Retrospective: Ars Magica

The period leading up to the release of the Second Edition of Advanced Dungeons & Dragons is an interesting one. Though TSR’s flagship remained the proverbial 800-lb. gorilla of the hobby – still popular and selling well – the larger landscape of roleplaying was beginning to shift. Starting in the mid-1980s and continuing into the early ’90s, a number of new and, dare I say, experimental RPGs began to appear. Many of these games deviated sharply in both design and intended playstyle from the template laid down by D&D in 1974.

Of these, the one that immediately stands out in my memory is Ars Magica, released in 1987 by Lion Rampant, a small outfit co-founded by Jonathan Tweet and Mark Rein-Hagen, two designers who would later leave a lasting mark on the hobby. Even though the original edition was a modest affair, as one might expect from a fledgling company in the days before desktop publishing and professional layout, Ars Magica was an impressive work of imagination and clarity of purpose. What it lacked in visual polish, it made up for with a bold vision of what a roleplaying game could be: a tightly focused setting, a flexible and evocative magic system, and a novel approach to campaign structure that encouraged long-term play and shared refereeing responsibilities.

Despite all this, Ars Magica didn’t receive widespread recognition at the time, at least not in the gaming circles I moved in. I don’t recall it being especially celebrated, let alone commonly played. My first encounter with it came by chance, through a friend whose cousin lived in Minnesota, where Lion Rampant was based. What struck me most was how different it felt from any RPG I’d seen before. Even then, though, it remained something of a curiosity – admired more for its ideas than embraced at the table. It wasn’t until the third edition’s release in 1992, now under the White Wolf banner, that Ars Magica gained broader visibility. By then, Rein-Hagen had already launched Vampire: The Masquerade and that connection lent the game a cachet it had previously lacked. But the seeds had been planted back in 1987, in that humble, ambitious little book that imagined a different kind of fantasy roleplaying, rooted not in treasure and combat, but in magic and myth.

At its core, Ars Magica is a game about wizards: not the fireball-slinging adventurers of Dungeons & Dragons, but practitioners of a consistent magical tradition grounded in a pseudo-medieval European world. The magic system, based on a combination of techniques (Creo, Intellego, Muto, Perdo, Rego) and forms (Animal, Aquam, Auram, Corpus, Herbam, Ignem, Imaginem, Mentem, Terram, Vim), was unlike anything I’d encountered. It encouraged creativity and system mastery in equal measure, rewarding players who approached spellcasting not as a list of pre-defined effects but as a kind of magical engineering.

That alone would have made Ars Magica noteworthy, but its concept of troupe-style play made it all the more remarkable. Players were encouraged to share the duties of the referee (the “storyguide”) and to control not only a primary character (a magus) but also companion characters and "grogs," which were lower-powered retainers and guards respectively. This structure fostered a sense of shared "ownership" of the campaign that stood in stark contrast to the more referee-centric campaigns I was used to. I hadn’t seen anything like it before and I remember reading Ars Magica for the first time and being struck by how different it seemed to be.

The game’s setting, "Mythic Europe," was equally striking. Rather than creating a wholly fictional world, Tweet and Rein-Hagen placed their game in a version of historical Europe where the content of folklore and legends were real. Monasteries, faeries, noble courts, and demons all existed side by side, filtered through the lens of Hermetic magic. It was a world where the mundane and the magical existed in an uneasy equilibrium and the player characters stood firmly on the side of the uncanny.

As I mentioned earlier, the first edition rulebook really was a humble production: a softcover with a stark black-and-white cover depicting a wizard at his desk. The layout was clean, if plain, and the text dense with ideas. It lacked the polish of later editions or the visual flair that White Wolf would later bring to the game, but it had a seriousness of tone and clarity of vision that made me take notice. Looking back, I think Ars Magica represents one of the more intellectually ambitious RPGs of the pre-1990s era. Its design anticipated many later developments like freeform magic systems, troupe-style "storytelling," and campaigns centered on a fixed locale (the covenant). That the game’s fifth edition, released in 2004, remains in print is, I think, a testament to the enduring strength of its foundational ideas.

For all its virtues, the original edition nevertheless had its rough edges. The rules were sometimes vague or overly ambitious and the troupe model required a level of buy-in and trust that wasn’t always easy to find in groups accustomed to more traditional GM/player dynamics. But these were small complaints in a game that dared to be different and in doing so, helped shape the future of the hobby in subtle but lasting ways. Though I was never a regular player, I was an admirer – and still am. In fact, I’d count Ars Magica among the few roleplaying games to which I’d gladly devote some of my dwindling time. That’s about as high a compliment as I can offer any game.

REPOST: The Articles of Dragon: "A New Game with a Familiar Name"

If the results of my poll back in October are any indication, nearly two-thirds of my regular readership entered the hobby within the first ten years of its existence, with a sizable portion of them doing so between the years 1980 and 1984. During that five year span, two different Basic Sets appeared, the first in 1981 and the second in 1983. Being a Holmes man who'd "upgraded" to AD&D sometime in 1980, I had no need for either of the Basic Sets released subsequently, but, TSR fan boy that I was, I nevertheless dutifully purchased both when they were released. That, of the two, I still have Tom Moldvay's 1981 version still sitting on my shelf today probably tells you all you need to know about my opinions of them.

But, back in issue #77 (September 1983) of Dragon, the reviser of the 1983 version, Frank Mentzer, made his case for why we needed a new Basic Set. It's a really fascinating article, both because it suggests that TSR obviously felt some need to justify the release of yet another Basic Set and because of the things that Mentzer says in his piece. It is, I think, a fascinating snapshot of the end of the Golden Age, making it well worth a read if you're at all interested in the history of this hobby and how it changed over the years.

