Book review: D&D Tales from the Table: A campaign Archive

 

A Target exclusive, this little book is chock full of good ideas.

Normally I don't do book reviews on this blog, but because I am away from home on vacation during the Christmas season, I have to pause my examination of the 1e DMG and my attempts to formalize my streamlined version of D&D and instead talk about this pleasant surprise I found while "after Christmas" shopping with my mom this year.

We took a drive to her local Target the other day and while it was sad that the place was woefully devoid of D&D game manuals, which was not the case in previous years, there were a fair amount of marketing materials promoting "Stranger Things" from T-shirts to novelty mugs to books, but I was lucky enough to get my hands on the only copy left of this book, at a discount even! Needless to say I was happy with the purchase.

Now I must preface this post by stating that I am not obsessed, or even a big fan of the show. I did attempt to watch the first season a few years back, but found myself unimpressed by it, the story was serviceable enough, for a sci-fi show and a period piece, but there were anachronisms that turned me off it, most of which have been well documented elsewhere in print and on the web, and thus, I won't rehash them here, but the show also had an "X-Files" vibe that I could not shake...for some reason I just could not get into it, even though I love the "X-Files" and watched all 10 seasons of that show from beginning to end when it originally aired on Fox back in the day.

But I digress, despite the connection to D&D, "Stranger Things" just wasn't doing it for me, but I may give it another chance now that Netflix is dropping the last season as this year comes to a close. 

This book is definitely dedicated to the fans, and seems to be a love letter to the show and its dedicated audience. It is full of references from the show, and from D&D, the latter of which I know and the former which I am only vaguely familiar with, having only seen the bulk of the first season. But boy do they pack a lot of bang for your buck for the $35 retail price ($48 Canadian)! The book comes with cutout stand up figures of the characters if you want to use them in a home brew game and play as those characters, it includes a myriad of stickers with references to the characters, locations, and 80's related memorabilia and nostalgic sensibilities, and even a mini fold out map to illustrate locations in a D&D game, and even a series of stock cards with stat blocks for a few iconic D&D monsters, in the style of the AD&D Monster Manual from 1978.

This last bit is what attracted me to the book the most, and what convinced me I had to make it a part of my seasonal gaming haul. It is written from the point of view of the main characters Will Byers, Lucas Sinclair and Mike Wheeler and written in graph paper as though the kids themselves were documenting their game sessions in a campaign journal back in the halcyon days of 80s table-top gaming. 

As an aside, we sure have come a long way from those days when niche gaming and geek culture hobbies like this were the purview of shut-ins or reclusive, socially inept gamers living in their mom's basements. Pop culture elements such as "Stranger Thigs" or even the mega popular web series like "Critical Role" and "Dimension 20" have shattered these stereotypes and have made these type of games so mainstream, that the old categories have become trite and passe. That is only a good thing! 

Moreover, the book is an entertaining read for both fans of the show and for D&D gamers in general, cleverly written and illustrated with line art and the aesthetic evocative of the time period and the audience it is trying to capture and succeeds at summarizing the more esoteric rules of both the game's basic version and it's more advanced counterpart. 

For a game master, this little book can be a treasure trove of ideas to spark inspiration for home brewed games or entire campaigns embracing the older game systems, with great location maps drawn on graph paper, just like your daddy's D&D used to be in all its hexcrawling, dungeon exploring, monster bashing glory. If you are a D&D or TTRPG neophyte, this book actually teaches you the fundamentals of the game, as it was back in the 80s in all its glory, and if you already know the game, you can still be entertained flipping through its pages and admiring the crude, but charming maps, explanations of locations featured in the program such as the Upside Down, and even fully fleshed out character sheets for both B/X and Advanced D&D. The photo copied clipped images from the old Player's Handbooks and Monster Manuals are a nice artistic touch and a nostalgic inclusion in the material.

Flipping through its pages might make you want to play the OSR editions once again, like it did in my case, or transport you back to your boyhood or childhood if you are a Gen Xer or old enough to remember playing with these. 

I just need to know why the show's producers felt it necessary to radically alter Demogorgon's form for TV, but that is a topic for another day. The book is published by Random House Worlds and Wizards of the Coast. Stranger Things Season 5 is now available streaming on Netflix. 

Frankenstein AD&D: A more streamlined way to game

Holmes Basic was the first official Basic ruleset that simplified matters after the original game set dropped in 1974, but for our "Frankenstein" streamlined version of the game we aim to run, I will be using a combination of BECMI rules and the rules later introduced in 1e, for such things as combat, encounters and character creations. 

 

 Although I have neglected this blog in calendar year 2025, as we approach a new season and new year, I have decided to continue with more frequent updates but with two specific goals in mind:

1. Building a better, streamlined easier to run version of my favorite edition of D&D (Advanced 1st edition) 

2. A campaign diary for my D&D and RPG games which can serve for some guidance and DM advice and feedback from those of you who have played the game a lot longer, or DMed for a while now.

I should probably preface all this by saying that I am not a noob DM. 2026 will mark 4+ years of being behind the screen of a regular local campaign and I also run a roll20 game every other week, when I am not playing in one, but these have been primarily 5e games.

