Lord of the Winds?

Before it falls too far into the past and the details are as such less fresh in my mind, I wanted to write something in these pages regarding The Lord of the Rings experience from this summer and how I was almost completely blown away, literally.

For the roll out of the Blue Ray extended editions of the Lord of the Rings movies, the powers that be decided to run the extended editions of the movies on the big screens at select AMC Theaters.  One such location was on the Streets of Woodfield, down the road some distance from my home in Mount Prospect, IL.  They ran the three films, one each, on three consecutive Tuesdays in June, and only one showing for each at 7pm.  Peter Jackson's (exclusive) introduction for the Fellowship of the Rings included a mention of the Blue Ray editions but he was quick to point out that while he would appreciate any purchases of it, the best way to see the films was on the big screen and of the extended editions.  For Return of the King, enjoyed mentioning that seeing six thousand Riders of Rohan, if the full number only briefly, was going to be one of the big treats, and it was.  In fact, I think the Battle of Pelennor Fields was about the greatest film footage I have ever witnessed, particularly this time around.  Awesome is the only word!

I was in attendance for the Fellowship of the Rings and Return of the King but was thwarted in my efforts to see The Two Towers due to a tornado.  It happened to hit during the time I would have been in watching the film, and I would have been many more miles away from where it hit if I had gone, but the weather leading up to it convinced me not to go.  There was a great deal of storm damage, particularly near the post office, and mostly in the form of broken trees. Some ten thousand plus residents were left without power and even three days later half were still waiting for service.  A few years ago we had a big storm, though no tornado, blow through that knocked out our building but we were spared this go around.  That time, we didn't have restoration of service for five days.  I had fortunately not been shopping for food for a few weeks so very little was lost.  They also upgraded much of the infrastructure at that time or this year might have been far worse.

All in all, the other two movies were well worth watching on the big screen and I hope they do something similar during the lead up to the release of the Hobbit move(s).

Dragon Strike (1993)

Recently one of my regular groups had the chance to dust off the classic Dragon Strike game.  We had a lot of fun with the simplicity of the characters and a good laugh at the video which could actually confuse newer players as to the proper playing of the game.  While a board game, it has at its core a spirit akin to TSR’s D&D of the day, some RPGing elements, as well as the mechanics of many good mini skirmish games.  Certainly, it has all the basics of the above.

Like the video, the box can be a bit deceiving in that there are no mounted characters or monsters.  It evokes the feel of a cool combat game, though, so perhaps the details aren't all that important.  The name, at least, lets you in on one of the core mechanics; a dragon is going to strike any group during an adventure if the players dawdle.

There are a good amount of components, rather impressive, really, but it should be remembered that this game was released in part in answer to the success of HeroQuest, so much of the accoutrements will be familiar to anyone who played that game or its expansions.  The mechanics differ significantly but the underlying play experience is quite similar.  There are obstacle counters, pits doors, traps, etc., as well as three dice, an eight-sided, a ten-sided, and a twelve-sided die.  I picked up five additional sets from Games Plus where we play so that everyone could have their own set and gameplay would be quickened.

The miniatures are simple without much detail but there are a good many of them.  The secondhand game I picked up was complete but the minis had been painted with varying degrees of success so I soaked them in Simple Green over night then stripped away the paint with an old toothbrush.  There are six characters, only five of which come into play, and lots of monsters including a dragon, of course, the evil mage, and many others.  Incidentally, I found out that American Science and Surplus had a ton of sprues of the original Dragon Strike miniatures, just the grey and the green, though, so I bought a ton of them for pennies on the dollar to fill out a number of factions for some mass combat games I was running at various gamedays and conventions.  It’s my understanding that they still have dozens of them, though only a handful in the store, so if you want more than they have on hand talk to the manager and I am sure they can arrange to get you plenty more.