The very first thing Mentzer mentions in his criticism of previous editions is that "you had to find someone to show you how to play." He notes that, in fact, learning from others who had figured out how to play on their own was the norm previously. That's because the game had "a devoted following, people who taught newcomers the ways of roleplaying." Mentzer is absolutely correct about this, as I've noted before. In those bygone days, you entered the hobby by initiation, aided by someone who'd done so before you. In my case, it was via a friend's teenaged brother; I, in turn, taught others how to play. That was the order of things in the late '70s and very early '80s. The 1983 edition is thus an attempt to correct this "flaw" of expecting that you'd learn to play from others.

Mentzer then notes that

the previous editions were not revisions. They were new attempts at using the same methods of organization applied to the original data plus evolution. They were not "revised," merely "reorganized." This one is different.

That's an interesting statement. I regularly point out that Holmes isn't really an introduction to AD&D at all, despite the claims inserted clumsily by TSR, but rather a new edition of OD&D that retains much of the original text of the LBBs. Moldvay is, I think, more of a revision than Mentzer gives it credit for. That said, it's also largely consonant with the LBBs, again retaining verbiage to be found in the 1974 game. The 1983, on the other hand, is even more than a revision; it's a rewriting of the game, using new language to express many of the same ideas. There's nothing wrong with that, of course, but the language is very simple and clearly geared toward children, which wasn't the case with the Blue Book I first encountered in 1979. Consequently, I recoiled upon reading it and it only further solidified my notion that the D&D line was for kids.

The 1983 set's focus on self-teaching and simple language probably made sense from a marketing standpoint. Given how well the set supposedly sold, I can't really fault TSR for going in this direction. At the same time, though, there was clearly a shift happening, away from adults and teenagers as the target audience and away from initiation as the means of entering the hobby. Likewise, the adoption of a unified esthetic (all Elmore and Easley artwork) that, while attractive, seemed to narrow rather than broaden the scope of the game. In short, the 1983 Basic Set marked a definite change from what had gone before.

I'll be honest: I was somewhat reluctant to write this particular post. I've gotten a surprisingly large number of requests from readers asking me to touch on the issue of the differences in philosophy between the 1981 and 1983 Basic Sets. But I also know the fondness with which many remember the Red Box and the profound influence it had on them as younger people. So, I hope no one takes this as a knock against the '83 boxed set, even if it's not to my cup of tea. I'm sure there were guys who started with the LBBs who looked at the Holmes set with disappointment, too; that's the way these things go. At the same time, I don't think it can be denied that 1983 marks another change in the history of both D&D and the hobby.

Campaign Updates: Between the Junta and the Apparatchiks

The Dolmenwood campaign will resume on May 6. However, both Barrett's Raiders and House of Worms had sessions last week. This is what happened in each.

Barrett's Raiders

The Raiders made their way to Fort Lee with no trouble, despite warnings about some of the locals. They were met at the gate by military police, who confirmed their credentials before directing them inside. Outside the gate was a large encampment of civilians, many in what appeared to be camping tents, while others occupied makeshift shelters. From what they could tell, there were several hundred of them and, they soon learn, they were refugees from Richmond. Also visible were military police.

The characters were received by the office of the Provost Marshal, whose job it was to maintain order at Fort Lee. Their arrival was unexpected, which is why Colonel Desmond Kearns, the Provost Marshal himself, wanted to speak with them in the morning. In the meantime, they were given accommodations, access to the mess, and showers. Lieutenant (formerly Sergeant) Cody realized that he'd never obtained a proper uniform after confirmation of his field promotion. He was told that could be arranged in the morning as well.

While in the mess, the characters heard all sorts of stories – about the aftermath of the Richmond action, the rise of New America, and troubles in the refugee camps. Apparently, an MP was stabbed and killed recently during a dispute. Col. Kearns wanted to punish the perpetrator severely but was blocked by General Summers, who felt that, so soon after Richmond, it would do little to improve the standing of USMEA. Many of the soldiers agreed with Kearns, but almost as many worried about the precedent that might be set by treating civilians too harshly, even in a case such as this.

Later that night, General Summers's aide-de-camp paid a visit on the officers of the Raiders (now officially known as Military Liaison Group-7). He apologized for coming so late, but explained that the general wished to see them tomorrow morning before they spoke to Col. Kearns. Lt. Col. Orlowski agreed, of course, but he began to worry that this suggested the rift between the base commander and the Provost Marshal might be bigger than even rumors suggested.

Next morning, they met with Summers, who explained that, while their arrival was unexpected, he welcomed them. As outsiders to the base, they could assist him with a problem. Supplies of food, medicine, fuel, and even ammunition had been discovered, suggesting an organized effort rather than just mismanagement. He wanted them to investigate everyone, military or civilian, under his authority to get to the bottom of this. Summers explained that, while he had the utmost respect for Col. Kearns, whom he regarded as a "good soldier," he lacked the subtlety needed to deal with this "in these trying times." Orlowski agreed, but, once again, was worried he and his unit had walked into a hornet's nest.

The meeting with Kearns was tense. He claimed to understand that they were only acting under orders "from some desk jocket back at Norfolk," but he nevertheless resented their presence. He'd assist as best he could but not gladly. Kearns explained he felt the base had been infiltrated by outside forces, perhaps the people sympathetic to the "unrecognized civilian authority" to whom he attributed all manner of malice. Naturally, this created some tension, since Michael, masquerading as the Polish national Aleksander, was a CIA agent and thus nomrinally allied to the civilian government.

