Traditional or "Book" Sized?

I've seen people posting here and there around the rpg community about size prefence in gaming books. It seems the book (or digest) sized booklet is gaining acceptance with the traditional fantasy gaming crowd.


For me, I like both. However, back in the day when I played post UA AD&D, I used to carry around a backpack FULL of rulebooks (which, admittedly, half were never even used). I would have loved access to booklet-sized rules back then.


Now, as a Labyrinth Lord GM/player, I carry around one (1) book, so, as they say, size doesn't matter. I do have a nice collection of pdfs of other rpgs and supplements that I have recently printed off as pocketbooks, which make for great and less clunky bedtime reading.


Does anyone out there have a die-hard preference, and if so, what drove you to wanting smaller/larger sized rpg materials?

A big thanks for representing LL in Knockspell.

I received my pdf copy of Knockspell #3 earlier today and it looks fantastic. I simply have to give a big thanks to Matt Finch at Mythmere Games for not only publishing my adventure, but making it look so darn good in print (a thanks to Mr. Kramer, too)!

The last time I really gave Labyrinth Tomb of the Minotaur Lord a good read was after its first and only editing session. As I re-read the module last night, I forgot how much freaking fun this adventure was to run. The puzzles, traps, new monsters and magical items all come together in a delightfully deadly labyrinth crawl!

Could I say that Minotaur Lord is worth the price of the magazine alone? Sure, but that would be overstepping my bragging rights, and this issue of Knockspell is packed full of so much old-school happiness that nearly every piece would be able to make the same boast.

As an extra incentive to get your own copy from Black Blade Publishing, for the rest of this week, they knocked 10% off the pdf price. 64 pages of Knockspell for $3.60! Check it out here!

Or if you like the deadwood edition: here.

Last thing I want to say here is to give another thanks to Matt for allowing me to represent Labyrinth Lord in his pages. He uses Knockspell as an entertaining and useful forum to prop up the old-school - from 0e to 1e and everything in between - and I'm just happy that he has decided to take on this endeavor to share with the rest of us.

...Minotaur Lord adventure released in Knockspell #3!

The cat is out of the bag!

It looks like Mythmere has a sweet deal with Black Blade Publishing! What's even sweeter is that Knockspell #3 has finally been released. And even sweeter-er is that KS#3 features our new adventure Labyrinth Tomb of the Minotaur Lord!

It has been a long time coming for this adventure, and it's worth the wait! Now, with the modules Treasure Crypt of the Salstine Pirate, The Lost Staves of Maurath, and now Labyrinth Tomb of the Minotaur Lord, that equals three module releases within one month. Good times. :)

I doubt that I'll maintain this type of schedule, but it's nice when everything comes together at once, you know?

You can find Knockspell #3 here in both PDF and print.

EDIT: There will be a big announcement on the Mythmere forums tomorrow (10/27) about the publishing deal. Regarding this, Matt said: "Don't buy anything today, because there may be a sale announced with the launch."

And you think Pac-Man is a retro game??

This is non-rpg related, BUT, I found these fantastic pics over at Retro Hound of a place called the Penny Arcade in Manitou Springs, Colorado.

I have actually visited this place a couple times and it is just as cool as it looks. Those who think that Space Invaders is an old game should check this place out and learn a little history.

Man, I love this stuff!

The Lost Staves of Maurath now available! FREE!

Prime Requisite Games is proud to announce a new Labyrinth Lord / BASIC rpg adventure available as a FREE download!

Classic Deep Level Dungeon Adventure DLD5: The Lost Staves of Maurath

An open sinkhole under a sacred temple has revealed a catacomb of twisted dark caverns. Vicious creatures from below raided the temple of its most precious possessions, the magical Staves of Maurath.

Now the staves must be found, and an open call has been issued for a group of powerful adventurers to explore the caverns and find the Lost Staves of Maurath. However, it is believed that the caverns may echo the deadly secret of an ancient and evil burial chamber.

The Lost Staves of Maurath is a challenging adventure for character levels 4-6. For use with the Labyrinth Lord™ rules or other Basic/Expert RPG systems.


Available for FREE at Lulu, Scribd, and Issuu.

Enjoy!

New mini module while you wait!

While the finishing touches are added to our next module, let me douse a bit of your adventuring thirst with our first Labyrinth Lord mini adventure released under our new KTM3T brand: Treasure Crypt of the Salstine Pirate.

The legend of the Salstine Pirate tells of a sea captain who turned pirate, killing off most of his crew and taking his treasure to land. Salstine found an abandoned tomb within the Dwarven Mountains to hide his stolen goods, and meant to stay there to avoid getting caught by the military he betrayed. However, what he found in the tomb was a horror that would keep the Salstine Pirate trapped within forever.

As always, this is a free download!

