Modern Appendix N: Your suggestions?

April 3, 2016, 7:53 am

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Dungeons & Dragons was heavily influenced by speculative fiction of the years prior to its creation--everything from classical mythology and folk tales, through the pulp stories of the early 20th century, to then-contemporary novels. These legendaria became known as Appendix N material, so named for the section of the AD&D Dungeon Masters Guide in which author Gary Gygax listed some of the many influences on his gaming.

There have been plenty of overviews of this source material--see here, here, and here, for example. And because that list of inspirational reading is decades old, folks have been suggesting additions to the literary canon.

Which brings me to my question: What are three relatively new (published within the past three decades or so) works that you would suggest to inspire fantasy gamers?

Here are my suggestions, all of which have great settings and, just as important, great characters:

• The Deed of Paskanarrion series by Elizabeth Moon: A sheepfarmer's daughter joins a mercenary company, setting her on a path to become a paladin--but not before numerous battles with opposing armies and even creatures of darkness. 
• Books of the Elements series by David Drake: Four citizens in ancient Rome Carce defend their empire from creatures of the Norse sagas, Native American legends, African mythology, and Indian folk tales, with pulp elements like Atlantean flying ships thrown in.
• The Desert of Souls by Howard Andrew Jones: Two officials in medieval Baghdad team up to stop a plot against the Caliph in a swashbuckling tale that combines 1930s action with 21st century sensibility--and a djinn.

Your turn: Suggest three works (series or standalone novels) that are inspirational reading for you and your gaming.

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Take a ride on the Reading Railroad

April 14, 2016, 9:07 pm

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The Ogre Designer's Edition has a couple of scenarios involving trains (one of which dates back to the original publication of GEV). So I decided I want one for my Monopolis battles.

I found this Micro Machines bullet train and track on eBay. It's about the right scale for games of Ogre on my large hex mat. In the game, a train comes in two sections, each of which takes up one hex, so I don't need the three passenger cars.

It also has nearly enough track sections to span my entire map. All aboard!

Ekranoplan work in progress

April 25, 2016, 4:11 pm

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Some time ago I purchased a Thunderwolf helicopter from Kenner's old Mega Force line of military toys to use as a transport in my sci-fi combat games. I finally got around to working on this vehicle, removing the remaining rotor and some oversized gun turrets. As you can see, it scales nicely with Ogre (and other 6mm) miniatures.

Instead of a chopper, this piece now represents an ekranoplan--a cross between a conventional airplane and a ground-effect vehicle used for transporting large cargo, such as armored vehicles, more quickly than seagoing vessels.

This model took a spray coat very well, and the paint brings out the details on it nicely. The front cargo door still opens. In my games, it will probably serve as a terrain piece/objective at first. I can also see using it as an actual vehicle in an amphibious invasion scenario, but that's a long way off.

I also created a couple of cargo containers (not pictured) from spare game pieces. Now I just need to do some detailing on the windshields, engines, and landing gear. Then it will be ready for my Ogre miniatures to fight over.

Signs, signs, everywhere the signs

May 8, 2016, 6:32 pm

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A great find in the clearance section of Hobbytown USA: Five sheets of Ultra Reflect 1/64 road signs printed on reflective material with aluminum backing--for $1 each! These sheets are from Innovative Hobby Supply, a company that sells slot car accessories.

Although a little on the small side for 28mm scale, these signs will add verisimilitude to modern and post-apocalypic game setups. Right out of the package they will make great modern-day terain for All Things Zombie and After the Horsemen. In addition, with a little weathering (rust, scratches, bullet holes), they can fit in with the rest of the Fallout-like scenery in a game of Gamma World or Mutants and Death Ray Guns.

I'm keeping one sheet for myself and sending the rest to my brother for his ATZ game. Since his Zombieville setup will include a multi-level parking garage and several streets, these traffic signs will dress the set up nicely.

Another Oldhammer find

May 10, 2016, 7:00 am

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Is fifth-edition Warhammer considered Oldhammer? It's from two decades ago, so I'm gonna say yes.

I found this Warhammer Battle Book from the fifth edition boxed set at Half Price Books recently. I'm a little surprised that I am interested in the background from this era of the game (I have the Lizardmen and Bretonnia army books), but it is pretty interesting reading.

The Battle Book includes brief overviews (and lotsa photos) of the various forces of the Warhammer world. It also has rules and stats for many of the races, beasts, and monsters. There's also a short section on running campaigns, which can be adapted to other games as well. Who else has scored something vintage from a used book store recently?

