Psychotronic Gaming: The Basics

 

Not too long ago I celebrated the 45th anniversary of me starting an AD&D 1e campaign. I started the campaign before I was a teenager and it is still going as I approach retirement. I also have an AD&D 2e campaign that is almost 20 years odl and a Champions super-hero campaign that is ‘merely’ over a decade old

A frequent question is “Why do you think your campaigns last so long?”, a question so common that a few years ago I sat down and summarized my thoughts on it and named the resulting list “Psychotronic Gaming”. Why ‘psychotronic’? Two reasons - it is a term sometimes used in movie criticism to describe a movie without a fixed genre, which I think applies to games to an extent, and because the list is just a summary of a mental attitude towards gaming. 

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Here’s my list of Psychotronic gaming concepts:

1) Strict Time Keeping of all gaming events
My players sometimes call this ‘the game world clock’. All characters are tracked as to location within the calendar and time of the imaginary game world. If the character Max Steele, Private Eye is in the Empire State Building at Noon on July 4th, 2029 in the game he can’t be in Tokyo at Noon on July 4th, 2029. If the fastest in-game-universe transporation from manhattan to Tokyo is a one hour cab ride to the airport and then a 20 hour flight he can’t mae it to Tokyo in less than 21 hours by the game clock.
Likewise, if the non-player character Stan Devlin, International Assassin, is also in the Empire State Building at Noon on July 4th, 2029 in the game Stan and Max might very well meet each other.
The game world calendar doesn’t have to be tied to the real world calendar but it needs to be internally consistent. If Bob, the guy playing Max, needs to stop play in the middle of a gun fight with Stan because he has to get to work tomorrow then the wolrd clock for Max ‘freezes’ at 12:04 pm July 4th, 2029 until the player can return to finish the action.
Likewise if Real World Monday the 1st of August the character Max takes three days in the game world to get a plane ticket, flies to Tokyo, then takes a 1 week cruise so that in 5 minutes of play his character has travelled 11 days forward on the game calendar. Bob could go home right after that, sleep, come back on Real World the 2nd of August, and start playing Max in Tokyo on Game World July 15th, 2029.
The use of the Game World Clock allows actions in the campaign to have natural repercussions.

2) Verisimilitude within the artificial world of the campaign
The world must make internal sense; the logic of the world must be consistent inside the world. If the gravity is just like Earth, it must remain this way unless there is a consistent in-world reason why not. If werewolves can be harmed by silver then that silver bullet can kill that werewolf. If no one is stronger than Amazing man then, well, no one is stronger than Amazing Man. And so on.
This means that even magic must have consistent rules of some sort. The Arcane Defense spell stops every attacking spell then if you suddenly add the Arcane Annihilator without any warning or fanfare and it kills someone protected by Arcane Defense you broke verisimilitude by changing the rules.
Verisimilitude allows players to make plans within the game world. If there is no telling if a certain device or action in the game can ever work the same way twice planning is almost impossible. More critically it allows players to think of the game world as its own thing, as close to being “real” as possible in fiction. If the rules, the history, and so on are always in flux then your suspension of disbelief is much harder.

3)  Status Quo is the Enemy, change is a natural result of actions
The world must change. If an evil cult brings a plague to the town of Oldbridge that kills everyone in the town then the town can’t be just like it used to be a few weeks later. If there is war and the army buys up all the canned food in the city then the characters can’t buy canned food until it is replenished or they go somewhere else. And so on.
Directly related to verisimilitude, if the game world has rules then the game world must also have consequences. Resetting everything to how it started over and over means that the rewards and risks of actions can never be very great. The campaign must grow and change over the course of play.
This means that things must be going on even when the player characters/players aren’t aware of them. The characters destroyed a massive orcish tribe that (unknown to the players) traded loot to an evil wizard = the evil wizard has to find a new way to get the stuff he needs so he has to make a new deal which might mean that distant goblins suddenly have more support.

