LIghts! Camera! Action! (photoshoot for Zhaan)

Regardless of the heat, your humble editor set up all the bright hot lights and got to shooting. All the Pics, illos and movies for this issue of Zhaan are shot and are now being edited for the issue.
And here's you first sneak peak of the set piece for the issue, the bowels of the great Refinery!
Hope you enjoy it all!
New issue soon!

~Ripley

Making Crates for your 3d Dungeon or Wargame

I'm currently working on an adventure and realized I need a bunch of crates and furniture for this one.

I could just cut out a bunch of squares and rectangles out of card but I thought I'd go all out for these ones since they'll get used a lot.

Crates are super easy to make once you know how.

First get yourself a couple of bags of these....

You can get 42 wooden cubes for a dollar at the dollar store! You're already halfway there!

Next paint them all black.

Now you need to make yourself a stamper. You can find out all about making stampers in issue 1 of sword of sorcery, download all the issues here.

This is a fairly simple stamper, just a thin rectangle on each edge, a diagonal crossbar and some more planks on the inside.

Now load up your stamper with a light beige to represent your wood color and stamp every side of the crates. 

Here's what you get!

I undercoated the cubes, made the stamper and got all the sides stamped while watching a movie so they really don't take long at all. If you do enough of them at a time the first ones are dry by the time you loop back around to them to do their second side.

As you can see they look just fine and are a lot quicker and cheaper than printing off cardstock printables and cutting, folding and gluing them all.

I hope you all can find a use for these guys.

~Ripley

Happy New Year! (an update post)

Happy New year to you all, followers of the LoSS site and on Google+.

And what has the year wrought for LoSS?

Stats

LoSS has been publishing for 1 year and 1 month!

166 posts

5 issues published representing the Core game rules of LoSS.

10,429 Views! 

150 Followers.

An interview on the illustrious Drink Spin Run podcast.

5 pwyw pdfs on Gumroad

5 hardcopy issues available through the website

And what does the New Year hold for the game?

Drive Thru RPG

Well after much thought the LoSS materials will be switching over to Drive Thru RPG. Both the print and digital versions of future issues of Loss will be available there.

"Revised" core rules

As for the first 5 issues, they will be combined into a single game book for release on DriveThru. The pdfs will still be pay what you want and the overall price of the hardcopy should be the same or less than buying the 5 issues here.

This won't be a "second" edition though. The compiled version won't contain any new rules, background or artwork that weren't in the first 5 issues. It'll just be compiled into a letter size format, will have a full table of contents and all the rules will be organized into their own sections. So all you people who bought the first issues, thanks for the support but don't worry, the new drive thru version won't have anything new so you won't be missing out if you decide to give it a pass.

New Issues of LoSS

As for new issues? They will continue to be released, probably with a longer page count per issue with more time between issues. They will be the Letter size format with Black and white interiors.

The first few issues will be primarily adventures and campaign material for the world of Kartharka.

Play some games

My 2016 will hopefully be full of gaming. I didn't get in a lot of actual table time with LoSS this year what with peoples schedules and all so I hope to have a regular game going soon. Still plenty of slots available for people to try the LoSS game so let me know if you want to play in the next session.

I also want to actually "play" some games this year. I've been wanting to get some time in on the other side of the ol' DM screen for the past couple of years so I'm looking forward to logging some time in as a player.

Demonboard

When I first published the Demonbaord issue (over a year ago now!) I wanted to show people that making a 3d dungeon was easy, cheap, and fast!

So you've seen a lot of that board over the past year. And while it admittedly looks great, plays fine and has held up well, I really want to improve it.

I've held off on using standard gaming miniatures, and using more advanced modelling techniques for the past year because I wanted players to see how much you could do with so little, that every single person could have an awesome 3d dungeon of their own with no skill whatsoever. 

Well over the next year I'm going to show you all just how far you can push the limits of the demonboard quality if you are willing to invest a little more time, and learn a few more tricks.

Fortunately for you all I'm still far too broke to attempt anything that isn't also "cheap". But keep your eyes peeled for details on the new improved Demonboard I'm working on.

Let's get this stuff done proper!

