Hey, I was going through my old mags and found an extra that could use a home.

In Dragon #131 their was a pullout Dungeon adventure: The Chasm Bridge by
Desmond Varady, for 3-6 characters levels 4-6.

My copy of Dragon has the adventure still bound in the staples, but I have a
second pulled-out copy. No staples, but complete adventure.

Anyone want it?  If you have some other deelio to trade I'll be pleased I
suppose.

Well, I have been running some Pathfinder Society games for my gaming group. 
They sem to love it.  I will say, the modules so far are pretty tough.  Out of
the games that I have run so far everyone was pretty much tapped out on their
resources by the end of the game.

It looks like we are going to be alternating between Pathfinder Society games
and Warhammer Fantasy for awhile.  Not a bad combination.  Perhaps we can get
into something a little more modern or sci-fi this winter.

I have just started with Pathfinder about a month ago.  Pathfinder is really
what D&D 4e SHOULD have been.  It does streamline a lot of the rules/rolls and
it is still very much compatible with all of the 3.5 stuff out there (so you
can still us any of the old books that you might want to).  I have had a D&D
campaign running for just under a year now.  All of the players are excited to
convert their characters over to Pathfinder.

     I have started reading through the Pathfinder published adventures.  I
have to say, they are really well put together and they seem to try to
incorporate a variety of skills, roleplay, and combat into them.  Paizo seems
to be doing a really great job.

     I am going to be playing in some Pathfinder Society games at GenCon this
year.  It's like the Living campaign settings of D&D old.  However, it is not
nearly as restrictive in the roleplay aspect of things.  But, it is currently
capped at level 12 (which you reach after 36 adventures).  Then, they have
special 12th level continuation campaigns.

     Anyone who might be looking for a great new version of D&D and wants to
see what D&D 4e should have been...take a look a Pathfinder.

I dunno, i'm kinda sick of rolling d20's, trying to track down a copy of spirit
of the century, have the free version, looks cool, so might as well toss some
money thier way.

One of the guys in my group is starting to DM us with Pathfinder, but he's
adding E6 into the mix.  Has anyone else played with E6?  Seems kind of
interesting.  Your character stops leveling at 6th level.  From that point on,
every 5,000 XP, you gain another Feat.  They've added a few new feats, too, to
compensate.  For instance, there's a Feat that let's you cast Restoration.  And
another Feat to cast Stone to Flesh.  Anyway, I'm looking forward to it.

Eh, well i just ran across it this weekend and I was thinking, well lessee,
looks like he (John Wick) is goinf over some of the same territory he has
previously published.

I've heard mixed reactions about it.  Don't think I'll be buying it
myself.  Why do you ask?

So has anyone on here looked at houses of the blooded?

A friend of mine is running aWarhammer Fantasy 2nd Edition game.  So far, it is
a lot of fun.  It can be pretty lethal too (go figure, it's Warhammer).  I like
the career system in WHF2e for picking up character classes.  You start in a
career where you gain all of the skills, Feats (I forget what WHF2e calls the
feats), and trappings (gear) of that career (character class).  Then, every
100XP you have a set of attributes that you can increase up to a certain amount
for that career.  If you complete all of the ability score increases then you
can pay an additional 100XP to move into one of that career's "exit careers" or
one of that career's "advanced exit careers."

In your new careers you need to pay 100xp to gain any of the new feats of that
career, 100xp for its skills, or 100xp for one of its ability score increases.
And, so it goes...

So far, my buddy has been running though printed modules and adventures from
WHF2e and they have been pretty good.  The whole game is based on D10's and
percentiles.

We did find out that small groups in Warhammer have a lot more difficult time
than in games such as D&D (except for 4e where a full group is generally
needed).  Usually, about four characters is pretty good but the game easily
accomidates many more.  There is a group that plays in Columbus at Ravenstone
Games and they regularly have bout 10-12 players.  That group has been running
for about 1.5 to 2 years now.

One thing that can slow the game down is the critical hit system.  There are
some charts and such.  However, my buddy made a spreadsheet that rolls out the
criticals for him when he punches in the dice rolls.  The big group usually
just skips criticals to and from "side monsters" and only worries about them on
"main monsters" or NPC's.

The game definately has A LOT grittier feel than say, D&D which has a more high
fantasy feel.  WHF2e is a more dark ages Europe type of a feel to it.  Witch
Hunters and Inquisitions are around every corner...but then again, so are chaos
sorcerers, demons, beastmen, skaven...yeah, you get the idea.

An acquaintance of mine got it, and i looked over it a lil and couldn't make
heads or tails of it, appearantly, there is some sort of puzzle mechanism made
out of punched cardstock that you somehow put together to determine your
characters stats, no idea how it works, and powers or skills are chosen from a
pile of cards, the whole thing looked more like a complex board game than an
rpg.

