Recent Arrivals: GameholeCon Swag

 So a few weeks back I wrapped up my final gaming convention of the year, Gamehole Con, in Madison, Wisconsin. I usually do only one or two conventions a year, but with the 50th anniversary of D&D, I ended up at five of them. For me, that's a lot of travel.

Oh, the name? Well, Gamehole Con is run by an attorney named Alex Kammer. He also owns a restaurant in Middleton called the Free House, built into a historic building. The stairs to the second floor were too steep to use for a restaurant, so it became his gaming group's hang-out - the Game Hole. In it Alex has collected a huge amount of old gaming material, including the original TSR Forgotten Realms map. And he oversees Gamehole Con, which has been in the Alliant Energy Center to the south of the city. It's a really good convention, incredibly well-run. High marks all around.

And one of the things I like about going to conventions is seeing what is out there as far as new games are concerned. While our local game stores are good, they don't always carry the depth and variety I see at conventions, in particular from small publishers. So I tend to go indulge in a bit of shopping therapy. Plus, you're often buying from the publisher and sometimes from the creator, so that's nice. 

Not everything here is from the convention. one is a local purchase and one from a kickstarter. But the bulk are from the convention, so let us start with those:

Gamehole Con swag: Program Book and a Rust Monster Plushie  The program book is a spartan and effective twenty pager, with ads from the supporting sponsors, maps of the site, policies, and a list of exhibitors and guests (no bios, which is fine).. The events themselves are online with QR Code, which creates a nice versatility (the site itself is very searchable as well). The plushie is a standard for GHC as well, and a freebie to guests (I still have the Mimic from several years ago). The traditional Monster Manual rust monster is this year's plushie. The Lovely Bride has already named him Palladium. 

[Note from the distant past - when the Rust Monster first appeared in D&D, there was no illo to go with it, so, since it showed up with various oozes, I assumed it was a pile of rust with Cookie Monster googley eyes. We didn't hear about the plastic toy until later.]

Wardens of the Eastern Marches, Alex Kammer with Josh Hoyt and Jason Knutson, Gamehole Publishing, 28 page saddle-stitched digest, 2024. Gamehole Publishing (Yes, connected with the Gamehole con) is launching its own organized play at the convention, and this was a free giveaway. The Eastern Marches are the setting for a bunch of adventures they've published over the years (see next entry). This tidy little booklet gives an overview of the world, as well as the basic ground rules for their organized play. All the information in the book can be found here, but it's nice to have a hard copy.

The Brain Gorger's Appetite by Alex Kammer,  Gamehole Publishing, 40-page softbound, 2016, GHC Purchase. Into the Deep Dark by Alex Kammer, Gamehole Publishing, 46-page softbound, 2017, GHC Purchase, Trillium, City of Enchantment by Alex Kammer, Gamehole Publishing, 62-page softbound, GHC Purchase,  2018 All three of these were published over the years by Gamehole Publishing, and sold at the convention. I meant to pick them up last time I was there, and finally did so this time. The three adventures are part of a larger arc, set in what is now the Eastern Marches (see above), and involve a mind flayer brain gorger named Marlipp. The trilogy starts in the small town of Okney's Hold, journeys into the Underdark Deep Dark, and ends up in the faction-ridden city of Trillium. It's old-school adventures wired up for 5E action. 

Lands of Runequest: Dragon Pass by Jeff Richard, Greg Stafford, and Jason Durall, 190-page hardback, GHC Purchase, Runequest doesn't get as much coverage out here in the local hobby stores, so I'm always glad to see it at conventions. Dragon Pass has its roots Waaaay back in the White Bear, Red Moon board game, and it is a highly diverse chunk of land at the crossroads of Glorantha. Lottsa sentient creatures, factions, and politics rolling around. Dragon Pass probably has the greatest weirdness-per-acre of any location in Glorantha. Nice to see the update.

No Time to Scream by B.W. Holland, Bridgett Jeffries with C.L.Werner  Chaosium, 104-page hardback, 2024, GHC Purchase, Call of Cthulhu shows up in the local stores more often, but hey, I was there at the convention booth and they had a sale. No Time to Scream consists of three straight-forward one night-and-change adventures. Though aimed at novice Keepers/GMs with instructions and advice on how to play, the scenarios work well for pick-up games and (insanely) quiet evenings with more experienced players. Works best with pregens, which are provided and also available as an online download (which makes the assumption that the buyer has access both to a computer and a color printer (having a color printer readily at hand is one of the plus sides of the return-to-office push. That and free pens)).

The Order of the Stone by Jared Twing, Lynne Hardy, and Paul Fricker, Chaosium, 152 page hardback, 2024, GHC Purchase. This one feels like an old-school CoC scenario - three chapters, ancient cult, entrapped eldritch god, world-ending threat, hiking distance from Arkham. At first glance, it looks pretty good, with a collection of Lovecraftian set-pieces - ghost ship, small port town, rural wilderness. It's really good to see Chaosium do new old-style adventures in addition to updating the classics for the new system. Player handouts available online, which still has the challenge of No Time to Scream.

Seeds of Decay by Darryl T. Jones, Splattered Ink Games, 436-page hardbound, 2004, Gift of the Author. A big adventure about tiny heroes. The Dobbers are a diminutive people living in the Alwaysgreen Forest, threatened by an eldritch evil that is spreading like rot. Set up specifically for Dobbers and other tiny-size creatures, its two parts cozy game and two parts heroic horror. This is the deluxe edition (gold-foil on the cover). The author is also the artist, so it is a very good-looking product. The hat on top of it is for an upcoming product A Time-Traveler's Guide to Dinosaur Hunting. Nice hat. 

Mazes by Chris O'Neill, 9th Level Games, 240-page hardbound digest, 2022, GHC Purchase. I mentioned Sentai and Sensibility in an earlier write-up, and I found the core mechanic (a single type of die tied to each character class) intriguing, but buried beneath a pile of setting-specific verbage. So when I discovered the system this was based on at GameHoleCon, I had to buy it. This is a revised edition, and is based on the original fantasy version of the game. It is much deeper than Sentai, and uses a number of interesting new systems. I'm currently digging through it. Its presentation is excellent, and it feels like a solid game. 

Scurvy Buggers by Irene Zelinski, 9th level games, 76-page softbound digest, 2024 GHC purchase from designer. I got this from the designer at the Con, and we chatted. This was a pirate (I'm sorry - PYRATE) version of the game system, and it may be that I was already reading the Mazes game, but the rules went down a lot smoother for me than for Sentai and Sensibility. This is very much Black Sails and Our Flag Means Death with genderfluid pyrates. Zelinski expands the one-type-of-dice per class mechanic to include ship types as well. Neat idea. 

Dead Man's Cove, by Tyler and Luke Stratton, Limithron, 1-page folder scenario, GHC Purchase, Buried in the Bahamas, by Luke Stratton, 22-page saddle-stitched digest, The Sinking of the Cthgan, Limithron, 8panel fold-out scenario, all GHC Purchases. It may occur to many readers that I am a sucker for pirates. Pirate Borg was a definitely superior evolution of the Mork Borg system, reshaped to fit the curves of the golden age of piracy. I have these in pdf from the kickstarter, but I really wanted to get hard copy as well. They are radically different in approach, and reflect very much a "maker" culture of craft where the presentation formats are elastic. I think I can keep them with my core book, which is a challenge when you have so many different physical approaches to the supplements. 

The Warded Man by Peter V. Brett, Del Rey, 592-page trade paperback, gift from the author. I met Peter doing a livestream dungeon adventure on Saturday night, and he gave me a copy of the book. Imagine a world where demons show up every night in a twisted version of the initial day of a Minecraft game. The only thing that keeps them at bay are magical wards, and humanity sort of lies low behind its magical walls in the darkness. The Warded Man is the guy who manages to incorporate and utilized the wards, challenging the demons on their own ground. Yeah, this goes on my TBR pile. 

Shadow of the Weird Wizard by Robert J. Schwalb, Schwalb Entertainment, 288-page hardbound and Secrets of the Weird Wizard by Robert J. Schwalb, Schwalb Entertainment LLC, 296-page hardbound, 2024 Kickstarter. About ten years ago, Rob Schwalb wrote the very excellent Shadow of the Demon Lord. This is an update to the system and a new world for that system. Demon Lord was very grimdark, while Weird Wizard is much more in the heroic mode - still a deadly world, but not a doomed one. Call it Greydark? Without too much digging (and yes, it rewards digging), it advances the design of Demon Lord just as Demon Lord advanced the design of D&D Third and Fourth Edition (and in a case of ironies, Demon Lord showed up around the same time as 5th edition, and Weird Wizard showed up with D24 (Yes, I'm still trying to make that a thing). Secrets is both the campaign setting and monster book, and takes the entire system out for a spin. The thing I can dun them for is that the tables use a light grey typeface that is hard on these old eyes. But a lot is going on here, and I'm going to be spending some time with it.

Godzilla The Encyclopedia by Shinji Nishiakawa, Titan Books, 216-page softbound, purchased at Midgard Comics. I bought of copy of this a while back, gave it to a friend who is a BIG Godzilla fan (we plowed through most of his DVDs from the Showa to Millennium era), then went back and bought a copy for myself. Titan is known primarily for their comic book collections, but this one started as a series of articles and just expanded from there. It's write-up of almost every monster in the Godzilla films, and every version of Godzilla, Missing are those that had an original version elsewhere (Rodan is there, but only appears here for when he first fought Godzilla), and the American versions. The writeups are two-page spreads, beautifully illustrated, that cover both in-world facts as well as design discussions of how the various Godzillas changed over the years. This is an incredibly excellent book if you're a Godzilla/Kaiju fan.