4) Characters Can Win or Lose based on their actions and choices
This is an inevitable conclusion of 1,2, and 3. And violating this rule is, in my experience of other campaigns, the fastest way to make players stop caring about your campaign.
This is a lot more than just ‘let the dice fall where they may’, it means that there is no plot, there is no pre-determined anything, and that anyone can die - or live! And any plan, including the player’s plans, can be thwarted.
Here is an example from the 1980’s: A fellow DM and friend named David and I would met and discuss our campaigns and what our NPCs were plotting. This was camaraderie and to help each other get fresh ideas. At that time the major threat to the characters in my campaign was the Hobgoblin King, a “super-chief” of hobgoblins that had an army and all sorts of plans to attack the human nation at the heart of active play. David knew that the plan of the Hobgoblin King was a slow war of conquest culminating with a seige of the human capitol city and an epic tale akin to the seiges of fiction.
Then six characters did something insane and bold, actually ambushed the Hobgoblin King and killed him even though they all died. Before the war even really began the leader was dead. I told David about it and he said,
“You can just have his lieutenant take over and still get the war and stuff you planned.”
But instead I followed the internal logic of the campaign and let the heroic deaths of the characters mean there was no war. In time a new Hobgoblin King arose, but a very different one with very different plans. In short, I let the players change everything. Of course, this applies to characters, too!
With this simple idea the players know that they are very important to the campaign and that they can actually “win or lose”.

5) Multiple Characters per Player 
With a strict Game Clock, verisimilitude, and so forth players will often have characters widely dispersed in space and time. Multiple characters are a must simply to be able to play! Also, I have found that with three or more characters per player the players treat tabletop role playing games less like theater/a stroy and more like what they are, games.
Interestingly enough, it also allows a much broader range of interactions among characters. if every player has one character then the characters must get along and cooperate no matter what they internal logic of the campaign or the development of the characters. If every player has multiple characters each things like arguments, fueds, romances, etc. between characters is poossible - and very likely, as I have learned.

6) Players Drive Action
In its simplest form this means the players decide what their characters are doing. But it stretches much further than that.
I do not tell the players ‘on Friday your 4th level characters will be going to the dungeon because that is all I have prepared/what I planned/the next scene in the story’. Instead i ask them ‘what are you planning to do? Which characters?’ and they are allowed to “surprise” me with last minute changes.
One way I facilitate this is that my campaign is not static (see #3, above) so things are constantly happening “off screen” as the Game Clock ticks ever forward. The various characters in various places are told the various rumors they hear, events they witness, etc. and then the players decide who, what, where, etc. for games.
The other side of the coin is that players also drive inaction!
Another example: in Game year 120 (top of my head) the various characters heard rumors, one of which was that the orcs were more active than usual. The characters spent the next game year doing odd little adventures, leveling up, and so on. in game year 121 they hear many more rumors that many small bands of orcs are very active in the Stone Hills. They spend game years 121 and 122 mapping a remote area, delving into a mega dungeon, and traveling across the sea and back.In game year 123 among a ton of other rumor hear that the orcs have drawn in their sub tribes and that their shamans are sending scouting parties over the mountains and the players finally investigate and realize that the orcs have almost completed the process of getting a new Overking that would unite all five of their nations and start a major war and, because they ignored it so long, they have mere days to stop it.
If they had blown it off again? War!
So - while player drive action the NPCs are not frozen, waiting for the characters to encounter them like it was a video game.

7) Genre is Descriptive, not Proscriptive
Some people are sonfused by this, but I find it very importantly. What I mean is this - Star Wars is science fiction because it has space ships. It is also fantasy because it has magic swords and magic force powers. And that is awesome. Your hard boiled campaign about hard-drinking private eyes in 1950’s San Francisco cracking fraud cases for girls that are trouble can have a vampire in it. Your very period authentic 16th century France emulation of a fantasy RPG can have blaster rifles from a crashed UFO. And so on. As long as you watch out for the other Psychotronic rules AND as long as you want it in it can work and be awesome.

And that’s the basics of why I think my campaigns run a long toime!

Play Report: Skull Mountain, the Dead Level

 Written by Jen, a player.

We first ran into the “dead level” long ago, fairly early on in our explorations of Skull Mountain. It was incredibly scary and intimidating, and we immediately turned back and intentionally avoided that area for years. But we often talked and debated about how we could get through it – and live to tell the tale. Quite awhile ago, we asked a sage about the dead level, and we found out that there was a constant level drain and entropy effect, so that anyone who spends time there would have levels drained, and would potentially age at an accelerated rate. In addition, it would eat away at items and marks, so that it would be impossible to leave a trail. We also found out that there were many traps further inside it, and there was a ghost found at the end of the maze. Further research indicated that a Globe of Invulnerability could protect against the level drain, but we still hesitated to enter. We later found out that it was the original location of The Device, until prior explorers moved it with a misapplied Vanish spell – this is actually what created the dead level. We knew we wanted to put The Device back where it belonged, hoping it would normalize this area of the Mountain. Plus we knew there was a massive loot haul from all who died there. This all made us really motivated to deal with this level of Skull Mountain, and we thought of it often through our years of adventuring.

