I got a recommendation at GenCon from Joseph Goodman to read Captain Blood as a next thing to read after appendix N. Captain Blood is a pirate story with fights and sailing and romance. I really enjoy Sabatini’s writing style and his stories are set in the age of sail, the American War of Independence, and the French Revolution.

Almost all his stories are romances hiding inside of action swashbuckling novels. Most of his protagonists are gentlemanly men who wind up falling in love and spending the book fighting the bad guys with a hope to win the girl.

These are dated books with traditional social roles and a lot of character behavior is based on social norms of the 17th century. Many of these norms create tension for the character and might confuse a modern audience.

On Saturday we are recreating a 28mm version of the Battle of Bennington Aug 16, 1777. The background material on the battle can be found here: http://blog.amrevpodcast.com/2020/06/episode-155-battle-of-bennington.html

We are using the Black Powder v2 rules from Warlord Games. A how to play video can be found here: https://youtu.be/V8tFXhAFSBI

I’m going to start setup at 1100 it will take me a good 30-45 to get everything in its proper place. I have 2 tape measures and lots of dice. If you are wondering what to bring: dice trays and tape measures.

Here’s the 2 page cheat sheet from Warlord Games on the rules:

Are you sick of Wizards of the Coast? Bloated rules, declining quality, retiring printed books, license struggles, and more! There’s not a lot to say nice about WotC and what used to be an excellent game. Would you like to find a game that plays like “the good old days”? Maybe DCC is what you are looking for. DCC isn’t for every one. If you spend days writing the great American novel style backstory for your character, don’t play DCC. If you want published rules about skills and feats and need a menu of options from the PHB to select from in order to do something as your character, don’t play DCC. If want lots of social interaction with NPCs and festivals and general in-game social loafing, don’t play DCC.

Perhaps you recall “the good old days” where you rolled up a character with 6 3d6 rolls in order, picked the class that best met those stats, got some gear and then ran off to find a cave to delve into the darkness to seek fortune or death. That’s DCC. If you want a fast to start, easy to play, and not too serious TTRPG you should play DCC. Just be ready to see many characters die. The game is lethal and unforgiving; yet with high risk comes high rewards. The rule seem to encourage the murder hobo lifestyle. Many of the adventures are dungeon delves for treasure. No complicated plot, no overarching social message; simply go into the cave, stick your sword into anything that won’t flee, take their stuff, rinse repeat.

Get the Quick Start Rules from their web site https://www.goodmangames.com/

Having played lots of DCC the things to think about if you are a WotC refugee:

• Race is Class (demi-humans are their own thing so no having to pick race and class)
• Anything you’d need a skill or feat for is just an attribute roll
• Magic is not Vancian. You can cast fireball all day long provided you roll over a 14 each time you cast it, but roll a 1 and really bad things happen
• You’ll want additional dice (Funky or Zocchi dice)
• You level up more slowly to a level cap of 10
• And the funnel…

The Funnel

When you start playing DCC you will not loving hand craft a character from a list options and set attributes using point buys and selecting backgrounds and feats and skills. NO! Roll 6 3d6s and fill out the sheet top down, roll hit points, and then roll on the professions table. You’re done. You are now a level 0 farmer with a spear and a cow. Off you go into the Portal Under the Stars and if you live you can pick a class. If you have to be a Halfling then fudge the roll on the professions table and hope you make through the funnel. For most funnel games the player has 4 PCs just because a level 0 farmer with 3 hit points doesn’t have a high probability of success by himself, but combine him with your halfling haberdasher with 2 HP and a dagger, a 4 HP milkmaid with a club, and a 3 HP dwarf miner with a mattock and you might just get one through the funnel and that becomes your character.

I won’t rehash the licensing struggle/drama unfolding with Hasbro/WotC related to Dungeons & Dragons. I will advise anyone who is not pleased with the corporate over-reach of a company that seems to have lost touch with its customer base to please please please learn to play something else!

I grew up with the game during the TSR days before the Internet. I have fond memories of playing AD&D, Gamma World, and Gang Busters. I have always been interested in other game systems. I got into Traveller in 1980s and made the jump from D&D to World of Darkness with Vampire and then Werewolf. The GURPS editions of the WoD material pulled me into GURPS for a number of years. Since that time I’ve played Chaosium BRP games, Fate, Alien, Savage Worlds, Starfinder, and 7th Sea 2nd edition.

New systems may seem dense, unapproachable, scary. They are not! Different mechanics just present different ways to randomly determine success. Yes we get used to reaching for a d20 and hearing the DC then rolling. Fast talking the merchant is a DC12, 13/20=65% Savage worlds you roll a d10 since your skill dice in fast talking is a d10 with a set target number of 4 for a very close 70% chance of success. Call of Cthulhu you have straight percentage skills so Fast Talking is 65% you need to roll a 65 or under on a d100. Some mechanical systems are closer to simulation trying to account for all sorts of details before letting players role and others are free flowing and toss realism to the four winds in an attempt to give players a pure cinematic experience. D&D has lots of picky rules that I feel get in the way of a fast playing game. I’m in combat, is that thing I want to do an action, a reaction, a bonus action, or a free action? I know all the definitions but what I really want to do is toss a poisoned dagger at the smug merchant the moment he turns his price gouging face away from me.

New lore is a joy. I know of very few people who pick one and only one story, movie, show, book and stick with that forever. You can love Lord of the Rings and Princess bride. I know because I have seen it. Games of Thrones and Star Wars. Red Dwarf and Harry Potter. Sticking with one setting, one lore, one story line isn’t natural for most people. Even WoTC doesn’t do this. There’s a plethora of stories and settings and even divergent timelines in the D&D source materials. I read a lot of system core rule books and most of them present a setting, lore, and cosmology that is new and exciting.

I’ll be posting recommendations here and on Gamemeisters in the coming weeks for D&D refugees trying to match your play style with a replacement for post OGL 2.X D&D.

I have been reading several papers about how to move on after being in a toxic workplace. There’s a lot attitudes and behaviors that will not serve me well in my new situation, but were required at VTC for simple survival. At first I was skeptical about the articles. After reading and pondering my time at VTC and reflecting on my feelings I can see value in actively working to mentally break with old behaviors.

My resignation from Vermont Technical College is not being handled well by the administration. I received a retro-active end of service date and cannot complete the work I had planned to finish in the first month of the semester. That means grade changes, help with incompletes, club transfer work, etc. is beyond my reach. I’m not sure how long I’ll maintain a VTC email address or access to any of the systems. If you are upset about not being able to finish your incomplete please email Dean Gaillat and the new VTSU Provost Atkins. Don’t bother Dr Tookey or Prof Damon, they are powerless to help and have their own trials and tribulations with the leadership.

The evidence is piling up that VTC and the follow-on VTSU is not a good place to work nor learn. It is unlikely that the CIS department will survive the merger and you should plan for a few things: 1) be ready to move to Williston. 2) Focus on the fastest degree you can complete. So if you wanted a BS plan your schedule to get an AS. This makes it easier to transfer to another school when the department collapses. 3) Take your CIS elective early. Most electives are taught by only one faculty (e.g. Info Warfare) if that faculty retires/resigns/terminates that elective is gone. Get as many of those done now as possible.

Best of luck going into what will be a very challenging academic year this year and a very perilous start of the VTSU. I would recommend you find a more stable and professional school to attend. You, as a student, don’t need to be in the middle of all this chaos while trying to complete a degree. You are paying to be at VTC/VTSU the least the leadership should do is provide a stable learning environment.