Ogre update and pics

September 5, 2016, 9:34 am

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No, I haven't given up gaming (although it's been awhile since I've rolled any dice). As proof, here are some non-canon vehicles I'm working on for my next Monopolis scenario, which I plan on running at Millennium Con this November.

Above is a mobile jamscreen, with a PanEuropean heavy tank for scale. The model is actually a Micro Machines toy that will work nicely as an ECM unit in Ogre. I'm leaving the paint job (except for some detailing) so it can go with either side in my games.

I also got my armored boats looking how I want them. I sprayed them brown and then drybrushed with tan and light gray. I chose this color scheme so I could use them with my North American Combine (green) or PanEuro (gray) forces.

These submarines also look decent on the tabletop. Like my other nonstandard units, these are painted so they can go with either side. In this case, it's a flat black primer with a light gray drybrush.

Here's a size comparison for the aquatic units. For reference, the hexes in this photo are four inches across. So what's everyone else working on?

More Oldhammer goodness

September 6, 2016, 7:00 am

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Once again, I had an opportunity to buy this Warhammer Armies book for WHFB 3rd edition, but I left it on the shelf. Months later, I was in the same game store, and of course it had vanished from where I last saw it. I lamented the fact that I had let this old-school find slip through my fingers.

So imagine my delight when I found this very volume a few shelves over. I took that as a sign that the purchase was meant to be, and I snagged this. Now to get an army put together and find an opponent to play some Oldhammer.

Ground-Effect Ogre (GEO)

September 7, 2016, 7:00 am

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Take a Mark III, replace the treads with hover gear, and you have the Ground-Effect Ogre (GEO)--a fast, deadly, and extremely vulnerable cybertank.

Instead of tread units, a GEO has ground-effect units. While attacks against them are resolved just like for treads, the fragility of g-e units is reflected in their smaller number on the Ground-Effect Ogre's record sheet. In addition, GEOs take double damage from ramming (as attacker or defender). If a GEO loses all its ground-effect units while in a water hex, instead of being immobilized, the Ground-Effect Ogre sinks and is destroyed.

When resolving a cruise missile attack on a GEO, all systems are treated as standard Ogre components except ground-effect units. Use the line for "Any D0 Unit or Any GEV" on the Effects of Missile Explosion table to determine attacks against ground-effect units, but a D result still has no effect.

GEOs have split movement as shown on the record sheet. Terrain affects GEOs the same as any other ground-effect vehicle. All other standard rules for Ogres apply to GEOs.

        GROUND-EFFECT OGRE RECORD SHEET

WEAPONS            ATTACK  RANGE  DEF            
  1 Main Battery     4       3     4    O
  4 Secondaries      3       2     3    OOOO                
  2 Missiles         6       5     3    OO        
  8 Antipersonnel    1       1     1    OOOO OOOO 

MOVE RATE    |  3/2 |  3/1 |  2/1 |  1/1 |  1/0 | 0
 20 G-E UNITS| OOOO | OOOO | OOOO | OOOO | OOOO |  

The model started out as a Matchbox hovercraft. I added some bits from an Ogre repair kit and a bead from my wife's beading supplies for the ball turret. My attempt at using greenstuff for the armor came out horrible, but it shouldn't be too noticable on the tabletop at arm's length--and I can rationalize it as battle damage.

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Water hexes for Ogre

September 9, 2016, 7:00 am

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When I first ran my Monopolis game, I borrowed some river overlays from a fellow gamer. But sooner or later I needed to come up with my own way to represent water hexes in my large-scale Ogre games.

Eventually, I found some hexagons that are the same size (four inches across) as the spaces on my Corsec game mat.

I bought a pack of 99 cardboard beer coasters in an eBay auction. Some glossy blue spray paint gave me that game-map shade to represent water.

For ease of setup, I attached the hexes in strips of three using Elmer's glue and old business cards. This way I can quickly lay out rivers or large bodies of water for my Ogre games.

Now I can put in some water hazards on my maps, with plenty of room to play out all those aquatic overruns.

Treasure of Goblin Forest (SoBaH battle report)

September 11, 2016, 9:18 am

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I got to play Song of Blades and Heroes with my wife this weekend. She'd never played before, so to draw her into the game, I created a warband for her that included her assassin character from our recent one-on-one D&D game.

In addition to the assassin, taken from the rulebook with the Leadership special ability added, she had a trio of elf warrior maidens, an elf wizard (with the magic changed to shooting for simplicity's sake and points balance), and a baby dragon that breathed blue flame. We called them the Hunters.

