As much as we get out of our hobby and as much fun as we have, it is often the case that it does not support its creators as well as it should. So when disaster or tragedy strikes, it places the creators in positions of unexpected financial difficulties above and beyond the difficulties caused by the disaster or tragedy itself. Such is the case with Sarah Newton, the author and publisher of Mindjammer – The Roleplaying Game: Transhuman Adventure in the Second Age of Space, Capharnaüm – The Tales of the Dragon-Marked: Fantasy Roleplaying in a World of Arabian Nights, Argonauts, and Adventure!, and Monsters & Magic Roleplaying Game. This is in addition to the numerous supplements and scenarios she has written over the years.
Unfortunately, and sadly, Sarah lost her husband of thirty years last year and as her many friends can attest, this has understandably affected her a great deal. In terms of the industry, it has hampered her ability to write, develop, and publish the imaginative and interesting gaming content which she is known for. In order to help support Sarah continue writing and creating the games we love, as well as support her through this difficult time, Solipsist RPGs has published a scenario from which all monies raised will be given to her.

The scenario is The Teuthic Temple. It is a one-page, molluscular scenario being sold ‘pay what you want’ and written for use with Sarah’s own Monsters & Magic Roleplaying Game. This is a retroclone which combines classic Dungeons & Dragons-style play with its Effects Engine to essentially bring narrative elements into the Old School Renaissance, almost as if it was ‘Dungeons & Dragons does FATE’. Despite the presence of these narrative elements, they do not mean that The Teuthic Temple cannot be run using the retroclone of the Game Master’s choice. To that end, notes are included to help the Game Master adapt the scenario and even add Squid or Octopus characters to a game. Certainly the squid and octopus-themed scenario should find a home in any aquatic or weird setting. So Green Ronin Publishing’s Freeport: City of Adventure or some link to The Squid, the Cabal, and the Old Man for Lamentations of the Flame Princess Weird Fantasy Roleplay from Lamentations of the Flame Princess. And given the nature of the scenario in The Sea Demon’s Gold from Arc Dream Publishing, it would certainly work as an equally odd companion to that too, and so bring it up to date for Dungeons & Dragons, Fifth Edition. Alternatively, rend it into the past and add it as an underworld location in the D1 Descent into the Depths of the Earth, D2 Shrine of the Kuo-Toa, and D3 Vault of the Drow trilogy of modules for Advanced Dungeons & Dragons, First edition.

Designed for a party of characters of First to Third Levels, The Teuthic Temple is built around a dungeon, the Teuthic Temple of the title. It is stunningly presented in full colour, just nine locations, but laid out like a squid and given a suitably crustacean, aquatic environment. It is an ancient ruined shrine, once a place of worship for the now dead Octopoi gods—who are definitely molluscular and octopoidal rather than Cthulhoid in design. Nevertheless, fanatical Octopoi priests and their Teuthic followers now guard the site, rather than going out and prothletising. Given the size and shape of the temple complex, it should be no surprise that it is fairly linear, but each location has a purpose and there are opportunities for both roleplaying and combat. As written, priest and wizard type characters are likely to get the most out of the adventure, it being a temple, but there is plenty of treasure to be plundered as well as Octopoi secrets.

As well as providing the dungeon itself, The Teuthic Temple provides six motivations or hooks to involve the player characters. These range from seeking an ancient artefact, such as the Sceptre of Fish Control or the Crown of Aquatic Command (possibly complete with Summon Fish spell?) and rescuing an abducted child to hoping to discover knowledge within the temple which help against a greater evil or needing to appease the spirit of the long dead god.

Physically, The Teuthic Temple is a five-page, 2.72 Mb, full colour PDF. The page count suggests that the scenario breaks its ‘One-Page’ concept, but this is not the case. Rather that it devotes one page to describing the dungeon itself, one page to map and scenario hooks, and one page to describing Teuthic characters—both Octopi and Sepoi (or squid)—in terms for both Monsters & Magic and other Old School Renaissance roleplaying games. It should be noted that both the front cover and the map are gorgeous pieces of work.

The Teuthic Temple is a simple straightforward adventuring site with plenty of gaming potential. Built around a pleasingly thematic dungeon, it comes with plenty of hooks to get the player characters involved and is perfectly setting neutral that the Dungeon Master can add it wherever she wants. Lastly, The Teuthic Temple is available as ‘Pay What You Want’, but best of all, all monies raised from its purchase go towards helping Sarah Newton make more games.

 Exhibit / February 27, 2020

Object Name: Atari Theatre brochure
Maker and Year: Atari, Inc., 1975-1976
Object Type: Sales brochure
Image Source: FlyerFever
Description: (K.E. Roberts)

The Atari Theatre Kiosk experiment was short-lived and ill-advised, but the very attempt, documented in this glorious brochure, captures the era’s unrestrained pursuit of what Atari called “innovative leisure.” Produced between the 1975 home release of Pong and 1977’s Atari Video Computer System, the Theatre was billed as an option for “elegant high traffic” locations serving “high quality clientele,” as opposed to the shabby riff-raff then infesting smoke-filled pool halls, penny arcades, and pinball parlors—video arcades didn’t pop up in the States until 1978, when Space Invaders came to town. The very idea of arcade cabinets is presented here as low-class (despite Atari inventing them), mere “vending machines” that had to be “rolled in and pushed against the wall.”

The concept illustrations depicting the Kiosk in the wild—er, excuse me, in “rich sophisticated locations… where children can entertain themselves in a wholesome environment”—are lovely and hint at the house style that Cliff Spohn would develop in the late ’70s. The centerpiece of the page is actually a photo of the Kiosk in the Velizy shopping mall in Paris (the Theatre concept originated with Atari Europe); there was also one that cheered commuters at the BART station on Powell Street in San Francisco. It’s obvious now how utterly impractical the scheme was: no matter how “elegant” the installation, no hotel or department store is going to want to be stuck with it forever, and shipping, moving, and maintaining the massive units could not have been cost effective. What’s more, your quarter bought you only 90 seconds of play—which, to be fair, is probably longer than I lasted on most Zaxxon cabinets.

The “interchangeability” of the individual games in the hexagonal “control panel” brings to mind the DIY geodesic domes then popular among the counterculture, out of which personal computing and video games emerged in the first place, while the design sensibility of the brochure swells with the vibrant late-’70s aesthetic that Atari in part created. In short, bless them for trying.

 Exhibit / February 26, 2020

Object Name: White Squadron Space Adventures
Maker and Year: Uncredited artist for Letraset/Thomas Salter Ltd., 1980
Object Type: Transfers
Image Source: Action Transfers
Description: (Richard McKenna)

A favorite gift of British nanas, uncles and aunts of the 1970s, transfers—like coloring books—inhabit the deadening overlap between creativity and restriction. As liberating as they always looked while still in their packets, once out on the kitchen table, doing transfers frequently turned out to be a depressingly uninspiring activity. Not so Thomas Salter and Letraset’s Space Adventures, which were rare in that their genuinely engaging vistas, full of odd detail and exciting perspective, were the main attraction, and the transfers themselves merely the pretext.

No matter how lofty its pretensions to didactic meritoriousness, it was a rare toy manufacturer of the second half of the 1970s who was righteous enough to resist the lure of millions of Star Wars-crazed children desperate to throw their pocket money at anything vaguely resembling a Jawa. Proof of this is that even Thomas Salter, the Lutheran-presenting Scotland-based toy producer famous for its worthy educational products, did a deal with the zeitgeist and went into business with dry-transfer giant Letraset to crank out its own space trash artifacts. And what lovely space trash artifacts they were: ten panoramas of a world poised between old-fashioned Alex Raymond-ey pulp (complete with giant clipper-equipped robots) and the post-2001 aesthetic of technologically imposing starships with ripped-off Y-Wing cockpits. The “plot”—I use the quotations advisedly, given its unintelligibility—concerns a space war of some kind in the year 2150, with on one side Princess Haiti, Captain Meteor, Professor Purbeck, and obligatory cute robot GRUD (Ground Receiver Understanding Device, whatever the fuck that means), and on the other a baddie called Swart, assisted by the Bat People. Only the transfers are credited as being printed in Italy, but to judge by the odd grammar and phrasing of the short synopses featured on each packet, they too were hastily cooked up over a heavy lunch in a trattoria somewhere in the vicinity of the Sodecor factory, a subsidiary Letraset had founded in the far north of the country.

Unreflective nostalgia is bad for us—on that, I hope, we can all agree. When scratching the itches of our youthful loves stops being an occasional frisson and becomes an obsessive way of engaging with reality, reactionary infantility is around the corner. But we have to be careful not to throw out the beautiful baby along with the rancid nostalgia bathwater: because on their own terms—compromised, venal and, yes, often childish—some of the ephemera of childhood does actually possess a bit of genuine beauty. White Squadron Space Adventures is just that: a kind of strange, modern-day stations of the cross that, in its puerile, cash-grubbing way, evokes more profound cosmic awe than the CGI phantoms thrown endlessly at us today—and, more important, inspires far more desire to actually pick up a pencil and create something.

By its very nature Old-School Essentials is easily combined with anything that supports B/X style play.   So it naturally Plays Well With Others. 
Mechanics are largely easy, what about tone and style?  Well, that is what I am going to chat about today.


OSE & B/X
This is the obvious mix. So obvious in fact that there is not a lot to say that isn't painfully obvious.  So instead I am going to admire how nice those two black covers look together.   A nice addition to what I tend to call Black Book or Black Box Basic (also because like a Black Box, I throw things in and get things out and don't really care how or why it works as long as it does).


Obviously, any adventure designed for B/X or even BECMI will work with OSE.  At least up to level 14.

OSE & Maximum Mayhem Adventures
Mark Taormino's collection of crazy gonzo adventures run from levels 1 to 14.  Are you thinking what I am thinking?  Well, today is the flip-side of a PWWO on Maximum Mayhem Adventures I did a while back.  If you want to know more about those adventures, hit that link. 


While the adventures are overtly and specifically designed for OSRIC/AD&D1, I have had a great time running these under B/X style rules.  I also find that none of the deadliness is lost here.  If anything the fun factor is increased.

OSE & Astonishing Swordsmen & Sorcerers of Hyperborea


Another popular choice of mine for PWWO.  For this, I would use the Advanced Fantasy options of OSE.  AS&SH can be trimmed down to "Basic" style play easily enough.  So the two games can meet in the middle, system-wise.  Style-wise there is more to overcome.  AS&SH is a "Black Sabbath" album.  Deep, rich with darker tones and cold nights.  OSE is a "Yes" album. Ætheric, it is journey of expected highs but also surprising depths.  The demi-humans of OSE-AF bolster the newer classes of AS&SH.  IT might not be a mix that all people like, but it does appeal to me.

OSE & the B/X OSR
There are so many products out there that support B/X style play these days and there is no way I could cover even all the ones in my own collection.
But here are few.


Does B/X or OSE *need* psionics? Likely no.  Is it better with it? I think so!  Richard LeBlanc's Basic Psionics Handbook is a great book and a fun psionic system.  One he could redo for OSE if he wanted.  But like all things psionics, it's a choice.  As it is now it is a perfect fit.


