Castles & Crusades Players Handbook – Collector’s Pack

https://trolllord.com/product/castles-crusades-players-handbook-collectors-pack/

Oh, this is beautiful. Troll Lord Games is coming out with a Castles & Crusades Players Handbook – Collector’s Pack, with a new cover and the 11th Edition printing. Nothing has changed, which is wonderful, but we are getting a new cover!

There are some other nice things in here, such as a coffee mug, canvas printing, a mouse pad, stickers, and a few other goodies to be revealed. The preorder is up now!

The best dungeon-crawling game just got better.

Dungeon Crawl Classics: Beloved

Dungeon Crawl Classics is gaining a cult following and a beloved status. There was one D&D YouTuber who criticized the game as a paragon of poor organization, only to eat their words after fans called them out. It is not poorly organized; the style harkens back to the original inspirations and the adventures' style. An apology was issued, and all is well, but the episode highlighted that the game is not like Old School Essentials and has sort of established itself as a different experience, catering to a different audience.

This is a game where you read the adventure rather than skimming it or just looking at bullet points.

While I like the condensed, OSE-style of clear organization and bullet-pointing of all the rooms' contents, that style is more their game, and I enjoy taking time to prep a level of an adventure and having enough flavor text to figure out what is going on, while also being entertained and enjoying the reading.

But DCC is an excellent game, and while some say it is OSR, I feel it has moved beyond the OSR and become something all its own. It is one of the best D&D 3.5E reimaginings, with Appendix N inspiration and a gonzo aesthetic.

DCC is less old-school and more gonzo science fantasy.

OSE is more OSR and traditional fantasy.

The OSR and the OGL

One of the best things to happen in gaming is the messy divorce between the OGL and the OSR. What Wizards did by attacking the OGL and destroying it forced the community out of their lazy comfort zone and fired up designers and players to create real alternatives.

Everyone knew how easy it was to use the OGL, clone SRD content, and rely on D&D's popularity to sell their games. After the OGL's death, people were forced to change.

And the games we have gotten since then are original, free from license issues, free for the community to support, and the entire event put a shot of sorely-needed energy into third-party publishers and those who play these games.

Wizards created their competitors.

Goodman Games has stepped up and become a major player. Troll Lord Games is incredible with Castles & Crusades, and this went OGL-free. Shadowdark became an overnight juggernaut. Games like Adventures Dark and Deep, OSRIC, Swords & Wizardry, ACKS, and Hyperborea all stepped up. Old School Essentials is going OGL-free. People got behind the alternatives instead of half-heartedly supporting them.

Even the 5E clones are doing relatively well. Paizo has benefited and is stronger than it was.

The 2d6 games under the OGL are moving forward, creating new concepts and ideas, and improving the game overall, rather than relying on familiarity and nostalgia. What the OGL did was tie us to the old ways, and now that we have broken free, the OSR can innovate and flourish. People were always too worried about "breaking familiarity," but now they have to innovate to survive.

The OSR benefited from this innovation once the OGL's chains were broken.

Even games outside of the OSR are using OSR concepts and gameplay.

It is a better world without the OGL.

Kickstarter: Book of Fell Wisdom (Adventures Dark & Deep)

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/brwgames/adventures-dark-and-deep-book-of-fell-wisdom

I like Adventures Dark & Deep a lot. As an expanded and reimagined first edition game, it is one of the best we have outside of OSRIC. We are getting a new book this year: basically, everything that didn't make it into the ADAD tomes we have, plus some of the PDF-exclusive evil classes the creator put out. And here is a list from the notification pager:

• Clerical servants of demon lords
• Necromancers
• Witches
• Alchemy
• Ley Lines
• Demiplanes
• New spells
• Followers for high-level characters
• Courtly intrigue
• Generational play

I am looking forward to this one a lot, since ADAD is the de facto new standard of first-edition gaming, expanded and beautifully presented in two massive tomes of first-edition goodness. Outside of Old School Essentials, this is one of the best OSR games out there, well worth your attention, and it captures the 1E vibe perfectly.

The Kickstarter should be happening in the next week, sometime from what I hear, so put this one on your radar, and if you haven't checked this out, please do so!

Cleaning Up My DCC Library

I have too much junk!

The zine culture, small publishing, endless modules, crowd-funded mega modules, and all this other "stuff" for DCC have my game bloated and unplayable. The DCC bloat feels as bad as the Shadowdark bloat at this time, and I find myself having to pare down my collection to the absolute best of the best and put all the junk in storage.

I am there with 5E, and I found focusing my collection just on Tales of the Valiant, and using the Shard VTT to support it with character creation, is my best answer for the mire of junk I find myself stuck in.

All of a sudden, 5E feels playable again.

The mess of options and fluff is gone.

And I am left with a smaller, more focused, compelling game. It is so easy to get overwhelmed when a game reaches a specific size; you just quit playing it.

I am there with DCC right now, and I can't play the game and shy away from it since my shelf is a mess, crowded, filled with junk, and unplayable. I would play you more if I had less of you. I want a smaller, cleaner, more focused "fun center" and not one stocked and jammed with so many books it looks like a disaster zone.

Right now, I don't even have any room for my dice on that shelf, and it is a huge shelf. When a game gets larger than one shelf, it is too much game.

I get why some flock to one-book games, like the excellent Dragonslayer. One book is all you need. Not a library. I could play this and one of the megadungeons, and be set.

Off the Shelf: Hyperborea

Let's pull Hyperborea out of our storage crates and put the game back on the shelves.

Hyperborea is very similar to the classic first edition, and it's compatible with both Swords & Wizardry and OSRIC. It is a strange game meant for swords and sorcery and not high fantasy. Hyperborea is a better choice (for some) than Dungeon Crawl Classics, offering a more traditional experience that lacks much of that game's table-based play and randomness, while retaining an intense, gonzo, Conan-style feel.