There are a number of card decks, the treasure and trap decks which the players will draw from during the course of adventures, and spells cards for the evil mage as well as for the player character spell casters.  There are sneak attack cards for the thieves and reference cards for all of the characters to help them choose their actions during play.  Each monster also has a card with its stats and information on how it operates.

 

The character cards are larger with a photo of each as seen in the video, very Eighties though the game came out in 1993.  On the reverse side are the stats and other information.

There are some clips that come with the game that allow you to stand up the character cards and other clips to put on the side and slide up or down to keep track of hit points.

For the Dragon Master, as the game facilitator is called, there is a DM screen, a rule book, an adventure book, and a map book.  Some of the same clips used to keep track of player hit points can be used to keep track of monster hit points along the edge of the DM screen.  Since the spell cards act as the other manner in which bookkeeping is handled, there’s no need in this game for paper or pencils unless you wish to make notes on the maps for various things.

There are two two-sided map boards to represent the four different environments in which adventures can take place.  There are a castle map, a cavern location, an outdoor environment, and a city map, too.  If you find a secondhand set of this game, even if incomplete but still containing the map boards, you might want to pick it up just for the kitschy battle maps.

There are over a dozen different scenarios from which to choose, that can take place in the various locations, depending on the number of players and the level of difficulty at which the DM wishes to challenge the players. We cherry picked a handful of them starting off with easy ones and progressing through to the toughest.

The maps are kinda cool, illustrated in three dimension, though they all include some features which actually come into play and others that are to be ignore, serving only to give some character to the locations.  They are divided into one-inch squares to facilitate ease of movement.  The maps in the map book show the DM where the monsters are and they are added to the boards when the player characters come into line of sight.

Along the side is a timer track that lets the players and DM know how long the adventure is meant to take and when the Dragon will Strike happens if the adventurers take too long on their various quests.

All in all it is a fun and fast-paced game suitable for beginning players of the genre.  The level of complexity is low so it is unlikely to challenge seasoned players of similar RPGs or board games but can be a good way to pass an evening and steep yourselves in nostalgia.

Pathfinder Group - Called Up from the Dugout

So it appears a group of regular players at the local game store, Games Plus, needed a replacement GM and I was asked to step in.  They've been playing Pathfinder for the last few years, having converted their 3.5 Eberron game over after giving 4E a short run for its money.  Their GM to this point for some time is moving out of state and one of the players is familiar with my GMing style, and thought I would be a good fit.  The group which has been continuous at Games Plus for nearly thirty years is known as Flame World, as homage to an early campaign, I believe.

They have a dozen plus people in the group, any six or eight of which might be available on any given week to play, so there are some logistical things to keep in mind when running such a game.  Although I had not run any PF directly in the past, I have the core book PDF, access to the PFSRD website, and have downloaded some monster cards and other bits to assist me in keeping the current campaign going.  Although they were fine with me switching system and settings if I felt that I needed to do so, I decided to maintain the system and transition from the setting.  They were often away from the main areas in the setting anyway, currently off on an island mission that really could be anywhere, so that shouldn't be too jarring.  Certainly keeping the system made sense, since they have all invested in the core book as well as in numerous supplements.  Since I run games with my laptop handy and could use some landscape oriented inserts for one of my GM screens, it seemed like the way to go, though I also wanted to give them a chuckle with what I might put on the players' side of the screen.

For the players' side insert, I snagged some images from the PF core book and added some appropriate text, "Flame-World" subtitled "The TPKening" just for a laugh.  I cut up the landscape alphabetized skills charts and rearranged them into more useful groupings for my own GMing style.  The campaign currently is about tenth level (I asked those who were lagging to raise their characters to that level to put all of the PCs on the same footing and to make encounter design going forward somewhat simpler for myself.  They've recently discovered that the agents of a Ancient White Dragon having been sending them on quests to secure items for their master that the Wyrm intends to use against the party.  Now on its islend, they have located where its lair but have several other foes to defeat before they can even hope to get close and destroy this evil menace.  It's already shaping up to be a good campaign and I'll blog more about it in coming weeks.

