It's another BECMI Monstrous Monday.  This is Expert Week and few creatures really exemplify the Expert experience to me (either B/X or BECMI) than sea monsters and dinosaurs.

As it turns out, the Field Museum agrees with me.
https://blockclubchicago.org/2020/02/28/move-over-t-rex-field-museum-is-bringing-in-ocean-dinosaurs-for-special-exhibit/

Or. At least they were going too.  Back when I planned this posting Covid-19 had not yet hit.

Sea Dragons are some of my son's most favorite creatures.  As before I am going to go with the BECMI format for the monster stat block.



Dragon, Sea
Armor Class: 3
Hit Dice: 12**
Move: 30' (10') Sea dragons are slow and clumsy on land.
   Swimming: 270' (90')
Attacks: 1 bite + 1 breath weapon (steam)
Damage: 5d8+5
No. Appearing: 0 (1d4)
Save As: Fighter: 12
Morale: 10
Treasure Type: H
Alignment: Neutral
XP Value: 2,700

Breath Weapon: Cloud of steam, 60' x 40'

Sea Dragons are an ancient type of dragon that some scholars believe are among the first of dragon kind.  They are known to swim in the deepest of seas where they make meals of all but the largest of sea creatures.

Sea Dragons also attack boats that swim into their territory.  They attack with a bite only and a dangerous breath weapon of superheated steam.  The steam is stored in a pressurized organ in the dragon's body.  This allows it to survive at depths that would crush other creatures.  It also allows the steam to become hot enough to melt soft metals.  Protection from fire, magical, or otherwise offers no protection from this breath weapon.  Damage taken is equal to the number of current HP the dragon has, save vs Dragon Breath Weapon for half.

Unlike other dragons, Sea Dragons do not cast spells or speak. They can speak, but typically only to other dragons.

Sea Dragons keep treasure in undersea lairs, usually inaccessible to surface dwellers.

Sea Dragons are believed to honor ancient immortal members of their species called Apsû and Tiamat, representing the Sweet and Salt waters respectively.

So June is BECMI Month and I am going to be doing some BECMI-flavored versions of regular features.

Since the Basic Set of BECMI came out in 1983 I thought it might be fun to pull out a play-list from 83.

But not just any play-list.
No, this one follows the line up of a cassette tape I bought back in 83, likely at the K-Mart.  I remember getting it because it was the only tape I could find with my then favorite song "Shock the Monkey" by Peter Gabriel.

Of course, I can only mean K-Tel's "Chart Action '83!"


Does it have anything at all to do with D&D or BECMI?
Not at all!  But it is what I was listening to then.

Here is the full cassette version playlist below.



What were you listening to in 83?

It's another #FollowFriday here at the Other Side.

Since this is the first week of BECMI Month I thought some good old-school sites and accounts were in order.


Remember.  It is often not just enough to join these sites, you need to engage with them as well.

Facebook

Let's start with the big one, the BECMI Facebook group.
Run by TSR Alum Bruce Heard it has been a treasure trove of BECMI information for me for years.
https://www.facebook.com/groups/BECMI/

Another is the BECMI D&D page on Facebook.
https://www.facebook.com/BECMI.DD/

Twitter
Want to see what is new in the BECMI/D&D world?  Check out Twitter.

Bruce Heard
https://twitter.com/Ambreville

TSR in the World
https://twitter.com/DNDCollecting

Blogs
Let's go with a Bruce Heard trifecta, here is his blog, About Bruce Heard and New Stories.
https://bruce-heard.blogspot.com/
In particular, I am focusing on this post for my War of the Witch Queens campaign.
Revisiting BECMI Skills, https://bruce-heard.blogspot.com/2018/09/GeneralSkills.html

MeWe
Over at MeWe there are a lot of groups that need some more followers and people to interact.

Mystara
Dedicated to the B/X, BECMI and later AD&D 2nd Ed world of Mystara.
https://mewe.com/group/5bbbf54aa5f4e527d1dec722

Instagram
And this one I just found and his art is really fun.
https://www.instagram.com/justindrawscomics/

He also does a Keep on the Borderlands themed web comic.
http://thekeepontheborderlands.thecomicseries.com/comics/first/

"You soon are lead to an elven maid, whose veiled grace and beauty outshines all others present as the sun outshines the stars-she is Rahasia.
"Will you aid me?" she asks."

Module B7 Rahasia

B7 Rahasia is an adventure for the BECMI version of the Basic rules.  Since module B5 the Basic modules all featured the new BECMI trade dress, but B7 Rahasia is an older adventure with some solid history in the D&D game.  But I am getting to the middle of the story.

Back in 1979 Tracy and Laura Hickman wanted to play AD&D but needed money to be able to buy the Dungeon Master's Guide. So like so many after them they wrote an adventure to sell so the could afford to pick up the DMG.   That adventure was Rahasia.

Later the Hickmans would go to work for TSR and here they would give us what is arguably one of the greatest adventures of all time, Ravenloft, but before that, they republished Rahasia in 1983 under the RPGA banner.  In fact, RPGA 1 Rahasia and it's sequel RPGA 2 Black Opal Eye were the first two RPGA adventures for the new BECMI Basic game.

Rahasia is for levels 1-2 and then Black Opal Eye for levels 2-3.


These currently go for a lot of money on eBay now.  RPGA2 Black Opal Eye is available on DriveThruRPG, but the RPGA1 version of Rahasia is not.

Rahasia would get a third printing again in 1984 as the new adventure module B7 Rahasia.
This new version was a combination of the two earlier editions.

For this review, I am considering the PDF from DriveThruRPG and my original print copy from 1984.

Module B7 Rahasia
Tracy and Laura Hickman. 32 Pages, color cover, black & white interior.
Cover art by Jeff Easley. Interior art by Jeff Easley and Tim Truman
Maps by Diesel & D.C. Sutherland Ill

This adventure is a primary example of what has been called "the Hickman Revolution" and while it was independent of the design of the BECMI rules, it does dovetail into the rules and feel rather well.  The Hickman Revolution can best be explained with the original requirements the Hickmans set for themselves in their adventures.

1. A player objective more worthwhile than simply pillaging and killing.
2. An intriguing story that is intricately woven into the play itself.
3. Dungeons with some sort of architectural sense.
4. An attainable and honorable end within one or two sessions playing time.

Another very strong point is an NPC/Antagonist that is more than just a mindless monster.  This can be seen in Dragonlance and can be seen in its ultimate form in Count Strahd from Ravenloft.

These all exist in one form or another in this adventure.  We have an evil cleric known as the Rahib, but is he really our "Big Bad" of this tale?  No. But again I jump ahead.

The plot begins as a simple one.  The characters agree to help an elven maid named Rahasia defeat a great evil that has come to her lands. This evil, the Rahib, has captured two elf maidens (Sylva and Merisa), Rahasia's father, and her fiancee. So the characters have to rescue the Prince this time!  He has also taken control over a group of elven cleric/monks (essentially) known as the Siswa.

This is an important bit, so I am going to interrupt myself here.  The Siswa are all mind-controlled, normally these are the elves that guard the temple, so they really should not be killed.  In the Hickman Revolution simply killing things is never the way to go.  This is true here.  The characters need to find ways to incapacitate the Siswa, but not kill them.

Defeating the Rahib is fine, and getting to him is the first half of the adventure.  The second half is discovering the REAL Big Bads.  You might have seen them on the cover.

Part 2, or the part that was covered in Black Opal Eye, deals with the real villains of this piece.  Here we learn that the Rahib had made a deal with the spirits of three dead witches, Karelena, Solorena, and Trilena.  These witches have now taken over the bodies of the elf maids and want to get Rahasia for Trilena.  They can accomplish this with the Black Opal Eye. When all three witches are freed they are much more powerful, so getting them before they can get Rahasia is the goal. Failing that any female character with a Charisma of 15 or higher is the target.

There are some traps, some false leads and some clues in the form of wine bottles.  But all in all a very effective adventure with some nice twists.  More importantly, it also gives us three (well four I guess) memorable NPCs.  While the Rahib can be defeated, and ultimately forgotten about, the witches, Karelena, Solorena, and Trilena, are far more interesting and really should come back again in a future adventure.

There are maps, pre-rolled characters to use, and of course an elven princess who will be in your debt.

The adventure also features something that the "new" BECMI modules all would feature, new monsters.
Here we get the haunt, the water weird (an AD&D import), and the bone golem who will not see an AD&D rendition until Ravenloft.

Ravenloft Connections
I have often stated that I feel that Barovia, the lands of the mists featured in the Ravenloft adventure and line, came from the B/X & BECMI world of Mystara.  Here is another connection.  First, the idea of body-snatching undead witches is a strong horror trope.  I am sure there are dozens of horror movies made before 1979 that feature this.  I am sure I have seen at least a dozen or more of these myself.


Plus like Ravenloft, Rahasia was written by the Hickmans. Even in the 5e era the Curse of Strahd adventure for 5e lists Rahasia as an influence.  Plus there are some other solid connections.  Like finding the same wines in Rahasia's Wizard tower and in Ravenloft Curse of Strahd.



For 5th Edition
Thanks to the efforts of the Classic Modules Today group there is a conversion guide for B7 Rahasia.  Classic Modules Today: B7 Rahasia (5e) is 10 pages and includes all the various stats you need to covert this adventure over to 5th Editon D&D.  In truth the conversions are very straight forward but it is nice to have them all in one place.  Plus for $1.95 it is really worth it.  Given the Ravenloft connections, I could see this as an adventure for 1-3 level characters in Curse of Strahd very easily.  You need the complete B7 module, that is not included here and there is no adventure information other than the stats. The Bone Golem and the witches, Karelena, Solorena, and Trilena get full stat blocks.

War of the Witch Queens
For me this is also a great starting module for my War of the Witch Queens campaign.  Three dead witches combing back from the grave to possess the bodies of three others?  If it can be done once, it can be done again and I have some great long term NPCs to harass my characters with.  Plus the mere fact that they came back now points to the upheaval in the Occult world that this War is having.
It also makes for a solid case for this game to be run using the BECMI rules.
Now there is a thought...

