Strictly (Duke) Springer - Day 005 (RRR)

Having reviewed the game Star Smuggler, I wanted relive my past and play it. If you aren't familiar with the game, you can read the review here or download the whole game there.

This series will be a day-by-day play through of the classic game Star Smuggler from the point of view of the fictional hero, "Duke".

Dear Diary,

Day five is less exciting than day four. We engage in RRR, I watched the engineer repair the ship's boat. He did it, he doesn't even need a die roll. Ugh.

Engineers are interesting, sometimes they can fight, they can always do repairs under direction and oddly can drive a skimmer. Every item repaired burns one Repair Unit (RU) per point of damage, no matter how big or small it is. 

At the end of the 10 hour day, I'm thinking of money. Here is today's stats:

1 Antelope starship,
1 Hopper with 15 units of fuel,
1 Hopper, no fuel,
1 Stasis pod 2 CU,
25 Repair units (one used to repair the boat).
1 Skimmer,
1 Damaged Skimmer,
1 Damaged U-bot.
and the ship is fully fueled with 6 hypercharges.

Crew:
Emily, weekly pay 15 secs. She has a sidearm and 35 secs.
Ratchet, weekly pay 15 secs. He has 30 secs.
Doc, weekly pay 10. He has the 10 secs that I paid him on day one.

Designated Heir: Emily.

I still owe 120,000 secs. in principal on the ship. I still have 350 secs in my pocket, but the gear will sell will help, a lot.

What is Dungeons and Dragons? Book Review

Title: What is Dungeons and Dragons?
Author: John Butterfield, Philip Parker and David Honigmann
Year: 1982
Pages: 231
Rating: ★★★★★

Way back when, my dad took me to The Tek Pharmacy and told me flat out, "I don't have any extra money to get you anything." As he shopped I made my way to the book section and was perusing the Choose Your Own Adventure Books. I didn't want another, I felt like I had "graduated" from those, even though they were always enjoyable.

Back then, things were not like they are today. Being a small pharmacy, the books on the shelves would be by today's standard very old. The books were perhaps as old as 5 year since their publication date being sold as new. This is why I can't nail down the exact year of this visit. But in all likelihood, I probably look like either one of the kids on the right.

After Dad picked up his script or whatever he was buying, he found me looking at a book called: What is Dungeons and Dragons? by John Butterfield, Philip Parker and David Honigmann.

As I put it back on the shelf to leave, my dad said, "Oh, a book. I have money for a book. As long as you read it." I was probably 10 or 11. Now I am almost 48. And I'll tell you, I read the hell out that book. The pages were falling out, the spine was shattered and the cover had gone missing a long time ago. Finally, the book met it's end when the basement flooded. It was a sad day because this book has been out of print probably for decades.

As you will note, this is my second 5 gold star review. My first was Nate Treme's The Moldy Unicorn. If I had it do over again, I would make What is Dungeons and Dragons? the first and The Moldy Unicorn second. My Mom is a publisher, my Dad writes game books and I write, too. I don't go forking out 5 gold stars for shits and giggles. (Normally, I don't cuss either, but it is what it is.) The content has to be not just superior, it has to be memorable.

I've read both over and over again and they both evoke the same feeling of nostalgia. Each was something wildly different than what I had encountered in the past.

Within Butterfield, Parker and Honigmann's book, you get a ground up approach to game play. The first 8 chapters cover a massive amount of ground. Back in 1982, this was the closest one could get to "The Internet". Chapter 1 is an introduction to D&D. Chapters 2-5 walk the reader through character generation, dungeon design, an adventure with examples, and the role of the Dungeon Master in the game. Each of these topics are presented in a solid and memorable framework, with the section on The Adventure standing out. The sample adventure is not a classic in the sense of many great modules, but is a model of what one could realistically expected to produce on one's own. And that is great!

The next several chapters cover more advance details, such as figures, accessories, computers and even AD&D with the same solid reporting of the first 5 chapters.

