Tag: ttrpg

Iron Falcon & Basic Fantasy RPG

One of the many OSR retroclones of some form of early Dungeons & Dragons, is Basic Fantasy RPG, by Chris Gonnerman, originally in 2006, and has lately been fully cleaned up as Creative Commons, no OGL or other license problems. And just recently his other game Iron Falcon, from 2014, has got the same CC cleanup and rerelease.

On both sites, the PDF or ODT (LibreOffice) files for the game and many (in BF's case, MANY) adventures are free, or you can buy a printed book from 'zon or Lulu. BF and adventures are sold at cost so are very cheap, Iron Falcon's priced a little higher but I got the hardcover rulebook for $22 and adventure for $8. Half the price of anything else you'll get!

Wherein I talk too long about game minutiae:

Basic Fantasy

BF is a pretty straight copy of Basic/Expert (1981). Most of it's much more terse than the original game. "Race" (I prefer the term Species) is not class: Some of the races (Dwarf, Elf, Halfling, Human) have limited lists of classes (Cleric, Fighter, Magic-User, Thief, F/M-U, T/M-U for Elves only), but there are no Level limits. So there's not really any purpose to being Human; he tries to balance that a little by giving 10% experience bonus, and an option in the back suggests you can double that. While I don't run a Humans-only game, I find it weird that so many games have devalued Humans to the point where you never see them played. Almost all fantasy literature stars Humans!

Levels go up to 20, rather than 14 in B/X. Clerics have a smooth spell distribution (I don't use them, but OD&D and B/X have a weird gap at Level 6 giving spell levels 3 & 4 at once; in BF L6 just gives SL 3). Fighters don't have War Machine/Cleave/Sweep etc, or any special abilities really. Magic-Users have a simple spellbook of Read Magic and one other spell, which is fine. Thieves get the usual list of skills with percentile chances, no species modifiers.

There's no alignment system. Which is fine, I often ignore or rewrite it for characters, but it's a serious lack in the monster listings.

Experience points gained for combat are 2-4x higher than B/X, Supplement I Greyhawk, or AD&D, so monster-bashing at lower levels is practical. "Non-combat challenges" are the only other source of EP ("XP") listed, gold for EP is listed in the optional rules.

Equipment list is decent, and most items have a paragraph explanation. Weapons could be longer but it's fine, and has variable damage listed, but not "damage vs large", which is useful to give Fighters an edge at higher Levels. Armor uses ascending AC only, base 11 (which I prefer, it makes 20-DAC=AAC (descending, ascending), but many OSR games use base 10, so 19-DAC=AAC), and chain and plate armor are priced reasonably (60/300 GP). Oddly, shields are 7 GP? Good list of land & water vehicles, and there's a very little bit of vehicle rules in Adventure and Combat, not a full wargame.

Encumbrance and movement is oldest-school weight tallying, rather than items or other faster systems; when every GP is 1 EP and you have to optimize weight to return value, that's "fun" for some people, but I can't anymore. Dwarfs & Elfs both get Darkvision, so the lighting rules are somewhat optional, but there are decent procedures here for dungeon exploration & long-term survival.

Initiative's individual, but only d6 + Dex mod, so there'll be a lot of simultaneous actions, which isn't resolved in detail. Maneuvering, charging, disengaging, running away, missile fire, grenades, cover, "flaming oil" (unrealistic but classic), a page+ of unarmed combat systems (oh no), energy drain, healing, falling, deafness/blindness, and how to use saving throws, combat has a good dozen pages of rules which handle most situations, MUCH more clearly than the original game or many retroclones.

There's 27 pages of spells, 100 pages of monsters, 17 pages of treasures. The spell book is excellent, basically everything from every variant of B/X and then some, to high Levels.

Monsters do not have any Demons, but do have dog-kobolds called Barklings, various weird renamings to avoid OGL like "Flicker Beast" for Blink Dog, "Deceiver" for Displacer Beast. Dragons (Cloud, Desert, Forest, Ice, Mountain, Plains, Sea, Swamp, Turtle) use randomized HP & breath weapons, not the traditional age-points-per-die, so an adult Red ("Mountain") Dragon with 10 HD has 10d8 HP and breath damage, rather than fixed 40 HP & damage. The fixed values made it easier to do rules of thumb and work out if you COULD take a Dragon on, rather than guessing at random values.

Treasures are fine, treasure codes like OD&D treasure types, and good variety of items. There's a grid for generating new form/effect combos for classic items. I go off-book of treasures very quickly, but if you're just stocking from this one book, it's adequate.

Then a score of pages of semi-random GM help, essays, and optional rules, with a couple very minimal dungeon & stronghold maps, and tables for filling dungeons. I don't know that that's sufficient for a new GM to learn to run, it's about as much as B/X but smaller scale.

There's a stat ("ability") roll system, but it's not great: Level/2 gives a target number, then roll d20 + stat bonus to beat that TN. Table lookup is annoying, modifier instead of direct use. Why not just roll under the stat, why involve Level at all? In this a Level 10 with DEX 3 needs 15+, same as a Level 1 with DEX 15; why even have stats?

So most of that sounds great. I've tried running BF, and found it was kinda goofy. Bonuses are very large compared to base class/Level abilities. The very weak Fighters need at least a couple improvements. Initiative is, as in so many OSR games, a mess that cannot have been playtested as written. The lack of Demons can be solved with the "Basic Fantasy Field Guide of Creatures Malevolent and Benign" (damn few benign), which calls them "Infernals". It's definitely close to the right OSR game, but not quite there for me.

The supplements for BF are fine, adding some combat options, monsters, and new classes. The adventure books tend to be very Generic Fantasyland Theme Park, boxy maps with mediocre design, a lot of boxed text to read and checkboxes for HP. Several are overtly "copy an old TSR module but make it blander than mayonnaise on white bread".

BF: ★★★★☆
Field Guide: ★★★☆☆
Adventures: ★★☆☆☆

Iron Falcon

IF is explicitly an "OD&D 3LBB + Supplement I Greyhawk" and nothing more. In many ways, this is much, much more my jam, scruffy rogues getting rich or dying in dungeons. It's SO VERY CLOSE.

I'm going to be complaining here, not so much about Iron Falcon, but about Greyhawk. And IF is catching buckshot because it has some Greyhawkisms.

The core of the problem is CG: "Dedicated to Gary, without whom none of this would exist."

But yes it absolutely would. Dave Arneson created role-playing games as we know them; and if some cobbler from Lake Geneva hadn't published it, Blackmoor (and his friend Dave Megarry's Dungeon) would still have spread everywhere in the world and we'd be playing something very similar. And the problem in these rules is the influence of Gary's power-creep Supplement I: Greyhawk.

CG: "Ultimately, though, this game is not a representation of those rules as they were written nor even as I understand them but rather as I would play them. It seems there is no way to avoid getting a little bit of myself into the mix."

Stats ("Abilities") are the start of this, with the Greyhawk Strength & Intelligence tables. OD&D had no physical bonus for STR, only higher Fighter experience (so high STR = faster advancement = stronger fighter). I don't object to bonuses, but when they're SO heavily loaded on high stats, Greyhawk rewards 16-18 so much more, several Levels' worth of bonuses, that you have to get high rolls or you're trash. At least IF moves the percentile STR (18/01 to 18/00, giving +4/+6 bonuses!) superhero bonuses to an appendix.

