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I got interested in Mystara after reading the reviews by Lowell Francis, seeing the new maps on Bruce Heard’s blog and the other maps by Thorfinn Tait. If only the printed copies were not so expensive. I checked eBay and felt that the price was far beyond what I was willing to pay.
reading the reviews by Lowell Francis
The argument I find convincing from Francis’ last thoughts on the gazeteers:
IMHO Forgotten Realms and some of other recent settings aspire to be Tolkien-esque: historical, detailed, logically consistent, rich and deadly serious. The Gazetteers and Mystara as a whole take another approach. They’re closer in tone to earlier D&D material. […] I do believe that lighter tone makes the setting feel more accessible, more friendly. As bizarre as it might sound, given some of the horrors in the setting, I feel like Mystara’s a good and happy place. I feel like my characters would be welcome there- and could make a difference.
I think I’m appreciating this more right now because when I try to describe my Labyrinth Lord campaign with the Shields Shall Be Splintered and Death and Dismemberment house rule, I often fall back on the images of *murder hobos* and *killer clowns*. It’s deadly and dangerous and in order to deal with all this danger and their flawed characters, players are ingenius, ideas are awesome, events are goofy, and we have a great time at the table. I’d say retro-stupid according to Jeff Rient’s threefold model.
I’ve seen this sentiment expressed on another blog, recently:
Slapstick isn’t something anyone would ever imagine adding to fantasy, it’s been quietly ignored in all D&D licensed comics, books and movies, it makes no sense - and it works. The massive infusion of humour and unpredictability it adds is totally vital to RPG’s as I play them. – Critical Fail by Rotten Pulp
#RPG #Old School
(Please contact me if you want to remove your comment.)
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Dear Alex. I’m glad you enjoy the work I do, however, in the future I would prefer you only posted a link to my maps, rather than posting them directly on your site. Many thanks.
– Bruce Heard 2012-06-27 14:05 UTC
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No problem. I’ll use a map of mine instead.
– Alex Schroeder 2012-06-27 14:23 UTC
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Or you could use a thumbnail. Cheers! 😃
– Bruce Heard 2012-06-27 17:40 UTC
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You can upload a portion of the map from here: https://docs.google.com/open?id=0ByHsRdpWU3qeQXJjSm1vb2xoU0U This would help illustrate your page.
https://docs.google.com/open?id=0ByHsRdpWU3qeQXJjSm1vb2xoU0U
– Bruce Heard 2012-06-28 17:43 UTC
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Thanks, Bruce. No worries about the map. 😄
– Alex Schroeder 2012-06-28 21:41 UTC