Other Posts & Links

• Rahasia, Ravenloft and Witches
• Class Struggles: The Basic/BX/BECMI Witches
• War of the Witch Queens
• The Witches of Radlebb (on the Vaults of Pandius)

This is going to irritate some people, but no honest discussion about the BECMI Basic set can occur without a mention of the doomed cleric Aleena and Women in Refrigerators. 

Briefly, Women in Refrigerators is a trope where the plot of a male character is moved forward by the death (or disability or rape) of an associated female character.  Also often the female character is not returned to the status quo; ie she stays dead or disabled.

This trope was masterfully, and somewhat depressingly, detailed by then comics-fan and now best-selling comic writer, Gail Simone (writer of Batgirl, Wonder
Woman, Red Sonja, and The Secret Six).  The name comes from Green Lantern #54 where then GL Kyle Raynor finds his girlfriend murdered and stuffed into a refrigerator.  So not just a murder, brutal one designed to antagonize the character by an enemy.

Now the issue of Green Lantern in question was from 1994.  Gail put up her original website in 1999.  If that was the only example one might excuse the writers a little.  But it was far from the only one.

Simone compiled a list in 1999, simply called The List, of all the comic book women who have been killed, depowered, raped, or disabled.  The list is long and sadly we could double it today.  Or as comic writer Mark Waid has said:
Jesus H. Christ in a birchbark canoe, is that a list disturbing in its length. And, yes, there are even more male characters who could make up a similar list--but it would be a smaller PERCENTAGE of male characters than this is of comics' females. Brrr...Lots of comic writers do it.  Lots of television writers do it.  I spent a better part of the early 2000s (just prior to starting this blog) trying to draw attention to this trope and the damage it causes on television.

It's also lazy writing.

But What About Aleena?

Aleena, as many fans of the BECMI Red Box know, is the cleric in the first adventure who is designed to help the Character, and thus the Player, learn D&D.  The adventure is a solo deal, so naturally, there is a little bit of a railroad.  This can be excused because of the space needed and to serve the purpose of the text; It's not a "real" adventure, it is a teaching tool in the guise of an adventure. As a teaching tool, it serves this role well.  As an adventure, it is a bit contrived, but that is excusable.

However, no matter what the character (a fighter, and a male one as depicted in the art) does, Aleena will die.

Overtly this is designed to give the character a buy-in to the "Life and Death Drama" that is D&D.  Characters will die.   In that respect, it worked.  To this day you can find "Kill Bargle!" adventures and t-shirts[1][2] and other reminders of the fateful battle between Aleena and Bargle.  She has her own Facebook page.  I even contributed to a "Shrine of St. Aleena" adventure for 5th Edition.   If the goal was to get buy-in to D&D then one can say it worked.

That doesn't mean it still not lazy writing.

I know that is going to blow some of my old-school cred, but everyone that uses this trope always defends why their use of it is right and appropriate.  Granted this one was written in 1983, years before Gail ever wrote her essay or even before the Green Lantern comic appeared.  But it was not before the trope itself was known. Often called "Disposable Women" it has had a lengthy history in all sorts of literature.

In fact, the one that hit me the most was not Alex, Kyle Raynor's girlfriend, but Gwen Stacy, Peter Parker's girlfriend in the Amazing Spiderman issues #121 to #122 from 1973.  I remember reading these when I was a kid in the 70s.  My barber had all sorts of great comic books in his shop so I would read these.   Gwen's death bugged me. It was so pointless.  Even then I could see the purpose was to enrage Spider-man, but he was already committed. He was going to go after Green Goblin anyway.  I thought it was just dumping on the character and needlessly killing a character.

Another one was the original Batwoman, Kathy (not Kate) Kane in Detective Comics (Vol. 1) #485.  This was 1979 and was right at the start of my D&D involvement.   Her death also seemed to serve no purpose than to motivate Batman.  Well Batman, like Spider-man, already had lost people what purposes did this serve?  More to the point why bring a character out of retirement only to kill her? Unlike Gwen and Aleena, no one even remembers the sacrifice Kathy Kane made.

And don't even get me started on Batgirl/Barbara Gordon or Sue Dibny. Just to name two.

The point I am getting here is this.  If a kid reading comics can see problems with this in the late 1970s and early 1980's, certainly others could too.

None of this is made any better by describing Aleena in the books using the language one uses for a girlfriend. Which, in this case, Aleena was the stand-in for Frank Mentzer's ex-girlfriend Aileen and written to die.

In 1987, after pretty much of all the old guard of TSR was gone, GAZ1 The Grand Duchy of Karameikos was published for the Basic D&D game. In it, there is an Aleena Halaran, a mace-wielding Lawful cleric.  She is supposed to be the same Aleena, unless of course, you played through the Basic set, then she is Anielle Halaran.

Aleena and Baron SherlaneMy Own Takes and What Would I Do?

I ran a couple of adventures for my kids a while back using Bargle and Aleena. I ran T1 Village of Hommlet but included Aleena and Bargle and yes, she still died in it despite my personal objections. Morgan Ironwolf also made an appearance.  I later ran The Shrine of St. Aleena for the Second campaign.  The point here was to show that in this other campaign with the same players that somethings are "fixed points" in the multiverse.  Something not lost on my players.

Later I contributed to the 5e conversion of The Shrine of Aleena.  I guess I really can't change the past.

I guess to make my multiverse connections right I would need to have a raised from the dead Aleena show up in my third campaign, Into the Nentir Vale, and riff off of my 4e stats for her since that is my "4e converted to 5e" game.

IF, and that is a big IF, if I were going to change the intro adventure I would drop Aleena in favor of an older male wizard.  More of a Joseph Campbell-esqe mentor figure.  Someone of the Gandalf or Merlin mold to guide the new adventurer at the start of their own Hero's Journey.  Indeed in the Hero's Journey the older mentor or supernatural aid dies so the hero can go on.  Maybe even Bargle is a failed student of this mentor and you, as the "ego" character, take on this brave wizard's quest.

"But!" you say, "how can Bargle kill a wizard old enough to have an apprentice?"  Well, the same way Bargle killed a cleric of at least 2nd level. Aleena does heal the player at one point so she has spells so is at least 2nd level and an average of 7 hp. That is still more than a magic missile can effect.

"But!" you say again, "Aleena needs to HEAL the player how is a magic-user going to do that?" to which I say the wizard has one, and only one, potion of healing.  He GIVES this potion to you and you are healed.  Going back to the purpose of this whole thing is to teach you how to play D&D you have now learned TWO things you didn't know before. There are magic items that can heal you (and the wizard can always lament the lack of a cleric here) AND that such items need to be managed carefully, ie resource management.  The wizard gets to be heroic by giving you his last healing potion even though he needs more.  A potion of healing even gets introduced at the end of the sample solo adventure anyway.

Bargle and this Wizard have history.  So Bargle wants the wizard dead. The wizard wants to protect you because you are only first level. Another lesson learned! Protect the weaker members of the party, it is the right thing to do.

I would go as far as to say that a fighter and a wizard are much more iconic duo than a fighter and cleric.  Look at the cover of Holmes Basic, look at the cover of Moldvay Basic.  Look at the cover for Pathfinder. Having a wizard instead of a cleric makes far, far more sense to me.


Would it have had the same emotional impact?  Hard to say.  Hindsight is 20/20 and it is easy for me to point out these sorts of problems because I have been focused on them for so long.  Less certain is the cultural impact this isolated scene would have had independent or the cultural impact as the whole the Red Box Basic had in total.  For me, a wizard mentor falling battle would have had the same impact intended, because I have to say one of the big turn-offs for BECMI for me was this death. I had already at this time thrown out a copy of Lord Foul's Bane, I didn't have to spend my money here. So I didn't. Until now of course.

Morgan Ironwolf is mentioned in the same tones of reverence and often in the same breath as Aleena.  But we know far less about her and she is, as far as I can tell, still "alive" out there in the worlds of Dungeons & Dragons.

I want to end with a comment made by Sarah Darkmagic about Aleena.  She quoted me years ago and I would return the favor here.  Sarah has said, " I pointed out that the D&D art I saw growing up didn't make me feel welcomed." this is combined with the entire treatment of Aleena did not make early D&D a welcoming place to women. I believe her. It wasn't.  She was not there in the early days, but I was, and often times the only women playing were girlfriends of the players.

She also makes the claim that Aleena was not very empowering for her. Again I have no reason but to agree. Aleena is NOT empowering. She is cannon fodder. She is fridge material.  She serves only one purpose here, to further the ends of a male character.

Simone said "if you demolish most of the characters girls like, then girls won’t read comics. That's it!" This is also true for every reader. And every gamer.

I am reminded of Whoopi Goldberg when she first saw Nichelle Nichols as Lt. Uhura on Star Trek. She went to her mother saying, "Come here, mum, everybody, come quick, come quick, there's a black lady on television and she ain't no maid!"  What would have happened if Uhura had been "redshirted" after an episode? What would've happened then?  What would have happened to Mae Jemison?

Granted this was years ago.  Today it is different. Hopefully, it is better.
It bears repeating, but representation matters.

But I still look at this section as the weakest point of the BECMI books and really kind of a low point for D&D in general.

My Posts On Aleena

• Aleena, doomed cleric for D&D 4 Essentials
• Review: The Shrine of St. Aleena
• Next Stop, The Temple of Elemental Evil
• Back to Basics
• Back to Basics, Part 2
• They Keep Killing Aleena, Back to Basic Part 3
• Weekend Gaming: The Second Campaign
• Featured Artist: Larry Elmore
• Shrine of St. Aleena for 5e

More on Women in Refrigerators

• WIR: Women in Refrigerators, the original site.
• The Artifice: Women in Refrigerators: Killing Females in Comics
• Comic Basics: Women in Refrigerators and Dead Men Defrosting – Is It Wrong?
• TV Tropes: Disposable Woman

I don't think it is a stretch of the imagination to say that the BECMI Basic box is the Red Box that most people remember. Indeed, when you say "Red Box" this is the set that most people think of.