Same for the insane Greyhawk Intelligence chart, which determines a Magic-User's Chance to Know, Min #, Max #, Max Level of spells; but it implies that you have access to all spells ever created, and you just somehow acquire them if you make this roll. Totally destroying the concept of magic from H.P. Lovecraft and Jack Vance's stories, where magic is a rare and poorly understood art with a few spells carefully studied, hoarded, and protected with ciphers. There is at least some understanding of the problem here, with a "Limited Spell Lists" option in the appendix, or the alternative "Extended Spell Lists" which requires you to buy a 2000+ GP spellbook for each Level, and you're just wandering around with this loot. I admire the attempt to rationalize this nonsense rule, but it's not OK. The BF spell acquisition rules are perfectly fine, so this was unnecessary. Swords & Wizardry has it, too, but then mostly ignores it in favor of spell acquisition.

Dexterity also adjusts AC with ridiculous –1 to –4 bonus; this is in most games at least left as an option for Fighters in light armor to parry, but here it's for everyone. AC inflation (deflation).

The good old "Trading Ability Score Points" mechanic where you get 1 for 2 or 3 from non-primary Stats to your prime requisite. In OD&D and Holmes, this only helped experience, 13 is as good as 18 for many things, but here it allows you to hit those absurd bonuses. Strike that out.

Classes (usual 4) go up to Level 22; OD&D Magic-Users went to 16, others to 10, while Greyhawk advanced M-U to 22, Cleric to 20, others to 14. EP costs are a little lower than OD&D or BF. Thieves have percentile skills and species ("racial") adjustments. Clerics have a newly weird spell table which isn't based on any version; good thing I don't use Clerics.

Species ("races") are Dwarf, Halfling, Elf, Half-Elf, with strict Level limits by class except Thief, and yet another variant of how multiclass works. Elf gets +1 to hit with sword & bow, Dwarf gets +1 to hit & AC vs giants, Halflings get no stealth but +3 (WTF) with sling, Half-Elfs get multiclass. Again sorry Charlie Brown, the Humans get a rock, tho this time Level limits mean you'd only play a demi-Human Thief or multiclass if you wanted long-term play.

There is a Law/Neutral/Chaos alignment system, as morality/group work, which at least means monsters have some indication of team.

Equipment's substantially reduced from BF, it has many of the same items but no descriptions, prices for armor are ridiculously low (like OD&D). And yet the weapon table is fully detailed, with "damage vs large". Range bonuses have varied between editions, none in OD&D ("see Chainmail" it says), Holmes and BF have +1/+0/–1 for short/medium/long, AD&D has +0/–2/–5, while Greyhawk has a horrifying table with different modifiers for S/M/L for each weapon vs armor. IF goes to +2/+1/+0, then in the appendix includes another version of the Weapon vs AC table. The problem is, the table's broken.

Delta: Big Mistake in Weapon vs. Armor Adjustments

So I'd say that any 1E players who are still engaged in this gnashing-of-teeth exercise with these tables would be wise to put it to bed, because the whole effect of those tables in O/AD&D was fundamentally broken all along.

So anyway, I've traditionally gone with +0/–1/–2, or +0/–2/–4 for S/M/L, because those make bows less effective than melee, which is better for swords & sorcery, Conan rushing thru a swarm of arrows to cleave the enemy. All rules are wrong!

IF uses by default DAC (Descending AC), which is seriously just why is this still a thing in 2025? It's a historical error that shouldn't be around. Anyway, big table of class vs AC. BUT, in the appendix there's a proper AAC (Ascending AC) and Base Attack Bonus table, and the monsters all list DAC (AAC) format, so you can play like it's 1999.

Combat rules are much reduced from BF, but in most cases it's just as good. Initiative is side-based, but Dex modifier can move a character faster or slower than their side; that's… not unreasonable. I don't usually do around-the-table order, but it's faster and with only two rollers, simultaneous is less likely. It has an option for individual initiative, but tells you to decide how to split it.

Charging, healing, morale, flaming oil 🙄, turn undead if you do that, energy drain, falling, poison, and saving throws. No rules for disengaging or movement here.

Then follows 26 pages of spells. Again very complete, the one thing I liked about Greyhawk. A number of these spells are not in BF, and at the higher end are more powerful.

54 pages of monsters. Half the variety of BF. Still no Demons, but they weren't in 3LBB+Greyhawk, so I guess that tracks. Dragons (Black, Blue, Brass, Bronze, Copper, Gold, Green, Red, Silver, White) are back to age-points-per-die, called by color not some terrain (where does a Red Dragon live? Anywhere it wants to!) Vastly more useful for running classic adventures, but the lack of some weirdo monsters can be an issue. But there is a "Handbook of Monsters" which fills the gaps, adapted from the BF Field Guide.

30 pages of treasures, very similar to BF, but no form/effect table. In Appendix B are 4 pages of Intelligent Sword rules.

Adventuring chapter's buried way in the back, but otherwise similar to BF.

Another problematic Greyhawk table returns, as the Experience Point Awards. To advance from 1st Level to 2nd as a Fighter, in OD&D (straight 100 EP per HD), you'd need to kill 20 Orcs (1 HD), or 5 Ogres (4+1 HD). In BF, you'd need to kill 80 Orcs or 8 Ogres (4+1 HD). In IF you'd need to kill 133 Orcs (1 HD) or 10 Ogres (5 HD)! So you see you're saving lives by using a faster progression! Of course being a more strict OD&D, 1 GP = 1 EP, and some claim that's the right way to Level, but it makes all adventures pecuniary instead of derring-do. An accountant might love that, but I don't.

Finally, Appendix A, Alternate "Combat" Rules. Exceptional Strength, no. Ascending Armor Class, yes. Paladins, no; this is the Greyhawk interpretation where they are a bonus given to Lawful Fighters with Charisma 17 which was almost certainly a cheat code for one player. Weapons vs Armor Type, ha ha no not ever.

A few pages of optional rules for spells (see above), and a page of how to deal with death, mostly raise dead; ha ha no not ever. Negative ten rule, fine, I don't want players constantly rerolling, but it's not a canonical rule.

I got the book as hardcover, POD (Print on Demand). It's nice looking, great B&W homage by Alexander Cook to the B/X dragon fight by Erol Otus. Cover curls outwards a bit, but I'll press it and see if that gets it flatter.

I also got the "Iron Falcon Adventures Volume One". It's four short adventures, not particularly inspired, but playable dungeon crawls. I didn't get print of Iron Falcon 75: The Lakeside Adventures, which uses IF to run a Magic Comes Back game in small town 1975, modern-ish equipment; amusing but I'd use Call of Cthulhu or my own Nightmare Eve for that.

I'm still hacking around on some house rules, but it's not that much to remove the stuff I dislike and get a pretty good edition. It's unfortunate some of the choices were made. If I get ambitious, the right answer would be to edit the ODT file, remove Greyhawk as if it never existed, add in vital things it's missing (Demons), and get it printed & bound properly; it's CC licensed, so I can do that. We'll see. OR, I can just pillage it for more parts for my Little Sword Game, which already uses some BF text for spells, but is a fairly different kind of game, not trying to be historical.

Iron Falcon as-is: ★★★½☆
Iron Falcon minus Greyhawk: ★★★★½
Greyhawk powergaming: ☆☆☆☆☆
Adventures Volume One: ★★☆☆☆

Monsters! Monsters!

Let me explain. No, there is too much, let me sum up.

Back in 1975, Tunnels & Trolls was the second RPG ever written. Space Gamer has this:

T&T has a bunch of virtues, it's VERY simple, only uses 6-sided craps dice, it's very cheap, and it's less contradictory than D&D. By not trying to do everything, it succeeds at more.

In 1976, Rick Loomis' Buffalo Castle came out, introducing the world to solo adventure gamebooks! Years before "Pick Some Kinda Road" (lawsuit-happy owner) books.

Also in 1976, Monsters! Monsters! was unleashed on the world, turning the tables on those horrible adventurers and townsfolk, with playable monsters.