Cody got his new uniform, but, when discussing the situation at Fort Lee, referred to it as "Kraków, Virginia" – a reminder of the paranoia they experienced while at the Free City. For his part, Vadim (also masquerading as a Pole), noted that post-war America was in a state of war "between the junta and the apparatchiks." 

House of Worms

While waiting at the Golden Bough clanhouse, Nebússa learned that two of his clan-cousins employed at Avanthár had recently been replaced by order of Prince Mridóbu. While shifts in personnel in the bureaucracy were to be expected after the death of an emperor, usually this occurred only after a new emperor sat upon the Petal Throne. From what he coud ascertain, it appeared that his cousins had been sacked because of their connections to Prince Eselné, a leading candidate for the throne and the favorite of two of the major factions with Tsolyánu – the Military Party and the Imperialists. Eselné was very popular with the legions and enjoyed the support of the Temples of Karakán and Vimúhla. He was thus a very strong contender.

Speaking of Eselné, he arrived in Béy Sü to lead a parade of "mourning and might" in honor of his late father. Supposedly, he was bringing only a few cohorts of the 1st Legion with him. However, as it turned out, he brought the entire legion with him, along with cohorts of the 7th, and almost all of the 23rd – nearly 20,000 men under arms. This worried the characters, who quickly rushed Kirktá into the Golden Bough clanhouse for his own safety. Nebússa in particular worried that Eselné might be planning something. The fact that the 7th Legion is named after a companion of the first Tlaktáni emperor and was heavily involved in early campaigns to suppress the cult of the One Other was suggestive.

He was right to be worried. Fairly soon after the arrival of these troops, notices began appearing the marketplaces announcing that Eselné had come to the capital to "safeguard the Petal Throne." This "safeguarding" took the form of checkpoints at all five of the cities Sákbe-road gates, checkpoints throughout the city, and the commandeering of the Palace of the Realm by General Kéttukal and his senior officers. Eselné made a public call for his brothers and sister to join him in his efforts, lest the empire fall into "the hands of death and fear," which many took as a reference to Dhich'uné. Soon thereafter, rumors started to fly that Princess Ma'íin had thrown in her lot with Eselné after previously attempting to do so with Dhich'uné.

Legionnaires were posted outside the Golden Bough clanhouse and anyone who came or left was interrogated by them. Waiting a day more to see what transpired, Grujúng and Chiyé decided they'd pay a visit to the Palace of the Realm. They sent a runner to the Palace to ask permission to see Kéttukal, whom they met the last time they were in the city. Word was sent back that their visit was welcome and indeed the general reiterated his offer a cohort commandership to Grujúng, something he'd previously rejected. Nevertheless, it made it clear Eselné was hoping to sway the characters, including Kirktá, to his side as he made his move.

Grujúng and Chiyé made their way to the Palace of the Realm, which they found to be heavily fortified. All the civilian scribes and clerks had been replaced by soldiers and other military personnel. It was now clear that, whatever Eselné claimed, Béy Sü was under occupation and he was likely laying the groundwork for a coup. It was only a matter of time before the violence and unrest that Nebússa feared would become a reality. The Kólumejàlim had already begun – ahead of schedule and played out on the streets of the capital of Tsolyánu.

Only So Many Campaigns

As my House of Worms Empire of the Petal Throne campaign inches ever closer to a conclusion after 10 years, I've found myself pondering the thorny question of what RPGs I might like to play in the future, whether with the players of House of Worms or any others. 

It's not as if there's a lack of games to choose from. There are likely more roleplaying games available today than at any point in the hobby’s history. Nearly every day brings news of a new game, setting, or ruleset, some elaborating on familiar themes, others staking out new ground. It’s an embarrassment of riches, especially compared to my earliest days in the hobby, when the available options were comparatively few and each new release felt like a major event. Now, it's easy to feel numbed – even apathetic – by the sheer volume of choices constantly thrust before us.

Yet alongside this wealth of options comes an unsettling realization: there is no way, not even theoretically, that I could ever hope to play even a fraction of them. Once upon a time, I might have imagined otherwise: that somewhere in the limitless expanse of "someday," I would eventually get around to all the games that caught my eye. Middle age has disabused me of that illusion. Someday has become today and the horizons ahead are no longer limitless.

As I've explained before, I always begin a new campaign with the expectation that it'll last for years. I like the slow unfolding of character and setting, the accumulation of shared memories, the way a world becomes real only after dozens, even hundreds, of sessions. It is in the long campaign that the deepest magic of roleplaying reveals itself. However, long campaigns require a major investment of time – and time is no longer the seemingly endless resource it once appeared to be. With every passing year, the opportunities for beginning (and, more importantly, completing) such campaigns grow fewer.

If a single campaign takes, say, several years to reach some kind of conclusion, how many campaigns do I realistically have left in me? Ten? Five? Fewer? Suddenly the question of what to play takes on a new and somber weight. Every choice I make about what to run or play necessarily means closing the door on countless other possibilities, not just new games, but even beloved classics I've never had the chance to experience properly. RuneQuest, Fading Suns, DCC RPG, not to mention my own Thousand Suns and Secrets of sha-Arthan – all beckon, but each can only be answered at the expense of the others. Each campaign undertaken is a silent farewell to others that will never be.

This isn't just a reflection on the state of the hobby, though it certainly speaks to the oversaturation of the RPG market, where even the most discerning gamer can feel lost amid the noise. The reality is that many of the games published today, for all the passion that went into their creation, will barely be remembered a few years hence. New games will push aside old ones; fashions will change; once-hyped titles will slip into obscurity, their creators moving on to their next project, and the hobby shifting its gaze. Our entertainments, like ourselves, are fleeting.