The same is true for any number of Monster books.  I mentioned that OSE would easily support Monsters 2 and Monsters 3 books with no issue.  Hell. With all the OGC sources a Monsters 2 and 3 could be made that mimic the monsters in Fiend Folio and Monster Manual 2.




OSE is not the only Basic-game in town.  Blueholme cleaves closer to Holmes Basic, but it's 1-20 levels provide a little more play (though those last 6 levels are not as fun as the first 6) and Labyrinth Lord provides the same.  LL has their Advanced versions too if you are planning an "Advanced Fantasy" style game.  This takes it in a slightly different direction, but ultimately (for me anyway) it makes it possible to play a "cleaner" version of the D&D/AD&D hybrid we used to play in the early 80s.  Purity is for water, not games.


OSE & BX Companion


Eventually, someone will ask for an OSE Companion book.  Taking OSE to level 36 or Immortals.  Well, you can wait for one or use the one we are all using now.

A while back I posted How I commit heresy with Adventurer Conqueror King. I can do the same thing with OSE.  Johnathan Becker's magnum opus is as much of a love letter to BX as OSE is.  While B/X Companion doesn't work as well with say Labyrinth Lord of Basic Fantasy (the main Basic clones at the time) it does work great with OSE.

Basic-Era Witches


I'd be remiss if I didn't point this out.  In fact, while working on this post and taking these pictures I am once again hit with the idea of how well this would all work out for my War of the Witch Queens campaign.

So OSE has been giving me no end of pleasure and I don't see that stopping anytime soon.

One of the hottest Old School Clones to hit the market recently has been Gavin Norman's Old-School Essentials.  Simply the game is a restatement of the Moldvay Basic and Cook/Marsh Expert Ruleset for Dungeons & Dragons.  It has combined, cleaned up and modularized.

It has also been a HUGE success.  First, there was his already well-received B/X Essentials line, then the crazy-successful Kickstarter which brought in €160,390 (or $175,000).  Now you can find it in your FLGS or for the next week as part of the Bundle of Holding.

Boxed sets are cool.It really has been a well-deserved success.

For this, I am going to review both the hardcovers and the PDF releases.  But first a word on the physical, hardcover books and boxed set.   Gavin has really set a new bar in the elegance of rule presentations.  The books are clean, crisp and the layout is fantastic.  The hardcovers are solid and the boxed set box is both attractive and sturdy.  My wife even picked it up and commented on how gorgeous it is.

This is the new mark for Old-School gaming. These books, while lighter on the art, are some of the best put together books from any other Old-School/OSR publisher.  This includes LotFP, S&W (so far) and it even edges out Astonishing Swordsmen & Sorcerers of Hyperboria.  Sorry guys, but this is the new gold standard.



Old-School Essentials
The Old-School Essentials (OSE) is a re-organization of the Basic/Expert rules from 1981.  Thus the Core Rules feature the basic four character classes of Cleric, Fighter, Magic-User, and Theif.  There are also the three "demi-human" classes of Dwarf, Elf, and Halfling.   The rules are divided up into different books both in the PDF and Hardcover versions as well as a combined Rules Tome.

Old-School Essentials: Basic Rules
PDF only, 56 pages.
This free 56-page book covers all the basics of the OSE line. Picking it up you can see the stylistic changes from B/XE to OSE. Also, this book covers just about everything you need to play right now. It includes the four human classes, some rules, some spells, some monsters, and treasure. Enough to give you a taste of what OSE will be like. It has the same modular design as B/XE so finding things is simple, leaving more time for play. There is no interior art in this free version, but that hardly detracts from it.

If you are on the fence about OSE then this is the place to start.  Grab it and you will be up and playing in no time.
My only disappointment about this product is there is no print option!

Old School Essentials: Core Rules
PDF and Hardcover, 80 pages
The Core Rules weighs in at 80 pages and gets to the very heart of the OSE line.  The essential Essentials as it were. It covers Ability scores in general, sequences of play and all the basic rules needed.  Combat is covered separately. Magic also gets a bit of coverage here in general terms and including how spells can be researched and magic items made.
The rules have been "cleaned up" from their obvious predecessors.   The focus is on readability and playability here.   like all of the OSE books every entry of a rule is presented on facing pages.  So you open up the book and everything you need on the subject is right there.  Only rarely will you need to turn the page.
In the original rules, it took a bit of digging to actually figure out how much a character moves.  This was vastly improved in later editions of the game, but here it is very succinctly spelled out. Other rules are equally made clear.
Since the "Basic" and "Expert" rules are combined here there is an economy of word usage here.  As much as I love my Basic and Expert games, sometimes you need to consult both books when a situation comes up.  This book though is more than a handy index, it takes that notion from the B/XE Core Rules and expands it into a much more playable game.
The philosophy of the Core Rules is just that, everything you need to play regardless of the genre.  Included in the boxed set (and an expected purchase) is the Classic Fantasy Genre Rules.  This is what takes the Core Rules and makes it into a "Basic-era Fantasy Game".  So in simpler language, this is Basic D&D.  You do need a set of Genre Rules to be able to use the Core Rules, but there is enough there if you are an aspiring game designer to make up your own. Say Roaring 20s, or Space or Horror.  Anything really.
The book has some really, really great old-school feeling art as well. Just fantastic stuff really.

Old-School Essentials Classic Fantasy: Genre Rules
PDF and Hardcover, 48 pages
These are the rules to allow you to play in any sort of "Basic Fantasy" style game.  Here get our character classes of Cleric, Fighter, Magic-User, and Theif and The three "demi-human" classes of Dwarf, Elf, and Halfling.  If you are familiar with the Basic/Expert games of 1981 then this is home territory for you.  Human classes are limited to 14th level and demi-humans vary.
In addition to the classes (half the book more or less) we go into Equipment, mounts, hirelings and building strongholds.  So yes, everything that concerns players from level 1 to level 14 or retirement.
This is one of the three required books by the players.  The others are the Core Rules and then also Cleric and Magic-User spells (if they are playing one of those classes).
Like all the books in this series the layout is crisp, clean and a model of efficient use of words. From a User Experience point of view it is an absolute gem.
The art is likewise fantastic with full color spreads throughout the book.



Old-School Essentials Classic Fantasy: Cleric and Magic-User Spells
PDF and Hardcover, 48 pages
Cleric and Magic-User Spells would have been my favorite book if OSE had come out in the 80s.  Right now it also has my favorite cover from the entire series. Seriously, I love it. It just oozes eldritch weirdness.
The book itself has 48 pages and covers all the Cleric and Magic-User/Elf spells in the game.
All the usual suspects are here.  Cleric spells go to level 5 and magic-user spells go to level 6, just as expected from the B/X sources. Again, when making my recent Cleric I used this book.
The modularity again is a huge boon for this book and game.  Adding a new class, like the Druid or Illusionists? Add a new book easy!  In fact, we see that is exactly what was done.  Expandability is the key here.

Old-School Essentials Classic Fantasy: Monsters
PDF and Hardcover, 80 pages
Ah, now this is a book I would have loved back in 81.  Also coming in at 80 pages this book is about monsters and nothing else.
Stat blocks are concise and there is none of the bloat in the descriptions that appear in later editions (ok to be fair that bloat was demanded by players).   The book is fantastic with my only reservation in I wish it had been illustrated more.  But even that is fine because the illustration we get are fantastic and very reminiscent of the old school monster books.
There are also NPC encounter tables and monsters listed by HD.  The utility of this book is top-notch.
I can easily see a "Monsters 2" and "Monsters 3" sometime in the future for this line.

Old-School Essentials Classic Fantasy: Treasures
PDF and Hardcover, 48 pages
Some games merge their Monsters and Treasures books and I can see the logic of that.  These are separate books and after using them for a while I like the separated.  Just like having a Monsters 2 or 3 books, more treasures can also be introduced.
This covers all the expected treasures and includes one of MY favorite things from early D&D, sentient swords.   The same clear and concise layout here as in all the books. Quite a treat really.
That cover might be my second favorite in all the series.

That covers the "Core Boxed Set."



You can pick them all up in PDF at DriveThru or from Necrotic Gnome's website. OR get a physical box from your FLGS or again Necrotic Gnome's website.



Old-School Essentials Classic Fantasy: Rules Tome
PDF and Hardcover, 296 pages
If you are a fan of the old "Rule Cyclopedia" version of the BECMI rules then this is going to be a treat for you.  The Rules Tome combines all of the "Core" and "Classic Fantasy" rules into one large and gorgeous tome.  There are three different cover versions.  I have the foil JShields version, the Andrew Walter is the standard version and in many ways, I like it better!  It is the same art on the Box Set, so I am happy to have both.  This book includes:

• Core Rules: Rules for character creation and advancement, adventuring in dungeons, the wilderness, and at sea, magic and combat.
• Classic Fantasy: Genre Rules: Seven classic classes (cleric, dwarf, elf, fighter, halfling, magic-user, thief), complete lists of weapons and adventuring gear, extensive lists of vehicles, mounts, and vessels, mercenaries and specialists for hire, rules for stronghold construction.
• Classic Fantasy: Cleric and Magic-User Spells: The complete set of 34 cleric spells (from 1st to 5th level) and 72 magic-user spells (from 1st to 6th level), for use by players or cleric, elf, and magic-user characters.
• Classic Fantasy: Monsters: A selection of over 200 classic monsters to challenge adventurers of all levels.
• Classic Fantasy: Treasures: A hoard of over 150 wondrous magic items.

So everything you need for a full fantasy game.
Should you get this one or the individual books?  That is up to you.  The combined volume is obviously cheaper.   But all are enjoyable.
I have a Rules Tome for me, a set of books for the table and a couple extra players' books (Core Rules and Genre Rules).



Old-School Essentials Classic Fantasy Referee's Screen
PDF only, 10 pages.
The one thing that B/X lacked was a proper GM's screen.  Yes, BECMI had one, but not B/X.  Well OSE has you covered, or screened as it were.
This product has 10 pages (1 cover, 1 OGL page and 8 pages of screen) for standard 8-panel, landscape orientation screens.  Purchase the PDF and print them out.  Easy.
The cover art is Peter Mullen's core art. So there are ways to get all the cover art...covered I guess.

All of these combine into a fantastic Old-School experience for those of us that grew up on B/X and for those that didn't.  It is just a really fantastic game.



But what if your tastes run to the Advanced end of the 80s RPG experiences?
Well OSE has not forgotten about you! The modularity of this rule expression pays off here when you can easily add on new rules, classes, and spells.

Old-School Essentials Advanced Fantasy: Genre Rules
PDF and Hardcover, 56 pages
Like many in the early 80s, I moved from the B/X version of the World's Greatest Game to the Advanced version.  But also like many, I never forgot my "Basic" roots and thought for all it's "Advancements" there was still something special about the Basic game.
Well OSE hears you.  The modular design of OSE makes adding material that is considered "Advanced" to be quite easy.  Granted this is not the first Retro-Clone to do this, but this one does it in such an elegant fashion.
Advanced Fantasy: Genre Rules adds new classes and new races. For new races we get drow, duergar, gnome, half-elf, half-orc, and svirfneblin (yes deep gnomes!)  Also true to the advanced rules this book pulls race and class apart.  In truth this was one of the major benefits of the Advanced game and that is true here as well.  For new classes, we get acrobat, assassin, barbarian, bard, druid, illusionist, knight, paladin, and ranger. There is also rules for multi-classing, something I always want to add to my basic games.  Some additional rules on poison and magic are also included.