When Loss started out it was just a throwaway idea that I did on a whim. I wanted to put out a quick and dirty zine of my own to have a place to drop some ideas I was working on and give me something to do.

Well it's certainly grown from there and it's time to start really making it shine.

Things like: editing, spell checking, tables of contents and page numbers. Making the text easy to read and refer to, organizing things in a way that makes sense, actually having some kind of consistent layout design between issues. 

You know those things that make something look, ummm, good.

Usually my goal is to just get it out there and have fun but now I'm looking to grow the audience a bit and clean, organized, and edited books are the way to do it. So you may see a bit of a gap before the next issue of adventures comes out as I'm also compiling the first book but when they do they should be pretty sharp so hopefully worth the wait.

Honestly, what it LoSS?

Over the past year I've been trying to write that same paragraph again and again. What is the game?

I've tried to put out something new, crazy, different, energetic and fun, but when you get down to brass tacks and put it in terms of rules...

LoSS is a roleplaying game.

The players take the role of heroes looking to make their mark on the world.

They are a a little stronger, faster, and wiser than the average citizen.

The characters can increase their power by earning favors for completing adventures.

Favours can be cashed in for money, equipment, or to have something done for them.

The characters have a fame and infamy score. These affect the world around them either making the people they encounter help them, or hurt them.

Fame is earned by completing adventures and performing heroic deeds. Infamy is earned by failing at adventures or performing evil deeds.

The combat system in LoSS is simple. Everyone starts a combat with an amount of Endurance. This represents how long they can fight before they let down their guard. Once their endurance is gone they are left open to a killing blow. Endurance is lost by losing a combat or by making an attack as both things will tire a character.

To attack you roll 2 dice and add your attack score, the defender rolls two dice and adds their attack score. The higher number wins the combat.

Endurance is regained between encounters by "resting". There is no healing magic.

The LoSS experience system awards "veteran" points for surviving dangerous combats, performing dangerous deeds, completing an adventure, or for roleplaying.

Veteran points can be spent to purchase increases in stats, or new skills which the character may use.

The magic system in Loss consists of "sorcerers" summoning spirits and demons. These spirits and demons may then perform tasks for the summoner. This may be something "magical" such as breathing fire or flying, opening a door, or even attacking their enemies.

Magic items are essentially special items with spirits trapped within them that are still able to perform some magical power. Such as shooting fire, creating light, or causing the bearer of the item to fly.

If a character wishes to do something other than attacking, for example, climbing a wall. They roll 2d6 and add any applicable stat. They will be trying to beat a number determined by the Demonlord deciding if the task is simple, difficult, or very difficult.

That pretty much sums up the game. Not too wild or different from other rules lite games. The rules are very similar to most other Old School Roleplaying games. The way they are balanced and work together makes for a good system though I think and lends itself well to "adventure" gaming based on trying to accomplish a specific goal.

Other Stuff for the year

Oh yes, there's still plenty more other stuff going on. I'm starting to paint up some more miniatures for the game (it is nice to be painting some old lead again).

The Lair synth continues on as well, I hope to get some actual music done this year but we'll have to wait and see.

I also hope that this is the year I get the injection molder actually up and running and then we'll really get some interesting stuff happening. Unfortunately my dreams of a Kartharka miniature line require a few hundred dollars more than I have lying around. If anyone's interested in buying original art from the first 5 issues for an exorbitant amount of cash let me know and maybe I can get this thing up and running.

Thanks!

To all of you who read, watch, listen and follow, thanks for giving a poor guy a break and a reason to keep playing with toys.

~Ripley Stonebrook

editors notes from issue 5 suming up a year of Loss

Thought I'd put this here since, hey why write things twice?

Editors notes:

Welcome to issue 5: Lairs! (The sideways issue)
As we near the end of another year we also near the end of the 5 core books of LoSS (Lair of Sword & Sorcery)
Lets take a look at what I’ve done with LoSS and why.
Issue 1: Demonboard: Detailed the making of the all important demonboard on which all the action of the game takes place. Since a battlemat was so inherently important to the proper play of the game it was necessary to dedicate most of an issue to it. But I didn’t want to just send you out to buy a battlemat or even more expensive 3d dungeon materials.
If the game was to be played by anyone I had to prove that you can make a great looking 3d dungeon yourself with just a few dollars. Not only that but I had to show a way that anyone could do it, not just artists that can create a full 3d dungeon out of foam and cardboard already.
I needed something that was cheap, easy, and not at all time consuming.
I often say that you can make a perfectly suitable Demonboard in the same amount of time as it takes to watch Conan the Barbarian.