By their nature, all entertainments are ephemeral. New games, new editions, new settings will continue to be born, shine brightly for a time, and then vanish, just as we all will. There is a poignancy in realizing that, just as the wider world moves on without regard for our preferences or our dreams, so too will the world of gaming. I regularly hear people claim that a new Golden Age of Gaming is upon us and that may indeed be so, but I can only grasp a tiny part of it before my time runs out.

It’s a strange thing to realize that, even in play, one must prioritize. One must decide what matters most: the games whose rules intrigue, the settings that still catch fire in the imagination, the experiences that promise more than mere novelty. There is a temptation, one I felt strongly in my youth, to want to sample everything, to dip a toe in every pool, to always move on to the next new thing. But eventually, if one is lucky, there comes the wisdom to linger, to dwell, and to savor a few chosen things in greater depth.

I don’t know exactly how many campaigns I have left. I hope it’s more than a few. I only know that I must choose them with care. In a hobby bursting with possibilities, it’s no longer enough to simply ask, "What looks interesting?" Instead, I have to ask, "What is worth the time and attention I have left?" What imaginary worlds do I want to live in for a while, what adventures do I want to undertake, what memories do I want to create? 

There are only so many years in a life – and only so many campaigns in a lifetime.

The Sigils of sha-Arthan

I've recently completed a gazetteer of the Eshkom District, one of the twenty regions that make up the Empire of Inba Iro, the sample starting area for Secrets of sha-Arthan. This gazetteer will appear in an upcoming issue of Fight On! (though I've already shared it with my patrons). A lengthier, more detailed version of it will appear later this year as part of a new 'zine I'll be releasing, about which I'll talk in the coming weeks. 

For the moment, though, I wanted to share a few pieces of art the ever-amazing Zhu Bajiee produced for this project. Unlike previous pieces of artwork, these don't depict characters or monsters from sha-Arthan but rather symbols of some of the factions within the setting. The first of these is this one, used by the House of Magdor, the current ruling dynasty of Inba Iro. Named after Magdor, the great-great-grandfather of the current King-Emperor, the House seized the Solar Throne almost two centuries ago when his Chomachto army conquered da-Imer, the First City. 

The House of Magdor

Of course, not everyone was pleased by this seizure of power, most especially the former Ironian dynasty and its allies, some of whom have clung to power in certain districts of the Empire (Eshkom being one of them). Though outwardly loyal to the House of Magdor, they have formed a secret alliance known as the Sunbound that works behind the scenes to overthrow the Chomachto and regain the Solar Throne. 

The Sunbound

The temples of the Eternal Gods are quite powerful within the Empire, few moreso than that of Akor, the goddess of silence and secrets. Akor's temple once acted as guardians of Inba Iro's known vaults, but that role was recently stripped from them, a move that has created a rift between it and the Solar Throne. Fortunately for the King-Emperor, the temple is itself divided, with one faction favoring the Sunbound and another desiring rapprochement in the hopes of regaining its ancient rights.

The Temple of Akor

The Unmakers are a loose collection of cults whose leaders see the Makers as having been detached, corrupt, and, above all, stifling to the development of sha-Arthan and its inhabitants. Though suppressed in nearly every realm of the True World, sects of Unmakers nevertheless thrive in the shadows. The Hollow Prophets are the largest and most powerful such sect within the Eshkom District.

The Hollow Prophets

Because of their proscription, these cults make regular use of way signs – simple, deliberately cryptic graffiti that mark safe meeting spots, hidden caches, and homes of sympathizers, allowing cultists to navigate a hostile world without drawing attention to themselves or their activities.

Way Sign of the Hollow Prophets

Retrospective: Top Secret/S.I.

After last week's Retrospective post on the Q Manual for James Bond 007, my thoughts were starting to turn towards espionage RPGs. This inevitably led me back to TSR's Top Secret, which I loved but didn't play as often as I'd have liked. That, in turn, reminded me of the existence of its offspring, Top Secret/S.I., released in 1987, just as I was preparing to go away to college. Consequently, I didn't get a chance to look at the game until a few years later, by which point it was mostly a dead letter, despite receiving a fair bit of support over the course of its five-year run.

It's a shame, because I think TS/S.I. had a fair bit of potential. Designed by Doug Niles and Warren Spector, the game took a somewhat different approach to its subject matter than did its predecessor. Gone was the procedural, often gritty tone of the Merle Rasmussen's 1980 version. In its place was something more colorful, kinetic, and cinematic. TS/S.I. doesn't aspire to be "realistic" so much as an emulation of the larger-than-life globetrotting adventurer-cum-"spies" we saw in the action movies of the time. It was, I think, a good call and probably a better fit for the realities of most roleplaying game campaigns.

Like most TSR RPGs, Top Secret/S.I. was released in a boxed set, packed with goodies. Say what you will about TSR, but one of its great strengths was the physical production of its games. I think they may have outdone themselves in the case of TS/S.I. The company clearly had high hopes for the game. The box contained:

• A Player's Guide (64 pages), clearly written and friendly to newcomers.
• An Administrator’s Guide (32 pages), providing the referee with tools and advice.
• Maps, cardstock character sheets, reference charts, and a sheet of cardboard stand-up figures.
• Dice, of course, because no boxed game would be complete without them.