Although I did run an RPG once that was focused on a team of blood bowl
players.  Had them travel around to various cities, with mis-adventures along
the way.  The idea was that when they got to a town, we'd have a game of blood
bowl.  Never sure whether it was a good idea or not, as the game fell apart
before the first time they would have played.  Which makes me remember
something I intended to ask a while ago...  Has anyone played the new Warhammer
Fantasy system?  I'm interested in it, as I heard they cleaned it up a lot, but
the price tag is dissuading me.

Yeah, Blood Bowl isn't an RPG.  It's a strategy game - or, as M Bison called
it, a wargame.

I'd say no, since even the TT version is actually a Wargame and not a RPG.

Since I don't play these games, I need to ask if LizPhairFan's question more
properly belongs in a forum for computer games; while some computer games are
role-playing in nature, I'm not sure if this one is.  Help me out here -
thanks.

Legendary Edition has more teams.

I was looking for Ptolus-specific conversions. Ratmen, guns, steampunk stuff.
I'll be picking up the Adventurers' Vault books and the Eberron Guide which
reference alchemy and includes info on the Artificer class, but was just seeing
if anyone else here had taken Ptolus, which is firmly based in 3.5 (with some
holdbacks to 3.0 along with a bit of Monte's own twists tossed in for good
measure), and adapted it to fit in with 4's own flavor.

I liked Ptolus because the setting takes the rules into account and you can get
away with using rules terms within the actual setting in many situations and
that the town is based around there being a heavy population of adventurers.

My game will involve all of the PCs being part of a rescue and reclamation team
in training that is sponsored by the Delvers' Guild. I'll be taking more than a
few liberties with the nature of the Guild to allow for an almost academy-like
aspect in addition to its canon description.

Well i don't think many people here are  fans, but if you are looking for  a
good conversion, i'd have to say there isn't one.  Basically all you can do is
figure out what the chracter is supposed to do and kinda pick what fits best.
For example, in a campaign that switched from 3.5 to 4e, i was playing a Ranger
Dervish, but ranger is pretty much just an archery school, and had to actually
make him a dual weapon weilding barbarian so he can kinda do the same thing.
hope that helps.

I'm going to be starting a 4th Ed D&D game using Ptolus as my setting. The
fluff will work just fine, but I'm wondering if anyone has seen any conversions
(well, new interpretations since converting from 3.5 to 4 is more of an
art/magic than science) of some of the creatures and whatnot out there.

I've been doing some looking about the great series of tubes and have found
some good sources, but I'd definitely appreciate any other resources people can
point me at.

One of the early and awesome games out of the Forge (when you could
count those things on your fingers instead of your fingers and all
your friends' toes) was Nine Worlds by Matt Snyder.  (He'd also done
the game "Dust Devils" which was about gritty westerns.)

Nine Worlds was a playing-card-based game, set in a universe that's,
well, it's a little like the Matrix except instead of finding out the
world is a lie and reality is a computer simulation hacked by badass
Goth fashionistas, you find out that the world is MOSTLY lies, and the
REAL world is the Ptolemaic geocentric cosmos as illustrated by the
bastard love child of Alphonse Mucha and Jack "The King" Kirby.

In other words, it's just about the best thing ever.

Anyway, I'm geeked as hell cause Snyder, after taking it off the
market for a while, gave it back to the world as a free PDF.

You've just gotta sign up on his site to download it.

http://storiesyouplay.com/nineworlds/

I did some Nine Worlds fanart tonight.

http://imgur.com/fH8bB

I finally got my hands on TORG 1.5.
I gotta say, for the time it was written, it was very well done.  I mean, there
have been advances made in RPG systems since then, it wouldn't be fair to
compare it to today's games, but it's very nice.  I recommend, if you like
cinematic games, to give it a shot.

As far as copyright, roleplaying rules are ideas, and you can't copyright an
idea. TSR/WOTC never did and never could copyright the idea of 3d6 attributes,
for instance. Look at all the games that have used the concept since the 70s.

You can copyright text describing ideas. In fact, simply writing text
automatically copyrights it. So you'd have to write/rewrite entirely original
text from the WEG rules, change the wording on all of the cards, and so on.

The other question is what you plan to do with what you write. If we're talking
a home game, no problem. If you're talking a PDF you distribute on the web for
free, it gets trickier. And if you start charging people, it becomes trickier
still.

Torg: Purgatory Printing owned the trademark as of 2005. Federal trademark
registration lasts, I believe, 10 years. However, Purgatory would have to file
an affadavit between the fifth and sixth year, but have a grace period in the
six months following the end of the sixth year. So they're at least good
through 2010, 2011, and the first six months of 2012.

I don't know, but there's a Russian medieval fantasy game out there; it's
called "Rus".  Published in 1990, out of print as far as I know.

http://www.arielarchives.com/Rus.html
http://index.rpg.net/display-entry.phtml?mainid=9709

"In medieval fantasy Russia, floor of (Baba Yaga's) hut stomps YOU!"

