The time has come: I’m going to create my first ever, genuine, proper fantasy hexcrawl campaign. I don’t know who will play in it yet but I do know that I am going to create it. There, I’ve said it.
The stars are right. What do I mean?
Three things have come into conjunction: firstly, I have reached a point in my understanding of roleplaying games through which the wisdom of past eras has come upon me; additionally, I have found a collaborator and creative partner through a serendipitous alignment of events; finally, I have all of the tools I need to realise the goal.
Do you want to know more? I know I do…
The Wisdom of Past Eras
Something happened that changed the way I think about GMing completely. Well, to be honest, five things happened in short succession that added up to me doing something I had never thought about before.
One of those five things (you can hear about the others in Episode 3 of my first podcast series) happened when a revelation hit me: I read the 1974 Original Dungeons & Dragons game alongside “Playing At The World” by Jon Peterson. Together, the story of the roots of this hobby and exploring the first, disastrously confusing roleplaying game got me curious. I added to that a read through the first 30 issues of the classic 1970’s “Alarums & Excursions” magazines. What I discovered was the creativity and explosiveness of the original game. It fired my imagination.
Yesterday, following another moment in which my social media streams carried to me something I never knew I needed, I received a copy of the curiously named, “Champions of ZED” roleplaying game. I think the back cover blurb tells you what you need to know:
The rules for “sandbox” campaigns lie scattered… Champions of ZED puts it all together, clearly, and under one cover, along with notes from long lost drafts, and house-rules from the games’ two original designers.
Champions of ZED, back cover
Leafing through the pages, I was drawn to the early section entitled, “Developing a World” and containing details on how to create a hex-map and stock it with adventure. This all comes long before the book turns to prosaic matters, such as character creation and how the game rules work.
For me, the past era of Dungeons & Dragons beckons me, not to the specific game play of OD&D but back to what The Alexandrian terms, “the game structure”. I’ve experimented a fair bit with the “Dungeon Crawl” structure and now it’s time to turn my hand to the “Hex Crawl”.
A New Creative Partner
Ravi and I met when he set up a short-lived Rolemaster campaign online using Roll20. He appeared to be a good Game Master but, as is so often the case, we drifted apart… torn asunder by the forces that swirl around us in modern life.
A few weeks ago, Ravi contacted me. We exchanged messages. We upgraded to email. Eventually, we began to Skype. Now we are collaborating.
I work best when I have someone to bounce ideas off and to challenge me on the crap suggestions. Rod Leary proved an excellent person to work with when I wrote for Mythras Classic Fantasy, and enabled me to complete my projects ahead of schedule.
Ravi is an artist and writer. He’s creative and intelligent, with wit and charm. He’s the kind of guy that I can talk about philosophy, politics, or religious matters with and feel comfortable in so doing. There are very few people like this in my life.
He and I want to create. We have an idea and we’re going to bring it to the world, making it breathe. And, for me, it all begins with a hex map.
At the risk of sounding presumptive, I think that it’s time for us to work together and see what we can create. And, yeah, he’s the guy who created that awesome logo for Roleplay Rescue too. Thanks, Ravi!
All The Right Tools
I’m ready to begin. I have the right tools to hand, depending on what the eventual group of players wants from me.
On the one hand, I can provide an old school Dungeons & Dragons adaptation using something like “B/X Essentials” and all of the in-built tools to create a hexcrawl experience.
Alternatively, through the magic of Mythras Classic Fantasy, I can take the same campaign and present it with a serious, exciting d100 engine without too much additional effort.
Finally, should we so decide, I could finally take the plunge and develop my very own homebrew game engine and bring a genuinely Webster-ish expression of fantasy gaming to the table.
The stars are right. Now is the time for creativity: it’s nearly 2019, for heaven’s sake!
Game on!
