Death by (Game) Design...

OK, so at this point we all know the drill.  Old-school characters are free to try just about anything and stand or fall on their own merits, unlike those entitled new-schoolers who get a trophy just for showing up and can't even think of trying something not on their character sheets.  Now, this is an obvious straw man, but it holds a grain of truth.

Yes, old-school heroes fight the good fight and devise clever solutions and strategies before ultimately, and dare we say, inevitably, succumbing to the obligatory total party kill.  And again, how unlike the spoiled new-school crowd, who show up to play through carefully scripted encounters where victory is assured and treasure (and levels) await those with the courage to be there!  Another stereotype.  But let's turn the thing around a bit....

While we're busy chiding modern players for never dying and having it easy, enjoying a cushy railroad to guaranteed survival while we drop like flies, it's important to remember that the spectre of certain death can easily become its own form of railroading! 

Oh look, another total party kill.  How quaint.  We never saw that one coming...

No, the goal of the game shouldn't be to die.  If that were the case, I'm thinking most of us could wrap things up halfway through the first combat encounter and call it a night while rolling up replacements for next week's' equally fatal session (lather, rinse, repeat).

There's no badwrongfun here, but the goal should be to survive at least long enough to have some fun and validate the designer's efforts to include higher-level monsters and magic items in their rulebooks.  And when death happens, it's because the players were foolish or took daring risks and just happened to die at the hands of a cruel and fickle fate...

Gratuitous death is almost as
boring as having too little in your game... 

Moreover, the goal should be to succeed.  And survival is just one of many rewards for those who play well or even those who just get lucky.  So if high lethality is old-school and low-to-no lethality new-school, then what we're offering here is gaming's middle-school!

Of course, we already know this.  Good referees craft adventures that are survivable if played well and luck holds, and it becomes the player's responsibility to combine their talents to overcome the challenges set before them.  You know, old-school gaming.  

Every game tilts the survivability meter in whatever direction the designer(s) see fit, although this is ultimately up to the referee (who should know their players and what it takes to properly challenge them) and the players, who are always responsible for ensuring they don't become a TPK statistic.  We're no exception, obviously, and our games show it:

BLOOD OF PANGEA is a game where players write their characters into existence and take them on adventures, and this implies at least some degree of survivability.  But 10 MIGHT goes fast when spent improving rolls.  Especially after triggering that 2d6 trap and then falling at the feet of an angry tyrannosaurus dealing +3 damage!  Um, ouch...

PITS & PERILS is the primrose path.  After all, your first-level fighter has 12 HP in armor while the average hit scores but one point of damage.  But once you've triggered that trap and stuck your hand into a chest only to pull out a writhing snake that bites for 2d6 poison damage, death looms when the orcs show up armed with greatswords and their inevitable shaman (and too bad for you, one that happens to know the assorted Bolt spells). 

In fact, death has no sting unless
character life has value and is allowed to unfold...

THE MAZE OF MEMORY is straight-ahead "bang, you're dead" kind of affair, so if you like that sort of thing, this one will make you glad you wore loose-fitting pants...

Most of these systems, including DICELESS DUNGEONS, feature somewhat predictable damage so that hit points (or their equivalent) become another resource for the players to carefully manage while simultaneously punctuating the balance with deadlier things that introduce greater uncertainty.  Often, these are contingent on player actions, especially with respect to traps that can be avoided with skillful effort.  You know, old-school stuff. 

The bottom line here is that a certain level of survivability is built into each game while at the same time introducing risk and uncertainty.  Foolish choices are dangerous at best, and when death finally comes, it's usually to a cherished character and, therefore, felt...

Remember, Conan never died.  But when Belit did, it was a major bummer for sure.

But these are just our solutions.  Most referees want tough, but fair, adventures and must ultimately navigate their own path forward.  And players are better served when they work for victory and reap the rewards of their clever strategies.  Giving them a fair shot while imposing consequences for tomfoolery can be done, and the only system-neutral advice we have is to remember that death isn't the only punishment for failure in an ongoing campaign...

A cherished magic item is destroyed.  Some vital negotiation fails and the characters, once revered, become fugitives.  Established characters in a well-developed setting have goals and plans that undoubtedly matter to them (and their payers).  Go for these, and you'll have their undivided attention and, with any luck, make them wish for a speedy death! 

Because death needs sting.  And it has none when it never happens.  But then again, it has none when it becomes commonplace.  Put another way, the sting of death comes only when life has value.  And such value comes with time and experience at the gaming table...   

