State of The Tavern - Minions of Tenkar, ShireCon, Tenkar's Thursday Night One Shots, and More

Wow. Things have gotten busy here at The Tavern. Let's talk about the balls being juggled ;)

Dungeon Crawl Cards should be going out in a few days. I did about 7 or 8 cards with pens that did a poor job leaving ink on the actual card, so I had to track down better silver ink pens. Ordered and crossing my fingers. Those receiving the first cards with the poorer ink will be getting a bonus to make up for it.

See that artwork/mock module cover above? That's from Fugli. Simply amazing. But it also inspired the adventure I'll be running at Shire Con on September 17th, 2022. Here's the pitch:

The Minions of Tenkar -The crazy dwarven bartender has left his Tavern and has taken up residence in the ruined abbey’s dungeons just outside of town. Over the past few months, a deformed tribe of goblins has heeded his call to extract revenge on his former town. Pets have disappeared. Someone peed in the brewery’s kegs. And now, old man Nasala has gone missing. Will you heed the call. Will you confront Tenkar’s Minions?

SWL levels 1-3. Characters rolled at table. Or bring you character back from a prior Shire Con and possibly level up.

I've got some twists and turns already mapped out in my head. Now to put it on paper.

I just ordered a Tenkar's Minions T-Shirt as well as an extra Torchlight hat. If the shirt meets my expectations, I'll order another as a giveaway at the Shire Con table, along with the extra Torchlight cap. There's a distant chance I may take orders for fulfillment at Shire Con. 

I'm thinking of using the following art for some Tenkar's Minions coffee mugs:

Starting in August, on the second Thursday of the month, instead of hosting the usual Tavern Chat Hangout on The Tavern's Discord Server, I'll be running a session of Tenkar's Thursday Night One Shots. These will use the Swords & Wizardry Light Rules with some options from Continual Light. We'll generate characters prior to the session, and characters that return from prior sessions can level up. It will be drop in - drop out and run from 8 PM Eastern till about 11 PM Eastern. The first session will be on the evening of Thursday, August 11th, 2022, and will use Discord for voice and Roll20 for the VTT. I am very much a VTT minimalist, so don't expect much more than for of war and online dice rolling It will be a playtest of The Minions of Tenkar, so if you plan on playing in my Shire Con game, I'll ask you to skip this session ;)

Oh, and no Livestream tonight for those wondering. Summers have a habit of f'n with expected scheduling.

K, time to get to work...

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Kickstarter - Whisper & Venom: Dark Fantasy Adventure for 5e and OSE

I've been a fan of Whisper & Venom since Zach Glazar first self-published it back in 2013 - holy shit, has it really been that long? Whisper & Venom has led to a strong friendship between Zach & myself, that continues to this day. Heck, we even get together for virtual racketball sessions on occasions. Just letting you know what the connections are, and any biases I may have :)

The Whisper & Venom: Dark Fantasy Adventure for 5e and OSE Kickstarter brings back the original with new art, updated layout, and is available in 5e and Old School Essentials versions. Those backing in the first 36 hours get a free gnome mini. I have mine directly from Zach at my first NTRPG. Again, has it really been that long? I guess so ;)

Those first 36 hours also get you a discounted price ($47 - plus shipping, of course - compared to the regular price of $50).

I'm in for an OSE version. Lets get 200 backers for the OSE version and unlock the higher quality printed book (instead of merely a POD).

Edit - 100 backers in the first 50 minutes - not bad at all!

Whisper & Venom, the acclaimed adventure setting, is being resurrected and expanded for Fifth Edition and Old-School Essentials. Originally released in 2013 by Necromancer Games’ very own Zach Glazar under his publishing venture Lesser Gnome, Whisper & Venom’s success was a surprise to everybody, especially its author. After many years of disingenuous promises, Whisper & Venom is here, and it is bigger, better, and more beautiful than ever. No, really it is!