A large part of this is due to the number of units sold. It has been claimed that this was the best selling version of D&D at least up to the modern age of 5e.   It was certainly one of the most widely distributed versions of D&D up to that date.

International

While I have seen French, German, Japanese, and more versions of this set, it was the one printed in England I wanted the most.


Reading this one is a neat little exercise in "what if."

What would this set have been like if it was a single volume?

The Japanese versions also looked great.


The French version seems closest to the American one.


Norway had a single volume version too, but their's appears to have been a hardcover.


Although I must admit I have always wanted the German version.  If I had known it had existed back then I would have grabbed it.  Sadly my German is terrible these days. Don't use it you lose it.


And some great pictures of Javier Murillo's Spanish editions.




In fact, Javier Murillo appears to be the leading expert on these foreign language editions.





There is an entire listing of the printed foreign editions at the Acaeum.

That is quite a legacy of print.
It should be no surprise then that the cover was often imitated.

Inspiration

Maybe more so than the AD&D Player's Handbook (or very close) no other version of D&D has inspired the look of other sets.  In fact, it has become its own shorthand to nostalgia.  Want to tap into those nostalgia dollars?  Make your box red.



Of course, nothing irritates the old-school crowd more than when this is used for a game they don't like.



and of course the D&D Cartoon,


a puzzle, again from Javier Murillo,



and the early "skin" for DnDClassics.com, which now points to DMsGuild.com,



Not to mention a bunch of t-shirts.




That's an awful lot of red.

Now certainly someone in the old-school gaming community will say something stupid like "sacrilege!" or some other nonsense, allow me to remind you what TSR was doing themselves back in the day.

How does one go about reviewing a game I know so well but in a book I know very little about?  More to the point how does one review a classic?

Well as my oldest son says, "with determination."

In this particular case, I am going to review the actual boxed set I was able to pick up a few years ago, the PDFs from DriveThruRPG and I will compare it to the version printed in the UK.



Basic Set (1983)
The third set of books to be released as the "Basic set" was the Mentzer "Red Box" Basic that would become the "B" of the BECMI line.  So many copies of this set have sold that it has become synonymous with "the Basic Set" and "the red Box" in D&D circles.  The set itself contained two books, a Player's Book (to be read first) and a Dungeon Master's Book (to be read by the DM).

Already we have a departure from the previous Holmes (1977) and Moldvay (1981) Basic sets.  While those older sets had one book for rules (48 and 64 pages respectively) and an included adventure (B1 and B2 respectively) this set only has the two books.  This is not the issue it might seem at first since this set features a rather infamous solo adventure and a programmed adventure that can be used with a DM.

The box set also came with dice, a crayon for coloring in the numbers, and some information about the RPGA.

It is helpful to look at the books independently.

The Player's Book
The Player's Book is 64 pages, color art cover, black & white interior art.

This is the familiar D&D game. The title page tells us that this is Dungeons & Dragons created by Gary Gygax and Dave Arneson.  The editor, though many will say the actual architect of the BECMI line, is Frank Mentzer.  He is so tied to this edition that it is also called the Mentzer Basic book.

While Holmes did a good job of organizing the Original D&D game into something that could be used as and introduction to the game (or too AD&D maybe), it was the Moldvay edition that really tried to make an introductory game to new players.  The Mentzer set takes this to the next level by giving us a true introduction to the game.

The target audience is 10-12-year-olds but it takes care not to talk down to the audience, there even seems to be a choice in language to try and educate as much as possible too.  TSR expected their target audience to be young, educated, and (for better or worse) male.  But I will touch on that later.

Up first you are taken on one of the most infamous solo adventures ever.  You are playing a fighter and you have to investigate a dungeon.  You meet a cleric named Aleena, and a goblin and an evil wizard named Bargel.  The rest is a tale told in many taverns across the known world. 
While I have a number of issues with the solo adventure, and I'll discuss those elsewhere, it is an effective tool for grabbing people and getting them into the game.  The adventure explains aspects of your character and makes them salient in the situation. In the education biz we call this "situational learning" and it is an effective tool.

After the adventure, we get to the part where your character is explained to you. What the ability scores mean, what the saving throws are for, how to hit with weapons.  It is the "what is Roleplaying" section of every other RPG book writ large.

There is another Solo adventure, with some nods to the two M series for solo dungeons.

So now that the player knows the basics of play the various character classes are introduced. Here we have the Cleric, Fighters, Magic-User, and Thieves for humans and Dwarves, Elves, and Halflings. The text is very, very explanatory.  Great for a brand new player but feels wordy to me now.  Granted, these were not written for someone with 40 years of experience.  Heck, no one had even a quarter of that yet when this was written so my point of view is out of sync with the design goals of this game.

Looking over the classes I notice a few things.  The class descriptions are very self-contained.  Everything you need to know about playing a Cleric for example is right there. Including the Saving Throw tables WITH the class.  A vast improvement over the constant flipping through pages we had to do with AD&D at the same time.   Also, I noticed how weak the thief was then. No comparison to the Rogues of later editions.

The design elements of the self-contained class pages is something we will see again in D&D 4e and 5e.  It is very effective and if you are like me and like to print out your PDFs then it also gives you flexibility in organizing your version of Basic.



There is a solid emphasis throughout the book on how playing together, and working together, as a group is the best experience.  There also seems a little extra emphasis on how the Players are not the Characters.  It feels wonderfully 80s when the was the moral panic that kids would start to act out like their characters and meet the fate of poor Black Leaf and Marci.  Today people online refer to their characters in first person and laud their achievements as their very own.  What a difference some time makes.

We get to alignment with a strong prohibition against playing Chaotic or Evil characters. Retainers and other topics.  There is even a solid Glossary (I mean really who does this anymore? I miss them!) to help in supporting my point of view of D&D as a learning tool.   There is even a small section on using minis, character sheets, and other aids.  There is even a nod to AD&D to remind players that this game, D&D, is not AD&D.

All the basics are covered. No pun intended. Ok. Maybe a little one.
Everything the player needs to get started.  They now just need a DM.  Thankfully the next book covers all that.

The Dungeon Master's Book
The Dungeon Master's book is 48 pages, color art cover, black & white interior art.
This book follows the Player's book in terms of layout and scope.

The title page here is largely the same as the Player's Book, but it is a chance for us to reflect on how this game is really the direct descendent of the Original D&D game. Though there is a reminder that Players are not to read this book! Only DMs!

We get right into the roles of a DM here, after covering some brief introductory materials and some common terms and abbreviations.  Looking over these were are still in a time that Pre-Dates THAC0 as a term.

There are checklists of things to do pre-game and during the game and during combat.  It's a nice clear and spelled out version of the same material seen in the previous Moldvay Basic set.  In fact, there is a lot of material here that looks and reads the same.  This is natural since both sets are drawing from the same sources.  It is a bit like reading something you are already very familiar with, but it is still somewhat different and new.  Like trying to read Danish after learning German.  Or maybe more accurately, reading American Spanish after learning European Spanish.

There is a built-in adventure for new DMs that serves the same purpose as the Solo one in the player's book. It is fine, but I think back to my time in running the Keep on the Borderlands and hoe much I learned from that.

The procedures and rules section is all laid out alphabetically. So "Elves" come before "Mapping" and "Time".  Again, I am reminded of the layout seen in 4e and it is obvious that the designers of 4e were fans of this edition.

The next big section is on Monsters.  This section reads very much like the same section in Molvay Basic, some even down to the exact same words.  I don't find this a problem though.  Some people went from Holmes Basic (77) to Cook/Marsh Expert (81) and some people will come from those earlier Basics to this.  There needs to be a continuity of rules. Minus some organization and some clearer directions these are supposed to be the same games.  Yes there are some differences.  I find them to be minor at worst.

Back to Monsters, the section seems to have all the Usual Suspects, give or take a couple.  I did notice that there is much less art here.  I would have loved to have seen more versions of these classic monsters.  An Elmore drawn Thoul? Yeah, that would have been great! Also, this has the only piece of recycled art I have found.  The dragon breath diagram looks the same here as in Moldvay.  That's actually pretty cool.  All new art?  TSR was putting their best on this.  I'll talk more about the art in a bit.

Treasure follows and it is every 1st level character's dreams come true.  Swords to hit those pesky magic monsters! Gold! Platinum! Potions of Healing!! 2-7  hp was all you needed back then to get back into the game.

A nice bit about creating and stocking dungeons with monsters and treasures.  More direction than we got in Holmes or Moldvay to be sure.

We end with some tables for random monsters, saving throws, and a combined index!

Art
The art in both books is fantastic.  Larry Elmore, Jim Holloway, and Jeff Easley at the very top of their game.  They defined how millions view Dungeons & Dragons.  Yes, yes I am a fan of the older stylings of Bill Willingham, Erol Otis, and Jeff Dee, but this was at a new level.  The art was consistent throughout and all of it wonderful.  Sadly it is also a little sparse compared to Moldvay, but I guess there are more pages to fill here.

The UK Edition
The UK edition is a single book about the size of a paperback.  It has the same color (or should I say "colour") cover.  The illustrations are sparse and in this case, all the interior art is by Helen Bedford.



The content is the same, just put into 272 smaller (4.75" x 7.5")  pages. There is even a tiny character sheet that taxes the ability of my glasses.
It sold for £4.95 back in 1986 when my copy was printed.




Legacy
I am going to spend a lot of time this month covering the legacy of the Basic Set and the BECMI series as a whole.  But this is the set. This is the one people think of when you say "Basic Set."
That's a pretty serious legacy.

Join me all month as I talk about all the BECMI books, boxed sets, and related topics.
This week is nothing but Basic.

For all of June, I am going to be focusing on the BECMI rules, the only* D&D I never really played.
(*I played a lot of Holmes, Moldvay, Cook and Marsh Basic through Expert and used some BECMI books.)

