DexCon 15 Registration Now Open!

Pre-registration and GM event registration for one of my regular conventions has just opened. DexCon, held in beautiful Morristown, NJ, will run from July 4th through the 8th of this year. It's a wonderfully eclectic mix of board games, RPGs (with an emphasis on indie RPGs), miniatures wargames, video games, and LARPs. It's held in a really terrific hotel, right in the middle of town, with easy access to a tremendous array of great restaurants. I can't recommend this convention highly enough.

This year, I've submitted the following events:

• Ogre Miniatures ("Operation Shockhammer")
• AD&D 1st Edition / Adventures Dark and Deep ("Temple of the Old Ones" - a new adventure)
• The Awful Green Things from Outer Space (the old Steve Jackson classic by Tom Wham)

As always, if anyone else wants to submit some old-school gaming goodness, I'll put together some flyers and hopefully drum up some additional interest. Let the Invasion of the Awful Grognards from Outer Space begin!

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Egyptian pyramids found by infra-red satellite images

From the BBC:

Seventeen lost pyramids are among the buildings identified in a new satellite survey of Egypt. 
More than 1,000 tombs and 3,000 ancient settlements were also revealed by looking at infra-red images which show up underground buildings. 
Initial excavations have already confirmed some of the findings, including two suspected pyramids.

I think it is so cool that there are still so much history that is still left to be discovered. I mean, entire pyramids!

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Kickstarter Update - We Made It!

I am most pleased to report that the kickstarter campaign for Adventures Dark and Deep™: A Curious Volume of Forgotten Lore has reached its goal! No joke.

YAY!

An announcement regarding further incentives to take us past the initial $2,500 level will be coming out in a day or three. But I want to thank each and every person who made a pledge to see this project come alive, and encourage everyone to tell your friends who might be interested to back it. It really means everything to me that you all had enough faith in me and the project to see it become a reality.

Thank you all.

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Repost: My Favorite April Fool's Joke Ever

Some classics never get old...

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Adventures Dark and Deep™ Kickstarter Almost There!

The cover image for the book

Well here we are halfway through the kickstarter campaign for Adventures Dark and Deep™: A Curious Volume of Forgotten Lore, and we're at 84% of the goal. I can't thank you all enough for your support of this project, and am deeply humbled by the results so far.

But we still have 16% to go. Help push this project over the goal line!

Adventures Dark and Deep™ is an attempt to explore what the game might have looked like if Gary Gygax had been allowed to keep developing it, based on several articles in Dragon magazine, numerous bits of information given in various online fora, and other writings. This is a best-guess based on the information available, the result of years of research and an open playtest that's lasted for more than a year and a half. Everything comes from his public statements; there's no insider information at work here.

This particular project, A Curious Volume of Forgotten Lore, is not a full rulebook unto itself, but is a rules supplement intended to be used alongside whatever 1E-like rules you currently use. Whether you're playing Advanced Dungeons and Dragons 1E, OSRIC, Labyrinth Lord with the Advanced Edition Companion, or something else that's compatible, you'll be able to take this book and start using it right away. And what's in it?

• A new bard class and the jester-sub class, along with all the spells that make them unique
• The mystic class, a sub-class of cleric, and tons more spells
• The savant class, a sub-class of mage, plus spells
• The mountebank class, a sub-class of thief with, you guessed it, more spells!
• A new alternative combat system that's faster and less complex, including a new unarmed combat system
• New monsters
• And lots more!

The book will be approximately 125 pages long, available in .pdf, softcover, and hardcover versions, and is designed to be completely modular. Want to use the mountebank but not the mystic? Don't want any of the new classes, but want to use the new combat system? Go ahead! Everything will work fine. Use what you want, but I think you'll like it all.

The money raised from the kickstarter campaign will be used to pay for artwork by the incredibly talented OSR artist Brian "Glad" Thomas, as well as professional editing.

Help make this a reality, and let's get the kickstarter campaign over the goal so I can start putting out bonus goals!

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Memphis, Capital of Mighty Erypt

"Surrounded by gigantic walls, mighty Memphis stood before us; no other city in Erypt was so beautiful, so great, so richly decorated. I could not believe my eyes."

The above image comes from François Marcela-Froideval's masterful series of graphic novels Chroniques de la Lune Noire. Specifically, Methraton 02 - Le Crâne (2003), written by Froideval and illustrated by Fabrice Druet. I don't speak a word of French, and only the first four books have been translated into English, but as you can see above, the art itself is worth the price. (As always, click to embiggen.)

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Also, please take a minute to check out the Adventures Dark and Deep Kickstarter campaign. Help make the ADD rules supplement, suitable for use with all 1E-compatible games, a reality!

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Mapping Beyond the Flanaess: The Low Khanate and Central Suhfang

Admittedly, this was an easier map to do, since Telchuria is mostly empty, as are the Low and High Khanates, but I've got to say these are coming easier and easier to me. Still, I never thought I'd belt it out in a day!

I also made a couple of changes to the map of the Orcreich and eastern Suhfang, in response to a bit of feedback I received on a mountain range name (thanks!) and as expected the result of seeing the two maps side-by-side. The revised version is above and is now linked over to the right in the "free downloads" section.

I'm now firmly into the territory depicted on the map from the 2001 Chainmail game, which led me to include a spur of the mountain range I call The Reins. It doesn't exist in the DA #1 map, but it's most definitely there in the Chainmail map, so I added it. It does add a bit of interest to a fairly dull map. The city of Haven up in the valley between the High Khanate and the Orcreich has nothing to do with the product from Game Lords back in the 1980's, but I do find the name evocative and thought that was a good place to put a lawless town of renegade humanoids and horse-nomads. It's purely my own invention; I don't think there's any canon source for what might be up there.

Speaking of the Chainmail map, it does imply that the whole of Suhfang is wooded. I'm taking that a little less than literally, and interpreting it so that Suhfang has scattered woodlands throughout its length.

Next up: I move south again, covering the Celestial Sea, the southern coast of Suhfang, Dragons Island, and northern Erypt. This map might take a little more time than this last one, because it's going to involve research as to the geography of Erypt, as envisioned by François Marcela-Froideval in his Chroniques de la Lune Noire.

And the gazetteer has not been forgotten, promise!

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Also, please take a minute to check out the Adventures Dark and Deep Kickstarter campaign. Help make the ADD rules supplement, suitable for use with all 1E-compatible games, a reality!

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