I found this half completed list for a random generator. I think it is cobbled together from disparate lists I found on other gamer's blogs. The purpose is to give me a quick NPC when the Player Characters decide they want to hit up a local for some information. This should give you enough details to make the encounter a worthwhile one.
Contact Information:
jay@vanishingtowerpress.com
Thursday, March 5
Random City Folk for your Fantasy Streets
Tuesday, February 25
A Present of, and a Review of Castle Xyntillian by Gabor Lux
Gabor Lux is a fantastic person. He is undeniably
generous. His output under the Echoes from Fomalhaut label numbers 60
individual publications spanning more than a decade of OSR creations. This not
only makes Mr. Lux prolific, but an artist who has printed content throughout
the history of the OSR movement from 2003 to the present. His blog Beyond Fomalhaut
should be recognizable to most OSR aficionados and needs to be added back
into my blog’s recommendation list. His zine Echoes is comfortably weird
and always worth a read.
So, this guy is mind-numbingly good and a great
example of how gaming product should be made when offering to the consumer-at-large.
I recently purchased EMDT 57 The Nocturnal Table from his line. I wanted
another generator for random city encounters and this 2019 digest-sized release
looked like a smart choice. Well, really, I knew it would be a smart choice because
it is from Gabor and Gabor’s shit does not suck. The price was very affordable
considering the book was coming from Hungry and the bouquet of DIY chewy usefulness
packed between the pages. And it was an extremely fortuitous time to order as
well. Seems my transaction was his 1,000 foreign commercial exchange and Gabor
acknowledged this by sending me a beautiful hard-bound copy of EMDT 60 Castle
Xyntillan, a 131page OSR adventure tribute to Judges Guild’s Tegal Manor. Tegal
Manor is known as an original example of a “funhouse” dungeon, a module packed
with interesting, unpredictable encounters with a loose or even no overall
relation to another.
It is not a small book, not digest size. More like hardcover
catalogue size? The cover art is original, a Peter Mullen creation. There is a liberal
amount of original and public domain art and uses the wonderfully efficient
presentation of two-column text on white paper for easy reading and scanning.
Besides a large dungeon the book includes 5 pages of
useful tables, a DM’s traditional tool which has come of age. Ordered in a
sensible method these pages are there to squirt out hirelings and NPC’s with
personality and information. The duplication and addition of maps, another sign
of OSR haute couture, is present throughout the book, including the end cover
pages. The addition of interior end cover pages with the castle’s map is something
you cannot get from a Drivethru POD and gives a traditional publishing house a
reason still for living; providing a print run tailored to a ttrpg adventure
book. Castle Xyntillan has been designed for the Swords & Wizardry game and
is suitable for 1st to 6th level characters. Castle Xyntillan has been designed
to be versatile, open-ended, complex, and accessible. This module should
provide ample opportunities for exploration, confrontation, and subterfuge.
Whether you would like a dungeon for one-off expeditions and convention play,
or repeated forays and full campaigns, this book should suit those demands.
Seeing as I have recently acquired it, I cannot
divulge the value of the majority of the book, the keyed dungeon itself. But it
has been extensively play-tested. You know this because the introductory pages
list all the Player Characters (not players) that survived and died in their forays
through the dungeon. It is a long list. Besides, it is Gabor so you know it must
be good. The cherry on top of this lovely book is the location marks for each
and ever Player Character which died in the dungeon. The big spreads on the end
pages contain the dungeon maps and the location and name of the dead PC is
placed on the map. There even is an MIA list, adventurers who’s fate remains
unknown. Sweet.
Monday, February 17
Mathew Finch Interview Coming Soon
[The Completed Interview can be listened to here]
Looks like Frog God Games has been making the rounds promoting the success of their latest kickstarter and the Vanishing Tower Press has been tapped for an interview. Super excited for an opportunity to interview Mathew Finch. One, I do have some topics I would like to discuss with any OSR luminary, let alone Mr. Finch. Two, the Vanishing Tower has not conducted an industry interview ever, so it is a great moment for the press itself. And third, I give good interview. At least I have in the past. Just like gaming, I have been out of the gonzo interview business almost as long as I was lost to TTRPG's. So it should be a worth a listen for that alone.