Quick trees for outdoor lairs on the Demonboard

Here's something a little different for all you Demonlords.

We're going out into the wilderness now. Outside, away from our dank musty Lairs.

But out in the wilderness we need something other than demonblocks and cardboard walls to define our areas.

Making an outdoor Demonboard for the Winterlands is easy. Just grab a sheet of white bristol board. Draw a grid of 1 inch squares on it with a marker, and you're done.

But all those wide open fields get pretty boring and make combat awful tricky when your heroes are outnumbered (which they usually are).

You can add a few buildings easily using demonblocks or card walls from your demonboard, but what happens when they are out in the wilderness?

So much open space needs to be cut off with something.

And so I present to you...Trees!

Hmmm, that spider looks familliar (click for bigger view)

"Wooden Blocks" and super multilevel encounters on the Demonbaord

And what fresh wonders do I have for you all? Witness below, the power of "Wooden Blocks".

Only $3 at dollar stores when you can find them. You can usually find more expensive sets fairly easily but these ones are perfectly suited to Lair.

Just look at the front of that box. Just imagine some weird monsters all over that thing and it's already some forgotten ancient city.

I've shown you the jenga blocks before but these are something much much bettter

Ramps and Multilevel Lairs with a Demonboard

Hail hearty adventurers and Demonlords!

Above we see a major problem which occurs while designing your Lairs. On your map you have a tunnel which goes above or below another tunnel. But since our Demonboards are flat what you get when you try to lay it out on the Demonboard is shown above. A tunnel apparently going through another tunnel. 

Well we can't have that, so this series is to show you all how to make ramps, so that your tunnels may pass each other without intersecting.

"Jenga" blocks and the Demonboard

Some of you may have been using the standard Demonboard for some a little while now. You may be using it with your games of LoSS (The Lair of Sword and Sorcery Adventure game) or perhaps as a 3d dungeon in your own fantasy roleplaying games. 

Giant Ants!

It's still Halloweeny time and still finding all sorts of great things at the dollar store. This package above is one of them.

100 ants! It's hard to tell from the pic but they are regular size ants to you and me. and look pretty good.

But to our intrepid heroes they are...

Demonboard Doors!

Time for some Demonboard upgrades!

I've been promising a tutorial for doors since the first issue and here it finally is. First lets meet our tools for the day.

Today we'll be using our old friend the basic modelling clay in the silver package. Available at the dollar store. Air dries over night, And at only $2 is a pretty good deal.

All players alive... so far

The portal of the Blind Burrower

Quick post, more in depth hopefully later...
The heroes have delved the depths of the Arrowblack cursewood.
They have fought many evil creatures, some innocents were not able to be saved, a war was averted (damn them) a bad boss was defeated and they stand before the yawning portal to the lair of the Blind Burrower.
Lot's of new players this week so they got thrown right in learning combat on the fly. The rope traps were stymied but the heroes are now throwing a lot of lit torches in the middle of a forest.
An attempt to set the forest on fire burning it to the ground was thwarted by bad rolls on the players part (thank god, I didn't want to have to generate rules for a forest fire on the fly).
One hero lies unconcioius in the cavers of the blind burrower, hoping that his friends live to retrieve his body.
Plus someone is playing a priest, so yeah, I'll have to come up with something for that, I haven't decided yet if the priesthood available to the players will have spooky powers or not. Considering he is still an acolyte I wont' need to decide yet.

Campaign design underway...

