A to Z of UK RPG in the 80s - G is for Games Designers Workshop

As I've said earlier I started roleplaying in the 80s with Tunnels and Trolls and then gravitated to AD&D (1e) but my first experience of Sci-Fi roleplaying was as a player in a Traveller campaign. 

GDW Traveller

Although I never owned the LBBs (Little Black Books) or the boxed set I did (and still do) own a copy of Double Adventure 1: Shadows / Annic Nova.  At this time White Dwarf was still covering all RPGs and regularly featured scenarios for traveller, a favourite of mine being "The Sable Rose Affair" featured in WD#17.

I loved the hard edge that traveller put on the whole Space Opera genre.  It wasn't so much about racing through the galaxy to rescue the princess, it was about dealing with the day to day minutia of staying alive in the cold depths of space and yet trying to eke out a living and possibly making that big score.  In other words more "Alien" than "Star Wars".

Believe you me, this was hugely influential to my 11 year old self whose Sci-Fi diet at that time was limited to Doctor Who, the odd episode of Blake's Seven, Battlestar Galactica and re-runs of Lost in Space.  Traveller also heavily influenced one of the breakthrough 8-bit computer games Elite by David Braben and Ian Bell which I spent many hours playing on my school's only BBC Micro.  Yes back then the entire school shared one computer!!

In 1984 GDW released Twilight 2000 which focused on the plight of the survivors of WWIII assembling their rag tag militas to fend of the remnants of the soviet army.  This got quite a bit of play at the club I was a member of at the time, but it never fit in with my cold war childhod as I recall most of the scenarios being set in the US.
 
Towards the end of the decade GDW released Space: 1889 which in hindsight shows how groundbreaking GDW were when they published the first victorian Sci-Fi RPG before cyberpunk had truly emerged never mind steampunk.  In recent years I have come to enjoy victorian sci-fi more and more, partly as a refracted, quintisentially English, vision of Empire and partly as a result of my fascination with the aestetic of heavy engineering during the industrial revolution (with brass finials and plenty of scroll work).

RPG Mapping Tools Part 2 - Dungeon Maps

In the first part of this series I explored the free options for Battlemaps. In this part I up the scale slightly to look at Dungeon Maps.

Dungeon Maps

These usually conform to the scale of 1 square to 5ft and come in a variety of styles from the original D&D module "Blueprint" style to isometric maps for complex multilevel dungeons. For the purposes of comparison I will attempt to recreate small sections of maps from each of the TSR modules B1 In search of the Unknown (a 2D map) and DL1 Dragons of Despair (a 3D map).  Again I am restricting myself to only using free tools or web based apps and from start to finish each map should take no more than 1½ hours to create. 

2D Map Sample	Isometric Map Sample

Google Sketchup (sketchup.google.com)

Free to use 3D modelling application (Windows/Mac OSX) which has a 2d export function.  First thing, make sure that you position the camera to be facing the "Top".  Then you can start off by creating a grid (Sketchup is very flexible when it comes to unit measurement so if you want to create 5ft grids do just that, using the appropriate template) it is possible to use the draw line function to draw in all the floors doors and walls.  Sketchup is always trying to fill enclosed shapes, so bear this in mind and make sure that when you close a shape you either delete or fill the "face".  It isn't really designed to do this, but the learning curve is shorter compared to other free vector graphics tools like inkscape or CC3.  Once you have a flat map it's trivial to use the isometric camera and Parallel Perspectives options to turn it into a full 3D map.  Extra depth can be instantly added by extruding (google calls this push/pull) a short distance, you can even animate the result (Cue spinning Death Star animation).  7/10 - "Who's The Daddy?" 

SketchUp 2d Output	SketchUp Isometric / 3d Output

Tiled (http://www.mapeditor.org/)

This is a free bitmap level editor (Windows / Mac OSX) designed to create level maps for 2d scrolling games and although it's not designed as an RPG mapping tool it is seriously versatile as it supports an unlimited number of user generated layers.  However, you do need to supply it with an image of your tiles to begin with so this tool is more of a DIY approach (ie: if you don't have a good bitmap editor then you'll struggle).  Here are my classic blue tilemaps if you want to try it out (the tilemaps are set at a size of 50 pixels square).  It can do isometrics but I spent far too much time putting the 2d tilemaps together to get round to drawing an iso tilemap, but I'll get there as this tool is just a joy to use.