Old-School Essentials Advanced Fantasy: Druid and Illusionist Spells
PDF and Hardcover, 48 pages
Much like the Cleric and Magic-User Spells book this one covers Druids and Illusionist spells.  Again the modularity of the game pays off here.  You can play Advanced Genre Druids and Illusionists OR you can just use the Cleric and Magic-User classes respectively and this book to play a Basic Druid and Basic Illusionist and not even buy the Advanced Fantasy Genre Rules book.  It would be better to pick up that book, but the way everything is written you do not have too.
This covers the usual suspects of spells again.  The Basic style presentation is fun and it is like seeing these classes and spells through new eyes.  It really is a testament to the system and the authorship.



These two Advanced books will fit in your Black Box set very easily.
Sadly no room for dice.



I have nothing bad to say about this set or these rules.
If I had ONE wish, and maybe only one, it would be for a spiral or coil bound version to have at my game table to lay flat.  But I suppose I could always print it out and put it into a three-ring binder.
I might just have to do that.

Recollections / February 25, 2020

A couple of years ago I posted an image on Twitter of the Hot Wheels Service Center Sto & Go playset seen above and got to feeling unexpectedly emotional (and more than a bit political) about it. The toy evoked feelings of a lost world, a celebration of blue-collar work, of craftsmanship, of a 1970s era of big cars and grubby parking garages with lots of ramps. I admittedly get emotional pretty frequently about artifacts of the late ’70s/early ’80s “Hinge Years,” as I call them (just check my archive of articles here at We Are the Mutants if you don’t believe me), but something about the Hot Wheels Service Center really hit me hard and stuck with me.

Hot Wheels cars loom large in the memories of Generation Xers because they came of age right along with us. In the late ’60s, American toy maker Mattel saw the broad and long-lasting global success of Matchbox cars, a postwar British manufacturing success story that debuted in 1953 with a line of diecast metal 1:64 scale models of real-world cars. Hot Wheels sought to take the Matchbox car to a new level, giving American kids a taste of the then-contemporary custom car culture, developing all kinds of wild vehicles in the same scale as Matchbox. In 1968 Mattel released its “Sweet 16,” the first vehicles in the Hot Wheels line, and their massive initial success meant that dozens of new designs followed. Hot Wheels vehicles were spacey, wild evocations of a resolutely American automobile imagination. (Hot Wheels also had better quality spinning wheels that allowed them to be used for racing more reliably than Matchbox vehicles.) Matchbox changed up its own marketing and design to keep up with Hot Wheels, while, as the ’70s went on, Hot Wheels produced more and different kinds of real-world cars to balance out the hot rods and custom cars. Hot Wheels also produced plentiful accessories for the racers from the very outset of the line, including race tracks that featured pit stops, which undoubtedly influenced the eventual design of the Sto & Go Service Station.

I’m not sure if Matchbox and/or Hot Wheels cars were ever my favorite toys as a little kid, but they were always around, omnipresent and inevitably underfoot for any grown-ups in our living room. I probably had a dozen or more. I’m guessing they were popular because they were both cheap and readily available; I clearly remember them prominently on sale at places other than toy stores, such as grocery store and pharmacy gift aisles. They were economical, collectible toys that kept smaller kids occupied for hours on end. But there was something special and unique about the Sto & Go Service Station—I got it for Christmas in 1980 or ’81—that kept me playing with it for a good long while. Its portability (the two levels of the garage folded up to make a handy carrying case—the “Sto and Go”—for your Hot Wheels) made it my favorite toy for taking on the road to relatives’ houses. Play-wise, it’s a typical pre-G.I. Joe and Transformers early 1980s playset: it has multiple levels, lots of moving parts, plenty of opportunities for both kinesthetic and gravity-propelled play, a really well-designed toy for the 8-and-under crowd. I also think that, in some small way, the Sto & Go appealed to me because it was ultimately incredibly cozy. Here was a “neighborhood,” if you will, with everything that a driver might need for their car: transmissions, tires, a dynamometer test, gas, tires, and a wash and wax at the end of it all. Moreover, none of these service station pit stops are owned by a huge chain or corporation; they each proudly display the (yes, admittedly all male) names of their owner-operators: Ted, Larry, Mike, Al, George. It’s basically the happy main street of an admittedly car-crazy town, perhaps before the Jiffy Lube, the Pep Boys, and the Wal-mart Auto Care Center came to roost.

I remember loving books in my early childhood that extolled the benefits of living in a tidy neighborhood where everyone had a vital job or a role. Whether it was Richard Scarry’s classic Busytown books like What Do People Do All Day? (1968) or the British Mr. Men series from 1971 (here the characters’ roles in town are more psychological than labor-based, but my point stands) or all of Mister Rogers’ various Neighborhoods (from Fred Rogers’s “real” neighborhood with working-class visitors like “Speedy Delivery” Mr. McFeely, to the factory footage that Mr. Rogers would show on Picture Picture, even occasionally to labor relations in the Neighborhood of Make-Believe), one of the signal lessons of my childhood cultural education was that an ideal society hums along with the buzz of people doing meaningful, valuable labor. Pretty typical Cold War-era pro-labor messages, all told; I’m guessing a lot of kids born in the ’70s remember similar themes in their media. The Hot Wheels Service Station absolutely embodies that set of lessons; each of these garages has its own purpose, implying that they’re all able to both stay in business and offer specialist expertise that the others can’t. When I joked on Twitter about the playset offering a glimpse of a syndicalist future, I was recalling the rise of the Wobblies and other laborers’ reactions to the Second Industrial Revolution, a period of labor upheaval where industrial workers found their small-scale, specialized skills superseded by a wave of technology-driven standardization and automation. One thing that the last forty years of neoliberalism and its own technological revolutions have proven is that specialized skills and individual small-scale industriousness fall like dominoes before the consolidated power of international capital. In the Hot Wheels Service Station, an era of smaller, local, more interconnected, more personal, and more personable industry is frozen in amber.

And yes, those ramps are also evocative; not just because they were a hell of a lot of fun to play with (if you managed to get your car all the way down to the gas station without crashing, a bell would usually ring), but because they summoned up what cities looked like in the 1970s, at least to me in the back of our family station wagon: overpasses, bridges, highways, expressways plowing through the centers of cities, all sprouting enormous and steep on- and off-ramps. Every trip into Boston in the family car involved navigating at least a few of these. Mutants contributor Rob MacDougall dubbed it “ramppunk,” and that term is now indelibly tied together—for me—with the built landscape of a particular urban milieu of the period. The Hot Wheels Service Center is topographically and practically improbable in the real world, of course. Maybe it’s not spatially uncanny or impossibly Escherian, but a two-level garage filled with five mechanics’ businesses linked by a long S-shaped ramp like this doesn’t exist anywhere in the real world. (Equally unreal was 1980’s follow-up to the Service Center, an actual City scene with the same layout as the Service Center.) But that unreality doesn’t matter when I look at it as an object, probably because I associate that same mix of beiges, browns, and oranges on the Service Center decals with an era where it seemed every road ended in a ramp and every built environment was designed to accommodate cars, not people. The Hot Wheels Service Center does double nostalgic duty: it reminds me of the intersection between the imaginary worlds and the real world of my youth, and the intersection between the ideal worlds our toys once created and a harsher reality I wasn’t yet conscious of.

Meet you at that big window overlooking the car wash.

Michael Grasso is a Senior Editor at We Are the Mutants. He is a Bostonian, a museum professional, and a podcaster. Follow him on Twitter at @MutantsMichael.

Heart of Atom Isa: A Short System Neutral Adventure in a Science Fantasy Future of Old is a scenario for Hypertellurians: Fantastic Thrills Through the Ultracosm, the roleplaying game of retro-Science Fantasy inspired by the artwork of Frank Frazetta and Roger Dean, the adventures of John Carter of Mars, Buck Rogers, and Barbarella published by Mottokrosh Machinations. Unlike the previous A Bride for a Vampire, which was a blend of the Gothic horror with the Science Fantasy, Heart of Atom Isa is very much grounded in classic Science Fantasy. It mixes Planetary Romance with a B-Movie supervillainess worthy of the Pulps of the twenties and thirties.

Although Heart of Atom Isa is written with Hypertellurians: Fantastic Thrills Through the Ultracosm in mind, it is all but systemless, and so like A Bride for a Vampire, it can be adapted to almost any set of mechanics. This extends to the four given pre-generated Hypertellurians, who come with strengths and weaknesses, plus a drive, all ready for the Game Master to adapt to the roleplaying of her choice. Hypertellurians: Fantastic Thrills Through the Ultracosm is of course, an Old School Renaissance Science Fantasy retroclone, so there are plenty of other retroclones which Heart of Atom Isa could be adapted to, but then again, it would equally work as well with Evil Hat Productions’ FATE Core. The given pre-generated player characters include a Victorian-era Ultranaut adventuress, a fez-wearing formless alien green blob fascinated by magic, a greedy ex-Pharoah, and a beetle-man general cut off from his Hive. The playing group is free to adapt these or use the the versions provided by the publisher.

As written, Heart of Atom Isa is designed to be played by four players in just one or two sessions. The scenario is thus relatively short, consisting of three scenes, but with plenty of scope for player input. The player characters are ultracosmic explorers, discovering the wonders of the multiverse aboard their silver bullet rocket, the Atom Isa. Unfortunately, when visiting the desert world of Sonnos, the ‘heart’ of the Atom Isa is stolen. It can still travel through space, but not with any sense of finesse, but it can no longer traverse across or through the Ultracosm. The culprit is Argencia, the feared Silver Sorceress known to crush men. As the scenario begins, they have discovered where the archvillainess lives—or hides depending upon your point of view—and that is amongst the nomadic tribe of Zelteens, who live and travel on gargantuan hermit crab-like beings, known as Tremendostaceans.

In the first part of the scenario get to visit the Zeldeens amongst their walking village of connected Tremendostaceans with their tremendous conical shells upon which stand the Zeldeens’ houses and connecting bridges, and visit one of their famous markets where traders from all over the Ultracomos come to deal. This can be in anything from strange paints (Dulux is not going to be offering these paints any time soon) offered by Magnus the Paint Seller and explorer’s gear from Taque’s Emporium for Explorers & Fortune Hunters such as a breathing bowl helmet to Lomarc’s Fashionistas of Tomorrow at which can be found figure hugging, shrink-to-fit Helix second skin onesies and Extra Teeth and Nanny Nontyvia’s Reclaimed Relics where you can find Relic-shards of the A.I. saints. Add in a table of random events, whatever the player characters want to do, and the opportunity to do some shopping, should provide plenty of opportunity for some fun gaming and roleplaying.

