Enough already!

I used to work in the motorcycle industry for years, involved in marketing and sales and working at a lot of trade shows and one thing that was always present and you could not get away from it was... Scantily clad women.

There are some aspects of motorsport and the motor industry that are firmly stuck in the last century and REALLY need to catch up

Sadly fantasy and science fiction art were and to a lesser degree are, still very much similar. Women being used to sell genres and ideas, clad in little more than a bikini (sometimes metal) alongside the muscle-bound hero of the piece, of if the woman is the focus of the art work, wearing bugger all and draped over a large tiger or dragon.

ENOUGH ALREADY! The people that play fantasy and sci-fi games now are probably the most switched on generation with regards to gender and sex ever and I am not sure this use of the female form to sell things is necessary any more.

I am a member of an old fantasy art group on Facebook and if you look at the sort of people that post the pictures of semi naked women, it is predominantly white middle-aged and older men. The sort that had these sort of posters on their walls in the 80's.

And chain mail bikinis? WHY? What is the point? Even in some of the really popular fantasy artists are guilty of this, women warriors in totally pointless armour.

Armour is protection, it is there to stop you being made dead. Protecting your groin and breasts to the exclusion of everything else is just mindless, and clearly there again, to sell the artwork or the game, or the book.

This has all the main elements you need for cheesy sexploitation. Large cat, no armour of any worth on a woman famed for her fighting prowess.


If you insist on painting women and men with no armour who are fighters, please cover them in scars and lost limbs. You do not get out of a fight without armour without cuts, lots of cuts. They have examined the bones of people who were clearly fighters and they had massive disfiguring injuries. You don't get out of a fight unscathed... Ever. 

A skull found at the battle of Towton England, shows a fighter with a severe but healed facial wound. 

So, apart from being sexist, exploitative, these sorts of images, as skillfully done as they are, they are just not realistic. But but but… It's FANTASY! Yes... And? How many of you have fighters that have had a few hit points of damage in each combat encounter they have had? Do you think all those little cuts and bashes heal without leaving a scar? People scar, people get wounded, artsists are kind of ignoring this fact. Writers often do as well, with the odd exception. David Gemmell wrote of Druss that he was covered in scars, and he wore armour of sorts. David Gemmell did try to have a look at weapons and armour so he knew what they could and could not do at least. 

Modern Day Master | Thomas Christian Wolfe. Joan of Arc

It is totally possible to do it right and realistically in fantasy art, be inclusive. Don't be sexist, don't be racist and if you want to pander to the sad old sexists that sadly still exist, then expect your market place to die off. 

Bedd Taliesin Part 1

    A fly buzzed around Toby’s ear as he sat in the long, sun-burned brown grass on the cliff tops looking out over Cardigan Bay. He flicked it away without seeming to really notice the action. Sea birds were calling; somewhere in one of the fields behind, a lark was singing as it rose into the crystal clear blue sky. Around him the early morning summer sunshine was waking the insects and everywhere it seemed everything was springing into life. The field behind him had a few sheep with scraggy fleeces that needed shearing badly, the wool had started to fall off in clumps as it did when they were left alone. Dirty brown wool could be seen here and there in the field. They looked in poor condition.

    The fields looked a bit more overgrown than usual and the farm house he had passed on his way to the cliff tops was a tad more run down that it had been this time last year, but it had stood empty now for fifteen years and another year was not going to make much difference. Had this been a day a year ago, it would have been idyllic and perfectly normal. Now it just hammered home how alone he was. Toby guessed he was the only person around for miles in all directions. In an area that had once been populated by thousands of people, bustling little market towns, villages and hamlets, farms and small centres of industry, there was just him and his dog.

    He tried not to dwell on the last year, but it was nigh on impossible not to do so, so much had happened, so much had changed. This was an area of the cliffs his mother had loved and he had resisted coming here over the last year as he knew it would bring back painful memories, and it did. He felt his eyes stinging as tears started to well. He had cried a lot over the last year. Not for the first time he wondered where she was. Where any of them were.

