The Three Prongs of Art's Dilemma...

Okay, so the title's a bit misleading. There's lots of great artwork in the gaming hobby, with something good for everyone, whether old school's amateur simplicity (a personal favorite) to the modern era's many excellent offerings. You can't go wrong. But the best our hobby can offer, regardless of visual style, lands on three prongs. Now much of this is subjective, being ultimately the province of personal tastes, which wander far afield. But setting this aside, a truly universal thread runs through the legendary art like veins...

First, there's the characters, the ones going on the adventure. The best art, especially cover artwork, captures these heroes at work, just before, during, and after their struggles with fearsome foes. Whether the original Dungeon Master's Guide, with its battle in the fabled City of Brass, or the first Player's Handbook (my favorite) in the aftermath of hostilities against endless hordes of demon-worshipping lizard men, nothing communicates the game's focus and ultimate intent quite like these icons of adventure plying their trade.

Next, we have the adversaries, the monsters. Shown alive or dead, these are the flip side of gaming art's metaphorical coinage, for what would the aforementioned D&D rulebooks be, really, without their flaming-red efreeti or recently slain lizard men? It's heroes against deadly opponents, so the best artwork, the stuff we call exemplars, has to include these terrifying foes. Now this isn't always possible, especially with interior illustrations; but if possible, these complete an all-encompasing picture of what our hobby's about...

Finally, there's the treasure (or reward, system dependant). What else would motivate the characters to tackle those deadliest of adversaries? Risk needs reward, making treasure, in all its many forms, an essential ingredient of iconic gaming artwork, giving AD&D's classic Player's Handbook, with its enormous gemstone eye, a definite edge. Holmes Basic checks the same boxes, among others. That said, your mileage will doubtless vary; but the above trifecta can certainly help to navigate the prongs of iconic artwork's non-dilemma. 

Musk and the Moral Homebrew...

Our hobby is essentially homebrewed. But it's also an industry eager to appropriate that which its players inevitably do themselves, whether through deliberate houserules or passive misunderstanding. Trust me, I'm the guy who wrote a homebrew after all of three sessions back in 1978 (a system swallowed by time). And it's not just mechanics either. Even a game's ethical foundations are largely homebrewed despite a system's ambitions.

Case in point, a certain billionaire wants to buy D&D to bulwark his version of its history because money's the final arbiter of truth; and seriously, what's the point of being a billionaire if you can't do this sort of thing? All sarcasm aside, it's pointless (words fail me) to suggest anyone can own the truth or the human imagination. The fact that I could homebrew a game after three sessions I barely understood speaks to the futility of trying...  

No, the hobby's progenitors weren't perfect, and how absurd to demand fealty to such a whitewashed version of history. They weren't perfect. Mere realism demands this assessment from us. But they did some good things as well, and gaming's one of them, even if its early vision was (sometimes) similarly imperfect. Anyway, it's not at all disloyal to suggest that our creative heroes were imperfect and shaped by their respective backgrounds.

Part of the problem is that Hasbro (and certain online tribalists) state the obvious without a shred of humility or self-awareness. Indeed, Hasbro shows all the sincerity of a gun-shy corporation shilling virtue while avoiding trouble. All while failing to admit the products they're deriding are (quite literally) paying the bills. Of course, some sins are unforgivable (way to sully a legacy, Professor Barker; Nazis can piss right off immediately)...

But who's left when our moral purges silence literally everyone not born after a certain year, especially since we'll all be judged (and rightly so) by future generations? Yes, the 1970s were sexist by modern, thankfully mainstream, standards. And yes, this had to influence the earliest pastime in subtle and not-so-subtle ways. But while it's right to acknowledge such things and do better, we didn't exactly earn the advantage of living in our time.

More importantly, and here's where the homebrewing comes in, such displays, whether the disclaimers of Hasbro or the performative outrage of Musk, accomplish very little beyond covering backsides (Legal insisted) or circling the proverbial wagons. No rulebook will ever play for us or be decent for us. We bring our intuitions to the gaming table, homebrewing mechanics and morality alike despite whatever rulebook(s) we're using*...

We own that. It's ours. No company, no rulebook can change it. We can homebrew original systems, giving commercial products only what power we grant them through time and/or money (an empowering thought if ever there was), and the same applies to our moral values as filtered through our actions. Thoughtful and welcoming rulebooks are great, but come to nothing without people of genuine goodwill honest and humble enough to engage.

*Within limits, obviously. Redeeming F.A.T.A.L. isn't worth the time or effort...

