Castle Xyntillan and the World of Xoth

 Out of sheer frustration I tapped my brother in Virginia to play Gabor Luxe's fantastic funhouse dungeon Castle Xyntillan. He was under insufferable heat and humidity so was keeping inside. This gave him the time to jump in! This was completely a nostalgia-grab back into the past when we would play B/X with a bunch of first level characters and the Isle of Dread or some such thing. A summer afternoon with the afternoon free to play DnD. Good times.

He "rolled" up 4 first level characters and spent some time briefly in the local township, a crap-hole called... whatever. They approached the castle in daylight and went right for the opening at the west side into the rose and vegetable gardens. There they were accosted by a troop of 8 bandits and their leader, one of the undead Malevelloooo, something. Neither one of us could pronounce the Hungarian script so we just called them Mulleaveys. So nine against four. Not good odds, especially because the bandits were hiding behind the rubble.

But there was nothing for it. He had just spent an hour rolling up characters so it was time to get into the action. It was a two-on-two with the missile weapons. Crossbows against short bows. Not being surprised and winning the initiative, Mike began what was a long string of high numbers, and the bandits rolling a string of low numbers. The bowmen were taken down in the first exchange! Then it was nothing but bloody melee, and even though the bandits continued to roll garbage, three of the PCs were dead and five of the bandits. This left 3 with the leader staying in the rear looking for a handy bow. Renee' the Thief took this opportunity to run back to town. I took an hour break while he rolled up 5 new 1st level characters.

And the other news I have is Book 3 Worlds of Adventure for Deluxe USR Sword & Sorcery is up at DriveThru. Or it should be, it is only available in PDF right now. The POD files need to get loaded and approved. But it does close the loop on USR Sword & Sorcery, for me. There is one or two more adventures to write for the game, but for what it is worth the game and myself have rung what we can out of each other and it is time to move on!

What I am working on now is Space Acid, my FGU Space Opera retro-clone, and MEGS the MEGS retro-clone. Two big works with little small dungeons in between to snap me out of a narrow view and redundant ways of thinking. My online games as well as what I am writing.

And so back to Xyntillan, he rolled up 4 fighters and a cleric. With Renee' at the head of the troop, they assaulted the castle again. This time they went through the Great Entrance which lead into the Vestibule. They interacted with the Mulleavey paintings in the hallway and the cleric almost had his head devoured by the hat in the cloakroom. 

They continued to poke around looking for something of value when the triggered the butler to show up. His ghostly form wanted to know why they were breaking down the bricks walling off a door in the Clerk's Office? He had not heard there was any construction scheduled to start today. He insisted they cease at once. Grubb, a Fighter, had collected much of the dried parchment filled with mad scribblings and showed James the Butler the party's "authorization" for work to be done. This satisfied the butler immensely, so when the PCs asked where they could heal up James led them to the Inner Courtyard and pointed out where to enter the Grand Bath. The cleric bathed in the pool hoping to be healed. Instead, they triggered the badness, failed the save, and turned into a pillar of salt. Dead. We are up to 4 corpses now in two hours of play. He hastily left the bath, Grubb did take another stab at the pool and became immune to poison for a week. Returning to the vestibule again and again, my brother reconnoitered the immediate hallways surrounding. When Ben the Fighter walked into the Glittering Cloud and started having his blood sucked out of him he called it quits for the day. 

We will pick up again tomorrow as he returns to town, makes some meager gold, and figure out his next step.

And Book 3 Deluxe USR Sword & Sorcery is out on PDF at Drivethru!

What is the OSR?

 This is the simplest explanation which is factual, and true!

The common thread that binds the OSR is the hack that created OSRIC and The Basic Fantasy RPG. The hack is that you can take d20 SRD and now the 5e SRD as a starting point for whatever creative vision you possess. 

OSR Wilderness Fundraiser Delivers, again (cont.)

Continued from this initial announcement, that is. 

Mission OSR II can be reported a success. This "ascent" is happening much later in the hiking season than should be attempted for the seriousness of the mission so I do not feel bad about just getting to the Highlands Center at the Zealand Trailhead. This time of the year the actual trailhead is gated. This has the effect of turning a 5-1/2 mile hike into an 11 mile hike. In icy snow with higher than usual river crossings. The weather on Wednesday was for shit too. Whiteout conditions closed in on I93 just as I hit my old hometown and punched through Franconia Notch. My brother took the right onto Route 302 towards Bretton Woods and pointed the way to the AMC Center's dusted lot. The wind was fierce and icy blasts bit hard into my face as I hustled across the snow-drifted entry into the massive conference center. My triple layer of base layer, fleece, and down sweater were pathetically inadequate for any real hiking on a day like today.

Luck was with the Irish though. The caretakers for Zealand Hut Croo were scheduled to attend high-level meetings the very next day. The front desk receptionist was sure to make sure the game kit got into their hands and into the cabin. I was too tired to take any photos on site, but here are the photos of the finished product which was delivered. 

Gaming & Garbage

 I'm hitting the road in a few days and it will involve some gaming projects. It is time off for me so I will get a chance to isolate and write. I will also be visiting friends and family. So chance to game face-to-face with old acquaintances. Who have also been active in the game industry. One has been an artist for some of the coolest independent creators out there, come to find out. Had him do the new maps in Shrine of the Keepers! The other friend published a board game with Ultra Pro which went on to a second printing. Which is good in the board game business. 

What I cherish most about these two friendships is I got the two of them back into TTRPG's. I wrote about getting a face to face game going like 11 years ago when I started this blog. It was this 7 hour long session which got my illustrating friend to active in engaging the industry to sell his illustrations. And he has been doing well. The other friend dragged me to Gencon 2017 to help him with his board game. He couldn't believe I was still playing rpg's. I hadn't been. Just rediscovered them. I got him into my online Basic DnD game which renewed his interest. He went on to run a Gamma World 1E campaign which, while short lived at 20 or so sessions, it was epic Gamma World. A setting guide has come of it and I will be working on getting it closer to publication with him this coming week. 

Oh yes, I will be able to deliver another slip case to an AMC Hut with Basic Fantasy Roleplaying Game and adventures inside. A gift for the Croo of volunteers which run the huts each summer. This will be the second one (the first being delivered to Madison Springs Hut) and I will be delivering it to the Zealand Falls Hut. This hut is open year round so will be accessible this time of the year instead of being closed up. Hopefully I won't have to do much post-holing along the trail. Not sure what the snow conditions are like in New Hampshire right now. 

And I am going to finish the week off with getting my parents in a game of DnD. It is about time I got my parents involved in a game which I vexed them to no end with as a child. I would not get my nose out from game books when I found rpg's for the first time. My singleness of focus at times would freak them out. Time to stop being so selfish with my passions. I will get Mom, Dad, my brother and his wife and they will have fun damn it! I probably should live stream it....