****

    Toby had always been a keen reader and a bit of a loner, he lived with his dog in the small village of Taliesin in Mid Wales. The view from the back of his small terraced house looked down over the hill bordered valley down towards the sea by Ynyslas and Borth. The front of the house was on the busy main road that connected the university town of Aberystwyth and North Wales. It was only a thirty mile an hour zone through the small village, but it did not stop the big tankers thundering down the road. It was noisy and he longed to get away from it, but he had bought the cottage when the house prices were cheap and the mortgage was cheap and he just could not afford to move now. Work was slow and although he had enough work to keep him and his black Labrador Ben fed and watered and the mortgage paid and enough diesel in his battered old ex army Land Rover 110, that was basically it. He had never been brilliant with money and after a prolonged period of being constantly short and a bit reckless with his money he was only now in a period where he was sorting himself out. 

    “Enough is enough!” He had told himself one morning after another call from his bank. He had sat down and budgeted for the first time ever and was strict with it, no longer spending his money frivolously. Books he found in charity shops, as did the clothes he brought as and when they needed replacing. He had enough bits and bobs to last him a lifetime, his small house was cluttered enough as it was, books were piled high on shelves and floors, a collection of air rifles and knives were in cupboards and boxes. Fishing gear spilled out of the cupboard under the stairs jumbled in with all the camping gear he had amassed over the years. He had always found reasons and excuses to get more gear, now he reasoned he finally had enough and would just have to make do. Sometimes you just had to calm down. 

    Perhaps at the age of 33 he was starting to grow up a bit, his mother despaired of him he knew, but she was always there for him. Cooking him a meal once a week when he went over to see her and her husband, his step-dad who he adored. She sometimes still brought him clothes and food from time to time, she just could not help herself, and he was not about to tell her to stop. He was the only child and he knew she did spoil him from time to time, she always had.

    “Any girlfriends on the horizon?” His mom would ask him.

    “Nope, sorry, not interested.” Toby replied. “Who would want me any way, when I am not working I am usually out walking, camping, fishing or shooting. And when I am at home I am either in the shed or reading. I am not much of a catch mum, no money and no interest.”

    He had had a couple of girlfriends in the past, but nothing lasted for the reasons he had given many times before. It wasn’t that he wasn’t interested in women; it’s just that he wasn’t interested enough. He would rather be outside and more importantly, he would rather be on his own. He had always been like that. At school he had just bumbled through, not getting bad grades, but not getting good ones either. When he should have been reading his books to revise, he was reading fantasy and science fiction books instead. He had had friends, but nothing like the classical best friends he saw everyone else have. And when he left school and more importantly, when his mom moved to Mid Wales, he left them all behind and that was how he liked it. It was quite a selfish outlook on life he knew, his mother was desperate for grandchildren and all the trappings that went with it, but it was just not going to happen, not just yet anyway.

Rich 2021

Talking about running?

 Yes that's right, running, not running an adventure... Actual running. 

I shall start with a wee bit of personal history... I used to be fat, not just a bit overweight but proper fat. To the point where it was literally crippling me. Operations on my spine, paralysis and long periods in traction etc. It wasn't until a surgeon said "Mr future old Git... Unless you sort your weight out, you will end up in a wheel chair in your thirties." 

It quite honestly scared the crap out of me. The following week I lost 11lbs, I noticed the difference straight away. I felt better, happier and looked different. I lost more, started rock climbing, lost more weight, started running and got down from 19.5 stone to 13 stone. Felt wonderful and lifted my mood hugely.

Skip a few years, things were a bit rubbish and I was going through a rough patch and getting bouts of depression. I went to the doctor and he asked if I ran at all, I said I used to. He told me the best way to beat low moods and depression without chemicals is to run and do exercise. I started running again and it worked a treat. I got massively into running, did marathons and half marathons, my week revolved around my Sunday long run. 

