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Amen to that. Their new 'hack master basic' is free to download.

HackMaster Basic

Though I haven't played in a long time I'll probably pick up the rule books and read through them.

Now if you want a man's game you would play Hackmaster. Mmmm... a fun world... insanely great rules.. really funny.. and it provides a great backdrop of Knights of the Dinner Table! How I do love that game.

I joined just before the Operation Sundevil raid, and remember it fondly. Online roleplaying, beta testing SJ Games products, and brainstorming new games were awesome fun for a 20-something geek with too much free time on his hands. I even got a few of my ideas published in the Hacker and GURPS Illuminati products, and a free copy of GURPS Magic Items just for providing one of the staff with the lyrics to Monty Python's Dead Philosopher song.

Once the web emerged, and I got an ISP with NNTP service, a two-line BBS with a 30-minute per day time limit became passe. But from time to time I did poke back in the web presence.

And I still use the same handle now, just about everywhere, that I used then on IOBBS.

Shame that the regulars who stuck it out this long had to see it end this way. May I suggest you seek refuge in the Kenser & Co gazebo? Those guys are cut from the same cloth.

GURPS is, of course, an excellent system complete with more different worlds than you can shake a stick at. High fantasy? Low fantasy? Sci-fi? Spy? Historical? Alternate history? GURPS has it all. Heck, if you want to run a campaign with Jedi Knights running around Discworld, you can.

Then there are things like the Traveller reprints, worth getting not just for historical value but because Traveller was a damn fun system. Ditto for the Space:1889 reprints--if you can't see the fun of playing a subaltern in the British Army on Mars, I don't think RPGs are right for you...

And of course there are a lot of other systems out there. We live in a great time for RPGs, if you know where to look. It's not at the local game shop; it's not D20; it's online.

Bah! Real tabletop gamers don't use simplified rule systems and only one die. We want to-hit tables, armor charts, save modifiers and most importantly, lots of dice rolls. When my warrior executes a jumping, 360 degree sword sweep while simultaneously imbibing a potion of gaseous form and making a rude gesture to the boss monster, I expect to feel the beginnings of carpal tunnel!

I fling my poo at the d20 system and especially D&D 3E with its new fangled, computer-artsy books and "prestige" classes. No good DM should be letting his players live past level 10 anyway.

Long live HackMaster!
http://www.kenzerco.com/

X

Let's not forget Hackmaster

I was intrigued to find in some of my Grandfather's WW2 service manuals, little tags of paper, glued at the left edge.

"What's this?" I asked.

"A revision, of course."

So simple, so effective, yet so few do it anymore.

One of the few places that I've seen still do it is a roleplaying company, of all things - Kenzer & Company, makers of Hackmaster. They published in their comics a series of errata, perfectly sized to cover the amended section, in the same font et al, so you could update your rulebooks without having to buy brand new ones.

Which is why at my table, we now play HackMaster.

It's what 3rd Edition D&D should have been.

You also have the possibility of having kids and passing traits onto them before death, then being able to play the kid when your character dies. One of the possible death paths is growing old, based on actual play time.

It's not a MMO, or even a CRPG, but Hackmaster gives players that option. It also has rules for players to acquire proteges and sidekicks, either of which can take the PC's place if he/she bites the dust.

You do whatever you want to do, but I for one am NEVER, EVER going to play an RPG that wasn't THOROUGHLY tested on animals.

No, you're not mapping out the area when you geocache. Geocaching is a lot like searching for buried treasure. Generally, people hide boxes filled with random goodies in somewhat remote locations and post the GPS coordinates (the 'treasure map', basically) to websites like the one above. Then people go find the caches, record that they've been there on a log, and exchange an item in the cache for one they've brought.

If you had permission from the owner of the land on which the cave was built, you could combine geocaching with spelunking ... make it truly a quest for some buried treasure. Just make sure you don't go overboard ... not like the characters in the Knights of the Dinner Table when one of them set up a cache and then decided to defend it (issue 64).