Prince Valiant The Storytelling Game (1989)

One of my weekly groups was between other large roleplaying game campaigns and we’d been playing board games and card games for a little while as we determined our next move.  There are a few different roleplaying game systems I have tried in small doses, or merely read, that I wished I could have given a more extensive forum for play.  Since summer time tends to cause random absenteeism among gamers, myself included, I thought about which games might lend themselves to smaller numbers of players who might come and go from week to week.  The episodic, low-prep, Prince Valiant seemed like a good fit.

Prince Valiant The Storytelling Game was published in 1989 by Chaosium Inc., designed by Greg Stafford with William Dunn and Lynn Willis.  It (mostly) used illustrations by Hal Foster, who created the Prince Valiant (in the Days of King Arthur) comic strip in 1937 which continues to be syndicated with other artists at the helm by King Features.  The game employs a simple coin flip mechanic that manifests in a number of useful ways.  Heads is good and Tails is not.  It's also good to be flipping multiple coins, to get positive modifiers to your flipping, and sometimes to get more Heads than an opponent in opposed situations. Within a little over one hundred pages, the rulebook includes a one-page version of the rules, a basic game, an advanced game, and some optional rules, as well as a pile of scenarios for adventure and character sheets, some ready for play and others blank.  In the simple forms of the game, one player acts as the Storyteller and facilitates the adventures.  In the advanced rules, any and all players at the table can have their turns running the game, even during the very same adventure, everyone adding to the story as it develops.

One major change, and some might cringe at this, was to substitute dice for the coins, a one, two, or three being Tails and four, five, or six being Heads.  What can I say?  We like rolling dice.  To that end I brought along plenty of six-siders and some dice cups from Pirates of the Caribbean Dead Man's Chest Pirates Dice game I picked up on the cheap when the Gamers' Paradise Chicagoland chain of game stores was going out of business a couple of years ago.  As some might recall, after they decided to close down they moved all of their stock to just three stores and in their last two months they began discounting their stock, beginning at 10% off, then 20%, and kept increasing the discount until they were at 90% off in their last week. This game, with its dented box, was one of a number of things I grabbed in the last couple of weeks.

Rather than beginning with the one-page rules, I opted to start the group all as Knights in the basic game.  I took some of the blank character sheets and added some of the starting information to a dozen of them including names, class (everyone begins as a Knight), two of their six starting skills (Arms and Riding are possessed by all Knights), beginning equipment, and 800 Fame points.  I gave them names beginning with the twelve first letters of the alphabet to avoid a stymied player from being Bob the Knight or Sir Osis, to help preserve some sense of a serious setting.  For some games those sort of naming conventions can be fun but I prefer the jokes to be part of extemporaneous table talk rather than ingrained in the characters.  I also added some clip art as crests for the Knights, suggesting that the players choose something that would symbolize the type of Knight they might be trying to conceptualize.

The players divide seven points between the two possible attributes of Brawn, which covers most physical exploits, and Presence, which covers non-physical areas.  They chose an additional four skills and divided nine points between their total six skills.  Their gear included a sword, a lance, a dagger, a standard horse, medium armor, fine clothes (as befits a Knight), and 5 gold pieces.  This is all standard character creation and outfitting as per the basic rules. Since this game wasn't to include large battles (at least for now), I did suggest that players not choose the Battle skill which replaces the Arms skill when characters are involved in Mass Combat.