What on earth has this got to do with TTRPG's I hear you ask?

I can't help noticing on Twitter especially how many role-players say they have mood issues, mental health issues and especially sleep problems. 

This isn't me preaching, this is me trying to help a bit. I know it's difficult at the moment with lockdown and everything, but exercise is a massive boost to your mood, it gives you free headspace time to think about game ideas, stories, scenarios, characters. Away form a screen or a TV, which do sap energy and don't always help with the creativity. It can help you to sleep, lift the dark thoughts and leave the demons behind you. Those things that can affect your creativity can literally be left eating your dust. 

It helps me loads. I plan and think about all the things I want to do when I am out, walking or running. It also has the added benefit of improved stamina, long game sessions fueled on coffee, coke and crisps get run on pure zest and energy then. It's a much healthier way of gaming. 

Sorry if I am preaching. It's not meant that way. I am fifty in a couple of years and if I did not run or walk, I would quite honestly go bonkers. Exercise can really help improve your gaming. 

Cardio is important

Mryddin's Circle

 One of the original old gits @Hopper_JT and I made contact last week after getting of for thirty years of no contact at all. It was a good evening spent chatting and reminiscing about events and people and our old gaming club. 

I moved to this area in 1989, straight from school aged 16, no friends here and just a fascination for fantasy books and painting Warhammer miniatures and with only a small amount of experience with roleplaying. On one of the first visits to the town I spotted a hand written poster in the local hobby shop where I purchased some miniatures. 

This is how we rolled back then, hand drawn posters and land line numbers6

It was for Myrddin's Circle, a roleplaying / gaming club in town. It had a name and a contact number. So for me, I did something that was very brave and I called and arranged to meet Jon. What followed was friendship that lasted directly for a year or so while Jon was in the area and fortunately has carried on where we left off. 

Quality posters, you don't get them like this any more... Sadly. 

Jon was great, he made me (aged 16) very welcome and suffered me being an irritating teenager at the games. But I learned a lot and he helped my find my roleplaying feet (not furry). We had a few extra players, Eric from Canada (also just made contact again after many years) and Griff and a few others. We even made the local paper at one point, because you know, Dungeons and Dragons was so weird and wacky back then!

Two members of the original Old Gits... Mryddin's Circle. That's me in the middle with the hair, when I still had hair. 1989!

Back in 1989 / 1990 there was a new thing just starting to be more heard of, Live Roleplaying, I had read about it and seen the amazing costumes in GM magazine and I had to do it! So I contacted one of the groups I had read about, Fools and Hero's and asked if I could set up a local branch. They ummed and ahhed about it as I was so young still, 17 at most. But they said yes, I got trained up, it was all very professional and the Aberystwyth branch of Fools and Hero's was opened. We celebrated with another hand drawn poster...

Fools and Hero's Aberystwyth. 

It ran quite well, even with the modest number of members we had in Aberystwyth. I went along to the festivals they held and again made a good number of new roleplaying friends. 

I can't begin to tell you how happy I was to see these pictures that Jon sent to me, I have not seen them for thirty years and in honesty, I had forgotten I set up the Fools and Hero's branch in Aber, when I was so young. 

This to me is proper roleplaying history, hand made, hand drawn, no smart phones and video screens... This is how us Old Git's rolled. 

PS..... I would love to get in touch with any of the old Fools and Hero's members if anyone knows of any?

Holding Out for a hero

 Now you all have Bonnie Tyler's famous song from 1984 going through your head, I kind of have your attention. 

For years when we were playing AD&D we had a very relaxed method of rolling up new characters, we would roll four D6, drop the lowest number and add the rest, do this six times for the stats and then do six sets of these and chose the best set. Plus we could arrange the numbers how we wanted them to assign them to the stats we wanted to be the better ones. 