Crafting the first linked set of Scenarios for Lair and it's going splendidly.
As we see in the combat rules each scenario needs certain things like: objective, reward, punishment, and special features.
First I write about a pager of notes in a notebook detailing the whole plot.
1 page should be more than enough...
Then I quickly sketch maps detailing roughly how many "rooms" are in each scenario and how they are connected.
Then I quickly turn my notes into a special feature for the scenario.
The special feature will usually suggest a few special places, enemies, and items to populate the place.
I then look to the Ranking system from the upcoming Veteran issue to balance the encounters.
If my special feature or number of combats seem too difficult for the heroes, or if I want to use more enemies than the party number would allow, I will make some followers available to enter the Lair with them.
So last night I sat down, wrote my notes, sketched my maps and wrote up the special features of the first scenario. Took a couple of hours.
Not bad.
I should be able to finish the further special objectives tonight.
I am running into some interesting things in the first one because it takes place in a forest.
I have a few ideas how to represent this using card walls or dungeon blocks but will also likely break out some construction paper to make "trees".
More coming soon!
~Ripley

50 Posts, 5 months, 900 views, 12 pages, 2 issues, one Campaign and 2 great special offers!

Karharka Lives and Breathes

Well it's been a wild ride from it's small start last October.

Starting with this little blog and a dream Kartharka was dragged kicking and screaming into the world.

The Lair site has finally reached 50 posts of updates, background, rules and fun.

I've kept up the dream for 5 months, the sites gathered 900 views.

Over 12 pages of content have been added on top of the regular posts.

2 issues of the magazine are out, including the Combat issue, allowing people to finally play the game.

And at least one Campaign has begun, hopefully the first of many that I will hear about.

I would like to thank all of those who come by, repost content, +1 content, comment, and even buy actual issues of the game.

Without you I couldn't have done it.

There are a few of you out there who are really going above and beyond to help out and when more details arrive I will be posting that as well.

I'd also like to thank the great folks over at Heroes Beacon here in Saint John, New Brunswick (Canada) for stocking the game.  The first of many I hope.

I want to get as many people out there playing as possible so I call out to you now.

I have some copies I would love to send to people, so if you have a site of your own and review games, contact me at spookyroomproductions@gmail.com with your details and I will get some copies into your hands. The supply of review copies is limited to the first 10 I hear from so send in your details now.

I would also love to get more copies into retailers stores so if you are a retailer or know one well enough to convince them to carry it, then send me your details and I will send you off an introductory retailer pack containing 5 copies of issue 1 and 5 copies of issue 2. You may keep one of each for yourself and supply the rest to the retailer. 

The only caveat is that you must post a review of the game online at someplace like rpggeek.com and that you supply us with the contact details of the retailer and a picture of the game on the shelves.

I would say that's a pretty great deal so this one is limited to the first 5 people who send in their details to spookyroomproductions@gmail.com.

Lair of Sword and Sorcery Campaign begins, Part 2

This is a continuation of the Play report of the first Lair of Sword and Sorcery Campaign.

Read part one here Part 1

The heroes enter the city of Stroh-Branoch!

One of the characters has decided that their hero will follow the path of Sorcery!

Not knowing where to start (none in the land of Kartharka does) they head straight for the sages hall.

They present themselves (and their +2 ccamaraderie and a pile of gold) to the sages at the hall.

It is agreed that they may begin their training on a trial basis for 1 month. They are allowed to stay at the Sages Hall, begin their tutoring in the history and sciences of Kartharka, and are given access to the library of the sages from which they begin copying as much of their lore as they can (getting a head start on a library for their demense, see the forthcoming veteran issue for more details on that)

