Heuristics

This week's Rolling for Initiative column looks at the concepts of heruistics and how they affect purchasing in the game and comic industry.

RPG of the Week: Dungeon Crawl Classics

Much like Pathfinder and Castles and Crusades, Dungeon Crawl Classics started life as a series of adventures created under D&D 3.0's Open Gaming License. Like the other two, the adventures proved popular enough that Goodman Games is one of the few companies remaining from the 3.0/3.5 Edition era, still publishing modules for the D&D 5th edition game as well as material for what became its house system Dungeon Crawl Classics.

Similar to Troll Lord Games C&C, Dungeon Crawl Classics opts to use its modified 3.0 edition rules and create adventures that have the feel of 1st edition AD and D adventures, with names reminiscent of the early TSR adventures such as "Beyond the Black Gate" and "The Sea Queen Escapes". 

Monolith

This week's Rolling for Initiative column looks at the recent announcement by Monolith to only "sell" the Batman Boardgame through Kickstarter.

RPG of the Week No Thank You Evil

No Thank You Evil is a RPG system from Monte Cook Games targeted at beginning players. As the cover says "Ages 5 to Infinity" . The system is quite simple and relies on die rolls and tokens. As in almost RPGs, the gamemaster guides the game and creates the adventure. Whenever the players have want to attempt something, the GM sets a "goal" from 0 to 8. A goal of 0 is something the players can easily accomplish, such as walking or talking. Higher goals are set for more difficult activities. The players can spend tokens from their characters to make accomplishing the goals easier.

I had the opportunity to play No Thank You Evil a few weeks ago. It plays well, comes with lots of components and bits and a session can finish in about 30 minutes or extended longer if the players remain interested. If you are a parent looking to introduce your kids to RPGs but think D&D is a bit too complex, No Thank You Evil is a great alternative.

Force Friday Followup

This week's Rolling for Initiative column recaps my conversation with Brendan Bell of Asmodee NA over Force Friday

RPG of the Week

Since we stock a whole lot of role playing games (RPGs) and sell very few of them (we sell 5 times as much D&D 5th edition per month as we do all other RPGs combines) we decided to start talking about one of them once a week in the hope of calling your (yes you) attention to some of the fine ones out there. We will also be doing this with some of the less popular boardgames we stock as well.

This week, we feature Castles & Crusades. This RPG dates back to the 3.0 D&D boom when dozens of companies brought out all sorts of RPG supplements for D&D under the OGL. Castles & Crusades is one of the very few companies (Paizo's Pathfinder RPG is another) to still survive from that era, the tagline being "Third edition rules, 1st edition feel." Troll Lord Games has always focused on recreating the style of adventures from the early days of D&D and AD&D, before there was a heavy emphasis on plot and campaign and adventures stood on their own, rather than linking together.

While characters have skills, character class is a major focus of C&C, much as it was in early AD&D and your character class defines what your character can do. If you like D&D 3.0 (or 3.5) or the play of Pathfinder, but Pathfinder has gotten too complex and materials for D&D 3.0 and 3.5 too hard to find (it is out of print after all), take a look at Castles and Crusades.

Three Books

In this week's Rolling for Initiative column, if you are interested in opening a game or comic store, or running a store in general, I would recommend reading these three.