As we went through the years of adventuring, we found tools and spells and henchmen that we thought could help. Seeker had been agitating to go back for quite awhile now, but the timing and opportunity were just never perfect – and we knew it would need to be perfect. Recently, we realized the best characters to cope with this all had downtime at the same time. Seeker (a mage/thief played by Jack), Greystar (a magic user played by Sam), Owen (a magic user played by Nick), and Ingrid (a fighter played by Jen/me). We spent a week of real time on planning and prep work.

Our plan became thus: we would scry the way with spells, and use a potent scroll of Globe of Invulnerability to protect ourselves as we traveled. Greystar had a cube of force as back up protection, as well as protection against the Ghost’s possession attack. Before we set out, we conferred with a Bishop about the Ghost. Seeker researched the idea of putting the device back with a wish. Owen used contact other planes to gather more information, and it seemed that putting the device back would indeed be a positive change overall. Meanwhile, Ingrid – who has not had a lot of luck staying alive and uninjured in the mountain – was terrified at what could happen. Level drain and age acceleration seemed to be huge potential issues. Ingrid sent a note to Brigid, asking for shelter if things went wrong and she was able to make it out somehow – vowing to never set foot in the mountain again if things went badly. Then, we finally set out through the mountain…

We headed down towards the fifth floor dead level, stopping just before at level four. We staged here before going further.

Greystar cast Divination to try to figure out the threats. This told us that the level had – 1) a powerful undead creature, a Ghost who hates all life and good, 2) a form of corrupted magical tech that spreads corruption across all things, 3) a quasi elemental portal that we had to be aware of, 4) a teleportation trap, and 5) tremendous loot, one of which is a staff of the magi.

Owen conjured an air elemental and asked it to map the level below us. It returned visibly weakened, but it was able to draw a very confusing map that did show the end of the level, and conveyed that some of the walls move.

At the very last moment, Seeker asked his summoner henchmen to cast “find the path”, and then we figured out which of our PCs and henchmen would be best to take with us so we would all fit inside the globe of invulnerability. Then, the moment came, and we entered the dead level.

We followed the path while inside the globe and managed to avoid eight pit traps and encountered three areas where the passages closed behind us. Once we got to the stairs going down, we were outside the entropy field – but where was the Ghost? With a limited duration on the cube of force, we had to be super careful of when we turned it on, and made the decision to turn it on just before we opened the door to the lost control room – and there was the Ghost! We were able to kill him, mostly thanks to Greystar’s new manservant, Filbert. Once we secured the control room, we used a wish to return The Device to its original location.

Doing this ended the dead level’s powers, and it instantly became what looks like a server farm, complete with roomba like cleaning robots, obviously space elf tech, and what felt like air conditioning. We put a feather token door between the main level and the control room which now holds the device – at this point, only Greystar knows the password for the feather token door. We know we need to further secure this area as soon as we can!

We gathered the rest of our party from the level entrance and then explored further, looking for the storied loot haul. We headed back to an octagonal room and come to a shiny black door. Inside is a massive, ragged cavern full of gold and loot – we saw at least one goldbug. We decide to explore the other areas first and come back for the treasure later. We found two secret doors, the first one smelled of ashes, and there is a small rift to the plane of ash – this leads to the Ash Temple, untouched for all these years. We opened the other door into a room with a shadowy form in a niche – then all of a sudden, we were on the pink moon, in the western planes. Guess we found the teleport trap! As we made our way back, we encountered Rupert in the former dead level, protecting and maintaining The Device, like he did before. We didn’t talk to him and quickly made our way back to the octagonal room and into the room we left, where we managed to disarm the teleport trap. We found another apartment entrance behind a secret door, where we found a heat box and a journal with a bookmark – a diary tab. We finally got back to the treasure room and cast detect curse, setting aside the cursed items. And we did indeed find *amazing* loot!

Now, all of us that went on this adventure are rich, leveled up, and ready to set up our domains!