Six sets of six, 4 D6 drop the lowest

We did this because not only did we not want to be limbered with really weak characters (weak characters are a pain for DM's as well as not much fun to play), but we jointly assumed that the sort of person who was going to be going off adventuring, was more than likely going to be above average in terms of capabilities. Stronger than average, better fighters, more intelligent, the most inquisitive and wise. Not content with the hum-drum life they had been given, they needed to seek adventure. 

There have always been alternative methods for creating characters, and we took this one and modified it to give us the best chance of having a character we wanted to enjoy playing. We did try playing with really restrictive stat rolling methods, but not a single player had fun, the DM struggled to make the adventures playable and not instantly deadly and we realised that most of the fun of roleplaying was being able to live out your fantasies and to play characters we kind of dreamed of being. 

There should always be an element of struggle and peril in a game, but not so much that it's just a chore and a grind trying to stave alive. We felt this relaxed rolling method worked the best for us, that and an understanding DM, if the six sets were all really pants.

I will leave you with Bonnie Tyler now so you can enjoy the Welsh singers best song ever. 

Rich 2021

The Joy of Hex

 Who here loves HEX paper?

MEEEEEEEEE!!!!!

I used to spend hours upon hours drawing maps, layouts and plans on hex paper pads purchased from game shops. I would selotape them together to make massive worlds, and then promptly losing interest in that world and start another one.

Happened all the time. For me, the joy was with the hex paper and the mapping, maps have always fascinated me. I was a member of my local mountain rescue team for a while and as a keen outdoorsman I can and do spend hours looking at maps. So to have a blank piece of hex paper and an overabundance of imagination fizzing away it was pure joy. Space maps, fantasy maps, town maps and dungeon layouts, all were possible and easy top use on HEX paper. 

I have not seen it in shops for a while, it's all gone virtual, but some kind soul sent me some pdf's of hex paper to print off and use again when I have time (that's the crux... time) to start planning adventures again.

What to do? The imagination I feel has been dulled by years of work drudgery and the need to be an adult, I would love to feel the same fizz again of ideas, of waking up buzzing to get started on a new world, new maps, new cities. That fire I am sure will come back.

The joy of HEX

Does anyone else still get the same thrill from using pens, pencils and HEX paper?

It started with a Hobbit

 Well...it sort of started with the Hobbit. Picture the scene if you will. It's 1978 and a young me is off to the cinema to see Ralph Bakshi's Lord of the Rings. I didn't know what the film was about, other than the cool poster

The film just captured my imagination and I have a soft spot for the movie today. I still own a copy! I found myself wondering about this story. The young me wondered if it had anything to do with the Hobbit. A story that had appeared on a kids show of the time called Jack-a-nory. I wondered if it had anything to do with those intimidating books I saw in the library. The drama teacher at my school had posters of certain characters on his wall. I had wondered for years who they were. Now I knew. It had captured my imagination in ways that no other kids movie had. I started reading fantasy. I started reading those intimidating books. I played the Hobbit on my old spectrum 48k (very old school home computer). That might have been that though, had it not been for the fact that I also had joined a wargaming group, roughly about the same time. 

One day I saw an advert for our wargame club, with a new offering called "Middle Earth" gaming. I was excited. When I saw one of the teachers who ran the club, I asked him what "Middle Earth" gaming was about.

His reply was:

"Not really sure to be honest. Something about knights charging each other in tunnels"

I tried to imagine what that would look like. I also couldn't recall anything like that happening in Lord of the Rings. And so I walked away, slightly deflated.

When the club met later that week, I had a chance to see "Middle Earth" in action. A group of boys had got a table at the back of the room. A green cloth had been thrown over it. Books were placed underneath to make hills. A few props placed on it. Some large miniatures were present that sort of looked like hobbits.