The packaging alone made it clear that this was a game, not merely a rulebook, but one that presented itself as a fun, playable experience intended to evoke a wide range of modern adventures, not just the high-tech gadgets and dangerous glamour of Cold War espionage fiction. I suspect that TSR hoped that Top Secret/S.I. would do for the present day what Dungeons & Dragons had done for fantasy: provide a flexible, accessible rules framework that could serve as the foundation for a whole genre of modern action roleplaying, from spy thrillers and paramilitary missions to pulp conspiracies and even near-future techno-drama.

In this, the TS.I. boxed set feels like a kind of Rosetta Stone for late-‘80s genre media. The core materials obviously nod to James Bond, Mission: Impossible, and the like, but the open-ended system and grab-bag of equipment, skills, and professions suggest a broader ambition. You could just as easily run an adventure inspired by Miami Vice, Rambo, or even Romancing the Stone. The structure was modular and the tone elastic. The overall design of the game hinted at a future where the spy game might grow to encompass all contemporary genre play.

TSR probably wasn’t just trying to publish a game about spies. Instead, they were trying to stake a claim on the modern era. The original boxed set suggested that they hoped to build outwards from it, creating a game that could handle every kind of adventure that could be found on video store shelves or TV Guide listings circa 1987. At least, that's what it looked like to me when I first read the game's materials during its dying days. If I'm correct, it was a pretty ambitious project to have undertaken, even if the end result didn't prove quite as successful as TSR might have hoped.

The rules of TS/S.I. were straightforward, modular, and forgiving. Characters were generated with six attributes (rated 1–100), a profession (which granted skill access), and a suite of percentile-based skills. It was a clean system, a sort of midway point between the crunch of, say, Twilight: 2000 and the elegance of James Bond 007. Combat, though potentially lethal, was far more forgiving than was the original Top Secret. Weapons and gear were detailed, but not exhaustively. The goal seems to have been clarity and momentum rather than obsessive realism. This was a game that wanted you to just dive in and play, not calculate cover modifiers for twenty minutes.

The default setting concerned the struggle between ORION (a kind of freelance intelligence agency) and WEB (a global criminal conspiracy) and was both its strength and its weakness. On one hand, it gave the game immediate stakes, a Bond-like clarity: good versus evil, gadgets versus goons. It let players jump into the world without pages of history or faction briefings. On the other hand, it lacked subtlety. There was little room for ambiguity, betrayal, or the slow-burn paranoia that often defines great espionage fiction. But for players raised on reruns of Mission: Impossible or The A-Team, this clarity was probably a feature, not a bug. There’s also an undeniable charm in how Top Secret/S.I. embraces the genre’s clichés. For example, some of the stand-up cardboard figures are depicted with trench coats and sunglasses and it’s hard not to smile at the earnest theatricality of it all. TS/S.I. doesn’t wink at its inspirations; it celebrates them without irony. Like a well-worn VHS tape of Octopussy or Delta Force, it’s content to revel in genre tropes, trusting that players will fill in the gaps with imagination and energy.

That attitude might partly explain why the game, despite its potential, never quite caught on the way its creators hoped. By 1987, the Cold War was already beginning to lose its pop culture dominance. The Berlin Wall would fall just two years later. Espionage itself was becoming murkier, more bureaucratic, and less suited to clean narratives. Furthermore, TSR was already showing signs of overstretch and its dominance in the RPG market no longer unchallenged. Top Secret/S.I. was well-supported, with modules, expansions, and genre-bending supplements like F.R.E.E.Lancers, but it never seemed to take off. As I said, I never even saw a copy until well into its run and I never owned it myself.

Despite all this, I think there's real merit in what the game tried to do. The original boxed set is well done, a terrific artifact of TSR at its peak as a producer of tactile, inviting RPG products. Likewise, the rules hold up better than one might expect, especially for pick-up play or shorter campaigns. The setting might be broad-stroke and somewhat Saturday morning in tone, but it’s also an ideal launchpad for more creative groups to riff, remix, and reframe. You could run hardboiled noir, techno-thrillers, or even supernatural conspiracy stories with only a few tweaks, just as TSR seems to have hoped to do.

In the end, Top Secret/S.I. stands as a kind of forgotten experiment: TSR’s attempt to bring modern action-adventure under the same umbrella as elves and dragons. It didn’t succeed, but it did leave behind a beautifully made game full of obvious enthusiasm and potential. For those of us who like to celebrate messier, less polished relics of the RPG past, maybe that’s enough.

The Articles of Dragon: "The Nine Hells (Part II)"

I was a huge fan of Part I of Ed Greenwood’s “The Nine Hells,” so it was almost inevitable that I’d be just as taken with Part II. Published in issue #76 of Dragon (August 1983), the second half of this magisterial tour of the planes of ultimate Lawful Evil is every bit the equal of the first, perhaps better. It’s longer, for one thing, and delves into the “deepest” layers of the Hells, including Nessus, the domain of Asmodeus. I probably spent even more hours poring over this article than its predecessor – and that’s saying something.

Part II explores the "bottom" four planes of Hell – Malbolge, Maladomini, Caina, and Nessus – ruled by the three most powerful archdevils: Baalzebul, Mephistopheles, and Asmodeus. As the Monster Manual tells us, Baalzebul commands both the sixth and seventh layers, a rare distinction that underscores his power. He rules the seventh directly, while the sixth is governed by his viceroy, Moloch, an archdevil in name, but one who holds power only at Baalzebul's pleasure. I've always wondered why Gary Gygax granted Baalzebul two layers when every other archdevil rules just one. Greenwood’s article doesn’t address this, though I suspect later AD&D material (perhaps Planescape?) might.