After the month is passed and the "bodyguard" has healed their serious injuries the sages present a problem to the would be scholar.
His money has run out. To continue his studies for another month he will have to pay more (which he hasn't got) or run some errands for them.
He accepts the challenge and is tasked with picking up some papers and items from the small sages hall located in the hamlet of Throm at the top of the valley of Fangs.
The bodyguard spends a large part of his ready cash on an almost full suit of Kartharkan plate.
Knowing that this is likely not to be as simple a task as it seems (remember the bandits on the road from earlier) the novice sage decides to enlist the help of some muscle from the local bar.
Spending the rest of their money they recruit 5 dangerous looking thugs to escort them to Throm.
And it's good that they did. While camping int he forest that lies before the great Wulf's Way road they spot a babd of men with torches approaching from the distance.
They quickly break camp and make for the woods to hide.
Luckily they find an abandoned cabin there to make their stand in and another epic battle ensues.
These men are the remainder of the bandit troop, and picked up their trail soon after they left Stroh-branoch.
The heroes again use tactics to their advantage, fortifying the cabin with traps and defending the doorways to great advantage.
The bandits do break in briefly and are able to kill one of the dangerous thugs but the heroes are unscathed.
They continue on to Throm with no further problems.
There they find the local Sages Hall abandoned, though the innkeeper has been entrusted with the key which he gladly gives to the novice sage since he bears the amulet of the Winterlands Sages (temporarily).
Entering He finds the Hall indeed empty, and the library locked, needing another key.
Luckily on the lectern is left a note, to any sages who may enter the hall.
I did not have time to prep the exact wording of the scroll but it begs any sages who enter to read the scrolls left behind and follow the sages into the cursed woods (pronounced Curse-edd of course).
The exact message of the note and the details of the scrolls will have to wait until the following game in two weeks as I had absolutely nothing prepped other than literally 10 lines jotted down for the first string of scenarios.
Something like "Road, attack, Stroh Branoch, travel, cabin in woods...' and then a couple more lines for the next scenario but that's a secret.
All in all a huge ssuccess campaign started and characters made on the fly and well into the first string of scenarios
What will they encounter next? Well they have seen a lot of Sword so far...
I believe they may finally get to the other half of Lair next time!

Next up will be a series of posts on the nuts and bolts of what specifically happened, and why, including a few rules tweaks, additions and other meddling bits of minutiae.

Ps- The continuing saga of our poor heroes will be detailed here in the posts as well as being archived in a permanent section here on the site soon

First Game Successful Part 1

The first official campaign for Lair of Sword and Sorcery has begun.
In put to the test the first tenets of the Lair philosophy, quick, easy, no prep.
My real life workplace had a lot of excitement this week and I also ended up working late on game night, whoops.
So when playtime came I had nothing prepped at all.
No problem!
People showed up late.
No problem!
Even with me flipping back and forth through the combat issue,
(page numbers, and tables of contents are now a feature from issue three up, you're welcome)
we still had characters ready in 10 minutes.
I simply started them on the Road to Stroh Branoch and had them encounter the miners from the example scenario.
No problem.
Instead of trying to get sacks of gold out they threw their miners at the bandits to kill them all before they could make off with the sacks, whoops, I did not expect that. I expected them to be a bit more careful with their miners and their heroes.
 They also set up a defensive wall of miners around the sacks to keep the bandits from getting to them. Whoops again. My bandits are having a real hard time getting at the sacks. I should start to rethink my strategy of avoiding the miners to drag sacks and just start attacking.
One player then set up a tangle of ropes at one of the entrances to the sack room using their rope and some spikes (and a sota roll of 7)
Huzzah, they're setting traps. Dammit they're setting traps.
Some my bandits are now having to fight through this thing to get at the sacks.
by the end of the scenario all the bandits were dead having looted only two sacks, leaving 28 sacks for the heroes to give to the miners for their reward.
The heroes have not suffered a single wound from the bandits though one has lost a few endurance from fighting.
Then they decided to turn on the last remaining miner to kill him and take all the loot for themselves. "Because there's no alignment in this game".
They manage to kill him but one of the heroes actually has to make a death roll in the fight, and fails!
Luckily once the scenario is over the recover roll leaves him only "severely injured".
In their now weakened state they decide to return to the miners camp near the road and return their ore for the reward, 28 gold pieces, a fortune in the winterlands!
I groan inwardly but have to admit they earned it with some clever strategy on the board.
During this first scenario we found alot of things about Lair which I will post some articles on during the week with some of the material going into the books.
But the night was not over!
This mighty encounter took only about and hour so they continued on to Stroh-Branoch
Read more about this one crazy night in part 2.

Some Thoughts on Lairs

Was doing a bit of reading yesterday (Where do we find the time?) on the state of D&D in 5e.
I will preface this article with something you may not know from the tone of the site.

