Drmg118, Dragon
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Magazine
Issue #118
Vol. XI, No. 9
February 1987
Publisher
Mike Cook
8
8
SPECIAL ATTRACTION
COMPETITION & TOURNAMENTS:
Games within games
The Fighting Circle Dan Salas
Gladiatorial combat in the AD&D® game
Surely, You Joust! Leonard Carpenter
The game of cavaliers: jousting combat and tournaments
A Day at the Faire Eileen Lucas
A brief visit to a medieval jousting festival
On Target Leonard Carpenter
The ultimate test of archery skills for AD&D game characters
NIBARS KEEP C.C. Stoll
A boardgame of arena combat for two players
Editor
Roger E. Moore
22
30
Assistant editor
Robin Jenkins
Fiction editor
Patrick Lucien
Price
34
Editorial assistants
43
Barbara Young
Marilyn Favaro
Eileen Lucas
Georgia Moore
Art director
Roger Raupp
OTHER FEATURES
ARRRGH!!! Christopher Wood
Some painful problems for AD&D game characters
Across the Fog-Gray Sea Lois Tilton
Kingship was Aarns curse and destiny, but his will was still his own
Sage Advice Michael Breault and Penny Petticord
Tackling Dungeoneers Survival Guide and Unearthed Arcana
A Heros Reward Leonard Carpenter
Rewarding skill and role-playing with hero points
38
Production staff
Gloria Habriga Carolyn Vanderbilt
48
Advertising
Subscriptions
Mary Parkinson
Pat Schulz
58
Ed Greenwood
Creative editors
Jeff Grubb
59
Contributing artists
62
Out of the Stone Age Jack R. Patterson
Neanderthal player characters in the D&D® game
The Dragons Bestiary The Readers
Wont you come into our parlor? said the spiders. . . .
The Game Wizards David Zeb Cook
Possibly the most horrifying column weve ever run
Unfriendly Fire Thomas M. Kane
War, revolution, and TOP SECRET® game agents
Denis Beauvais
Roger Raupp
Larry Elmore
David Trampier
64
Paul Jaquays
Stephen Fabian
Diesel
Francis Mao
Bruce Simpson
Richard Tomasic
68
Joseph Pillsbury
Dwain Meyer
Marvel Bullpen
72
78
The Warlock Redux Jon D. Martin
Three against Thanos and a special surprise
The Role of Computers Hartley and Patricia Lesser
Gettin down with OrbQuest, Roadwar 2000, and World Builder
82
DEPARTMENTS
3 Letters
7 0 TSR Previews
9 6 Snarfquest
4 World Gamers Guide 9 0 Gamers Guide
9 9 Dragonmirth
6 Forum
3 3 Convention Calendar
101 Wormy
COVER
The final piece in a series of fantastic chess paintings makes its appearance on
the cover of this issue. Denis Beauvaiss The Draw is actually a self-portrait; Denis
is wearing one of his (quite real) fantasy costumes in the role of the Black King.
The intense rivalry that one feels between the Black King and the onrushing
viewer perfectly symbolize the theme of this issue: the competition within games
themselves.
2
F
EBRUARY
1987
Editorial psychosis
3-D thinking
might welcome it, and he might (given a few
months) alter his old campaign to come back
into line with what the players want. I had the
same problem that your DM has, and getting a
berserk campaign back into control is hard to
do but it can be done. RM
Lets see. In the first week that I
came back from Christmas vacation,
the computer broke down twice, the
film processor jammed, the H&J-
print machine burned out, and I
accidentally blew a fuse when I
turned on the photocopier. Then
Carolyn Vanderbilt (one of our be-
loved typesetters) regretfully said
that she would be leaving us, and
shortly after that, I received a ran-
som note for $1,000,000 from two of
my co-workers, or youll never see
your Mr. Potato Head again! At-
tached to the note was one of my
Mr. Potato Heads little plastic ears.
Now I hear that MTV isnt renew-
ing Martha Quinns contract. Oh,
cruel fate! How can an editor func-
tion in such chaos?
The only wonderful thing that
happened in the whole week was
that we hired Barbara Young as our
newest editorial staff member. Bar-
bara is now the assistant editor for
DUNGEON Adventures, just as
Robin Jenkins is the assistant editor
for DRAGON® Magazine. Barbara
spends most of her free time reno-
vating her hovel, as she calls it, and
offering me advice (Dont deal with
terrorists; make them bring Mr.
Potato Head back in one piece.)
Lest anyone fear that we finished
making our changes in DRAGON®
Magazine with the return of Sage
Advice, the Bazaar, the Bestiary, and
fantasy fiction, be warned that this
was only the start. Other new offer-
ings are in the works, though we
want to keep our doings secret for
the moment.
