Mystara Marches On!

As I posted in Mystara Community History discussion at The Piazza yesterday, 2013 is significant to the Mystara community as the year when Mystara modules returned to PDF. In addition to that Bruce Heard is posting even more Alphatia material on his blog, giving us the full details on the Kingdom of Ar.

Yesterday I got news that the Vaults of Pandius just got a new update! This update includes many old articles, including material from Bruce Heard there as well. Click here to see whats new.

If you are on Facebook, make sure to join the Mystara Reborn group to socialize with other Mystara fans and authors from the Golden Age. Also 127 people now "like" Aleena the Cleric. Are you one of them? :)

-Havard

Supplement II Blackmoor Coming Back in Print!

Its been all over the social media and forums today. I think the first place I noticed it was TAD's post on The Piazza where he writes that Wizards of the Coast will release a printed premium, deluxe edition of the Original D&D "White Box".

The price is a little steep, 150 USD, but based on the pictures it looks gorgeous. For Dave Arneson fans like myself it is also worth noting that the box includes Supplement II: Blackmoor! That is right. I only yesterday wrote about the DA2 Temple of the Frog returning as a PDF, but now you can get your hands on a real physical copy of the original Temple of the Frog as well!

Those who said Blackmoor was gone forever are sorely mistaken! :)



More discussion of this article.

-Havard

DA2 Back on Sale!

February is Temple of the Frog month it seems! I only just talked about how Monte Cook is sneaking in a reference to the legendary Dave Arneson adventure in his upcoming Numenera RPG. Temple of the Frog was of course the first TSR published adventure, appearing in Supplement II: Blackmoor. TSR later published an expanded version, DA2 Temple of the Frog.

As most of you will know, WotC have been bringing back some of the classic edition PDFs this year in cooperation with DrivethruRPG. It is interesting to see DA2 being so high up on the list of modules being brought back. I am delighted that it is once again legally available to fans.

Several versions of the Temple of the Frog have appeared over the years:

D&D Supplement II (TSR) - 1975
DA2 Temple of the Frog (TSR) - 1986
Return to the Temple of the Frog (WotC) - 2007
Temple of the Frog D20 (ZGG)  - 2007

The Temple also appeared as part of the Blackmoor MMRPG Campaign.

When will we see yet another new version of the Temple?



(More discussion of this article)

-Havard

A Sexier Temple of the Frog by Monte Cook

Aegir over at the Comeback Inn forum pointed me in the direction of this stunningly beautiful painting by artist Matthew Stawicki.

Known as Le Temple De Frogue (I don't know French, so I guess it could mean anything ;) ), this fantastic location is part of Monte Cook's latest endevour of Numenera. According to the Numenerea website Le Temple De Frog is located in the Caecilian Jungle. With its many crosses between fantasy and science ficiton, I could have sworn I had brought up Numenera earlier on this blog, but I guess I never got around to it.

Automaton by Guido Kuip

Ever since Monte Cook walked away from D&D Next, I have been curious to see what this game designer was up to. Running side projects such as the Unbegotten Citadel with James Raggi (LotFP) and lately the news of the Planescape Torment Computer game Sequel set in Numenera with Colin McComb are all things that sound great in my book!

From the start I thought Numenera had a Blackmoor vibe to it with Automatons and other sci fi references tossed into its fantasy(?) setting, but with the Temple included as well, I know I am going to check it out :) By the way, if you like Matthew Stawicki's art you can find more of it in his gallery here.

More discussion of this topic here.

-Havard

Toska Rusa Miniature Available!

As I reported a few weeks back, the Blackmoor miniatures are back! ArmorcastDLL is not allowed to use the Blackmoor Trademark names, but these miniatures are still the same ones that Lance & Laser made during the Zeitgest Games Era of Blackmoor products. Even more exciting, this includes the limited edition Toska Rusa miniature that apparently Lance & Laser never got around to making! Toska Rusa is of course as most of you will know, the queen of the Afridhi, detailed in DA4 The Duchy of Ten.

Best news of all, these miniatures are all available now! As Glenn from Armorcast writes:

 The minis are all up in the webstore. I have found three minis that were late releases and the limited miniature. The Frogmen set was one of the last to be listed, the evil sorceress was the limited miniature and the casting sorceress was the regular production variant, that was never released. Are all available here at www.armorcast.com under Lance and Laser miniatures.

I know that Armorcast will have one new customer for sure. How about the rest of you? Visit Armorcast's website now.

More details on which miniatures you need to get here.


-Havard

Nosnra Comes to D&D Next

Nosnra is of course the notorious antagonist of the classic AD&D adventure G1 Steading of the Hill Giant Chief. WotC now reveals that this adventure will appear as part of the D&D Next playtest run later this year.  G1 was the first adventure module published by TSR, unless you count Temple of the Frog, which was part of Supplement II of course. Does this mean we might get to see yet another rendition of Temple of the Frog as well?

In the module written by Gary Gygax, Nosnra the Giant, is of course a reference to our own Dave Arneson, so this gives reason to celebrate here at the Blackmoor blog!



Image Source: http://www.flickr.com/photos/dungeonmaster/150871610/


-Havard

Blackmoor Miniatures Return in 2013!

When Dave Arneson's company Zeitgeist Games announced that they were relauncing Blackmoor back in 2003, the company Lance & Laser obtained the lisence to produce miniatures for the setting. The miniature line included Ash Goblins, Beastmen, Afridhi, Thouls and other classic Blackmoor creatures. I posted more pictures and details about these miniatures in this blog article.

Now the old Dave Arneson miniatures are due to return thanks to Armorcast LL:

"All of the old Arneson Select molds and masters have been purchased by Armorcast at www.armorcast.com. The miniatures will be re-released during the first quarter of 2013.
 -Steve aka Ginfritter VP Armorcast LLC"

This could be my chance to finally get my own Blackmoor miniatures! :)


-Havard