Edition Musings

When Wizards of the Coast released their new edition of the world's first published roleplaying game to great fanfare in the summer of 2000, what did the company call it -- that is, besides Dungeons & Dragons? Well, a variety of names were used, but the most common one was "Third Edition" (or 3e for short). Take a look at the WotC website now and poke around the D&D section -- don't worry, no one will hold it against you -- and see how the company refers to the current edition of the game. It's "Fourth Edition" or some variation thereof. But that begs the question: Fourth Edition of what?

I'm sure most of you can see where this is going, since it's a point I've made before. Once upon a time, there was Dungeons & Dragons and Advanced Dungeons & Dragons and, while the latter was clearly derivative of the former, the two were treated (by their publisher if by no one else) as if they were two separate games. As time went on, though, mere Dungeons & Dragons became a kind of also-ran game, standing in the immense shadow of its descendant, AD&D. So great was the influence of AD&D that, when Wizards of the Coast had the opportunity to revise the game, they not only acknowledged that their edition was, in fact, dependent on it (by calling it "Third Edition"), but also dropped the "Advanced" part of its name, thereby making it the only D&D.

Depending on how one chooses to count, AD&D, whose first volume didn't appear until 1977 (and that wasn't a complete, playable-on-its-own game until late 1979), was either the second or third edition of Dungeons & Dragons. And it was never called anything other than AD&D until its second edition arrived in 1989. Even then, I don't recall ever using the phrases "1e" or "First Edition" until the advent of Third Edition, though I'm getting old and my memory is increasingly unreliable about events more than two decades ago. Yet, for a lot of people, including WotC, which is reprinting its first three volumes in April, AD&D -- and Gygaxian first edition AD&D -- is D&D without much qualification or any exceptions.

I don't necessarily object to this identification and I can name many reasons why it's the case, but it's interesting to observe nonetheless.

The Articles of Dragon: "Hold That Person!"

Issue #90 (October 1984) of Dragon contained a short installment of Gary Gygax's increasingly irregular "From the Sorceror's [sic] Scroll" column entitled "Hold That Person!" The article's subtitle explains its purpose. According to Gygax, "the vast array of new monsters" found in books like the Fiend Folio and Monster Manual II have left players and DMs alike wondering which humanoids are affected by the spells charm person and hold person. Was that the case?

I ask because I distinctly recall that my feeling upon reading the article nearly 30 years ago was one of bemusement. I mean, I was, back then, very much enthralled by nearly everything Gary wrote. He was, after all, the creator of AD&D and his word on the subject was Law. But a list -- a definitive list, no less -- of what creatures qualified as "persons" for the purposes of certain spells? Why was this necessary? Did anyone really wonder whether a swanmay could be charmed or an ogrillon held? Was this even an issue at all? Maybe it was needed in tournaments, I don't know, but it was never an issue that came up in my gaming groups.

Just as interesting as the list Gygax provides are his closing comments in this article. He says the following:

If you, as a player, are grateful to have this expanded list, your gratitude is certainly appreciated but keep in mind that it is a mixed blessing. Players must attempt to remember the list of creatures affected by charm person and hold person, for when it comes time to cast a spell, the DM must never allow them to consult their reference works except for the Players Handbook. On the other hand, the DM can use any reference source at his disposal (including articles like this one) to check for desired information.

Now, there's nothing beyond the pale in what Gygax says here. In my experience, it was pretty much standard operating procedure amongst the groups with which I had contact. However, this is the first time I can recall its ever being stated outright as the Gospel of Gary. Again, I don't disagree with it, as it's identical to my own practice, but it is nonetheless interesting to see it stated so plainly.

Original EPT Now Available

Victor Raymond asked me to pass the following along, on behalf of the Tékumel Foundation:

The original manuscript for Empire of the Petal Throne is now available from DriveThru/RPG Now.  Known as the "green cover" or "mimeo" version, it was produced in the Spring of 1974 in a limited and confidential run of fifty copies for the world of Tékumel, the creation of Professor M.A.R. Barker.This is the first time this original manuscript has been published or made available to the general public.  The PDF product now available for purchase was prepared from a copy taken directly from Prof. Barker’s archive, and is presented with each facing page containing the text of the original manuscript.