For my June Monster Mondays (and there are 5 of them!) I am going to focus on a monster that would have been appropriate for the boxed set I am reviewing that week.  Also, I want to pick monsters I would have been likely to have used then OR ones I actually created back then.  Thankfully for this I have been "given" my youngest son's old game computer (wait...didn't I buy this??) and it has the only DVD-ROM drives in the house now.  I have been digging through some wonderful treasures I had semi-forgot I had.

So for this week, I want to do a creature that would have felt at home in the D&D Basic Set.  My general rule today is if I could have encountered them in the Caves of Chaos, then they are good.

I was talking to my oldest son about this and he suggested Grimlocks.  Honestly, it is perfect.

A lot of my own D&D world-building was built on the classics, and what is more classic than The Time Machine, both the book and the great 1960 George Pal directed film.   The Grimlocks of D&D have a spiritual ancestor in the Morlocks of the H.G. Welles classic.  Both creatures are essentially a human species that has "devolved" into a barbaric state.  They even share some literature (and not literal) DNA with similar creatures from H.P. Lovecraft or Richard Sharpe Shaver's "deros".  They would have been right at home in the Cave of Chaos.  Especially since they fill an "uncomfortable" niche of what happens to humans who dedicate themselves to darkness and chaos.  The Morlocks would have been still fresh in my mind in my early D&D days from the almost forgettable (expect by meI guess) 1978 Time Machine TV Movie.

I also like them for the witch connection.  Grimlocks were popular monsters on Charmed where they are essentially low-level demons.

In my games, Grimlocks are much the same as they are in all sorts of D&D games.  Save they are demon-worshipping cultists and their distrust of all other races (and their cannibalism) keep them from forming strong bonds to really rule the underworld.

Grimlock
Armor Class:  7
Hit Dice: 2+2*
Move: 120' (40')
Attacks: 1
Damage: 2-7 (1d6+1)
No. Appearing: 2-20 (0)
Save As: Fighter 4
Morale: 8
Treasure Type: Nil
Alignment: Chaos
XP Value: 30

Grimlocks are a blind subterranean race that attacks anyone and anything they do not know.   They are descended from a group of human cultists that worshipped the foulest demons.  Whether they were driven underground or sought it out on their own they have since moved far away from their original humanity into something more akin to a monster.

Their skin coloration is a dull gray and their milky white eyes appear to dull and sightless. Indeed the Grimlock is blind, but their senses of smell and hearing are so acute that they can still "see" in the complete darkness.  They can sense vibrations so they are capable of spotting and attacking enemies, even invisible ones, up to 120' away.  They do not use missile attacks and prefer to fight with clubs or rocks.  Most are bald, but some have sparse dark hair on their heads, especially the females.
Grimlocks are stronger than average, 15 Strength, but they also have lower than average intelligence and wisdom (usually 9 or 8).

Grimlocks have lived in small isolated communities for centuries.  They will keep prisoners to replace fallen members, at least until such prisoners can produce new Grimlocks for them.  Prisoners, fallen Grimlocks, or any other enemy, once they are dead are eaten.  Grimlocks have no use for, or understanding of, treasure save for weapons.

Despite being blind and immune to any effect that requires sight (a medusa attack for example) they loathe the sun and will avoid going to the surface world save for nights of the new moon.

Special Grimlocks can advance as far as the 4th level as a Warlock to a demonic cult.

Grimlocks and Troglodytes hate each other and will attack the other to the exclusion of all other enemies.

Some scholars believe that the human cultists that spawned the grimlock race had intermingled with lower demons to produce the first grimlocks.  So far none of these scholars have ventured out of their lofty towers of learning, with plenty of sunlight, to put their theories to the test.

1960 Morlocks
1978 Morlock
Grimlocks from Charmed

Tomorrow is June 1st.  Crazy. Where did April and May go?

Well, I have been planning something like this for a bit now and I wanted to spend some time going over the D&D system I have the least familiarity with, at least in a proper sense.

The Basic, Expert, Companion, Masters, and Immortal Sets edited and written by Frank Mentzer.


Each week I will cover a different set with reviews of the main boxed set, associated products, and topics.  In my case I am also going to compare these sets with versions I am much more familiar with such as the B/X sets from Moldvay, Cook and Marsh, Holmes Basic, and the D&D Rules Cyclopedia.

Now I am not going into these reviews blind, I have had experiences with these books before, some experiences even going back to the time when they were published.

But I never played the game using these rules.

When the BECMI rules came out I was firmly in the camp of AD&D.  As the years went on I would adapt some BECMI products to my AD&D game and others I bought out of curiosity or interest.

So this will be a learning experience for me.  I am not expecting any great insights to the D&D game or any esoteric knowledge.  But who knows, maybe there is a tied bit here or there for me to learn.

Can't wait to find out.

You would think we had enough "Gritty Modern Supernatural Horror" RPGs out there.  But nope!  There is always room for more.

This one looks like could be fun too.

Bloodlines & Black Magic



https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/stormbunny/the-bloodlines-and-black-magic-roleplaying-game?ref=theotherside

There is a free guide, not really a Quick Start, up on DriveThruRPG for you to check out.

It reminds me a little of Elizabeth Chaipraditkul's WITCH: Fated Souls and a little bit of KULT: Divinity Lost. 

Only 48 hours left!

Last week was the Season Finale of Motherland: Fort Salem on the FreeForm channel.   The season was great, start to finish. It had great characters that showed a lot of growth and at least three different "What the Hell!" moments in the last few minutes of the last episode.

If you have not been watching then you are missing out.  Motherland gives us an alternate history where witches rose up during Salem and forged a pact with the then Colonies to protect the new country from their enemies.  There are fewer states in the US and a large portion, The Cession, was given back to the Native Americans in return for their help and magic.  The series follows three new witch recruits, Abby, Tally, and Raelle, as they go through Basic Training and survive as a unit.
There is a terrorist organization of rogue witches known as the Spree who resent the servitude that sends all witches to the Army.

    Honor me, make a place for me and my kind and we will win your wars.
- General Sarah Alder to Massachusetts Bay Militia, Say the Words    
The show features a full cast of strong, interesting women characters.  The leader of the Army is General Alder, a 300+-year-old witch, their drill sergeant is a woman. Even the President is an African-American woman.  Men are either tertiary characters at best (the Witch-Father) or eye-candy (Abby's two boy toys).  Tally doesn't even see a man until one gives up his seat for her so she can fly from California to Massachusetts.  Not that men are put into a bad light.  The Witch Father is respected and well-liked. Raelle's dad is proud of his daughter and worries about her.  It's just their stories are not as important here.  That's a nice change of pace really.

The witches are also not a Ms. Pac-Man trope. They are warriors, witches but also women and they are allowed to be all three. It really is quite enjoyable and very different from what I have seen in the past.  It has been a fantastic first season.

I can't believe I have to wait a whole year to catch up on the Bellweather Unit and their battle against the Spree and "The Camarilla", the "Ancient Enemy" of all witches.   This certainly sounds like a lot of fun.   But can I wait that long?


So what am I going to do?  Easy.  Convert them to D&D characters!
The witches of Motherland are perfect as adventurers really.  They are great as a group with Abigail as their leader, Raelle as the healer and Tally as the seer.   I don't know much about who or what the Camarilla is, but given what we saw in the last episode I am looking forward to it.

Witches vs. the Camarilla?  Yeah. Sign me up!
Basic D&D and D&D 5
D&D 5 is the latest and greatest version of the game but the Basic version from the early 80s is my game of choice these days.  So I figure I can do both.
Basic D&D (1981)In this version I would use one of my own Witch classes.  But instead of Traditions, I would opt for family lines.
I am putting them all at 3rd Level since they "Finished Basic." I know. Dumb D&D joke. 
D&D 5th EditionIn this version, there is no proper witch class.  There is a warlock of course, but that doesn't feel like the right call here.  With their focus on combat, voice-based magic, leadership, and some healing the obvious choice is the Bard class.  There is even a perfect sounding group for them, The College of War.
Abigail Bellweather
Abigail "Abby" Bellweather, of the East Coast Bellweathers, is the leader of the Bellweather Unit.  She starts out in the show as an arrogant, if even spoiled, girl of privilege. By the end of the series she is the leader she was born to be.  Even her rivalries with Raelle and fellow East Coast witch Libba Swythe become something different as she accepts the responsibility of what being a soldier-witch means.
Base AbilitiesStrength: 12Dexterity: 11Constitution:  13Intelligence: 14Wisdom: 11Charisma: 17

Hair: Drk. Brown
Eyes: Brown
Basic D&DWitch Level 3, Lawful
HP: 10  AC: 7Tradition: Bellweather family (Leaders) (For this I will use my Amazon Witch Tradition)Abilities: Windstirke*, Fighting ProwessSpells: Fury of the Ancestors, Windshear* (Ritual), Suggestion
D&D 5th EditionBard Level 3, Lawful Good
HP:  21   AC:  11Abilities: Bard Abilities, SpellcastingSpells: Eldritch Blast, Thunderclap, Truestrike, Cure Wounds, Featherfall, Heroism, Thunderwave, Phantasmal Force, Suggestion
Weapons: Dagger, Scourge.

Click here for her D&D Beyond Sheet. 
Tally CravenTally comes from the depleted Craven line. All her aunts had gone to fight in the Army and they all died.  She is the last of her line. She lived in the Matrifocal Allotment near Sacramento, California. She had not even seen a male until she answered her call of duty, an action her mother strongly wished her not to do.  Her power is to "see." She can detect disguised and hidden objects or people and might be one of the most powerful seers to come up in the ranks in a long time.
Tally is a sweet girl who loves with all her heart because that is what she knows.  She is fiercely loyal to her Unit.
Base AbilitiesStrength: 11Dexterity: 13Constitution: 14Intelligence: 13Wisdom: 12Charisma: 16

Hair: Red
Eyes: Brown
Basic D&DWitch Level 3, Lawful
HP: 9  AC: 7Tradition: Craven family (Seers) (For this I will use my Classical Witch Tradition)Abilities: Windstirke*, Detect EvilSpells: Foretell, Detect Invisible, Witch Sense
D&D 5th EditionBard Level 3, Neutral Good
HP:  24   AC:  11Abilities: Bard Abilities, SpellcastingSpells: Thunderclap, Truestrike, Detect Magic, Heroism, Identity, Thunderwave, Detect Thoughts, See Invisible
Weapons: Dagger, Scourge.