I have not really gotten into Hyperborea, as I am more of a fan of first and second editions than I am heavily modified derivatives. Still, I see the strengths of a game like this, where the experience is more like savage sorcery than your traditional Arthurian knights. Modern Dungeons & Dragons tends to slip into a pseudo-Renaissance setting mixed with the Knights of the Round Table. These days, D&D is more an allegory for modern street adventures than anything in the fantasy genre. I like a heavily themed game that gives me a barbaric feeling, as this one does.

The game is contained in two books, one for players and the other for referees, and it is a tight implementation of the rules. It is 100% compatible with any first edition or even Swords and Wizardry, so you will not go without adventures or monsters.

The magic is more traditional and does not have spell failure or spell mishaps like Dungeon Crawl Classics does. The original game never had wacky spell failure, so I understand where they’re coming from. The gonzo and crazy nature of the world is where the focus is, instead of an internal focus where magic mutates you. Here, the focus isn’t on mutation and randomness. Referees and players, not the rules, enforce the gonzo, insane nature of the world.

This is the key difference between Hyperborea and Dungeon Crawl Classics. Hyperborea does not rely on randomness to convey its theme and feeling. The game will be as gonzo and insane as you make it. If you want something to happen, make it happen, and it does. There are times when Dungeon Crawl Classics feels like “gonzo with training wheels” when it is far easier to be less reliant on charts and tables and random results, and do it yourself, given what you know and like. You will always get the result and craziness that is closer to your heart if you do not use a table and let it tell you what happens next.

That is why some prefer Dungeon Crawl Classics as a game that you migrate from the fifth edition. The charts and tables tell you what can happen, and you need that level of training to understand what savage swords and sorcery all are about. For experienced groups and game Masters, it is far easier to say something crazy happens and then enforce the genre through direct rulings instead of chart results. I still like the tables in Dungeon Crawl Classics, but having played these games for decades, I don’t really need them. There are times when I find the results on the charts limiting and less imaginative than what's in my head. I suppose I would have more fun with the game like Hyperborea, where I can “say what happens just happens.”

This is going alongside my first edition collection and my second edition books, along with the grandmaster game of OSRIC, and joining my games on my living room shelf. A solid tabletop game, fewer books than my bloated DCC collection, and I look forward to reading this and having some fun.

DCC vs. Second Edition

 If I had to keep one game for fantasy, would it be Second Edition or Dungeon Crawl Classics? While my love of a combined Second and First Edition is strong, the fun factor of DCC can't be discounted.

DCC has far, far, far better support than Second Edition, and even ongoing and regular crowdfunding projects, and if there is only one reason to put Second Edition away, this would be it. DCC's support is better than 5E's at the moment, with giant adventure modules released regularly and a steady stream of smaller adventures with varied and imaginative settings.

With Second Edition? I am either playing BX adventures, which are not bad, or recycling AD&D adventures. The support is "sort of what you can find or convert in." It is not bad, but it is not dedicated support. There are a few adventures written for For Gold & Glory, and they are nice, but they are still nowhere near the support DCC regularly receives.

On the other hand, every adventure written for BX, OSE, Labyrinth Lord, Swords & Wizardry, and any other retro-clone is compatible, and it gets easier if they support descending AC. So, really, you do have pretty good support if you expand your thinking and pull in adventures from BX. These work well for FG&G, and really, this is the OSR; your choice of rules is how you express yourself today, and that is cool.

It comes down to a few things. Can I get the full rules to a new player for free in PDF form? Is the publishing license open and free for anyone to create under? Is the book attractive and invites new players to join in and have fun?

FG&G hits all three points perfectly.

And there are some amazing ones. I like a lot of the mega-dungeons written for these games, and each one is easily a 10-year campaign. There is an open question of "Are mega-dungeons too much?" I love how huge and expansive they are, but there are times I prefer a larger campaign area with a few dozen medium-sized dungeons rather than one huge, multi-level monstrosity.

Second Edition has the nostalgia factor, while DCC gives me a tribute band experience, not bad, but not the real thing. There are some tribute bands of classic acts that are better than the real thing. As age takes its toll on these bands, the tribute bands can play with an energy and technical level that shocks me. I don't know the hard-working tribute bands; they pour a lot of heart into what they do, struggling and endlessly compared to the real thing, but putting in the time and effort just out of pure love.

DCC hits that same level of respect from me. This is a group of hard-working people who love the hobby as it was and are trying their best to bring back those days with fun, imaginative ideas. As a tribute band to old-school play, DCC hits all the right notes and brings me back to those days. With the Second Edition, I am playing a game that has seen better days, still the beloved original, but there is a danger here of my memories clashing with the reality of a game that has seen better days and fallen out of active support.

With DCC, every class is designed for maximum fun at the table. They are great class designs, and they have that "instant fun" designed into them, so if you sat down at a random table in a convention to play DCC, you are guaranteed to have a good time. With the Second Edition, it is the slow grind, and while I appreciate that, in today's world, where lots of things ask for our time, I will gravitate towards an instant-gratification game more than a slow grind.

I still like Second Edition; it is the best version of the game for me, across every edition Wizards or TSR put out. For the classic feeling and play, little matches it, and they loosened up the racial level limits to a point where they don't matter as much (or could be ignored), and the story XP is a solid system that is like a lot of the modern XP systems we have today. Taking away "gold for XP" and boosting moster XP makes a huge difference in motivation and why we play. The second edition is 100% compatible with anything made for the first edition or AD&D, so it is a solid choice.

For instant gratification and fast play, DCC wins.

For campaigns and classic play, the second edition, using For Gold & Glory as my rules, wins.