Free Adventures: Coming Up Soon!

Okay, it's time.
Starting this saturday, each week, for 35 weeks, I'll post a part of "The Secret of Ammersfurt".

The Secret of Ammersfurt is a free role playing supplement for the Dark Dungeon 2nd Ed game, fit for players and game masters.

In every issue you'll get new bits for the Ammersfurt adventure setting, like monsters, NPC's, locations, skills, character templates, role play tips, and so on. Sometimes just a few pages, sometimes more than ten.

And also every week, you'll get an adventure seed, which you can turn into a weekly adventure. Together these 35 adventures can make up a complete campaign lasting a whole year of play. Or you can use what pleases you instead.

The good thing is, you can easily read this stuff as a player, since what's in here is for players eyes too. Even the adventure seeds are safe to read if you want to play. Because the endings are not set. The seed starts with a situation, and then the game master (or mistress) decides which of the suggested things will happen next.

And what if your not playing Dark Dungeon 2? But D&D 3.5 or Paizo, or OD&D instead? Don't worry, even then you can use this series. It's free form enough, although it's all but dungeon romp. Rather it's a springboard for medieval adventures and heroic stories in a fantasy variant of the Netherlands, where I'm from.

Keep your eyes on this blog, download, play what you like, and enjoy!


Art repro from the public domain, Saint George and the Dragon by Rafael Santi; and a reworked map of the town of Amersfoort from the 15th century.

Pick #31: Who is OSRIC?

You might think that Osric is an orthodox, poetic, and slightly silly paladin. And that's right. Sir Osric, portrayed by Nathan Rice, in Dorkness Rising is exactly that. But he's not the Osric I meant.

Sir Osric is named tongue in cheek after OSRIC. Which means Old School Reference & Index Compilation. None the wiser? Neither was I. Old School refers to first edition Advanced Dungeons & Dragons. And OSRIC is a complete rewrite of these rules. It's a retro-clone.

A rewrite of AD&D, is that legal? Not the first thought that popped up in my head, but you might ask. Well... Since TSR (who owned D&D) was bought up by Wizards of the Coast, it became part of the Open Gaming Licence. The OGL looks like a page of legalese definititions without any meaning for a common person like you and me. But it appears to mean that you can rewrite any rules owned by WotC, as long as you print this OGL in your book. You can't just copy the rules, but you can rephrase them. And you can't call it AD&D. But then it's ok. So that's what the guys at OSRIC did.

Suppose you are yearning to play old school AD&D. Suppose you burned or sold your old books, or suppose you never owned them. Then you can download OSRIC for free. Or let it be printed on demand at Lulu. Cool isn't it? Then you could play an old school, orthodox, poetic and somewhat silly paladin like... Sir Osric!

Movies for Gamers #11: De Vloek van Woestewolf

This is part of a series of reviews of movies particularly interesting or inspiring for role playing. Because of their setting, style, characters, editing or story. Read the introduction here or here if you are new to this series.

Yes, this movie title is Dutch. And it's only available in Dutch. It's a children series for TV, made in the 1970s. And it means “Curse of the Werewolf”. It is based on a book by Paul Biegel, which was translated into english, french and spanish - so if you're not keen on learning our language you might consider finding the book.

A little over a year ago it came out on DVD, and to my surprise the story still works. It is no longer as scary as it was when I first saw it – I was eight at the time – but it's still fun to watch. If you understand Dutch, that is.

The story follows doctor Kroch who is given a huge treasure to cure a patient from gold fever. At first the doctor is not interested in the treasure, but when it is stolen by bungling thieves Oenk and Boenk, his interest is piqued. He sets out to find the rich patient, the Duke of Dire Wolf, and his adventures become stranger and stranger. And if you're young: scarier and scarier.

The special thing of the show is, that it's filmed entirely in front of a blue screen. And the backdrops are children book illustrations. It makes it a strange mix between child fairy tale and real life. The illustrations are very atmospheric – done by Carl Hollander. And the excellent storyline is done by children book writer Paul Biegel.

It's easy to convert the story to a more grown up, grittier version, and use it as a series of adventures. Your players don't have to play a doctor. But they could be invited to lift a curse. And then they'll have to find the Castle of Woestewolf, a ghostly place that exists only when the stars are right. Somewhere between reality and fairy tale. And in the mean time they have to resist the... gold fever.