Many eons passed. T&T became the most popular soloing RPG, and a cult favorite for group play as well. It's always been my pick-up or teaching game, I can just bring out the City of Terrors pocket book, and have a full game and setting.

Often there were good mini-rules and adventures, in particular T&T Adventures Japan and the Beginner's Bundle, and the last edition, Deluxe Tunnels & Trolls and adventures updated for it.

More recently, Ken sold Tunnels & Trolls to a company which has done nothing much with what's left of Flying Buffalo. So he started focusing on the game he didn't sell: Monsters! Monsters!

In 2020, a new edition of Monsters! Monsters! came out, to go along with a new version of The Toughest Dungeon in the World (which assumes a Troll PC).

In 2022, Monsterary of Zimrala introduced a new setting, full of weirdo monsters.

And then in 2024, we got updated version of M!M! 2.7, and Steve Crompton's fantasy superhero/sexy times comics got a comic/sourcebook treatment, Cthulhu Crisis.

SO, that's what I'm gonna talk about here, the state of Tunneling & Trolling/Monstering Monstering these days.

Monsters! Monsters! 2.7

Cover is an arched portal, with monsters of all sorts coming thru. This works fine. The book is spiral-bound, on very heavy paper, which can be a little hard to flip thru but it's convenient at the table.

Ken promises a 3rd ed of M!M! will be more complete, but 2.7 is what we have now. It's fairly short, leads right into character creation by rolling stats (3d6 eight times as usual), picking species (no longer called Kindred) from Trolls (Forest or Jungle), Serpentmen, Uruks, Gremlins, or Zim (Zimralan Ogres). These have very simple stat modifications, not too far above Human.

Later in the book there's 28 Humanoids (Balrukh to Zombie), 22 Non-Humanoids (Basilisk to Unicorn), 26 Zimralan Humanoids (Bat Trolls to Zim), 7 Intelligent Demons (Anticorn to Xipe), all with typical T&T/M!M! stat multipliers and a special power! You can quickly get very powerful characters. Then another 78 non-statted monsters (they get one "Monster Rating" (MR) which serves as attack & defense!) for use as enemies. No playable Humans, Dwarfs, or Elfs!

Immediately drops into How To Do Combat, just 3 pages. It's a QUICK and EASY game. Every combatant rolls their weapon or monster dice, plus "combat adds" depending on stats, side with highest total inflicts the difference on the losers. There's a few specific rules for missiles, spells, armor, etc., but it's not meant to be hard or detailed, YOU invent the descriptions.

Saving Rolls (SR) are the main clever feature of all T&T/M!M! games, a roll directly against a stat, 2 dice, doubles add & roll over (DARO), plus stat score, target number is 20 at Level 1, +5 per Level. M!M! improves on previous editions by having a page explaining how to use Stunts, SRs in combat.

Chaos Factor is new, giving non-magic monsters a chance to adjust the dice. In my house rules, I require you to recharge your Chaos Factor with magic energy, Moon Crystals in Zimrala, but as written you can use it over and over, but only one monster per turn.

Adventure Points are experience. They're not well explained in 2.7, you SHOULD get them based on the MR/Level of defeated monsters, and a bunch of other things, but all that's listed is your SR rolls. More house rules time, which is fine, "make the game your own".

You directly spend AP to increase your stats, and your highest stat determines your Level, rather than saving AP up to Level, and maybe getting a +1 to something. Advancing your character is far more interesting in M!M! than that other game.

In even the first edition of T&T, there was a simple equipment list, then a VERY long detailed one with every historical & fantasy weapon & armor you'd want, with STR & DEX requirements, speical abilties, precise ranges… M!M! does not have this. It has a mini-rules level of items. Sure, many monsters don't use equipment, but it's still bad.

There's a very small list of 9 weapons for Egyptos (Humans brought from Earth). 11 weapons for the Zim, but they're massively overpowered (75d6 magic flint spear!). 20 Demon magic effects for weapons, which is helpful since T&T has never had a real magic weapon list. 3 special items for Dwarfs, a big table of generic guns, a few ray-guns for Curators and Advanced Humans.

Magic is next, with a reasonably good but low-Level spell list, 20 Level 1, 22 Level 2, 29 Level 3, 10 Level 4, 5 Level 5, 5 Level 6, 3 Level 7. As opposed to T&T, which had fewer spells, but went up to Level 17. I'm not thrilled that many of the spells got new names, or were pulled from Kindred-specific spellbooks, but that's more a matter of me relearning what's in there.

Monsters in Detail gives paragraph to quarter-page descriptions for dozens of monsters.

Ken St Andre has his own M!M! House Rules, because nobody plays any game the same way, including the authors. The really important one here is Spite Damage, which keeps combat from being a one-way death spiral.

There's a brief setting overview of Zimrala, two GM adventures of looting haunted, ruined towns. I must note a little indignantly that there's no scenario set up for invading a populated Human town and making off with their loot and pretty mates, or devouring people! That was the key attraction of M!M! 1st Ed, and it's still the most fun. Pretty obvious how to write it up, but the M!M! 1st Ed townsfolk table was more useful.

There's a Treasure Generator for coins & gems which has been in various T&T products for 40+ years.

An invitation to make new products for the M!M! system, a few of those have already come out.

★★★★½ - still needs a lot more equipment and more high-Level spells, but otherwise a kick-ass game. Usable as both a "normal" RPG or as a crazy monsters game.

Monsterary of Zimrala

Nearly the same cover as M!M!, but in a ruined temple and fewer monsters. As a bestiary, this is more fitting.

This world is connected to but not the same as the City of the Gods setting, where all the old pantheon gods ended up. There's a solo adventure, Mission for a Cat Goddess, where the goddess Sekhmet and Demi the Demoness ("Tenh-Mer") pull your character from wherever (Trollworld probably) to Zimrala.

The Zimrala setting is a typical giant continent with every terrain and culture mashed up. Perfectly serviceable as a gaming setting. The desert has been "invaded" by ancient Egyptians, in a colony of Sekh-Atem; there's a promise of a sourcebook but this hasn't come out yet. A long timeline for 28,000 years of prehistory. An excuse for Gristlegrim's Dwarfs to come to Zimrala. I really want a lot more setting, I'm spoiled maybe by DT&T's Trollworld chapter with multiple cities and a gazetteer in a bit more detail.

Magic on Zimrala is more interesting, adding Chaos Factor with a little better explanation. God Magic is divine intervention with no limits except GM caution. Demon Magic is always-on but a little more focused, 9 "Auras" of types of demons. Dwon (Demon Dwarfs) Magic is delusional religion, roll and see if your wish works. Moon Crystals can contain Wizardry power or specific spells or super-powerful effects, but also attract monsters called Etherdragons. Portals are all over Zimrala, leading to dimensions or into space!

Zimrala has 7 (or 8) moons, and most of these are habitable/explorable. There's not a lot of explanation in detail, but there is in Cthulhu Crisis.

Zimrala doesn't use coins, but gems, Amethysts are equivalent to GP or $, up to Moon Crystals worth $20,000.

So that's quite a lot, and only up to page 34! The majority of the book is bestiary, a page on Humans and near-Humans, animals, 68 monsters, 27 playable monsters, 6 demons, 12 demon monsters. These are often really weird and non-standard.

A short GM adventure/useful information site for monsters to explore.

And finally the Mini-Rules, just enough M!M! to be playable with this book alone.

★★★★☆ - great bestiary, very minimal as a setting book.

Humans! Humans!

Cover has scary humanoids, maybe Humans, Elfs, Dwarfs, and a Wizzard, busting into a nice safe dungeon, with the comic book characters pasted in front. Unimpressed.

