The Ever Expanding Dungeon: Sessions 21 and 22

"Zombies!"

Dleggit's shout came over the squeaking of the flood of giant rats plowing through the room. Movement became incredibly difficult. And of course, Sister Linkat, the best possible party member to face off against an undead horde, was clear on the opposite side of the room.  Perceval and Manchiver, who had gone to check out the door in the north wall, found themselves cut off from providing any assistance to Dleggit

[How far are the zombies? about 20 feet away

Do the rats attack the party? Chaos 4, 50/50. 54, No

roll d6, no but they will hinder movement until they get out. for 2 rounds party must save vs turn to stone to move, and then dex to avoid falling ]

The rats, as it turned out were not interested in attacking, only running through, ostensibly to get away from the shambling corpses behind them.

Still, the mule was frightened by the moving knee-high carpet of fur and kicked and reared, its reign ripping from Waldu's grasp.

[Does Waldu drop the torch? 50/50, 51, no]

Initially this would turn out to be a boon, as the mule tried to stomp and bite at the squeaking mass. It was unsuccessful and perhaps fueled on by this failing, turned on Waldu as he tried to regain control of the animal. Fortunately the damage was minimal (1 HP. But, at 4 HP, 1 HP is kind of scary none the less).

[Perceval save vs stone: 14, rolls 4  he's unable to even find a way through the rat pack

Sister linkat: 14, rolls 18, she makes her wy into the living carpet Dex is FOUR, rolls a SIX she trips and crashes to the ground

Manchiver -needs 13+, rolls 6, he's unable to wade into the rates

Waldu - to grab the mule's reins he'll have to hit an AC of 5(mule is 7, but the rein is moving too) - needs a 15 or highr, rolls 19. Waldu proves his worth and grabs ahold of the rein and works to calm the mule down]

Sister Linkat, in her efforts to cross against the current, lost her footing and ended up on the floor, rats running over her for the door she had been guarding.

[The rats are intent on getting out, but linkat is down, do they attack her? unlikely 77, no]

Again the mule broke free from Waldu, but with luck and force of will he again, and more firmly, took control.

"Confounded dang blasted no good beast of burden" 

The shouting from Waldu echoed down teh halls.

[Wandering monster: 4 phew]

Perceval was finally able to make it to Deleggit's side, where they slugged it out with the first rank of zombies. But, it was Sister Linkat, once she had hauled herself to her feet, who turned back the bulk of the horde by her faith in the Hedonistic Lumberjack. The remainder were quickly dispatched with hammer, mace and sword.

With the threat neutralized, Sister Linkat cast Cure Light Wounds on Waldu. As both a villager and his employer she believed she had more than reason to use the spell on him.

As expected, she wanted to pursue the undead. She continues to be concerned by the growing number of encounters with them and the meaning that might have for the village.

Perceval agreed, and the remainder of the party saw no need to argue. 

A short time later, she was forced to use the remaining two Cure Light Wounds on Dleggit who had suffered damage at the hands of the zombies, and then fell down a 20' pit trap. 

The party debated continuing - their healing resources were used up, but figured another room or two wouldn't hurt.

After triggering a scythe trap when a door was opened, the party was momentarily overcome with some relief when the room was empty save for 3 stone chests. Dleggit used his natural given Dwarven abilities to try and check for traps. With no traps found, Perceval pried the lid off the first stone chest.

And was promptly struck by a poisoned needle fired from the ceiling. He died immediately. For a cache of 600 sp.

The party took a serious blow to their morale. 

They loaded Perceval's body and the lousy 600 silver he died for onto the mule and prepared to exit the dungeon to make their way back to town. As a native son, the townsfolk would want to say their goodbyes

For the party, their anger was made worse in that there is no one to extract revenge upon; it was the work of the dungeon itself.

Somberly, they made their way out of the dungeon and back to town.

****

Perceval was the sole surviving member of the original expedition into The Ever Expanding Dungeon. He started as a simple 0-level porter but soon found himself embroiled in combat (and the rules are quite clear that once XP is earned, 0-levels pick a class). A valiant fighter who sought glory and fame beyond his village, he was rather ignominiously struck down by a poisoned trap. And, as i noted above, his death really can't be avenged in any traditional sense.

I was, in fact, genuinely down about his loss. I had hoped he would live to maybe make a stronghold of his own. On the other hand, I am glad that I did not fudge the roll. As a solo player, I feel there is a certain sanctity in preserving dice rolls that affect the characters' fate - damage, attacks, attributes, saves, etc. 