Frankenstein AD&D

The version of AD&D I want to run harkens back to the 1e days, those halcyon days of youth which for many Gen Xers such as myself, can be colored with nostalgic sensibilities but which undoubtedly has also helped define and shape what gamers, RPG gamers to be specific, call the OSR movement. 

I can't believe it's been several months (almost 10 to be exact!) sine I attempted an in-depth dive and look at the 1e DMG by Gary Gygax. This is the book I started playing with at age 13 in 1983, but have now come to appreciate with the benefit of a 50+ year filter, that I was looking at this book all wrong, as rather than adhere to all its esoteric contents and complexities, the book is meant as a guide and can be as malleable as you want it to be, tailored to each individual campaign or game table.

 So what follows then is a continuation of that initial post, but also a reconcentrated effort to take the best or most usable bits of that tome and apply that which I want to use in my games, while throwing out the rest. The same goes for the 1e PHB and the subsequent books like Unearthed Arcana and the survival and dungeoneer's guide, which I find provide us with a blueprint for proficiencies which in my opinion, are superior to the feats which arrived in later editions of the game.

But in order to arrive at a truly unique "Frankenstein" recreation of Dungeons and Dragons, I submit that additions must also be made, whenever they are of a beneficial nature. That's when BECMI enters the picture, the precursor to the AD&D game, but which in my mind does a superb job of introducing neophytes into the RPG and D&D action and mechanics. 

I realize that Holme's blue book basic was the first official basic ruleset, but I find BECMI to be more complete and easier to build a character and get a group going. So for our project, we are going to simplify the combat sequence found in AD&D 1e and utilize the much easier to run and digest combat sequence found in the BECMI player's book by Frank Mentzer, (starting on page 58).    

But let us return to the DMG and continue where we left off more than two seasons ago. Before anything else I will point out that I am absolutely using the secondary skills table on page 12 upon character creation, as this gives some structure and guidance to the budding character, not to mention wonderful role-playing opportunities, akin to backgrounds in 5e. I have discussed in that previous post the character age, aging and death mechanics and those will also be included. From there we skip to the brief section on the Paladin's warhorse, which is interesting (on page 18) but only if you allow paladins in your game, which were not a part of BECMI but are definitely a part of the advanced game. 

We will be skipping the section on followers for upper-level characters in favor of the rules for followers, mercenaries, NPC parties and hiring of specialists found on pages 24-27 of the Expert BECMI set, as I feel these are more clear and easier to digest than the convoluted guidelines for hiring these NPCs as presented in the DMG.

From here we jump back to page 19 of the DMG where Gygax outlines the thief abilities with greater detail than what can be found in the class description of the 1e PHB. 

The assassin subclass of the thief in 1e D&D

 

The last topic we will look at today to consider for possible inclusion to our game is the concept and rules for alignment. It is quite interesting to me that in Holmes, there was a system of five alignments: Good, Neutral, Chaos and Evil. This is in contrast to the nine-alignment system introduced in AD&D found on page 23 of the DMG. Alignment is more than a tool for role playing, it also dictates the creatures which can be found in the outer planes. (1e PHB p. 120) BECMI simplified it to three basic alignments: law, chaos and neutrality and also espoused the idea of a alignment language. I think alignment languages over complicate things, so I will not use them in our streamlined AD&D Frankenstein version. 

Throwback Thursday comics: DC's Dragonlance

 

Dragonlance No.1, DC Comics, December 1988

In the fall of 1988, specifically December of '88 DC comics had in its stable of titles classics such as the Legion of Superheroes, Batman (where the iconic "Death in the Family" story arc was in full bloom), Green Arrow and Superman, but also adaptations and retrospectives like "The Prisoner" mini-series, "The Shadow" and of course, Dragonlance No. 1, based on the iconic novels and TSR game modules. 

Besides being a pretty innovative adaptation and start to the DL series when DC had the D&D I.P. (Barbara Kesel wrote in the letters page of the comic that in addition to the Margaret Weiss and Tracy Hickman classic, DC would also start to publish other D&D titles and adventures.) Dragonlance No. 1 for me personally is a bit of a time capsule of a great time in life, when I was a freshman in college going through the transition from H.S. to the quarter system as an undergraduate student at the UCLA campus.

What's fun and unique about the DL comics from that era is that editorial intended them to be more than a fun series based on D&D, they also had stat blocks and a map of the world of Krynn every fourth issue. Full disclosure, I only own the first two, so I am not really sure if this goal was achieved, to blend the series with a sort of gamemasters' supplemental tool, but through the exploration of this series over 30 years later, I aim to find out.

The first issue features background information on the Clerical Order of Majere with their mostly pacifist monks, lists the comic's protagonist Sturm Brightblade as a lawful good 8th level fighter with a THACO of 14 and with 47 hit points! At the time of the story told in the debut comic, Sturm is coming back from a five-year-long journey to discover his legacy. It also goes into describing why the Solamnic Knights like Sturm have fallen into disfavor in the world of Krynn, which is known by any fan of the novels or modules, but not necessarily well-known information to comic book readers not familiar with D&D in general and Dragonlance specifically. 