One would hope this is the things monsters are scared of. It is instead more of a book for running Human & friendly PCs.

The book's pretty thin. Starting player & GM advice for surviving and not TPKing when facing the giant monsters of Zimrala as a squishy little Human. I'd just suggest not being one!

Humans, Dwarfs/Dwon (Demon Dwarfs), and Moon Elfs (ugh Warcraft) get stat multipliers, Professions, Skills, and 1 in 6 get Special Abilities. That's OK, mostly brings them up to monster power level. There's no stats for Fairies, Leprechauns, and "Hobbs", classic T&T kindred, and I kinda miss the first two.

Professions and Skills overlap a lot, but the Profession doesn't provide any fixed game benefit. Skills replace Talents, and have a Level, adding to Saving Rolls. Special abilities are somewhat rare, and range from Eagle Eyes to Divine Intervention, specific mechanics aren't given for everything but you can add to SRs also.

The Elven & Dwarfen Professions, Skills, & Abilities are each different.

Human Vampire & Avatar rules are also printed in the comics which they're based on. Vampires are fairly weak but are nearly impossible to kill permanently. Ken gives them 1 stat point per 100 years, to make 3000-year-old Vampirooni from the comics not be super-powerful. I'd do d6 x 100 years, and 5 stat points per century.

Avatars may be divinely-blessed like Erika Amerika or magic artifacts like Tessa Ract. It's purely up to the G.M. to decide what abilities these get.

But then there's 5 pages of equipment reprinted from M!M!, NOT new weapon charts, which would actually be useful.

★★★½☆ - does what you need for filling out Humans in M!M!, but I'm unimpressed by the Avatars, and the equipment repeat made me 🙁

Cthulhu Crisis, Vampirooni's Crisis

So, Steve Crompton and the late Randy Vogel had been writing these Vampirooni (Vampirella knockoff), Demi the Demoness (succubus), Erika Amerika (super-powered reincarnating Native American girl), and Kitt-Ra (Sekhmet's four-tittied cat goddess avatar) softcore porn comics for a long time. Which I often find this kind of thing entertaining, I'm a Richard Corben, Vaughn Bode, Robert Crumb, etc. kind of sleazy Zap Comix kinda guy.

The Crisis comics start on Earth present & near future, Tessa Ract (get it tesseract), and an evil vampire from ancient Egypt, a Moth Girl and Squid Schoolgirl working for the Yellow Wizard Hastur, who colludes with Cthulhu, wreck their days. There's a dumpster full of dead ninjas, the god Set, spaceships, and a skull asteroid base.

On the one hand again this is generally my jam in comics, but as M!M! sourcebook it's really not at all what I do. Some parts are useful, each issue has a mini-GM adventure/location. None are related to Zimrala, and only a bit to City of the Gods. But I'm sure not putting Vampi in my games.

★★★★☆ style but ★★☆☆☆ utility.

Book Report: Making of Original Dungeons & Dragons, Part II

Part II: 1973 Draft of Dungeons & Dragons

In which letters show Dave Arneson running Blackmoor for the Lake Geneva mob, and they set up their campign, with more areas taken from the Great Kingdom map. Interestingly the Grand Duchy of Urnst, south of Nyr Div lake, is full of dinosaurs and prehistoric mammals; Keoland, at this time much closer, not across the Wooly Bay and mountains, has Martian Thoats, Apts, etc. By the time of World of Greyhawk (1983), all traces of weird stuff has been erased, the encounter tables are all Knight, Pilgrim, Men, Men, Men; tho Blackmoor's table shows Gibberling, Quaggoth, Qullan, and Ice Troll encounters, at least.

Gygax's later implausible story in Dragon (July 1977) is that Arneson "contributed" 18 pages of notes and ran "variant CHAINMAIL", while he heroically typed 300 manuscript pages.

I've gone over the draft D&D rules some when the Arneson v. Gygax court case document came out, and we have handwritten parts from Arneson, and typewritten draft from Gygax, which had this bon mot:

Introduction: This is where Gary editorializes and tells neat stories
as much as his little heart desires and if he wants to use the extra
pages. A rule book is a rule book not a novel.
—Dave Arneson

Stats are at this time GP (the rule doesn't say to x10, but the examples do), Intelligence, Cunning (Wisdom), Strength, Health, Appearance (Charisma). Cleric level titles are Acolyte, Friar (Adept), Village Priest, Priest (Vicar), Vicar (Curate), Curë (Bishop), Abbë (Lama), Patriarch. These have long been contentious, and obsolete, since no recent game has level titles, but the originals are MUCH better than the renamed ones. Lama? Magic-User they got right from the start, Fighter swapped Warrior (2) for Swordsman (3), and again I think the original is better.

Equipment lists "Zilidar" (200 GP) under Draft Horse, Small Thoat (400 GP), Large Thoat (1000 GP), Pegasus (2000), Hippogriff (3000 GP), Griffon[sic, "Gryphon"] (9000 GP), Roc (5000 GP), Thoat Saddle (25 GP), Hippogriff/Pegasus Saddle (15 GP), Roc/Griffon[sic] Saddle (50 GP), Thoat-Sized Saddle Bags (15 GP), Light Rations -1 on "Strength" after 1 week (2 GP/week).

Missing are the Iron Rations, Silver-Tipped Arrow, Mule, 10' Pole (!!!), Flask of Oil, and all the herbs & vampire-killing gear. Clearly wilderness adventures were the more significant part of the game at this time.

The preposterous prices for armor are there from the beginning: Leather (15 GP), Chain-Type[sic] Mail (25 GP), Plate Mail[sic] (50 GP), Helmet (5 GP), Shield (5 GP); latter two doubled in price. In more realistic historical records, Chain should be at least 75 GP, and Plate as much as 200-300 GP. Also all prices should be silver standard instead, but that's the least of our problems. Armor beyond Jack (not here represented) was for knights with a much higher economy than the peasantry, but everyone's rich in D&D.

NPCs are at this time "NON-REAL PLAYERS". Rules for hiring & retaining monsters are simpler, they abandon post as you spend time away from your castle. Henchmen can be hired for 100 GP/Level up to Level 3 Swordsman.

High-Level benefits are much more clearly explained, published OD&D simplified this to nonsense to save half a page. Notably:

When players reach the top of their class the referee should award
EP's at a rate of 1 for 3 to 1 for 10 or worse, depending on the
circumstances.

Thus resolving the high-Level Dwarf problem.

Many adventuring parts were later moved to Book III, notably the MONSTER DETERMINATION & LEVEL MATRIX which has killed so many with the 1/6 4 HD, 1/6 3 HD which can appear on dungeon Level 1. The monster tables are odd, Level 1 is just missing Skeletons & Spiders. Level 2 has extra Skeletons, Spiders, Giant Ants, Anti-Warrior (F 2, but struck out?). Level 3 has Thaumaturgists (M-U 5!), Anti-Warrior (F 2), Wight, and Giant Hogs, Toads, Crabs. I can't make sense of the original ecology, but published isn't better.

HITS AND RECOVERY: An actual explanation of damage, instead of a passing reference in Book III, and the healing rate is 2 HP/day, instead of 1/2 like published.

SCORING HITS: An actual system was presented, and completely cut from published.

Generally CHAINMAIL rules will apply as modified by the following:

Men vs. Men: If there are small numbers Fighting it will be most
interesting to use the Man-to-Man Melee Table. If large numbers are
fighting the Combat Table based on a troop ratio of 1:20 should be
used.

Men vs. Fantasy Figures: It is suggested that the 1:20 Combat Tables
be used, with men scoring 1 hit point when they hit and fantasy
figures scoring hits equal to a die roll (1-6). Of course, some
fantasy figures cannot be hit by normal men, and no hit points will be
scored against them. (See the Fantasy vs. Fantasy section below.)

