1. The Midnights Lair – From the Lair issue 5 Featuring James Maliszewski from Grognardia.

2. RPG Circus – Episode 6 Featuring an interview with Michael Shorten also known to the Old School renaissance as chgowiz

3. All Games Considered – Episode 114 Featuring a general overview of many Old School products

4. RPG Circus – Episode 9 Featuring a guest appearnce by James Edward Raggi III of Lamentations of the Flame Princess

5. The Games the Thing – Episode 061 featuring an interview with Matt Finch of Swords & Wizardry fame.

There is more to come, maybe even some actual play podcasts.

If anyone reading this knows of anymore Old School related podcasts, please don’t hesitate to comment.

Check ‘em out

Archaeopteryx Potens

Thylacine

Zetan

But now things are gonna get weird.

I’ve drawn up a list of Fortean Rumors for inclusion in my Age of Lemuria campaign, you know typical stuff Mothman, Men in Black, Hairy Bipeds, etc.  Just enough info to get you started, weird out your PCs and or start them down a blind alley.

Inspired by Scott at World of Thool, I have decided to research more unconventional and public domain fantasy sources for my campaign setting “Age of Lemuria”

I started here and picked out a few interesting authors

Francis Stevens
Edward Lucas White
George Griffith

Also possibly Arthur Conan Doyles “The Horror of the Heights“

MIZU-MEN

Hit Dice: 1d6
Armor Class: 7 [12]
Attacks: 2 claws (1d4), 1 bite (1d3) or 1 weapon (1d6)
Move: 9 (swim 12)
Saving Throw: 18
Challenge Level/XP: 1/15 XP
Special: Amphibious, Hopping

Legend has it that Mizu-Men were the aboriginal folk of the marshy land on the west coast of Elgarth (Map 3). With the encroachment of men looking to harvest salt in the marshes  and the establishment of the Human settlement, DimOoze, the many Mizu-Men clans moved deeper into the swamp and further south.

There are rumors that some clans of Mizu-Men worship a degenerate god deep in the swamp, a loathsome being known as Xothaqqua.

For every group of 5 or more Mizu-Men encountered there is a 75% chance of a leader/shaman being present.  The leader/shamans are slightly larger than normal Mizu-Men(1d8) and carry a “Shock Rod” with which they can stun and beat(1d8) opponents(Save vs Paralysis) or stunned for 1d4 rounds.

When fought in the open Mizu-Men can hop at their enemies gaining +1 to hit, when cornered they bite.

Though sometimes known as Water-Goblins, Mizu-Men are not related to Goblins nor are they trollish.  They do not fear the sun and suffer no penalty when fighting in daylight. Mizu-Men also tend to leave behind a strong smell of alflafa and almonds.

Mizu-Men are OGL

In case anyone is wondering this little guy inspired the Mizu-Men, also known as the Loveland Frog.

Now let me just say that, I for one do not care how adults choose to play make-believe with other adults.  I mean that is what it is in the end.  Fiction, that’s all Carcosa is.  It’s true to it’s Pulp roots and I can take that.  And hopefully most modern folks can look at it the same way.

But truthfully we in the hobby not doing anything and remaining silent while other RPGs get all the word of mouth is the killer.

At this point I would like to suggest that the Old School take a page from the New School playbook by one coach Fred Hicks and his team Evil Hat.  Those guys know the score, bad reviews, good reviews thats not really the issue.  The issue is, “Are people talking about your product”?  Silence = Death.  This is especially true for smalltime publishers.  Take a look at some of the post below where Fred lays it out for you.

RPGPundit Review

Value of a Negative Review

Online RPG Promotion

Honestly, if I had the time to really devote to it, I would start the IPR clone myself and implement each and everyone of Mr Hicks suggestions, but for the Old School.

I think the key is that Fred likes running the biz as well as designing the game.  So he might make mistakes, but he and everyone at Evil Hat learns a lesson and will not make that mistake again.