On a different topic, this issue is
on competition in gaming but not
the sort of competition in which
players themselves are rated. I con-
fess that Ive never tried to be rated
as a gamer or a game referee; that
sort of thing seems to defeat the
purpose of gaming (which, to my
mind, is socializing and relaxing).
Worse yet, I suspect that I am not
always a very good gamer, and Id
rather not advertise that!
No, the competition in this issue is
between characters and no one
really minds if their characters go
toe-to-toe in the arena or on the
jousting field. The tension of the die
roll is magnified to Olympic propor-
tions when your elven fighter (19
dexterity) is trying to outshoot Jeffs
(continued on page 77)
Dear Dragon:
Recently (in issue #116), I read an article on
Chaosiums ELFQUEST® game. Are there more
Chaosium game articles in the works? I would
really enjoy a couple of CALL OF CTHULHU®
game articles now and then.
I especially enjoyed your castle kit which
appeared a while back (issue #86). I hope to see
more of this type of feature in the future.
Maybe a special game crafts section could be
integrated into DRAGON® Magazines current
monthly features. Patterns for castles, carts,
ships, siege machines, etc., could be printed,
along with construction ideas using household
items (such as washers for portholes or modi-
fied spoons for catapult arms). I understand the
heavy cardboard in the center of the magazine
probably costs a lot more to produce, so maybe
this could be reserved for precolored patterns,
while most features could be traced from stand-
ard paper patterns to balsa wood or similar
material.
Some suggestions
Dear Dragon:
I just received issue #116 of DRAGON Maga-
zine, and it was refreshing to see articles on
other role-playing games instead of just TSR
products. I hope that you will keep this up, and
maybe Ill even get to see an article or two on
the RUNEQUEST® game. It would be nice.
Maybe there even might be room in
DUNGEON Adventures one day to include
modules from other role-playing games.
I also hope that you will be bringing back
some of the miniature reviews to the pages of
your magazine. I think that is what I miss most
from the older DRAGON Magazines (a cross
between a miniatures magazine and the publica-
tion it is today). Though you are a more profes-
sional magazine, I do miss that miniatures-
magazine charm of the old wargame magazines
(like the Armchair General and Wargamers
Newsletter) that gave you a kind of intimacy
that I cant quite describe.
Until this issue, your publication really didnt
cater to my interests or really seem to care. Not
one of many letters that I had written has ever
been answered, and I really dont expect this
one to be answered, either. However, I do hope
that you will be covering more aspects of the
hobby than TSR publications and material, such
as the articles on other role-playing games,
reviews of miniatures, and reviews of other
products that come out.
Chris Ewich
Tacoma, WA
At the moment, we dont have any CALL OF
CTHULHU game articles but we wouldnt
mind seeing a few from our readers, hint hint. I
like the game, myself
You were correct in saying that we wouldnt
be able to run special cut-out-and-fold-up
sections very often because of cost, but we are
interested in suggestions from readers on the
kinds of cut-out sections that would be the most
useful in gaming. We also have a few of these
planned out ourselves. RM
Out of control
Herman Liebson
Valois, NY
Dear Dragon:
I have a friend who is, to say the least, not a
very good DM. He was okay once, but now he is
getting out of hand. For example, a friend of
mine has a character in this persons campaign;
in about a month (and he only plays him a few
times a week), he has become a deity. He got
this by the use of a wish. He also got his
strength raised from a 16 to the equivalent of
Thors strength, and along with it he got Thors
hammer (also with a wish). This DM has a few
other people in his campaign, and we would like
to get him back to being a partially good DM,
but we havent the slightest idea how. I decided
to write you to find out if there is any way we
can get him to be a more reasonable DM.
(Name and address withheld by editor)
Weve pointed this out before, but we do not
receive a great deal of material on role-playing
games other than those produced by TSR, Inc.
This isnt our prejudice; please note that the
ARES Section covered an enormous variety of
science-fiction games (many of them NOT pro-
duced by TSR, Inc.). We run the best of what we
get but non-TSR games are in the minority.
This particular issue reflects this problem.
DUNGEON Adventures will remain strictly for
the D&D and AD&D games for the time being.
You might find some interesting modules that
could be adapted to almost any other fantasy
role-playing game in DUNGEON Adventures,
however.
We arent considering miniatures reviews at
the moment (though thats still a possibility).
However, we are considering articles on the
painting and use of miniature figures in gaming.
You may find some of these articles to be of
particular use and perhaps you might con-
sider sending an article or two of your own on
the topics youd most like to see. RM
The thing that might help the most right now
would be to have someone else be the Dungeon
Master for a while someone who can start a
new campaign land (even a small one) and set
things off on a better foot. Talk the current DM
into being a player again for a change he
D
RAGON
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