Fantasy vs. Fantasy: Because of the vast number of fantastic creatures
and levels of men, a matrix to show hits is totally impractical (we
know because we tried, but with 70 or more categories it becomes too
unwieldy to handle). We therefore recommend that a system utilizing a
20-sided die (increments of 5%) be adopted. The basis for this will be
the assumption that a man will require e score of 19 (90%) or better
hit an opponent in plate mail and shield. Armor Classes will be given
in such a vey as to indicate their efficiency, viz, deduct their
number from 20, and the base number to hit them is obtained. Thus,
Plate mail and shield is "Class 2" and 2 - 20 = 18 [sic]. Each fantasy
figure is listed below, giving its base Armor Class (along with
various other data regarding it). Armer Class and what scores the
various levels of Fighting Men need to score a hit are:

Then a to-hit table which is literally just THACO 21 - Fighter Level; a 4th Level Hero would be THACO 17, AC 2 is 15+, AC 9 is 8+. Only levels 1-9 are shown, presuming you can follow a pattern of "-1 per Level". It does not have the weird gaps and level ranges for each class.

Magic-Users and Clerics have overly complex conversions, but essentially get competent at the Hero-1 level, Enchanter for M-U, Curë for Cleric.

As has been previously mentioned in interviews, Arneson increased defensive abilities by level, not so much the HP, but Gygax was doing both. Eventually this got deleted.

All men (Fighters, Magic—Users, & Clerics) add +1 to their Armor Class
when they attain the level of or equal to 4th level Fighting Man (Hero
and Abbë and Warlock in the other classes). 8th level Fighters
(Superheroes) add another +1 (as do 12th level Magic-Users and 10th
level Clerics). Only fighting men will continue to add to their
defensive capabilities, with +1's being awarded at the 12th and 16th
levels.

That certainly changes things. You can either be untouchable to greater HD monsters, or strip down to a lighter load and keep the same AC, a Superhero in Chain being as good as a mook in Plate.

Monster list (moved to Book II) and castle encounters (Book III) are apparently unchanged. Wilderness encounters are mostly the same, but annotations in here for Optional Dinosaur Swamps of results 9-12 Crocodiles to Snakes were not included in published, making that terrain very very dangerous.

PRIZE MATRIX: aka Treasure Types. Type A (Men) is fairly different, having prisoners 2/10 men for land & water, 1/20 men for desert, higher chances of loot it seems. Wow, Bandits & Brigands have 1d6 x 10 GP for each man. I'm fine with the 50%: 2-12000 GP in lair, but singles having 1/3 starting gold is crazy.

There are only Types A-H listed, published added Type I for Rocs only. Otherwise they seem similar. I should do some number-crunching, and also compare First Fantasy Campaign, see how the values line up.

Hrmn. Fighting experience is 100 EP x HD, and OSR loot GP is typically 1-4x fighting EP. So maybe the Bandits aren't as off as I think, I just don't see coins on each monster that often.

THE UPPER WORLD: An entire section on overworld adventuring not included in published, tho bits appear in OTHER WORLDS in Book III.

For example, there can be "gates" through which the players will enter
into the primordial past, the world of Barsoom, Lankhmar, or a
fantastical moon peopled by whatever creatures you desire.

 

Finally, there is the natural rivalry among players themselves. When
they attain the top rank of their various classes they must choose
domains in which to build their castles and live. This will result in
warfare between players, and usually such battles will provide the
most exciting table top play.

Endgame of Dungeons & Dragons is PVP mass warfare!

SPECIAL CONSTRUCTION AND EQUIPMENT COSTS: naturally follows, instead of just being a weird "why are there castle building costs?"

I will note that Arneson had a lot, A LOT, of Gor fanfic shit in First Fantasy Campaign, but it was mostly scrubbed from published D&D. But in this draft, there's still hireling costs for Female Slave (100-600 GP Initial Cost), Male Slave (200-400 GP), and Barony investments: Slave Dealing. It's not elaborated on, but Dave wrote this, Gary typed it up, and it made it thru multiple drafts before someone told them to stop.

MOVEMENT IN THE UPPER WORLD: Gives hexes per day (a wilderness "turn"), modified by the Outdoor Survival rules. Hope you have those handy! … The earlier reprint of 3 pages does not include this essential table, here it is from Outdoor Survival at Boardgame Geek

Column A shows the terrain, column B shows how many Movement Points it costs to enter

Some of the cut parts are so essential, I don't understand how D&D got published in this state. I'd previously assumed it was just "we knew this in play but didn't write it down", but they DID write it down.

And that brings me to the end of the first half of the draft. The rest is "Explanation of…"

Public Domain Monster: Mouseling

Mouseling (Swords & Wizardry stats)

HD: 2d6, AC: 6[13], Attacks: Nip (d4) or Weapon (d6), Save: 16, Morale: 8, Move: 12, Align: Chaos, CL/XP: 2/30.

Demi-humanoids with mouse-like features, no more than 3' tall. Surprisingly robust and rubbery, they can survive being stretched, dropped, bounced down stairs, hooked with cargo winches. As characters, they may be Thieves (max Level 6), Fighters (max Level 4, HD d6), or apprentice Magic-Users (max Level 3). Giant-sized attackers have a –4 penalty to hit them.

Mickey Mouse

Mouseling Thief 2, Special: musical animals, CL/XP: 3/60.

Wannabe riverboat captain, and musician. Relentlessly cruel to other animals, and can use them to make musical instruments. All who hear this performance must save vs Paralysis or be stunned until the end of the peformance, or 2d4 rounds.

Dungeons & Falling

As noted in Review: Swords & Wizardry Complete Revised, there's no rules for falling damage. Never have been. Referees just rely on folklore and other games to figure it out.

Researching OD&D sources is frustrating, but if I've read all this, you should too!

It never clearly says in OD&D (books 1-3, supp 1-4, nor Holmes). In Book III, there's a Chainmail example of 1 die save on 5 or 6 per level (10'?) fallen.

AD&D Player's Handbook (1978, but non-canon to me), it's 1d6 for each 10', and the commentary makes it clear that's the meaning intended. You wouldn't say "this is not realistic" if falling was super dangerous.

FALLING DAMAGE
Falling into pits, from ledges, down shafts, and so forth will certainly cause damage unless the fall is broken. While such falls could break limbs and other bones, it is probable that your referee will simply use a hit points damage computation based on 1d6 for each 10' of distance fallen to a maximum of 20d6, plus or minus adjustments for the surface fallen upon, This treatment gives characters a better survival chance, although it is not as "realistic" as systems to determine breaks, sprains, dislocations, internal organ damage, etc.

Basic Dungeons & Dragons (1981), same. Interesting note that climbing is per 100'!

Climb Steep Surfaces, when failed, will result in a fall. The thief will take 1-6 (1d6) points of damage for each 10 feet fallen. This roll should only be made once per 100' of climb attempted. If failed, the fall will be from halfway up the surface.

Suddenly in Dragon # 69 (Jan 1983), in a sidebox in the Thief-Acrobat class, Gygax claims that it was cumulative ALL ALONG.

Falling damage
The correct procedure for determining falling damage in the AD&D game system is to roll 1d6 per 10' fallen, cumulative. Since a falling body accelerates quickly, the damage mounts geometrically: 2d6 for the second 10 feet fallen, 3d6 for the third 10 feet, etc. The maximum of 20d6 is therefore reached after a fall of approximately 60 feet for most characters. A thief-acrobat can often fall further distances, but the same 20d6 maximum should be applied. The rationale behind this system will discussed in the next issue (# 70) of DRAGON Magazine.

