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Message: <blockquote data-quote="(un)reason" data-source="post: 4519805" data-attributes="member: 27780">Dragon Issue 40: August 1980Part 1/286 pages. Convention season is upon them again, and that means we'll be seeing articles about them, and how they went in the next few issues. The convention circuit continues its rapid expansion in venue size and professionalism, mirroring the rise in the hobby in general. What new releases will be making the big buzz in the rumor mill this year? We shall see. In this issue: Out on a limb: We have one letter bitching about all the modules they print, asking for less filler and more fiction. One mans cheese is another mans rancid milk m'dear. They can't please everyone. A letter complaining about the price increases, and also about the joke article on taxes in issue 36. Someone needs to learn to laugh at their problems. Yes, that particular article wasn't very funny, but that doesn't mean the principle behind it is wrong. A letter complaining about the inconsistency between restricting PC's levels and the presenting super-powerfull characters in GitE. Yeah, I'm in agreement with you on that one.A letter complaining that the dragon accompanying the gem dragon article in issue 37 has only 2 legs. To which they quite rightly reply don't be such a pedant. And finally, a letter saying that people shouldn't complain about high level characters so much, and there ought to be more adventurers catering to them. Go you, I quite agree. Sage advice is missing. Booo.The dueling room: Sometimes you don't want the sembelance of plot. Sometimes you just want a one-one arena fight to determine who is the superior character. Another one of those anachronisms of D&D like alchemists and scribe monopolies, where it is assumed that there are high level NPC's there readily available just to maintain conventions like this, yet the main setting remains pseudo medieval. If you want a white room fight, just make it happen out of continuity. A silly but fun article, and it's good to see PvP get a little love instead of being roundly discouraged.Fantasy has reality: Douglas Bachman expands on his piece in up on a soapbox last issue. He goes into a complex explanation of his vision of the fantasy realm, the moral quests and questions it ought to pose, the difference between the realms of adventure and the places where people actually live. This includes such tricky subjects as characters gaining incredible power in the magical realms, but then becoming regular people again on returning home; dooms and destinies, and the world becoming unbalanced because of the sins of the heroes. This is the kind of article which if used, would completely alter the character of the game, slanting it towards a very particular type of Campbellian high fantasy. I'm really not sure if I like this or not. It has some ambitious ideas, but implements them in a heavy handed way, and would only be fun if the players actively bought into the principles espoused. Funerals and other deathly ideas: Looting the bodies of the things you've just killed, and then leaving them to rot really isn't a very nice thing to do, particularly for supposedly heroic adventurers. Similarly, just divvying all your own fallen comrades stuff with no regard for supporting their family shows rather a disregard for societial mores. Your players may complain when you introduce the ideas from this article, but they do help make the world seem more like a real place, not just a game where you kill with no reprecussions. One of those ideas you shouldn't overuse, as too much realism spoils the fun. Wham's revenge - his games: A history and profile of the Gratefull Dead of RPG artists, Tom Wham. An unpredictable and eccentric designer, with a tendency to get sidetracked, he seems like the kind of person who is fun to be around, but a nightmare to employ. Still, this is another interesting insight into TSR's inner workings and the people who make it up. Hopefully we'll be seeing more profiles soon.  Don't drink this cocktail - Throw it!: Many people had realized that using flaming oil was considerably more tactically advantageous than fighting with conventional weapons. This article examines this more closely, including figuring out ways to keep players who overuse it under control. One of those cases where emergent rules turn out to be far more deadly than a fair fight, and another thing that would never work in 4th edition (do they even give stats and costs for flaming oil in 4th ed?) File this under muahahaha. The wolf in your paint pot: Advice on painting wolf and werewolf miniatures. A fairly detailed article that does exactly what is says it does. The fatal flaws of Crane: A bored player drops out of a play by mail game because the cost to fun ratio was rather too low. This article describes how the game was skewed towards people willing to spend more money on their characters and empires, the cost for playing each turn went up, odd social conventions grew up as people learned to exploit the rules of the game, and the gamemasters failed to provide new material for higher level characters. Which shows how many parallels old play by post games have with modern MMORPGS, in the problems they have to deal with. And that is very interesting indeed. One case of there's nothing new under the sun I wasn't expecting to see. A very thought provoking article. Artifacts of Dragon pass: I guess someone's finally paid attention to the repeated requests for Runequest stuff. This is a big load of magic items, each with their own big chunk of history, and full integration into the setting in a way that contrasts sharply with D&D's vague hints of ancient wizards and curses. Like tekumel, Glorantha seems to attract people with a greater love of worldbuilding than D&D at the moment. Its nice to see it arrive in Dragon at last, and I'm guessing there'll be plenty more articles on this game in the future.   The other were? Right here!: 10 new types of lycanthropes for your game. Some of which are rather silly, such as weresloths and bison. As is the norm for this period of D&D, they seem to present an implied setting where after being infected, people lose interest in mortal society, and wander off into the wilderness and form little tribes of lycanthropes, spending most of their time in hybrid form. What's all that about then and where did it come from?</blockquote>

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