The interface is really easy to learn and if you've struggled with Pymapper like I did try this with my DT1 tilemap.  In my opinion this could also easily replace Dunjinni for Battlemaps, and the ability to have all your objects instantly available in the tileset window is infact a big advantage, so no more struggling to locate that one particular tree which you accidentally loaded into the wrong folder.  9/10 - "The future so bright I gotta wear shades"

Tiled 2d Output	Example of Battlemap Output

RPG Map Maker X (http://fmteau.perso.neuf.fr/rpgmapmaker/rpgmapmaker.htm)

A Mac OSX native donateware tool ($37 to buy) which has been around for donkeys years.  Although the feature set is huge as it has autogenerate dungeons, I found the interface frankly bewildering at almost every stage.  The output is also quite primitive in comparison to other free options I tested and given the low pain threshold I have I couldn't even be bothered expend the extra energy to persevere with it beyond the 2d sample.  2/10 - "There's better fish in the sea"

RPG Map Maker X 2D Output

Other Posts in this Series:

• Part 1 - Battle Maps
• Part 2 - Dungeon Maps
• Part 3 - Region Maps
• Part 4 - Planet and Star Maps

An infinite number of humans cannot type Shakespeare

Please accept my apologies if you have been unlucky enough to see sneak peaks of future articles which were inadvertently published in the last 12 hours.  Unfortunately there has been a breakdown in the trained humans used, and this will not happen again.

"Trophies" by Jason Edmiston

A to Z of UK RPG in the 80s - F is for Fighting Fantasy

F is for... Fighting Fantasy

Flying Buffalo not Fighting Fantasy

My first exposure to the world of Adventure Gamebooks was actually a copy of Weirdworld, a Tunnels and Trolls solo adventure which my dad brough back from one of his trips home whilst working in Durham in the North East of England.  I was mesmerised by this crudely made book and I didn't let the mere fact that I didn't have a copy of the T&T rules stop me from repeatedly entering the Madhouse of Maximilian the Magnificent.

My father (who is to blame for all of this) was a keen wargamer and so I ended up going to the Bradford Wargames Society and being exposed to full blown Roleplaying Games such as D&D and Tunnels and Trolls at quite an early age.  Then came the first great gaming hiatus as we moved away from Yorkshire to South East London.  

I was already a veteran when the first of the Fighting Fantasy books was published in 1982.  Schoolmates who had not already been exposed to RPGs devoured the Fighting Fantasy books with gusto and whilst I enjoyed playing their copies and followed them on their trips to the only gamestore in the area, I didn't buy any of these gamebooks at the time.  However, it was on one of these trips that by chance I discovered a copy of the Corgi Tunnels and Trolls rulebook, money exchanged hands and I was now ensconced as the group DM.

So although my relationship with Fighting Fantasy is not atypical, I can acknowledge the huge debt owed by UK roleplayers to Steve Jackson and Ian livingstone for setting many of our friends on the path to exploring our own adventures, not just choosing them.

My Collection Includes

Island of the Lizard King Buy it on eBay

Free Way Fighter Buy it on eBay

The Warlock's Way Buy it on eBay

Warlock Magazine

The Abominog - Les Edwards

Fighting Fantasy fans could also indulge their passion on a monthly basis via the pages of Warlock Magazine which was a brilliant piece of marketing and essentially contained at least one new adventure per issue.

My favourite issue was the one featuring the monster form the Uriah Heep album "Abominog" painted by one of my favourite artist Les Edwards.

Les Edwards was pretty much the go-to-guy if you wanted a fantasy or horror painting for your new paperback or movie poster.

When they needed an artist to immortalise Hawk The Slayer, you guessed it they went to Les.

For some strange reason Games Workshop produced an artbook called Blood & Iron containing high quality prints of the many artworks they had used as cover for their games over the years.

Maybe this was part of the deal with Les, but they never did it with any other artist to my knowledge although John Blanche did publish the book The Emperor's Will under the Warhammer 40K banner.

Board Game

Warlock of Firetop Mountain
Buy it on eBay

In 1986 Gamesworkshop released the Warlock of Firetop Mountain Boardgame in their defacto Bookcase format.  A race to the finish with heavy Player vs Player interraction this was an immensely popular game in its day and still has a cult following over 35 years later.