That wraps it for now. And more things have shown up while I was putting this together, but for the moment, more later. 

The Political Desk: Final Edition

 I usually wait for a few days for the dust to settle, but the vote margins most of these races are pretty decisive. Let's take a look

Yes to Initiative Measure No. 2066 - Protect the natural gas industry This is tight, and usually late ballots skew to the left. However, it has been pretty stable for the past few days. 

NO to Initiative Measure No. 2109 - Repeal the capital gains tax.

NO to Initiative Measure No. 2117 - Destroying carbon tax credits.

NO to Initiative Measure No 2124 - Bankrupt the state-run long-term care insurance.

President - Donny Trump and JD Vance. Hey, color me surprised.  For what its worth, Washington State generally pummeled the heck outta the GOP - it looks like none of his minions got close to the levers of power on this side of the state.

US Senator - Maria Cantwell

US Representative Congressional District No. 9 - Adam Smith

Governor - Bob Ferguson

Lieutenant Governor - Denny Heck

Secretary of State - Steve Hobbs

State Treasurer - Mike Pellicciotti

Attorney General - Nick Brown

Commissioner of Public Lands - Dave Upthegrove

Superintendent of Public Instruction - Chris Reykdal

Insurance Commissioner - Patty Kuderer

Legislative District No 11 State Senator -  Bob Hasegawa

Legislative District No 11State Representative Position 1  - David Hackney

Legislative District No 11 State Representative Position 2 - Steve Berquist

State Supreme Court Justice Position 2 - Sal Mungia  The other tight one, but the late ballots had it for Sal.

Superior Court Judge Position No 41 - Paul Crisalli

Kent School District No. 415 Proposition No. 1 Capital Projects and Technology Levy - Yes, much to my surprise. This one is razor-thin, and could flip back as we move to fruition. 

Final thoughts before we cover the Political Desk with a tarp for the winter? Well, Washington State did a fine job protecting itself from Washington DC. And if the new/old administration does half the things that they promised to do, there's going to be a lot of buyer's regret for the rest of the country. But that's the nature of democracy (see Brexit). In the land of Ivar's, we'll keep clam and carry on.

More, as always, later. 

Theatre: In Rep We Trust

 Primary Trust by Eboni Booth Directed by Kaytlin McIntyre, Seattle REP, through November 24th

OK, after By the Skin Of Our Teeth, I was looking at redemption here. Not to bash on the Thornton Wilder play TOO much, but even the best reviews touted the actors and the stage settings, and not a one called out Thornton's words to praise (the general consensus was "Allegory!"). So I stand by my previous review, and looked at the Rep to pull out of a middling first showing.

And they did so. Primary Trust is a perfect little play, well acted and directed, and is the first play in a long time that made me say "Wow, I wish I had written that". Its a Pulitzer winner, which usually leaves me cautious, but it is really, really good.

Here's the summary - Kenneth (Stephen Tyrone Williams) is a lonely man. He works in a used book store. He drinks and eats dinner at a local Tiki bar. He doesn't have any close friends, except maybe Bert (Andrew Lee Creech). And Bert has his own challenges (no, I'm not going to do spoilers on this one. I go into these plays mostly blind, and I have no idea if I would have reacted differently if I knew what was going on before). Anyway, Kenneth is trapped in the routines of his life, and the story is how he gets untrapped.

And that's about all there is to it. It is a real simple, sweet story. And it is so well-written and well-presented.

Let me rave on the actors for the moment - Stephen Tyrone Williams is a kind, endearing Kenneth. He's well-intentioned and introverted and uncomfortable and a little broken and scared of the world around him. Williams has previously been in Rep productions - August Wilson's Fences and the Piano Lesson,  He captures the chaotic internal voice of Kenneth, turning on a dime from budding confidence to overwhelming panic attacks and back again, pulling the audience along. He's just really good in this role. 

Allyson Lee Brown matches him step for step as a cascade of waitstaff at Wally's Tiki Bar, a flood of customers that the bank that hires Kenneth (The Primary Trust of the title) and one waiter that helps Kenneth break out. She has the improv skill of morphing characters one after another, literally filling the town of Cranberry, New York. Andrew Lee Creech is Bert, Kenneth's only mental support network, and captures that nature of the bud who is always there for him. Rob Burgess is excellent both as the owner of the bookstore, and later as the bank manager, each with their own quirks. And Justin ("Lizard Boy") Huertas rounds out the cast ambient music throughout. 

This is a good cast, and hits that point I like to make about Repertory companies, that you get to know the actors, not just the characters they portray.  And they have good material to work with.

Eboni Booth is an incredible naturalist writer, and her characters emerge through their dialogue. The interrupt, they fill in each other sentences, they apologize, and they talk about nothing in an amazing realistic sense. She uses repetition to her advantage to show passage of time ("Welcome to Wally's!") and the nature of the community the play is set in (just about everyone says "Pardon My French" at least once). And the actors are up for it, their portrayals feel like real conversations. 

The Lovely Bride pointed out that all the characters were nice. And she's right, All of them. There is no bad guy in this play, except for Kenneth's own crippling insecurities and blocks. And we find out why Kenneth is broken, and not only the WHAT of Bert but the WHY of Bert as well.

The stagecraft was great and not intrusive onto the action itself, scenery floating in and out. The main set is a sort of "Our Town" street, but it becomes Wally's, the bank, a snooty restaurant, a street, and it does so without poking too hard at the reality of the play itself. No big puppets needed. 

This one falls into the "Go see" category, a pleasant way to spend the darkening, rainy afternoons and evenings. And sweet. Really sweet.

More later,. 

The Political Desk: The Jeff Recommends

We're a week out. I've been covering politics and elections for twenty years now in this space, and realize that I've gotten more serious and less snarky over that time. It's something I'll have to work on (regaining my snark).

The press has been particularly frustrating this election season. Yes, I know about a couple major newspapers were cowed into submission by the GOP into "No Endorsements", but it goes deeper than that. The Seattle Times published it endorsements in the open, but its individual endorsement articles are behind a paywall (which is amusing since its endorsement of Bob Ferguson is a master class at timidity and praising with faint damns). The Stranger has just been purchased, and just fired its news editor, Rich Smith. And you would not know from the Kent Reporter that there even was an election (plus they soft paywall as well). Small sites tend to be more localized and partisan, and they still provide some good general data, but lot of old standbys have gone by the wayside. They will be missed. 

Here's an interesting comparison of Stranger vs. Seattle Times endorsements, for your edification and amusement.

I do stand by my opinion of the GOP's "Flood the Zone" approach of doing so much so badly that no one can keep up with their crimes and errors. We've seen a new accusation of sexual assault, the revelation that the impeached former president withheld funds for blue-state disasters, military threats against anyone that looks at the convicted felon funny, a couple mental meltdowns on sympathetic podcasts, and a Nazi-ish Madison Square Garden seeping with hatred and rage. And that's just been in the past week. Yeah, it's been taxing. I just do this thing once every four years and I'm exhausted.

And there has already shenanigans and low-level violence on the ground. Most of them have been GOP-related, and their argument that there is election fraud, and to prove it they will commit election fraud. There have been fights and threats. In Washington State, we've had some ballot boxes vandalized already, so now you have the added task of checking to make sure you ballot was received and counted. Because there are jagoffs out there.

AND you can find one of your nearby ballot drops and voting centers here, or you can mail it in. No postage necessary. The deadline is 8 PM November 5 for the drop boxes, postmarked Tuesday, 5 November for the mail ins. You can even register to vote and vote the same day at the voting centers. 

Anyway, summing up the past week of posts, I've put in a simple format for you. These are my endorsements and belong to me. Go fetch your mail-in ballot and take us across the finish line. As I've stated before, I don't care who you vote for. But I would want you to vote. 

The Heywood Initiatives: NO on all of these budget-busters:

NO to Initiative Measure No. 2066 - Supporting natural gas by preventing regulation that encourages other energy sources

NO to Initiative Measure No. 2109 - Repeal the Capital Gains tax on people much richer than you while killing funding for education.

NO to Initiative Measure No. 2117 - Destroying carbon tax credits and in doing so kill funding for transportation, energy conversations, and emissions-reduction.

NO to Initiative Measure No 2124 - Bankrupting our state-run long-term care insurance, because they can.

So NO on the bundle of them.

President: Kamala D. Harris and Tim Walz. I never realized I had more guts that Jeff Bezos. Learn something new every day).

US Senator - Maria Cantwell

US Representative Congressional District No. 9 - Adam Smith

Governor - Bob Ferguson

Lieutenant Governor - Denny Heck

Secretary of State - Steve Hobbs

State Treasurer - Mike Pellicciotti

Attorney General - Nick Brown

Commissioner of Public Lands - Dave Upthegrove

Superintendent of Public Instruction - Chris Reykdal

Insurance Commissioner - Patty Kuderer

Legislative District No 11 State Senator -  Bob Hasegawa

Legislative District No 11State Representative Position 1  - David Hackney

Legislative District No 11 State Representative Position 2 - Steve Berquist

State Supreme Court Justice Position 2 - Sal Mungia

Superior Court Judge Position No 41 - Paul Crisalli

Kent School District No. 415 Proposition No. 1 Capital Projects and Technology Levy - Yes. Put this long electoral nightmare out of our lives.

That's it for the pre-election write-ups. I'll do a follow-up with results a few days after the election (We're mail-in, remember, so it takes a while to get the results, and in some cases lead changes). Then we're back to talking about games. And theatre. And if you're very good, collectible quarters. See you next time.

More, of course, later.