Each of the four planes receives a detailed write-up, highlighting notable locations like the capital cities of their ruling archdevils. This is a big part of what made this article and its predecessor so compelling. Greenwood gave each plane a rough geography, filled with distinct locales that made them feel like actual places where adventures could happen. Before these articles, the planes all seemed like vague, featureless expanses that were hard to visualize, let alone use in play. Now, there were cities, fortresses, lakes, places a referee could actually work with. That might seem like a small thing, but it’s not. Believe me.

Each plane also got write-ups for the unique devils who dwelled there, often in service to its archdevil. These included the so-called "dukes of hell," but also the "princesses of hell," the consorts of the archdevils. Even more than the dukes, this was a new concept in AD&D conception of devils, though not an unreasonable one, given their depiction as a court of ever-scheming infernal aristocrats. It also opened up new possibilities for gaming, as the dukes, princesses, and archdevils all had their own agendas, each looking to gain advantage over the others. Characters could easily become enmeshed in such gambits, whether willingly or not.

What truly set Part II apart, however, was its six-page appendix detailing how the Nine Hells distort spells, magic items, and even class abilities. Greenwood didn’t invent this approach, but he uses it to great effect, emphasizing how alien and hostile the Hells are compared to the Prime Material. This matters, especially for high-level play, where such distinctions are needed to pose real challenges. I suspect this is why Gygax became so invested in planar adventures later in his TSR career: the planes offered a new frontier to test powerful characters and keep long-running campaigns exciting.

Taken together, these two articles transformed the Nine Hells from vague backdrops into vivid, dangerous realms ripe for adventure. Greenwood’s work gave referees the tools to turn them into meaningful, playable settings, not just abstract concepts. For high-level campaigns looking for their next stage, the Nine Hells suddenly made a lot more sense. I adored these articles in my youth and still think highly of them today. They're also reminders of just how good Dragon was in the early to mid-1980s. What a time to be a subscriber!

Traveller Distinctives: Character Generation

I've often mentioned a classic Traveller computer program that I first encountered years ago and that I use as a time waster. The program faithfully recreates the game's character generation system and I've always found it a fun way to spend a few minutes. Of course, one of the reasons I find it so enjoyable is that, like Traveller's character generation system, it's an exercise in risk management, luck, and ambition.

Where most roleplaying games treat character generation as a more-or-less straightforward process of choosing (or rolling) ability scores, picking a class/profession, and selecting skills or equipment, Traveller invites the player to step into the shoes of his character long before the campaign even begins. The character isn't just a blank slate with a sword or a spellbook. He is a veteran of one of several possible interstellar institutions: a former Marine, a merchant officer, an "Other," whatever that is, with a past. And that past is determined through a series of career terms, each one a gamble.

Do you reenlist for another four-year hitch in the Navy? Making Captain comes with a +1 SOC and those additional rolls on the skill tables are tempting. Plus, your mustering out benefits could use a boost. But there's always the chance that this time, the dice won't be so kind. You might fail your promotion roll. You might fail to get any useful skills, leaving you four years older with little to show for it. You might even die.

There it is. The most infamous and distinctive element of the design of classic Traveller: your character can die during character generation. Even people who’ve never rolled up a Traveller character have heard the jokes. It’s a legendary bit of RPG lore, often recounted with equal parts amusement and awe – and for good reason. This single, brutal mechanic has played a big part in defining the game’s reputation for nearly half a century.

Of course, not everyone finds it funny. For many gamers, the idea of losing a character before the adventure even begins feels not just strange, but cruel. Why spend time building a character only to have him die on the metaphorical launchpad? But that very unpredictability, that razor’s edge between possible glory and oblivion, is what gives Traveller its edge. Character generation isn’t just prep; it’s your character's first adventure. It’s a gamble, a dare, a high-stakes game of chicken with the dice. And that’s exactly why I love it.

You can muster out early with a safe, if unremarkable, character. Or you can go for one more term, hoping for that coveted rank, that ship benefit, that skill. But with each term comes a greater risk of injury, aging and, of course, death. And when you roll that fateful snake-eyes on the survival roll, even with the +2 DM for a high Endurance score, that's it. You're dead. Roll again.

Later versions of Traveller, beginning with MegaTraveller and continuing into Traveller: The New Era and the Mongoose editions, have sought to blunt the edges of this system. MegaTraveller, for example, included "brownie points" the player could use to influence dice rolls in his favor. Mongoose, following an option present even in the original rules, replaces death with injury or a mishap on a failed survival roll. These modifications are understandable from a certain perspective, but I think they miss the point entirely. The original system's ruthlessness is not a flaw; it's a feature.

In Traveller, your character doesn't just have a backstory – he earns one. Every skill, every benefit, every rank is the product of risk. The characters who survive are often quirky, sometimes underpowered, occasionally broken, but they're also often memorable and utterly unlike the kinds of characters I'd have chosen to make. The character generation system breeds an emergent narrative, where the highs and lows of the dice suggest a life of triumphs and setbacks, filled with enough hooks to seed a dozen adventures.

I also think this system encourages risk-taking even in players. They become gamblers, daredevils, and strategists, all before the campaign even starts. Each reenlistment roll, each attempt at promotion or benefit, becomes a choice weighed against the threat of death. Do you settle for a safe, mediocre career or roll the dice one more time for a shot at greatness? It trains players to think in terms of trade-offs and consequences, to live with the results of their choices, and to embrace uncertainty. In doing so, it sets the tone for the entire game. Traveller is not about balanced builds or power fantasies; it's about living by your wits in a vast, indifferent universe.