Click here for her D&D Beyond Sheet. 
Raelle CollarRaelle lived in the part of American known as the Chippewa Cession where the Indigenous Tribal Federations are.  She is a healer of great power, like her mother was.  Her mother was reported dead by the Army and Raelle blames the Army and Gen. Bellweather in particular.  She doesn't want to be there and her plan was get enlisted to the infantry and get killed as soon as possible.  Her attitude earned her the nickname "shitbird" from Abby.
Raelle attitude changed when she met and fell in love with fellow cadet Scylla Ramshorn.

Base AbilitiesStrength: 12Dexterity: 13Constitution: 15Intelligence: 12Wisdom: 13Charisma: 15

Hair: Blonde
Eyes: Blue
Basic D&DWitch Level 3, Lawful
HP: 11  AC: 7Tradition: Collar family (Healers) (For this I will use my Pagan Witch Tradition and Basic Witch Tradition)Abilities: Windstirke*, Healing Touch (1d4)Spells: Cure Light Wounds, Sleep, Heal Affliction
D&D 5th EditionBard Level 3, Chaotic Good
HP: 24  AC: 12Abilities: Bard Abilities, SpellcastingSpells: Thunderclap, Truestrike, Cure Wounds, Feather Fall, Healing Word, Sleep, Lesser Restoration, Warding Wind
Weapons: Dagger, Scourge.

Click here for her D&D Beyond Sheet. 
Scylla RamshornScylla is a "Necro" or a Necromancer.  Because their power makes others uneasy they are quartered in a different part of the base. We learn that Scylla's parents were killed when she was young.   She meets and falls in love with Raelle.  Later we find out she is part of the terrorist organization known as The Spree, responsible for hundreds of deaths across the country.  Her job was to recruit Raelle, but she actually fell in love with her.

Base AbilitiesStrength: 11Dexterity: 13Constitution: 16Intelligence: 14Wisdom: 13Charisma: 18

Hair: Black
Eyes: Blue
Basic D&DWitch Level 4, Chaotic
HP: 13  AC: 7Tradition: Ramshorn family (Necromancer) (For this I will use my Mara Witch Tradition)Abilities: GlamourSpells: Bewitch I, Lay to Rest, Dark Whispers, Hypnotize
D&D 5th EditionBard Level 4, Chaotic NeutralHP: 35  AC: 12Abilities: Bard Abilities, Spellcasting, Magic Initiate (Necromancer)Spells: Chill Touch, Message, Minor Illusion, Toll the Dead, Truestrike, Bane, Charm Person, Disguise Self, Dissonant Whispers, Sleep, Enthrall, Lesser Restoration, Suggestion
Click here for her D&D Beyond Sheet.

Notes

For Basic D&D I linked to the Witchcraft Tradition that best fits each witch.  If I were to do something more like this I might revive my old "War Witch Tradition."  This is the ancient Celtic tradition of witches like The Morrigan and Scáthach.



For 5th Edition Bards felt like the closest match.  I originally had Scylla as a Magic Initiate (Warlock) to cover her other magical abilities and to represent her membership in the Spree.  But I changed it to Magic Initiate (Necromancer) to cover some of her Necro powers.  She is still too low-level to really take advantage of the necromancy spells.

I considered making them all Sword-Pact Warlocks and taking a Magic Initiate Feat at first level to cover their various Traditions/Backgrounds.  So Necromancer for Scylla, Cleric/Healer for Raelle, Bard for Abby and Wizard for Tally.  That might still work well to be honest.

*Windstrike is the basic attack ability of a Warrior Witch.  With her voice the witch can cause 1d6+1 hp of damage.

*Windshear is a ritual spell performed by multiple witches.  It is a shield from attack and it destroys whatever comes in contact with it.



The Scourge is a flail like weapon used by all witches.  It is long with a whip-like handle and a knob on the end that glows with the witch's magic.  It is considered a +1 weapon and does 1d6+1 points of damage.  In D&D 5th Ed it is considered an exotic weapon.

The real test will be doing stats for Sgt. Anacostia Quartermaine and Gen. Sarah Alder.



Other Editions of D&D

Building these characters was so much fun I could not help but think how other editions of D&D might work.

1st Edition AD&D
Bards are out because they are very different here.  I would use Magic-users and let them dual-class into another class to help.  Or even use Druids.

2nd Edition AD&D 
Ah now here is a chance to really try something fun.  Like 5th Edition, I would make them Bards, but I would also have them take the Blade kit from the Complete Bard Handbook.  Again like 1st Ed, I might let them dual-class into another class OR just allow them to take the proper spells.

3rd Edition D&D
So many choices here.  I would try out a Hexblade or Bladesinger for these.  I mean really, a witch-army has the Forgotten Realms written all over it!  Blasesigners and Witches of Rashemen are just about War Witches now.

4th Edition D&D
So many classes!  Ok make them Pact of the Blade Warlocks, let them take a multiclass feat at first level to add the other class features they need.  OR start them out as Witches from Heroes of the Feywild and then multiclass feats.

I might try each option on one character to see how it would work.  The choice is obvious.


She may be General Sarah Alder, but I know a Witch Queen when I see one.

I like to think I have some solid talents. I am at an age where I know what I can do well and what I still need to learn how to do better.  And what I am terrible at.

I am a terrible artist.  I don't even try anymore.  That's fine really. I know plenty of great artists and the things I am good at have allowed me a lifestyle where I can buy the art I want.  But I still love to create.   And that is where character generation software comes in.
I was a HUGE fan of the Brazilian Factory of Heroes (Fábrica de Herois), the City of Heroes character builder, the Skyrim one, and the character builder with the added benefit of 3D-Printed minis, Hero Forge.

A few weeks ago I was in the market for a new character builder, potentially one for a project I have coming up.  Well in one of those rare instances of serendipity while I was doing my Google searches I was approached by András Bondor of Overhead Games.
András offered to send me a copy of the ePic Character Generator to try out. I figured it would be fun.  Well it is. I'll get into the details in a bit.

The character builder is free. You can download it and start right away.  There are even ways to gain free "packs" of design elements.  Their model, and I think it is a good one, is to charge for various design packs.  You see something you want, say the "Sorcerer" pack or the "Drow Spellcaster" pack then you can purchase them and add them to your suite.  You get four packs for free to start, "Female", "Male", "Large Male" (think demons and centaurs), and "Season #1" which combines a lot of smaller releases.
Prices range from $5 to $150.  So there is a pack for every budget.  There is a special perk I am going to talk about later, but it helps offset those costs for me.



For this review, I built a bunch of characters over the last month or so, but for today I'll walk through the building of my new favorite character, Maryah, a Ranger for Old-School Essentials.

Your opening screen has the four basic packs I mentioned above.  If you are going with just the free version for now then the Female pack has the most options.  Click on your pack and hit "Start".
Now at this point you might want to click on the tutorial first.  But I'll leave that to you.


Clicking start gives you the Female demo pack.  In my screens, you see the other packs I have installed.  Hey, you know me, if I can't make a witch first thing then I lose interest pretty fast. ;)


You can choose a pack and start with that. OR you can choose Load Fantasy, Load Modern, or Load All.   Typically I like to load all.   The advantage is you can mix and match all your elements in one design.  The disadvantage is you have lots of screens you might have to click through.


Once you do that you are given a workspace and your new character.  You can try clicking on "Random" to see what you get or click through the various options.
"Skin" also includes species options. So if you want a drow, an elf, a catgirl, or even a zombie this where you start.



There are options for scars, tattoos, and even dirt.  These options are a little limited.  For example, you can't design your own tattoo nor move the presets around.



Some options also exist as "Presets."  So in the "Hair Preset" it is a style and a color.  But what if you want a style, but a different color.  Or a different color anything for that matter?  There is a color palate wheel at the middle bottom of your screen that will allow you to change the color of your current selection.   You move your cursor to the desired color and get a standard RGB notation for it as well as a palette of recently used colors.  The ability to type on the RGB numbers is a great plus.  I might not be able to move my mouse where I want it exactly, but I can type in the numbers.


The ability to do this helps when matching clothes later on.  After the body mods you can then choose how your character appears.  Different packs give you different options.  since I am working on a ranger here, I am going to choose light armor/clothing and favor greens.


You can choose all sorts of items like weapons, back items. and even magic effects.
You can also add tails, horns wings and other elements depending on your packs.



Lastly there are backgrounds and other effects. In this section there are a lot of backgrounds, or you can choose to make the background clear.  You can add companions as well.  I rather like the choices of the animal companions, but the people companions look a touch "off" to me.  No fault of the software or the design team, I think it is a bit of an "uncanny valley" situation.



You can also move any element to the foreground or background.
In this section there are also auras, magical effects, and other items.

Let's move Threnody to the front.
The BEST part of this section is the ability to take your character and make Tokens or Cards. I have not tried to save these and import them into software like Roll20, but I can't see that it would be difficult.




If you have the paid version you can also remove (or turn back on) the Logo.



NOW here is my least favorite part of this software.
Saving and Loading is not at all intuitive.
You click "Settings" then are given the option to "Save" or "Load".

Thankfully if you attempt to exit or go back without saving you will be warned about losing your characters. You can also export your files as a PNG (with optional transparent background) or as Photoshop PSD (if you purchase that option).  Every element in the software is saved as a layer in the PSD file.  Very convenient really.

Not sure why her hair lost it color, but that is not a big deal.Other Packs give you the option of making character portraits or monsters.

Honestly even with just a couple of packs, including the free ones, you can have a nearly endless supply of choices.  Of course, the packs are very, very tempting and I have been very pleased with the ones I have grabbed.  Overhead Games is always making more.