Archworld (or How OD&D Was Made)...

Yesterday, we talked out manual type as the poor-man's typesetting, and while we rarely post any kind of next-day follow-up, we had to today.  I talked a little about local game designers who typed up their rules, photocopied and stapled them, and sold them in Ziploc baggies at the local hobby shop.  However, there's also a tradition of semi-professional companies exploiting manual typewriters in place of Letraset Dry-Erase font sheets and/or professional typesetting services, because it's both easier and cheaper to pull off...

But I've used Letraset in the printing lab at school and found it to be a tedious pain in the ass compared just typing a page.  I mean, if you already know how to type, it's a hell of a lot faster than rubbing out individual characters, especially for something as ambitious as the original D&D rulebooks.  Letraset for covers, maybe.  But not the insides.  And securing any commercial typesetting requires capital that goes beyond the merely amateur, which points to the fusion of amateur and professional elements in the early hobby.

The early gaming industry was a
fusion of amateur and professional elements...

But first, a primer on offset printing and how OD&D was physically made...

First, all text and illustrations are laid out on a board to be photographed using a big graphic arts camera (probably a Robertson back then).  The negatives of each page would then be used to "burn" metal printing plates (photosensitive bromides) that would be mounted on whatever press was used.  Now, here's the interesting part.  The plates were secured on a roller that ran through an ink trough, where the ink stuck only to its burnt image, and then through water that flushed clean any unprinted area.  Finally, paper was fed through the printer, with (properly oriented images) offset from the inked images to the paper.

A small offset press and an
example of photosensitive printing plates...

Black and white requires only a single plate, whereas four-color printing employs separate and overlapping plates for cyan, magenta, yellow, and black.  If you've ever looked over a box of Cheez-Its or something else, you'll see a bar with all four colors used as a tool to help the printer align the colors.  But OD&D was simple black and white... 

Even then, we aren't done.  A sizeable run had to be quality controlled and subjected to the bindery process.  Books are collated, stapled, and trimmed along the edges for a clean and professional appearance.  This is actually was kind of fun, and this equipment remains in use today even as photocopiers and printers dominate the inheritors of this craft.

But is this amateur?  I mean, there's money and professionalism at work here.  Yes, OD&D's artwork was delightfully (and some say horribly) amateur.  But everything else speaks to a melding of amateur and professional elements.  Other emerging companies took the same route, but split things up differently, with the Arduin and Archworld games providing two prominent examples (and for those in the know, Archworld was the spiritual inspiration for our own Pits & Perils, both in terms of visuals and mechanical approach...

Illustrations, manual type, and Letraset were
doubtless combined for Archworld's delightful interior...

Archworld was a wargame by Mike and Sheila Gilbert.  She wrote and he drew, and both developed the rules, which also draws parallels to our own games.  This delightful wargame with role-playing elements is something I'd kill to get a License to revive and would actually throw myself into securing the capital to make a good product possible.  But it was released by Fantasy Games Unlimited who, apparently, received their homebrew markups and sent them off for printing.  And these markups, complete with Mike's art, were manually typed and completely (and delightfully) self-made at home.  Talk about an amateur pedigree!

I'm really not sure why FGU lacked a consistent aesthetic, but it undoubtedly gave the authors freedom to do their own thing at home.  Especially since one of them was a damned fine artist and the other an equally fine writer and editor.  And in the earliest days of this budding hobby, things were never too far removed from their homebrew origin...

That's it.  We promise.  Vacation beckons (and I just kicked a flu).  See you next month!      

The Tale of the Type (and Why We Love It)...

In the 70s, there were no personal computers, so anyone who wanted to make nice-looking manuscripts at home needed a typewriter.  Luckily, these were commonplace in business and industry and represented something of a professional standard.  Only newspapers and book publishers had anything better, and even by the early 90s in the Air Force, typewriters were still in use in some quarters, although this would end soon enough...

I remember spending my allowance on a used typewriter in 1978.  My mother kept me in ribbons and white-out because (ostensibly) it was educational, although mostly, I used it to write adventures, campaign notes, and the homebrew monster magazines I made with my brother (who never became a gamer).  Back then, typewriters were analogous to Microsoft Word today, and I was very proud of what I did with mine.

Now, OD&D is praised/reviled as amateurish, and the artwork certainly was.  But the cover and interior fonts would have most likely required metal type, and the books were doubtless printed on a AB Dick printer or a similar offset process, and even its bindery (stapling and trimming) would have required professional equipment beyond most...