Maybe WotC will falter to such a point that Hasbro will sell it off for a very small amount...it's not a manufaturer that would be hurt by closing down plants, so I doubt it will be a $1, but I can dream :)...anyway, someone bys up the relic of WotC and takes the best brands from it, sending the rest of the company into oblivion. I don't think that will ever happen to D&D. It's at the stage now where just the brand name of D&D can command a little green. The owners just need to keep the overhead down.

Cheers and happy birthday to D&D! I'm playing Hackmaster now though! They licensed 1st and 2nd edition D&D rules to make a really fun game that truly hearkens back to the glory days of D&D. Also...long live KODT

Maybe WotC will falter to such a point that Hasbro will sell it off for a very small amount...it's not a manufaturer that would be hurt by closing down plants, so I doubt it will be a $1, but I can dream :)...anyway, someone bys up the relic of WotC and takes the best brands from it, sending the rest of the company into oblivion. I don't think that will ever happen to D&D. It's at the stage now where just the brand name of D&D can command a little green. The owners just need to keep the overhead down.

Cheers and happy birthday to D&D! I'm playing Hackmaster now though! They licensed 1st and 2nd edition D&D rules to make a really fun game that truly hearkens back to the glory days of D&D. Also...long live KODT

Knights of the Dinner Table

Problem solved, but not in the way you want:

Make the number crunching fun.

HackMaster by KenzerCo

The quirks and flaws system is incredibly fun, and yes, you can skip the parody part and have a great game!

This was also in "Knights of the Dinner Table", a comic that ran for a while in Dragon magazine (maybe it still does, I don't know, but you can probably by the bound books at your local gaming or comic shop) I don't know which came first, KOTD or the Alewives thing. (I believe there was a strip about the gazebo too, but maybe the Gazebo is a general DandD meme?)

It sounds like GW is trying to increase profits and push their retailers by using the philosophy that their games are popular, thus people will buy them, so they should have to pay full price. In short, the product sells itself and they can charge whatever they want. I've noticed other companies (*cough*Wizards of the Coast*cough*) trying to do the same thing.

By comparison, other game companies are taking the exact opposite approach: they encourage local retailers to stock what they can, no requirements about "you must take such-and-such to get such-and-such" and simply let the market decide. They actively go out and promote communities around their games and gaming in general. They tend to devote a lot of time to the community. From what I can tell, Kenzer & Co. is one of the best examples out there (they publish the comic Knights of the Dinner Table, as well as Hackmaster, Kingdoms of Kalamar, Fairy Meat and Dwarven Dig.) Their message boards are literally the heart of their community, but the neat thing is that the major names all participate in the discussions. More to the point, the major names even take part in the esoteric discussions of favorite B-movies. Heck, the other day, Gary Gygax popped in and briefly talked about a stuffed koala he used to own!! When discussing the games and the rules, etc, they give the distinct impression that player feedback matters.

The result of this is that they've fostered a fanatically loyal fan base who voluntarily spend money on products to ensure that the company stays afloat. GW would do well to foster that kind of relationship with their fans.

--
Evan

The HackMaster GM's guide has a +2 Spatula. When used by clerics of good alignment to make breakfast, the food will heal damage. :)

Some of us love that eccentricism, though.

It's why I bought HackMaster.

Reading these books (we're stuck playing Wheel of Time right now) was like coming home. The system itself is full of flavor and spice, unlike the blandness of Third Ed. Yes, it's easier to play, but even though pablum is easier to digest, I'd still rather have a steak dinner with all the fixings.

Other examples include Kovalic who publishes varius excellent gaming-related comics (Dork Tower, Nodwick and soon PvP) and other fancy stuff (like the Sith Park T-shirt), and another small publisher, Kenzer & Co., publishers of other gaming-related comics, though they have less online presence than Kovalic.

Especially Kovalic has aquired a good reputation among the possible customers (read: gamers) through both online and magazine (Pyramid, Dragon) presence. (A pity their "Pokéthulu - Gotta Catch You All" T-shirt seems absent from their store... :-P)

When was the last time you watched other people play D&D?

About once a month, when Kenzer & Co.'s Knights of the Dinner Table comes out.

If you want a cool sample, check out the animated shorts based on KODT. (Warning: requires recent Flash plug-in.)

Jay (=