I did try the software out on my Chromebook as well, installed via GooglePlay and it worked well enough.  Not enough to make me want to switch over from my Windows 10 machine, but it is an option.

Chrome vs. Windows 10The big thing that caught my eye was their full Commercial License.  Yup, if I want to create some art here and add to one of my books I can do that!  It won't (nor is it intended to) replace an artist, but it will give me some spot art or filler art for characters.  Especially the portrait options.


Overhead Games has strong customer service and support.  In the short while I have been using it I received a customer questionnaire asking about features and prices.  They also have customer forums where others share tips, tricks, and creations.   All my interactions with the company have been great and they are eager to answer any questions.

Another perk are the updates.  The software is updated often.  In fact sometimes I went in to my software and was told: "because you purchased XXXX we are including YYYY now for free." Or something to that effect.

If you are already competent with any 3D art software like Daz3D then you won't need this.
BUT if you are like me and can't even draw a stick figure OR you just want something designed to do RPG-style art then this is a good buy.  It is at least worth the download.

I have played around with it for a while now and I have been able to create most characters I wanted.  I did try to create a passable "Batman" but it did not turn out the way I wanted, but that is much harder to do really, and I am sure Overhead Games wants to avoid people being able to create such a recognizable character.

I was able to get a couple great looking versions of Larina.


It was worth getting the Sorcerer pack for the broom and witches hat.  I know what my priorities are.

Plus some classic D&D characters I'll talk about more next week.  Aleena and Morgan Ironwolf!



I even made a card, exported and edited in Photoshop. Pretty much set up for an RPG as is.



So yes the ePic Character Generator is a ton of fun.  I also see a use for it in the future for some books, but I'll have to judge that according to the book since I most often prefer older looking art.

The pricing model is also great. 

My only complaint is the saving and loading features, but otherwise it is a fantastic bit of software. I can't to make some more characters and see what else this can do.

Get it here: https://overheadgames.com/epic-character-generator/

Here is a nasty little beastie from WAY back in my past.  I used these guys in AD&D 2nd Ed and then again for Ghosts of Albion where they were a big part of my Obsession adventure.

Blood Goblin (Hæmogoblin)

Undead faerie
Frequency: Very Rare
No. Enc.: 1-4 (1-6)
Alignment: Chaotic (Chaotic Evil)
Movement: 120' (40') [12"]
Armor Class: 6 [13]
Hit Dice: 4d8+4** (22 hp)
Attacks: 2 claws/1 bite (blood drain)
Damage: 1d4+1, 1d4+1, 1d6 + blood drain
Special: Acidic blood, 1d4 on touch, only harmed by silver, track by scent
Size: Small
Save: Monster 5
Morale: 7
Treasure Hoard Class:
XP: 225

Blood Goblins are nasty little beasties. Nominally part of the faerie, their essences have been corrupted by a vampiric or demonic power. The ritual to turn a faerie into a blood goblin is unknown to most mortals, but what is known is it is dark and evil and requires the vampire or demon to bind the potential blood goblin to feed it some of its own foul blood.

Once complete the faerie undergoes a horrible transformation. Their form becomes a twisted parody of what it once was. Wings (if they had them) wither and fall off. Teeth grow long and sharp. Their skin takes on the unhealthy look of a bruise or rotting flesh and thick acidic blood weeps from their pores. Arms grow long and their now taloned hands drag the ground. Their eyes turn completely milky white with no pupils visible.

They can speak, but it is difficult to understand them.

Blood goblins are bound to their master and will do his bidding. The trouble is most are far too dimwitted to be anything other than a nasty little killer. They enjoy hiding in alleys or darkened paths and ambush their targets. They have a keen sense of smell so often they need something that smells like the intended victim in order to attack them.  But they can and will attack anything warm-blooded.

Like all undead blood goblins are affected by holy water, taking 2-8 hp of damage per vial. blood goblins also take damage from sunlight. Blood goblins take 10 hit points of damage for every round they are exposed to bright, full sunlight. A “Continual Light” spell will also cause 1d4 hp of damage. Also they are unaffected by any mind spells (“Charm”, “Hold”, “ESP”) or “Sleep”.
Blood goblins have infravision to 90’.

Blood Goblins turn as Ghasts.

Here are my original AD&D 2nd Ed stats for them.


Hæmogoblin
CLIMATE/TERRAIN: Any
FREQUENCY: Very Rare
ORGANIZATION: Solitary
ACTIVITY CYCLE: Night
DIET : Living beings
INTELLIGENCE: Low (5)
TREASURE: Nil
ALIGNMENT: Chaotic Evil
NO. APPEARING: 1 (1-4)
ARMOR CLASS: 6
MOVEMENT: 12”
HIT DICE: 4+4
THAC0: 16
NO. OF ATTACKS: 3 (claw/claw/bite)
DAMAGE/ATTACK: 1-8/1-8/1-10
SPECIAL ATTACKS: Blood Drain
SPECIAL DEFENSES: Can only be hit by silver or magic.
MAGIC RESISTANCE: Nil
SIZE: S (3’ to 4’)
MORALE: Steady (11 - 12)
XP VALUE: 800
PSIONICS: Nil

The highest level of undead a human may obtain is arguably the Vampire. It’s ability to blend in with human or demi-human society is as much as an asset to it as it’s great strength and magic. However, many sub-human races are not suitable for vampiric conversion. Some sages claim it could be their force of will or life is relatively low. Others claim it is the gods that control the sprits (and not souls) of these humanoids that do not allow them to become vampires. It could be that vampires find these sub-humans distasteful. However some sub-humans have become undead. Undead gnolls (q.v. Shoovusa) and trolls (q.v. Spectral and Spirit Trolls) have been recorded. The Hæmogoblin is also such a creature.
Hæmogoblin’s, are created by vampires in need of a specialized servant. Creating a hæmogoblin is similar to creating any other type of vampire; blood is exchanged between the vampire and the victim. However to create the hæmogoblin the vampire needs to do something slightly different. The vampire uses any humanoid creature, (orcs, kobolds, goblins, hobgoblins, norkers, etc…) usually goblins are chosen, due to their size and manageability.
It should be noted that creatures as large as an ogre might be used, but none have ever been reported, also goblyns (from Feast of Goblyns) can not be used, they have already been converted using powerful magics.
The vampire master takes the humanoid victim and first drains it of most of its blood. The vampire then will regurgitate the purloined blood back into the humanoids mouth. The victim will swallow the blood and it’s transformation to undeath has begun. Usually by the next nightfall the victim will reawaken to full hæmogoblin status. The vampire lord can create a number of these creatures that is equal to its own hit dice, e.g. a 12 hit die vampire can create 3 (3*4 hit die=12) of these creatures. From this point the hæmogoblin will act as a servant somewhere between a homunculus/familiar and a vampiric slave.

Combat: Hæmogoblins attack with a claw/claw/bite routine. On any natural “20” rolled to hit with the bite attack the hæmogoblin will begin to drain the victim's blood at the rate of 1 CON point per round. The hæmogoblin can only be removed with a successful “Bend bars/Lift Gates” roll. The victim may not attack during the rounds an attempt to remove the hæmogoblin takes place. If the hæmogoblins are S size or smaller then up to two may be draining one victim at the same time. If the victim reaches 0 CON points then they die. Unless a “Bless” or “Remove Curse” spell is cast on the corpse it will rise the next night as a Ghast.

Hæmogoblins turn as Ghasts. Hæmogoblins cannot pass on their curse of undeath like the vampire to create other hæmogoblins, however, there is a 50% chance that any sub-human killed by a hæmogoblin will become a ghoul, with 5% of those becoming ghasts. These victims are free-willed, but they are at a disadvantage when encountering the vampire that created the hæmogoblin. They make their saves at –5 and are 25% more likely to fall under that vampire’s control.
Like all undead hæmogoblins are affected by holy water, taking 2-8 hp of damage per vial. Hæmogoblins also take damage from sunlight. Hæmogoblins take 10 hit points of damage for every round they are exposed to bright, full sunlight. A “Continual Light” spell will also cause 1d4 hp of damage. Also they are unaffected by any mind spells (“Charm”, “Hold”, “ESP”), or “Sleep”.
Hæmogoblins have infravision to 90’.

Habitat/Society: Hæmogoblin’s are created undead, none will occur “naturally”. They can be most often found in or near the lairs of vampires. Crypts are very commonplace for hæmogoblins. They have been known to associate with ghouls for increased protection and hunting. Hæmogoblin’s prefer to eat living humans and humanoids. Often however they are forced to eat the scraps left to them by their vampire masters. If hard-pressed hæmogoblins will eat corpses.
Most hæmogoblins encountered will be in the service of a vampire lord/lady. They are often used as spies for the vampire. In one recorded incident a vampire set up one his own Hæmogoblins as a scapegoat to cover his own tracks. While any angry mob was dealing with the hæmogoblin, the vampire left the area.
Unlike a true familiar, the vampire suffers no ill effects if his hæmogoblin is destroyed.

Ecology: Hæmogoblins are undead and produce nothing. While the corpses of hæmogoblins may be useful to necromancers or sages, they have nothing else of value.

On Twitter #FollowFriday is a long-established Friday tradition.   You post your tweet with the #FollowFriday hashtag to get more followers.

Well today I want to do to bring your attention to some lesser-known or lesser trafficked social media sites.

This is the next evolution of The Best Blog You Are Not Following. This moves a bit beyond blogs into all social media.
I'll post my links and if you have any you want to share post them below.  Just keep them on topic.

Ove on Facebook there is a lot great D&D and RPG groups.  If I posted one a week I would still be posting in a year or more.  Today I want to share a couple.

I'd Rather Be Killing Monsters
https://www.facebook.com/groups/776216536226728
This group covers the same sort of material you will see here.  Started by Tim Knight of Hero Press fame it is RPG and geeky media focused.