Note you would also not use 20d6 as a limit if you were counting 1d6, 3d6, 6d6, 10d6, 15d6, 21d6 all along.

Next issue (Feb 1983), he makes Frank Mentzer carry his water and blames some editor (Mike Carr?).

Gary has always used a geometrically increasing system for falling damage in AD&D games; the trouble arose because that system simply never made it into the rule books. When the AD&D Players Handbook was being assembled, a brief section on falling damage was included: a mere 7 1⁄2 lines that offers more advice on broken bones and sprains than on falling damage. As we now understand the event, the section was not included in the first draft, and the editors requested a brief insert on this frequently referred-to topic. So Gary hastily wrote a sentence describing damage as “1d6 per 10’ for each 10’ fallen.” Someone removed the “per 10’” as being (so it was thought) redundant, and off we went. That section was later quoted in passing in the Aerial Adventures section of the Dungeon Masters Guide, thereby becoming further entrenched in our game procedures.

My bullshit meter goes off the scale at this sudden Invention of Lying level retcon. But is it a better rule?

AD&D 2nd Edition (1989, again non-canon to me) has this lengthy rebuttal:

Player characters have a marvelous (and, to the DM, vastly amusing) tendency to fall off things. generally from great heights and almost always onto hard surfaces. While the falling is harmless, the abrupt stop at the end tends to cause damage.
When a character falls. he suffers 1d6 points of damage for every 10 feet fallen, to a maximum of 20d6 (which for game purposes can be considered terminal velocity).
This method is simple and it provides all the realism necessary in the game. It is not a scientific calculation of the rate of acceleration, exact terminal velocity, mass, impact energy, etc. of the falling body.
The fact of the matter is that physical laws may describe the exact motion of a body as it falls through space, but relatively little is known about the effects of impact. The distance fallen is not the only determining factor in how badly a person is hurt. Other factors may include elasticity of the falling body and the ground, angle of impact, shock wave through the falling body, dumb luck, and more.
People have actually fallen from great heights and survived, albeit very rarely. The current record-holder, Vesna Vulovic, survived a fall from a height of 31,33O feet in 1972, although she was severely injured. Flight Sergeant Nicholas S. Alkemade actually fell 18,000 feet—almost 3.5 miles—without a parachute and landed uninjured!
The point of all this is roll the dice, as described above, and don't worry too much about science.

The 3.0 SRD is typically boring, legalistic, but continues this standard:

FALLING
Falling Damage: The basic rule is simple: 1d6 points of damage per 10 feet fallen, to a maximum of 20d6.
If a character deliberately jumps instead of merely slipping or falling, the damage is the same but the first 1d6 is nonlethal damage. A DC 15 Jump check or DC 15 Tumble check allows the character to avoid any damage from the first 10 feet fallen and converts any damage from the second 10 feet to nonlethal damage. Thus, a character who slips from a ledge 30 feet up takes 3d6 damage. If the same character deliberately jumped, he takes 1d6 points of nonlethal damage and 2d6 points of lethal damage. And if the character leaps down with a successful Jump or Tumble check, he takes only 1d6 points of nonlethal damage and 1d6 points of lethal damage from the plunge.
Falls onto yielding surfaces (soft ground, mud) also convert the first 1d6 of damage to nonlethal damage. This reduction is cumulative with reduced damage due to deliberate jumps and the Jump skill.
Falling into Water: Falls into water are handled somewhat differently. If the water is at least 10 feet deep, the first 20 feet of falling do no damage. The next 20 feet do nonlethal damage (1d3 per 10-foot increment). Beyond that, falling damage is lethal damage (1d6 per additional 10-foot increment).
Characters who deliberately dive into water take no damage on a successful DC 15 Swim check or DC 15 Tumble check, so long as the water is at least 10 feet deep for every 30 feet fallen. However, the DC of the check increases by 5 for every 50 feet of the dive.

Arduin Grimoire has a complex table, RCH = Random Critical Hit (Arduin crits are murder), others are Broken, Crushed, Dislocated, bruisE, Fracture, Multi, No damage, Sprain. I would never use this, but it's on par with linear damage until far up.

Conclusion

I'm certainly going to stick with 1d6 per 10' linear, but it should increase some chance of injury or death. At low Levels the HP damage is going to be the deadly factor, so it doesn't matter if there's also injury. At higher Levels, falling damage equivalent to your Level should be highly risky, and even moderate falls should have some risk.

Falling

Characters who fall more than 5' take d6 damage per 10' to a maximum of 20d6. If fallen 20' or more, make a Save vs Paralysis, + DEX bonus, –1 per 10' past the first, on failure roll d6 to see what you landed on:

  1. Head. Instant death. You needed that, roll a new character.
  2. Left arm. Broken, cannot hold shield or 2-handed weapon, or cast spells.
  3. Right arm. Broken, cannot hold weapon, or cast spells.
  4. Torso. Broken ribs, half STR, CON.
  5. Left leg. Broken, cannot move.
  6. Right leg. Broken, cannot move.

Cure Serious Wounds or Restoration will repair all but the head, otherwise takes 2d4 weeks recovery.

(note I don't have Clerics, but there are items or rituals which can produce these effects)

I made a table to better understand the odds here (assuming Save 15 at 1st-Level, +1 bonus for Paralysis), and I think I'm good with this. A 3rd-Level Thief with DEX 15 has a 50% chance to drop 50' with nothing broken, a 1st-Level Magic-User has 20%. HP damage is much more likely to kill them.

Distance Level: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9
20' 14 13 12 11 10 9 8 7 6
30' 15 14 13 12 11 10 9 8 7
40' 16 15 14 13 12 11 10 9 8
50' 17 16 15 14 13 12 11 10 9
60' 18 17 16 15 14 13 12 11 10
70' 19 18 17 16 15 14 13 12 11
80' 20 19 18 17 16 15 14 13 12
90' 21 20 19 18 17 16 15 14 13
100' 22 21 20 19 18 17 16 15 14

Review: Swords & Wizardry Complete Revised

I funded the kickstarter, still waiting for my lovely print book, but you can get PDF now, and I assume print-on-demand (POD) will come eventually.

S&W was one of the first "Old-School Renaissance" games. Matt Finch had worked on OSRIC (an AD&D-like retro-clone) in 2006, and took that and applied it to the original game.

I'm going to review the new book by looking at three (plus a bit) editions over time.

Swords & Wizardry Core in 2008, had most of OD&D (Original D&D, 1974) and fragments of Greyhawk (Supplement I, 1975):

  • Stats ("Ability Scores"): Uses the "modern" order of STR, DEX, CON, INT, WIS, CHA (instead of SIWDCCh), but rolls 3d6 for each. Like OD&D, bonuses are only -1 to +1. INT has reduced extra languages, which I prefer to replace with CHA-10 languages. Has a bizarre new EP bonus system, where WIS, CHA, and class Prime give +5% each, no penalties for low stats. M-U with INT 15+, and Clerics with WIS 15+, get an extra 1st-Level spell.

  • Classes: Only Fighter, Cleric, Magic-User, and a few non-Human species ("Race", as was the fashion at the time): Dwarf (with their own class table), Elf (with their own class table), Halfling (barely defined, Fighter up to 4th-Level). Fighter has a base save 14, everyone else has 15, Dwarfs only get +4 save against magic; in OD&D they get +4 levels against all saves (which varies from +2 to +4 bonus depending on level).

  • Combat: Mostly OD&D-like, but opinionated because there are not clear procedures in the original. For both legal and modernization reasons, it changed Armor Class from descending 9 (unprotected) down to 2 (plate+shield), to combination ascending, 9[10] (unprotected) to 2[17] (plate+shield); saving throws went from five different numbers for Death, Wands, Petrify, Dragon Breath, Spells & Staves, to a single target number, with bonuses for some classes and species.