Play Report: Skull Mountain

   At the end of the last Skull Mountain session the PCs had retreated to safety at Owen's redoubt, met with visiting elves, and recovered from injuries for some time. A lot happened away from table with them and with many other PCs slowing their return. But yesterday they returned, the same players and so on

Personal Update and Play Report

 I prefer not to talk about my current personal life because this blog is about gaming, pop culture, etc., not a journal. But I have been light on blogging for the last three years because of multiple personal medical emergencies ranging from emergency abdominal surgery to save my life to a pulmonary embolism that should have been lethal (I do not recommend them). Very many of the last 18 months have been bedrest, recuperation, physical therapy, and so on. I am facing at least one additional surgery over the next few months so I will not be back to full strength and productivity for about another 2-3 years. 

  This has slowed down a number of projects I was working on ranging from my own fantasy table top RPG to my mass combat rules to a magazine. I apologize for these delays, but all are still moving forwards. I am deeply grateful for the prayers and support I have gotten from the larger community of gaming fans and especially the guys and gals on my Discord. Thanks you.

    This last weekend saw a major foray into Skull Mountain by 5 players. Skull Mountain is the megadungeon in my 44+ year old AD&D campaign called Seaward.

    The players and their characters:

Jennifer played Ingrid 8th level Human fighter
Jack played Seeker 9th/10th Elven Mage/Thief
Alex played Starfalcon 7th level Half-Elf Ranger
Sam played Clint 9th level Paladin
Nick played Owen 10th level Human Mage

  There were 15 henchmen along, notably the 7th level half-ogre fighter Octavius with his sword Horsekiller and the 7th level human fighter Baldric. This is glossing over a group of henchmen of great skill and power with multiple 5th-7th level clerics/religious brothers.

The goal was to return to the Eastern Tunnels and both follow what they call the Extension Cord and deal with the overly-large Greater Sewage Beast in the Middens.

   The party met at Seeker's home, which is the level he added to the megadungeon. After getting equipment and confirming load outs, encumbrance, etc. they used the Hidden Ways to get to the Cavern of Herds. There they ran into the (NPC) Beginner of the Third Way, a powerful but mysterious monk that lives in the Briars. he often travels to Skull Mountain to fight powerful creatures in his quest to master the martial arts. Together with the Beginner, who they all know, they went to the Snard Village at the edge of the Cavern of Hers where they found the entrepreneurial snards (think 'subterranean humanoids the size of brownies that tend toward Good) are now making and selling cheese. 

  The party checked in with the mayor of the snards and learned that things had been quiet, although the cave bison had been avoiding the southern edge of the vast cavern. Investigating the ranger Starfalcon noticed new 'game trails' coming from the caverns where the Trog Tribes had formerly lived. Scouting they realized the sprawling Trog Tunnels were infested with ulsios (eight-legged rats the size of terriers)! But Seeker had a bad feeling, so he turned stealthy (Ring of Inaudibility and Invisibility and a Sachet of Sentlessness) and used his broom to inspect the ceiling...
  ....and almost bumped into a Stalactite Terror (18' tall 'living stalactite' with multiple very long tentacles)! The horrible creature attacks, its barbed tentacles easily reaching the 50' to attack the main party on the ground. Seeker, already airborne, was joined by   with a Fly spell from a henchman and in just 4 rounds the creature was destroyed. Mage henchmen led by   used Fireballs to wipe out the ulsios.

  Pivoting back to the main mission, they paused to ask the snard mayor to keep them updated and then went down the Eastern Tunnel. Going a bit over a mile they approached the Three Caves of the Space Bugs. The Asteroid Snail was, luckily, at the far end of the central cave and they were able to approach it and parley. The monks and druids were able to convince it that the party meant it no harm and were not food. Attempts to parley with the Galaxy Snail failed, as usual, but they realized that it only fired its plasma spheres at things approaching it or the large pool at the end of its cave. They party fell back and Seeker cast Clairvoyance to look into the pool.

  He learned that the 'algae' on top is really death slime that would dissolve anyone attempting to jump into the pool. Against the far wall about 20' underwater in a recess is a bronze door covered in warning runes as well as a glyph particularly attuned to ward away Baba Yaga (!!). Seeker made notes, told the party, and they continued down the Eastern Tunnel.

  Carefully skirting the edge of the Cave of Falling Stalactites and dealing with horror beetles roaming for food the party passed the five entrances to the Monster Maze but detoured just before the tunnel to the Middens to scout the Star Tombs again. Getting closer they decided to send in only Seeker, who is of the same sub-race of elf as the space elves were. The two Swordmaiden Guardian Statues at the entrance allowed him to pass, as did the Type III Golem, but the second set of Swordmaiden Guardian Statues flanking the far door barred his advance.