Looks like Frog God Games has been making the rounds promoting the success of their latest kickstarter and the Vanishing Tower Press has been tapped for an interview. Super excited for an opportunity to interview Mathew Finch. One, I do have some topics I would like to discuss with any OSR luminary, let alone Mr. Finch. Two, the Vanishing Tower has not conducted an industry interview ever, so it is a great moment for the press itself. And third, I give good interview. At least I have in the past. Just like gaming, I have been out of the gonzo interview business almost as long as I was lost to TTRPG's. So it should be a worth a listen for that alone.
I would like to live stream and record at the same time, but it is to important of an opportunity to have everyone hanging on air while my horrible media tools melt down around me. So next best is a recorded interview. This provides editing opportunities, but I always found going live the most exciting. Most like a role playing game, the spontaneity and unpredictability of live takes is tonic for the manic!
Don't miss it, I will be posting it. Currently scheduled for next week, then edits, so two weeks and I will have an interview to drop?
x
Thursday, January 23
Patrick Stuart's Sky-Stone-River Place
Is an obscure PDF, no longer available, containing a very entertaining dungeon filled with opportunities for climbing, swinging and yelling in a vast cavern filled with toppled templery and mosaic birds.
My Rom'Myr Dying Earth campaign was built around this adventure module as the start location. Firstly, because I think the adventure is hella-cool. I knew I wanted to run it as soon as I skimmed the plain text doc. The other is because my OSR Homebrew setting used the Thief class as the base character class. If you don't qualify for any of the other six classes you are a thief. And with thieves having a high Climb Walls ability, the only ability they can really exercise with some assurance of success, is a perfect match for the dungeon's interior environment.
The campaign has moved on from the starting location, obviously, in the last year and a half, but before more daylight appears between that glorious opening and the current campaign's direction I would like to honor this original freebie with my own illustration of the water-warped temple.
My Rom'Myr Dying Earth campaign was built around this adventure module as the start location. Firstly, because I think the adventure is hella-cool. I knew I wanted to run it as soon as I skimmed the plain text doc. The other is because my OSR Homebrew setting used the Thief class as the base character class. If you don't qualify for any of the other six classes you are a thief. And with thieves having a high Climb Walls ability, the only ability they can really exercise with some assurance of success, is a perfect match for the dungeon's interior environment.
The campaign has moved on from the starting location, obviously, in the last year and a half, but before more daylight appears between that glorious opening and the current campaign's direction I would like to honor this original freebie with my own illustration of the water-warped temple.
Tuesday, January 21
How Many USR Character Sheets Were Downloaded
... in 2019 you ask? Probably not, but I read the end of the year numbers on how many times this universal character sheet downloaded with the diligent scrutiny one would reserve for reading tea leaves. And I ask myself many questions which may never be answered.
For what purpose could 37 (that is this years count) USR Character Sheets be used for? Are they all for active games? Does the same person download them again and again?
I like to think that Scott Malthouse's minimalist rules-set Unbelievably Simple Roleplaying is getting some decent love for an obscure indie game.
Let us look at the numbers:
Customer #1612763 downloaded the sheet the most, 7 times! Dude, save it to google drive! Every other download was from a separate customer. So one must conclude 31 different people showed interest in the USR system. One customer looks to be playing a game regularly!
22 copies of USR Sword & Sorcery were purchased this year, and Anthro USR sold a copy, 1. So fuzzy animals are not nearly as popular as iron thewed warriors.
My first commercial DnD adventure sold 20 copies here at the end of the last quarter of 2019.
10 copies of Horrors Material & Magic Malignant is pleasing to see. This means 1 out of every 3.7 customers who purchase Sword & Sorcery decide the supplement is a good buy as well.
Santapocalypse was a disappointment. I thought it was a nice pocket war game which deserved more love. Well, 2020 looks like another exciting year here at the Vanishing Tower. Podcast will be making a brief appearance for live drop from the convention floor in February.
I'm going to put up a blog post where I get all philosophical on what a role playing game is (and it isn't the fucking rules). I get into stupid arguments on the internet, and I should get my thoughts in order at least.
Vanishing Tower's house game, Rom'Myr Dying Earth, continues down its twisting, picaresque path. A BFRPG-run game, me and the players experiment with the plastic medium of a roleplaying game every other week. The PCs are responding to a very responsive game environment, have adjusted accordingly, and are just as hungry for more adventure as they were on day one. For myself the continued yearly play reveals how gratifying a game can be when everyone at the table is invested and interesting. And then poof, it is gone. Is their any other artistic medium which is so ephemeral, yet so enthralling to the participants? The "best practices" for our games as championed by the OSR have shown their sturdy utility again and again. At its diamond core the game is nothing but responding to the fascinating and creating fascinating game moments is tough stuff.
