NOW LIVE! Today's the day you meet your new best friend. You don’t have to leave Wolfy behind... In 'Pets & Sidekicks' your companions level up with you!

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Message: <blockquote data-quote="(un)reason" data-source="post: 4657500" data-attributes="member: 27780">Dragon Issue 91: November 1984part 3/3Coming attractions: Just in time for christmas, we get another attempt to let us know about all the stuff they have for sale. They really should do this more regularly. I guess they still don't spend enough time on the supplement treadmill enough to make this worthwhile every month yet For the indiana jones rpg, we have module IJ3: Crystal death. Requires use of the Magic Viewer. Ahh yes, I remember that little gimmick from the transformers toys. Star frontiers gets module SFKH, 2001 a space odyssey. Now your characters can play the events of the film and book. Sounds interminably tedious to me. I hope they remembered to license it properly this time.  For the marvel super heroes game, we have module MH4: Lone wolves. Or how to force a team of Mr Broody McAngstinthepants to work together to deal with a common foe. D&D gets module CM3: Sabre river. You may have got yourselves domains, but that doesn't mean you can't go dungeon-crawling. This time though, even the dungeons are bigger and badder. You'd better come prepared. AD&D, as usual, gets the lions share of products. Dragonlance is already up to it's 5th module, Dragons of mystery, and is getting mini's of the main characters as well. And Conan is fighting against darkness in CB2. Beware Thoth-Amon. ARES Log: Eratta, eratta, what bettah place to put ya than in the edita's section.  Bleh. Anyway, problems aside, it seems the the marvel-phile is easily the most popular part of the section. They have taken note of this and intend to keep it showing up regularly. More evidence that pure sci-fi isn't that popular. A bit awkward, really, and a sign that this section isn't going to last forever. Not that anything does. It's just a question of how long it will last, and enjoying it while you can. Does anyone here speak Aslan?: Languages are a pain in the ass. They're one of the areas that gets most consistently fudged or worked around by some handwavium power in game settings, simply because the alternative is so much hassle to deal with, and constantly having to learn new ones wherever you go is bad for smooth and fun adventuring. Thankfully Traveller has never been known for it's cinematicness, so even with a certain amount of linguistic homogenization caused by concious governmental attempts, you still have thousands of the bastards out there, more than any one person could learn. This article covers the rules for learning new languages in a reasonable, but not excessive amount of detail, and somehow manages to keep the idea a likable one. A bit of grit never hurt anyone, (Yeah, I know, so not true, especially if you get it in the eye) and dealing with language barriers opens up almost as many plot avenues as it closes. If you want a more gritty realistic game, this is definitely an option to consider.  Day of the Juggernaut: A quick star frontiers scenario squashed between two longer articles, and with a slightly odd layout, this has a definite feel of something used to fill up space. Better that than more adverts, I guess. Like OGRE, this is a one big ship vs lots of smaller ships engagement, where you have to figure out how to stop the thing before it causes huge amounts of devastation. Perfectly serviceable, but not particularly exceptional. The marvel-phile: Ahh, here we go. The marvel-phile tackles several interesting things this time round. We have stats for Cloak and Dagger (oh my aching sides.) Transformed by a mob experiment that went horribly wrong, they now target drug dealers and cure addicts. Here we see the conflict between the desire to tackle serious social issues, and the constriction of the comics code, forcing them to represent drug-taking as seriously wrong and detrimental to your karma, no matter what, no greys or excuses. (5 karma per glass of booze? Man that's harsh) How dated that all seems now. As with the U.N.C.L.E conversion, this is a great reminder that there are plenty of sillier things than rpg's out there in media land, and also that Dragon is horribly bowdlerised by it's editorial policy most of the time. You don't notice some things are missing until you see them, and them you're amazed that you didn't notice before. And frankly, I think I could handle a bit more sex and social issues, if you would be so kind. Careers in Star Law: Yes, it's more detail on these guys. Having had a great idea opened up to us, now someone else weighs in on the crunch behind the idea. And instantly starts introducing restrictions and requirements that close plot ideas off again. This sucks. Every bit of inspiration requires a lot of perspiration to turn into a fully realized product, and maintaining momentum at every stage is nearly impossible. But still, this could definitely have been handled better. Very disappointing. Don't leave home without 'em!: A nice little counterpart to the D&D treasure trove, they've also decided to give us a load of cool /magic/ technological items for gamma world. Anti-grav packs, energy shackles, /admantine/ duralloy war claws, this is definitely a step in a gonzo direction. Not that there's anything remotely unusual about that in gamma world. So you can slot them straight in, or file the technobabble off and convert them to D&D magical items with a minimum of fuss. Another bit with a good word count to fun had in actual play ratio. Fiction: The rune and the dragon by Lawrence Watt-Evans. So you took something from a dragon, and now it's following you, trying to get it back. Why would it hold back, instead of tearing you to shreds like the impertinent little mammal you are. A very good question, and one I won't spoil you on the answer to, other than to say that while this may be a one-joke piece, it's a good joke. Another cool little bit of fiction. Reviews: Shogun is this month's bumper sized review. A card game with substantial similarities to five stud poker, it's a license of the book and tv series by James Clavell. Thankfully, it's not as long-winded as the book, with good production values and a design that makes it simple to learn, but tremendously varied in play, due to the number of special cards and combination of luck and skill required to win it. Seems interesting. Anyone know how this one did sales-wise back in the day?  Mercenaries, Spies & Private eyes gets a rather mediocre review from Ken. It's fast paced simple style does not seem to appeal to him, and he is left unsatisfied by it's lack of depth. What does it have to distinguish itself from the other modern action games like Top secret, Gangbusters and Daredevils? He certainly doesn't see anything special in it. Death in dunwich is a call of cthuhu adventure. Already the game is rising to a popularity that belies it's humble origins as a license of an obscure author, with a strong emphasis on the PC's suffering horribly. This is a good adventure, but not the best organized ever. It has some serious errata, and no overview, forcing you to read it carefully before you can play it. If you do it wrong, it'll be as much a mystery to the GM as to the players. One for an experienced group. The vanishing investigator is a Gangbusters adventure. Unlike our last foray into the lands of mystery, this does have a proper index and chronology, making it easy to run. With strong characters, plenty of settling detail, good illustrations and an action packed plot, this gets his top rating for this month.  In addition, we have a whole bunch of capsule reviews. Dragons of dispair, the marvel superheroes game, The mountain environment and Bree and the barrow downs all get under 200 word summaries of their style and contents. None get particularly spectacularly praised or slated. Wormy shoots Irving. Snarfquest goes to the big city. Dragonmirth is oh so wrong in it's implications. With it's big size, format changes, and multiple classic articles, this is definitely another high water mark for the magazine as a whole. They may have their ups and downs, and things'll never change as fast as they did in the first few years again, but they're still learning and growing. Let's hope this isn't their artistic zenith as well as their commercial one, and we'll get some more amazing issues in the near future. Don't save it all for issue 100. Lets finish this year off in style as well.</blockquote>

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