The Political Desk: Getting Schooled

 OK, here we go again folks. 

Kent School District No, 315 Proposition No. 1 Capital Projects and Technology Levy is the fourth attempt to get money for the school buildings. Each one has gone down in flames, and each one has come back retooled, asking for less funds, being clear about what they're spending it on, and reducing the number of projects. The amount they're asking for is not excessive. I will note that this time they included an athletic field revision for Mill Creek school, which was one of the complaints of the No people the last few times. It's purely transactional, but it's politics. 

I'm not a big fan of replacing athletic fields, but I am a fan of roofing, building sidings, boilers, and emergency generators, along with upgrading their tech to modern levels. And this is a reduction on the property tax it replaces. So, I'm with YES

The No side is hauling out their standard scare tactics. Property taxes! Can't trust the school district to use the money like they said! What happened to the AC improvements? They dun the current measure for removing stuff that they complained and campaigned against last time. Pretty much they don't like the current Kent School District admin, and are willing the starve the schools until they get what they want (Accountability! is a great buzz-word. So is transparency, which they didn't use this time. 

There have been some yard signs around (YES for education!), but the local paper of record, the Kent Reporter, has been notably absent from the reporting on this. And it is the last thing on the ballot, separated as far as possible from the budget-busting initiatives at the front end. But hang out for the after-credits scene, here - and vote YES (Yep, I put it in bold twice).

More later, 

The Political Desk: Mild Court Press

Now I'm working more in the dark. There used to be a site called Voting for Judges which served as an excellent aggregator of  endorsements from the various groups interested in judges (like the various bar associations). That site is no longer in operation, and general political coverage tends to be a bit scattershot.

A lot of court positions are elected in Washington State this time, but the vast bulk of them are unopposed. So congrats to all the Justices who are lonely in their ballot box. I'm not going to do the research on you, not even for entertainment purposes. We have only two races that have any competition.

State Supreme Court, position 2 - The Seattle Times bemoans the fact that court positions are officially non-partisan, but the final choices are from a Democratic-supported candidate and a GOP-supported one. Because the position is non-partisan, but the candidates are not. Still, they (and 8 out of 9 other Supreme Court justices) support Sal Mungia, a lawyer out of Tacoma with a strong resume, solid endorsements from the legal community and a good track record on civil rights. OK, I can go for this. 

Superior Court Position 41 - Even less information than the State Supreme Court. The Times doesn't cover the race. The Stranger uses the space to mostly campaign against the established court system. Still, Paul M. Crisalli has gotten a hatfull of endorsements, including all the current State Supreme Court justices and 53 of his judicial colleagues on the King County Superior Court. So yeah, I can go for this.

More later, 

The Political Desk: State Legislature

 This one is fairly short, in that there are no Republicans running here, and two out of the three positions don't even have competition. 

Legislative District 11 straddles I-5 and I-405 and stretches down to Panther Lake and Grubb Street - we're in the far SE corner. Bob Hasegawa is our incumbent State Senator and is running unopposed. David Hackney is the State Rep Position 1, and recently showed up in a Seattle Times article about crime (he's against it. He also supports Bob Ferguson's pitch to spend $100 million more on cops and public safety). He's also running unopposed. Steve Berquist is State Rep Position 2, has a secret identity as a school teacher, and is running against a Libertarian candidate. I'm recommending Berquist for the usual reasons (he's done a good job, particularly on education issues), but I'm pleased to see other parties running for office that are NOT the big tickets. Hey, they even have yard signs!

And that's it for local news. More later.

The Political Desk: Statements on the State

 Now we're down to the state level. Washington State elects its entire executive branch every four years, so the potential for massive turnover is always there. However, the state's been doing pretty good, has recovered well from COVID, and regularly gets high marks in various ratings as to the health and well-being of its citizens. So yeah, I am up for the Democrats in general.

Governor - This is an open position with Jim Inslee choosing not to run for a fourth term (and that's a good thing, in my opinion). The Democratic candidate is current Attorney General Bob Ferguson, who has been an activist is protecting consumers in the state. He's gone after corporate shenanigans, took on pharmaceutic companies over fentanyl, cleared out the rape kit backlog, and been a bridle on Trumpian nonsense for the past four years. He has been an activist, aggressive, AG, and don't see that changing when he becomes governor. It is kinda amusing that a lot of positive political candidates come out of the AG offices these days, but that's probably a beard-stroking analysis for later. So, Bob Ferguson.

A positive word, though, about Dave Reichert, who is likely the best candidate the GOP has put up for the past twenty years. The former King County Sherriff, former US Rep, he was not endorsed by his own party because he wasn't crazy enough. He may or may not support Trump depending on who he's talking to but I will take him at his (current) word. But I am happy to not recommend him purely on his political views (Tried to defund Planned Parenthood, doesn't support marriage equality, anti-climate science). Of late, he's been making a case for divided government (even though that has been a mess at the national level). So, no thanks.

Lieutenant Governor - The Lieutenant Governor presides over the State Senate, and does more than a little nudging on its priorities (like the current housing crunch). This is the department of "Don't Mess Things Up".  And Danny Heck has succeeded admirably with not messing things up and actually moving the ball forward on things in a bipartisan fashion. So yeah, let's keep him.

Secretary of State - OK, I will be honest, I'm a strong supporter of Steve Hobbs. He has maintained the integrity of our election systems that Sam Reed and Kim Wyman had built up, and kept our elections free and fair. But he's also a gamer, and an extremely vocal one, and has pushed to protect small game stores and game producers, as well as expand RPGs in school libraries and prisons.. We've got a lot of small companies out here, and I appreciate the support. I did attend a fund-raiser for him at the Mox Boarding House, where he not only committed to his support for the industry, but also went into extreme gamerly detail on the cases that his staff have handled over the years (A student voting in two places, people who died between when they mailed their ballot and when it was counted). He did so with the pride of DM telling about you about his latest adventure. So yeah, Steve Hobbs. 

State Treasurer - Now we get into the more boring but just-as-important positions. Meat and potato stuff.  The ones that handle the money. The State Treasurer is the state's CFO, collects the cash and distributes is Mike Pellicciotti has done a bang-up job, such that people who rate us on our financial stability and such give us high marks. Moody's gives us a AAA rating, Standard and Poors gives us a AA+, and we have strong state pensions. Not bad. So, Mike Pellicciotti.

State Auditor - The treasurer spend the money, the auditor makes sure it is spent correctly. Auditor is a watchdog operation. These are the accountants looking over the books. Pat (Patrice) McCarthy has been an auditor for twenty years, starting with Pierce County, and has picked up the torch in 2017, and has done a good job, not only checking up on pandemic funding, but also uncovering fraud and waste in the government (like $7 million in misappropriated funds for a local housing agency). McCarthy has a earned the position.

Attorney General - With Ferguson running for governor, the AG is an open position, and there is a game of musical chairs. Nick Brown has risen to the top of that scuffle, and is an excellent candidate for the position. He was Inslee's General Counsel. He was the first Black US Attorney for the state. He's pushed hard on the fentanyl crisis, consumer protection, and sex trafficking. Pro choice, pro gun safety, pro-consumer. Brown has large shoes to fill, but I think he can pull it off. 

Commissioner of Public Lands - This race is another win/win for voters, in that both candidates are good. Jaime Herrera Beutler was both a State and US Rep. She also voted to impeach Trump on the second go-around, and the state party will never forgive her for that. Dave Upthegrove has botanical name and has been on the King County Council and a State Rep for a neighboring district. . Either could run our extensive state forest lands. The big diff is dealing with our mature legacy forests (Not the old growth, but stuff has hasn't been lumbered since WWII). Upthegrove supports keeping them intact, Beutler wants to let in the logging companies that have been funding her campaign. On the other hand, few year's back Upthegrove got shirty with some traditional enviros that supported someone else in the primary. So, jump ball on this one, but I'm still going to give the edge on policy to Dave Upthegrove.

Superintendent of Public Instruction - Chris Reykdal is the incumbent and has navigated the department through some really choppy water of later - the COVID pandemic being part of this. However, he's got the numbers back up to pre-COVID times, and we have more graduations than ever. Also, school meals, CTE training, retaining teachers, and improvements for rural schools. And he takes a hit every time people have to pay their property taxes. (Did I mentioned that paying for the kid's education is literally in our state constitution. Yeah, it is). Reykdal has also been a bulwark against conservative culture warriors and voucher advocates. So, yeah, I'm going with him.

Insurance Commissioner - The previous guy who held this job for many years turned out to be a jagoff and as such is not running for re-election. The Democratic party actually does that - it's an accountability thing. Republicans? He'd be on the conservative talk shows complaining about persecution, demanding a trial, then pushing it back as far as possible. But that's just a personal rant. Patty Kuderer is an excellent candidate to hold the position of wrangling our insurance industry. Her background is from the state legislature, where she's been active in employment discrimination, which makes her a good choice to help the office recover from its previous commissioner. She's pro-consumer protection , pro reproductive healthcare, and pro-transparency with the insurance companies. Yeah, let' give her a shot.

OK, this was a long one, but it is all downhill from here. More later. 

More later, 

The Political Desk: Congressfolk

 Let's look at Congress. We have two races on the ballot, one at the state level for Senator, and one for the 9th Congressional District. The 9th is a rough trapezoid with the corners at the International District in Seattle, Sammamish in the north, Auburn, and Federal Way in the south, and includes Mercer Island and Bellevue.  So yeah, a lot of people in a relatively small space.

