Hex Help

Much as I adore the incomparable map of the Flanaess from the World of Greyhawk – perhaps the best RPG map ever – over the last few years I've really come to appreciate the style of hex map that appeared during the Moldvay/Cook/Marsh era of Dungeons & Dragons. Though nowhere as artful in their presentation as Darlene's gorgeous work, the B/X hex maps do nevertheless have a beauty all their own, one born of clarity and utility. They are very easy to read and to use in play, especially if, like me, you are saddled with eyesight that's nowhere near as sharp as it once was. This fact alone counts for a great deal nowadays.

That's why I'd like to prevail upon the collective knowledge of my readers. Are there any programs out there that might enable an incompetent Luddite such as myself to make rough approximations of these maps? Once upon a time, there was a program called Hexographer that came close to doing so, but its current iteration looks much too complex for some of my limited skills to use effectively. Are there any alternatives readily available or must I buckle under and learn how to use this new version of Hexographer?

Retrospective: The Northern Reaches

I mentioned, in last week's retrospective on The Grand Duchy of Karameikos, that I didn't own many modules in the D&D Gazetteer line, in part because of my disappointment with its inaugural release. Despite this, I did own the seventh in the series, The Northern Reaches, released in 1988 and written by Ken Rolston and Liz Danforth – and, to this day, I consider it one of the most interesting things ever published for the D&D game line. 

Like all the other entries in the Gazetteer line, The Northern Reaches is, first and foremost, a detailed examination of one of the regions of the Known World setting (soon to be known as Mystara). In this case, the region in question covers three realms, namely Ostland, Vestland, and the Soderfjord Jarldoms, all of whom share a culture that resembles that of the Norse peoples of medieval Europe. However, The Northern Reaches is more than that. In presenting these three nations, including their histories, societies, and major NPCs, the module also presents several new optional rules for use with D&D and it's these rules that, in my opinion, make the module so fascinating.

Co-author Ken Rolston was already a veteran RPG writer by the time this book appeared (as was Liz Danforth). Among the many games on which he worked was Chaosium's RuneQuest, for which he'd eventually serve as developer during the all-too-brief "RuneQuest renaissance" of the early 1990s. I mention this because, in my opinion, Rolston brings to bear many of the skills he no doubt learned working on the mythical world of Glorantha. The Northern Reaches is a remarkable product that takes inspiration from a real world historical culture to present a fantastical version of the same, without forgetting that this is a module for Dungeons & Dragons and should, therefore, be both accessible and fun. 

By and large, Rolston and Danforth succeed admirably in this. One of the ways they do so is through the use of four different NPCs whose viewpoints on various matters of interest can be found throughout the 32-page Players Book, which, along with the 64-page DM Book, makes up the product. These NPCs – three humans and dwarf – all have unique voices and areas of expertise. Consequently, when they describe aspects of the Northern Reaches, they do so with varying degrees of bias. While this means not everything they say is wholly reliable, it also gives players and DM alike a sense of how the people in this region view the world. It's also a terrific guide for playing Northmen either as player or non-player characters. 

The DM Book, though larger, is the least interesting of the two. This book is written in a matter-of-fact way, presenting the history, geography, society, and current events of each of the three realms, with emphasis placed on those that are most useful for adventuring in them. We also learn about the unique nature of certain nonhuman races here, such as the dwarves and trolls, which are based a bit more on their Norse mythological equivalents (though not too much, lest this run counter to the expectations of standard D&D). There are also extensive treatments of the major personalities of the three realms, in addition to multiple adventure ideas and campaign outlines. Interestingly, there are also brief guidelines for converting the module to AD&D and even making use of the material in campaigns set in either Greyhawk or the Forgotten Realms. 

The Players Book presents the three realms of Ostland, Vestland, and the Soderfjord Jarldoms as potential homelands for player characters. To that end, there is a section devoted to generating Northmen, starting with an optional personality traits system that's more or less identical to the one in Pendragon, albeit with slightly different sets of opposing traits (no "Chaste/Lustful," for example – this is a family-friendly game product!). There are also optional systems for determining a character's reputation, background, family status, past experiences, skills, and more. None of these systems is mechanically complex, but they're all sufficiently flavorful that I think they'd go some way toward marking a character from the Northern Reaches as distinctive.

There's also a section on the godar, as clerics are known in this region of the Known World. These Norse priests have different abilities and obligations based on the deity – I mean, immortal – they serve. These immortals should be familiar to anyone with knowledge of our world's Norse mythology. Odin, Thor, and Loki are all here, along with several others. Runes and rune magic also get their own treatments here. Again, the new systems associated with these things are fairly simple and don't deviate much from standard D&D, but they do so just enough that the end result is something flavorful and fun.