The final chapter addresses other game systems, in a rather cursory fashion when compared to the information now available to us now. At 231 pages, some of which are maps, diagrams, and indices, there is no way for this book to rival information available on even a couple of web pages, but this is all I had back then.

This book is a treasure. At this point I am going to throw an ad at you. If you love the history of the game, go purchase this book.

Strictly (Duke) Springer - Day 004

Having reviewed the game Star Smuggler, I wanted relive my past and play it. If you aren't familiar with the game, you can read the review here or download the whole game there.

This series will be a day-by-day play through of the classic game Star Smuggler from the point of view of the fictional hero, "Duke".

Dear Diary,

Day four was boring. We found a Utility bot and a damaged skimmer. The end.

Bots are boring in this game. They have a Tech level but can't fight, they can also breakdown when being used and have a weekly secs cost to operate. They are a money suck most of the time. Since they can't fight, the Tech level is only increasing the chance of a breakdown. They have very specific uses, so don't get excited about them. 

For the record, all U-bots do is carry stuff. They can carry 3 CUs of items for you, which comes in handy because a human can only carry 2. 

At the end of the 10 hour day, I'm thinking of money. Here is today's stats:

1 Antelope starship,
1 Hopper with 15 units of fuel,
1 Hopper, no fuel,
1 Stasis pod 2 CU,
26 Repair units,
1 Skimmer,
1 Damaged Skimmer,
1 Damaged U-bot.
and the ship is fully fueled with 6 hypercharges.

Crew:
Emily, weekly pay 15 secs. She has a sidearm and 35 secs.
Ratchet, weekly pay 15 secs. He has 30 secs.
Doc, weekly pay 10. He has the 10 secs that I paid him on day one.

Designated Heir: Emily.

I still owe 120,000 secs. in principal on the ship. I still have 350 secs in my pocket, but the gear will sell will help, a lot.

Now throwing it back to Phil... I haven't tried to sell you anything in a while. This website is supported through ads on DriveThruRPG. You can also purchase my books posted on the upper right of every page. However, today I would like to suggest a title on DriveThru RPG called Cyberpunk Red Jumpstart. Like Star Smuggler before it, it is very much a child of the 80s. It also has two booklets, maps, pre-generated characters and is reasonably priced at $10.00.

Strictly (Duke) Springer - Day 003

Having reviewed the game Star Smuggler, I wanted relive my past and play it. If you aren't familiar with the game, you can read the review here or download the whole game there.

This series will be a day-by-day play through of the classic game Star Smuggler from the point of view of the fictional hero, "Duke".

This is getting old, fast. We are still in the ruins looking for "good junk". Today was much better than yesterday. We scored big. First, Emily found a working sidearm and the we found a damaged ship's boat or Hopper. The ship's boat from the ruins is the best item you can find. You roll 1d6 to determine how beat up it is. This one has one point of damage, which can be fixed in a day by an engineer. 

Found equipment gets a roll for Tech level, just like anything else. The problem is, the Tech level of Regari is low so nothing found can have a Tech level higher than 1. 

At the end of the 10 hour day, we're sore, but have some loot. Here is today's scorecard:

1 Antelope starship,
1 Hopper with 15 units of fuel,
1 Hopper, 1 point of damage.
1 Stasis pod 2 CU,
26 Repair units,
1 Skimmer
and the ship is fully fueled with 6 hypercharges.

Crew:
Emily, weekly pay 15 secs. She has a sidearm and 35 secs.
Ratchet, weekly pay 15 secs. He has 30 secs.
Doc, weekly pay 10. He has the 10 secs that I paid him on day one.

Designated Heir: Emily.

I still owe 120,000 secs. in principal on the ship.  I have 350 secs. in my pocket.

Emily now has a gun, for reals.