I failed the save and so Perceval met his fate. 

The dice do not always give us what we want but they are a neutral judge, jury and executioner.

To put a positive spin on this, I have been noting my preference for Sister Linkat over several sessions - she has such a clear drive to protect the villagers no matter the cost, that she is easy to role play. Similarly, her efforts to spread the word of the Hedonistic Lumberjack provide for ample narrative opportunity for activity between adventures.

Plus, I almost always play a cleric when I play b/x.

Dleggit is so close to 3rd level after this delve. Given he is currently the only dedicated fighter in the group, he is likely to be the party's tank. Surely the loss of his friend to a trap he didn't detect will bring something out in him. Perhaps, as a dwarf, he WILL find a way to extract revenge against the dungeon itself or perhaps I'll find some way to instill him with a berserker rage when he scores a 20 to hit.

Manchiver is too new to be deeply affected. Frankly, he's just trying to survive.

The party will undoubtedly have to make some efforts to attract additional bodies via full fledged members or hirelings.

New Year, New (Social) Game: Session 6

I almost forgot that just prior to my trip, we played a session of my ongoing sci-fantasy game using USR.

The session began with the PCs looking at their ransacked room. Of course, the party immediately split, with Pa Ku heading to find the innkeeper and Jade poking around for clues.

Mustafa, the innkeeper is a bit of a fool (think of him as Jasmine's dad from Disney's Aladdin) and believed two dust covered men that they were friends of Pa Ku and bore news of his father being ill. Of course, sap that he is, he directed the men to the PCs room. Upon hearing the description of the men,  Pa Ku knew the two were the same two bounty hunters from his tribe that he had encountered in the Ruins of Parth back in session 2. They had used the same lame story then but about Jade's father.

Meanwhile, Jade had found a faint footprint of red dust - the same red dust that makes up The Waste and a broken flint dagger - which felt was too similar to her own to be a mere coincidence.

Mustafa offered Pa Ku a new room as an apology, but when the PCs reconvened they decided it best to pretend to take the room and instead find another place to stay. Which they promptly did at a place called Tarantella's.

They decided to find clothing to blend in with the populace - between xenophobia and the bounty hunters, it didn't do well to wander around dressed like inhabitants of the Waste. Pa Ku had some research he wanted to do as well - about the contact he was to deliver Jade to in the city state of Hakami. Somehow they got it in their heads that, instead of say, going to the library which I spent a great deal of time preparing, they would look for a used book shop.

Following the rule of "Yes, and . . ", lo and behold they stumbled upon one such shop just next store to a tailor.

A bit of digging around yielded them nothing of what brought them there in the first place (I let the dice decide), but useful acquisitions none the less: an old map of the city (Nekheb, where they are now) , a treatise on manipulation using magnetism (Jade spent her Narrative Point here to have the treatise come with a bag of small metal spheres, which she intends to turn into bullets propelled by magnetic control) and a bestiary of creatures of the plains East of the city.

Pa Ku began formulating a plan, and decided that they needed a guard to sit outside their rooms at Taranatella's, in case the bounty hunters tracked them down. They opted to try the marketplace (I don't know why, I'd have posted a want ad or something) where they found one Bob Asak.

Bob? Well, one of my players bitched and moaned that my NPC names are too hard to remember (I suggested she write them down but she'd have none of it). Honestly, I thought I was doing them a favor by using a naming convention inspired by Tony Bath's Hyboria. Each tribe or city state would have a real-world nationality assigned to them - and I would use names that reflected the assigned real-world cultures. So, for instance, natives of the city of Hakami have Japanese names, of Nekheb, modern Arabic names, etc.

So, back to Bob. She suggested my NPCs needed easier to remember names "like Bob. And why do they always have negative quirks. Why doesn't anyone smell of roses?"

In a fit of exasperation, perhaps intensified by the single Miller High Life I had consumed, I threw up my hands and said  "Fine! His name is Bob Asak."  Which I said as "Bob Ass-sock."  And yes, yes he ALWAYS smells like roses. (When asked by Jade why he smelled like roses he flashed a smile and said, "Family secret.")

What can I say, it was late and juvenile humor had been running rampant all night.

The session ended with Jade checking back in with the Academy of Arcane Science about her application for admission. To her surprise (her admission interview ended rather abruptly for no apparent reason), she had been accepted.

There were cheers all around and then I went to bed.

Home Again! Super Short Reviews! July Plans!

