Deal of the Day - GM's Miscellany: Eventures (5e)

Some of the best GM resources are offered by Raging Swan Press. Today's Deal of the Day is GM's Miscellany: Eventures for 5e. Seven adventures that focus on roleplay and social skills, so even if you are an OSR gamer, it shouldn't be hard to convert these to the system of your choice. Normally 9.95, GM's Miscellany: Eventures (5e) is 3.98 until tomorrow morning.

This GM’s Miscellany presents seven eventures ready for your campaign! Use them as a change of pace from the same old dungeon crawls and wilderness expeditions or as an opportunity for role-playing and urban exploration.

Eventure are akin to a normal adventure, but do not (normally) feature violence or physical challenges. Instead, an eventure focuses on the use of social skills and role-play to resolve the challenges, or events, therein. Eventures are an excellent change of pace and can be used as filler between adventures or as situations in which characters who have invested in social skills can shine. They are also perfect for players who enjoy role-playing.

GM's Miscellany: Eventures comprises the following eventure

A Day Out at the Circus

A Day Out at the Executions

Five Night at the Scythe

Four Nights at the Orc's Head

Night of the Masks

Raisa's Auction Most Wondrous

Where There's a Will

The eventures in GM's Miscellany: Eventures are suitable for any level characters and can be used with any size group. While they are designed for the Ashlar campaign setting they are easily adapted to virtually any GM’s campaign.

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19 Years Later, I Would Still Do It All Again

19 years ago today, I went to work remarking to myself what a beautiful day it was. 

19 years later, I’ve survived cancer that was certified 9-11 related, and most recently Congestive Heart Failure and a blocked Carotid Artery, both likely due to chemo and radiation treatment I received to combat cancer.

I do not regret my actions that fateful day. Being a first responder is a special calling, and even those that take such a job for the salary or pension benefits find themselves putting their lives at risk to protect their fellow human beings on a daily basis, not just 9-11. The risks to their lives are both immediate and long term. They take those risks so you don’t have to.

I feel blessed to be alive and hold each day as special. But for the grace of God, there goes I.

52 Copies of Swords & Wizardry Continual Light Sold as DTRPG Deal of the Day - Thank You!

 Just want to give a quick but huge "Thank You!" to the community for the support given to our very own Swords & Wizardry Continual Light. There were 52 copies sold and I am truly humbled.

I've spent the past two weeks knee-deep in doctor appointments and medical testing, this after nearly a week in the hospital. To say I'm far being where I wanted to be creatively nearly halfway into September would be an understatement. Work will recommence on Torchlight #1 next week, with the aim to release by the end of September.

Alright, I need to get ready for Tavern Chat on the Discord server at 9 pm. 

Again, thanks :)

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Deal of the Day - Swords & Wizardry Continual Light

Today's Deal of the Day is The Tavern's very own Swords & Wizardry Continual Light. Normally 3 bucks in PDF, for the next 24 hours it is only 1.20. Woot!

If you like old school RPGs but want a streamlined package, Continual Light was created with you in mind.

You remember, don't you? The sounds of battle heard through the clatter of dice? The shuffling of character sheets? The war stories shared with fellow campaigners?

There is a longing in the soul of every adventurer and though it sometimes fades to a whisper, you still hear it. Swords & Wizardry Continual Light marks your return to fantasy roleplaying - or if you're curious what fantasy gaming is all about, this is the perfect introduction.

This book, a twenty-sided die, and a few six-sided dice are all you need to return to the table, recall those halcyon days of heroism, and forge brand new legends! Welcome back!

What is Swords & Wizardry Continual Light? It is a streamlined version of the Swords & Wizardry rules many of you already love. You will recognixe some White Box and some Complete, but its all Swords & Wizardry.

It covers four core classes (and a bunch of optional ones), four races, seven levels of play (and optional rules to keep the game going after seventh level), magic items, spells, monsters and more - all in about 17 pages of rules.

Suiable for introducing new players to old school gaming or reintroducing a lapsed gamer, pefect for pick up games, convention play and yes - even campaigns.

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Kickstarter - The Complete Curse of Roslof Keep Campaign (1e & 5e)

 I've been a fan of Scott Taylor / Art of the Genre for a number of years. The individual modules have classic TSR era styled cover, and the art and writing are simply top-notch. Probably the best of the adventure arcs is the Roslof Keep series. The Complete Curse of Roslof Keep Campaign Kickstarter put that story arc into a single hardcover book.

With the success of our first Roslof Keep campaign in 2015, there was little doubt that we would revisit the concept of Mithelvarn’s Labyrinth at some point in the future. So came The Curse of Roslof Keep mega-dungeon in 2018, and after two years, 6 full Folio adventures, 9 campaign adventures, 6 mini-adventures, and a setting gazetteer, the full width and breadth of this new high level dungeon was realized. Now, for the first time, ALL of the various odds and ends of the massive campaign will be housed in a single place, The Curse of Roslof Keep ‘orange spine’ hardcover! Some things within have never before seen print, and all 128 pages will be dedicated to characters levels 10-17. So, we hope you will join Art of the Genre as we ‘complete the OSR circle’ and render another AD&D-inspired hardcover right out of the 1980s, with an incredible cover by our final member of the ‘four TSR artistic horseman’ Clyde Caldwell. 