This version is a precursor to the game published shortly later by TSR, Inc. and contains a number of significant differences.  However, it is in many ways is substantively similar to the later TSR publication, and is being produced more as a historical document than as a different product.   Print-on-demand versions are in development and expected to be available by mid-March. "Tékumel" is a trademark of M.A.R. Barker; for more information about Tékumel, visit www.Tekumel.com. 

Pandemic

Last night, we took a break from the Red Tide Labyrinth Lord campaign to play the cooperative boardgame Pandemic. This was one of my Christmas gifts from my lovely wife, but we'd not had a chance to play it yet. The premise of the game is that the players are all members of the CDC working to control the outbreak of multiple diseases across the globe before they become so virulent that nothing can be done to contain them.

Since we'd already played Forbidden Island, a cooperative game by the same designer, we were fairly familiar with the basic rules and approach of Pandemic. There are some differences, of course, chief among them being that Pandemic is a more difficult game to beat, since it's designed for older players. Likewise, when we played our first game, I misread the setup instructions and wound up using the "heroic" (i.e., hardest) rules rather than the introductory ones. Needless to say, we lost.

But it was a fun game nonetheless. Like Forbidden Island, it's not a game where you can afford to be lax. Players must quickly adopt an aggressive and proactive play style or else the multiple plagues will overwhelm you. That's a lesson we didn't apply, so, even if I hadn't flubbed the setup as I did, I doubt we'd have won the game, though it might have taken longer for us to lose than it did. I hope to play it again in the future, since it looks like it'll be quite a challenge.

Artifacts and Relics

The skull of St. Wenceslaus of Bohemia

On Friday evening, my parish had an exhibition of relics to which my family and I went. Relics are an aspect of Christian belief that don't get much discussion nowadays, except perhaps negatively, which is too bad, because the veneration of relics is both an ancient practice and theologically important. The history of the Church is filled with stories of relics, including miraculous ones, reflecting the Bible's own recounting of such things (the man restored to life by touching the bones of Elisha, the woman cured by touching the cloak of Jesus, etc.). And, of course, there's an undeniable degree of luridness to the practice of collecting and displaying the bones, clothing, and other possessions of the deceased.

None of the relics I saw on Friday (there were 168 in all) were as impressive as the one depicted above. Almost all of them were tiny fragments of bone (ex ossibus in Latin) or clothing (ex indumentis) placed in a theca, a small, circular, gold container, which in turn was placed in a standing display. The theca (meaning "receptacle" in Latin) is sealed in a special way, using four strings and a wax seal impressed with the signet of an appropriate authority (a bishop, an abbot, or a postulator), and is always accompanied by a certificate attesting to its authenticity. The lack of any of these things -- the strings, the seal, the certificate -- makes the relic dubious and thus not fit for public veneration. During the Middle Ages, the creation of fake relics was almost an industry, thus necessitating the Church's oversight and regulation of the practice, including the banning of the sale of relics. This prohibition continues to this day.

In regulating relics, the Church distinguishes between three types. First class relics are either items associated with the life of Christ (like a piece of the Cross, for example -- one of which was at my parish's exhibition) or the physical remains of a saint. The vast majority of the relics I saw were first class relics. Second class relics are items worn or frequently used by a saint. Third class relics are items touched to a first or second class relic. Consequently, many people at the exhibition brought rosaries, crucifixes, and similar objects to touch to the relics on display so as to create third class relics from them.

Theca of a relic of St. Louis de Montfort

I bring all this up in part because I distinctly recall my surprise as a younger man upon reading the Dungeon Masters Guide and seeing a section on "artifacts and relics." With the exception of the Mace of Cuthbert, though, none of the DMG's items are connected to the life of a saint. As he so often did, Gary Gygax had universalized the meaning of a word for gameplay purposes, so that a "relic" came to mean a potent item associated with the life of a past historical figure. So, we get (to cite a few examples) the Sword of Kas, the Machine of Lum the Mad, the Mighty Servant of Leuk-o (all second class relics by Church standards), in addition to the Hand and Eye of Vecna and the Teeth of Dahlver-Nar (first class relics).

