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Message: <blockquote data-quote="(un)reason" data-source="post: 4879390" data-attributes="member: 27780">Dragon Magazine Issue 135: July 1988part 2/5Give them enough rope!: Another little article engaging in some realistic analysis. With lots of Runequest references. Curious. As usual, the various RPG's differ substantially from reality and each other in their treatment of rope. Something that could be dull very easily, but Robert Plamodon's inventive set of uses for it, laced with dry humour, manage to redeem it. Another one to look at when stuck in an awkward situation with basic equipment and short of ideas on how to get out. MacGuyver would be proud.  Bazaar of the Bizarre: More arrows this month. 33 different types of magical arrow, many of which have lots of subcategories as well. Be generous with them and in letting players find out what they do, for as usual, these are one-shot devices. Even the cheap (non cursed) ones cost 120 gp each. Still, definitely enough here for months of amusing treasure deliveries as they more than double the basic stuff from the core books. My favourites in this selection are the arrow of clairvoyance (perfect ninja weapon) The arrow of multiplicity (great visuals there) The arrow of roping, and the arrow of pursuit. Plenty of interesting stuff for players here. Definitely more than enough here for a good themed badguy as well. Another neat article in this series. When game masters go bad: Another serious article with a humorous edge here. So many ways that the GM can mess things up. So little time to list them all. Adversarial GM'ing, messing up the rules, lack of enthusiasm, insufficient preparation, favouritism, formulaic design, railroading and overeliance on things turning out a particular way. Actually, that's not such a huge list. This is another case where most of the stuff mentioned is pretty familiar, so it's mostly a matter of how well the writer phrases it this time that determines if I like it or not. And this time it's pretty good, with some very amusing illustrations. Whoever came up with using the old image of the man eating his own face was a twisted genius. Credit to both the Roger's, much as they hate being lumped together. <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f61b.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":p" title="Stick out tongue    :p"  data-smilie="7"data-shortname=":p" /> The game Wizards: Jim Ward is buzzing away at several things at once as usual. Most important is the new Greyhawk corebook. Lots of suggestions have been sent in, and he's sorted through them and is incorporating the best ideas. Along with the usual endless demand for new monsters and spells, a lot of people also want a system for properly developing 0 level characters without them going into a class. So we'll give it to them. I suspect some of them would actually like to get rid of classes altogether, and make D&D skill based, but they ain't getting that. He also plots a pun-filled dungeon, and forgotten realms miniatures. Looks like someone's trying to keep the spirit of mischief that was more prevalent in the early years of the hobby alive. Now, can they keep moving forward while doing so? The Mix-&-Match Module: Zany crossovers! Now there's something that's declined quite a bit over the years. Definitely a case of appropriate juxtaposition putting it next to Jim's piece. But actually, this isn't that zany or gonzo, being advice on how to convert modules from one genre or system to another. This is particularly useful when playing non D&D games, since D&D probably has more modules to convert than all the other RPG's out there put together. You can also steal ideas from books, movies, TV, etc, and as long as you alter it enough, no-one need be any the wiser. Learn enough techniques like this, and you never need worry about writer's block again! Now all you need to do is figure out how to live with the guilt of knowing you're nothing but a hack. I suggest large quantities of alcohol. 9 out of 10 fleet street journalists recommend it! And they write even more than I do on a daily basis, so they should know. I seem to have become sidetracked again, because this is actually a pretty dull article. Hopefully I won't have to use it. Palladium starts trumpeting the universality of their system. Now you can go from genre to genre with the same characters, and have equally screwy and unbalanced adventures in all of them. Next thing you know they'll make a setting explicitly designed for gonzo crossovers <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f609.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=";)" title="Wink    ;)"  data-smilie="2"data-shortname=";)" /> Heroes are made - Like this!: Following on neatly again, talking of converting from one system to another, here's the usual proper characterisation and backstory advice, converted to the superhero genre. To build a character, you need to figure out their connections with the world, both as a person, and as a superhero. Are they part of a team, what are their likes and dislikes, how have they taken gaining powers, etc etc. Once again, this is pretty familiar material, that fails to shake off the boredom. Let's keep going, shall we. Philip jose farmer's The Dungeon! I love this series, even if it does suffer some tonal problems with the shifting of authors from book to book. A great inspiration for planar gaming in general. Go buy it now.</blockquote>

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