I watched this game for a short while. I have to be honest, I was not impressed. They spent most of the evening arguing over rules. The rules were of course the original dungeons and dragons boxed set. I didn't know what dungeons and dragons was, but what I did know, is that this game had nothing whatsoever to do with "Middle Earth". I got tired of watching this group go round robin on some interpretation of the rules. I didn't get it and frankly didn't care to.

And so the years pass. Middle Earth faded from view. Real life intervened and I could easily have gone down a different path. One Saturday, I chanced across a sci-fi magazine in the local news agents. It was an American mag, called Astounding tales. Quite rare to see something like that in the UK at that time. It was an impulse buy and it put me back on the path so to speak. It was the usual collection of articles and short fiction. As I read it, I found one article in it concerning something called "Roleplaying Games" - I didn't know what these were, but I read the article all the same. Man! That article lit a fire in me that day. It not only explained what the hobby was, but gave a description of a crazy game that was a mix of high fantasy and Sci-fi. I was completely hooked. The passion with which the author had treated his subject, sold me on roleplaying. I also realised that this is what those boys from my time in School had tried to do but failed. They were playing it wrong - came the cry. (an issue for another blog perhaps) I would do better I thought. The problem was - how? I was too young and inexperienced to consider homebrewing something. I knew I had to get my hands on one of these games. It was then that fortune fell in my lap in the shape of an old wargaming magazine, called "The Wargamer" - this issue though, was a roleplaying special. I'm having that I thought and raced off home with my treasure. In it, it had a few essays on the hobby, but it also had a "pick your path to adventure" solo scenario. I can't remember much about it, but it was the first time I had an example of what a game could be like and let me try it out. The magazine had one more surprise for me. It had a review of a game being released in the UK. The game was called: Runequest. The review was quite the glowing one and I was determined to get a copy in my hands ASAP.  I had to wait a while, but one Xmas eve I was given money to go and buy it. (My folks were worried they'd end up buying the wrong thing.) I went to a game store (long since gone sadly) and picked up a copy and was advised to also pick up a packet of Dragon Dice, which I did. It will come as no surprise to anyone, that I started reading it as soon as I got home.

Runequest 2nd edition. It was everything I could have wanted. It was also a very easy system to pick up, especially for someone who was coming into this via an old movie and some magazine articles. It was clear from the outset that the game was a bronze age setting. The ducks threw me (ducks are playable race in the game) but the rest of the setting gave off strong vibes of Conan, Robert Adams Horse clans, the Sinbad movies like Eye of the Tiger and the old Jason & the Argonauts movie from the 60s. Runequest was a world with some very unique ideas at the core of it. It was a mix of ancient Babylon, Ancient Greece, Rome and plains Indians of America. It had no orcs or goblins. Trolls were an ancient race and not evil. Elves looked like man sized Ents. And yes, lets not forget the the Ducks. Everyone can use magic, Rune Lords and Rune Priests could wield God Power. Spirits could be captured and bound. Hero Quests could be attempted were characters would reenact ancient deeds of valour. At the heart of it was a very simple percentage system. First chance I had, I ran the first scenario set in the town of Apple Lane. From that moment the die had been cast and my path set.

From Glorantha, I would be dungeon delving in Tunnels and Trolls. Flying rusty old Free Traders in Traveller. Play survivors of the apocalypse in games like Aftermath, The Morrow Project and Gamma World. I play in westerns and play as Samurai in games like Bushido. Fought ancient alien and godlike beings in Call of Cthulhu. And yes - I finally got to Middle Earth via the Middle Earth roleplaying game. It would be a full 10 years before I finally encountered Dungeons and Dragons again. This time it was 2nd Edition "Advanced" Dungeons and Dragons. The difference here, apart form the mechanics. Was that the previous games all had worlds built around them. AD&D had none as part of its core rules. You had to buy into a world separately. But I encountered most of them From Greyhawk to Spelljammer, though I still rate the old Lankhmar setting as my favourite. I like the old sword and sorcery tales best.