The second part sees the crew of the Atom Isa chase Argencia off Sonnos to her secret lair on a distant, icy moon. (Of course it has to be an icy moon, the player characters have been on a desert planet!) Naturally—or rather unnaturally (which is perfectly natural when you are dealing with a feared archvillainess like Argencia)—Argencia’s lair is just a little bit weird and a whole lot creepy, including keeping a harem of physically fit and attractive men and women for pleasure and decoration because, well because… In addition, Argencia has actual minions at her command, so if the player characters want a fight, then they will give it to them. Conversely, Argencia herself is intended to be sexy and slinky, preferring to use her charisma, bargains, and seduction to get what she wants. Or get away with what she wants. Ideally, she should give the Game Master plenty to get into in terms of roleplaying, but the sex appeal of the character may not be to be the taste of every playing group. Now Argencia is designed as a B-Movie, Pulp villain, and so this does fit the archetype, but the Game Master needs to be aware of this prior to play and may want to take her players’ sensibilities into account. Of course, like any good Pulp villain, there is a means for her to make her escape and be ready to make a comeback in a future scenario.

Physically, Heart of Atom Isa is a slim,digest-sized book. Done in full colour throughout, the artwork has a pleasing cartoonishly pulp look to it. In particular, the thumbnail portraits of the pre-generated player characters are really good. The adventure is mostly presented in an almost bullet point style, making it easy to pick up off the page.

Heart of Atom Isa is really easy to pick up and run and easy to adapt to the roleplaying game mechanics of the Game Master’s choice. A minimum of preparation is required and the Game Master could easily run Heart of Atom Isa as a completely systemless adventure with even less preparation. Whether running as a one-shot or as part of an Ultracosmic Saturday morning style serial, Heart of Atom Isa: A Short System Neutral Adventure in a Science Fantasy Future of Old is a tongue-in-cheek, pulpy, fun scenario.

Today I wanted to get into a monster from my recent re-discovery of Daniel Cohen and a bunch of books I read as a kid and critical to my early ideas of what could be part of my D&D games.  One of those books was "Monsters, Giants and Little Green Men from Mars."

And one of those monsters was the Monster of Lake Fagua.

Appearing something like a large manticore, it reminded me a lot of the Piasa Bird.

The monster was said to have been "found in the kingdom of Santa Fe," in Peru, in the province of Chile, "in Lake Fagua, which is in the" lands of Prosper - Voston."  At least as reported in France on several prints sold in Paris in October 1784.

The creature was described as follows:

"Its length is eleven feet; the face is almost that of a man; the mouth is as wide as the face; it is furnished with two-inch teeth length. It has two 24 inch long horns which resemble those of a bull; hair hanging down to the ground; the ears are four inches long and are similar to those of a donkey; it has two wings like those of a bat, the thighs and legs are 25 inches; it has two tails, one very flexible, which it uses to grip the prey; the other, which ends in an arrow, is used to kill him; his whole body is covered with scales.”

It had been described as a relative to the harpy.  So let's keep that.  Potentially a manticore/harpy crossbreed.

Monster of Lake Fagua
(Old-School Essentials)

Armor Class 2 [18]
Hit Dice 8 (36hp)
Attacks [2 × claw (1d6), 1 × bite (2d4)] or 1 × tail spike (1d6+poison) or 2 x horn gore (1d4+1)
THAC0 13 [+7]
Movement Rate 90' (30') / 180' (60) flying / 360' (120')  swimming
Saves D8 W9 P10 B10 S12 (8)
Morale 9
Alignment Chaotic
XP for Defeating 1200
Number Appearing 1d4 (2d10)
Treasure Type None

• Amphibious Movement. This creature is equally at home on land, water or sky.  The fagua monster can spend up to 12 hours underwater. 
• Nocturnal. The creature is only active at night and can seel equally well in the dark. 
• Tail Grab. On a critical success on a tail attack (natural 20) the Fugua Monster can instead grab a victim and squeeze them each round for 1d6 points of damage. A Strength check is needed to escape.
• Tail Spike. The spike of the Fugua Monster has a paralytic poison. Save vs. Poison or become paralyzed for 1d4+2 rounds.

Nice to see this guy again!

A full weekend of gaming.  Friday Liam went to his friends' game (5e) where they are rotating DMs. I think this is a great idea. Gives everyone a chance to try DMing and keeps everything fresh with everyone's different style.  Next week I hear they are doing Trek! 
Saturday was Connor's group. They are going through the Curse of Strahd, but the characters are again the stereotypical bi-sexual, kleptomaniac, pyromaniac band of murder hobos.  One of the players could not make it this week or last, so their character, a goblin fey-pact warlock, has been in the barbarian's backpack this whole time sleeping.  Trouble is the barbarian has decided he likes spiders, so he keeps putting live spiders into his backpack.  This will be fun next week.
Tonight Liam has his other group, his "college" group, over.  They are also going through Curse of Strahd.
We also went out to Games Plus this weekend to drop off some books for the local game auction.
For food, since it was 50 degrees in Chicago (which is like 70 everywhere else, except Minnesota, they think 40 is like everyone elses' 70) I grilled.  Chicken, garlic bread, romaine, as well as cornbread and brownies. 






Right now everyone is laughing, so it sounds like a good time. Hope your weekend of gaming went well!

Like any roleplaying game with its own set of monsters, familiarity breeds contempt. One exposure to them too many and they become less impressive, less of a threat, and so they lose their impact. So it is with Dungeons & Dragons and the contents of the Monster Manual and so it is with Call of Cthulhu and Trail of Cthulhu and other roleplaying games of Lovecraftian investigative horror. Now for Dungeons & Dragons the common solution is to provide an ecology guide to a particular monster or a whole new bestiary, but for roleplaying games of Lovecraftian investigative horror there is less obvious scope for creating and adding more monsters to the canon of the Cthulhu Mythos. There is though, plenty of scope for variation, reinterpretation, and making connections, which is exactly what Hideous Creatures: A Bestiary of the Cthulhu Mythos does.

Published by Pelgrane Press, it should be made very clear from the start that whilst the mechanics of Hideous Creatures are designed for use with the Gumshoe System of Trail of Cthulhu, the rest of the supplement’s content will work with just about any roleplaying game of Lovecraftian investigative horror. And even then, adapting the mechanics of Hideous Creatures to any other roleplaying game of Lovecraftian investigative horror should not present too much of challenge given that for the most part the creatures and monsters it presents and re-presents are already present in those other roleplaying games of Lovecraftian investigative horror. So whether for Call of Cthulhu or Cthulhu Hack, Delta Green or FATE of Cthulhu, this is a supplement which should prove useful to the Keeper or Game Master of those games, not just Trail of Cthulhu.

As the title suggests, Hideous Creatures: A Bestiary of the Cthulhu Mythos examines the creatures of the Mythos—not the gods and deities, but the various races, beasts, things, and horrors. It builds around some fifteen or so such examinations previously available as single write-ups, all written by Kenneth Hite, to which Gareth Ryder-Hanrahan, Becky Annison, Helen Gould, and Ruth Tillman have added another sixteen. So some thirty-one of them, from Bat-Things, Bholes, and Black Winged Ones to Wendigo, Worm-Cultist, and Y’m-Bhi. Many of them will be familiar, such as Byakhee, Deep Ones, Ghoulds, or Shoggoths, but others are new. Yet whether old or new, all draw inspiration from and are described to some degree in some of the writings of H.P. Lovecraft, August Derleth, Robert Bloch, and others. Each entry comes with an overview of the hideous creature, accompanied by its stats in the game. After that, each and every entry in the book gets a whole not more interesting, for overview and the stats mere serve as the chassis upon which is mounted various ideas, developments, and suggestions. They include possible alternative abilities; variations upon the explanation and interpretation of what each hideous creature is; Mythic Echoes draw parallels between the hideous creature and monsters and creatures of various myths around the world; the ‘Investigation’ second provides clues for each and every one of Trail of Cthulhu’s investigative abilities; ‘Scenario Seeds’ are adventure ideas; and lastly, the Bibliography provides a thumbnail description of the hideous creature’s source in the Mythos fiction as well as other works of note in which it—or an alternative version—has appeared over the last century. 

So, what Hideous Creatures provides is not just thirty-one horrible monsters and alien races, but over three hundred possible extra abilities across the thirty-one entries, over three hundred variations, over one-hundred-and-fifty parallels and connections with the Mythic Echoes, over nine hundred clues tied into Trail of Cthulhu’s Investigative Abilities, ninety or so scenario seeds, and thirty-one bibliographies and sample clues. It should be noted that the variations are designed to be ‘intentionally self-contradictory’, whilst the scenario seeds are based upon the classic or baseline versions of the Mythos creatures and monsters. It seems churlish to reduce the supplement to just numbers, but what it showcases is the scope of the supplement’s imagination and just the sheer number of ideas on show. 

So for example, Night-gaunts, the winged creatures with barbed tails, prehensile paws, and inward horns upon their heads, traditionally known for their blankness of their faces and their predilection for tickling their victims are suggested as having a face like a roiling storm, a shifting plasticity, or a void which opens onto a Great Abyss. They might not be slender, but as their name suggests—gaunt, with wings like a moth or a flying squirrel or… Instead of simply tickling to make a victim laugh, a Night-gaunt’s barbed tail renders him agonizingly breathless or recoiling in helplessness as spiders scuttle over the skin. New possible abilities include Chest Crunch as a Night-gaunt lands upon a victim’s chest and crushes his lungs, or Tracking, enabling a Nigh-Gaunt to track a victim it has already touched via its sense of smell, whether on the Earth, the Moon, or in Dream. Variations include Night-gaunts capable of assuming the faces of those it has killed or of anyone currently dreaming, actual investigation of or curiosity about Night-gaunts enables them to filter into the dreams of the foolish and so attract their attention, and Night-gaunts themselves are immune to the most harrowing of Mythos manifestations or locations. Mythic echoes draw parallels between the Night-gaunt and the legend of the Night Hag, amongst others… Amongst the Clues, Anthropology links cultures around the world with traditions of dark shapes crushing or tickling their victims, whilst Cop Talk reports many people hearing the missing girl laughing ‘from upstairs’, but can she have been upstairs from everyone on the whole block? Of the three scenario seeds, ‘Precious’ looks to be highly entertaining, as the 1928-1929 archaeological dig at Lydney Park by Tessa Wheeler and Mortimer Wheeler unleashes something which haunts and hunts those associated with the dig, including one J.R.R. Tolkien! The bibliography starts with H.P. Lovecraft’s ‘The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath’ before suggesting authors as diverse as W.H. Pugmire, Brian Lumley, Gene Wolfe, and more. Lastly, the handout takes the form of a flyer put out by a husband whose wife disappeared upon Silverstrand Beach, warning others and calling for the attention of the authorities.

As well as examining many of the familiar, Hideous Creatures examines nine new creatures—Bat-Things, Black Winged Ones, Gaseous Wraiths, Medusas, Raktajihva, Ultraviolet Devourer, Vampirish Vapour, Worm-Cultist, and Y’m-bhi. Of these, Raktajihva actually comes from a letter written by H.P. Lovecraft and is interpreted as an avatar of the Bloody Tongue, whilst for Call of Cthulhu purists, whilst the Worm-Cultist may not necessarily be new. Something similar, named the Crawling Chaos, does appear in Shadows of Yog-Sothoth, the very first campaign for Call of Cthulhu.