None of D&D's relics seem to be the objects of veneration. Rather they're just powerful magic items -- another example of the game's often reductionist appropriation of religion and mythology. But that didn't stop me from inventing my own more saintly relics in my campaigns of old (like the Sword of St. James) and attaching them to pilgrimage sites rather than throwing them in a dragon's hoard somewhere. The structure of the Dwimmermount campaign's cosmology does not (at present) allow for saintly relics, so I don't have any new ones to share. However, that may change in the future, as more of the setting's ancient past is made known through the actions of the PCs, in which case I may return to this topic in earnest.

Thecae in display stands

Open Friday: Inspiring Illustrations

I woke up this morning and was ecstatic to discover an email from Jeff Dee that included the preliminary sketches for a couple of illustrations he's doing for the upcoming Dwimmermount book. I'll probably share those later, but what immediately struck me upon seeing them was how beautifully he'd captured scenes I'd described in actual play, such as the ascent up the stairs of the Path of Mavors to the first level of the dungeon or the fight with the eldritch bones in the Red Chapel. As a writer, it's really gratifying to see one's words given another form.

This in turn got me to thinking about illustrations from published adventures that I found particularly inspiring. The Erol Otus piece on the back of The Keep on the Borderlands has always been a favorite of mine, as has Jim Roslof's fight with the kuo-toa from the combined edition of Descent into the Depths of the Earth. I could cite lots more, but those two have always stuck with me, in large part because they expressed two equally important parts of D&D play: the grand beginning and the nitty gritty of combat against a dangerous foe.

So, for today's Open Friday question, I'd like to ask you: what are the illustrations in published adventures that most fire your imagination?

Happy Birthday, Dr Holmes!

Over at his excellent blog devoted to all things Blue Book, Zenopus reminds us that today is the 82nd anniversary of the birth of Dr J. Eric Holmes, who edited my favorite edition of D&D. Head on over and offer up a testimonial in memory of Dr Holmes.

REVIEW: Carcosa (LotFP Edition)

Going back to review a new edition of a product one has already reviewed is often an interesting exercise. A significant part of the interest comes from seeing whether the changes introduced into the new edition have noticeably altered one's opinion. In case of Geoffrey McKinney's Carcosa, whose original edition was self-published in 2008, and which I reviewed over the course of four posts, I largely stand behind by initial assessment, namely that Carcosa is a frustratingly eccentric work whose primary virtue is also its primary flaw: a rejection of the (often unstated) moral structure underpinning Gygaxian D&D. It's this rejection, I think, that's at the heart of much of the controversy surrounding Carcosa, which attempts to present a stark, even bleak, interpretation of Lovecraft as the basis for a gonzo science fantasy setting filled with serpent men, gray aliens, Great Old Ones, and Jack Kirby-style science-as-magic. Go ahead and read those original reviews, if you're unsure of the basic premise of Carcosa and what it includes.

The new edition, published by Lamentations of the Flame Princess, and available as both a gorgeous hardcover or PDF, differs primarily in presentation from its 2008 edition, though there are changes, about which I'll speak shortly. Purely as a physical artifact, Carcosa (2011) stands head and shoulders above its predecessor. Indeed, it stands head and shoulders above most other recent gaming products I've purchased. Its cover, which you can see here, depicts a silhouette of the mysterious city of Carcosa after which the book is named. The image is embossed on leatherette that feels right when you hold it, like some ancient tome of forbidden lore. Also right is the fact that the book has no title or identifying marks on it besides the above image and a sigil on the spine. In addition to making Carcosa look like a grimoire (but not in the gaudy way many RPG books have attempted this in the past), I also found myself reminded of early editions of weird fantasy books by authors like Abraham Merritt, William Hope Hodgson, and Arthur Machen, which I suppose was probably part of the point.