The goblin warband consisted of ten goblins, two spiders, and an ogre, all from the rulebook. Unfortunately, with no Leader special abilities in my group, they weren't very motivated. And it didn't help that my activation rolls resulted in turnovers quite often.

The scenario we played was Treasure Hunt, with the background that my spouse's character had been hired to recover a certain valuable item, the location of which had been narrowed down to somewhere in a goblin-infested forest. Most of the figures and terrain are Heroscape, while the treasure chests are Mage Knight.

The ogre quickly left his smaller teammates behind and got into the thick of things. The big guy attemted to stop the ladies from grabbing the treasure, but even with the help of the web-spitting Boris the spider, he was taken down by the Hunters and dealt a fatal blow.

The goblins (Pathfinder minis, by the way) and surviving spider were too slow to stop Casandra from grabbing the treasure and heading toward safety, although they did chase after the Hunters for a little while.

The evil creatures ended up contenting themselves with snaring the blue dragon, keeping it alive until it could be cooked properly back at their lair. I have it on good authority that the dragon later escaped.

The Hunters left the battlefield with their objective achieved. They killed the ogre and one spider, while I managed to take out only the small dragon. A lopsided victory for my wife. And she said she will play the game again, so that makes it a win for me as well.

GEO and Mark III comparison shots

September 13, 2016, 7:53 pm

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At the request of a member on the Steve Jackson Games Ogre/GEV forum, here are some side-by-side shots of my kitbashed Ground Effect Ogre and an Ogre Mark III.

They;re about the same length, but the GEO is a little closer to the ground than its tracked brethren.

The width is pretty much the same as well. The Matchbox vehicle I used as the basis for the G-E Ogre was the perfect size for this conversion.

I want to see how the GEO compares on the battlefield. I need to playtest it against the defenders in the Mark III attacking the command post scenario. Meanwhile, it looks pretty good next to another cybertank.

Sunday Ogre games

September 15, 2016, 7:00 am

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This past weekend, I had a chance to meet up with a fellow member of the Steve Jackson Games Ogre and GEV message board for a couple of games.I brought my portable set (large-hex paper maps and 1" classic counters) to Great Hall Games for us to play.

We started out with the classic Mark III Attacking scenario from the original game. I played the defenders and set up with all my GEVs and most of my tanks forward. I kept my missile tanks, remaining heavy, and infantry at the back. Thanks to some good shooting at the treads, I managed to slow the Ogre down, giving my units a chance to keep up with it until I could immobilizing it.

Then we played the Raid scenario from the sequel. I took the attackers, concentrating on destroying town hexes and enemy units that I came across. The strategy worked for me until I got impatient and decided to send four of my GEVs into an overrun. I "won" that combat, if you can call trading three units for two a good deal. My force was much reduced, and I ended up sticking around too long and the defender was able to pick off all my GEVs, ending up with a marginal victory.

It was nice to find a fellow Ogre fan in the Austin area. We hope to make Ogre gaming a regular thing, and maybe even get some more players.

My next gaming project

September 18, 2016, 7:52 am

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I won't start working on it until after Millenniumcon 19 in November, but I've decided what my next gaming project will be. More details later, but for now, here's a hint:

Ogre minis work in progress

September 24, 2016, 2:50 pm

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Some of the miniatures on my painting table today in various states of completion. How's your weekend going?

The importance of playtesting

September 30, 2016, 7:38 pm

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I had a chance to run the latest iteration of my Monopolis scenario for Ogre with some friends before I present it at MillenniumCon in November, and I'm glad I did. First, I was able to lay out all the terrain, and it looked cool. More important, however, I got some valuable feedback on my design.

The players were blunt about some problems with my setup: Mainly, that some objectives were too far for the attacking player to reach, and some parts of the map never saw any combat. I was told I went overboard with the terrain, and they're right. At the playtesters' recommendation, I am going to have the attackers come in closer to the city--and from more than one side of the map. I will also give the defenders some reinforcements.

Another thing they discussed were the objective cards I had printed out. They told me the cards needed pictures of the objectives (which I didn't have time to get for the playtest). I also realized that I forgot to mention that lasers can be used offensively as well as defensively, which I need to tell the players. This is something I will include in the player handout, along with other tips and hints that players unfamiliar with the rules as well might appreciate.

I enjoyed running the game, and even if the scenario wasn't perfect, I had a good time--and I think the players did too. Now, back to the drawing board!