Influenced by the One Page Dungeon contest, KTM3T (which stands for Kill The Monsters, Take Their Treasure) mini modules are one or two page adventures that can easily plug into any existing campaign, or they can simply be a great Saturday night time-killer.

These adventures will be written with the quick-game in mind. There will not be long drawn out stories full of cryptic rumors and mysteries to solve. KTM3T modules will have three major elements: monsters, traps and treasure. So not only will these adventures make for a nice quick one-session game, they are perfect as introductory modules for new players.

As far as scheduled releases for KTM3T mini modules, I must say that the full-length modules will have priority, so the minis will be released as time permits.

Enjoy and Happy Gaming!

New cover art!

Here is an early peek at the cover art.

As I finish up the new module

Right now I am deep in the rewrite/art and design stage of PRG's new adventure module The Lost Staves of Maurath. Like our past releases, this will be released under the Deep Level Dungeons Adventures brand. Maurath will be released as adventure module DLD5.

So where are the modules DLD3 and DLD4? Well...

DLD3 is the temporarily shelved Beyond the Midway Post adventure and DLD4, The Labyrinth Tomb of the Minotaur Lord, will be published in the upcoming Knockspell #3.

So there you go. :)

As a side note, I'm trying to get a lunch-hour Labyrinth Lord game going at my job. When it finally happens, I believe we're going to give Brave Halfling Publishing's The Ruins of Ramat a spin. Knowing my players, they'll have no problem running sword-first into a fray with the Tentacled Demonic Guardians (and then we'll quickly roll up some new characters after the carnage).

Test play for our new LL adventure

Saturday's test play for the full-length The Lost Staves of Maurath was a blast! I don't think I've ever ran a game that was so crazy and by-the-seat-of-the-pants as was this one. We were having so much fun that the group didn't want to stop, turning the evening into a seven hour long Labyrinth Lord marathon!

However, I find that when you don't know when to say "when", and the party is near the adventure finish line, people start making foolhardy mistakes when they're tired. Although Jason, a PRG test-player regular, did some very smart and innovative role-playing throughout the evening, a fatal mistake was made in the very last room. His thief died...again. We'll mourn his lack of hit points here...again.

I'll admit that we should have stopped a couple hours earlier and saved the big stuff for another night. This saves the party from just trying to "push through" to the end just so that we can reach the end (in our group's defense, our gaming sessions are rather far between, so we'd probably not be able to continue the adventure soon enough to keep its momentum).

So now the tweaking, writing and art shall begin in preparation for publication. Those of you familiar with the one-page dungeon from which this adventure is expanded, much has changed! I'm excited to get this one out, and like the other PRG adventures, it will be available as a free download.

I'll keep you posted.

The Lost Staves of Maurath revamp and other goodies

Things will start to move right along. Next weekend is our next scheduled gaming session. We will be playing a revamped and full-length version of my one-page dungeon The Lost Staves of Maurath. This version includes an expanded temple and an all-new third level.

The plans are to make The Lost Staves of Maurath for levels 4-7, so the critters will be bumped up from the original if they have any hope of giving the PCs some serious boo-boos.

Again, like my previous adventures, if all goes well with this one, it should be the next Labyrinth Lord module release for PRG.

After this one is finished, I'll continue on a module that I am really excited about titled The Fierce Foes of Fire Peak Mountain. This Labyrinth Lord adventure will be for higher level characters (around 6-10) and will feature some hard-hitting baddies.

PCs will venture through seven or eight small levels full of Fierce Foes as they travel up toward the Fire Peak, including some "abandoned" ruins, a security fort, a village and its graveyard, and a vast labyrinth of caverns that will lead characters to the peak.

Typical stuff? That's right! Fire Peak Mountain is going to be a 100% old-school dungeon crawl (take a gander at the cover to the original D&D Dungeon Geomorphs for the type of flavor I have in mind). While that might not be for everyone's taste, hopefully we can win the naysayers over. After all, free-of-charge adventures are hard to beat!

One last thing: I still have my sights on an X-plorers rpg mission module release. This will happen (or my test-playing crew will string me up). Whether this will happen before Fire Peak is released is all up in the air right now.

New Goblinoid Games site is up!

For those of us who have been waiting with a drooling mouth for the new Goblinoid Games web site, the wait is finally over.

The new GG site is up and running. It's well-organized and after navigating through, I had the urge to break out the dice and role-play a game (but at 2:45am, it's highly unlikely).

I want to thank Dan at Goblinoid Games for the "shout out" in the site's our partners section. I'm happy to support Labyrinth Lord and I look at this acknowledgment as a thumbs-up directly from the source.

One last thing -- I must say that the copy on the main page is perfect, especially the line, "It's time to wipe the high gloss off your gaming table and take a journey leading to gritty old-school adventure."

Amen!

News on our upcoming adventures

Just to let you know that I haven't been sitting on my hands since the release of Fabled Curse of the Brigand Crypt, the next adventure has already been written and ready for publication.