I love D&D.
I'll just put that out there along with the fact that I think 5e has the potential to be the best system since the Cyclopedia.
Do the math, look yourself square in the eye, face some hard truths and you'll agree, the Cyclopedia was the best flavor of D&D every produced. If it had been supported in the same way as the boxed sets in the 80's it would never have gone away (instead of being viewed as a gateway drug to "Real D&D")

Today I want to talk about Lairs.
For the last year or so I've been hearing alot of talk about the 5 Room Dungeon, and with 5th edition alot of talk about Lairs, encounters, and experience point Math.

I know these longer rambling posts tend to get skipped over a lot so I'll just put the main point up front here.

Lair of Sword and Sorcery is built from the ground up for "Lair" Encounters.

Those of you who know what that means will be interested enough to read on. For those of you who don't, in a nutshell "Lairs" represent the way people have been playing D&D all along if the DM is doing their job right and everyone is having fun.

History time, skip to the heading about "Lairs in Lair" if you already agree.

Go to your first edition handbooks, look in the Dms guide for how to make up your own Dungeon. Remember back to how we thought of "Dungeons" way back in the day. Not any particular published dungeon but that one that we all have striven for, the one we read about in the comic book ads for Dungeons and Dragons, the ones we imagined when we read the rules for Torch Duration, and when buying Iron Rations.

The massive sprawling, multilevel monster dungeon, where players went in level one, fought enough 1 hd monsters to level up, then went to level 2, fought enough 2hd monsters to get up to level 2 and so on.

Each level increasing in size to have enough encounters to level up again, with parts being added on periodically to keep things "fresh", wandering monster tables, "to keep you from wasting time", 

Huge randomly generated monstrosities with encounters in "30%" of the rooms, oh and don't forget to map everything, even in that massive 70% of barren nothingness or your party will become "lost".

We all dreamed of playing or running one of these behemoths, but the fact is, if we ever sat down to actually play it, it always came off a little pretty poor, unless the Dm really did his job.

And what was that?

In the huge warren of a dungeon you find a door, opening it you find a pile of bedding, a monster is about! Now that the players are on their toes they enter one of the two doors leading from this room, It's a cave with 3 orcs sitting over a cook-pot, interesting,

They kill the orcs, find that the pot doesn't contain anything and so go back and go through the other door, Here they find a fourth orc, about to butcher some poor adventurer for the stew pot. The kill the orc and question the adventurer. 

This brave knight had been on a quest to discover the great lost sword of whosiwhatsit, held by a brave knight venturing here to kill an evil cleric who's run off with the churches jewels. 

Careful searching of the rooms reveals a few coins and a letter from said cleric saying to meet him at the usual place by the well. Wait a minute there was a well just outside this door says one of the players. So they wait, kill the cleric but he does not have the treasure. They follow his trail around the corner to another grouop of rooms.

These rooms are clearly an evil temple, Finding a secret passage near the altar they brave their way to the inner sanctum, narrowly avoiding a fiendish pit trap in the dark.

In the inner sanctum they accidentally release a fiendish devil fromt he pits whom the evil cleric worshiped. 

Luckily they discover the magic circle in the floor which protects them while their cleric using a chalice found in the stolen churches treasure, banishes the demon.

The NPC gathers up his churches belongings, there is of course plenty left over for the players.

They killed some orcs, a mid level evil cleric, and even defeated a minor demon, depending on the system they will get xp for the gold or avoiding the pit trap as well. Not a bad haul.

They got to figure out some clues and the whole string of encounters was wrapped up in a single night, an accomplishment.

What they just defeated was a 5 room dungeon, or what could be considered the Lair of an eveil cleric and his minions. Just because it happened int he middle of a sprawling megadungeon does not change it one bit.

Now say you start that story off with an hour of wandering monster rolls, mapping endless empty corridors, tracking torches and rations on your character sheet, and then do the same thing on the way out.

Would that make it more or less fun? A good Dm would have handwaved all the bit at the beginning and the end saying "You are now at the place you left off last time", and at the end he would handwave again saying "you make it back to town safely".