It will be a full-color, hardcover book written for Old-School Essentials by Necrotic Gnome or the ever-popular Fifth Edition system. In addition, many of the options from the 2013 project will be available as add-ons, including the 28mm miniatures featuring a selection of notorious adversaries and hapless NPCs that appear inside the adventure. This new batch of 28mm miniatures will be cast from the original masters by Valiant Enterprises.

Whisper & Venom was written by Zach Glazar and John Hammerle as a tribute to the fantasy adventures and roleplaying game accessories of the 1980s. Following its release, Whisper & Venom proved to be a well-received title that was played and discussed more often than anyone, especially its author, expected.

It is now being released by Necromancer Games, which brings the experience, resources, and talent to the project to make Whisper & Venom even more special. A combined total of 80 years of publishing experience will allow for art, editing, and design resources that are an order of magnitude bigger and better than what was possible when it was first released.

Whisper & Venom is a regional setting and multi-part adventure set in the Whisper Vale, an isolated community of insular villagers beset by an outside supernatural force that sow's distrust and paranoia. Undue stress has induced social hardships and pushed their community to the point of breakdown. As they blame each other, the actual source of their misery remains camouflaged.

The Tavern is supported by readers like you. The easiest way to support The Tavern is to shop via our affiliate links. DTRPG, Amazon, and Humble Bundle are affiliate programs that support The Tavern. 

You can catch the daily Tavern Chat vidcast on YouTube - Tenkar  

Deal of the Day - Filling in the Blanks (OSE/OSR)

I am a sucker for campaign resources and tools.

Filling in the Blanks is a guide to populating hexes with lairs and features to use in fantasy role-playing games. While written specifically for Necrotic Gnome's Old School Essentials it is compatible with virtually all OSR-style games, and can be used with more modern versions of the game with little effort.

It provides tables for randomly generating the number and type of lairs and features that can be found while exploring the wilderness and guidance on how to craft the results into coherent setting details.

I literally just purchased the Filling in the Blanks PDF and expect to do a deep dive in a week or so.

Filling in the Blanks is normally 10.95 in PDF, until tomorrow it is 4.38.

The Tavern is supported by readers like you. The easiest way to support The Tavern is to shop via our affiliate links. DTRPG, Amazon, and Humble Bundle are affiliate programs that support The Tavern. 

You can catch the daily Tavern Chat vidcast on YouTube - Tenkar  

 

Kickstarter - Palace of the Golden Princess #1 (5e Adventure & Comic Book)

5e module and comic based on the first RPG adventure written by a woman.

In 1980, Jean Wells, the only woman in TSR's design department, was assigned to write an adventure for the "B" (Basic) series that would teach new players how to play D&D using rules for the D&D Basic Set. This module would be unique as it was the first TSR adventure authored by a female designer. Wikipedia - Palace of the Silver Princess

It's not often, if ever, that I start a blog post with a quote from Wikipedia, but I thought it was appropriate this time ;)

Now, on to the "connections". The project creator, author of the comic, and co-author of the adventure is Preston Poulter. Preston is a frequent participant in The Tavern's weekly hangouts on Thursday Nights on our Discord Server and loves creating comic books. Courtney Campbell is a prolific and highly skilled writer of RPG material. Courtney has a blog - Hack & Slash - and can often be found lurching in the Common Room of The Tavern's Discord Server. Heck, he was there earlier today.

So yes, I know the main folks behind the Palace of the Golden Princess #1 Kickstarter project. Quite simply, if Courtney is writing RPG material, I want it. If Preston is publishing a comic book, it will literally look amazing (parental supervision may be required on some comic book titles, as the artwork can be risque ;)

So, what can you get and for how much?