As an aside, I studied printing and graphics arts at the local community college and even earned an associate's degree, working at several print shops until I met Robyn and joined the service, so I think have a fair understanding of what OD&D must have entailed, although I'd welcome talking shop with anyone in the direct know about this. 

So OD&D was semi-amateur at best.  But what about Joe (or Jane) amateur who wanted to publish their own stuff?  Answer: they used typewriters.  Now, I can only speak for my own experiences, but there was the equivalent of a small press publishing thing happening, where people (enthusiastic amateurs with great ideas) typed up their own games, stapled them along one side, and sold them in big Ziploc baggies for a few bucks at the most...  

And these creations made their way into my local hobby shop until professional products soaked up all the demand.  Again, I can only speak for my own experience, but this left an indelible impression and guides what Olde House Rules does today! 

Now, as someone who's used typewriters extensively, here's my advice for anyone wishing to recreate this sort of thing (for what it's worth, cause' I'm learning still):

(1) Boldface was possible by retyping over the same words several times, although this didn't always get the best results.  Instead, all capitals were used.

(2) Right justification of a sort was possible, but only by counting each character and making sure each line ended in roughly the same place.  This was a colossal pain in the ass, and I can't emphasize this enough, right justification was rarely, if ever, attempted.

(3) Underlining was possible by backspacing and using the line key, but many publishers drew this in themselves, which is a nice flourish for added realism...

(4) Finally, Adler is a nice, rough font.  However, it doesn't have the (!) character and always displays this invisibly unless you use something else, like Sears Tower, etc.  My Underwood is a cleaner font, but doesn't have the (!) or (+) characters, usually defaulting to Times New Roman.  So instead, switch to Sears Tower to preserve a uniform look.  Sears Tower is probably rougher than Adler, but dammit people, this one has all the relevant stuff! 

Oh, and Adler types (1) as a Roman numeral (I), so maybe replace it with a lowercase L to preserve some semblance of readability (hard-won knowledge, folks).

And that's the tale of the type (and why we love it).  Robyn and I are going on vacation this coming weekend and won't be back until June, so be safe and take care, everyone...

The Diceless Dungeons Are Here!

Inside every old-school game is a diceless system waiting to get out, and so we're proud to announce the release of our digital version of Diceless Dungeons!  Because diceless gaming is just about as old-school as you're gonna get.  After all, decision-making, exploration, and role-playing are the foundations of old-school adventure, and anyone who's spent an entire session debating how best to proceed knows what we mean...

Seriously, how many of us have gone an entire session without so much as rolling die one, or with minimal dice in favor of negotiation and role-playing? 

So Diceless Dungeons exploits the no-brainer stuff, because you never know what's hiding around the next corner, and this is just low-hanging fruit.  But Diceless dungeons does other things meant to preserve an old-school feel in a gaming genre otherwise known for it's more modern leanings.  Ultimately, we wanted something pure that would feel more like childhood play, only with an objective mechanical foundation to hold it all together:

(1) Simple (but detailed) rules for character creation that include the mysterious sorcerer's apprentice and a challenging, but straightforward, magic system.

We kinda think our rulebook
channels Tunnels & Trolls in some respects...

(2) A combat system that preserves the feeling of risk and uncertainty while possessing an objective mooring to guard against supposed unfairness by the referee.

(3) Monsters and powerful magic to be won (and wielded) and a non-typical advancement system that makes it easy for replacement characters to jump in!

(4) A narrative system of gameplay that makes everything a tactical choice with combat, in particular, becoming a chance for players to manage personal resources while preserving a traditional division of labor between the party and, or course, their referee.  

(5)  And, finally, all of this is delivered with the look and feel of an amateur digest rulebook from the early 1970s.  Oh, and there's also an optional dice mechanic offered for the faint of heart and all those diceless skeptics out there (one called himself die-curious)!

The aims of this 42-page rulebook are summed up in its closing words:

"More than anything else, this is a game of 

imaginative play.  There is enough freedom to make anything 

possible balanced with just enough structure to hold it all 

together, and a willingness to negotiate and improvise will unlock everything it 

has to offer.  Thrilling adventure awaits, with or without dice..."

Also worth pointing out is that this game emphasizes human adventurers in a low-magic world seeking fame and riches underground.  There are no demi-humans on offer, although creative types will surely add them, and we might too at some future date!  Oh, and we're working on its softcover (and digest-sized) counterpart we hope to get out in the weeks ahead, pending a proof from Lulu, cause' it's always that, right?  Until then, the digital version beckons...