Anyway, thanks to Fred, Rob Donoghue, Leonard Balsera, Chad Underkoffler for experimenting in public and allowing us all to learn on your dime.  Now if only folks would listen, we could GET ON WITH THE GAME!

My gaming group and I have been working on something of an old school campaign world.  I’m gonna be posting bits of it as we finish certain areas.  I hope to make this similar to Judges Guild settings of old, lots of hooks, NPCs, and weirdness in general.  No real metaplot stuff. I also hope to add a good bit of Fortean creatures and situations.

To get us started here is the main map for play.  There are eighteen areas, each area corresponds to a 17×22 inch hexmap.  So there will be wilderness crawls as well as dungeon crawls

Major influences for this campaign world are Hyperborea from Clark Ashton Smith, The Moonpool and The Metal Monster from A. Merritt and The Hobbit from Tolkien, notice I didn’t mention LotR.  Also having a hand in this campaign world are a few fortean writers John A. Keel, Jacques Vallee, Jim Keith and Charles Fort himself.

Just to be clear this is what i consider OGL:

+++BEGIN LEGAL+++
Open Game Content may only be Used under and in terms of the Open
Game License Version 1.0a (OGL). This entire work is designated as
Open Game Content under the OGL, with the exception of the
trademarks “Black Science Press,” and “Age of Lemuria”

and with the exception of any artwork and maps, unless otherwise noted.  These trademarks, and the Trade Dress of this work (font, layout,style of artwork, etc.) are
reserved as Product Identity.

+++END LEGAL+++

So eventually I will add write-ups for creatures, NPCs and items which will be OGL.

More to come.

They are simplified and reworded, but I think they should still lend some spice to “rollplaying”.

Download the PDF here.

And the OpenOffice document here.

This PDF is licensed OGL.

Crits and Fumbles Screenshot

Their adventure modules, reference material and MAPS!  So I made THIS .

This map is in PDF format and is 22 by 17 inches at 300dpi

In addition to Judges Guild I was inspired by a post by Amityville Mike over here.

So anyway this is another freebie for OD&D S&W or anything that uses hex maps at 5miles per hex.

Go to Kinkos or Staples and print `em out to your hearts content.

Here is a screen shot:

Screenshot

Krampus

The more rural areas of Alpine Germany and Bavaria among others continue to have a scary tradition for Christmas, that of the Krampus.

If St. Nicholas brought good cheer and presents to the good little boys and girls, Krampus was his travel companion and beat bad children with a switch and or stuck them in a pail to be taken away.

Man, talk about tough love.  But hey, there’s gotta be a S&W Yule adventure in here somewhere…

Vault of the Krampus, Lair of the Yule Devil, The Tannenbaum of Terror.

Frosty the Snowman, Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer (other Pagan archetypes) have got to be NPCs.

Maybe a distraught Burgomeister could contract the PCs to steal back his bratty child from Krampus.  Lets see where would the Krampus live…well if he rode with Santa, and was his servant, he might live up at the North Pole too.  Which, in my campaign, is where the Dwarves come from.  They have their mines etc up there.  So while Kris Kringle (err…Santa) live in a comfy Mansion, down below…in the dungeon Krampus has his lair.  That’s where he takes all the bad children to slave away building toys for next year.  So the PCs have to rescue the bratty Burgomeisters child and foil, kill or imprison the Krampus. Maybe they have to at least bind and control Santa as well revealing him to be old one eye himself and teaching the true meaning of Christmas as well.

Wow, maybe I should call that Adventures in Humbugland instead.

Of course the PCs might choose to join Santas cause.  I mean that kid was really bratty, she broke her toys, burnt down the town Tannenbaum, stuck some kids tongue to an ice cold flag pole, ate the Sugarplum Fairy, and had a habit of dropping snow down the backs of other children and adults.

Anyhow, Merry Christmas and watch out for the Krampus.