I'd be exaggerating if I called The North Reaches revolutionary or even groundbreaking. In many ways, it's a fairly ordinary transposition of the historical Norse to a fantasy setting, with almost no changes to differentiate them from their inspirations. Yet, in the context of late 1980s Dungeons & Dragons, that's more than enough to mark it as worthy of praise. That Rolston and Danforth do so in a way that simultaneously conveys the spirit of its inspirations while never losing sight of its purpose as a D&D supplement sets it apart from many similar products in the history of the hobby. That's probably why, even after all these years, I still retain a great fondness for The Northern Reaches and wish I'd paid more attention to the Gazetteer series at the time.

Retrospective: The Grand Duchy of Karameikos

I was a TSR fanboy, but I was also something of a snob when it came to products released under the banner of plain old Dungeons & Dragons, which is to say, D&D minus the adjective "advanced." To me, that was "kiddie D&D" and unworthy of my attention. At the same time, I had my weaknesses and one of them was new campaign settings. So, when TSR released the first module in its line of D&D Gazetteers in 1987, I was more than a little intrigued, despite its connection to non-advanced D&D.

My contradictory interest in The Grand Duchy of Karameikos was rooted in the fact that it was part of the "Known World" (later Mystara) sketched out in The Isle of Dread, a module I'd used to good effect when it was first released (again, despite my elitist suspicion of D&D – my standards were frustratingly inconsistent in my youth). I was also curious to see what Aaron Allston might do with the region first mentioned in the D&D Expert Rules, since the module boasted of providing "a complete historical, economical [sic], geographical, and sociological overview" of the Grand Duchy and its inhabitants. It was a tall order, to be sure, but the thickness of the supplement – 64 pages – and its inclusion of a "full-size, four-color map" of Karameikos and two of its major settlements gave me hope that it would be worth the purchase.

The module is divided into two sections. The first part is the gazetteer proper, covering the history, politics, and society of the Grand Duchy, including descriptions of its most important locales and NPCs. The second part, which is very short, provides ideas for adventures set in and around Karameikos for a variety of levels of play, from 1st level all the way to 36th. Together, the two sections provide a lot of information for the referee to digest, but they also include lots of inspiration too. Scattered throughout the module are numerous maps for use in play, like typical taverns and manor houses. This is in addition to the large, poster-sized map of the Grand Duchy, its capital city of Specularum, and the frontier town of Threshold. 

Riffing off the details first put forward in the excellent adventure, Night's Dark Terror, which is set in Karameikos, Allston paints a portrait of the Grand Duchy as an analog to one of the eastern European satellites of the medieval Byzantine Empire (here represented by the Empire of Thyatis). Karameikos is rough and tumble sort of place that is slowly in the process of becoming more settled and orderly, but with enough enemies, both internal and external, to keep it interesting for D&D adventurers. In many ways, Karameikos is a nearly perfect setting for the game, since it's just settled enough to provide bases from which characters can operate and just wild enough that there's plenty of scope for exploration (and looting). The place has a frontier feel to it that makes it very easy for the PCs to carve out domains of their own under the suzerainty of the Grand Duke.

Of course, that also means that Karameikos is a bit on the vanilla side. Beneath the Slavic veneer of the place, it's your typical fantastic medieval realm with the full panoply of D&D flourishes: knights, monsters, allied demihumans, thieves, etc. There's likewise a faux Christian Church to which clerics can belong, in addition to dark, secretive cults up to no good. This isn't necessarily a bad thing. As I mentioned above, it's a very solid set-up for a standard model of a D&D campaign and there's enough information here to save the referee a lot of trouble when it comes to framing his adventures. However, if you're hoping for something different, or even just off the beaten path, you'll likely be disappointed.

And I was. I didn't hate The Grand Duchy of Karameikos; that's too strong an emotion for a product like this. Instead, I was simply unimpressed and, as a result, avoided the other Gazetteer volumes that followed in its wake (with the exception of The Northern Reaches, released in 1988). I simply assumed that all the subsequent volumes would be similarly paint-by-numbers in their content – an assessment I would later learn was gravely mistaken and that would lead to my not reading the other volumes in the series until many years after the fact. Live and learn, as they say!

Retrospective: Red Arrow, Black Shield

One of my gaming white whales is a means to adjudicate large scale, strategic-level conflicts in a way that's simultaneously straightforward (if not necessarily easy) and meaningful. What I want is not a wargame, at least as generally understood, but rather a system of some sort that produces the right mix of randomness and plausibility. That's almost certainly too much to ask of any system intended for use with RPGs. Nevertheless, it's one I have long sought. 