    Turn Undead is a new table, based on the D20 SRD, using a d20 chance to turn all of the same type. It's pretty generous, and makes Clerics OP against Undead and Demons!

    You know what's hilarious? There's no rules for falling, fire, or disease. Some monsters list damage for poisons, others it does death. How is Neutralize Poison useful? It's unknown.

  • High-Level Adventuring: Followers, mass combat, spell research, all very brief.

  • Magic: Almost all of the OD&D + Greyhawk + some later spells. Notably, Magic Missile has both variants, auto-hit for d4+1 damage, or to-hit as a +1 arrow.

  • Referee: How to design a dungeon, very light. Two sample maps, side-layout lines, and small dungeon. Random dungeon & a couple terrain-specifc encounter tables, but no overall wilderness encounter table.

  • Monsters: Most of the OD&D monsters, but not the under-defined "Maybe dinosaurs, giant bugs, robots, Martian Thoats" entry. As in later games, but contradicting OD&D, Skeletons are 1 HD not 1/2 HD, Zombies are 2 HD, not 1 HD. There's only 2 Demons, Lemures & Balrog ("Baalroch"). Dragons are Black, Blue, Gold, Green, Red, White, Turtle.

    Officially it uses d8 hit dice. OD&D was unclear, Holmes and later specify d8 hit dice, but I continue to use d6 for all except very tough monsters (Dragons x3 HP, Demons, Elementals, Giants get larger HD by type).

  • Treasure: Core through Complete (unrevised) used a system of giving GP = 2-3x monster XP, with trade-outs that almost never (5%) generated magic items. The item lists are minimal compared even to OD&D, intelligent magic swords almost never happen (1/1440 of major treasures!) and only have a 10% chance of spell-casting.

Core's fine for a quick and very minimalist game, and has higher-Level options almost all other retro-clones ignore, but you need to add a lot to finish it.

Offshoot: There's also a White Box variant, cutting out even more of that material, and later another publisher made White Box Fantastic Medieval Adventure Game (FMAG), which is more variant, adds Thieves, and limited to 10th-Level (12 for M-U), but it's very compact, a good pick-up game system; while apparently some people have run long games with FMAG, you'd do better with Core/Complete/Revised.

Swords & Wizardry Complete in 2010, was a major upgrade. Where I don't mention, it was the same as Core, but often expanded and rewritten for clarity. Boxes sometimes explain the rationale for rules, which at least helps you write house rules to change them!

  • Stats: Adds more of the Greyhawk tables, increasing power of STR but doesn't add the 18/d100 mechanic so that's… overpowered but not the worst. INT removes the M-U bonus spell, and adds a bunch of stupid spell choice mechanics. I hate the INT table, so much. I give M-U Detect Magic, Read Magic, 2 spells of choice, +1 spell for INT 15+. Done. Never make spell gain rolls. WTF Gary Gygax, let's not perpetuate this.

  • Classes: All the classes of the OD&D supplements, Ranger (stupidly overpowered) from The Strategic Review/Dragon, but not Bard, Illusionist, or Barbarian. Stat minumums for the "better" classes are an optional rule, but listed. Non-Humans are standard classes or multiclass, and Half-Elves are added. "Halflings" are still garbage. Multi-classing is explained clearly, tho not necessarily the way I like. But it's A system.

    The Cleric spells/day table changed, more like OD&D, but I think this is a design error. In Core, 5th is 2/2/1, 6th is 2/2/1/1, Complete jumps from 5th is 2/2 to 6th is 2/2/1/1; inexplicably gives 2 spell levels at once.

  • Alignment: Defined as a juvenile, He-Man, Law-good, Chaos-bad thing. I reject this, I'm more Moorcockian where everyone is bad except maybe Balance (and, you know, not everyone likes my Captain Planet "replace Humans with trees" definition of good).

  • Combat: Has an alternate version of the OD&D saving throws, tho they're not integrated into the rules. If you do want to use these, understand that the deadliest, most environmental things are easiest to save against, mere inconveniences are harder, directed effects are hardest. You can read hardest to easiest if you're a bastard DM, easiest to hardest if you're tolerant.

    There remain no rules for falling, disease, and minimal for fire and poison. Starting fires is listed under Lamp Oil (which is ridiculous, lamp oil is not napalm or Greek Fire). The use of poisons is barely touched on in Assassins, but not their effects.

    Surprise is completely rewritten and expanded, and includes a hard-to-read monster reaction roll.

    Initiative rewrites the Core mechanic, and then presents two alternate systems: Holmes-like DEX rank (which is what I use), and Eldritch Wizardry activity points. All 3 systems are still using a 1-minute round which isn't clear in OD&D, contrary to Holmes and B/X which are 10-second, I use the 10-second round (and 100-second combat turn) from Holmes.

    Turning undead uses almost the same table (slightly harder at Level 9+), but changes from d20 to 2d10, and turns only 2d6 Undead (no Demons), so now high-powered Undead are up to 10x harder to turn.

  • High-Level Adventuring: Followers, strongholds. Research is moved to Magic, rest is moved to Referee.

  • Magic: Same spell list, with minor changes.

  • Referee: All-new dungeon examples, an evocative side-view cross-section, a much better detailed dungeon, and a sketchy part of Rappan Athuk with no key, but good design. Better dungeon encounter tables (from 6 to 10 options) and adds a very good, detailed wilderness encounter system. Mass warfare, siege warfare, aerial combat, ship combat are all fleshed out and quite usable; tho in practice I've always used the GAZ4 Kingdom of Ierendi larger-scale naval system.

  • Monsters: Adds many classic monsters:

    • Bulette (ludicrously lists Tim Kask's pr. "boo-LAY", when French pr. would be "bu-let")
    • Crocodiles
    • Demons (13, from Manes to Orcus)
    • Clay Golem
    • Leech (which drain a life level like undead!)
    • Naga
    • Rakshasa
    • Fish, Octopus, Squid, Sea Monsters (adds a 30 HD variant! Screw you! Never get on a boat! Never go in the water!)
    • Shambling Mound
    • Shrieker, Lurker, Piercer, Slithering Tracker, Trapper (screw you to dungeoneers)
    • Yeti
  • Treasure: A few more items, swords are now intelligent more often, but there's no real mechanics for this. Adds cursed scrolls.

I've run S&W Complete for 11 years, I use the nice blue-cover kickstarter edition (look under "Troll Slayer" in the back), it's a very solid OD&D-that-doesn't-suck. I don't use everything, but it's nice to have the options. It's easy to extend into a "modern" (2nd-gen or later) RPG, adding professions & skills, more character background options, situational rules, and there's not many interacting parts to stop you. Very importantly, saving throws are basically D20's "DC 15" skill roll. Just add a stat or skill modifier, and Level bonus is built in.

See under "Previously Swords & Wizardry" my notebook of Olde House Rules for Complete. I'm currently hacking up all my character & referee notes for a new version. If you like opinionated house rules, you'll like that when I'm done.

Swords & Wizardry Complete Revised has just completed its kickstarter. It's the same size book, 144 pages, but more usable pages: 140 vs 125 in Complete. This is because there's No Fucking Index. Complete's 2-page index wasn't the most useful thing ever, everything's listed in contents and reasonably organized, but occasionally I have to search in PDF instead of checking the index. SIGH, why, Matt? No kickstarter credits in new book, either.

Many places in the book now go from 2-column to 3-column layout, which can be helpful or too tight. It's fine for spells & monsters which have a lot of data fields, less great for species.