  Suddenly Clint had an epiphany: when meeting the King of Tirgalen 2 years previously he had noted that an unusual old-elvish word was used to greet the king's guards. He had written it down as very odd and decided to try it as a password to avoid the 5 guardians of the Star Tomb.
    It worked

DM Note: The player, Sam, had indeed made a note when the same PC was in the Court of the King of Tirgalen about the odd word used as a greeting to the king's guards in an adventure in, I believe, 2021. It is, yes, a memory of the old protocols for this base. Good notes!

  Beyond they found a junction that led to 4 other caverns. As they entered five Fiery Tentacle Beasts erupted from above each tunnel and began to attack! Several party members were burned, bashed, cut, and stabbed, but after about 8 rounds the vicious creatures were slain and the injured patched up. Seeker's new short sword, Deathknell, proved its worth that battle.

  One tunnel off the junction held an elven village of about 15 home as if they had been snatched from a sylvan forest somewhere. Long deserted. The next tunnel led to a massive circular cavern where a broad, flat ledge ringed a huge, deep pool of pure water. the ceiling was an iris door over 600 yards across. The third led far around the cavern with a pool and was a highly advanced Control Station, far superior to anything seen so far! They found the far end of the Extension Cord here and disconnected it. They then accidentally contacted Admiral Finnan Laclaer, commander of the Silver Fleet's Fifth Squadron on the Starbase. 

  What followed was a great deal of good news for the essentially stranded and incommunicado Fifth Squadron. With an exchange of information the Admiral agreed to send a ship to the drydock atop Skull Mountain so that some of his people could take over Level Zero. Clint hopes to negotiate a trade agreement between Starbase and his own, new, domain. 

  They also learned that the sometimes-visitors to that part of Skull Mountain were not the Space Elves but rather the Githyar from Planet Iau. They were honor-bound to maintain the guardians of the Tomb. What tomb? The tomb Seeker had seen earlier! It is called the Tomb of the Vampire Sorceress Natasha, Baba Yaga's Favorite Daughter.

  The party agreed to scout the last tunnel before turning back to prepare to meet the space elves in 5 more days. Along that tunnel they entered a large cavern, dimly lit, that held a manufacturing area. A female elf was wandering around the middle of the cavern repeatedly inventorying the materials on the benches. Very wary, the party slipped closer and observed that every 2-3 minutes she would 'flicker' and distort.  About every 3rd flicker she would pause and stare at her own hands mumbling.

  "Am I real? I'm not real! But I have to be real! What is happening?!"

  Or something similar. Then she would go back to her job. When the party was about 60' away they called out to her. She began to slicker and pixelate more. The sights of this forced teh party save vs magic (fear). About half the part failed and they were paralyzed in terror. Then she talked her voice getting louder and and louder,

  "Yes! The evacuation order! I had to evacuate! But the teleporter... the teleporter! The teleporter was damaged! I had to try! THERE WAS NO OTHER WAY! I HAD TO USE THE TELEPORTER!"

  And she screamed. The scream sounded like a terrified woman and a dial up modem combined and it was so loud it knocked items over 90' away.

  The party was more than 30' away from the Digital Banshee, but less than 90' so the save vs death was normal. SIXTEEN OF THE TWENTY PARTY MEMBERS FAILED THE SAVE! At that range everyone who failed lost 50% of their maximum hit points.

  Then the Digital Banshee charged.

  Luckily there were enough people to meet her charge and one of the not-paralyzed henchmen clerics had the spell Remove Fear to free Clint. Clint closed with his holy sword, the Purifier, and the Digital Banshee was disrupted. Once the party was free of paralysis effects (just 2 more rounds until it wore off) a scroll of Dispel Evil was used so the tormented creature would never reform.

  At this point the party carefully retreated the way they had come back toward safety, only needing to fight two more horror beetles on the way. They went to the Salon and Spa on the Deep to recuperate in the healing waters there.

Player quotes:
Sam: 'So just a half-mile from the Eldritch Horror from Beyond Space that had a save or die attack there was a Tormented Soul Trapped Between Life and Death that had  different save or die attack? I'm really not looking forward to whatever is down the Eastern Tunnels beyond here."

Jennifer: "So both times we face these creatures Ingrid dies or almost-dies? She's not coming back down her! Nothing but overland adventures for a while!"