You don't have the massive body of available works to base a slavic/Russian
game off of, like you would with British, French or Greek/Roman. Unless you
read Russian and can travel to eastern europe on a book finding spree. Not an
overabundance of translated material.

There are a few good ones though. If i was to build a game, i'd actually look
at Hellboy first (the comic, not the movie) as the tone of eastern european
mythology rules that comic. Dark forests. Evil spirits. Kobolds, Czernabog and
Bilibog, Baba Yaga. Trolls, Hags, household spirits. Its a different animal
than your western european mythologies which have skewed toward brighter and
nicer generalities.

I would emphasize the horror. Make the monsters more than just hit points in a
sack. You have to defeat them through trickery or deal making rather than
violence.

Man all i can say are add trolls, cuz well, i ain't familiar with slavic
mythology cept for Baba Yaga stories.

I've been really wanting to see a resurrection of TORG (perhaps with updated
rules) for years.
I am now lead to believe that the trademark has expired and that a game isn't
copyright-able.
Doesn't that mean TORG is in the clear?

If you were going to create a roleplaying game based on Russian/Slavic fantasy
rather than Tolkien, what would you add?  What would you consider important?

Anyone know where I could get my hands on the old Lost World line from the late
eighties?  My brother got all our copies when I left for college, and he tells
me he's long since lost them.

Ok so i finally got done reading PHB3 for 4e (yes they are already up to PHB3)
and have to say they are offcially running out of ideas for new shit to add to
the game.  The best new additions to the game are basically them getting around
to reprinting an old standby (The monk) and making a class that is more like a
Druid than the Druid (which they call a seeker) The Psionic classes (which i
guess are just added because D&D always has some half-assed psychic addendum)
are pretty mich just minor and less interesting variations on the Wizard,
Fighter, and Cleric Classes.

The original is an old school game.  It has classes and levels, rather D&D-like
attributes, a system for mapping underground warrens, etc etc...

The 2nd edition is available (probably not legitimately) as a PDF from here:

http://www.megaupload.com/?d=32on1hl0

Checking it out it seems to be similar to the first edition I have, but with
some gratuitous Jeff Dee artwork along with the charming original artwork.

SOmebody's uploaded the PDF to Scribd, where you can read it online here:

http://www.scribd.com/doc/4925930/bunnies-burrows-2nd-edition

I've only ever played the GURPS version of B&B.  How different is the 'feel' of
the original?

Well, I never actually read Watership Down, so B&B *is* my source material. :)

Realllllly?

I've always wanted to play in a B&B campaign - but it's not unlike wanting to
play in a Middle-earth campaign.  There's a delicate line there to trace, in
trying for as much of a feel for the original source material as possible (i.e.
Watership Down vs. LOTR).

The "bought in store when it was new and actually played the hell out of it"
artifact I still have lying around, besides a large pile of T&T solo dungeons,
is Bunnies & Burrows from FGU. :)

I have both, bought them in the store, and have both editions of Bushido, from
Phoenix and FGU. :)

I've got both, but not cause I bought them in the store; I saw a copy of MA at
a GenCon auction and snagged it.  :)  Something similar with Bushido; I dont'
remember where I got it.

Bah.  Such tests are silly.  It's like knowing trivia - sure, there's lots of
interesting trivia out there, but it's not critical to know.  Same thing here.

I guess i'm not old enough to be a grognard, i've never seen a copy of
Metamorphasis Alpha, or Bushido, and those games were already obscure when i
started some 27 yeard ago.

Some deluded old fart.  Ignore him.

There are whole blogs devoted to exploring "old school play" (i.e. pre-1980,
mostly).  Like "Grognardia."  Who I was reading the other day and he mentioned
something on the blog of some dude named Victor Raymond.  Where have I heard
that name before?

Don't have to be.  It's quite clear that "old school" games are a distinct
style of play, so anybody can game this way.  There are younger gamers getting
introduced to it, and like it.

No, I meant to refer to my earlier comments about us being old grognards. :)

Well the oldest one i'd consider is Traveller, which strangely, is the oldest
and still in print. Others are maybe, Earthdawn, Battletech, that's all that
springs to mind atm.

Vincent "Dogs int he Vineyard" Baker is working on a post-apocalyptic game
called just "Apocalypse World" that looks sweet.  I'm seeing some reactions
from playtesters and though mixed there's a lot of people psyched about it.

cf "old".

For some reason the idea that Big freakin robots fighting Elder Gods and being
able to to fight back agaiinst the Cthulhu minions seems kinda antithetical to
the mythos origins, just my opinion.

Okay, got it :)  That explains my confusion... and I'm clueless then, sorry :)
Sadly, there's no wiki page for Iron Golem Games, either.  I looked.