Let's do Senator first. Maria Cantwell has done a real good job in her tenure, and I would normally recommend her to keep her job but as a matter of course. But I want to enthusiastically recommend her based on her performance this senatorial season. This has been first and foremost due to her pushing through the CHIPS and Science Act, which has encouraged semiconductor  research, development, in the states in the States. This act has seen amazing benefits already, and will continue help our home-grown computer chip industry. That's a good effort on her part, and a recommendation to keep her and encourage more of the same in the future.

The 9th Congressional District is in one of those really good positions with two good candidates. Adam Smith has been the House Rep within our ever-shifting borders for nearly thirty years now, and in his seniority has a good position as the Senior Democrat on the Armed Services Committee. He's done good work in that time. Melissa Chaudhry, on the other hand, is from the more progressive wing, and has extensive experience in charities and NGOs. I recommended Chaudhry in the primary as new blood, but I have to admit that Adam Smith is competent, capable, and has done a good job, which is one of my base-line requirements. So I'm telling you both candidates have merit, and you need to do a bit more digging to find out if you think they are worth voting for. Myself? Walking around both of them for a day or so, I have to go ultimately with Adam Smith. But I'm going to say this is going to be real close.

More later,

The Political Desk: Prez and Veep

 Kamala Harris/Tim Walz. Well, Duh.

I mean, seriously, I was going to vote for Biden anyway, even with the age issues. The current administration has spent the past four years digging out of the holes that the previous admin put us in, and has done an excellent job. Let's face it - the economy is better than most of Europe post-Covid. Stock market is up. Crime is (generally) down. Illegal immigration is down (but still there and still illegal). Inflation is really down (but still inflation). As legacies go, it's been pretty good.

And Kamala Harris has been there for the good stuff. Presiding over the Senate, she cast the deciding vote for the Inflation Reduction Act, and has helped with the recovery over the wishes of a brattish, do-nothing GOP. (The Republican-controlled House is the LEAST productive of any governing bodies since the 1960s, with the possible exception of ginning up investigations that do nothing but generate copy for FOX news). So yeah, she gets the credit for a good administration. 

But she isn't just a continuation, she's a Biden-Plus - the good stuff you've gotten as a result of the Great Recovery and her own plans for first-time homebuyers. Decriminalization of pot. Protection of women's rights. Cap insulin prices across the board. Expand the Earned Income Tax credit. If she gets a fragment of her plans enacted, she's doing pretty good.

She has a LOT of experience in all three branches of the government - Judicial (Attorney General of California), Legislative (Senator), and Executive (the current gig as Veep). The resume is pretty damned solid. And let's add to the fact that she's pretty much put together her organization in 100 days, and has exceeded the expectations of even Biden's team.

And then there are the endorsements. OK, you expect other leaders in your party to endorse you, but she has EVERYONE on her side and out there pulling for her, including a handful of former presidents. And the mass of entertainers, which is nice but not confirmative, in my opinion. The Insane Clown Posse like her. That's nice. Oh, and there is a group of Gamers for Harris, which is also nice but not confirmative for most people. I'm proud to have added my name to this list, by the way. So just so you know, I'm in the bag on this one. 

But what's interesting about endorsements is the number of name-level Republicans, government, and military folk that are supporting her. A lot of them have "former" and "retired" in their title (as in "can't punish me for speaking my mind"). A lot of them have had first-hand previous experience with the convicted felon that's her opponent, and they want nothing to do with him. But the big thing with these types of endorsements is this: You can still vote for Harris and be considered a good Republican. 

The other guy is, well, the other guy. He was the previous administration, and pretty much a complete collapse - screwing up COVID (while sending medical supplies to Putin), kowtowing to foreign authoritarians, threatening our own allies, running up the debt more than any other president, helping overturn Roe v. Wade. The wall that never got built, the infrastructure week that never happened, the replacement of the ACA that never occurred. Pretty much a dead loss as an administration. Mind you, he gives an entertaining speech, as he dances between subjects like a drunken badger on meth. Most of the people who worked for him are not supporting him, and many are publicly going for Harris. He does have his ardent supporters, who hope he hangs around long enough to pass some dreadful conservative legislation. They just want someone with a pulse. Though we don't know for sure because he won't share his medical records (Harris did, of course).

And he seems tired. Worn out. Non-linear. He says he's doing "the weave", and we just can't get the depths of his sagacity. He'll be claiming to do zen koans next. I feel real sorry for him, and I wonder why the mainstream media isn't talking more about Woodrow Wilson (who was incapacitated late in the administration, and access to him (and his decisions) was controlled by a small group of people). 

Eight years ago I put forward the idea that his approach was to "Flood the Zone" - say and do so much that is wrong that no one can keep up with you. Just keep piling crime upon crime, insult upon insult, weirdness on weirdness. Stage an embarrassing photo op at a closed MacDonald's? By the time people call you on it, you're out there talking about Arnold Palmer's junk. And while that is sinking in you mention how Hitler had the best generals. Because if you ever stop delaying and denying, the entire mass of insults and lies will collapse and crush you.

There are others running. Jill Stein and the Greens are running to deny Harris a majority, so then people will pay attention the THEIR issues (because that always worked in previous elections). RFK Jr is still on the ballot in Washington State because he didn't drop out fast enough, and will probably drain off some Republicans that can't bear to vote for the guy that promised RFK Jr a place in his administration. The rest are minor players in this particular passion play. Thanks for showing up.

But like I said, I was pleased to put my name on the list of Gamers for Harris, and declare my support. And I think she's going to be a great president.

More later, 

The Political Desk: Trolling for Initiatives

 TLDR: NO on everything. There. That makes it easy.

The top of the Washington State ballot is not the presidential race, but rather a collection of initiatives. The initiative process is a pretty cool thing that Washington State does, in that it provides an alternate method for passing law. We have the Legislature, but the initiative process allows citizens to propose and pass state law. It is a nice bit of direct democracy, but the system has some challenges and can be gamed.

The challenge is that you need to get a certain number of signatures to but it on the ballot - 8% of the total votes for Governor the last election. And given the population of the state, that comes to roughly 325,000 signatures this time around. Which means you need a lot of dedicated volunteers to gather those signatures, or paid signature-gatherers, or most likely both, in order to succeed. As a result, the initiative process is normally the domain of people with a lot of money and resources at hand. Initiative gadfly Tim Eyman made good book on monetizing the process with initiatives that rarely won, but almost never stood up in court. Eyman got himself in trouble skimming off the top of his fundraising, and is no longer active in the process.

So, this year we have a wealthy hedge-fund manager, Brian Heywood, who is fled California because of the taxes and wants to get rid of them here as well. He and his mob collected the requisite signatures and got initiatives on the ballot for six items. The Legislature has the option of just passing them right there, and three of them we passed without having to go to the voters. Then he added another one, so there are four measures on the ballot this time. And all of them involve saving money for the wealthy and gutting state funding, and leaving you with the bill. 

Here's the quick and dirty.

Initiative Measure No. 2066 wants to repeal laws controlling natural gas regulation and/or promoting electrification. Natural Gas is a big polluter, so I see the point in encouraging more electric power through inducements. But I am personally involved here in that we use gas for cooking and hot water here at Grubb Street, which has proved to be a good thing when the power goes out (windstorms give us about two outages a year). But a blanket measure that gives a blank check to the natural gas operations, effectively putting them above the law? Yeah, no. I'd rather see this one fought out in the Legislature one piece at a time. Vote NO.

Initiative Measure No. 2109 eliminates the Capital Gain tax. This is a tax that takes a small sliver of the earnings of the wealthy, which is why Heywood wants it gone. If your assets are below $250 million, it's a moot point (unless you're planning on winning the lottery soon). Cutting it guts funding for education, which is something we are required to fund (it is in the state constitution), and have been kinda half-assed over the years about doing it as it is. Vote NO. 

Initiative Measure No 2117 eliminates the carbon tax credits. Carbon tax credits are a method to (long-term) reduce pollutants. The government sells indulgences to organizations that are churning out pollutants, which range from big businesses to things like UW (steam heat). Over time, the amount of credits are reduced, encouraging folk to upgrade their systems to healthier alternatives. Killing the credits defunds transportation, clean air, renewable energy, conversation, and emission-reductions (I'm just quoting the initiative language, here). So NO on this one

Initiative Measure No. 2124 makes long-term care insurance optional. Affordable long-term care is a growing issue, such that even the national Democratic party thinks it is a good idea. Making it optional is a great invitation to making it useless, and with defund Washing's public insurance programs providing long-term care benefits and services. I've been kicking in to long-term care for a while now, and think its a pretty good thing. Vote NO.

Everything these initiatives attack are "eat your broccoli" laws, which is good for the long-term health of the people of Washington, but have a price tag on it. And the people behind these initiatives don't want to spend any of THEIR money on YOU. You aren't going to get much if these initiatives pass (No, your gas prices are NOT coming down as a result of these), and things will be just a little bit crappier around here with them in place.

More later, 

The Political Desk: Go Time

 OK, folks, it all comes down to this. Election Day. Early voting has already started in a lot of states, and the ballots are out for Washington State. This year is important. Every year is important.

(And my ballot arrived while I was out at GameHoleCon, and excellent convention in Madison, WI, so I'm getting a late start on it this year. The Lovely Bride has already voted, and I will drive her to one of the convenient nearby ballot boxes to drop her vote in).

I really don't care how you vote, but I want you to vote. I'm obvious in my political views, so you'll find few surprises in this I provide these recommendations in the hopes of creating an enlightened and aware set of voters. They haven't drifted that far from the primaries. What I really want is competence and ability. These are people we are trusting with our money, out safety, and sometimes our lives. So this is important. It's not a wedding proposal, it's not a Saturday night date - it's a job hire.

