An OD&D printing history lesson - with visual aids!

An OD&D printing history lesson - with visual aids!

Originally shared by Jon Peterson

Back in 2014, I expressed my intention to celebrate the birthday of Dungeons & Dragons on the last Sunday of January: since it happened to be January 26th, that is commonly given as the anniversary. But in 2016, it falls on the final day of the month, and to honor the occasion, today I'm inaugurating a new Playing at the World video series.

This first episode is focused on the original Dungeons & Dragons boxed set; I am joined today by my friend and fellow collector Bill Meinhardt, who graciously provides his hospitality, expertise, and amazing collectibles. Even if you're not in the market for the physical boxes, you can still experience the game, as Wizards recently released PDFs of their eighth printing of the original Dungeons & Dragons books - on January 26th, it turns out.
https://youtu.be/sQlA6oAyLXg

Why OD&D Is Still Relevant

Originally shared by Rob Cortigino
http://www.enworld.org/forum/content.php?3190-Why-OD-D-Is-Still-Relevant#.Vqq1JZorK9I

Get 'em while theyare hot!

Get 'em while theyare hot!
https://gwythaintny.wordpress.com/2016/01/28/my-character-art-is-now-on-sale/

Update on Tales of Peril from Allan Grohe:

Update on Tales of Peril from Allan Grohe:
"Black Blade will release our John Eric Holmes fiction compilation Tales of Peril sometime between GaryCon and North Texas RPG Con this year, as well as at least two more adventure modules (one of mine, and one of Rob Kuntz's)." #ntrpgcon
http://odd74.proboards.com/post/177724

A short post on the new pdfs:

A short post on the new pdfs:
http://zenopusarchives.blogspot.com/2016/01/whitebox-od-pdfs.html

Wayne plugs my Balrog Reference Sheet, which I had sort of forgotten about. : )

Wayne plugs my Balrog Reference Sheet, which I had sort of forgotten about. : )

Originally shared by Wayne Rossi

In which I talk about the PDF re-release of OD&D and recommend a few resources.

OD&D, now back in [electronic] print!

OD&D, now back in [electronic] print!

Originally shared by Rob Conley

Good news folks! It looks like the OD&D PDFs are doing to be dropped into RPGNow/DnDClassics by Wizards. My library just updated and I was able to download the cleaned up books from the collector's set.

The impact Homes Basic had on Olde House Rules...

Would there be any interest in me running and you playing a #Flailsnails Temple of Elemental Evil campaign via G+...

Originally shared by Joe D (Joethelawyer)

Would there be any interest in me running and you playing a #Flailsnails  Temple of Elemental Evil campaign via G+ where you would play characters aligned with the Temple?  Basically you'd be playing the bad guys, starting out as river rats in Nulb, working your way up through the hierarchy.  You'd try to gain power and privilege within the ranks while defending yourself from your backstabbing evil competitors, as well as defending the Temple from the occasional B&E by those assholes from Hommlet.  You might also go on missions outside the Temple that I would make up.  Perhaps assassination, raiding and looting, mini dungeon crawls, espionage, reconnaissance, sabotage, terrorism, etc.  Anything to further the power of the Temple and your own careers.  AD&D based game.  Likely a fixed time---I'm thinking three hour sessions, on alternating Saturday afternoons before Shawn Sanford 's games.  I'd change enough of the module around so that even people who played it lots of times will not have any firm idea of who is who, so as to make it unpredictable.  

Just a heads up though---while it will be an "evil" game, I'm not looking for players who want to act out some extreme sort of deviant fantasies.  I tried running a campaign in a world where morals did not exist, and it got really weird with one player.   There will be no roleplaying of killing babies, raping, ritual sacrifices, etc.  I'm not going full on James Raggi/LOTFP here.  Most of the evil I see you doing is against your own supposed "allies" in an effort to stay alive.  It's a kill or be killed kinda place.  Also, you'll be defending against and taking out your avowed enemies, like  paladins, rangers and clerics of gods opposed to yours.  We're won't be focusing on spilling the blood of innocents--though sometimes that may happen, it will not be what drives the game.  

I see this as a campaign, rather than a dungeon crawl.  That way people like Chris H  who like long standing campaigns in a setting where they can develop relationships, etc can have fun, while players in the Flailsnails 'verse can drop in from time to time for some ass kicking and xp if they want.  Obviously not a place to play your paladin or ranger or other goody-two-shoes type characters though.  

I've always wanted to run something like this with TOEE, and I played in a couple sessions on G+ as a player in just such a campaign and it was a blast.  With that in mind, any interest?