That's why, back in 1985, when TSR released module X10, Red Arrow, Black Shield, I immediately sat up and took notice. Written by Michael S. Dobson, the module touts itself as a "strategic wargame" that allows players to fight a massive war against the Master of the Desert Nomads. It's more than that, though. The module also includes a diplomatic adventure, with the player characters being appointed Ambassadors Plenipotentiary and Extraordinary of the Republic of Darokin. Their mission is to travel across the length and breadth of the Known World in an attempt to sway its realms to the side of the Republic, as it squares off against the Master. 

Red Arrow, Black Shield includes a 48-page booklet, a full-color hex map of the Known World setting (or "D&D Expert Set game world, as it's called here), and 200 die-cut counters to represent the military forces of the various nations. Despite not being much of a wargamer, I adore counter sheets. Seeing them included in a RPG product always brings a smile to my face. Outside of The Fantasy Trip, I can't think of many contemporary RPG products that include counters of any sort, which is a shame. I'd love to see counters make a resurgence in contexts like this.

The adventure consists of a series of min-scenarios, each associated with a kingdom of the Known World. Depending on the characters' actions, they may positively or negatively influence the attitude of the kingdom's rulers toward the Republic of Darokin or the Master of the Desert Nomads. The outcome of each mini-scenario thus determines the final order of battle for the war that is brewing. If the characters are very successful, Darokin's alliance will be stronger, while the reverse is true if they fail. It's a simple approach but a solid one, since it keeps the diplomacy "adventuresome," which I think is a good call. 

The module also includes an overview of the war, with notes on how to use Battlesystem to adjudicate its battles. However, the expectation is that the the DM will make use of the War Machine rules presented in the D&D Companion Rules. War Machine is looser and less detailed than Battlesystem, placing an emphasis on speed and ease of use over precision. They're closer to the kind of thing I want in a mass combat system, even if there are some aspects of them I don't like. Regardless, they work well in this context, I think, and it's partly why I still think so well of this module. The other reason is that Dobson provides guidelines, albeit short ones, on how to handle the aftermath of the war. For me, that's vital and a big part of why I wanted a product like this in the first place.

Red Arrow, Black Shield isn't perfect, but I like it. If nothing else, it provides a possible foundation on which to build a system for handling macro-events in a RPG campaign. I'd love to see some enterprising fellow to take up this task. Otherwise, I might have to do it myself. My House of Worms campaign long ago reached the point where large scale events, including wars, became important. Thus far, I've been winging it without the help of any systems to supplement my own creativity. There's nothing wrong with that, of course – my players haven't complained – but there are many times when I would like events to happen independent of my choice. This is a matter that demands more attention.

Retrospective: Adventures in Blackmoor

I'm not ashamed to admit that, when I first started playing Dungeons & Dragons, I barely recognized the name of Dave Arneson. Certainly, his name appeared prominently on the inside front page of the Basic Set I first owned, but, for some reason, it never really registered with me. That probably has something to do with the fact that, in the pages of Dragon and elsewhere, Gary Gygax was the spokesman and face of all things D&D. Arneson was relegated to little mentions here and there, if at all. 

Consequently, I was somewhat surprised when I saw an advertisement for the Origins Game Fair in 1983 that announced that the convention's guest of honor was Dave Arneson, "co-creator of Dungeons & Dragons games." After my initial bafflement wore off – after all, Gary Gygax was the creator of D&D, right? – I recalled seeing Arneson's name and started asking some of the older guys I knew about this mysterious Arneson fellow and why I'd never noticed his name before. 

This being before the Internet, precise information was hard to come by. Instead, I got hearsay and innuendo about a falling out between Arneson and Gygax, former friends and colleagues, a lawsuit, and more. It was all vague and unclear but it was my first sense that the history of D&D was a lot more complicated than I had believed. The game had not sprung fully-formed from the head of Gary Gygax but may have, in fact, involved others, such as this Dave Arneson fellow. I had to content myself with such fragmentary evidence for years. It was only when I obtained a copy of Supplement II: Blackmoor that I gained some confirmation of the story. Reading Gygax's effusive praise of Arneson in the foreword to that work made it clear that, at one time, the two men had indeed been friends and collaborators. Exactly what had sundered their relationship, I did not yet know – and wouldn't for many years – but I now knew it was true.

Around the same time, TSR began to publish the "DA" series of adventure modules for the Dungeons & Dragons line, the first of which was entitled Adventures in Blackmoor. I, of course, knew the name Blackmoor already, both from the OD&D supplement I had acquired just previously but also from the World of Greyhawk setting, which featured a Barony of Blackmoor in the far northwest of the Flanaess. This new module didn't seem to have any connection to Greyhawk, but the cover, depicting some frightful retro-tech machine with the face of a bull, intrigued me and I bought a copy. 