For what purpose could 37 (that is this years count) USR Character Sheets be used for? Are they all for active games? Does the same person download them again and again?
I like to think that Scott Malthouse's minimalist rules-set Unbelievably Simple Roleplaying is getting some decent love for an obscure indie game.
Let us look at the numbers:
Customer #1612763 downloaded the sheet the most, 7 times! Dude, save it to google drive! Every other download was from a separate customer. So one must conclude 31 different people showed interest in the USR system. One customer looks to be playing a game regularly!
22 copies of USR Sword & Sorcery were purchased this year, and Anthro USR sold a copy, 1. So fuzzy animals are not nearly as popular as iron thewed warriors.
My first commercial DnD adventure sold 20 copies here at the end of the last quarter of 2019.
10 copies of Horrors Material & Magic Malignant is pleasing to see. This means 1 out of every 3.7 customers who purchase Sword & Sorcery decide the supplement is a good buy as well.
Santapocalypse was a disappointment. I thought it was a nice pocket war game which deserved more love. Well, 2020 looks like another exciting year here at the Vanishing Tower. Podcast will be making a brief appearance for live drop from the convention floor in February.
I'm going to put up a blog post where I get all philosophical on what a role playing game is (and it isn't the fucking rules). I get into stupid arguments on the internet, and I should get my thoughts in order at least.
Vanishing Tower's house game, Rom'Myr Dying Earth, continues down its twisting, picaresque path. A BFRPG-run game, me and the players experiment with the plastic medium of a roleplaying game every other week. The PCs are responding to a very responsive game environment, have adjusted accordingly, and are just as hungry for more adventure as they were on day one. For myself the continued yearly play reveals how gratifying a game can be when everyone at the table is invested and interesting. And then poof, it is gone. Is their any other artistic medium which is so ephemeral, yet so enthralling to the participants? The "best practices" for our games as championed by the OSR have shown their sturdy utility again and again. At its diamond core the game is nothing but responding to the fascinating and creating fascinating game moments is tough stuff.
Sunday, January 12
Death in Rom'Myr
The last session was a continuation of coming to grips with the denizens of the Pale Knight's Palace. They had indeed returned to the Aticorn with the 8 threads from the vampire lord’s cloak, and the creature of Faerie did release the party from the peculiar geas laid upon them. But they had left the young Violet behind in the nightmarish palace. None of the warriors could look each other in the eye if they left their potential meal-ticket lost and uncashed. So instead of pushing on to the realative safety of Le Freniae, the party turned around and marched back to the ruined structure which just last night held an alien conclave and was racked by terrible explosions. The daylight did little to relieve the gloom saturating the steep, forest hollow. Once inside they wasted little time plowing to the room of dragon eggs and the broken throne room. The 3 eggs which were left behind last night appear now to be gone. The throne room was appropriately barren, but the unbelievable events which overtook the group last in this room left behind signs of the awful reality which had transpired.
Clues
wrapped in a dropped communique hinted at deep conspiracy on now a
cosmic scale. But nothing yet seen prepared them for the colossal
marble snake coiled in the center of it’s room of rampage. Not a
hallucinatory dream after all. Stone it was made and still it
breathed and slumbered. Above the beast, as if suspended like an
acrobat, the silvery beauty, the alien and powerful Aladonia floated
like a billowing cloud over the rubble. Her advisory, the grotesque
talking hair-skin thing, was no where in sight. An unoccupied alchemy
lab provided insight on the child-snatching which they were bearing
witness to. Their
bowels turned to water as a closing, suffocating trap threatened a
TPK
and
still no sign of the lovely Violet. Questions dogged their every
step; what with the stealing of children? What was the significance
of multiple dimensions filled with strange beings? And how was all
this going to pay?
Tuesday, January 7
Original Design Metal Gamer Tees I Made
I've been wanting to do this for some time. I imagine it has already been done, is being done. This is an easy phrase to stumble over when thinking what would make a good t-shirt? What this tee has that no one else does is a piece of my original scribble art found in my new OSR compatible module I recently released to loud acclaim (see review link right).
So that is why you need to get this DIY indie shwag! These will be available for the next twenty-five days, so no dawdling.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)