Physically, Hideous Creatures is as well laid out and as well written as you would expect for a book from Pelgrane Press. If there is a downside in terms of the presentation, it is that the artwork is not quite as good as in other supplements for Trail of Cthulhu. That said, the handouts for each and every one of the entries in the supplement are excellent.

Ultimately, Hidden Creatures takes its inspiration from H.P. Lovecraft’s own assertion that stories of vampires, werewolves, and even ghosts had become too familiar and too formulaic to evoke true horror—“Horrors, I believe, should be original – the use of common myths and legends being a weakening influence.” Unfortunately, with the proliferation of the Mythos in fiction, games, and other media, the authors of Hideous Creatures suggest that, “Almost a century after he wrote, his own monstrous races have likewise begun to seem like comfortable story furniture rather than unnerving signals that the world is horrible and wrong.” Hideous Creatures: A Bestiary of the Cthulhu Mythos is a counter or solution to this problem, presenting a plethora of ideas and variations which successfully makes the familiar unfamiliar, and providing inspiration upon inspiration for the Keeper or Game Master—whatever the roleplaying game of Lovecraftian investigative horror.

Hearts and Minds: Saving a World on the Brink of War! A Mindjammer Adventure is a sourcebook and scenario for Mindjammer – The Roleplaying Game: Transhuman Adventure in the Second Age of Space, the Space Opera setting with a harder, more contemporary Science Fiction edge published by Mindjammer Press. Set some fifteen thousand years into the future during the Second Age of Space, it takes place on the world of Olkennedy whose society stands on the brink of civil war. Originally settled eight thousand years ago during the First Age of Space, like so many planets settled then, the original colonists were forced to survive with no contact from Old Earth, a local astronomical event forcing some into stasis, the others to survive as best they can. When the surviving original colonists awoke, their reappearance led to tensions between them and the society which had survived, regressed, and was building anew. These tensions have been exacerbated in the last two decades when long spread rumours of aliens were confirmed with the arrival of the Commonality.

In the Second Age of Space, the New Commonality of Humankind presides over an expanding sphere of influence and control, seeking to maintain and protect its culture as it maintains and protects those of other worlds through the offices and agents of the Security and Cultural Integrity (SCI) Instrumentality. Yet not every world wants or is ready to accept the influence of or integration into the Commonality. So it is with Olkennedy. There are many on the world who do not believe that the Commonality when it says it protects the rights and cultures of those worlds it adopts and in particular, they fear the loss of individuality should they accept implants which grant them access and membership of the Mindscape, the virtual world which connects the Commonality. There are a great many who would take up arms to protect the loss of such rights and culture, and there even more who could be persuaded to join them. Opposing views clashes, tensions rise, and civil war  looms. It is into this febrile situation that the player characters step.

The first half of Hearts and Minds is devoted to detailing and describing the world of Olkennedy, its people, history, and culture. Or rather it focuses on the area which can support life, a crater deep enough to hold an oxygen-rich atmosphere and which has a subtropical climate, including a sea, with snow layers to the north. The planet has a high gravity, is subject to high winds and storms, and has a short day. The generally self-reliant inhabitants have had millennia in which to adapt to this. The planet is home to five distinct nations. Columbiana is youngest, but the most advanced and most dominant, its citizens mostly descended from the colonists—known as the Awoken—who emerged from stasis a millennia ago, whilst Van Kuvrai is home to the descendant of the colonists who did not enter stasis. Nwasha and Omianto are home to the Nwasha pithecines who were originally developed as labour by the original colony. Nwasha is primarily an arboreal culture whilst Omianto is more industrialised. Lastly, Akantack hominids, similarly developed as a labour force by the original colonists are nomads who live in the Snow-Layer which runs around the rim of the Crater or the Akantack Sanctuary. Although the five nations of Olkennedy have existed peacefully for a century, now their planet’s membership of the New Commonality of Humankind threatens to bring them into conflict once again.

As well as the inhabitants and cultures of Olkennedy, Hearts and Minds details the colony’s ecology, flora and fauna, major cities such as Craterport Down, technology, and more. Scenario hooks and random events are provided for both wilderness and urban settings, such that there is more than enough information here for the Game Master to run her own adventures. Together with the Genotype for the Akantack hominids, there is also information enough to create characters native to Olkennedy and perhaps explore some of its history, for example, why the Awoken emerged from stasis when they did or what were conspiracy theories surrounding the Commonality’s presence prior to the Disclosure, the traumatic event which revealed the existence of the New Commonality of Humankind to the Olkennedians. 

Of course, Hearts and Minds is designed to explore a clash of cultures, that is between the Commonality culture and a relatively newly found culture, that of Olkennedy. Whilst some Olkennedians accept the presence of the Commonality, many do not and they have coalesced around the Fiver separatist movement, named for the five nation on Olkennedy. In the years prior to the arrival of the player characters, its activists have been actively attacking the Commonality presence on planet, fomenting riots, causing unrest and engaging in acts of ‘terrorism’ or ‘freedom fighting’—depending on your point of view. This is not helped by factionalism within the Commonality itself. Two factions are detailed. The Integrator faction want to bring newly discovered planets into the Commonality, whilst the Dialogic faction wants to maintain a conversation with each newly discovered world rather than simply bring into the Commonality.

The second half of Hearts and Minds is the adventure itself. The most obvious role for the player characters will be SCI Force agents, sent to Olkennedy because of the deteriorating political situation, but they might also be diplomats, soldiers of the Armed Forces Instrumentality, merchants, scientists, or a mix of all six. Their roles of course will colour their approach to handling the situation on Olkennedy. For example, soldiers of the Armed Forces Instrumentality are more likely to commit to a military solution, whilst diplomats will seek a more conciliatory solution. Whatever their roles, throughout the scenario the Game Master will be tracking the effects that their actions have using Mindjammer’s Plot Stress mechanics. Essentially, through their actions, it is entirely possible for the player characters to sway the opinion of the Olkennedians towards or away from accepting the presence or membership of the Commonality—or somewhere in between.

The adventure is played out over four episodes and an epilogue, the latter being when the Game Master will assess the actions of the player characters and determine the ultimate outcome of events on Olkennedy based on them. There are plenty of opportunities for both roleplaying and conflict, but Mindjammer being a Transhuman Space Opera roleplaying game, there are lots and lots of opportunities for action. Now much of the action may well look a little like a cliché in places, but the action scenes are well handled and once the player characters get involved, with their wide array of Aspects being brought into play, the action will be anything but. If there is an issue with Hearts and Minds, it is that running it is a challenge. This is because it explores numerous options and their consequences as the scenario proceeds, and it is all too easy for the Game Master to get lost in them. The likelihood is that the Game Master will need to work harder to keep track of everything, especially of the consequences of the player characters’ actions and decisions, and when combined with having to present the scenario and roleplay its many NPCs, she may well find she has a heavier workload than is the norm.

Physically, Hearts and Minds is well presented behind its Eugène Delacroix’s ‘Liberty Leading the People’ inspired cover. The book is mainly done in black and white, but touches of colour are used to bring out its maps. The artwork is excellent, although a little dark. The writing and editing are well done, but if there is one thing that the book lacks, it is an index. Although less than a hundred pages in length, there is a lot of information in Hearts and Minds and having a better means of finding things would make it easier for the Game Master to run.

Originally published in 2015, the politics present in Hearts and Minds, although set on a Science Fiction world in the far future do feel relevant today. The adventure and situation explores deeply polarised political views, threats to cultural identity, loss of status, and so on, which escalate into civil unrest, acts of violence, and even terrorism. Of course, Hearts and Minds is a fiction, but undeniably there are parallels with contemporary politics, whether in the United Kingdom, Europe, the USA, and elsewhere. How much a gaming group wants to read into the scenario is another matter. It can be played with or without the group drawing the parallels.

Hearts and Minds can be played as one-shot or a convention scenario, and there are guidelines given to that end. Yet to do so, would be to miss a lot of the depth and nuance to the scenario’s set-up, to all too easily and quickly side with one polarised faction or another. Played as a full scenario, and what Hearts and Minds does is present an exploration of Mindjammer’s core themes—cultural conflict, the rediscovery of strange new worlds, and the personal conflicts which arise from them, all played out against an advanced Space Opera background. Simply, Hearts and Minds: Saving a World on the Brink of War! A Mindjammer Adventure is the ideal first scenario to showcase what the roleplaying game is all about.

Published by Hydra Cooperative, LLC, Lorn Song of the Bachelor is an Old School Renaissance fantasy scenario for the roleplaying game of your choice. If choosing a retroclone, it works with any that use ascending Armour Class, and in terms of setting, it would work with any which involve elements of colonialism, imperialism, and mercantile adventuring companies, such as the East India Company or the Dutch East India Company. So it would work with Arion Games’ Maelstrom as much as it would Triple Ace Games’ Leagues of Adventure: A Rip-Roaring Setting of Exploration and Derring Do in the Late Victorian Age! or the same setting as Hot Springs Island or that of Crypts of Indormancy. It would also work as far off location in Empire of the Petal Throne: The World of Tékumel. The scenario does also mention the use of firearms, but they are not integral to its play and the Game Master can easily ignore their inclusion.

Obviously, the scenario’s themes of colonialism, imperialism, and mercantile adventuring companies are contentious issues, even difficult ones for some, but the author of Lorn Song of the Bachelor makes clear that they are unavoidable given the legends and history of the region that the scenario is based upon, and that they are open for the players and their characters to explore and make choices about. To that end, no obvious incentive is provided to involve the characters in the situation detailed in Lorn Song of the Bachelor.

Although is a sandcrawl of sorts, Lorn Song of the Bachelor is quite different to the previous sandcrawls published by Hydra Cooperative, LLC, such as Slumbering Ursine Dunes and Misty Isles of the Eld. It is as far away from the Hill Cantons as can be imagined, being a riverine and dungeon crawl inspired by a story from the island of Borneo. It shares much with the lovely fanzine, MR-KR-GR The Death-Rolled Kingdom—crocodilian gods, forgotten monkey-empires, dangerous waters, and exotic fantasy—and indeed, they share the same author, Zedeck Siew. And just like R-KR-GR The Death-Rolled Kingdom, Lorn Song of the Bachelor feels humid, sweaty, and sun-drenched, strange, and exotic.

In essence, Lorn Song of the Bachelor is all set-up. At the far reaches of a river, in the lands of the tribe known as the Gleaming Fins, grow great trees from whose heartwood can be extracted a valuable incense, Dreaming Agaru, which aids divination of all sorts with flashes of true inspiration. So the Company sends trade factors and loyal mercenaries—all bad teeth and bad breath—up river to trade and harvest the heartwood of these trees. Yet that trade is threatened by the Bachelor, a giant albino crocodile, which has been the scourge of the river for centuries, having killed all of the other crocodiles. Long has it preyed upon the boats of the Gleaming Fins tribe, upending them and tipping the men into the water to be snapped up. Many times the tribe has hunted the great riverine beast, even killing it, but always it returns. Is the Bachelor a god? Is he immortal? Now it takes the Company’s boats too and so threatens its investments and revenues.