This, to me, is one of the glories of classic Traveller. It's a game that understands that sometimes, the most compelling stories are forged not in a carefully "balanced" system, but in the chaotic, glorious churn of a couple of six-sided dice.

That's why I keep playing that little program and continue to find it so addictive. It's also why, when I've refereed Traveller in the past, I've never considered eliminating the possibility of death from character generation. It's not that I enjoy punishing players, but mostly because I think it's fun. It's a rite of passage, a crucible that produces not just numbers on a sheet, but living, breathing science fiction adventurers in the far future. To strip away that danger, that gamble, would be to rob Traveller of one of the things that makes it truly distinctive. Why would anyone ever want to do that?

Levels Are For Video Games

Today, "leveling up" is a central feature of countless video games, from sprawling open-world RPGs to mobile idle clickers. As anyone who reads this blog of course knows, levels come from Dungeons & Dragons, which introduced them half a century ago as a way to mark a character's growth in power and ability through play over time. What began as a simple abstraction to track advancement has since become a core gameplay loop in video and computer games, where clear, incremental progress has come to be seen as essential to keeping players engaged. 

As video games came to outshine the tabletop games from which they borrowed mechanical concepts like levels, it was perhaps inevitable that tabletop RPGs would return the compliment by inflecting their own designs with assumptions shaped by digital play. Over time, many adopted video game-inspired approaches to advancement: faster progression, more frequent rewards, and clearly defined “power-ups” that echo the dopamine loops of their digital descendants. The result is that some players now approach tabletop RPGs expecting the same steady drip of mechanical achievement they get from a screen, treating levels, feats, and skill boosts not as optional frameworks but as the very point of play. This feedback loop between mediums has reshaped how many people think about character advancement, often narrowing it to the accumulation of stats rather than the growth of an in-game persona, his relationships, or his impact on the wider setting. It’s also made me increasingly skeptical, if not outright critical, of levels themselves.

Before we get too far, let me be clear: this post isn’t an attack on levels. They’ve been a part of tabletop RPGs since 1974 and I'm not advocating for their abandonment. In the Gygaxo-Arnesonian conception of levels, a character can cast more spells, survive more wounds, and fight more fearsome foes as he advances. In this conception, levels bring a sense of scale and direction to campaigns and help frame a rough arc of a character's growth after the fashion of, say, Conan's rise from a young, inexperienced warrior to a battle-hardened general of Aquilonia (and, eventually, its king). It was, therefore, only natural that early computer RPGs, like Ultima and Wizardry would follow suit. Computers are excellent at tracking numbers, after all, and early video games needed straightforward mechanics.

As the years went by, the leveling paradigm took over. Players of video games came to expect a steady stream of mechanical rewards for their investment of time. Kill monsters, gain experience, level up. It’s a feedback loop as familiar and addictive as a slot machine and just as tightly engineered. With the massive success of MMORPGs and action-RPGs, the model has became entrenched and, unsurprisingly, it has filtered back into tabletop gaming. Many players now approach tabletop RPGs with the assumption that leveling up, or some equivalent form of mechanical advancement, is not only expected but essential.

And that brings back to something I've been feeling for some time: tabletop RPGs don’t need levels. In fact, they don’t need mechanical advancement at all.

Plenty of games, some of them quite old, have already demonstrated this. Consider my favorite roleplaying game, Traveller. Characters in Traveller begin the game with their skills already in place, having completed careers before adventuring begins. There is no leveling system. Characters can improve, albeit very slowly, with years of in-game training, but mechanical advancement is not central to the experience of playing Traveller. Instead, the game focuses on exploration, commerce, politics, and survival in an indifferent universe. What matters is what one's character does within the setting, not how his numbers go up.

The same could even be said for a game like Call of Cthulhu, where the main arc of a character’s life isn’t defined by rising power but by gradual decline – into madness, death, or at best, retirement from delving into the Mythos. He might get better at Library Use or Spot Hidden, but he’ll never become an investigator resistant, never mind immune, to cosmic horror. That’s not the point of the game. Even RuneQuest, though it includes skill advancement through use, eschews levels entirely. A seasoned Gloranthan character is still vulnerable, still mortal. Advancement, when it comes, is more than a matter of increasing skill percentiles, but rather one of reputation, relationships, position within the world of the Third Age.

These games remind us that the real power of tabletop RPGs lies not in mechanics, but in meaning. Unlike a video game, which must quantify progress to function, a tabletop RPG has no such constraint. The game lives in conversation and imagination. If a Traveller character becomes the right hand man of the subector duke, or earns the ire of an Ine Givar terrorist cell, or uncovers the secrets of the Ancients, those are significant achievements. No hit points were gained, no XP awarded, yet the character has advanced in ways no level system can fully capture.

This is not to say that mechanical advancement is inherently bad, because I've used to good effect for decades. Leveling provides structure and creates a sense of forward motion. These are good things. For some players, it also scratches an itch that is very real. However, when mechanical growth becomes the primary – only – form of advancement, it distorts the nature of tabletop play. Players start to see everything through the lens of optimization. They choose actions based on what yields the most mechanical benefit, rather than what makes the most sense for their character or the world he inhabits.

I’ve seen it happen; I suspect most of us have. A party bypasses an intriguing mystery because it offers no clear reward. A player makes choices like navigating a skill tree, optimizing for mechanical advantage rather than what fits the world or character. That mindset can make sense in a video game, where content is finite and progress must be explicitly marked. But tabletop RPGs aren’t software. They aren’t bound by code or limited to scripted outcomes. Their flexibility is their greatest strength. A character can change the world – or be changed by it – without his stats shifting at all.