The Labyrinth Tomb of the Minotaur Lord will be out soon enough, but not through Prime Requisite Games. I am pleased to announce that as of this writing, Minotaur Lord will appear in the next issue of Knockspell magazine (issue #3)!

While the adventure's title may be a bit self explanatory, the deadly traps and cryptic puzzles within are anything but predictable. The Labyrinth Tomb of the Minotaur Lord is compatible with Labyrinth Lord and Swords & Wizardry and is suitable for character levels 3-5.

I'm excited that Mr. Finch accepted Minotaur Lord to be in the pages of Knockspell (as well as provided some desperately needed line editing of the adventure manuscript). I'm equally excited that Matthew tapped fantasy artist Christopher Burdett to illustrate the adventure! Very, very cool.

While I do not have a time frame of when Knockspell #3 will be released, I'll definitely let you know as soon as I know!

In the meantime I have plans for a high-level Labyrinth Lord release as well as a mission module for the X-plorers role-playing game.

More updates to follow! Woo-hoo!

Grey Area Games releases X-plorers RPG

The X-plorers sci-fi RPG is now in full release. David "grubman" Bezio, famous for his Phoenix Barony fantasy setting, has made both a print and PDF version available at Lulu.

He is also offering a free version at his Grey Area Games web site for you to check it out before purchasing the real deal. According to Bezio, the free version doesn't have the art, sample adventure, and a few other bits which are all included in the full version.

Why have I been hyping up the X-plorers RPG? Well, my regular Labyrinth Lord group will give this game a spin during our next scheduled session. If all goes well, the adventure we test-play might find its way out to the public through Prime Requisite Games! We loves us some space battles! More news on that later.

Am I helping or hurting the OSR?

I was going to comment on Mishler's post on the Doom of RPGs once I had more time to digest it. Then I came across this posting from Labyrinth Lord publisher Dan Proctor.

He writes about what consumers are starting to expect, which are PDFs for free and impractically priced print products. Well, sure, of course. Who doesn't want cheaper products? But they don't consider what it takes to get that fine rule book or adventure out cost wise (as Mishler breaks down for us).

Dan says the reasoning behind this sense of entitlement is, "the people who price their POD books for nothing have a cost of $0 to produce the book, because they either write it themselves, had volunteer writers, did the art themselves, or had volunteer artists."

He then states, "People see these very low prices and wonder why a product of similar page count can't be so cheap, too. more than that, people are now starting to expect that the POD books be priced for nothing much like PDF books."

Knowing human nature for wanting everything to be even and "fair" (blah), I believe that Dan might be right. If that's the case, then Prime Requisite Games would be part of the problem.

I am a basement publisher doing this as a fun hobby. I do all the illustrating, layout, design, editing, writing, map-making, and even a bit of advertising all on my own. Unlike Dan, I don't have to fork over the dollars to some talented individuals to produce a decent product (side note here: I'm not saying that my products are the best, but they don't look like refrigerator drawings either! :) )

Therefore, I can sell my product at cost and it seems cheap compared to others on the market. Also, since the print products are sold at cost, the PDFs are simply given away for free. Is there a chance that making these products available as such makes people believe that it should be the norm? Do OSR consumers believe other publishers have some sort of obligation to sell their modules for $5.90 a pop? I'd like to hope that isn't so.

Why? Because Mishler's breakdown of the RPG product price doesn't affect me in the slightest (since the dollar amount for each cost is zilch) as it does for other publishers. My time is the only thing spent.

That being the case, Dan's products (as well as John's from BHP, Raggi's from LotFP, among others) are fairly priced. On the other hand, I feel my products are also priced fairly in a sense that I want to spread the word about Labyrinth Lord (my game of choice) and I'd like to get my adventures into as many hands as possible.

I love doing this as a hobby! I love the people involved and the excitement they get when playing, producing, and watching the hobby grow and grow. My time is not only spent on adventures, but also going to different forums and Q&A websites to drop a Labyrinth Lord or Swords and Wizardry link here and there. I even got a bit of light-hearted ribbing for my MySpace ads promoting PRG and Labyrinth Lord.

I wanted my products to be a way in helping the OSR grow. I remember when I started PRG, I figured the best way to spread the word is to offer cheap/free RPG materials. However, am I shooting the OSR in the pinky toe by doing just that?

Bezio's new sci-fi RPG is ready for test play!

Ah! I've been anxious to get David Bezio's new sci-fi game X-plorers ever since he announced the project on the retro forums. His idea of "what if" the fathers of RPGs were more into sci-fi than fantasy when they wrote the original 1974 set - that sounded intriguing to me (and to a couple of my test players who are big sci-fi geeks).

Mr. Bezio has graciously provided the public with a test play version over at Lulu for free. Hopefully, I'll be able to give the game a spin around the game table.

Here's my official good luck to David with his new game. I hope it's a succuesful one.