The rules state that a Hopper class ship's boat takes up 40 CU in a bay. The drawing of the ship makes it look like it will fit in the ship's hold, meaning the Antelope can carry two. I don't know if that is an accurate reading of the rules, but that's how I roll. If that was not true, I would assume Emily could fly it behind the ship to another area using fuel units from the other boat. I am uncertain if the rules assume you don't bring the Antelope or they expect you to. 

Now taking back my captains chair, this is Phil. If you look on the right hand column, there to two features I hope stand out. First is the blogroll and the second is podcasts. If you are a creator and want to get your podcast or blog mentioned here, I am happy to oblige. Mention it in the comments or catch me on Facebook or Mewe and I would be glad to add you to the ever increasing list of titles I read or listen to.

Exciting 2020 Blogs - THAC0 and Red Dice Diaries

I was going to make this post about a lot of blogs, but I only have time for the one I am really excited for: Red Dice Diaries. John is working on a campaign for Colonial Time Period B/X game.

Over on THAC0's facebook page, someone was just asking about guns in D&D, which sort of fits John's idea. However, my question is, how does magic slide into a Colonial Setting?

Go check out the Red Dice Diaries here. And friend THAC0 on Facebook here at this link. THAC0 also has an associate blog page which is a wonderful read if you like anything about D&D.

If I were to suggest a resource or two for John's campaign, I would pick the book "Everyday Life In Early America". I've always meant to do a review of this book as it paints a highly detailed picture of common things the colonist would have done or encountered in a day. I totally use this for my D&D campaigns to get the brain juices flowing.

Red Dice Diaries also has a link to an excellent resource called "30 Days of Worldbuilding: An Author's Step-by-Step Guide to Building Fictional Worlds" by A Trevena. He will be using this book to build his campaign, so now is a great time to either follow his blog or add the podcast to your podcatching software.

Star Wars: Roleplaying Game Core Rulebook

Title: Star Wars: Roleplaying Game Core Rulebook
Author: Andy Collins, Bill Slavicsek, JD Wiker
Rule Set: d20
Year: 2000
Pages: 319
Number of players: 2 or more

Rating: ★★★★

For many years, Star Wars was in the stable of West End Games. Over the years, I accumulated many of their books, but never had a chance to play. In 2000, with The Phantom Menace coming to screens, Wizards of the Coast produced a gamebook for the series, which included everything you needed to play, including a set of rules to convert from WEG Star Wars to d20.

The system is a pretty close skin of D&D 3.0 or 3.5, with some great differences.

The system is a standardized d20 system. Standardization from the ground up is very good. One of the great advantages is it breaks every character down into a couple of stat blocks, which makes building a quality, unique character easy. Each character is made of 7 different categories of descriptions, all of which is uniform between classes. You start with ability scores, then everything changes. You select a species which is an approximation of race in D&D terms, a class, skills, feats, character descriptors like reputation, equipment and finally spells, if any. All characters have the same 6 items, unlike D&D where some characters get spells in addition to their other "stats".

So, what about The Force? Those aren't spells, they are tied into one Feat and several Skills for Force Sensitive people. Hit points are replaced with vitality and wound points. This changes the dynamics of how characters work. Vitality is how much energy and stamina you have, while wounds are actual chunks of flesh. Hike through a hellish landscape will reduce your vitality, but a blaster to the head is a wound. Wounds stick around or are fatal, while vitality tracks how much "give" you've got. Nice system, considering how dangerous a lightsabre is. Vitality returns with rest and wounds require healing. The reputation system is a replacement for alignment, which actually has some mechanical advantages or disadvantages, unlike the alignment system.

While this is a d20 system, there are several advantages to this rule set over a typical d20 RPG. First, your players will have a general idea of what they want to be if they have seen Star Wars. To this end, there are 25 character templates so you can play right away. The rules allow you to flavor these characters, so you are a cutout character, but perhaps not made of cardboard. Additionally, if you played WEG Star Wars, there is a set of conversion rules in the back. There is a section on Starships, Droids, and a Game Master Section, with a module included. Everything you need to play is right there.

4 of 5 stars.