Another thing you might consider, is using such a  - slightly scary - children series as a storyline for a game for your kids.

Yes, you could entice your eight year old or twelve year old into playing exciting fantasy story with werewolves, but with bungling thieves, silly grown ups, and so on. I'd not give them the roles of the doctor and his assistant, but make them children who travel with the doctor and his assistant instead. They would have to help the grown ups and be smarter than same grown ups (which will be fairly easy, actually). You shouldn't make the game deadly, and give experience points for being smart instead of slaying everything on their path maybe. But I think it will work. I already did a few role playing experiments with my seven year old, so...

Go see it, if you dare. And speak Dutch. Or no, wait. I think I'll use it myself in an adventure first.

RPG Pick #30: Elite and Oolite

“So you want to fly your space ship to the next star sytem?” the game master said. “Then go sit at the controls and go do it.” He ushered me to the Amiga computer and switched it on.

It started to load ELITE, a spaceflight trading and shooting game. Fortunately I knew the game well, and it was fun to see it integrated into a gaming session. It gave the student room we were playing in the feel of an actual space ship for a moment. I steered the sleek machine toward its target when we were surprised by pirates.

“You are the gunner” the game master said to a fellow player. “Go help him!” And my fellow pressed the fire button until we killed them all. It was fun then. A good gimmick.

I tried to do the same thing later, but not with the same success. Still, I do wonder sometimes if we could not integrate a computer game and a paper and pen role playing game more like this. The tough thing would be to match the computer universe and the storyline. And then I don't exactly mean like in an MMO. Because that's different. The computer becomes dominant there. What would happen if the face to face game would be dominant instead? Think about it.

Want to have a look at ELITE (again)? The coding by Dave Braben and Ian Bell was so ingenuous, they crammed a full game and complete universe onto a singe density floppy. But sound was pretty crappy in most versions, and a lot of time passed since 1984.

OOLITE is the open source remake you may like better. Its reviews were rave. And you can even build your own expansions. Maybe here's a way to integrate your own adventures after all. You can download it here, and start wishing you could connect a joystick to your webbook.

Or you may have forgotten the controls like I have. You can find these here or here.

Classic RPG Review #13: Dungeon Master's Design Kit (AD&D)

Advanced Dungeons & Dragons supplement

by Harold Johnson and Aaron Allston

1988 TSR Inc., Lake Geneva WI, USA

Three thin booklets in a soft cover. One called Adventure Design, a second is the Forms Book, and the third – also just 32 pages thick – is the Adventure Cookbook. Advanced players of course scoff at it, because hey, it's AD&D and it's commercial and... it's a cookbook. You cannot make gourmet adventures with a cookbook, can you?

But as I hardly dare admit to my regular players, I actually use this one. Not always by long, but more often than you might think. It's not bad at all, especially if you use it just to jog your imagination. Imagination which can run dry, as many a GM may know. Or get stuck in the wordprocessor somewhere.

The cookbook (book III) has a number of quick random tables to decide what your adventure of this evening will be like. You just roll percentage dice, and see what comes up. Before you know it, you have the outline of... some sort of story anyway. Say it's an espionage adventure, featuring the long escape of the heroes. They may start out with the dying delivery of another spy, somewhere in a cosmopolitan city (you'll have a favorite in your campaign). They'll end in a madman's fortress and will visit a magic lake, be helped by a merry minstrel and face a ravager for a master villain. A chief assassin will make their lives harder, and the whole thing will climax in a bloody battle. Good eh? Just ten dice rolls!

Alright, it's fuzzy, and you'll have to fill in a lot of the blanks for yourself, but it often helps me to get ideas. And if it does not, then I'll surf a bit on internet or pick one of my history books to think of something new. Or I plunder from films, series and books. Anyhow, whenever I'm stuck, I often find myself browsing this little booklet. And that's a feat for something twenty years old.

The other two booklets were fun to read once, but these are less my own style. They might be helpful for many a Game Master (or Mistress) though. If you want to structure your ideas, and plan your adventure or campaign well ahead, put it all down in prearranged forms where you can find what you need, then this may be for you. Just be sure to copy your forms before you make the booklet useless for another time.

And if you fill out all the sheets for your session you will probably spend more hours preparing your adventure than you'll end up playing. Unless you use it twice, maybe. Like, hey, you want to play my Bloody Quest of the Dead Minotaur again? Or you could sell your hard work as a module to other game masters.