The interior of the book is similarly attractive. The pages are thick and off-white in color, again suggesting a libram of black magic. The layout is clear but varied -- sometimes a single column, sometimes two, sometimes more elaborate -- and makes good use of color (green and purple). I'm not especially fond of some of the title fonts, which are occasionally hard to read at small point sizes, but I don't think that seriously undermines Carcosa's esthetics, which I think are nearly perfect. To that end, there are illustrations by Rich Longmore throughout, depicting many aspects of the savage world of Carcosa. I was initially somewhat skeptical of the inclusion of any artwork in the book, feeling it'd undermine individual imagination, but, having now seen Longmore's work, I'll readily admit to being wrong about that. I think the artwork does a superb job of fueling my imagination, in large part because it helps ground Carcosa rather than leaving it to float in some ethereal realm. Longmore is the perfect artist for this purpose, too, since his dark, realistic style provides some much needed weight to elements of Carcosa that might be goofy in other hands, like the dinosaurs and robots.

Carcosa (2011) is an expansion of its predecessor and, for my money, the expansions do a lot to make the setting both more playable and more palatable. Chief among the expansions are the hex descriptions of the Carcosa campaign map. Whereas Carcosa (2008) had terse, often single-line, descriptions like "1 Cthugah's Flame Creature," Carcosa (2011) adds a second encounter or point of interest, which helps, I think, in providing some depth to the setting. Likewise, some of these descriptions include small, off-hand references -- "9 Irrationalist Space Aliens" -- that encourage further development and expansion, something I appreciate in sandbox setting hex descriptions. Also included among the expansions is a starter adventure, Fungoid Gardens of the Bone Sorcerer, originally published in Fight On! Starter adventures are always useful, since they let the reader know what the creator thinks you're supposed to do with his creation, thereby providing a model to emulate. In a setting as weird as Carcosa's, I think this is essential.

Geoffrey McKinney has penned a new essay, "Humanity on Carcosa," which offers some insight into what it's like to live on Carcosa amidst all its Lovecraftian horrors and extraterrestrial entities. It's pretty bleak stuff, in my opinion, and reinforces the notion that I could never run an extended campaign in the setting. At the same time, I am grateful for its inclusion, since I believed in 2008, as I do now, that a setting like this one demands some "designer notes" to properly get a handle on it. "Humanity on Carcosa" is brief and doesn't explain everything, but it goes a long way toward making explicit some of the thinking behind the setting. A series of random monster tables is another addition in the 2011 version that contributes greatly to playability.

Taken together, Carcosa (2011) is a very impressive package and a good example of where I think an amateur effort was noticeably improved by more "professional" presentation and production values. Purely as an object, I think Carcosa (2011) may be the most attractive old school RPG product I've seen and a vindication of James Raggi's often-eccentric esthetic. As a RPG, I think Carcosa (2012) still remains somewhat frustrating, at least to me, largely because it is written from a viewpoint so alien to my own. That's almost certainly a feature rather than a bug for most people, including its author, but I can't deny that I continue to find Carcosa too bleak and nihilistic a setting for my tastes. It's not just a "hard" setting; it's a hopeless one and, girly man that I am, I'm not much interested in hopelessness in my pastimes. On the other hand, one could reasonably make the argument that its bleakness is in fact a perfect emulation of Lovecraft's worldview, where mankind is cosmically insignificant and knowledge is a double-edged sword. If that's what one wants, Carcosa delivers it in spades.

(I'm going to leave the comments open for this review BUT, as ever, I will ruthlessly delete any comments I consider needlessly intemperate or insulting. Feel free to disagree either with my assessment or with the value of Carcosa all you wish, so long as you do so in a civil, constructive fashion. I didn't allow comments on my original review of Carcosa precisely because of the nonsense it engendered. It's my hope that, in the years since, people have learned to phrase their thoughts and feelings in less inflammatory ways. Don't prove me wrong.)

Presentation: 10 out of 10
Creativity: 8 out of 10
Utility: 6 out of 10

Buy This If: You're looking for a Lovecraft-inspired swords-and-sorcery setting and don't mind a heavy dose of bleakness and amorality.
Don't Buy This If: You prefer your fantasy settings tinged with at least a little bit of hope.