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Monopolis at MillenniumCon

October 12, 2016, 7:13 pm

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MillenniumCon 19, the wargame convention in Round Rock, Texas, will take place the weekend of November 11, 2016. I will be running my Ogre scenario, the Siege of Monopolis, on Saturday the 12th. You have till the end of the month to register and sign up for games, including mine. Here's the description of my scenario, taken from the convention event list:

The peaceful City of Monopolis rises above the rubble of the Last War, a gleaming center of commerce and industry. But no peace lasts forever. Now invaders march to conquer the city while outnumbered defenders scramble to protect their home. This is a custom scenario for Ogre Designer's Edition, using the official Ogre miniatures (and a few original units) on a large hex mat with 3-D terrain. With room for up to 8 players, you and your friends can aid in the defense of the besieged city--or help the invaders conquer it. Fight in the Siege of Monopolis!

If you're interested in MillCon, you have till the end of the month to register for the convention online and sign up for games. But act quickly; all the events fill up fast, and half the spots in my Monopolis game are already spoken for. Even if you're not interested in Ogre, let me know if you're going to the convention. I would love a chance to meet some of the folks who read this blog.

Monopolis aerial photo

October 20, 2016, 8:44 pm

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Here's a shot from a recon satellite of the greater Monopolis area. This photo was taken in winter, so the vegetation is not obvious (that is, I haven't added the forest and swamp yet). It looks peaceful now, but in a couple of weeks it will be under siege at MillenniumCon in my Ogre scenario. If you're interested in playing, last I checked there were still a few slots open.

Original D&D play report

October 24, 2016, 8:15 pm

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So I got to play some old-school Dungeons & Dragons over the weekend--I'm talking the original three booklets version (with house rules, of course, as that's the Old School Way). One of the folks on the OD&D Discussion forums mentioned an ongoing game here in the Austin area, and when I inquired, he was kind enough to invite me. Turns out their sessions were so popular, they started a second game with another DM. It was his first time behind the DM's screen, and my first time as a player in a campaign since I left the Hill Cantons.

There was a good crowd for this session: Seven characters, including the son of the DM and the son of one the players, and the DM. Character generation was quick and simple: 3d6 in order. I was thrilled to roll three 15s in a row for my guy's Strength, Intelligence, and Wisdom, but then was brought back down to earth with scores of 7 and 8 in Constitution and Dexterity, respectively. I named this character Clumsy Carp and made him a cleric. We started off in the village of Meadsville, learning of a threat to caravans and a separate threat in the nearby woods, which we investigated.

Long story short: Having a cleric came in handy, since we ran into a lot of undead, as well as a minion of the witch who one of the magic-users charmed. We came out of the dungeon with enough of a haul to get nearly everyone up a level. It was a good time, and I look forward to playing some  more.

Monopolis tourist attractions

October 25, 2016, 5:22 pm

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The peaceful City of Monopolis rises above the rubble of the Last War, a gleaming center of commerce and industry. Come see all the attractions this prosperous urban center has to offer at the beginning of the 22nd century!

Visit the region's center of government, Monopolis City Hall. 

Explore the learning resources available at Monopoly University.

The Bank of Monopolis is a vital financial powerhouse for the area. 

Enjoy the neomesoamerican architecture of the city's famous Nueva Azteca neighborhood.

Tour the high-rise marvels of biphase carbon engineering that make up downtown Monopolis.

Daily flights in and out of Pennybags Intercontinental Airport.

Monopolis. Advance to GO!

More Monopolis points of interest

October 27, 2016, 6:00 pm

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Not everything in Monopolis is photogenic, but it's all vital to the functioning of this 22nd century urban center.

This power generator complex is part of the Electric Company that keeps the lights on throughout the city.

The Water Works treats waste runoff and purifies river water to meet the city's H2O needs.

Monopolis Stadium hosts all sorts of sporting events, including Dreadball, Slaughterball, and Battleball.

Izzinanutter Castle is still home to a minor Ruritanian noble house, but most of this palace is now used as a museum.

The Túpharr Bridge one of two main crossings over the Monopolis River.

The Reading Railroad is another span that crosses the waterway.

Ghódurek Lítu Jail is a necessary facility, even in the eary 2100s.

Riveside dock facilities receive cargo and freight from all over the region.

The goods have a brief stay in warehouses until they are shipped to their final destination.

Chemicals are also stored and stockpiled at the Tank Farm.

These raw materials come together in the many manufacturing facilities around the city contributing to the economy of the entire region.

Monopolis. Advance to GO!