The comic book, the adventure, and character sheets in digital format will be 10 bucks. Print of the comic book adventure will be 20 bucks. Then it goes a bit crazy but in a good way. There's a Deck of Many Things, limited covers for the comics, resin minis, replica swords, wall tapestries, and more. Phew! Have at it. Damn, but the sword tempts me ;)

Subsequent to the success of the Palace comic, I sought to build a campaign to offer a module set in the world of Palace. Ultimately, I partnered with prolific module writer Courtney Campbell to bring you an adventure that, while published under the current 5e ruleset for the world's most popular roleplaying game, has been customized by Courtney and myself to embrace the play style of the 1980s. I invite you to download our introductory release, available on drivethrurpg as a "Pay what you want" PDF. 

Rejecting the modern notion of roleplaying which seems to have evolved into what can best be described as "fantasy superheroes," Courtney and I dispatch the modern notion of character "builds" straight away by declaring that character stats should be generated by rolling 3d6 for each stat in the order the appear on the sheet, just like you would have done back in 1981 to play Jean Wells original work.

Of course, you are free to ignore our rules recommendations, but we feel you will be cheating yourself and your group out of a different kind of roleplaying experience that delivers a lot more fun. 

The module offered with this campaign incorporates all the material of the introductory release, and expands upon it to offer a multi-session adventure designed for 4-8 characters of levels 1-3. 

 

The Tavern is supported by readers like you. The easiest way to support The Tavern is to shop via our affiliate links. DTRPG, Amazon, and Humble Bundle are affiliate programs that support The Tavern. 

You can catch the daily Tavern Chat vidcast on YouTube - Tenkar  

nuTSR Discord Channel Screen Captures for All to Read and Use as They See Fit (Google Drive)

My anonymous source (that provided me the screenshots for today's earlier video on Vince Florio) has decided to share all the screen captures they have from the TSR Discord and put a Google Drive link for folks to access.

Here's the link: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1ii1iTjlLdQqlkjih2i20UERN7ZLsh9mm?fbclid=IwAR3pjzHrV9pc16fthveSjALExDfpQkBBZIObkOlq5OwaAoLWlrQmF7VJSY0

From the beginning, it's been about the truth when it comes to nuTSR, not the clicks. I'm very happy to be able to give this wings and hope others will use the included information to make their own decisions about nuTSR.

Feel free to use it on blogs, websites, videos, etc.

ConManKen PSA for Those That Don't Watch the Tavern on YouTube

I only follow a handful of blogs, of course the Tavern is on that short list. I can also be kind of lazy and tend to go and review a whole week of posts on these blogs over the weekend, or when I have a quiet moment at lunch.....well, allegedly I'm on lunch.

Imagine my surprise when I'm going through the last week of posts here at the Tavern and I simply cannot find the post I'm looking for. I could've sworn that there was an update regarding Ken Whitman, er Con Man Ken? What is it that Erik calls him....Whitless? I know I could do a search and figure it out, but lazy and I'm already on the blog, posting.....

....of course I forget that most every web browser has something call "tabs". Maybe I should have more coffee before hopping online....

OK, ConManKen and Whitless are things and not my creation or imagination. Was it my imagination that there was an update? I could've sworn I heard about one and Whitless is really where my introduction to the Tavern, as a guest poster, began. Kenny managed to bilk my household out of $450 on the KoDT: LAS Kickstarter and Erik let me rail on about it.

The thought that Kenny might get back into our community, in ANY capacity other than as an inmate requesting we send him gaming materials to make his cell time more comfortable (hey, a guy can dream, right?), well it gives me chills.

I did find the info I was looking for....it was on the Tavern's YouTube channel. Not listed here in any easy capacity. No, that will not do:

I know this is essentially double-dipping, but it's not Erik's fault.....it's mine. Kenny is working an angle...has to be, he's done it before, actually multiple times IIRC, and him popping up to solicit Erik for an interview cannot be a good thing. You have to dig through the YouTube comments, well all 14 at this point, to see that info.

While I should really have, well a "real" post for today, I can't let this one go. The thought that this KickScammer might circle back around to us......*shudder*

If Kenny does an interview, I really hope it is documented online outside of YouTube.