The most obvious way into this for the player characters is to be hired by the Company—akin to Conrad’s Heart of Darkness—but what they will discover is faction upon faction within the lands of the Gleaming Fins. The one-armed, silver painted Vartu Si Sartu, Gleaming Fins chief wants the Company gone; the untattooed, jade finger-nailed and abacus-wielding Company merchant, Machivir Sanna Krau, wants the Bachelor dead; and the wrinkled, incense-infused, firefly surrounded witch and midwife, Sati Wu Sati, wants the curse of the Bachelor on the river lifted and the breaking up of the crocodile cult dedicated to him. These are not the only factions and not the only motivations threading their way through Lorn Song of the Bachelor. The player characters will need to weave their way through these to learn the secrets that lie at the literal heart of the Gleaming Fins territory.

Lorn Song of the Bachelor is presented in a sparse fashion. Descriptions are kept to a minimum, often supported with a table or two of further elements waiting to be found and interacted at each location. There is often a bullet-point or list-like quality to the writing, making it accessible and easy to work with. In terms of scale the adventure really only consists of eight locations, each roughly a half day apart, and a small dungeon of just seven locations, a ruin left over from the Monkey Empire. Here the descriptions are richer and weirder, perhaps even more wondrous.

Of course, the presence of the Bachelor, the albino god-crocodile, lurks throughout the scenario and will become an active threat whenever the player characters are on or by the water. Unsurprisingly, this is very likely to occur given the location of various places in Gleaming Fins territory, and ideally it should, since the Bachelor is mystically linked to parts of this land and should he be hurt, there are repercussions for these locations. This perhaps one of the two weakest parts of the scenario in that it does not seem quite strong enough in effect and will need to be carefully worked in by the Game Master. The other is that the solutions to the scenario, there being several given the number of different factions present in the region, are not clear. Now part of this is intentional, as after all, they should not be obvious, but the players will need to work as hard to get at them as the Game Master will in presenting them.

Physically, Lorn Song of the Bachelor is a lovely little book. It is well written with its peoples and personalities, its places, and its strangeness being described with a very simple economy in terms of its words. Whilst the cartography is clear and strong, the minimum of description in the writing is paired with utterly delightful artwork, light, if not ethereal, ranging from the inhabitants of the Gleaming Fins lands and the weird objects found there to the strange vistas of the Monkey Empire ruin and the bestiary found at the back of the book.

The isolated and exoticism of Lorn Song of the Bachelor does mean that it may not be easy to add to an ongoing campaign, since it may well be far away from the campaign’s main locations. However, that does not stop it from being a lovely little adventure, a mini-sandbox into which the player characters can come and explore and perhaps aid one faction or another. It is simply presented with artwork which evokes so much of the strangeness and exoticism of the Gleaming Fins lands. Although the formatting means it looks simple, there is a lot of detail and flavour to Lorn Song of the Bachelor which together evoke visions of a very different world and of a very different fantasy to which a Western audience is used.

From Chaosium, Inc. with the Miskatonic Repository for Call of Cthulhu, Seventh Edition and the Jonstown Compendium for RuneQuest: Roleplaying in Glorantha and HeroQuest Glorantha (Questworlds) to Wizards of the Coast with the DM’s Guild for Dungeons & Dragons, publishers are seeing the benefit of fan-based content. Free League Publishing, the Swedish publisher best known for roleplaying games as Mutant: Year Zero – Roleplaying at the End of Days, Coriolis: The Third Horizon, Tales from the Loop – Roleplaying in the '80s That Never Was, Forbidden Lands – Raiders & Rogues in a Cursed World, and Symbaroum, has its own platform for user-made content in the form of the Free League Workshop.
Slaves to Fate: An Adventure of Endless Winter is a short scenario for the near-Dark Ages fantasy roleplaying game, Symbaroum. Published by Earl of Fife Games, it is a focused affair actually intended as an introduction to a new campaign, Forever Winter. Consequently, it is linear in structure, it requires a particular set-up, and places a big responsibility with one player. The set-up is quite simple. The player characters are slaves. Mostly Ogres and Goblins, but also a mix of other races and occupations, so the player characters then. They should all be beginning characters and their players should decide how and why they ended up enslaved in the first place—captured by slavers, sold into slavery, to pay off a debt, and so on. One of the player characters should be a Changeling, and whilst Slaves to Fate provides enough in terms of motivation and background for this character, his player is free to create whatever character type he likes and there is still room for him to add elements to his backstory if he so desires. Alternatively, the Game Master can simply create this character as an NPC.

As the scenario opens, the player characters, as part of the slave coffle, have been taken north into the Davokar Forest where they are being worked all but to death felling trees and preparing lumber for shipment south. As the temperature drops and the player characters try and cope with exhaustion and not enough food and water, there is opportunity for them to escape. Several methods are discussed, but whatever the means, the player characters find themselves hounded from their camp by marauding beasts. Ultimately, they will find refuge, but all too quickly it becomes a prison and again they must escape to confront the forest itself…

The scenario does call for a degree of buy-in upon the part of the players, not least of which upon whoever will be playing the Changeling. Some players may object to being pushed from pillar to post, and may just simply refuse to the trust the Changeling, whether a player character or an NPC. To an extent the scenario includes advice on what happens if either the Changeling or the player characters die, but to get the fullest out of Slaves to Fate, the Game Master may want to talk to her players about the expectations of the scenario before play begins. Certainly she will need to do that with whomever is playing the Changeling.

Physically, Slaves to Fate is a 4.63 Mb, fourteen page, full colour PDF. The layout is clean and tidy and the illustrations are good, and generally well written even if it needs an edit in places.

In fact, Slaves to Fate is not a new adventure, it having been adapted to Symbaroum from previous versions for Zweihänder – Grim & Perilous, Shadow of the Demon Lord, Demon Gate, and the Genesys roleplaying game. The grim, near apocalyptic nature of the scenario though, fits the Dark Ages feel of Symbaroum as much as it does Zweihänder – Grim & Perilous and Shadow of the Demon. The scenario can only work as a prelude, the set-up for the campaign to come, Forever Winter, it otherwise being too linear and too bleak to really work as a one-shot. As the set-up to a campaign, Slaves to Fate works well enough and will hopefully lay the groundwork for the Forever Winter campaign.

The Love Potion by Evelyn De MorganThought a Class Struggles might in order today.  I have been thinking a lot about the Alchemist lately and thinking that of all the potential classes, this the one Old-School AD&D/D&D talks around the most, but never actually executes. My history with the alchemist goes back to when I was creating a bunch of new classes.  There was the witch (obviously), followed by the necromancer, the "sun priest" and finally the healer.  The alchemist was one that I mentioned in conjunction with all these other classes, but never had much more than an outline of it.

So let's have a look at how the Alchemist has presented to us over the years and what the class has become today.

The Dragon Magazine Alchemist(s)
I want to start here since these are the first alchemists. The ones that even predate the information in the DMG.
To claim there is one alchemist from Dragon Magazine is a bit of a stretch.  While a claim can be made for the Dragon Mag witch class, the alchemist has seen less cohesion.
The first alchemist we see, and one that predates AD&D, is the  "New D&D Character Class: The Alchemist" by Jon Pickens in Issue #2, page 28. This is a solidlyOD&D class.  Here we get 20 levels of the alchemist class which functions as a slightly weaker version of the magic-user.  It can create potions up to 6th level, like spells.  This alchemist though has some special powers to go with it. It can detect and then later neutralize poisons and paralysis. It can identify potions and can prepare various poisons.  The class is playable, but feels limited to a support role in some cases.  The Prime Requisite is Wisdom, though I think Intelligence is a better choice.

A few more years in and we get a combo of classes for Roger and Georgia Moore in Dragon #45, "NPCs For Hire: One who predicts... ...And One Who Seeks the Perfect Mix." This gives us two NPC classes, the Astrologer and the Alchemist. While the Astrologer looks like a lot fun, I want to focus on the alchemist now.  This is a pure NPC; no class levels or XP, no hp, just what they do and how they do it.  There is a bit on hiring an alchemist as well.  The assumption here must be that these are all older professionals likely past their adventuring years.  Fo me I can see both versions working at the same time in the same class.  Pickens' class for adventuring years and the Moores' for after that.

Separate, these classes feel a bit lacking by my standards but are likely fine by others.  Together though they combine rather nicely into a complete whole for me.

In "Recipe For the Alchemist" (Dragon Mag Issue #49), Len Lakofka presents, in very typical Len fashion, a very complete alchemist class.  Like many of his classes, this one is an NPC only and should be considered something of a more useful henchman.  In addition to the powers of detecting and making potions and poisons there are skills on glass blowing and pottery making.  Two useful skills for an alchemist to be sure.
There are XP per levels given, but they add up to be a little bit more than the magic-user if you consider the first couple levels are "apprentice" levels with little more than pottery making and glass blowing skills.   While the class is very complete it is a bit prohibitive as a PC class. I am certain that is by design.

There is a bit of a stretch before we get to another one, but it is worth the wait. "Better Living Through Alchemy" from Tom Armstrong in Dragon #130 has become in my mind the defacto article on alchemy in D&D.  Armstrong gives us not only an alchemist class but also a primer on Alchemy and how it could work in the game.  This is also the only alchemist I have played and playing the class though was hard. It had higher XP per level than the wizard and there was little they could do without their lab. The article is dense. That is in the sense that there is a lot here to read and unpack.
The article reads like a cleaned-up version of all the alchemists we have seen so far and this one also has the benefit of a few more years of play on it. 

The Alchemist in the DMG and D&D Expert
In between all of those we get some notes on the alchemist from the Dungeon Master himself in the DMG.  Though if anything this only makes me want to have an Alchemist NPC class, or better yet PC class, even more.


While the alchemist is not needed for higher-level magic-users, someone is going to need them.  Plus someone out there is creating all those potions.   If Jonathan Becker's recent deep-dive into the Illusionist class is any indication we could have used a magic-user sub-class of an alchemist more than the illusionist!

The D&D Expert set also has guidelines for an alchemist and maybe the most iconic alchemist art there is in D&D.


For 1000 gp a month you can have an alchemist on hire. Likely less for that sketchy guy above.

So how do we get there?  Well, let's see what the 3rd party publishers have to say.

Bard Games



I have gone on the record many, many times about my love of the books from Bard Games.  Their Compleat Spellcaster is still a favorite and particularly germane to today's discussion is their Compleat Alchemist.


While the Compleat Spellcaster is my favorite for obvious reasons, the Compleat Alchemist seems to be the most popular.  There are two prints from Bard Games, the Arcanum (which combines all three) and then another one from Wizards of the Coast long before their D&D years.

This was one of the most complete (it says so in the title) alchemist classes for some time to come. At 48 pages the book was huge for a single class.  By necessity, the class was written for "any FRPG" so a lot of the language is coded since they did not want to run afoul of TSR. But there is enough information here for you to read between the lines to figure out what to do. 