Games, Grinches, and Good Ideas...

As we enter the holiday season, yours truly can't help but remember what was doubtless the most important (and consequential) Christmas gift to ever grace the bottom of a tree. This wondrous delivery was Holmes Basic with Keep on the Borderlands. Toys break or get lost in the dustbin of our collective childhoods, along with everything else we wrongly believe we possess. But Homes was basically an idea. And ideas are powerful things in the right hands, and quite possibly the only lasting things our hands have made... 

Case in point: having read the rulebook and enclosed module, the whole thing could go up in a house fire and we'd probably still have enough to reconstruct a playable fascimile from scratch. A homebrew creation all the funner for the sense of ownership. Of course, that never happened, and I went from Holmes to AD&D thereafter; still, it underscores how exposure alone arms a creative person. Simply understanding the division of labor between the players and referee is 90% of what happens, setting Holmes above that year's gifts.

Now I've talked about this before, making it the equivalent of holiday leftovers. But it bears repeating, especially given the commercialization of the hobby. At best, we publishers offer convenience and the chance to explore another's vision. It's an optional service no one really needs, which counsels humility and appreciation. But every referee keeps a game designer somewhere inside of them, making WotC's overreach ultimately futile. It's the idea behind our hobby that truly matters, a thing more precious than any rulebook...

I know; there's content. Monsters, spells, the works. But knowledge of the division of labor, something akin to hit points, and the need to roll for actions is probably enough to get started with a men vs. monsters type affair, with everything else developing during preparation and gameplay (arguably, where it belongs). This is what I got for Christmas, 1980, and it gave me a lifelong pursuit. People are more important than anything, and ideas more important than mere things, so here's wishing everyone a season full of everything that matters.

Bitterblossom: The Small-Press Supremecy...

Our hobby has always been a small-press thing. Even now, with modern, corporate D&D, the pastime remains in the capable hands of the hobbyist, empowered as they are to add or otherwise change anything. Tabletop roleplaying games are a set of written rules where the action, from battle to negotiation, takes place inside the participan't heads. And what can houseruling tell us the about small press? Everything, or so it appears, because the referee, so commisioned, carries a game designer's power in their dice bags...  

Why buy Second Edition when you can house rule the first? And even if we published the slickest game known to man, it still wouldn't be 100% of what gets played at the table, meaning the actual participants are always, and necesarily, closer to the action than the rules being utilized. Bonus point: since these players can self publish original content, to include original rulesets, small press is likewise (again, necesarily) closer to the action than anything the big names could possibly achieve. Small press rules the tabletop roost.

And, of course, the hobby began as small press (by the gamers, for the gamers) and, barring a few notable exceptions, remained so. Nothing embodies this ethos more than fanzines, where house rules (by the fans, for the players) rise to the forefront. A perfect example of this is Bitterblossom, a fanzine for Mydwandr. This digital volume contains...

1) New kindreds, bound to specific regions of the setting. From mechanical dwarven bottle gnomes to lizard folk from the swamplands around Cornyth, these races deliver! 

2) Added abilities. Speak with the recently dead or wield a whip Indiana Jones style, with several lending a real strategic element to the right campaign, maybe yours.

3) Original guilds and gods. Famous taverns and house rules galore from Biz, Tim Fox, Serra Marbol Mordan, Jon Salway, and James Hook, ready to incorporate into your game!

4) Stylish illustrations (by Luke Ryan Herbert), with an easy to access layout.

5) Tools for referees in a pinch, including sample parties and hirelings to get the party going in convenient and seamless fashion. It's a fanzine that doubles as a supplement...

Like any fanzine, this one puts power in the hands of the players, offering a buffet of content to pile high on their plates. Mydwandr itself is an eponymous setting fully customizable by whoever's at the proverbial helm. Our Mydwandr is different from Jon Salway's, different from yours, but no less valid, because gaming means power to the players. But publication, like parenting, means inevitably surrendering our creations, however beloved or deeply personal, to the people actually playing the game, underscoring small-press supremecy.

Players (read: fans) put the fan in fanzine. And no one's closer to the games being played than the participants. Rulebooks aren't games. Rulebooks are tools. Raw materials for others to bring their worlds to recreational life. And next up from these actual participants are the small press publishers, because while gaming doesn't (necesarily) need a cash economy, if economies have to exist, they're absolutely best kept closest to the bottom, no offense to Wizards. Anyway, we recomend Bitterblossom to the fans, and zines to everyone...