But I want you to vote, not just vote for what I recommend. I provide other people's endorsements as well, and I'll update them as I go forward. 

Here's the summarized endorsements from the Stranger, now under new management. The full endorsements are long and detailed and most of the candidates don't tick off all their boxes. That's the nature of life. 

Here's the Seattle Times' endorsements, who has been grudgingly dragged more centrist over the years. The Times and the Stranger have been drifting closer together as time goes by. 

There are others, with their own political interests. Washington Conservation Action is here. Progressive Blue Voteguide is here. The Urbanist is here. Crosscut/CascadePBS does a nice job summarizing the candidates and issues here. I will add more as I come across them.

I'm (politely) left of center. I'm going to be endorsing Democrats, which is a relatively easy thing to do in Western Washington. The GOP (nationally) is a bit of a snake pit, and even those that are not involved in some messy political stance or personal scandal are problematic because they DO support the folks who do..  

But ultimately, it's all up to you. Even not voting is a choice (though I'll admit that its a bad one).

This is your chance, people. Don't pass it by. Don't blow it. For folk in Washington State, or wherever early balloting is permitted, you have two weeks. For everyone else, get out on November 5th.

More later,

New Arrivals: PreConventional Entry

 So later this week I'm heading out to Gamehole Con in Madison, Wisconsin, along with a whole host of friends, colleagues, fans, and fellow professionals. So I want to get all this out the way before I add more to the pile.

The vast bulk of these come from Kickstarters resolving, and arriving on the doorstep. So I may comment on the process as well as the product.

Let's start.

Ryder's Intergalactic Guide to Robots by Jake Parker, JP Creative, 128-page landscape-formatted softbound, 2024, Kickstarter. Jake Parker did Kepler's Guide to Spaceships last year, and I thought well enough of it to get the next volume. Parker wraps a story around a collection of autonomous robots, worker mechs, AI-guided vehicles, and warbots. I love the variety, and am sure there is a full universe in here somewhere, just waiting to come out.

Sentai & Sensibility, by Bug Boll, 9th Level Games, 108-page digest-sized softbound, 2024, Kickstarter. This is one of the stranger games I've picked up, but I'm glad I have. It's a combination of Japanese tokusatsu (live action with extensive special effects) with Regency Romance, in Boll's words, "Power Rangers as written by Jane Austen". You are one of the Gentlefolk (gentry), who can become a heroic Ranger when danger threatens, and with the rest of your allies (sentai) you combine to form a colossus (Voltron) to battle kaiju (giant monsters). The rule system is interesting in that your class (Station) determines the die you roll, and different type of challenges (Dance Moves) require different results, such that the physically weakest class is also the best at social interactions. The challenge is that all of this is buried under a mass of unique terminology set for the Regency era, so you're learning new terms to go with new mechanics. The Kickstarter comes with a deck of cards (characters, classes, and rules) and some standups, which are very nice, but now I have to make sure they don't get separated in my mess of an office. 

The Electrum Archives Issues 1 & 2 By Emiel Boven and Ava Islam, Cult of the Lizard King, 70-page and 78-page Digest-sized softbound books w/ four-panel paper maps, 2024, Kickstarter. This is a game system masquerading as a campaign setting. It is set in Orn, a desertified world that has seen several rulers and conquerors (and their ruins) over its long history. It is alien in many ways, and its magic runs off of ancient ink, which is also the coinage. Five attributes, three character classes, and a whole lot of weirdness which really tickles my Tekumel-based biases. The rules are presented cleanly and clearly, and while the players need a bit more investment (Spell names are random-rolled, and you get to figure out what they mean with your GM/Seer), it looks absolutely fascinating. My only gripe? I saw it for sale at GenCon a month before I got it in my hands. Yeah, it would be nice for the original funders to get their copies. 

Historica Arcanum: Era of the Crusades, Sarp Duyar &  Doga Can Sayilkan (Project Leads), Meta Creative 272 page hardback,  and Historica Arcanum: The Sigil of Jerusalem,  240-page hardback, two full-color maps, slipcased, 2024, Kickstarter. Meta Creative, out of Istanbul, rates up there with Free League for producing beautiful-looking books. They've concentrated on historical fantasy, expanding out the 5E system into Cairo and Jerusalem in the 13th century. There are new classes, the the system is growing outwards with new Professions, and a Deck of the Damned to make combat more stressful (with the stress mechanic developing in a similar fashion to CoC's Sanity Rules). Sigil of Jerusalem repeats some of the player-facing material, and launches into a conspiracy in Jerusalem itself.  Metis does itself a great favor in its release schedule, as this showed up on my doorstep JUST as they were launching their new Kickstarter. 

Campaign Builder: Castles & Crowns, by Richard Green, Tim Hitchcock, Brian Suskind (Lead Designers), Kobold Press, 272-page hardbound,2024, Kickstarter. Kobold hews closer to 5E than a lot of the other D&D Descendants listed here. This is the second volume of their Campaign Builder series, and deals with the elites - nobility and the court. And it is a toybox of new heritages, subclasses, settings, factions, kingdom types and monsters. It works closer to traditional Western European D&D, but has a lot of good foundational material for kingdom building. Yes, I Kickstarted this, even though I could have mooched a copy off chief Kobold Wolfgang Baur, but I wanted to see what was in it. 

Never Going Home by Braden Aten and Matthew Orr, Wet Ink Games, 118-page softbound, 2019, Purchased from Grandcon (Grand Rapids) from Pete Petrusha, who had a booth there, This was originally Kickstarted, but I don't know why I didn't go in for it at the time. It is an original system using both dice and cards for resolution and resources. The setting in 1916 in the trenches of WWI. In the Battle of the Somme, a tear between worlds has unleashed a horde of nastiness on the battlefield. Where your unit is. Your squad has to deal the the atrocities of the battlefield as well as horrible things that crawling into our reality. 

Sol System by a small host of talented people, Green Ronin Publishing, 112-page softbound, 2024, Midgard Comics. Designed for The Expanse RPG, this is very much an old-school sourcebook, with tons of subject matter and just a smattering of RPG rules. It handles a lot of the factions, corporations, religions, and criminal operations in the sol system, an expansion of the trade rules from the original book. This is much more in the "readable" column than the must use to play column, but given that the company is upgrading the core rulebook to handle the current situation in the universe, it's pretty cool.

Astro Inferno by Andreas Ruu, Haxan Studios, 384-page hardbound, 2024, Kickstarter. Astro Inferno is the most recent arrival here, and requires a bit more thought. It is both stylish and convoluted. Set in a post-apocalyptic demonic SF universe, it uses a lot of unique mechanics and, like Sentai & Sensibility, buries them under a mass of setting-related names and descriptions. It is a beautiful art-game, with excellent production qualities, and a variety of hard-to-read fonts, including that jagged-lightning typography favored by heavy metal bands. Long ago, at TSR, we received a copy of Wraith, from White Wolf, which used this iconography for its cover, and could not decide what the title was - we finally settled on "Noseroids". It's the same thing here. Yeah, this one's going to be a tough climb to wrap my brain around.

And that's it for the moment. I will be at Gamehole Con later in the week, and will probably find some more cool stuff there. 

So definitely More later. Noseroids.

Theatre: So It Goes

 The Skin of Our Teeth by Thornton Wilder Directed by Damaso Rodriguez, Seattle Rep, through 20 October,

The new play season at the Rep began for us with another adventure in short-distance theater commute. The weekend traffic situation has been painful in the region for the past couple weeks, so we chose to leave early. Which was fortunate because an accident on one of the freeways ate up all the time we gained. We still got there before curtain rise, but it has been a challenge.

Anyway, Skin of Our Teeth:

I wanted to like this. I SHOULD like it. It ticks a lot of boxes that I grouse and complain about in this space. It is traditional theatre, as opposed to dance troupes and improv groups. It uses talented actors I have seen before on the boards, living up to the "Repertory" part of the name. It has a huge cast in a world where five-person plays push the limits. It has community volunteers on stage. The author is well-known. It won a Pulitzer back in '42. It had a successful revival recently on Broadway. It runs 2 1/2 hours with three full acts, making it a blockbuster in theater terms.

And it landed with a thud for me. 

Let me summarize. The Skin of Our Teeth is a the story of the immortal Antrobus family, who represent the human race. Everything is allegory here. George (Carlos Lacamara) is the patriarch, and represents progress and authority. Maggie (Emily Kuroda) is his wife, domesticity and family. Son Henry (Chip Sherman) is violence, daughter Gladys (Rachel Guyer-Mafune) is the future. Their story takes place in three periods where the world is ending, by ice, flood, and war. There is a lot of anachronism and absurdity. The first act takes place as the glaciers are bearing down on the Antrobus's suburban home in New Jersey, where they keep mammoths in the house and invite the great philosophers in for coffee and sandwiches. The most accessible character is the maid, Sabina (Sara Hennessy), who breaks the fourth wall to complain to the audience about the absurdity of the play itself. Allegorically, she is human nature, and is really the main character here. 

So first act, threatened with extinction during the Ice Age. Second act, rinse and repeat. Third act comes to the resolution that, in the words of Rosanne Rosannadanna, "It's always something". The program book comes with a handout explaining that we're being non-linear and absurd in places, and that's part of the point. 

Plus in the middle of this, the play being presented is plagued (in the script) with mishaps, miscues, and labor troubles, ending in most of the cast breaking character, having some honest moments, and recruiting volunteers to finish the play itself. The last is a good comment on the relationship between play and audience, but with the pacing it just sort of trundles along.