What is within these pages? This 6 level mega-dungeon is rendered in both 2D ‘blue’ hex maps, as well as full 3D artistic rendering, and is complete with 6 full size modules, 9 smaller campaign addition modules, and 6 bonus mini-adventures as well as the Rogues Guide gazetteer for the setting proper. You will find new monsters, deadly NPCs, and all manner of dungeon crawling wickedness, all for characters in the teen levels of experience, and rendered mechanically in both 5thEdition Dungeons & Dragons and classic Advanced Dungeons & Dragons formats.

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Deal of the Day - Kuf (OSR Modern Day Horror)

 A modern-day horror RPG built on an in OSR chassis? I think I may need to Frankenstein this :)

Kuf is normally a 9.99 but until tomorrow morning its on sale for 4 bucks.

Kuf is a Gnostic modern day horror RPG that is built on top of the rules light Knave OSR-system, modified with extended rules for stress and harm to support a more gritty mode of play.

The characters are weirdos and outsiders who are pulled into a maelstrom of terrifying events.

Includes rules for gaining experience from studying magical texts and interacting with strange beings, ritual magic and how to travel beyond the barrier that keeps us trapped in this world.

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We Need More Above Average Gamers

I'm back from my last business trip and decided to hit up my local game store and pick up more miniatures that I definitely don't need, mostly because I can and because I'm gearing up for my winter shut-in project(s), which will be setting up my painting station and working on my bazillion minis.

As a side note, I somehow effed up my back on this trip, enough to warrant an ambulance ride to the ER and missing a couple days of the trip writhing in near-constant pain. Not mentioning this for sympathy (multiple shots and pills helped immensely), but to put into context some things I was thinking with regards to gaming.

Might be a stretch here, but please bear with me.......so I'm pretty much laid-out on the floor unable to do much more than roll around and moan. While I wasn't straight-up frightened, the feelings of helplessness reminded me of the last time this happened in much worse conditions (situational and severity) and I remember thinking...."Whelp, this....this is how I die."

A few hops, skips, and jumps in thinking and I'm imagining my folks going through my stuff and thinking, "Holy fuck Chris has a shit-ton of these little unpainted plastic miniatures. What the hell was he planning on doing with all this stuff?!" I guess it's better than it might have been had I been in my 20's and they could wonder on just how much I spent on all this porn.....

......I kid. In my 20's my military buddies and I had a mutual agreement to scrub our porn collections before the military sealed and packed off your personal possessions, so that wouldn't be a problem.....

Longs story short, I realize that I'm the only gamer in my family, so all my gaming stuff is....well, just "stuff". There's nobody to relish getting my books and minis to use in their own game, and I've come to the conclusion that I/We need more gamers, and not just "average gamers", but "Above Average" gamers.

What's an Above Average gamer? Well odds are you would qualify as in my experience the average gamer plays one RPG, probably with the same group of friends they've been playing with since high school. They don't go to conventions, they don't try other games, and they generally don't do "other" gaming stuff......

...which is a bit of a shame because these days being a dork/geek/nerd is somewhat cool and a lot of people are into what I would think of as "ancillary" gaming stuff. Movies are a great example. How many people love Lord of the Rings, but would never even think to play MERPs (Ok, that one I get...) but with the mainstream popularity of the Marvel movies and the popular Marvel based video games (the Lego games come immediately to mind, but the AAA Title Marvel Avengers just came out this last week), but have these fans been exposed to the classic Marvel Super Heroes RPG?

In my family my mother just loves pretty much any TSR paperback that has been printed. Dragonlance, Forgotten Realms, Icewind Dale.....you name it, she's probably read it, but never once has she picked up and slung dice, much to my chagrin.

Now as far as my family goes, all my fault. I've picked up some D&D starter sets before, but maybe I should've started with the Dungeon board game, or even some other board games to whet their appetite. I missed the boat, pure plain and simple.....

.....but these days we have a golden opportunity with all this COVID-19 stay at home mentality. With kids/families spending more time at home indoors, we have a captive audience. Playing RPGs can be a family-friendly cost effective form of entertainment and depending on the game even educational!

One game I HIGHLY recommend for trying out with younger kids is Dungeonteller Fantasy RPG from Blue Boxer Rebellion. Honestly I'd just buy/download everything that Blue Boxer Rebellion has for Dungeonteller, but I'm biased. All you'll need for dice is a butt-load of d6's and the mechanics are kid friendly, quick & easy to boot. Make sure you download the free extra character classes.

This is one way we can help start growing new gamers, but that's just a start for average gamers. For Above Average gamers we need to take the basic/average gamers and start exposing them to the larger gamer culture. Get them playing one game and then try out some other games, try different genres. Introduce them to Zines....bring them to conventions. Hell, even just making some tweaks to your normal game is a good start! If you have a mini-heavy game, try playing more "Theater of the Mind" or vice-versa.

I'm just spit-balling here, but the basic idea is that I think we need to not only grow the fan base for RPGs in general, but we need to "close the loop" and bring RPGs not only more into the mainstream on a personal level, but to broaden our shared experiences. Most of us play because we really enjoy it and getting to share that with friends and family, now and even after we're gone, is important. I think we should all be looking for opportunities to create some Above Average gamers.

Now excuse me as I look online for D&D plushies for my Great Nephew (1st of his generation in my family).







Last Second Idea Edit!
Actually I've an idea........comment to this post the name and relation (something along the lines of "Titus my Great Nephew", don't need to be too specific) of someone you'd love to introduce to RPGs and I'll pick one at random to hook up with a fair bit of Dungeonteller Fantasy RPG kit. I'll make a selection next Sunday, which will give me a week to reach out to Doug Anderson and make sure he gets paid and figure out the logistics. Worst case I'll just send a gift card for DTRPG you can use to pick it up.

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