Jack: "One the one hand, why do so many people use Skull Mountain to hide things? On the other, I live in Skull Mountain to hide from things."

Nick: "Remember, every 500 yards down these tunnels I tack up another advertisement for my Salon and Spa in the Deep. I left extra in the control room."

Cauldron of Creativity, or the Early Days of RPGs: The Movies and Television

   The crew on my Discord have been asking me to talk about the culture of the early days of the RPG hobby. While I started relatively late (only began playing in '77 and didn't start DMing until '79) I am very much part of that First Wave and, as a Gen Xer, was definitely in the culture.

  This is going to be bounding around a little bit between TV, movies, movies on TV, the dawn of the VCR age, etc. but I will try to focus on '75 - '84.

  TV was rather different then and I find it hard to explain to my own children who grew up with cable and on-demand and are now in the age of streaming services. In general unless you had access to an independent station you got what everyone else got - I Love Lucy, Brady Bunch, Gilligan's Island, Saturday morning cartoons, and so on. I was lucky enough to live within range of Channel 4 out of Indianapolis and had access to their indie shows like Science Fiction Theater, Horror Theater, and (of course) Sammy Terry! So before I got to RPGs I had seen all the classic Universal horror films, all the Godzilla movies of the day, and a ton of Hammer horror, to boot. This background stuff is more important than you think. For example, the description of a vampire's abilities obviously draws on Hammer horror films at least a little.

  The theater movies that were current or coming to TV at the time were certainly something that influenced the games I was part of or knew about. A memory that came to me as I was writing this was how I visualized the very first dungeon I went into as being like the ship in The Poseidon Adventure after it capsized; strange, threatening, and full of things that could kill you. The Omen and The Exorcist were certainly influential and I remember one of the first cleric PCs I saw, run by an adult, was named Father Karras.

  But the big names in the room of movies in that era were the blockbusters and the cult films. 1975 was the year Jaws came out, and that film is a horror film that taught a lot of young dungeon masters that less was more - keep that monster in the shadows, behind the trees, around that next corner, and let the players' own imaginations terrify them. 1975 was also The Rocky Horror Picture Show a cult film that starts as horror but turns out to be science fiction, shredding genre limits (and being goofy fun).1976 had King Kong, a big monster film and inspiration for at least one module, of course. But it also had In Search of Noah's Ark. 

  Yes, In Search of Noah's Ark. Never heard of it? It is based on a book theorizing about where Noah's Ark came to rest (no, really!) and, brace yourselves - It out earned The Missouri Breaks, Midway. Marathon Man, and Carrie. But stuff like that, Chariots of the Gods, films about Nostradamus, documentaries on Bigfoot, UFOs - they were all very popular so secret histories, conspiracy theories, alien invaders, and so on were certainly part of general culture and the bleed over into gaming was massive. 

    1977 was a big year with Star Wars and Close Encounters of the Third Kind both being incredibly popular all over the world. But you also had Planet of the Dinosaurs, Damnation Alley, Island of Dr Moreau, The People that Time Forgot, and Wizards, all that same year! A ton of science fiction, and that really impacted gaming, especially since Traveller came out that year, too, perfectly timed to be the science fiction RPG of the old school. That was also the year of Sinbad and the Eye of the Tiger, a great D&D movie if there ever was one.

  So you can see, just as the Monster Manual was hitting shelves and ushering in AD&D 1e the overall culture was neck-deep in science fiction, fantasy, and gonzo films and TV.  As AD&D was released slowly from 1977 through 1986 [yes - really] the initial RPG explosion that gave us everything from Traveller to Rolemaster to WEG Star Wars and so on we also had the VCR explosion that was essentially ubiquitous by 1982.

  Then the golden age of VCR films really began. Flash Gordon, Hawk the Slayer, the Archer, Dragon Slayer, Excalibur, Time Bandits, Ator the Fighting Eagle, Beastmaster, Conan the Barbarian, the Dark Crystal, and the Sword and the Sorceror, all top-shelf cheesy fantasy films, all part and parcel of the RPG mentality, were all released within 32 months of 1980 and 1982! The incredible volume of fantasy, science fiction, post-apocalyptic, and "what the Hell did I just watch?!" movies from 1977-1985 is probably beyond the ability of Man to count. and with VCRs all over and the glorious mom & pop video stores willing to put Italian Giallo movies on the shelf if soldiers, college kids, and band nerds were willing to rent them they were everywhere.