All well made Mega dungeons are really just a series of  "Lairs" or 5 room dungeons strung together along a theme. The "dungeon" was originally just an easy way to get right to the adventure without having to write alot of backstory why the characters would be encountering this band of orcs and a cleric, "They're in the Dungeon" is all they needed. If this happened in the wild on a road the Dm would have to do alot of story crafting, once it's in a dungeon it's all readily accepted by the players.

Look at all the original modules, you would get a wilderness map which players would tromp through to make the trip to the dungeon more interesting (each dungeon does need a bit of history and backstory) but when you got there it would be a tower with 3 levels with 10 rooms each, half of which were empty, or to look at it another way, three 5 room dungeons each one harder than the next.

Lairs in Lair

In Lair of Sword and Sorcery the players all gather together and play a "Scenario". Every scenario takes place in a "Lair". The lair is laid out on the Demonboard, either all at once (for a "Skirmish" type scenario, ie a pitched battle between two groups) or one room at a time for a "Blind" Lair.

The Demonboard is a fixed size, no single Lair may be larger than the Demonboard.(22x28 squares).

At the end of one Lair they may find the entrance to another but all the action for this lair will occur on this one Demonboard.

The main difference between Lair of Sword & Sorcery and other Roleplaying games is that each Lair has an accompannying scenario which states some basic rules for this Lair (the same Lair may have different a different scenario if the players return to it however)

Each Lair must have the following things:

Scenario Objective:

This is what the players need to do to "Beat" the Lair. They may know the objective when they begin or it may be a secret which they have to discover within the lair.

Reward:

The lair must have a reward for beating it. If the Objective is killing the evil cleric the reward could be something simple like recieving his treasure. Or it may be something less tangible like recieving a blessing from the noble knight they saved, or they may be allowed to stay at his temple and recieve training, or the temple may owe them a favour to be cashed in later.

Sometimes the Reward could be something as simple as not recieving the punishment for failing, which is a reward in itself.

Punishment:

If the characters are not able to defeat the Lair then there will be a Punishment. This is a huge difference between Lair and other Roleplaying games. In your typical dungeon if you don't feel like going in the dank tunnel under the altar to see what's inside you can just leave. Or you can decide to go back to town, get a couple of strong lads and healing potions and come back to defeat the demon.

There is little sense of urgency to pressing forward in the dungeon.

In Lair things are different.

The Players are always in a Lair for a reason. The backstory will usually provide this but the punishment rule reinforces the urgency of the dungeon. The evil cleric may have kidnapped the children of the town and will sacrifice them if the players are not able to stop him first.

The punishment also need not be that dire.

In the evil cleric example above if the players decide to leave the lair without pushing on into the passage beneath the altar the next time they return they will find the passage has been entered by someone else, likely other orcs, and stripped of it's treasure, meaning the Knights temple will never recover their sacred relics. In this case the punishment was the lack of any reward, which is acceptable, though the temple may be a little standoffish to them in the future.

Special Feature:

Every Lair is Sword and Sorcery needs a special feature.

It will usually be tied into the Scenario Objective and possible the reward and punishment as well.

It is the mighty set piece of the Lair and will not have appeared in any Lair before (thought it may be reused later but not as a special feature). Every special feature requires rules for the players to interact with it.

In the Evil Cleric example the Special feature may be the "summoning room" that they enter. The rules would be that when any player first touches the circle the demon is summoned (demons are not special features, the room itself is). Another rule would be that the demon cannot enter the circle so the players are "safe" while there.

The players would not be told this when entering the room, finding out the special features rules is the biggest fun of the game.

Special features may be an incredibly devious trap or lock with many levers to pull, may be a special raised platform the final enemy hides upon dumping boiling oil on the players, a special item, a special creature, anything which the players have not encountered before. 

Ideally the rest of the Lair will be built around and lead up to the special feature.

By specifically stating that each Lair must have a special feature and that each special feature must have rules made up pertaining to it it actually takes a lot of work off of the Demonlord (DM in Lair parlance). Because frankly each dungeon should have something special, something unique, It doesn't have to be fantastically original, the oil dropping example above shows that a simple difference, with some rules attached to it will bring an ordinary encounter up to an epic battle with the players have to come up with whole new strategies to accomplish what would ordinarily be a straight up fight.

