Let's look back at the year 2012

This is the post about my gaming year of 2012. I'll write here about things that affected my gaming the most.

Old School Reneissance And Clones

Old Dunegons & Dragons never was the game I enjoyed when I was a kid. I already played RuneQuest and Warhammer 1e so when testing some red box D&D and AD&D 2e those didn't feel fun for me. The main reason propably is that I didn't start gaming with d20 (well, my first game was ANKH what is inspired by D&D) so D&D just didn't feel special anymore.

Last year I started to get really interested in OSR thanks to several blogs. At that time I enjoyed mostly Vampire: the Masquerade and was totally bored in fantasy because it was almost exclusively fantasy that I gamed when I was a kid (some scifi and cyberpunk too, but less of those).

But reading all neat OSR stuff I realized that fantasy can actually be cool if you do it right. Also I found out that actually some old-school games are rules simple and you can focus on the adventure instead of hundreds of pages of different rules.

I do enjoy storytelling games where characters are in the center but I also found out that games where the adventure is the main thing are awesome. Also the fact that it is so easy to write universal material for old-school games is awesome!

Lamentations of the Flame Princess

It was late 2011 when I bought the Grindhouse Edition box but I started to read and like it in early 2012. The rules are simple and I like the weird/horror themes of the game as I am a horror fan. It was easy step to start digging OSR with LotFP because it did hit the spot where my interests are. Also the Referee book is good read.

I liked the rules how they played like 3.0 but still old-school. That's ascending AC there. When I played D&D 3.0 I stripped the rules and when got into LotFP I realized that its rules are what I wanted 3.0 to be.

I never was that interested in pre-made adventures because I wanted to create and control my own games. LotFP adventures are so good that they actually made me appreciate pre-made adventures for the first time.

Of the 2012 games for me LotFP must be one of the most influencing game. It was the final hit for my OSR interest and it is a great game with great adventure and sourcebooks.

Also whole year 2012 LotFP products (Vornheim, adventures, Isle of the Unknown) were only gamebooks I wanted to buy new. That's something.

Labyrinth Lord

When searching for a real retro-clone (LotFP is like house-ruled version of traditional D&D-esque fantasy games) there were several game PDFs I checked out but none of those felt right for me. Then I found Labyrinth Lord and with some background research I realized that this is the real retro-clone for me.

I love how simple the rules are even though I am not a fan of Thac0 type combat (it fits LL perfectly though).

Labyrinth Lord is like old D&D for me now.

Most of the year I only owned the no-art PDF of Labyrinth Lord but in the autumn I won the softcover book in one competition. That was super awesome!

Creating Material

Now with OSR it is super easy to write fantasy (and other genre) material for roleplaying games. I don't have to worry what system to use, because OSR is universal system. Raggi in LotFP showed how to easily write stats for monsters and NPC compatible for both ascending and descending AC (armor as leather). And it's pretty fun to write little fantasy stuffs in the blog (and easy as I said).

Mutant Future

Interested in OSR and liking Fallout 3 videogame a lot and hearing about Gamma World I started to find out about that game more. Soon I found that Gamma World 1st and 2nd edition would be most interesting for me but unfortunately those are out of print now. Then I found Mutant Future and I was happy!

With Mutant Future you can play totally gonzo or more realistic Mad Max style. Or Fallout game with black humor including mutants. Mutant Future easily found its way to my favorite games. Rules are simple, mutations are whacky and post-apocalyptic setting is neat. I love playing this game and I am looking forward to buy the book.

Netflix

This is not roleplaying game, but I have enjoyed watching movies when I go to sleep (some movies might take even 5 days to finish). TV series I haven't watched that much but with Netflix coming to Finland and being compatible with Xbox 360 I've watched also several series.

When I watch movies I always thing roleplaying. How this scene, background story, character, gadget and so on could be awesome in a rpg.

Netflix is not only an awesome passtime but also great resource for endless inspiration for roleplayer.