  The two movies I want to single out today will probably surprise you. Everyone who knows me know I am constantly promoting Hawk the Slayer, Beastmaster, and Deathstalker II as not just wonderfully entertaining but D&D adjacent, but! I think the best movies to illustrate the Old School RPG Attitude are - 

    The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension and Big Trouble in Little China. Both of them use genre as a descriptor, not a confinement. Both have a ton of details and throw information at the vuewer left and right.

  Look at the opening of Buckaroo Banzai: the movie cuts back and forth between a military test range and an operating room letting us know Buckaroo has been called in to assist as a neurosurgeon then (after recruiting a new member of his team) arrives to drive a rocket car. At about 8:30 into the movie it is casually mentioned that his jet car has broken the sound barrier and that's not the most interesting thing he does in the jet car before 10:30. 

  In BTiLC the motivations for the villain is casually mentioned in a bunch of fast-paced patter and the existence and powers of the Three Storms are just - there. Why are there rival martial arts gangs like a Shaw Brothers film and dueling wizards in contemporary San Francisco? The real question is "why not?" because they certainly never spell it out slowly for the viewer

  And let's pause to discuss the big fight in BTiLC: The leader (Wang Chi) and his pal Jack Burton get a wizard and a bunch of martial artists together then sneak through monster-haunted dungeons to break into the fortress of an evil wizard to save the prince-, uh, fiancé and reporter. BTiLC is part western, part Wuxia, part heist film, and ALL Dungeons & Dragons. To old school RPGers the massive martial arts fight/wizard duel in a neon-lit room with an escalator was pure gold.

  As mentioned, both use genre as a reason to expand, not contract, and both let us know they have a solid, consistent internal logic that is shown on the screen not explained to the audience. They involve groups of people with various talents teaming up to defeat evil with a broad ensemble of skills and abilities.

  But most importantly both assume that the audience is intelligent. Each film is packed with references to the reality that exists within the cinematic universe of the particular film that imply a huge, sprawling world where you just know is full of other stories just as entertaining, fun, and excisting as the one you are watching.

  This attitude, where your AD&D 1e campaign could have a villain with a three-bladed rocket-propelled sword, you might run into a very odd mechanical monster deep under Mount Thunder, and everyone knew what a certain chant meant (bad news) was common in an explosively creative time for RPGs and unique, personal campaigns flourished. Don't get me wrong, it wasn't 'every campaign used everything from everywhere'! I firmly disallowed three-bladed swords, but did not have a problem with steam-powered 'muskets', for example. But the 'pop culture is a buffet for RPGs' was just an assumption for the majority of us. But, again, the most important element was that the RPGs also assumed that the gamemasters and players were intelligent - and creative. There was 'space' inside the best games for you to make it what you want, add and subtract what worked for your table.

  For as many times Gygax wrote 'there is ONE WAY to play AD&D!' in the DMG there are three things listed as 'optional, like six-guns, power armor, and dynamite. The artifacts and relics in the DMG include the computer from Altair IV, the steam organ of the Gods, and a giant mecha. This multi-genre, make it awesome but stay internally consistent ethos was the core of actual old school attitudes toward play.

  

Massive Session Report: from West to East

       Hello, folks, it is time for a massive update! There were two sessions recently, both played on a weekend. In the first one we had

      Hans Shrek, World's Strongest Halfling and his henchmen

      Ingrid, Fighter and her henchmen

      Thorin, Fighter/Thief and his henchmen

      Starkiller, Cleric/Fighter/Magic-user, and his henchmen

     Graystar, Magic-user, and his henchman

Session Report: War in the Stone Hills!

   The most recent sessions took place in the Stone Hills west of Seaward.

The heroes were:

Carlton - 6th level paladin. The Hero of the Battle of Eagle Valley. Famed as a master of the lance.

Fiona - 4th/4th Fighter/Magic-user. Elf. Known as a tactician and for her keen senses.

The Sparrow - 8th level Thief. Through magic and cunning fights with a two-handed sword. One handed. Senior thief in the Company.

Akira - 7th level monk. The Man with the Eldritch Fists. 

Conrad - 6th/5th Fighter/Cleric. Dwarf. Champion of the Innocent, Defender of the Downtrodden, hammer of Foes.

Henchmen brought the party to a total of 11 members with levels. The Hills are rugged and empty so they brought a dozen mules loaded with provisions and gear, 2 drovers, a cook, and a camp guard to hep the henchmen.