Victorian Gamers Association
https://www.facebook.com/groups/VictorianGamersAssociation
This group is one I run and it is dedicated to all sorts of Victorian-era RPGs.  Here we talk about the games and the Victorian-era, 1837 to 1901.

Over on Instagram there is a lot of great artists.

Wayne Reynolds Art
https://www.instagram.com/waynereynoldsart/
Wayne Reynolds has been making art for D&D and Pathfinder for years.

Djinn in the Shade
https://www.instagram.com/djinnintheshade/
Djinn is an old friend of the Other Side and she has some great D&D art and the lewd adventures of her D&D character Solaine.
If you prefer something more SFW, try her other site: https://www.instagram.com/djinninthebox/

MeWe is the newest Social Media kid on the block, and it shows, so let's give some of those groups some love.

Basic Fantasy and Table Top RPG
https://mewe.com/group/5bbcd4672ee15f2bb807556c
This is a group I am active in and it needs some more active participants.  So please come by and join!  Let me know you saw it here!

And here are my sites.

Personal Sites

• My Facebook Page
• Instagram
• Twitter
• MeWe
• Pinterest 
• DriveThruRPG and DMsGuild books

The Other Side Sites

• The Other Side blog  (hint, you are here now!)
• The Other Side Publishing at DriveThruRPG
• The Other Side Facebook Page
• Instagram
• MeWe Group
• The Other Side Tumblr

Post your links below.

I want to get back to my One Man's God series, but before I do I want to take look at the various Goddess of Magic.

Hecate by Iren HorrorsOne thing myths seem to have in common, at least the handful I have covered to date, is a Goddess of Magic.  These goddesses, while different in many respects and aspects, share something in common.  They have learned the secrets of magic and these secrets seem to be something only goddess are meant to know.

Here are a few an how I see them through the lens of a Goddess of the Witches.

Ereshkigal
The world's first goth-girl.  I talked a lot about her during my wrap-up of the Babylonian, Sumerian, and Akkadian myths.  She is the goddess of the underworld and the magic associated with that. Ereshkigal is often considered to be the dark half of her sister Innana/Ishtar.

Isis
Isis is the earliest Goddess of Magic of Egypt.
With Osiris and Horus (the divine child) they make up a Holy Trinity. She is the Goddess of marriage, motherhood, fertility, magic, healing, reincarnation, and divination, to name but a few. Isis is the patroness of priestesses. One myth has Isis poisoning the Sun God Ra, offering to save him only if he would reveal his secret name. At last, at the brink of destruction, Ra gives Isis his heart, with the secret name it held, and his two eyes (the Sun and the Moon).  Isis quells the poison and ends up with Ra’s supreme power. In time the great Eye was passed along to her son Horus.  Proclus mentions a statue of her which bore the inscription “I am that which is, has been and shall be. My veil no one has lifted”. Hence, to lift the veil of Isis is to pierce the heart of a great mystery.

Hecate
Hecate got her own OMG post a while back.
Hecate is, in Greek mythology, the Goddess of darkness, magic, and witchcraft.  She is the daughter of the Titans Perses and Asteria. Unlike Artemis, who represented the moonlight and splendor of the night, Hecate represented its darkness and its terrors. On moonless nights she was believed to roam the earth with a pack of ghostly, howling dogs. She was the Goddess of sorcery and witchcraft and was especially worshiped by magicians and witches, who sacrificed black lambs and black dogs to her. As Goddess of the crossroads, Hecate and her pack of dogs were believed to haunt these remote spots, which seemed evil and ghostly places to travelers. In art Hecate is often represented with either three bodies or three heads and with serpents entwined about her neck.
Of all the deities who have covens, Hecate’s covens are the most widespread and well known. Hecate was once a fairly benign goddess in early Greek times. She later became the dread Greco-Roman Goddess of ghosts, a close confidante of Persephone, and a patron of witches. The brutally wronged Hecuba of Troy was reincarnated as one of Hecate’s black dogs, which accompanied her on her night walks. When Hades kidnapped Persephone in the later Greek myth, farseeing Hecate was the only one who witnessed it. Hecate was worshiped at three-way crossroads at night even by ordinary Greek families and could ward off ghosts if properly propitiated. But Romans also believed She had more sinister worshipers; the witches and sorceresses who could coerce even the gods to do their will.

Freyja
Freyja is associated with magic, but mostly with seiðr. What is seiðr? Well, it is a bit of an odd translation but it usually refers to a pre-Christian pagan form of magic.  Today we would shorthand it and call it "witchcraft" but that is not exactly right.
I hope to cover her more when I finally get to Norse myths.

Ceridwen
Celtic Goddess of wisdom, intelligence, magic, divination, and enchantment. She is the Goddess of the cauldron. Popular among the Celtic Classical and Craft of the Wise Traditions.
Cerridwen’s cauldron has the power to return the dead to life.

Áine
Another  Celtic Goddess is the Irish goddess Áine.  She is also the Goddess of Summer.
I want to get back to Celtic myths soon.

Coyolxāuhqui
I forgot to mention Coyolxāuhqui last week when I did Central American myths.  She is the sister of Huitzilopochtli (the God of War in the D&DG).  She is most often depicted as the Goddess of the Moon when she was beheaded by her brother and he tossed her head into the sky.

Huitaca
Also known as Xubchasgagua she is the Goddess of arts, dance and music, witchcraft, sexual liberation, and the Moon. That is quite the portfolio.  Like many Goddesses, she is associated with the owl as her animal.  She is described as a "rebel Goddess." She is really the archetypical witch.
She is associated with the religion of the Muisca which is now Columbia in South America.

From D&D

Wee Jas
Wee Jas also got her own post a while back.  Wee Jas is what Hecate would be if she were a Suel god. Or more to the point the D&D version of Hecate, the Goddess of Magic, Witches, Ghosts, Necromancy and the Crossroads.   It is said that Wee Jas guards the doorways to the dead and the same is true for Hecate.  In fact, I have used them rather interchangeably for years.

I think for my own version of Wee Jas, I would start with the Dragon 88 version, add a little bit of what we saw in D&D 3.x, and then change her "Death" portfolio to "Spirits" ("Wee Jas" = "Ouija").  She can summon undead, and her priests may do so as well, but no raise dead spells.  I rather liked the Raven Queen from D&D 4 and 5, so pass off Wee Jas' control of Death (save for spirits) to the Raven Queen.  Since the Raven Queen is described as a young or new Goddess, it could even be that she is the daughter of Wee Jas.  Ioun was one of Wee Jas' first students.

Mystra
Mystra is the Forgotten Realms Goddess of Magic.  I have not talked much about her here because my knowledge of the Realms is limited.  But I have always wanted to explore the Mystra-Mystara connection.  Is there one? Likely not, but there should be at least in my games!

I am sure there are more, lots more even, but this is good for now.

If you have not heard the news it is official, Gen Con 2020 has been canceled.



You can read more here:
https://www.gencon.com/press/gen-con-2020-cancellation

With many cons canceling including Comic-Con this was too much of a public health risk.  We had planned to not go this year back in late March, but I was hoping that things might turn around.

My hope would have been justified if we didn't have a complete moron in charge of our country, but I should have known better.

This is the right call really.

If you look at the high-risk population and the average Gen Con attendee, there is a lot of overlap. 

Now, of course, we don't know what will be going on in late July, early August, but I do know that plenty of schools are considering not opening up for Fall term and they stand to lose more than Gen Con by several orders of magnitude.

So I am sad yes. I have not told my kids yet. 
I have canceled my hotel I had downtown (at the J.W. Marriott where we stay every year).

I was looking forward to finishing the great Order of the Platinum Dragon campaign we play at every Gen Con.  The characters are just one adventure away from retirement.

One of the big influences I have had for my Monstrous Mondays and my new monster book has been my mom.

No kidding.

My mom loves sci-fi and horror. When I started playing D&D back in the 80s she took one of my D&D books, I think it was the AD&D DMG, and she proclaimed "this is just mythology and math!"  But she loved all the monsters and she had always loved telling all us kids stories about them.

Here is one of them!

She told us this story back when I was in sixth grade.  I know that it is not 100% original, but it still thrilled us as kids. Though in my mom's defense, she never read any Clark Ashton Smith.

Gladyolus
Monstrous Plant
Frequency: Very Rare
No. Enc.: 2-20 (5-100)
Alignment: Chaotic (Chaotic Evil)
Movement: 0' (0') [0"]
Armor Class: 9 [10]
Hit Dice: 1d8 (5 hp)
Attacks: 1 (blood drain)
Damage: 1d4+1
Special: Nag (see below), takes 2x damage from fire
Size: Small
Save: Monster 1
Morale: 12
Treasure Hoard Class: Nil
XP: 15

According to tales, the Gladyolus flower began not as a plant but as a woman named Gladys.  Gladys was not a happy woman.  She nagged her adult children, her friends, but most of all she nagged her husband.  One day she was complaining about something when her husband finally snapped and he killed her.  Seeing what he had done he decided to dig up his garden and bury Gladys in it.
The next spring the flowers he had planted grew, but all had Gladys' face and voice.
The nagging drove her husband to kill himself and the Gladyolus fed on the corpse.

The Gladoylus is a monstrous plant that feeds on the blood of warm-blooded creatures.  Humanoids are its favorite source of food.  The plant flower has the face of a woman.  When encountering humanoid creatures each flower begins to talk to berate the creatures.  On a failed save vs. Spells the creatures will wade into the plants to attempt to get them to be quiet.  Once in the midst of the plants they will all begin to attack, up to 1d10 plants per round, doing 1d4+1 per plant.

The plants can't move and take double damage from fire.

--

So I am solidifying my stat-block for this book.  I am going to opt for Advanced Labyrinth Lord compatibility.  This solves two really big issues.  First, it gives a solid XP matrix to work with.  Since LL is one of the most popular retro-clones on the market, this covers a lot of players.  Second, it also gives me a Treasure Type/Horde Class that is easier to use and I don't need to invent my own.