If you missed it:

If you missed it:

Originally shared by Jon Peterson

In late 1970, Leonard Patt published a fantasy wargame system with Heroes, Anti-heroes, Wizards that throw “fire ball” spells, dragons, orcs, ents, and so on. The authors of Chainmail surely knew it, and it appears that Dungeons & Dragons and many fantasy games that followed owe an unacknowledged debt to Patt’s rules. Take a look for yourself.

http://playingattheworld.blogspot.com/2016/01/a-precursor-to-chainmail-fantasy.html

As promised, a Holmes character generator, with the one addition of Halfing thieves.

As promised, a Holmes character generator, with the one addition of Halfing thieves. Let me know if you see any mistakes.
http://smolderingwizard.com/2016/01/21/holmes-basic-dd-character-generator/

Character Generator for OD&D LBB characters by Doug M.

Character Generator for OD&D LBB characters by Doug M.
Uses the Holmesian Random Names.
http://smolderingwizard.com/2016/01/19/original-dd-3lbbs-character-generator

This thread has me thinking about Wizard Duels. Here are the original Chainmail rules for counterspells:

This thread has me thinking about Wizard Duels. Here are the original Chainmail rules for counterspells:
"If there are two or mare opposing Wizards, and the game is not a recreation of a battle found in a novel, determine which is the stronger magician (by casting dice if necessary). The stronger magician can successfully cast a counter-spell with a two dice score of 7 or better, while a weaker magician needs a score of 8, 9, 10 or 11, depending on his relative strength. A counter-spell fully occupies a magician's powers."
http://odd74.proboards.com/thread/11533

...aaand last night's Enlandin session, it ended as we had feared...

...aaand last night's Enlandin session, it ended as we had feared...
http://smolderingwizard.com/2016/01/15/holmes-basic-dd-play-report-conclusion/

A play report and my thoughts on running Holmes in the Endless Tunnels of Enlandin.

Doug M wrote:

A play report and my thoughts on running Holmes in the Endless Tunnels of Enlandin.
http://smolderingwizard.com/2016/01/13/holmes-basic-dd-play-report/

These monsters by Arlin Ortiz are awesome.

These monsters by Arlin Ortiz are awesome. In the format of TSR's Monster Cards, they have great graphic design, including bright colors, art that reminds me of 1960s paperback sci-fi, and the Futura font ala original Monster Manual (and Holmes). I do wish they had actually stats rather than being system neutral but I'm sure this format has more crossover appeal.

Thanks to Aaron Kesher for the reminder.
http://monsterpamphlets.tumblr.com

If you missed it, there's now a free 389-page pdf of the 5E rules.

If you missed it, there's now a free 389-page pdf of the 5E rules. It's a SRD for use with the OGL. It includes basically everything you need to run a game: class info, spells, magic items, monsters. All of the classes are on separate sheets, which is nice because you could just print out the info for the class you are playing and keep it with your character sheet (or use it as your sheet).
http://dnd.wizards.com/articles/features/systems-reference-document-srd

Somewhere in glam rock heaven, two stars are reunited...

Somewhere in glam rock heaven, two stars are reunited...

Holmes-era photo, Sep 1977, from Bowie's appearance on Bolan's last MARC show, one week before Bolan was killed in a car crash.

Inspired by playing Adventure, I dug out my old Infocom compilation, "Classic Text Adventure Masterpieces" CD-ROM,...

Inspired by playing Adventure, I dug out my old Infocom compilation, "Classic Text Adventure Masterpieces" CD-ROM, which I haven't tried out in years. I quickly discovered it doesn't run in OS X. But there is a program Zoom which will run the old Infocom files with just some minor tweaking to the file names.
http://www.logicalshift.co.uk/mac/zoom/manual/launch.html

Play Adventure (aka Colossal Cave) on the AMC website

Tonight I discovered you can play Adventure (aka Colossal Cave) - the original text adventure game - on the website for the AMC show Halt and Catch Fire (which I have watched the first 2 seasons of btw). The game play is on a "simulated PC screen circa 1983" with green text on a dark background, but with artwork accompanying certain rooms. No save but it seems to remember where you are if you leave the page.

http://www.amc.com/shows/halt-and-catch-fire/colossal-cave-adventure/landing

I may be going to the #ntrpgcon for the first time this year. Anybody else here going? http://ntrpgcon.com/

I may be going to the #ntrpgcon for the first time this year. Anybody else here going? http://ntrpgcon.com/
http://ntrpgcon.com

The A0-A4 reprint compilation is now available as a $9.99 pdf. Includes A0, an introductory adventure for levels 1-3:

The A0-A4 reprint compilation is now available as a $9.99 pdf. Includes A0, an introductory adventure for levels 1-3:
http://zenopusarchives.blogspot.com/2012/11/new-ad-basic-level-adventure-from-wotc.html

Originally shared by Ramanan S

The fancy new version of the Slavers series is now available for purchase from Wizard's as a PDF. So, we continue to circle closer and closer towards OD&D as proper PDFs.
http://www.dndclassics.com/product/169626/A0A4-Against-the-Slave-Lords-1e