You would think with several quiet evenings at my parents house in Western New York, I'd have squeezed in some kind of gaming but, no, unless you count reading:

• Platoon Forward! - Although I've read plenty of suggestions about characterization of commanders in the pages of Lone Warrior, I bought this primarily for that purpose. But I found I also really like the campaign generation. Taken as a whole, it's a nice system of  personality, scenarios and events.  It's  system neutral and can be used with your favorite set of WWII rules. 
• Mutant Future - I am going to play a mutant hedgehog (inspired by the cover of the old Dragonsroar RPG) in an online, play-by-post game. Thought it might be good to check out my mutant powers. The mechanics are Labyrinth Lord, which automatically means I'm somewhat endeared to it, although it does feel like they simply copy and pasted a good bit from LL. It probably could have been a setting book with new classes and a bestiary. 
• GURPS Lite (3rd and 4th eds.)  - I am going to be facilitating a feudal/mythical Japan game in the fall and, having purchased GURPS Japan, thought I'd check out the Lite rules, which I had heard were far easier to digest than the complete rules and offer a good gaming experience as is. They don't seem terribly complicated and frankly, I'm wondering why so many people seem to find GURPS difficult. Perhaps I need to read the complete core rules.
• Jack Vance's The Gray Prince (1 chapter to go) - I've been reading this here and there for awhile now. It stands to be the first novel I've read in some time. Provides a nice mish-mash of magic and technology on a far away planet.

I probably should have spent some time thinking about the next session of my USR campaign game or playing the next session of the Ever Expanding Dungeon (I actually HAVE played a session since the last one I posted, but it was solely the encounter with the giant rats and the zombies. I ran out of time to do anything else.)

When I wasn't reading, I was watching American Dad or Keeping Up Appearances (which I find to be side splitting fun) or practicing drawing. I may or may not post the results of that over on my other blog. If I wasn't doing that, I was working.

I took on a second job, which began last week, doing QA testing for a website related to the gaming industry. I'm pretty excited about it, even though it's only a few hours a week. 

The position is temporary for now, with a chance it might become permanent (although the same number of hours) after an unspecified time period. The only disadvantage so far is that they are backed up on testing and, as a result, there's a bit more work than would be usual.

You can probably guess what this means. Yes, my gaming will be severely limited for a time. Especially when I juggle in my non-gaming hobbies.

My USR game will continue for sure (the PCs are waiting for the next session), I have the next encounter planned for a Pacific WWII game, and I'd like to get enough adventuring in so I can write up the next entry in the saga of the Ever Expanding Dungeon.

All of those are feasible within July, I think.

Somewhere in Western New York

This weekend, I've taken Young Lord Shadowmoss to visit his grandparents (my parents), his aunt and cousin. Among the toddler clothing, children's toys and such, I stashed my dice, my Ever Expanding Dungeon "tool kit", Bushido RPG,  sketchbook, a novel and my kindle. 

Sadly, I left behind my newest acquisition, More Wargaming Pioneers Ancient and World War Ii Battle and Skirmish Rules by Tony Bath, Lionel Tarr and Michael Korns Early Wargames Vol. 4.

At 2/3's through, all I can say is, is there anything published as part of John Curry's History of Wargaming Project that isn't a good read? I may never use the rules within but i love the anecdotes and play reports from an era gone by. 

Speaking of, I'm thinking I'm going to have to put a wargaming zine out sooner rather than later. Something that eschews the aesthetics of the glossies for the low art, photocopied look of the old newsletters, and with a broader coverage than Lone Warrior (which I do love to read and get tons of ideas from). I would love it if it was just people sharing their ideas, what they're up to gaming wise, etc. Like the forum in Lone Warrior but not just solo gamers. 

Isn't that what blogs do? Yes, but I happen to love the feel and look of dead tree periodicals. And, not everyone wants to write a blog but they could probably send an email with a few paragraphs about what they're gaming lately, or some idea they had, or a problem they've encountered.

More to come - right now it's just a brain storm.

I just finished reading Never Unprepared : The Complete Game Master's Guide to Session Prep A lot of GM's undoubtedly have their own systems and I imagine some of them are very good. Mine was not. So far, with the help of this book, I feel like my prep has taken a turn for the better.

I've only run 1 session using the ideas within (I ran session 5 of my New Year, New Game USR campaign, a post on that to follow soon), but I feel like i was well prepared without being overly so. True, my player's thought of plenty of ways to turn a lot of what I did into scrap paper, but even so, I felt I was better able to roll with the punches thanks to the suggestions within. 