I am still going to add Type, Frequency, and Size.  But I don't think I am going use the size = different HD as I talked about last week.  Adding Type, Frequency, and Size. is easy and won't detract too much on people's games.  Changing HD type might be a bridge too far.  So my current plan is to provide them as an Appendix.  So this creature would be listed as: "Gladyolus, Small, 1d6 (4 hp)."

This is going to be a lot of fun!

A new Kickstarter from Goodman Games and good friend of the Other Side Jason Vey!

DCC RPG: Fred Saberhagen's Empire of the East


https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1409961192/dcc-rpg-fred-saberhagens-empire-of-the-east?ref=theotherside

So what do we have here?  Goodman Games.  Dungeon Crawl Classics AND Mutant Crawl Classics.  Jason Vey of AFMBE, Castles & Crusades, AND Night Shift fame.

I always enjoyed the work of Fred Saberhagen and discovered him at the same time I was getting into AD&D, so in a way I always associate him with AD&D even though I can't point to a single thing of his I imported into my games.

This might change that.

Jason has had a solid game design career.  He worked on a number of great AFMBE books for Eden, LOTS of Castles & Crusades and Amazing Adventures (which he is the line developer) and of course OSR games with Elf Lair Games.  And yes we worked together on Night Shift.

So these reasons alone are enough to get this. 

The other day I posted some concepts for a set of "Old-School Compatibility Logos."

This morning I decided to expand on the idea some more.

Old-School Compatibility Logos Page
I created a page here with all the logos and a list of details about the games I like to use for each one.  I am not indicating 100% compatibility with a single game, but rather a compatibility with a play style.  I have also listed the DriveThruRPG categories I put items I have written that would use these logos/banners.

You can see that page here:  https://bit.ly/osclogos
If you could, please use this shortened URL for linking.

Sub-Categories on The Other Side store.
I also modified them slightly and used them as sub-categories over at the Other Side storefront at DriveThruRPG.



Here is how the Basic-Era Sub-Category looks.



Going to play around with it for a while and see what happens.

One Man's God: Central American Mythos

I return to One Man's God today with one of my favorite groups of Mythos, and the one that is the most problematic in terms of dealing with real-world history and myths.


Central American Mythos is a catch-all section that includes gods and monsters from a variety of societies and times.

Olmec: 1500 BCE to about 400 BCE, Mexico
Maya: 2000 BCE to 1697 CE, southeastern Mexico (Yucatan), all of Guatemala and Belize, and the western portions of Honduras and El Salvador.
Mezcala: 700 BCE to 650 CE, Central Mexico.
Zapotec: 700 BCE to 1521 CE, Central/South Central Mexico.
Toltec:  900 CE to 1168 CE, Central Mexico. (and there is still debate on this)
Aztec: 1300 CE to 1521 CE, Central Mexico.

While these people and civilizations overlapped and had influences on each other, there are a number of distinct differences.


Another issue to deal with here is the nature of demons and the gods of these myths.  In a very real sense, these myths are the epitome of "One Man's God is Another Man's Demon."

Even according to scholars it is difficult to tell what is a demon and what is a god.  From the outsider's point of view, many of the Aztec and Mayan gods can be considered "Demonic" and were certainly called that by the Catholic Priests that would come to these lands from Spain (predominantly).

A good example are the Aztec Tzitzimitl, or demons (or gods) from the stars.  They were thought to have been the demons that attack the sun during a solar eclipse and also been the gods that protected to place where humans were created.

Tzitzimitl
Undead Demon
FREQUENCY:  Very Rare
NO.  APPEARING:  1-6
ARMOR CLASS: 3
MOVE:  12" Fly 24"
HIT DICE:  9+9 (50 hp)
%  IN  LAIR:  10%
TREASURE  TYPE:  Nil
NO.  OF  ATTACKS:  3 or 1
DAMAGE/ATTACK:  1-6 (claw)/1-6 (claw)/2-12 (bite) or bone club (1-10) + Special
SPECIAL  ATTACKS: Cause Darkness
SPECIAL  DEFENSES:  +1  or  better weapon to hit; double damage from sunlight
MAGIC  RESISTANCE:  25%
INTELLIGENCE:  Average
ALIGNMENT:  Chaotic  Evil
SIZE:  L  (9')
PSIONIC ABILITY:  Nil

Tzitzimitl are the demonic spirits of women who have died in child-birth or stillborn babies.  They appear as giant skeletal women wearing skirts decorated with the skulls and bones of their enemies. Around their necks, they wear the still-beating hearts of these enemies.  They are charged with protecting the lands where humans were created and thus they are invoked by a Curandero when a woman is giving birth.  They protect the mother and the child but demand that the ones that die be turned over to them.
They have been known to attack the sun during eclipses and this the time when they manifest in the Prime Plane. 
They attack with a claw-claw-bite routine or with a legbone from a defeated enemy.  On any successful hit with this leg bone, the victim must save vs. Paralysis or be blinded.
These creatures are semi-undead and can be turned by a cleric as Special.

One god in the book that works very well as a demon is Camazotz, the God of Bats.
His name means "Death Bat" and as I have pointed out before he could be a God, a demon or even a very, very powerful vampire.  In the Popol Vuh his description is very much demon-like.

Demon Lord, Camazotz
The Death Bat, Bat God, Sudden Bloodletter, Slaughter Lord 
FREQUENCY:  Unique
NO.  APPEARING:  1
ARMOR CLASS: -2
MOVE:  12" Fly 24" (infinite at night)
HIT DICE:  24+24 (132 hp)
%  IN  LAIR:  10%
TREASURE  TYPE:  Qx10
NO.  OF  ATTACKS:  3
DAMAGE/ATTACK:  1-8 (claw)/1-8 (claw)/1-12 (bite) + Special, Blood Drain 3 Points of Con
SPECIAL  ATTACKS: Cause Darkness, See in Darkness
SPECIAL  DEFENSES:  +2  or  better weapon to hit; see below
MAGIC  RESISTANCE:  50%
INTELLIGENCE:  Genius
ALIGNMENT:  Chaotic  Evil
SIZE:  L  (15')
PSIONIC ABILITY:  Nil

Camazotz is the demon god of bats and vampires. But he is not truly a god or a demon or a vampire but something that is thousands of years old and akin to all three.  Vampires pay him homage more out of fear than actual piety. Humans on the other hand worship and hope that he will reward them with the gift of immortality (vampirism).  He requires blood sacrifices every new moon.  Camazotz himself goes through periods of extreme torpor and frenzied blood lust.

Camazotz dreams of one day destroying the god of the sun.

Camazotz attacks as a vampire with a claw/claw/bite routine of 1d8/1d18/1d12.  His bite (any natural roll of 18, 19 or 20) will drain 3 points of Constitution per round.  Anyone reduced to 0 becomes a vampire under his control.

He can see perfectly well in even the most complete of darkness, magical or mundane. He can also cause darkness as per the spell to 100’.  In darkness his AC is reduced to -4 and +4 or better weapons are needed to strike him.

He lives in a dark cave-like plane know as Xibalba on the Abyss where he serves as a vassal to Orcus. Again this is not out of fidelity but out of fear of the Demon Prince of Undead.  The cave is dark and the floors are stained with blood.  In this cave, Camazotz can summon up to 1000 bats to do his will.

Camazozt appears as a giant bat whose mouth is filled with bloody fangs.  He can also appear as an old man or a young warrior with bat wings.

He also makes a great demon lord to the Nabassu demons from Monster Manual II.

Tlazōlteōtl
This goddess is listed as the Goddess of Vice in the book.  She is also a "sin-eater" or someone that takes on the sins of others.   Among other things she is also the Goddess of Healing, Midwifery, Childbirth and the Goddess of Sweeping and Brooms.

Sounds like a perfect witch goddess to me!

What is Missing?

As to be expected with several lands, cultures, and 3,000 years of history, a few things are missing from the pages of the Deities and Demigods.

For example Dwarves. Dwarves in earlier Olmec culture and then in later Aztec culture are considered to be "touched by the gods" or the offspring of "witches."

Werejaguars are also an important creature with many warriors having the ability to become jaguars in battle.

Werejaguars
FREQUENCY:  Rare
NO.  APPEARING:  1-4
ARMOR CLASS: 3
MOVE:  12"
HIT DICE:  6+12 (39 hp)
%  IN  LAIR:  50%
TREASURE  TYPE:  Nil
NO.  OF  ATTACKS:  3
DAMAGE/ATTACK:  1-4 (claw)/1-4 (claw)/1-6 (bite) + Special
SPECIAL  ATTACKS: Lycanthropic curse, see below
SPECIAL  DEFENSES:  Obsidian or +1  or  better weapon to hit
MAGIC  RESISTANCE:  0%
INTELLIGENCE:  Average
ALIGNMENT:  Neutral Evil
SIZE:  M  (6')
PSIONIC ABILITY:  Nil

Werejaguars are often found in tropical cities and ancient jungle ruins, but will appear in more temperate climates as well. These lycanthropes can assume the form of a jaguar, a human, or a bipedal, jaguar-like hybrid of the two forms.
Lycanthropy: If a victim is reduced to half total HP will become a werejaguar on next new moon.
Werejaguars can only be hit by obsidian weapons or by magic.

But the biggest miss, in my opinion, is the God Seven Macaw.

Vucub Caquix, or Seven Macaw, as a trickster demi-god and thus has the best chances of interacting with the characters.  Like many tricksters, he is chaotic, and also in this case evil.  He is associated with the Hero Twins Hunahpu and Xbalanque.  He tricks them into thinking he is the God of the Sun, Moon, and Corn.  They respond by killing him and becoming the gods of the Sun and Moon themselves while their father also becomes the new Corn God.  But like all good tricksters, he comes back.

I don't fault the authors and editors of the D&DG for missing certain aspects of these myths or getting them "wrong."  While researching this I was reading that new translations going on in the 1980s and into the 1990s changed how we now view these stories.  And again, with 3,000 years of myths told and retold across seven or more civilizations there would be more to put in than the book could allow.

There is a lot more I could go about here, but one of my goals is to contain myself to the entries in the book and only add when needed.