Want to know more

In the course of dragging these memories from my caffeine addled grey matter I have encountered some very fine Fighting Fantasy resources:

• Fighting Fantasy Collector - A full listing of all the FF books and a price guide
  
  
• FightingFantasy.com - Official site of current FF publisher Wizard Books
  
• Fighting Fantasy Fandom - Wiki containing over 8,000 articles about the Fighting 
  
  
• Big Blue Bubble Inc have released iOS versions of Warlock of Firetop Mountain, Deathtrap Dungeon, Citadel of Chaos and City of Thieves.
  
• Fighting Fantasy Miniatures - Atlantis miniatures plans to release miniatures of all the cover art.
  
• Search for Fighting Fantasy on eBay - Help support this channel buy using the affiliate link
  

NEXT: G is for... GAMES DESIGNERS WORKSHOP

A to Z of UK RPG in the 80s - E is for Elric of Melnibone

E is for Elric of Melniboné (it's mel-nib-o-nay not mel-ni-bone)

Stormbringer RPG on eBay

Michael Moorcock was de rigeur reading amongst my fellow roleplayers and the Elric Saga particularly so.  Elric was for most readers the first true anti-hero and introduced the concept of exploiting flawed and troubled character possibilities in roleplay.

The Novels

My fondest memories were of my school mates and I swapping the London Panther editions in the playground like kids do today with XBox games. 

• Elric of Melniboné (1972) - Where Elric, the 428th Sorceror Emperor of Melniboné and he discovers the runeblade "Stormbringer" from which he derives power and vitality.
  
  
• The Sailor on the Seas of Fate (1976) - Forced to flee Melniboné, Elric journeys across the sea and learns his fate, to become the Eternal Champion.
  
  
• The Weird of the White Wolf (1977) - Where Elric returns to Melniboné with his companion Moonglum and confronts the usurper Yrkoon.
  
  
• The Vanishing Tower (1977) - Where Elric turns mercenary sorceror
  
  
• The Bane of the Black Sword (1977) - Introduces the love of Elric's life Zarozinia and sets up the events of Stormbringer
  
  
• Stormbringer (1965) - Elric must confront the Sorceror King of Pan Tang, Jagren Lern, who has allied himself with the Lords of Chaos in an epic final battle.

Elric is one of the many incarnations of The Eternal Champion, a hero who exists in all times, universes and dimensions who is charged by Fate to defend the cosmic balance between the gods of Law and Chaos.  Other incarnations being Doriam Hawkmoon, Corum Jhaelen Irsei, Oswald Bastable and of course Jerry Cornelius. 

The RPG

With all this rich source material and an established fan base it was an obvious move to publish an RPG based on the books, which Chaosium promptly did in 1981 with the release of Stormbringer.  This then led to a small (in relative terms) collection of sourcebooks, modules and expansions.

The Miniatures

When Games Workshop began distributing Stormbringer for Chaosium one of the first things they did was to make a set of miniatures.  The Eternal Champion range was quite extensive and, beyond the boxed set of hero characters,  featured Melnibonéan infantry and cavalry and Pan Tangian infantry, and tiger handlers.

(Top: L to R: Corum Jhaelen Irsei, Elric Kinslayer, Elric of Menibone, Erekose)
(Bottom: L to R: Jerry Cornelius, Moonglum, Count Ulrik Skarsol, Duke Dorian Hawkmoon)

The Music

Buy it from eBay

Michael Moorcock was heavily involved in the London psychedelic scene in the 1960s and he has explored many musical projects and  has colaborated with several bands including Blue Oyster Cult and most notably space rockers Hawkwind.

This lead to the album "Chronicles of the Black Sword" based largely on the Elric Saga, the notable exception being the track "Needle Gun" which is based on Jerry Cornelius another work by Moorcock and another incarnation of The Eternal Champion.

Tracklisting

1. "Song of the Swords" (Dave Brock)
2. "Shade Gate" (Harvey Bainbridge)
3. "The Sea King" (Huw Lloyd-Langton)
4. "The Pulsing Cavern" (Bainbridge, Alan Davey)
5. "Elric the Enchanter" (Davey)
6. "Needle Gun" (Brock)
7. "Zarozinia" (Brock, Kris Tait)
8. "The Demise" (Bainbridge, Brock)
9. "Sleep of a Thousand Tears" (Brock, Michael Moorcock)
10. "Chaos Army" (Bainbridge, Brock)
11. "Horn of Destiny" (Brock)

NEXT: F is for... Fighting Fantasy