  • Character Sheet: New sheet is a fillable form, many more boxes, but less aesthetic than the old one. In any case, I just use James V West's character sheets, many of which have single-save boxes. I will note, the new one lists AC from 0 to 9, instead of 9[10] to 0[19] order & labelling. I really dislike that.

  • Stats: Same as Complete. CHA does get a new use for follower morale.

  • Class: Cleric spell table remains in design error. Fighters now have a standard 15 save, BUT get a +1 bonus against all except spells, which is a little better balanced, more OD&D. Monks no longer have stat minimums, BUT most of their powers require higher stats, so an average-Joe Monk would have only minimal skills. There's no stat minimum for Paladin, except when a Fighter takes vows they need CHA 17, inconsistent.

    Thieves remain up to 10d4 HD (while Assassins are up to 13d6!), but have a +2% chance to Climb Walls, Dwarf Thieves get a +15 on Traps, no +10 bonus on Pick Locks, finally this travesty is corrected! Must-buy for this change! :) Seriously, all the classes are pretty close.

    There's an argument here "Why Would I Play a Fighter?" that Rangers & Paladins are not Fighters, so don't get Fighter STR bonuses, etc. I'd rather that it just went back to stat minumums, so you can't be one of these advanced classes unless you roll well. Especially this makes no sense for Paladins, who are JUST Fighters who've taken holy vows; why would they suddenly lose their fighting skills?

    The non-Human species (now "Character Ancestry") are the same; this is a little disappointing since there was room to improve the class/levels permitted from long dialogues to clearer lists:

    Dwarven player characters must be Fighters or Fighter-Thieves. Multi-classed Fight- er-Thieves are limited to 6th level as Fight- ers, and may not advance beyond this point. (For more information on multi-classed char- acters, see below.) A Dwarf who is purely a Fighter may advance beyond 6th level only if the warrior has Strength of 17 (maximum 7th level) or 18 (maximum 8th level). Such a Fighter may also take advantage of any XP bonus due to a high Strength score to gain experience more quickly.

    Could be cleaned up to:

    • Fighter (max Level 6th, 7th if STR 17, 8th if STR 18), Prime requisite bonus applies.
    • Fighter/Thief (max Level 6th/unlimited)
  • Movement: Encumbrance & movement has been changed, and now combat speed is faster, 60-120' per 1-minute round (Core was 3-12', Complete was 10-40'!), walking & running out-of-combat are still per 10-minute turn. Combat speed is now nearly plausible if you use a 10-second round, Usain Bolt did 100m in 10 seconds, so 1/3 rate for equipped normals is fine. The per-turn speeds are still nonsense, even with mapping it should be 10x or more. There's a collected movement chart here that is much clearer.

  • Combat: Morale rules have been added, and a morale stat to every monster. Now, here's the thing: It copies B/X (Basic/Expert, 1981) in using roll 2d6 under morale to save. OD&D almost always had roll high good, and Chainmail's morale system was roll 2d6 high over a number determined by troop type. I would have greatly preferred a standard d20 save with morale modifier per monster, or some such. But the presence of any morale rule and stat is helpful.

    There's arguments, most recently on Wandering DMs, about the use of morale, but I think it's an essential tool, both as wargame simulation, where people in battle do sometimes just crap their pants and "Run away! Run away!"; and narratively as a way to avoid mass-murdering everyone you ever meet and fight.

    There remain no rules for falling, disease, and minimal for fire and poison.

    Healing has been reduced back to OD&D rate of 1 HP per 2 days, 4 weeks heals all. Death is at –1 HP, with an optional rule for survival to negative Level. Whoof. Since I don't use Clerics, that's not really practical.

  • Magic: Magic item creation is detailed, including the very popular rule from Holmes that Magic-Users and Clerics can write their own scrolls at 100 GP per Level, which makes a massive improvement to their quality of life. All new layout and a spell index, which since they're in alphabetical order I didn't really need. The page numbers could've been on the spell list instead!

  • Referee: Alas, the side-view dungeon & Rappan Athuk maps are gone, the dungeon from Complete is kept in 1-page dungeon form. Which is convenient for design, but less in depth for training new Referees.

    A new system for generating random castles, inspired by OD&D Book 3, is very welcome. And there are stats for generic high-Level NPCs, with sometimes magical equipment, spell lists, etc.

    A Referee Session Log ("control sheet" as I call them) is added, with fillable form fields, which may be very helpful to new Referees. There's no explanation of its use, but at least they can see how to organize information for a game. There's no time tracker on this one, I use a 6x24 chunk of graph paper in Turns for mine.

  • Monsters: Each monster now has Morale, Number Encountered, % in Lair (but I prefer % is Liar from OD&D and Arduin), and a full stat line you can copy-paste out:

    Bugbear: HD 3+1; AC 5[14]; Atk bite (2d4) or weapon (1d8+1); Move 9; Save 14; Morale 9; AL C; CL/XP 4/120; Special: surprise opponents (1–3 on d6).

    New monsters:

    • Dinosaurs: Ankylosaurus, Brontosaurus, Triceratops, Tyrannosaurus Rex. They've always been 20% of the Clear encounters (Oof!), but weren't defined in previous editions.
    • Horse finally gets full stats.
    • Mammoth
    • Night Hag
    • Nightmare
    • Otyugh

    Designing monsters, there's new CL modifiers, EP values for CL 8+ have increased a bit, and the table goes up to 21+ now, more fairly rewarding very powerful monsters.

  • Treasure: System has been totally redesigned. You now roll on GP value tables, which give more specific coin & gem results, and many more of them have chances for magic items. At 4001-7000 GPV, you now have a 1/6 chance to get a major item, 1/6 to get a medium item, 2/6 to get a minor item. I'm not really gonna complain it's too rich now, but it's a big jump from 5%.

    Intelligent weapons are at the same rate as Complete, but now there's actually rules for ego contests.

    Items seem to be the same.

Book abruptly ends. So, the current license situation is there's no license ("all rights reserved"). There will be a Mythmere license very like the old OGL, or ORC with an SRD, or something, in the very near future, as a downloadable thing.

Conclusion

So this has been a long haul over a few days comparing PDFs until my eyes bleed out. I can't speak to the print book condition until I get it; my old blue book is in perfect (well, Very Good) condition after a decade of hard use, but printers are random.

There's several other retro-clones of OD&D, in particular Fantastic Medieval Campaigns which is VERY precise at copying warts and all of the original books, with minimal spackle over the rough spots. There's a lot, a kaiju-sized shitload, of B/X clones, which have a goofier, overpowered style, poorly adapted to swords & sorcery; I have played some Basic Fantasy lately and it was fine, very candy-coated Saturday morning D&D cartoon tone, but not a replacement.

Swords & Wizardry is much more eclectic and opinionated. It's also much more playable, more hackable, and more easily used as a "modern" RPG (I always air-quote that, but RPG design has moved on from Dave Arneson's game that Gary Gygax published & ripped off). There's still a lot of weird little gaps.

★★★★½ — S&W is a really great "dnd"-like to run, and Complete Revised is the best of these. I really dislike not having an index. I still need a booklet of house rules to play.

Covers: One last thing, the cover art over the editions is… not the best progression. I think the Core rules cover was the most D&D-like, an homage to the AD&D cover but grimmer. The Erol Otus blue book cover was fun, the electric demon and portal are eerie. The old city is meh, you can barely see the adventurers. The flying polyp thing is hideous. Giants are amateur. FMAG has gone thru many variants, they all look like (often are) clip art with airbrushing. The new edition comes in a green embossed cover, classy but boring, or a POD cover with maybe the most hideous art I've ever seen; only the teeny preview is available, and that's a blessing like Langford's Parrot basilisk.