Using these in other games

These basic rules, Objective, reward, punishment, and special feature, can be used in any encounter, dungeon or lair in any game system you like. Simply applying these strategies when building your own D&D encounters make the sometimes tedious and boring task of crafting encounters fun again, and the reward punishment system may breathe new life into a campaign grown stale.

Please leave any Comments you may have positive or Negative I'd love to hear what you all think.

~Ripley

Combat Issue released!

The combat issue is officially on the shelves at Heroes Beacon. See the "Where to Buy" link on the right hand side for details on address etc.

Thanks Everyone for coming by to see what's up and hope you like what you see!

Next issue is definitely going to be the Veteran issue but since Sorcery is also part of the Veteran system you'll be seeing a little bit of that in that issue as well.

The Sorceror material will then be expanded fully in the Sorcery Issue.

~Ripley

Photography Begins on Combat Issue!

Issue 2, "The Combat Issue", has just finished final editing and design. Now we head into photography, hopefully topping the quality of the photos in issue 1. Sorry about that one guys I'm still learning over here.
This is the big one, this issue where you actually get some Rules!
You've all been reading about the tone of the game, the design principles behind it and how it's different. With this issue Lair is going to back up all those claims.
My own "Campaign" is ramping up and will running shortly after the Combat issue comes out.
You'll be hearing all about how it goes as it'll be the testing grounds for the first group of Published Scenarios.
Thanks for Listening and everyone prepare for Combat!
~Ripley

Post Hoiday Update

And We're Back!
Hope everyone had a Mighty Christmas!
Work has fired up for issue 2 again and good news for my group,

I'm working on the first round of adventures.

The Tales of Wild Adventure Issue!

They will be a series of Introductory scenarios for beginning characters taking place in the area of the treacherous Valley of Fangs.
All within a weeks travel of Stroh Branoch they will be a way for the group to get to know the world of Kartharka and the dangers it holds. The first 5 scenarios will likely be published as it's own issue either before or after the Sorcery issue.

"Role playing" guidelines
It will also include guidelines for "doing things in town" and doing things with people "other than attack".
This issue will include things like interacting with the local shops, encountering people at the inn, on the road, or even finding a friendly in the middle of a Lair.
Experienced Role players would not require such guidelines but I want Lair to be an inclusive game for all those people who always wanted to try Role playing

games but felt that it was either too difficult or that the people they found took things "too seriously" to be fun.

Issue 2 is Written!

So let it be written, so let it be done!
All of the copy text is written for Issue 2 "The Combat Issue!"

For all fans of Sword and Sorcery The complete Lair of Sword and Sorcery Rules will be appearing in this issue.

Features include:

• Character Creation
• Equipment
• Roleplaying and Combat mode
• Combat rules
• The SOTA rules (Something Other Than Attacking)
• Background for The "capital" of the Winterlands Stroh-Branoch, with map and key features.
• Character Sheet
• Amassing your figure collection.
• The Lair Skirmish game
• An introductory scenario with tips for beginning Demonlords

The art for this issue is half done so if you would like to see your art in this issue you had better send it in to spookyroomproductions@gmail.com.

Issue 3 will be the Veteran issue, containing rules for:

Pushing your characters to the next Rank,

Balancing the enemy forces for the Demonlord, 

A list of some animals of the Winterlands both helpful and harmful

Issue 4 will tentatively be the long awaited "Sorcery" issue. And will likely be the first "forked" issue, With one version being for the players and the other for the Demonlord.

The "forked" issues are published at the same time, with the players info in a players copy of the issue and the Demonlords info in the Demonlord copy. They will both have the same issue number but with a P for players or D for Demonlord next to the number on the cover.

Concurrent with the regular run of Sword and Sorcery will be a special "Lairs" supplement, containing 10 Lairs to be used for either the Lair Skirmish game or as full blown adventures for your heroes.

Also in the new year my own group of players will be starting their own journey to fame and glory, Their exploits (as well as their advenutures) will be published on a semi regular basis as well in the special campaign issues of the Demonlord fork of Lair of Sword and sorcery. 

Let the adventure begin!