There's a 16 page preview here. 

I'm working my way through the related campaign prep book now and it's got some great ideas too. 

Somewhere on the Eastern Front

Saturday night, I had a bit of time to game and decided I wanted to bring my painted 1/32 Soviets and Germans to the table for their first real outing.

A few months back, I began looking for a rules to play company level games and as luck would have it, Lone Warrior #182 brought Tactical Combat by David Newport to my attention. My intent is to use them in the Pacific, but I also really like the ideas of fighting larger operations with the big figures. 

The rules themselves are simple - easy to learn and easily modified if desired, and the author himself quite helpful in that regard. I wrote Mr. Newport early on to thank him for making the rules available and told him of my plans for Pacific Theater battles, and he replied with suggestions for additional rules to capture the feel of that conflict.

Basing is 1 base = 1 section, 3 sections = a platoon. For tanks, I'm not sure of the intent but i treated them as 1:1.  As my figures are not ordinarily mounted on a base, I used cork squares as ad hoc bases. Not pretty, but they did the job.

I left the ranges as written. I find this really helps allow maneuver room in a game with the big figures 

The ground scale and figure scale are perhaps far out of whack at that point, but I really don't care. It's a game; if I can accept that 2 static figures represents 10 active men looking for cover and the best firing position available, the notion of a turn sequence, or the fact that a die roll represents bullets, then I can accept the game-facilitating effect of the movement and weapon ranges.

For solitaire's sake, I used the Nuts!2.0 Enemy Activity Level, Possible Enemey Force (PEF, aka blinds), PEF movement and PEF resolution once revealed. If a PEF resolved to actual troops, then their movement thereafter was controlled by he enemy movement rules from Gunstorm! 

Scenario

1943. The German advance has pushed the Soviets from the village of Pushkinskya (to my knowledge, a fictional place). My under-strength company of 2 platoons has been reinforced with a T-34/76 and has been tasked with halting the German advance, so the remainder of the battalion can regroup.

Victory Conditions: Game ends when any German unit exists the board on my base line or all German PEFs are eliminated / forced to retreat off of their own base line.

  The Battle in Pictures

My baseline. German blinds deployed.

Turn 1?: My right flank rather unsurprisingly reveals a Pz IV opposite my own T-34.

The German middle assaults the hill. The unit on my left leads the charge with covering fire from the unit at the village edge.

Turn 2: An ill-fated infantry attack on the Pz. IV results in 2 hits to the section (3 hits and it's eliminated).

The T-34 has better luck and the PZ. IV is forced to fall back, hull down and buttoned up.

The middle is a brutal affair. The German unit on the left storms the hill and pushes the Soviet section back. The Soviet left begins to close in to flank the Germans.

Turn 3: To my chagrin, one of the PEFs is revealed to be another Panzer.

Turn 4: On my left the infantry section is eliminated and my T-34 is hit for a suppression. Meaning it can't act next turn unless it passes a morale check at the end of this one. Which it doesnt'.

In the middle, 1 German section is eliminated. Unfortunately, my units can't hit the broad side of a barn on a clear calm day from 1 meter and they're unable to take out the German section in the village.

Turn 5: The German tank and infantry section on my right break through my defensive line. Another section on my left does the same. My tank is STILL not back in the game. At least i finally took out the Germans in the village.

Turn 6: The game ended on turn 5, but I opted to play one more for giggles. My infantry ganged up on the tank but did nothing. But, hey, look at that the German blind left on the board finally moved! (It needed to roll a 1 on either of 2d6 and this was its first success).

****

I had a great time even with the poor dice rolling for my guys and eventual loss.

Once again, I love the rules and as mentioned, they are easily modified. In this case, I allowed the tanks to fire an MG at infantry (which allows best of two dice, instead of rolling 1), rather than limiting them to their main gun.

Can't wait to get more figures of both sides finished. 

I hope to field a full company each for use with Tactical Combat, sooner rather than later.

FYI My New Blog Up

I decided to set up a new blog for my zine and zine related activities, as they don't all tie into gaming and such.

It's Bucket of Spiders. Which is also the name of my Etsy shop where I also sell the zine.

Posting will probably be far less frequent than I post here.

No need to follow it if it's not your thing - my gaming posts will still appear here.

And if you want to order the zine, clicking the link above on this blog for Six Iron Spikes & a Small Hammer will take you there.