Some time is given to the art and science of alchemy. This includes the use of special symbols and language to communicate with other alchemists. Prices and rarities of ingredients and equipment.  And even a component sheet to keep track of the alchemist stores.
Potions and Elixers are granted by level as one would expect, only, in this case, it details what the alchemist can do at their class level. Not by let's say potion level (like a spell).

This alchemist really was the gold standard by which all other alchemists were to be judged for years.  Enough so that it appeared in several different books by a few different publishers over the years.  So much so that it still appears in the Arcanum 30th Anniversary Edition from ZiLa Games.

The OGC / OSR Alchemists
Not to be left out modern authors have looked back to the Alchemist and created their own versions using the OGL.

Pathfinder
The evolution of the D&D game to Pathfinder has also given us an evolved alchemist class.  This is presented as a fully playable PC class. It is also so popular that while it was originally a "Base Class" in Pathfinder 1st Editon, it became a Core Class in Pathfinder 2nd Edition and the favored class of Pathfinder goblins.
I rather enjoy this version of the class since it more playable than previous versions of the class.  Good rationale is given as to why an alchemist would want to leave the lab and get out into the field of adventuring.   The class though does tend to be a little too "blasty" for my tastes and it seems that the 2nd Edition version has gone even more in that direction, but it is still a very fun class to play.

There is so much alchemist stuff  (over 300 according to DriveThruRPG) that there is even a product to collect all the OGC extracts into one place, Echelon Reference Series: Alchemist Extracts Compiled.

Pathfinder is not the only place though to find a "new" alchemist.  There are plenty of OSR/Old-school choices out there.  Here are a few I have grabbed over the years. In no particular order.

The Alchemist
Tubby Tabby Press
This is certainly one of the more complete alchemist classes I have seen. At 81 pages it is full of information on all of the class details, equipment, ingredients and everything the alchemist can create by level.  Designed for AD&D it can be ported over to any game. It is based on the Bard Games version.  There is only a small amount of art in this one and no OGL statements.  Despite that this is a very full book and plenty to keep players and GMs busy.

Basic Alchemist
Den Meister Games
This is a smaller product, but it is totally in line with the Basic-era games.  What makes this particular product useful is its flexibility.  Produced for Labyrinth Lord it is a solid B/X feeling class. The cover art even invokes the Erol Otus alchemist art from the D&D Expert book.  The alchemist can build potions, elixirs, and compounds and use them as magic-user spells.  Some examples are given and it has a great old-school feel. In particular, I love the alchemical failure table! 
At six pages it is not big, but it makes each page count. I do wish there more examples of spells though.

Supplement #1: The Alchemist
Vigilance Press
This is another smaller product. Five pages (1 cover, 1.5 OGL, 3.5 content) at $0.99.  It reminds me a bit of the Dragon magazine alchemists; Smaller XP per level needed, but only a few "powers" per level and some levels none at all. Slightly better hp and attacks set this off from other "magic-user" based alchemists.   I do wish this one had more to it than this, but it is a playable class.  If I were to use this one I might try it as a multi-classed Magic-User/Alchemist.  Get the advantages of the magic-user spells and the better hp/attacks of the alchemist.  Designed for OSRIC.

Old School Magic
Vigilance Press
This is an update to The Alchemist also by Vigilance Press. For another buck, you get more classes, another 23 pages and a better-looking layout. A good deal if you ask me.  The alchemist is very much like the one from the previous product.  Like the alchemist supplement, I might do a multi-class with this alchemist. Either as an alchemist-artificer or an alchemist-sage. 
The other classes include the artificer, conjurer, elementalist, hermit, holy man, naturalist, sage and seer.  Plus there are some new spells that I rather like.

The OSR Chymist
Jeremy Reaban
A slightly different version of the alchemist. Jeremy Reaban does some great classes and this one is no exception.  This chymist is closer in nature to the Pathfinder Alchemist but somehow this one feels more like an old-school class and manages to work well.   He includes some new formulae for alchemists/chymists and some sample NPCs.  Also there are tables for whatever old-school games you are playing. Sure conversion is easy, but this makes it all easier. 
It is PWYW, but my advice is to send him a buck or more. It is 16 pages so that is not bad for a dollar.

There are more, including many alchemists that are parts of larger books like Fantastic Wizardry, The Crimson Pandect, and the previously mentioned Arcanum.

 Exhibit / February 20, 2020 

Object Name: Betamax sales training video
Maker and Year: National Training Systems, Inc., 1977
Object Type: Training video
Description: (K.E. Roberts)

Sony’s first Betamax VCR was the SL-6200, and it was housed in a teak wood cabinet with a 19″ Trinitron TV. The LV-1901 console, as the package deal was called, was released in Japan in May 1975 and debuted in the US that November. Price: between $2,295 and $2,495. Weight? Really fucking heavy. The VCR was sold separately (for about $1,295) starting in 1976, but department stores and consumer electronics outlets were left with the onerous task of unloading the first generation beasts loitering in their stock rooms and warehouses (the last 20 seconds of Raiders of the Lost Ark come to mind). Sony provided a “demonstration checklist” designed to help sales teams explain the entirely new concept of “recording one program while watching another” and “[recording] a program without even being there,” and they paid a company called National Training Systems, Inc. to help sales teams convince customers to shell out what amounted to the cost of a new Toyota Corolla.

Let’s start with the decor. The LV-1901 squats on a circular island of worn beige shag, which matches the implacable earth tones of everything else in the faux showroom, including the uneasy Muzak and the garb of our stereotypically unctuous salesmen—except for the plentiful ferns, which served as a kind of middle-class status signifier in ’70s and early ’80s America, similar to the aspidistra in prewar and postwar Britain. Although the sleek white pedestals and open cubes propping up Sony’s various TVs and stereos add something of a contemporary touch, the vibe is mostly that of the local, reliably down-home Sears. It’s certainly not the futuristic flavor served up in Sony’s 1975 promotional video introducing the LV-1901, where we see the monolith floating in star-twinkling space, kaleidoscopic video synthesizer effects, and lots of dry ice smoke. “The Sony Betamax,” intones a reverb-treated voice. “Its only purpose is to serve you.” And: “You’ll be free of the restrictions of time. Its uses are defined only by the limits of your imagination.”

Back on earth, our two salesman teasingly quibble and wink about who’s going to “role play” as the customer, and I half expected a porn film to break out. The sales pitch promises that the Betamax is “easy to use,” extolls “the great beauty of videotape” (blank Betamax tapes recorded a max of 60 minutes and cost almost $20), and endlessly reminds us that the LV-1901 (not to be confused with LV-426) comes with “dual tuners.” Although Betamax lost the format war precisely because Sony banked on consumers paying more for the perceived higher quality of the brand name, it holds a formative place in my media-chomping career. When the video store I worked at closed in 1987 or 1988, the magnanimous owner gifted me a used Betamax VCR, probably the SL-8200, along with a Beta movie of my choice. So I heaved the old bastard home and watched Enter the Ninja on it five or six times before it became my very own piece of antique furniture: comforting in its immovability, beautifully useless.

I was not going to talk about this today.  I wanted to do a One Man's God today.

But in truth, I can't be silent about this. Last week I talked about Bob Bledsaw II and his racist, anti-Semitic, anti-woman, posts on Facebook.  Some fans of Judges Guild were content to ignore them or try to separate the "art from the artist".

Well, I am here to say that is all bullshit.


If you buy one of my books you are buying a piece of me. You are buying the stories I read, the music I listen too, the movies and TV shows I watch.  When doing research I make choices to read Book A or Book B, Article C or Article D, Documentary E or F.  This goes on and on.  What I choose is based on my interests, my time, and yes, my political leanings.  You don't have a choice in this save for one; to buy or not buy my books.  When writing I have one principle that applies; is this fun to play. If so then I do it.  If I do it right you buy and enjoy it too.

But don't pretend my politics don't enter into it.

Well. Now all the hemming and hawing and handwringing aside, Bob Bledsaw II posted the following unhinged screed on the Judges Guild official Facebook page.  There is no separation now of art and artist.  And to be 100% accurate, BBII did not, as far as I know, create anything for Judges Guild.

You might need to click on this or download it to read the whole thing.  Otherwise, Tenkar over at his eponymous Tavern has been doing a good job of keeping track of this whole clusterfuck.


There is so much wrong with this posting that it would take me several hours to point all the self-contradictory statements, the outright false-hoods and tin-foil hat wearing conspiratorial bullshit and frankly, he is not worth my time.

But there are only two facts that matter to me.
1. This was posted as part of an official release on the Judge's Guild page.
2. It is so full of hate, bigotry and vile thoughts as to be repulsive to any reasonable individual.

Does BBII have to right say what he wants? Yes. So fuck off with the "free speech" bullshit argument.  There is no such thing as consequence-free speech.  He can say what he wants. So can I.

BBII has destroyed any sort of good legacy Judge's Guild had left.

So fuck him. Fuck his ideas. Fuck his company's products.
And if you support him or his ideals then fuck you too.

I am not going to buy any of Judges Guild stuff. If you decide you don't want to buy my stuff.
Good. I don't really want your money here.

I am happy to note there are many in the community, and in the OSR community too, to stand up against this type of behavior.

Here are some videos that address the topic.





There are undoubtedly more and plenty of Twitter and Facebook conversations too.

TL;DR Bob Bledsaw II is a piece of shit and if you support him don't fucking buy my books.
Likely you are too stupid to understand them anyway.

 Exhibit / February 19, 2020 

Object Name: Mr. Coffee
Maker and Year: North American Systems and others,1972-present
Object Type: TV commercials for home coffee maker
Video Source: YouTube (Bionic Disco/Beta MAX)
Description (Michael Grasso):

The state of play in home coffee brewing in America during the early postwar period offered very little opportunity for a good cup of joe. The electric percolator, long the choice for home brewing, would often overheat and burn the coffee, or send foul, bitter-tasting grounds back into the brew. Individual-size European coffee makers like the French press and the Moka pot gained in popularity after World War II but were still mostly niche products purchased by European immigrants (or Americans with European pretentions). Instant coffee predated the war but became one of the many broader consumer products that gained market share thanks to the same developments in wartime food preservation that brought frozen concentrated orange juice to American breakfast tables. So if an American coffee-drinker wanted a quality cup of drip coffee before 1970, he or she would visit a restaurant or diner for a cup from the new, reliable filtered drip-brew coffee maker, Bunn-O-Matic. But most Bunn coffeemakers in the 1960s were built to churn out dozens of pots of coffee a day, with large carafes and multiple hobs, putting them well out of the price and practicality reach of most consumers.

Making the drip filter coffee maker easy, compact, and affordable enough for home use was the task that a pair of coffee supply executives set for themselves at the outset of the 1970s. Samuel Glazer and Vincent Marotta of the Cleveland, Ohio company North American Systems saw the popularity of the big filter-drip industrial coffeemakers and wondered why they couldn’t have a cup like that at home. They lured two former Westinghouse engineers, Edmund Abel and Erwin Schulze, from their aeronautics and electrical engineering jobs to work on a coffeemaker that could deliver just that. The key was the heating element—too hot and it would simply duplicate the bitter efforts of the percolator; too cool and it wouldn’t actually brew the coffee. The new coffeemaker beat the percolator on taste and on speed; using gravity to drip 200-degree Fahrenheit water through grounds in a disposable filter could produce a modestly-sized pot of coffee in under a couple of minutes. Abel’s patent went on sale as “Mr. Coffee” in 1972, and the American public went for it in droves, with a million Mr. Coffee machines being sold in its first couple of years on the market.