There are sidebars also included which describe two magic items presented in the comic: A Medallion of Majere and a footman's Dragonlance, different from the more powerful ones used by dragon-mounted riders. Issue 2 has stats for Lord Soth (with 59 hit points and a THACO of 12) 

The story found within the covers of issues 1 and 2 is a good introduction to the series and features appearances by Lord Soth and an old wizard who should be familiar to any Dragonlance fan. Plenty of action and "Gamerese" as well with the reveal of a High lord's blue dragon mount and a column by the late Jim Ward on the RPGA Network. 

These comics are fantastic and every fan of RPGS, D&D and comics in general should get their hands on them, they are easy to come by in back issue bins and on the web. 

Happy 2024: 3.0 DMG advice part 1

 

The DMG from the edition that changed the game irrevocably and ushered more "crunch"

It may be strange for me to be wishing readers a Happy 2024 in March, but the Nexus blog had been more focused on my mmorpg gaming late last year when I was trying to enjoy my Everquest and wow subscriptions.

I even had a post from January about my mmo gaming goals in 2024, goals which so far gave gone unmet due to the fact my internet connection has been quite poor since I moved in Northern California to my new place mind 2023. As a result, I have been recently trying to boost my signal, something not easily accomplished in rural areas, to be sure. So I abandoned most of my mmorpg gaming and have been primarily focused on running my weekly 5e game.

Last weekend I traveled to Santa Rosa where I frequented some used bookstores and came away with some really cool finds, among them was a pretty clean copy of the 3.0 D&D DMG and the 3.0 PHB at a very reasonable price. 

This led me to want to continue and pick up a project I started during the pandemic years, three years ago when I was examining all the printed DMGs dating back to the TSR era (As D&D has been my primary gaming hobby since the 80s; yes I am old) I thought it would be instructive, both to myself and others who may stumble upon this blog, to examine in great detail, chapter by chapter if need be, some of the information and sage advice available to DMs and wanna be game masters from the pages of all these wonderful and entertaining tomes. 

I had started with the more accessible 3.5 guide, but since I recently acquired the 3.0 guide in the aforementioned book store, I thought it would be fine to start with this one instead while concurrently comparing the info found in both. Do they repeat? Are there new nuggets of information presented in one that they didn't include in the other? Well let us find out.

From the first chapter, the authors advice DMs not to worry about teaching the players all the rules ahead of time. They suggest that all they truly need to know are the basics that apply to understanding their characters (i.e  how spells work, what AC means, how to use skills etc.) and they can pick up this information as they go along. This seems like sound advice when you consider how much more of a "crunchy" system D&D 3.0 and 3.5 are, compared to other systems like 5e and/or Pathfinder 1st edition.

There is a brief discussion of determining the style of play in your games and campaigns, such as what they call "kick in the door" style of play, advice on whether you should take a serious versus humorous tone (personally I prefer the former rather than the latter, but not to the exclusion of occasional mirth and in jokes at the table), table rules, how to integrate new players into an existing game or campaign, and other considerations for running a game including whether or not to use a DM screen, the role of computers in Dming, and the pros and cons of employing miniatures and counters.

An interesting aspect of this chapter is the inclusion of a section dealing with mapping. Mapping is a convention that seemed to be more integral to the earlier editions of the game and which has been somewhat lost in the modern era of virtual table top apps like Owl Bear and others. I remember reading the basic D&D BECMI manuals of the early 80s and even AD&D first edition, where it was recommended or encouraged that a player take on the role of "mapper." Again, this convention seems to have mostly gone the way of the dodo in modern times, probably due to the inclusion of detailed DM and maps for the players that are so detailed, most gamers make use of them without tweaking much, or without having a party explore an area on their own. The 3.0 DMG seems to encourage the older style, even though I am not sure if there were a lot of premade dungeons in this edition, versus the myriad of complex dungeon "hex crawls" of years past. I simply did not play the system enough when it came out in the early 2000s to give a more informed opinion.

As mentioned, this DMG seems to espouse the earlier convention in favor of the DM describing a layout of the place in as much detail as he/she/they want, including room dimensions and confusing maze like dungeons.

 

Before wrapping up this first part I will add that I will limit the scope of this analysis of D&D game guides to official TSR and WOTC products, even though I fully realize that there are many wonderful and helpful third party guides for novice, burgeoning game masters, but I do not own many, so I won't include them, with the possible exception of Sly Flourish's "Return of the Lazy Dungeon Master" since that specific reference is talked about a lot with high regard in the RPG community, and I actually own that tome. 

If you enjoy podcasts or audio discussions of geek culture topics, consider tuning in to www.kpfz.org an listening to my weekly show "The Nexus of Geek." Fridays at 4 PM PST. It is a diversion of mine which I do with my gaming friend and fellow geek Bo on the local community PBS style radio station, many topics that interest me from Superhero and genre film to fantasy fiction and of course gaming are presented. We welcome new listeners and fellow game geeks. 

Speaking of podcasts and/or non print material, I rather agree with this youtuber's take in defense of third edition.  Enjoy!