Seriously, the Adventure Design booklet contains a lot of good advice and things to think about. Choosing a villain, choosing scenes, fleshing out the story and the non-player characters... all very organised. If you are just making the step from a hack and slay dungeon delving mission to an actual storyline, then this is pretty good. And if you are an accomplished storyteller, even then you may find some ideas you had not thought of. You'll smile a lot too.

INSPIRATION 4/5

(for three thin booklets there is a lot of ideas here)

USABILITY 4/5

(the cookbook is pretty good, the adventure design book contains a good framework for stories being more than a hack and destroy mission)

FEATURES

(random tables, forms and organised guidelines to set up fantasy adventures somewhere between dungeon delving and storytelling, although made for AD&D the kit can be used for most fantasy games)

OVERALL 8/10

Pick #29: Diabolic Webbook

If there is any computer game which approximates the feeling I had when I first played D&D, it's this one. Descending into the depths of a spawned dungeon, which seems to be there for no other reason than the adventure of exploring it - and kill or be killed. The threatened village is there too, with all the supplies an adventurer could need, and vague non player characters who drop clues on what to do.

Diablo is one of the all time classics. The first issue that is, the rest is mostly rehashes. Actually, it's a very neat graphic version of the Unix classic "Hack!" (or Rogue). Top down 3d view, accompanied by the cries of the dead and spooky music. Completely nostalgic.

Okay, so I'm a sucker for old games.
Okay, so my webbook isn't the fastest computer around.
But who cares? I can run old games on my slow webbook!

If you do have the CD somewhere, you may run it on a CD-driver-less computer with MagicIso. If you don't have the original CD, you can always download a shareware version of Diablo here.

The game might even inspire you to master a cheap adventure. Real cheap maybe, but hey.
Now where did I leave my Longbow of Endless Arrows? Ah, here... Let's go then.
Mwuhahahaha!

Movies for Gamers #10: Brotherhood of the Wolf

This is part of a series of reviews of movies particularly interesting or inspiring for role playing. Because of their setting, style, characters, editing or story. Read the introduction here or here if you are new to this series.

A fantasy movie set in historic France, in 1766? Yes. And it's based on historic fact too. Just based on, because it takes a few leaps from there. Horrific leaps. Martial arts leaps. Special effects leaps. Conspiracy leaps. Brotherhood of the Wolf combines many genres.

Director Christophe Gans, who also did Crying Freeman made it an impressive, atmospheric, and somehwat episodic movie. A movie about the legendary beasts of Gevaudan.

The beasts of Gevaudan in real life terrorized part of France during the reign of Louis XV, and assaulted and killed maybe as many as twohundred people. They may have been wolves. Or some sort of crossbreeds. It's still a mysterry and legend. Alive legend, I found out on my latest holiday in France. At several places where we stayed and ate, there were pictures of the beast. It was kind of scary. Like a werewolf that was never caught for sure. It made sleeping in a tent... different.

The film follows Fronsac, the royal taxidermist of king Louis XV. He is supposed to find the monster, and capture or kill it. Martial arts dancer Mark Dacascos, who was the lead in Crying Freeman now is his Native American Iroquis aide: Mani. Together they proceed on a path that becomes more and more twisted and misty. And they find out about a curse and a conspiracy...

Monica Belluci is in the movie too, as a mysterious character fit for player character status. She is much more than a courtesan. See for yourself and think about the wonderful implications. Belluci's real life husband Vincent Cassel also plays a role, with one arm bitten off by a lion in Africa.

The strong thing of this movie is, that you get an impression how to combine history and fantasy into an exciting mix. Eighteenth century history, at that. With flintlock guns, new found science, printing press, colonies in the west, martial arts of the east, American Natives. And a monstrous beast in an otherwise normal country. It shows that mystery can be stronger than loads of new zany creatures and treasure. You can use that knowledge in your games too.

The film was so inspiring to a few friends that they decided to do the story as an adventure. The idea was perfect. Except that they should have left the storyline and let us be the heroes. What they did instead was trying to make us fit the movie script, and take away our choices as players. I wish they'd try again and just use the backdrop. The feeling is so strong and rich. It would still work.

But then again, now I've seen the movie. Oh well. They can change the story a bit. I won't mind. I just want to feel the rush of this setting again!