A big key to Mr. Coffee’s appeal in these early years was thanks to Marotta’s dogged pursuit of one of his favorite sports icons as brand spokesman: the Yankee Clipper himself, Joe DiMaggio. So reclusive in the years since his retirement from baseball and the death of ex-wife Marilyn Monroe that he’d been enshrined in song, DiMaggio relented to Marotta’s eager call to become the Mr. Coffee pitchman (DiMaggio himself wasn’t even a caffeinated coffee drinker because of an ulcer; he preferred instant Sanka). The combination of an approachable brand name, an easy to understand set of operating instructions, and an avuncular, trustworthy celebrity face made Mr. Coffee a household name. Mr. Coffee came along at a time when, thanks to women entering the workplace, more and more men were being asked to make contributions in the home and especially the kitchen; with coffee historically being associated in America with hard-working men, Mr. Coffee and its soft-spoken yet macho pitchman were culturally in the right place at the right time. Like many other home goods manufacturers, later owners of the Mr. Coffee brand would use its initial success to branch out into other products with not as famed or successful a brand career as the original. Nevertheless, Mr. Coffee’s ubiquity in the 1970s and ’80s led inevitably became fodder for pop culture parodies.

I was out getting some driving practice with my sons over the weekend.  They didn't want too so I made them a deal, if they drove we could go to our favorite local game store Games Plus.  So we did and I found something of a little treasure.


This is Avalon Hill's Witchcraft Ritual Kit from 1974!

So imagine this, the year is 1974.  Avalon Hill knows about D&D having passed on previous Gygax penned works.  The biggest movie of the year is The Exorcist and rival Milton Bradley is churning out Ouija boards all day.  What is Avalon Hill to do?  Simple they create a "game" based on Wicca and Witchcraft.

Supposedly authored by "Dr. Brooke Hayward Jennings", who I can find nothing on anywhere, and neither has anyone else, this was one of two of their occult-themed games.  The other was called "Black Magic" and featured a similarily "porny" cover.

Now, all that aside I have been wanting this game forever.  It has been out of print since the mid-70s and finding a good copy is nearly impossible.

I found this sitting in the stacks of out of print wargames. It was labeled as "unpunched" and interior in good condition even if the box had some shelf wear.  I knew, more or less what I was getting here, so despite the high price (I am not going to tell you what I paid for it) I had to get it.

Well.  I am not disappointed.

Let's have a look inside.






That game board is gorgeous! Not so sure about all the pieces, and those game tokens have to go!
I'll likely replace the male and female figures with minis, maybe 72mm ones, and the other items with small 3D printed versions.  Don't know yet, have to read how they are used.


The gamebook is a mix-mash of all sorts of wicca, occult and pagan ideas that lack coherence. It is, however, a fun read.







This is easily the most 70s thing I own.

I could not find any reviews online and none from any pagans or gamers to give me their insight and point of view.

Also, I am not sure what I will do with it yet. Like I said some of the pieces have to go to make it playable in my mind, but that game board.

In line with my "Traveller Envy" I talked about with Wizard's Quest and Witch's Caldron boardgames I really WANT to use this as part of the larger "War of the Witch Queens" campaign. I am just not sure how yet.  I do have other board games to add to it.

Oh, it also been properly pointed out that the TRUE way to express my Board Game Traveller Envy is via Starfleet Battles and my "BlackStar" campaign.  But that is a topic for another day.

 Exhibit / February 18, 2020 

Object Name: Denby tableware
Maker and Year: Denby, 1960s-1970s
Object Type: Tableware
Description: (Richard McKenna)

A strange talisman of British middle- and lower-middle-class aspirations of the 1960s and 1970s, Denbyware—the costly, absurdly heavy, hard-wearing (read, impossible to rid yourself of or destroy) brand of British tableware famed for its dun-colored hues, threatening shapes, and cranial-trauma patterns—was for a time the ne plus ultra of performative provincial socializing.

The British Midlands had long been a center for ceramics and pottery, and Denby had been producing stoneware—pottery fired at extremely high temperatures to make it impermeable to liquids—in the Derbyshire village from which it took its name since the early 19th century, over the decades cannily adapting its output to the changing needs and social aesthetics of the day. When the back-to-nature ideas of the counterculture began permeating the mainstream in the late ’60s, Denby’s products—their dolmenic mass hinting at ancestral connection, olde-worlde authenticity, and worthy refutation of shallow consumerism—were perfectly suited to the mood. The company’s memorable description of its “Ode” line (aptly pictured in the advert above with an anvil) as “immensely strong” and “devastating in design” provides a fairly accurate précis of Denbyware’s vocation: the implication was that these artifacts would not only outlive their owners, they might even outlive their owners’ civilizations, the only things left standing in the ashes of the increasingly likely nuclear radlands. Resembling ominous votive objects, Denbyware’s inscrutably esoteric forms seemed to emerge from ancient memory, as though the shade of Max Ernst might be using them to try to communicate something about the 20th century’s fucked-up relationship with its ancient past.

By the early ’70s, Denby’s main rivals for the White Collar Earth Children demographic were probably fellow Midlands pottery Midwinter, whose Stonehenge range flirted with Pagan themes, and Yorkshire company Hornsea Pottery. Denby’s principal perceived advantage over these competitors seemed to be that its products were heavier. A shitload heavier. In fact, Denby’s “stoneware” contrived somehow to be far, far heavier than actual stone. So heavy that it was actually an issue when moving house, as the stuff tended to hurtle through the bottoms of cardboard packing boxes like incoming meteorites breaking through cloud cover on their way to causing an extinction event. Unlike other tableware, if you dropped a Denby, the risk was not to the plate, it was to you and to your home and loved ones. The cups were so heavy that they would gradually droop over the aching fingers hooked through their handles and deposit liquid onto carpets and groins—though luckily their congenital crypt-like chill meant that within moments even the hottest of drinks was only tepid. It was almost as though the cups and plates and sugar bowls were not actually discrete objects but protrusions of some ur-tableware poking out from beneath the surface of the present day and moored to the eternal ley lines beneath.

Midwinter, one of Denby’s competitors

Together with other totems beloved of those migrating to the lower-middle classes—a pay-in-installments copy of the Encyclopaedia Britannica it was erroneously presumed would make me clever and some uncomfortable Ercol chairs—my family owned a set of Denby Sherwood when I was growing up that my parents had received as a wedding present back in the late ’60s. Given the Robin Hood-referencing name, it’s possible that evoking the sensation of slurping silt from concave rocks while sheltering under sodden foliage actually was Denby’s vision for the range. In any case, it was the result. Sherwood’s weird, death-colored finish conferred strange flavors upon any edible substance that came into contact with it: tea drunk from the millstone-heavy cups acquired a peculiar clayish taste, while Friday night fish’n’chips would go waxy and limp, as though being gradually irradiated. The Sisyphean force needed to lift the burial-urn mugs would often send their granite rims smashing into the teeth of the unwary like some ancient punishment, and each time the serrations of a knife or the tines of a fork accidentally caught on the surface of a Sherwood plate, a terrifying Stone Tape-esque screech was emitted that would freeze the whole family mid-fish finger.

Strangely, instead of encouraging the McKennas to rid ourselves of the cumbersome tableware, these weird properties only conferred upon The Denby an even more eerie grandeur. It was the same in every household I knew that had a set: The Denby were treated like fetishes—miniature henges, to be brought out only on occasions of highest ritual or to impress delegates from neighboring tribes. I called them totems earlier, and the received impression was very much that by laying hands on their chill surfaces, mind-melding with pre-lapsarian Iron Age ancestors could be achieved and balance restored to the earth.

It was also taken absolutely for granted that, as eldest son, I would in time be proud to have the Denby passed down to me and would fill all my available storage space with its imposing mass, as though it had been in the family for dozens of generations instead of bought on the HP in a department store in Chorley in 1967. Threats to sell the lot were greeted with uncomprehending horror, and in fact any nominal gain would in reality be offset by the difficulties involved in getting rid of the bastards: postage would incur moonshot-level costs while personal delivery would likely shatter the suspension of any car I’d ever be able to afford. How large numbers of Denby were ever moved about the country at all is a mystery up there with how the components of Stonehenge were rolled all the way from Wales to Salisbury—or at the very least testament to the sturdiness of the British freight rail system pre-Thatcher. 

I’m exaggerating in my critique of Denbyware, of course, and especially of Sherwood. I grew up venerating it, and even today bits of our set continue to crop up unbidden in my life like ancestral relics. Designer Gill Pemberton produced some lovely work for the company, and Sherwood was one of her most memorable: strange grave goods that show the denizens of capitalist industrial society grasping through their growing pay packets for something meaningful, something to connect them to who they are and to who they have been, even as they tuck into their Asda beefburgers. Something heavy.·

Between October 2003 and October 2013, Chaosium, Inc. published a series of books for Call of Cthulhu under the Miskatonic University Library Association brand. Whether a sourcebook, scenario, anthology, or campaign, each was a showcase for their authors—amateur rather than professional, but fans of Call of Cthulhu nonetheless—to put forward their ideas and share with others. The programme was notable for having launched the writing careers of several authors, but for every Cthulhu Invictus, The Pastores, Primal State, Ripples from Carcosa, and Halloween Horror, there was a Five Go Mad in Egypt, Return of the Ripper, Rise of the Dead, Rise of the Dead II: The Raid, and more...

The Miskatonic University Library Association brand is no more, alas, but what we have in its stead is the Miskatonic Repository, based on the same format as the DM’s Guild for Dungeons & Dragons. It is thus, “...a new way for creators to publish and distribute their own original Call of Cthulhu content including scenarios, settings, spells and more…” To support the endeavours of their creators, Chaosium has provided templates and art packs, both free to use, so that the resulting releases can look and feel as professional as possible. To support the efforts of these contributors, Miskatonic Monday is an occasional series of reviews which will in turn examine an item drawn from the depths of the Miskatonic Repository.

—oOo—
Name: A Fossil

Publisher: Chaosium, Inc.
Author: Sean Monaghan

Setting: Modern Day

Product: Scenario
What You Get: 1.69 MB twelve-page, full colour PDF
Elevator Pitch: A lost auction is too heavy a price to pay. 
Plot Hook: A second chance to own the one book you really must have.
Plot Development: A dead rival, scales before the eyes, and a festering town...
Plot Support: Nine plain as they can be handouts and monster and creature stats.




Pros
# Open, flexible set-up
# Scope for player input
# Solid hook for the antiquarian investigator
# Potentially interesting setting
# Bullet point format eases Keeper’s job
# One-shot or one-session scenario
# Period neutral
# Creeping body horror

Cons# Needs editing
# Underdeveloped, murky setting
# Too much festering?
# Plot strands kept apart?
# No ACTUAL Sanity losses

Conclusion
# Underdeveloped 
# Needs editing
# Seaside body horror for one?