If there’s one thing my House of Worms campaign has taught me, it’s to lean into that flexibility. We should reward clever thinking, bold risks, and engagement with the setting over mechanical upgrades. The most satisfying kind of advancement comes from caring about a character and his place in the world, not just from tallying experience points. When advancement does happen, it should feel earned not because the rules dictate it, but because something significant has happened.

Levels are great. Experience points can be fun. But they are tools, not goals. Tabletop RPGs aren’t about reaching 10th level. They’re about entering and exploring an imaginary world through an equally imaginary character. What matters isn’t how many hit points your fighter has, but what you do with them. Success might mean founding a colony, retiring in disgrace, making a terrible bargain with an otherworldly power, or changing the course of an empire. These are the kinds of outcomes that emerge from choices, consequences, and collaboration with the referee and other players, not from ticking boxes on a character sheet. Advancement in a tabletop RPG is ultimately about meaning, not math.

Those aren’t the kinds of achievements a level-up screen can show you and that’s exactly what makes them worth chasing – or, increasingly, it’s what keeps me playing after all these years.

Campaign Updates: The Blue Room

This week, I only refereed my House of Worms campaign. That's because, as I've previously noted, the Dolmenwood campaign is on a temporary hiatus. Meanwhile, I was feeling a bit exhausted on the day I usually run Barrett's Raiders, so I took a bye. Normally, I try not to do this. I'm a firm believer in playing every week unless I have a good excuse not to do so. Building consistency is an important part of ensuring campaign longevity, after all. However, I just wasn't feeling up to it this week and decided I could do with a break. 

I was, however, very much up to refereeing House of Worms, which continues to barrel ever close to its conclusion. In the latest session, the characters decided that now was the time to reclaim Kirktá's golden disk, the one that could verify that he was indeed an heir to the Petal Throne. Having determined that it was located within Béy Sü's Temple of Belkhánu, Kirktá, Keléno, and Nebússa set out there to find a priest named Chekrásh, whom Kirktá remembered from his youth there and who, in a previous meeting, had intimated that he knew something more about his past.

Chekrásh received the trio with enthusiasm. After exchanging pleasantries, it quickly became clear that the old priest was waiting for Kirktá explain why he had come – the real reason, not some ruse. This was difficult for Kirktá, as he was cautious by nature, all the more so given the current situation in Tsolyánu. Eventually, though, he admitted that he had come for the golden disk and Chekrásh seemed pleased. He explained that the disk was in the possession of another priest named Míru and that, if Kirktá wanted it, he'd have to come with him to meet Míru.

The name Míru was quite familiar to all three characters. It was the name of a priest whom they knew back during their days in Linyaró. A priest of Belkhánu and a colleague of Keléno's first wife, Hmásu, he was also secretly a priest of the One Other. He'd been instrumental in helping them thwart efforts by the Temple of Ksárul to free their master from the Blue Room. His reappearance in Béy Sü as the keeper of the disk was thus a surprise – but also not. In some ways, it seemed almost inevitable that a priest of the One Other whom they knew well would become involved in their present struggles.

Míru didn't hesitate to offer Kirktá the disk, so that he might "take his skein into his own hands." He explained that the disk was "no mere token of clan or blood. It is a reminder of a pact, one older than Tsolyánu" itself. He added that Dhich'uné hoped not merely to subvert the original pact between the first Tlakotáni and the One Other but to unmake it. In doing so, he would throw not just Tsolyánu but all of Tékumel into chaos, which is why Kirktá and his friends have no choice but to stop him. Míru then pledged to aid them however he could.

When pressed for more details about the consequences of Dhich'uné's plans, Míru elaborated. 

“In the time before Time spiraled inward, before we lost the Sky-that-Burned, there was a great betrayal. Ksárul, the Ancient Lord of Secrets, He Who Confronts the Inner Being of Reality, looked beyond the Curtain and beheld the cold fires hung in endless darkness, shining without warmth and without mercy."

“The other gods, even those of Change, opposed him. They knew that to follow him beyond the Curtain would be to lose everything. The cold fires heralded their own extinction. There is no place for gods beyond the Curtain. Sorcery dies there. The Pattern crumbles. Why Ksárul would want this they could not conceive."

“So they sealed him up in the Blue Room. It is his cage, a place beyond Time, where the Doomed Prince lies dreaming of escape, not just for himself but for mankind. He dreams of the cold fires and the unmaking of Tékumel.”

“For untold millennia, his priests have whispered rites in silent vaults, peeling back the seals, seeking to open the Final Door. And always, the One Other has stood in his way.”

Míru then added that, knowingly or not, Kirktá and his comrades have aided the One Other in preventing Ksárul's escape and all that would follow from it. Dhich'uné's plan would upend this. He seeks to bend the One Other's covenant with the Tlakotáni to serve his own ends, but, in doing so, he risks awakening the Dreamer, rending the Curtain that protects Tékumel from the cold fires of the void. The original pact with the One Other must remain intact and unchanged. Just as the nine gods of Stability and Change turned to the One Other to seal Ksárul away in the Blue Room, so too did the Tlakotáni do so to ensure the strength of that seal.

Míru said that Kirktá had been prepared, though he did not remember it, to be something that has been lacking for many generations: a Tlakotáni priest of the One Other, who would oversee the conclusion of the Kólumjàlim as it was meant to be concluded. This had not been done in some time, because even the Tlakotáni had forgotten the true meaning of it. Now, with Dhich'uné foolishly trying to pervert it to his own ends, Kirktá was needed now more than ever. He could not enter the Choosing as a candidate; he must survive. Of course, that's exactly what Dhich'uné seems to want as well ...