A Point of Clarification

I received a number of emails and other correspondence asking about the system under which the Dwimmermount megadungeon product is being written. Though this is spelled out in the FAQ over on the Autarch blog, I thought it worth stating even more emphatically: Dwimmermount uses Labyrinth Lord as its ruleset. I am doing this for a couple of reasons, chief among them being that Labyrinth Lord is the system I use in my home campaign and have used for several years. Like all referees, I've made some modifications and additions to the basic Labyrinth Lord rules (which will be published separately in the forthcoming Dwimmermount Codex series), but, fundamentally, the rules remain those presented by Dan Proctor in Labyrinth Lord, Original Edition Characters, and the Advanced Edition Companion, all of which I've used to varying degrees in kit-bashing my own Holmes Blue Book-like house rules.

I'm also doing this because, in my opinion, Labyrinth Lord most closely emulates the old school fantasy rules I prefer. Labyrinth Lord has all the delightfully quirky elements -- descending armor elements, multiple saving throws, three alignments, etc. -- and includes them unapologetically, which is how I like it. It's also worth noting that Adventurer, Conqueror, King, itself a very fine game, makes good use of the Open Game Content from Labyrinth Lord, meaning that, while there will be some differences, Dwimmermount will be usable with ACKS without much difficulty. The same, of course, goes for Swords & Wizardry, OSRIC, Basic Fantasy, Delving Deeper, and Lamentations of the Flame Princess. That's one of the many great things about old school D&D: differences aside, it's all quite compatible.

I'll have more details on Dwimmermount in the days and weeks to come, both here and elsewhere, but I wanted to make this particular point clear, since there seems to have been some confusion about it.

Retrospective: The Ice Dragon

The period between 1984 and 1985 was a strange time in the history of TSR, the Cent-Jours of Gary Gygax, who returned from his Californian "exile" to find the company he founded mismanaged and deep in debt. Gygax quickly maneuvered to retake control of TSR -- and, in so doing, unwittingly laid the groundwork for his own eventual ouster -- and attempted to get its financial house in order, in part through the publication of a large number of game products, many of which are today regarded with some ambivalence, such as Unearthed Arcana and Oriental Adventures. I share the mixed feelings some have about this era of TSR. Even as a teenager whose only "contact" with TSR was through the pages of Dragon and Polyhedron, you could sense that the times they were a-changin' and not necessarily for the better.

Late in this period (September 1985), Pocket Books published the first of four gamebooks written by Gary Gygax and Flint Dille about the adventures of Sagard the Barbarian. When we are introduced to him, Sagard is a youth of sixteen years preparing to undertake his Ordeal of Courage, which, if successful, will mark him as an adult amongst his people. As a gamebook, The Ice Dragon really isn't that interesting in my opinion. For one, it's quite short (there are only 121 entries) and has only three different conclusions. By way of comparison, most of the Choose Your Own Adventure books had 30 or 40 different conclusions, while the Fantasy Fantasy volumes typically had 400 individual sections. Likewise, the game elements of The Ice Dragon are limited, using only a four-sided die for resolution -- an odd choice! -- and most are heavily slanted in the player's favor. It is possible to die in The Ice Dragon, but the likelihood is small. For that reason, I didn't find the book particularly compelling and never picked up any of its sequels.

The main interest that The Ice Dragon holds is that it's written by Gary Gygax and that it takes place within his World of Greyhawk setting. I can't deny that these were the primary reasons I bought the book back in the day. In the end, the book didn't feel noticeably "Gygaxian," which led me at the time to think that Flint Dille had written most of it; I still have no idea if that's true. Likewise, the Greyhawk content was limited to a few place names here and there. As I understand it, later books had even less to do with Greyhawk as we know it, since Gygax was forbidden from using certain names as a result of his departure from TSR. So, in the final analysis, there's not much to recommend in The Ice Dragon and it remains in my mind emblematic of an era when I first recognized that the bloom was finally coming off the rose planted in 1974.