The main actors are fine, but their characters are flat, and only when they break away from them (portraying the actors who are portraying the characters) do they seem to come to life. The secondary tier of support characters are excellent, with callouts to Sunam Ellis as the nervous stage manager and Laura Crotte as the Atlantic City fortune teller. The teeming masses on-stage are pulled from the Rep's Public Works program, and some subscribers get to read quotes towards the end. I like that part.

The stagecraft is excellent. I usually bash on the overproduced nature of these things, but here the collapsing roofs, advancing ice sheets, and arrival of a ferry/ark all work out just fine. Also, a dinosaur and a mammoth. And a hydro race.

Ultimately, all this had more meaning some 80 years ago, and was experimental and engaging in 1942, but now it tends to creak from its age. There were two intermissions, and after each there were more empty seats in the house. The Lovely Bride would never insult the actors by leaving, and I wanted to see if the third act redeems that which came before (it does. A little). 

But really, the history of humanity? It all boils down to "It's always something". 

More later, 

The Book Backlog: Knives Out

 [Bloggers Note: So, I've been fretting over one particular entry for a while - a review of a game product that I'm spending way too much time fiddling with. I'd take it off the shelf, rewrite chunks of it, then put it aside as more immediate matters (the Political Desk, plays that have a closing date) get in the way. But as a result, I have created a backlog of books on the corner of my desk I want to talk about. So this is the Book Backlog. I will (once again) put aside the much longer piece and try to whittle it down, though  that may be a fool's errand. 

Anyway:]

Court of Daggers by Alexandre Dumas Translated by Lawrence Ellsworth, Cyrano Productions, 2022.

Provenance: It is no surprise to long-term readers (both of you) that I've been a fan of Lawrence Ellsworth's translations of the Musketeer Cycle. So I was a little disappointed when I could not find the continuance of the series on the Pegasus Books site or its distributor Simon & Schuster. But I found this volume and the next one on Amazon, continuing the story under Ellsworth's own imprint. 

Review: I'll be frank - we're in the doldrums here. It is season 5 of 7 seasons and the movie. The original Musketeers stories were written to be serialized in newspapers, and while that makes for reading them fairly neatly and compartmentalized, collecting them together lacks a bit of heft as we move further away from the original adventures. 

This is the second part of the Visconte de Bragelonne, which started in Between Two Kings. As such we get a a chance to deal with other characters than the four core musketeers. In particular, the rising star is the titular viscount, who is the son of the almost saintly Aramis. Of the others, Athos is now a clergyman. Porthos is nobility. D'Artagnan has land in France and England, and still works, off and on, for the Crown, resigning whenever the Crown displeases him.

There are three arcs within the text. The first centers the conflict between the Superintendent of Finance Fouquet, and Jean-Baptiste Colbert, who controls the late Cardinal Mazarin's wealth. The King sides with Colbert and signs the death warrant for two of Fouquet's underlings. Fouquet  hires mercs to capture his minions, escaping through a nearby building, and then covering their tracks by setting the building ablaze. Oh, yeah, the building is owned by D'Artagnan, who is on the scene when this goes down. D'Artagnan foils the plot, kills Fouqet's mercs, and lets Fouquet's men be properly hanged.

D'Artagnan is then hired by Colbert to investigate Fouquet's building up a fortress on the coast. D'Artagnan finds that Porthos is charge of the fortifications, and since Porthos is not the sharpest mental blade in the basket, discovers that Athos, now a bishop, is behind this particular development. Fouquet does from fancy diplomatic tapdancing to avoid the noose himself. Interestingly, Dumas (and D'Artagnan) likes Fouquet better than Colbert, even though he is working against him. 

The last act consists of the King marrying off his brother to the sister of King Charles of England (who our glad lads helped put back on the throne). A lot of young men are hot for Princess Henrietta, including the second Duke of Buckingham (which worked out SO well the last time). Bragelonne has to be the voice of reason here, even though he is himself smitten with his childhood love, who in turn has been elevated to a Lady in Waiting (and caught the eye of the King). More drama to come, but that will wait for the next volume, Devil's Dance. 

Bragelonne, the titular hero, threads his way through all this. He is D'Artagnan's Padawan in the first third. He argues with his father a bit in the second set of chapters, but then we scarcely see him until the final bit, where he comes into his own. And while the Viscount worships his father, he shares much with the bravado and cunning of D'Artagnan.

Ellsworth acquits himself well here, covering a lot of territory that most Americans and English-speakers have not heard of in the canon. He trims, edits and modernizes, without losing the plot or burying small bits. An earlier translation of the text can be found here, and it is clear that Ellsworth makes the work readable and engaging for the current readers, just as it was for serial readers in Paris itself. He smooths things out and reduces the stuffiness (to our ears) of the earlier translations. Plus he backs up with footnotes and character descriptions in the back that help clarify where everyone is standing with each other and what any asides and allusions refer to.

In short, I'm still enjoying the series, through we are now 30 years out from when D'Artagnan first entered Paris with his wobbling horse. And it gives me wonderful source material for Miseries & Misfortunes. And I'm looking forward to reading the next volume as well.

More later 

Edition Wars: Player's Handbooks

 So I got a copy of the new D&D Player's Handbook, and it's pretty good, but my problem is what to call the darned thing. The official WotC version is that it is just D&D. Not a new edition. Not a halfway 0.5 revision. Just D&D. OK, but how do I separate it from all the other D&Ds we've played over the decades? This got me quickly rabbit-holing down the various flavors of Dungeons & Dragons, and what it means to have a new edition. And if the latest version is really counts as a new edition or not. 

And for the purposes of this discussion, I'm going to be talking about the main line development of the hardback books. There are a lot of interim points in this lineage that I'll touch on in passing (like Unearthed Arcana and the 3.5 edition), as well as the alternate D&D line of the three Basic Boxes, the BECMI line, and the D&D Cyclopedia. Not to mention the Open Gaming and OSR clones. Like I said, it is real easy to rabbit hole. I'm going to look at seven products and see where they differ.  And what I'm looking at is primarily significant rule changes, particularly character creation and combat. To a lesser degree, I'll track presentation, because that evolves as well. Also influential on the discussion is who is writing these various editions, who is playing them and how the market has changed over the years, though that's really a story for another day.

Enough caveats? OK, let's get to it.

Let's start with the Original Gangster D&D - the little brown booklet in the woodgrain (later white) box. Dungeons and Dragons Rules for Fantastic Medieval Wargames Campaigns Playable with Paper and Pencil and Miniature Figures by Gary Gygax and Dave Arneson. in particular Volume 1, Men & Magic. Written and presented by people knowledgeable in wargaming, it required some understanding of miniature gaming. The original presented classes are Fighting-Man, Magic-User, and Cleric. The Races are Dwarves, Elves, and Hobbits (Changed to Halflings in later editions). The combat system was literally opaque to anyone who has not played Chainmail, but has as an Alternative Combat System the Attack Matrices for Men Attacking and Monster Attacking. These charts were the ones we were using back in the 70s when I started playing.

And while it doesn't tell you specifically how to create a character, it does state that "Prior to the character selection by players it is necessary for the referee to roll three six-sided dice in order to rate each as to various abilities, and thus aid them in selecting a role". Putting aside the note that the DM (not called as such yet) is rolling the players' ability scores, it does make generating ability scores the first step in character creation, followed by race, class, and everything else (including modifying those ability scores depending on class).

That's OD&D, our ground zero. The next step is Advanced Dungeons & Dragons Players Handbook (no apostrophe) by Gary Gygax, later called 1st Edition. And it stuns me when I see the quantum leap between those original booklets and what we find here. Big, sturdy hardback. Tiny type. A lot more definition on the rules, often with unique cases for specific situations. Character Classes are now Cleric, Fighter, Magic-User, Thief, and Monk, with the subclasses of Druid, Paladin, Ranger, Illusionist, and Assassin. Bards are there, but are in the back of the book as high-level play. Most of these classes showed up in other OD&D products or the Strategic Review, before becoming Core Canon. Races added the Half-Elf, Half-Orc, and Gnome. The attack matrices have moved to the Dungeon Masters Guide, but are the recognized method of combat (there was a year between PH and DMG - we used the tables from the original set during this lull). Saving throws are situational, as it was in the original flavor D&D, and it mattered you we being hit by a wand or dragon's breath.

In character generation, the player generates abilities first, then race, class, alignment, name, starting gold pieces, and hit points. Methods of ability score generation were also moved to the DMG, and four methods were provided; 1) roll four dice, drop the lowest, put the rolls in any order on your sheet. 2) roll 3 dice 12 times, keep the highest six, put them in any order 3) Roll in order listed, roll 3d6 six times each, keep the highest. 4) Roll 3d6 , in order, for 12 characters, then chose the character you want to run. Yeah, it sounds overly complex, but it fits with the complexity of the rest of the game. The ability scores in order were Strength, Intelligence, Wisdom, Dexterity, Constitution and Charisma. These were the Prime Requisites of Fighters, Magic-Users, Clerics, and Thieves, respectively, plus hit points and the dump stat (unless you were aiming at being a paladin).

The sheer massiveness of all this says that AD&D is clearly a different edition of the game, though still backwards compatible, in part because there was so much NOT Covered in the original. This was the version that showed up in the mall bookstores in the late seventies.

Then comes Second Edition, or rather the Advanced Dungeons & Dragons 2nd Edition Player's Handbook (note the apostrophe) by David "Zeb" Cook. Again, there's a presentation change as the accessible printing tech improves. Now we have a second color in the book, with full-color pages. The contents reflect the changes provided through a lot of the other 1st edition hardbacks, and excluded some (goodbye, Comeliness from the Unearthed Arcana, You are not missed.) from the canon. 

