Tuesday, June 16, 2009

Big News for S&W

Looks like Swords & Wizardry carried the day in the May Lulu sales contest. That alone is awesome news, particularly so soon after Fight On! achieved the same feat in the previous sales contest. Potentially even bigger is the fact that S&W will likely be going into regular distribution through an existing (though currently unnamed) publisher, who plans to support the game line with new products.

Both are big victories for S&W and are well deserved. I certainly hope that they will help give this awesome game a higher profile and add yet more steam to the old school renaissance. Great news.

12 comments:

  1. That is great news, for it not only proves that old school gaming is flourishing, but also seems to indicate that a lot of people are turning back to the older, simpler game systems. One has to wonder if the recent release of 4th Edition has anything to do with this.

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  2. That's awesome! I hope the content is still considered "open" and that a word file is still provided.

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  3. Yeah, I hope there will still be a free word file available too, because that's frankly one of the many attractive features of S&W. If that goes away, I'll be very sad.

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  4. Matt has stated repeatedly that the S&W core rules (and WB rules) will continue to be available for free, and that the content will remain 'open' forever. I don't think that there is anything to worry about on that score.

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  5. And the WP file will still be there, too. The only things different will be (1) a price bump to allow the game to be profitably sold in stores, and (2) the print version will have about 5 extra pages with a couple of optional character classes. The extra pages are so the hobby store has "something more" in their book than the free pdf has.

    In every other respect (free pdf, free WP doc, open license, etc) the game will remain the same.

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  6. There is a lot of support out there for these games and it shows. Congratulations to Matt & his crew.

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  7. great news matt! I gave away 4 copies i ordered from lulu earlier this month at my old gaming group's annual Gathering of Fools. They were very well received.

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  8. If it finds itself on the shelf of my local hobby store, I will certainly buy it.

    Does anyone know if these optional character classes will be conversions of previous classes from some version of D&D/AD&D, or will they be classes not previously seen?

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  9. That's great to hear, Matt. I like S&W just fine the way it is and, while I know the potential deal with a bigger company is a boon for the game, I'd hate to see it change what S&W is and why I love it so.

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  10. It won't change anything - it's a license deal, not a purchase of the IP.

    The optional classes will be old classes - as a retro-clone, the rulebook isn't the place for going outside the box. I want readers to get the 0e experience from the rule book, and find materials for pushing the envelope in the blogs, free downloads, and from independent publishers like Skathros (and others who are gearing up). It is still a fan-based initiative, but now with a beachhead in the mainstream gaming world.

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