We began with the back-story being that the three characters had been knighted, starting them with the standard 800 Fame for such, 500 for beginning characters plus 300 more for being knighted.  Prior to the start of our campaign, the Knights had helped stave off a Hun attack on their town and castle, gaining their knighthood as reward, each previously being part of the castle guard.  Of course, they wanted to celebrate right away, so off to the Sickly Boar Tavern for drinks and carousing.  The tavern keeper felt compelled to treat them to a night of free drinks because of their part in saving the town, and they enjoyed themselves, though with temperance since they also had a mission the next day to track the retreating Huns and ensure they were not going to rally and return.  A couple of local toughs, pig farmers, were asked to give up their table for the illustrious Knights, which they did begrudgingly.  After the evening's festivities, two of the Knights returned straight away to the castle though one opted to check out a local inn rather than retire to his usual room in the castle.  Along the way, he was waylaid by the pig farmers who had been lying in wait hoping to catch one or more of the Knights unaware.  The brawl that ensued was little challenge for the Knight and he finished them in short order then secured lodgings and slept fitfully.  The next day the three Knights retrieved their horses and were off to track the Huns and this is where we left off for the session. We'll pick it back up this week and I look forward to seeing how they handle themselves against more serious opponents.

Happy Fourth!

Good times in Mount Prospect, IL, for fireworks on the fourth.  The works were cancelled last Thursday due to high winds so they folded them into tonight's display.

EN World's Chicago Gameday 29

There's still plenty of seats for next Saturday's (July 9th, 2011) EN World Chicago Gameday 29.  Follow the link to Buzz's homesite for all of the info and a link to the sign up thread.  It's mostly roleplaying games but a vast assortment of them in two slots (plus the breakfast slot for those early risers).  Held at Games Plus game store three times a year for the last ten plus years, this excellent event can be an all day affair or you can simply sign up for the early or later slot to get a little weekend gaming in your schedule.

The Work of Ray Harryhausen: A Gamer's Perspective

With the impending release of the Ray Harryhausen film/documentary, Ray Harryhausen: Special Effects Titan (2011), later this summer, I thought it would be fun to explore some of  his body of work and review those films through the eyes of a gamer.  I will be obtaining a number of the movies through Netflix and some I have in my own collection.  When I have a film on DVD with a case, additional information, or extras, I will try to include some details but mostly restricting myself to when the material is pertinent to the interests of me as a gamer or to me as a Harryhausen fan.

Although the full merits of the particular films can be debated, I'm a fan of all of Harryhausen's works.  I'm not blind to the flaws, I just love the style so much that I can look past them.  I won't be writing individual blogs on his short films and earliest work, nor full blogs on films where he had little involvement or limited amounts of special effects such as Mighty Joe Young (1949), It Came from Beneath the Sea (1955), The 3 Worlds of Gulliver (1960), and First Men in the Moon (1964). While there is merit in all of Harryhausen's work, the aforementioned do not offer much or enough for me to write regarding their use for gaming, with the possible exception of Gulliver, though the use to gamers in that film has more to do with the original novel, in my opinion.

Out of his entire body of work, I am choosing to give my perspective on just nine films with which Harryhausen was involved: 20 Million Miles to Earth (1957), The 7th Voyage of Sinbad (1958), Mysterious Island (1961), Jason and the Argonauts (1963), One Million Years B.C. (1966), The Valley of Gwangi (1969), The Golden Voyage of Sinbad (1973), Sinbad and the Eye of the Tiger (1977), and Clash of the Titans (1981).  I will take them out of chronological order with One Million Years B.C. first, then Mysterious Island, and then The Valley of Gwangi.  There are interesting ideas in each of these three but other works have a great deal more for me to discuss.  After those I'll look at 20 Million Miles to Earth, in particular with an eye to what Harryhausen brought to Ymir, the animated alien character.  I'll follow that with a look at Clash of the Titans, with some comments on the recent remake.  The home stretch will be the four films I think give the most fodder for gaming, The 7th Voyage of Sinbad, Jason and the Argonauts, The Golden Voyage of Sinbad, and Sinbad and the Eye of the Tiger.  All of the four are rife with elements that any RPG Game Master should find inspirational.

*edit* You can now this program on Amazon Prime (for FREE if you're a member) here.