It was quite a convoluted journey to get into the hobby. A movie. A terrible example of D&D. A couple of magazine articles. Glad I took the trip.

Rock n Roll Generation

 I was watching the Lemmy Rockumentary the other night, he was a man from a very different generation to where we are now. 

That's kind of how I feel. 

I have been away from the roleplaying world for a good number of years now, and although I have never truly disengaged from it, I have not been active or mixed with people who are currently active in it, until recently. 

Before I get too involved, I think you need to know a bit more about me as it is entirely possible I will get badly judged for some of the things I am going to say. I am (very) left wing and active in my politics, I would describe myself as an anarcho-socialist and pro LGTBQ and equal rights, civil rights. I am what a lot of people would describe as "woke", but...

Roleplaying back in the late 80's and 90's was a group of mates playing in a smelly bedroom, usually there was porn on a TV in the background, there was lots of cigarettes being smoked, often joints lots of crap food, fry-ups and endless bags of crisps and chocolate. The games were full of dreadful jokes, bad puns and really poor sexual innuendo along the lines of DM "Dawn comes"... The players in unison "Orgasm noises". 

Oddly enough, far from being the outcasts in the town we lived in, we were some of the cooler cats. I had moved from a place where being a nerd was bad to where being a nerd was cool. We loved it! We drank, smoked too much and played AD&D badly. We argued not over rules but over what we thought was physically possible, we never put any thought into characters backstory, they were just poor copies of characters from books, my mate basically played Rasitlin, but because he was a bit lacking in imagination, called him X the Mystic because he could not come up with another name. 

We hit imaginary monsters with imaginary weapons and cast imaginary spells in imaginary situations and laughed and laughed and laughed. And that was it.

And now coming back into it after a gap of many years I see things like this, and I feel kind of lost. 

Alien concepts to me

And please please please do not think I am posting this example to make fun of it, it is merely an example of things similar to what I have found recently. 

To me, the above example is completely alien to me, not only do I struggle with the terminology, I just don't recognise it as part of roleplaying. I am not saying it's bad or wrong, I simply do not understand it or see it as part of what I remember a game to be.

I would love to hear some of your feedback on this. I know I grew up in a time when feelings were repressed, gender issues were not discussed other than to use as insults and they certainly played no part in roleplaying, what to us was a way to kill a few hours on a Sunday evening. 

I love roleplaying, I used to spend hours making maps, writing scenarios, reading fantasy and sci fi books (still do) and use them as inspiration for games. I am a total sci-fi and fantasy art nerd and I totally love arms and armour. But seeing people get so emotional over characters, agonising over drawing maps and seemingly seeking confirmation from other gamers over their feelings, just leaves me confused. 

I am not saying what goes on today is wrong, I need to get used to it, it's not going to change for me! I am not saying our games were wrong, they brought us endless hours of pleasure, what I am saying is us older rock and roll generation of gamers need to understand where the new players are coming from, and they also need to understand where us old gits are coming from at times.

Its a voyage of discovery for me now again. I am an old git in a new and alien world so please go easy on us old gits, we are often confused. 

Dungeon Master... Old school

Let's get muddy (Possibly)

 What started as a fairly innocent conversation on Twitter has sparked an idea that is continuing to grow.

A Table Top Roleplaying Festival... A place for you and your mates to come for a weekend, meet up, game, drink, listen to music, have a laugh and then go home with some festival tales and a wrist band. 

The Old Gits are working on it at the moment, it's still very much in it's infancy and we very much need Covid-19 to hurry up and do one, but it's there as an working plan. 

Rolefest or Burning Elf

Contacts are being made locally and discussions are being held, but what we want is people to come forward with ideas and suggestions, possible pit falls and things to look out for etc. Please do not be shy, spread the word and see if we can get this thing off the ground.

We will use this blog to keep you posted on any developments so keep checking in. 

Any ideas or offers of help please get in touch with us at oldgitsanddragons@gmail.com