Races/Species through the Editions

The 2nd Edition has the least number of changes between the editions - THAC0, which was being used in conventions and embraced by the RPGA, is now fully incorporated (goodbye, attack matrices). The Half-Orc disappears from the racial lists. Classes are reorganized under four general groups - Warrior (with Fighter, Ranger, and Paladin all presented as equal classes), Wizard (Mage and Specialist Wizard, with Illusionist as a detailed example), Priest (Cleric, and Priest of a Specific Mythoi, with Druid as the specific example), and Rogue (Thief and Bard). The ones outside the "Big Four" character classes are presented as optional, but everyone used them in their base games anyway. 

One of the major changes has been presentation and organization of the book - the order of chapters in the Player's Handbook, sketched out by editor Steve Winter- Ability Scores, Races, Classes, Alignment, Proficiencies, Money/Equipment, Magic, Experience, Combat, Treasure, Game and Combat Mechanics). This basic outline would remain pretty much intact until the most recent Player's Handbook.

Of the editions, the transfer between 1 and 2 is the slightest as far as core rules are concerned - a lot of this is necessary housekeeping. During the design there was discussion of more radical changes ("Hey kids! We're gonna nuke the Cleric!"), but in general this was a clearing of the kudzu and ivy that had grown up around the core rules. The arrival of 2nd Edition came along with the spread of the "Big-box bookstores", which needed a lot of content to fill its shelves. 

The Third Edition, now (no longer Advanced)  Dungeons & Dragons Player's Handbook Core Rulebook I by Jonathan Tweet, Monte Cook, and Skip Williams, was a major overhaul. THAC0 is banished. Higher armor classes are now better.  Saving throws move from individual cases to three general classes (Fortitude, Reflex and Will). Feats and Skills are added. The races snap back to the 1st edition list with the return of the Half-Orc. The classes are Barbarian (back from Unearthed Arcana), Bard, Cleric (now with Domains), Druid, Fighter, Monk, Paladin, Ranger, Rogue (Formerly Thief), Sorcerer (new), and Wizard (With Illusionist as alternative, as opposed to a subclass). 

Ability scores are re-arranged - Strength, Dexterity, Constitution (the physical scores), followed by Intelligence, Wisdom, and Constitution (the mental/social scores). More importantly, we see the rise of the ability modifiers as opposed to the ability scores themselves. The ability scores are rolled with four dice, drop the lowest, then assign. The order for character creation is Ability Scores, Class and Race, Assign/Adjust Ability Scores, Record Racial and Class Features, Select Skills, Select a Feat, Equipment, Record final you Skill and Combat Numbers, Finally Name, Gender, and Appearance.  

Character Classes through the Editions

Reversing the AC also has the effect of solidifying the D20 roll. THAC0 is abandoned for a more straightforward and modifiable die roll, though the result in play was often that the players and DM were hunting for plusses to see if they could boost the die roll into a success. 

Presentation is upgraded as well - full-color throughout, and the art is more diegetic - looking like sketches that could be from within the fantasy world itself, he covers looked like ancient tomes, the pages looking like old parchment. It had a Conversion Manual to bring your game from 2nd to 3rd. They did eventually do a 3.5 revision, but kept the same layout, adding new abilities, class features, and skills, but it is not thought of as a new edition - it kept the 3 designation. Tap this one with the rise of the Internet booksellers. 

Fourth Edition is the red-headed stepchild of the lineage, which is a pity, because it was a pretty good design, and if it was not D&D, it would have hailed as an important rival to D&D. On the cover it is Dungeons & Dragons Player's Handbook: Arcane Divine and Martial Heroes,  Roleplaying Game Core Rules by Rob Heinsoo, Andy Collins, and James Wyatt. Ability Scores remained the same, though Constitution and Dexterity switched places.  There are now three methods of rolling Ability Scores - 1) A standard array of six numbers, assigned by the player, 2) six basic scores, and spending 22 points to raise them, and 3) Roll four dice, drop the lowest, and assign them to your abilities. 

The order of character creation is Race, Class, Ability Scores, Skills, Feats, Powers, Equipment, Number Skills (AC, hit points, attack and damage bonuses), Character Details (everything else).  Race is missing the Half-Orc and the Gnome, but added now are the Dragonborn, Eladrin and Tieflings. Classes simplify to Cleric, Fighter, Paladin, Ranger, Rogue, Warlock (new), Warlord (new), and Wizard. Bard, Barbarian, Monk, Druid, and Sorcerer are all absent. Subclasses (called Paragon classes) branch off at 11th level. They also delve into general character roles (Controller, Defender, Leader, and Striker), but don't do much with that concept elsewhere. 

But the big change here (the one that may have irritated a lot of people) was Powers - called different things (Prayers, Exploits, Spells), they a pretty much spells for every class and every level. And while this created a more balanced game, it also turned each class into a similar style of play (tracking your cards), and people did not care for that. This system, though, did survive in many of the D&D board games that showed up during this period.

Now, Fifth Edition, or simply the D&D Player's Handbook by Mike Mearls and Jeremy Crawford, (2014). In some ways it is a throwback to Third Edition. Ability Score order is the same as Fourth. You choose Race, Class, Ability Scores, a grab bag of descriptions ( alignment, ideals, bonds, flaws, and background), then equipment. The core classes change again to 12 total - Barbarian (back), Bard (back), Cleric, Druid (back), Fighter, Monk (back), Paladin, Ranger, Rogue, Sorcerer (back), Warlock, and Wizard.  Races are everything from Fourth, minus the Eldrin, plus the return of the Half-Orc, and Gnome.

A big system change for this one was the use of advantage and disadvantage. Allowing rerolls was previously used for feats (lucky) or racial traits (halflings). Now they become situational, where you can roll two die and take the highest (or lowest in case of disadvantage). More importantly, any number of advantages can be negated by a single disadvantage, and vice versa. This helps avoid the hunting for bonuses seen in Fourth Edition.

And then, (FINALLY) we get to the new kinda-edition, also called the Dungeons & Dragons Player's Handbook. Bigger and beefier in page count. Completely revised text. Art is not nearly so bad as the Internet will tell you (though I did get the Gold Dragon cover, since I liked it better). 

Part of the big change between PHs is organization. Mention of proficiencies, saving throws, skills, combat, and difficulty classes are moved to the front of the book, BEFORE you get to character classes, More importantly, there is a detailed rules glossary in the back, which allows them to mention something important in the front matter, then get into the gritty details later on. Combat comes early as well and that works out just fine, since I usually tend to start flipping pages when I have to deal with pages of each new character class abilities. This is the first edition I've seen where things like mounted combat is not relegated to a detailed discussion in the back (or the DMG), where most people never see it. 

Creating a character is very different: Class, Origin, Ability Scores, Alignment, Details.  Same twelve classes as 5.0. Origins are a new thing, a combination of species (formerly race, which grant special abilities), backgrounds (which affect ability scores, skills, and feats), and languages.  We change up the species again, as the core species are Aasimar, Dragonborn, Dwarf, Elf, Gnome, Goliath,  Halfling, Human, Orc, and Tiefling. Half-elf and Half-orc are gone again. As with the other editions, there is stuff that has been tried out in other products and then added to the core (like, say, Ranger abilities, which I have opinions on, but that is another discussion). Subclasses are back, but framed as a career choice when you hit 3rd level, similar to d20 Modern.

So, after all this, is this a new edition? If you compare it to the 1st to 2nd shift, the answer is definitely yes. In addition to changes in the system, it has been completely rewritten with an eye to clarity and presentation. If you look at the difference between 3 and 3.5, there are definite differences that could merit that designation as well (5.5). But if you compare it to its predecessor Fifth Edition, though, the core mechanics are all still there. It all depends where you draw the line as Core Canon. Does breaking up Race into Species and Background change everything? Do adding more Species/Races options count as a new edition? Is the way we handle subclasses enough of a change? The d20 resolution system first presented in 3rd edition is still there, and the Ability Score Modifiers are a piece that have survived since them. 

Ultimately, I am good with calling the game Dungeons & Dragons in general usage, and when I'm talking about this particular version, I've decided to use the designation D24. As in the year of release. Here's my reasoning - the game will continue to evolve, particularly with the expansion of D&D Beyond and its table-top initiative, Sigil. Much like the old Strategic Review, or new options provided in hardbacks like Tasha's, there will continue to be expansion and development. But for Core Canon, which this is until the next edition shows up, I'm going with D24. 

And that's my TED talk. More later, 

New Arrivals: The Gen Con Haul

 So, I was invited out to Gen Con back in early August as a Guest of Honor this year in Indy, and despite the Covid, it was pretty darn good.

The official house was 71,000 gamers, all of whom I suspect were on the exhibit floor at the same time as I was. The convention had spread out even more than the last time I attended, which surprised me, and worked into every nook and cranny of the surrounding hotels (and they are building more hotels in Indianapolis, which bodes well for future conventions). I had been invited to sit of several panels for the 50th anniversary of D&D (Here are some videos), and helped out with the Writer's Symposium as well. And I picked up a lot of stuff, including huge blisters on both feet from all the walking around (and Covid).

I will confess I packed a large suitcase, half-empty, just to account for all the things I was intending to bring back. I also sent a copy of Shadowdark to a colleague who asked for it, and it was a good thing, because they sold out of the last of their print run at the con itself. 

OK, so what do we have? 