I was immediately enthralled. Though the 64-page module did include an adventure intended to introduce the characters to Blackmoor (here depicted as having existed 3000 years in the past of TSR's Known World setting), it was the gazetteer and sourcebook of the Northlands that was vastly more interesting to me. Here was, I had just learned, the first setting for fantasy roleplaying, and it was quite different from any of the D&D settings I'd previously seen. I already knew from Supplement II that Blackmoor included science fictional elements, much like Gygax's own Expedition to the Barrier Peaks. Arneson's "Temple of the Frog" adventure from that book included an alien being – Stephen the Rock – genetic engineering, high-tech weapons and armor, and more. So, seeing that weird Jeff Easley cover piqued my interest mightily.

The appearance of Adventures in Blackmoor seemed to coincide with the departure of Gary Gygax from TSR and I doubt that was coincidental. That said, the module is fascinating in its own right, in that we get we get a decent amount of information about the Kingdom of Blackmoor, its history, present political situation, and notable personages, albeit through the lens of Frank Mentzer's D&D revision and the burgeoning Known World setting (later to be redubbed Mystara). The map by Tom Darden, depicting the Northlands, was, for me, the crown jewel of this module and I pored over it for many hours, pondering its many evocative place names (as well as noticing commonalities with names from Gary Gygax's World of Greyhawk, such as the Duchy of Ten(h)). 

What Adventures in Blackmoor did was make me much more aware of and interested in the early history of Dungeons & Dragons and of the RPG hobby in general. Consequently, I have very fond feelings about this module and keep it within arm's length of my writing desk. It and two of its three sequels – I never owned The Duchy of Ten, alas – are among my favorite TSR products from the the late 1980s. If anything, my warm feelings toward them have only grown.

A Gaming Regret

Lest it be forgotten that this is a gaming blog, I wanted to talk a bit about one of my gaming regrets.

Back in the late 80s, as 1st edition AD&D wore me down with its relentless series of ill-conceived hardcover expansions, I was about ready to call it quits. The advent of 2nd edition briefly renewed my interest in Dungeons & Dragons, but it didn't take long before 2e recapitulated the history of late 1e and the same feelings of dissatisfaction I had a few years earlier resurfaced only much more definitively. I continued to play AD&D but much more sporadically and without the same level of devotion I'd had earlier. Over the last few years, I've come to realize that the late 80s and even early 90s weren't quite as bad a time for D&D as I felt at the time. Sure, those years aren't undiluted gold but neither were they utterly devoid of interest.

A good case in point was the Dungeons & Dragons Gazetteer line, each of which described a region/nation/culture of the Known World (I refuse to use the name "Mystara," which always struck me as silly). I was always fond of the Known World setting, going back to the Summer of 1981 when I seemed to be running The Isle of Dread non-stop. The Known World is a very "broad" setting after the fashion of Howard's Hyborian Age, borrowing real world cultures and societies with glorious abandon and then making enough changes to fit them into a fantasy setting. It's frankly a solid method of world building, even if some turn their noses up at it.

But I never bought any of the volumes of the Gazetteer until quite late in their run and then only a handful of them. To me, they were too strongly associated with "kiddie D&D" and so I avoided them. As it turns out, I missed out on a lot of well-done products during this time. As AD&D continued to spiral downward into incoherence, the D&D line seemed to be experiencing a renaissance of sorts, expanding in a lot of neat directions while still retaining the simple, straightforward rules that nowadays I consider so appealing.

More than once in recent years, I've heard several old schoolers speak fondly of the late 80s and early 90s D&D line, which I am given to understand was considered such a "minor" line by TSR that its designers had pretty much a free hand to do with as they wished without much interference from the higher ups in the company. Re-reading them now, I can fully understand why such fondness exists. Despite their length, the Gazetteers are surprisingly full of good ideas -- "stuff," as I call it -- and don't (generally) engage in the kind of voluminous fantasy ethnography that turns me off setting books these days. In short, these products are usable and I'm sorry I missed out on a lot of them.

I've slowly been acquiring many of the Gazetteers but it's a difficult endeavor. For various reasons, they command high prices in second hand markets, especially if you want copies that include all the maps, counters, and other goodies that made them so special in the first place. I'm in no hurry to get them all, since I've already got my own setting, but they make nice research materials nonetheless. Plus, they're a reminder that there's no expiry date on creativity, especially when it comes to roleplaying games.