New Year, New (Social) Game: Wastelands Game Session 5

Last night, I ran the 5th session of my USR game set in a post-apocalpytic sci fantasy world. I'm going to skip the session summary this time and focus more on things from my side of the GM screen (figuratively speaking, I don't have a screen for this game).

The long break between the last session and this one was due mostly to the crushing work load I had in June but also in part because  I wasn't thrilled with the last session. The party felt they had been pushed onto rails, despite my efforts to prevent that.

The other issue is that I'm just not comfortable running adventures in an urban environment. I knew I had to step things up. So, I did what I am apt to do, research. 

Enter Vornheim: The Complete City Kit. I've had this PDF for awhile, but hadn't really done more than skim it. It turned out to be exactly what I needed, particularly the Urban Crawl Rules section.

The distinction Zak S. makes between crawling and moving was like the heavens parting: 

"'Crawling' only occurs when passage through the city is difficult or mysterious for some reason and so, therfore, the choice of route and means of locomotion between points is important . . .Merely 'moving' is simple. The PCs say where they are going and the GM can describe the journey . . . or simply shift the scene to the destination."

Simple, but I hadn't thought of it.

I was focused on the city as a crawl and getting lost in how to appease my player who is openly hostile to any notion of any type of crawl. I had forgotten that I could simply allow movement as mostly hand-waving.

With a new found confidence,  I sat down and brain stormed using my favorite method: the mind map. In fact, I did this several times, starting from a different question each time. The result? 

After 3 or so days of brainstorming, I had hit upon several NPC plots that the PCs could 1)learn about 2)get involved with and 3)potentially change the game world and how those plots play out.  Even better, those plots pose a real threat towards hindering the PCs from completing their own goals, so resolving them is to their advantage, or they'll need to trek to a different city.

I created some 17 obstacles/challenges/encounters the PCs might encounter - save for the first which was a continuation of where we left off, none were guaranteed to happen. 

No outcome of any encounter was planned, just the setup, notes about any NPC and a note to myself as to why I thought the enounter would be meaningful to the players. I also prepped a random NPC table for use in the marketplace and random street encounters.

I also picked up some things from an article on Gnomestew: 

1. Narration first, mechanics second. I put this on an index card in front of me - too often combat devolves to dice rolling back and forth and the description disappears.
2. Make failed skill checks interesting. Often, if the PC fails, I simply describe that but even failures can contribute to the story.

Finally, I reminded myself that I improvise all of the time when I play solo and that I should treat those moments in the social game the same way. And I did - I used the Yes and, Yes But, No but, No and roll on a d6 to my advantage, and had story cubes on hand just in case.

In the end, the game session went quite well - the players didn't feel like they had to "pixel bitch" to get around, there was no rail, they had interesting encounters which hinted at some strange things afoot (the fact that it involved something one would probably find in a game of Call of Cthulhu aided in capturing their interest) which turned a trip to the market place from one of gathering information about an individual in another city, to also one of leveling up their armor. And we ended with them returning to their room to find it ransacked.

I was drained when it was over, but I was told the session got an A+. which made it totally worth it.

Of course, now I have to live up to this performance next time!

Onigai shimasu!

So, I was informed yesterday that I was volunteered to run a game for 3 friends (2 of whom are the participants in my USR Wastelands campaign which will be resuming shortly). 

My first thought was, "What?!?! You hate my GMing." 

(Lady Shadowmoss has a particular style of game she likes, all others be damned.)

But I accepted none the less and floated the idea of a Cthulhu game, a feudal Japanese / swords & sorcery campaign, a supers game, Arrows of Indra (medieval India), and some others to Lady Shadomoss.  She really liked the Japan game idea (without a doubt she is the decision maker of the three) and so that's what I've glommed onto.

Knowing her distaste for reading and learning rules, I picked up a PDF copy of Ruins & Ronin ($0.80 with the JULYBOOKS13 discount code), which is based on the Swords & Wizardry White Box.  The system is quite simple but the book lacks any kind of really useful background info for capturing the flavor of feudal Japan.

So I also ordered a PDF of the GURPS Japan source book from e23 - I do not play GURPS, never have, but the source books I have are great (I have GURPS Traveller and the GURPS WWII title, Return to Honor: The Defeat and Rebirth of France, both of which I got for a steal).

And of course, how could I resist ordering Fantasy Games Unlimited's Bushido? 

I was planning on getting this back in April but I had to wait at least 30 days. Well, time is up!

 It has frequently received high praise for the ability to capture the flavor of the period, but just as often gets marks against it due to the complexity and layout of the rules. That itself probably is the death knell for my little group (see above about rules).