Gen Con Program Booklet by Peter Adkison and many diverse and talented hands, 170-page magazine format. This bears out a call-out because of how much it shows the depth and diversity of Gen Con as it celebrated 50 years of D&D. Stuffed with ads from exhibitors but also showing the maps of all the locations, it covers the history of D&D, the guests of honor (I'm on page 91), the writer's symposium, the costume contest (one of my old D&D group from college is on page 125), and all sorts of subcons and special interest groups. An excellent memento of the convention.

Legions of Carcosa by John Harness, Kira Magrann, Sarah Saltiel and Monica Valentinelli, with Daniel Kwan, Pelgrane Press, 200-page hardbound, 2023, Gen Con, and Black Star Magic,  by Robin D. Laws, Sarah Saltiel, Gareth Ryder-Hanrahan, and Ruth Tillman, Pelgrane Press, 184-page digest-sized hardbound, 2023 Gen Con . Pelgrane's The Yellow King is one of the more intriguing games I have in my collection and one of the more challenging. Its system is a simplified version of their Gumshoe system, which uses condition cards as opposed to more traditional hit points and the like, yet it remains a bit of a mental climb for me. The setting itself is four settings based on the work of Robert Chambers, who in the 1890s created an alternate 1920s with a dictatorship in America with suicide booths in the major cities. The game itself has four separate time periods to it - Paris in the 1890s, during the Continental Wars, and post-war, post-dictatorship US, and a modern era. So all this is background. Legions of Carcosa is a monster book, Black Star Magic is a book of spells. Nice additions, though I know I'll have to do a bit more digging to see how they can be implemented. 

The Fifth Imperative by Robin D. Laws, Pelgrane Press, 192-page softbound digest, 2022, Gen Con  Also from the Pelgrane Press and also dealing with the alternate history of The Yellow King. This one is set in the period following the dictatorship, and involves politics and otherworldly conspiracy. I really like the lateral development and fiction books that Robin D. Laws and Pelgrane put out, and usually don't see enough of them through my standard purchasing venues. So this will likely end up as a "plane book" to be read en route to conventions.  

Hamlet's Hit Points by Robin D. Laws, Gameplaywright Press, 196-page softbound digest, 2010, 2015, Gen Con. This is the third time I have purchased this book. On the two previous occasions, I have recommended it others, loaned it out, and never saw it again. It is an interesting examination and mapping of beats and pacing within narrative stories. For Laws, such beats are instances with specific purposes, be them - Dramatic, Commentary, Anticipation, and the connective tissue of Pipe, and combine to create Hope and/or Fear in the audience. He then uses this analysis to examine Hamlet, Casablanca, and Dr. No, under this lens. It's an interesting approach, and the only thing I can ding it with is the each beat is considered as a single unit - a particularly positive beat gets the same weight as a negative beat, so that the progress of beats is downward, regardless of resolution. But that's just a quibble. I'm glad I got another copy of this. No, you can't borrow it. 

Pendragon Core Rulebook by Greg Stafford, with input from myriad others, Chaosium Inc./Moon Design Publications, 254-page hardback, 2024, Gen Con. I'm a fan of Chaosium's games - I've played a lot of Call of Cthulhu. I've played almost no Runequest (but love the lore). Pendragon falls between those two poles, where I've done a bit as both player and gamemaster. And so a goal of this trip was to pick up the new version (I would have also picked up some Miskatonic Library volumes, if they had any on-hand, just so you know). The latest version is polished and is incredibly readable. The downside is that this is primarily a Player's Guide, with a lot of good information for players. For a GM, it would more of an uphill stroll, and hopefully there is a GM resource in the works. In the mean time, I would still likely spring the Starter Set on my players.

Kaiju Preservation Society by John Scalzi, Tor Books, 266 page Trade paperback, Gen Con. So what's the deal with including all these books here? Well, they were part of the Gen Con swag I returned from Indy with. This volume was a reward for helping out the Writer's Symposium, spending part of an afternoon stuffing swag bags for the attendees. A good group activity. The book itself deals with a slacker taking on a temp job that takes him to another dimension filled with giant monsters. That's about all I know about it right now. Kate's read it on Kindle (I have a hard time concentrating on devices when I have other options to engage with) and says its pretty good. It becomes another plane-trip book. 

Miseries and Misfortunes: Roleplaying in 1648 by Luke Crane, Burning Wheel, six softbound digest volumes for 852-pages total, 2022-2023, Gen Con. This is the sort of thing I love at Gen Con - finding something I had never heard of before, something that is much tougher in this Internet Age. So I was delighted I found the six volumes of this game at the Burning Wheel booth and snapped them up. The gamer takes place in the post-Richelieu, post- Louis XIII era of the Musketeers Cycle, where you had the underaged Louis XIV, the Queen Regent, and a noble revolt known as the Fronde. While it notes its descent from Basic D&D, it has morphed from those early designs into a completely different animal with a lot of different mechanics. The books themselves are 1) a system book for game mechanics, 2) a character creation book (which should be read first so you know what they're talking about in book 1, 3) a book on magic, 4) and expansion to books 1-3, 5) an adventure set in Catalonia, and 6) a MASSIVE book on Paris itself. So yeah, I'm pretty pleased with myself.

Religion in the American West: Belief, Violence, and Resilience from 1800 to Today.  Edited by Jessica Lauren Nelson, University of New Mexico Press, 196-page hardbound, 2023. So at Gen Con, my hosts put me up at the Fairfield, which was one of a collection of interconnected Marriot-branded lodgings. My room faced the Eiteljorg Museum of American Museums and Western Art. And since I had arrived a day early, I actually had the chance to see something in the city where I was. And it is an excellent museum of Native American and European Western art, and I would recommend it just on the basis of that. But the special exhibit was on Religion in the American West, and covered both the stuff most folk know about (The Mormons, the Spanish missions), as well as lot of things that tended to get pushed to the back (Presbyterians and their influence on the Erie Canal, the rivalry between Catholic priests and Protestant ministers among the Native Americans). It was a good exhibit, and I went back on Sunday to get the book (which was half-price since that was the last day of the exhibit). Look forward to reading it. 

Fifty Years of Dungeons & Dragons, Edited by Premeet Sidhu, Marcus Carter, and Jose P. Zagal, the MIT Press, 372-page Trade paperback, 2024, Gen Con. Purchased at the MIT press booth, no less. The 50th anniversary of D&D has encouraged a spurt of commentary and analysis. This volume is a collection of essays from a number of talented individuals. I've been reading this is bits and pieces, and there are parts I find engaging, and those that I give the hairy eyeball and raised eyebrow at. The final collection probably should have had one more pass through it by a well-intentioned grognard or two to catch the nits. One obvious nit? For a document that pushes cultural accuracy in many of its essays, the cover shows two Viking-types fighting what I would guess to be a Lindwyrm. And the Vikings have wings on their helmets. Its a minor thing, but triggers that eye-roll thing. 

The Egg of the World: A Guide to Gaming in the World of Tekumel by Victor Raymond, 256 page ringbound draft, 2022. Gift of the Author. It is well known that I am a fan of Empire of the Petal Throne, but recognize that the very alienness and completeness of the world is a major stumbling block for new players. There's a lot to grok - no only all the strange names and alien creatures, but the non-Western-European concepts of rigid class and clan. The original EPT had 11 pages of backstory for the world at the start, before digging into it properly. So this volume sorts out a lot of this for the referee, hitting the important points of what makes a Tekumel campaign, as well a host of scenarios, adventures, factions and patrons that can be grist for your mill. This is a referee's source material to get your players into EPT without overloading them, and allow them to experience the world as opposed to confronting them with a big data dump. I'm looking forward to seeing this in its final form. 

Questionable Content by Jeph Jacques, TopatoCo Books, 592 page trade paperback, Gen Con. Look to the blogroll to the right, and you'll see QC listed. And I check it out on weekdays. At Gen Con, I hunted down Jacques among the teaming thousands and myriad booths. He had already sold out of Volumes 1 and 2, but I bought Vol 3 and he included a drawing of Hannalore (I have friends who are artists, but it still lifts my heart when someone does that). Anyway, Questionable Content has been around for twenty+ years, and deals with the relationships of Marten and Faye, who were a couple back at the beginning, then broke up and dated others, then broke up with those others a few more times and now are in pretty stable relationships. This is of the era when Hannalore, who grew up on a space station, shows up more, Marten still has a band, and has such things a whether Penelope, the new employee, is really the superhero Pizza Girl and the threat of the the VespAvenger and her transforming robot scooter. The writing is smart, the characters are intelligent, and the strip remains excellent. The strip has evolved as it deals more with robots and SF elements, and there are a host of characters that rotate in and out, sort of like Doonesbury. I really like the strip, and you can rabbit hole through the archives if you don't want a physical copy. So check it out. 

Neoclassical Geek Revival Second Edition Acidic Rulebook (it is acidic instead of basic, get it?), by Zzarchov Kowolski, Neoclassical Games, 170 page hardback digest, Gen Con.  I'd seen mentions of this product elsewhere, and was delighted to see it with a booth (low-tech and high pressure), so I picked up the core book and a couple support products. I expected another OSR-clone hewing close to the original little booklets, but instead discovered that they took the core concepts and headed for the exits, changing them over time to produce something completely unique. The tone of the books are that same jaunty in-your-face attitude of the guy across the gaming table explaining his house rules, but everything has changed dramatically, such that you're learning a completely new game. The part that is most like original D&D is the presence of a GM (mentioned briefly) and the 1st edition tendency to create a new system whenever confronted with a new challenge. It's really impressive. I also picked up Havenvale (16 pages), a tidy little starting area in a mountain valley, and The Price of Evil (32 pages), a way to create haunted houses with a deck of cards. 

Whew! And that's the lot. And more have shown up, but we'll deal with them later. So, more. Later.