specific to them. They are now even more capable of demonstrating both power and finesse, and really ruining peoples days. This is an in-house production by Skip Williams, taking care to feature all their new powers specifically in the story. It comes close to shattering my suspension of belief as a story rather than a custom written promotional piece, but still manages to stay interesting. This is a case where the quality of the work manages to win me over, but I wouldn't like to see this kind of thing become common practice, with ecologies appropriate to whatever splatbook is coming out this month being a constant intrusion. You tread a perilous line here, TSR.
The hatchling magazine: A recap of the 7 issues of the strategic review. It has been quite a while. Another of those reminders that before the internet made copying things virtually free, far fewer gamers had access to any of the stuff from before they personally started playing. Only a small fraction of Dragon readers would have read these, and many would never even have heard of them. Let's see if this can shed any insights, either on the old magazines, or the current trends in historical interpretation.
The first issue, not too surprisingly, gets the most detailed examination. All the features are individually mentioned, and there is plenty of commentary. Unsurprisingly, quite a bit of it is focussed on just how far the magazine has come, both in contents and professionalism, and how little idea they obviously had about the directions the game was going to go. A particularly notable little bit is the commentary on the idea of cutting out the money off coupon, and how it would impact on the issue's collectability. They seem slightly surprised by the prevalence of PbP games, and the stuff for designing solo dungeons. We might have come a long way, but there were still some things they were doing back then that can be usefully drawn upon. Overall, the commentary is fairly neutral, neither slating or particularly gushing over the contents.
SR2, on the other hand, gets a very short description, mainly just a list of the contents. The main notable comment is the drawing attention to the fact that Brian Blume was already trying to set them apart as Gamers in general, not merely Wargamers. Thinking big, or the first signs of egomania? You decide.
SR3's description is also pretty perfunctory. It reveals that the quality of the paper went up. and they went from gluing to stapling for binding. Gary's rant of the issue is mentioned in a nonjudgemental fashion, and the fact that there is still huge variety in the contents seems important to them. I guess it would stand out in contrast to the current era, where the amount of non D&D stuff is seriously on the decline.
SR4's overview answers the question I've been wondering for ages. Yes the cartoon is by that Marc Miller. Guess he was in on things right from the beginning. Their main commentary is that FRPG's are rapidly increasing in dominance, and they too notice that the Dragon is coming. They have realized what the market wants. Poor wargaming, already being split away. In other words, this seems to be the point when they start to react to the changing market, altering their approach, and getting in new people to meet the increasing demand.
SR5 gets the biggest amount of text. The substantial improvements in production values gets lots of detailed attention, and the reviewer is pretty positive that this is where they moved from newszine to proper magazine. He's also has quite a bit to say about the sharp contrast between the willingness to throw anything into the melting pot and kitbash rules freely, and how it contrasts with Gary's calls for strict orthodoxy in the early AD&D era. Although he tries to stay neutral in this commentary, I get the impression he prefers the more freewheeling option. The kicking off of the great Gen Con Vs Origins war sees a bit of amusement peeking through. And like a lot of people, he wishes he'd taken the lifetime subscription option when he had the chance. Oh well. Your loss.
SR6 is a fairly brief one, which I find curious, since I preferred this one over SR5. The increasing dominance of RPG's is noted again, as is the fact that this issue was printed in purple ink. The rapid expansion of game clubs in mapping the dungeons is also tracked. Things might not all be going their way, but it's made all the more clear how they, and gaming as a whole are expanding.
SR7 is another fairly long look over. Gary's contributions get a lot of attention, with another bit of amusement at the intensity of his rantings peeking through. Twinks Beware! Once again, the increases in production values get noted as well. Also interesting is how much more we got to see of the writers personally, with profiles, photos, etc. They had to be more hands on in general in their handling of the various aspects of the company back then.
While overall, this is a pretty dry review, it does throw a new light on a few bits that I didn't note as significant, but probably were. And it's definitely interesting in that it's got me to look back on the first few issues of the magazine with new eyes. We're reaching a point where nostalgia can really start to come into play, and the people who've been around for a while are significantly older than when they started. How long before talk about "getting back to the roots of the game" becomes commonplace?