Still, I am hopeful that the three combined should work just fine for me. 

A Second Chance for Disposable Heroes

I'm human. I make mistakes. 

In this case, it was writing off Disposable Heroes. Something kept gnawing at me to give it another go, this time for an actual game scenario, and with 1) card activation for each unit and 2) the use of the optional rule that any one '1' rolled to hit a unit can take out the officer or special weapon.

So yesterday, I set up the same scenario I used for THW's War Against Japan (beach assault). I modified the unit sizes to use those suggested in Red Sun, Red Death.

Here's the setup (I gave up on the photos this time around):

The Japanese are randomly determined using the War Against Japan guidelines. Both of the full squads, on the left, have LMGs.

My squads hit the beach but my Platoon HQ had no room to land.

Turn 1
My first order of business was to get my squads off the beach, with the end goal being to take out the Japanese defenses.

FYI, the yellow circles are first pins, red is the second pin a row.

 As you can see two of my units suffered two pins and heavy losses (the lower left was reduced to a man alone). But my HQ was able to land.

Turn 2
I managed to rally on the right and drive back the Japanese unit opposite.

Close combat erupted on my center right, and I destroyed a Japanese unit (a rifle team) while the LMG team of the same squad suffered a pin result.

Unfortunately all was not rosy; on my left, I lost a rifle team and my HQ was pinned with the loss of some riflemen.

Turn 3
The man alone on the left (the squad's sergeant), joined the Platoon HQ (which is why 1a looks like it disappeared).

I completely over ran the Japanese center and put the hurt on their LMG team of their remaining squad.

Turn 4
My marines continue to advance - not without loss, a rifle team from my 2nd squad was taken out. But the Japanese were dealt heavy losses and were unable to rally their LMG back into action.

Unfortunately, real life intervened and I had to call the game.

I have no doubt it would have been a marine victory, but a costly one at that.

Below you can see the figure counts remaining on the table:

Not very encouraging if this was a campaign!

I had a great time playing and it was the most engrossing attempt at playing this scenario. The rules are so easy to memorize that they disappear after awhile. 

Are they perfect? No, but they were a good bit of fun. 

So I withdraw my lack of enthusiasm for these rules. Time will tell if they become a regular staple (I realize recently that the only wargaming rule set I use with any consistency is G.A.S.L.I.G.H.T.) or if this was a fluke.

Back at the Painting Table

Last night, I managed to get my butt in the chair and make some painting progress on the next batch of 1/32 WWII Soviets and Germans. 

Once I started, I couldn't remember why I'd been so resistant to paint all through June. Quite silly really.

Perhaps the expression "80% of success is showing up" (usually attributed to Woody Allen) is true.

July is International Zine Month

Although the official governing body escapes me, July is International Zine Month.

If you follow the link above, you'll see a suggested list of activities for creators and readers alike.

There really doesn't seem to as of yet be a centralized distributor handling a wide array of RPG zine titles (Microcosm , a zine/alternative press publisher, carries CRAWL! but, to my knowledge, so far that's the only one they're carrying. Noble Knight as of this writing has two issues of The Manor.) so you might think you're on your own for supporting the RPG zine scene.

Think again!

Rended Press keeps an updated list of RPG print zines which generally speaking, can be ordered directly from the person or people responsible for their creation.

Topping that list is one I just learned of:  AFS, which looks like quite a tome with its comb bound 56 pages. This one tops my list of zines to buy this month. At $7.50 (USA, incl postage) it isn't cheap, but look at it. LOOK AT IT! I can't resist it.

Erik Tenkar announced a submission call for The Unofficial OSR Zine in Mid-June, and while it may not be ready for a bit,  its an opportunity to get something published without producing your own zine.

Speaking of, just today, Tim Shorts of Gothridge Manor, Boric G of the Dwarven Stronghold, Ken Harrison of The Rusty Battle Axe, and Sean Robson of Tales from the Flaming Faggot have announced the formation of Pulp Mill Press with an open call for dedicated to swords & sorcery short stories in the classic style. If I understood that style, I'd try my hand at it, but alas, I don't think I really do.

Finally, If you're a zine creator or want to be, IZM coincides with The 24 Hour Zine Thing wherein you try to make a 24 page zine in 24 hours. I'm signed up. I have no idea what my zine will be about (you're not supposed to think about it before hand). Odds are against it being gaming related, but you never know what will happen.

The  first challenge is figuring how I can schedule 24 uninterrupted hours.