Free GM Resource: Free Map Tiles by Madcowchef (via Devient Art)

Unfortunately my day job has me offsite for a month, which has been.....interesting so far. Let's just leave it at that, shall we?

I'd spent some of my unexpected free time this weekend looking for some specific art resources for a project I'm working on and even though I doubt I'd ever be able to use anything found on the site I did poke around Deviant Art a little bit and cane across the work of "Madcowchef", specifically a few sets of  freebie map tiles.

As of the timing of this post there looks to be eight (8) sets of tiles: Underground, Forested, Diabolic Fiery Waste, Winterscape, Fortifications, Tree City, Desert, and Swamp. They're a bit small for my taste at 72dpi and a size of 14"ish square, but I'm sure that some GMs could get some really good use out of them. I'm coming around to the idea of printing them up small and using them as mini, mini maps, like this idea from my buddy @billiambabble: 

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I'm playing around with my "Pocket Edition" Dungeon Cut-Ups. The pencil has been added for scale since the flagstone squares are only 10mm wide. A cork tile makes a handy non-slip surface (failing that, you still have the option of pinning pieces down). I sell the Inked Adventures Dungeon Cut-Ups Cards in my Etsy store. :) Either search for "Inked Adventures" on Etsy, or try http://bit.ly/IA_Etsy Shipping from UK to the world. :) #DnD #TTRPG #dungeonsections #dungeontiles #RPG #dungeonmap #Etsy #tabletop #illustration #InkedAdventures

A post shared by billiambabble (@billiambabble) on Jul 15, 2019 at 1:36pm PDT

Regardless of the specifics on how I'd use these freebie map tiles I thought I'd share and see if any of my 12, or is it now 13....(?)...irregular readers get up to utilizing these cool small-scale maps.

Free GM Resource: Daniel's Maps (Free Maps on Patreon)

I've been spending this week at work (so far) up to my elbows dealing with computer upgrades, software updates, and documenting things so my more computer-illiterate co-workers (hey, they self-identified!) could deal with issues down the road. When I come home I've been staying off the computer to re-charge.

Well tonight I fired up the laptop and poked around/caught up on Facebook and came across this one map artist advertising his free maps. Daniel's Maps is a Patreon page and most of his offerings are for Patrons, BUT he does have some good freebie maps for download.

I'm digging what I'm seeing and am going to seriously consider adding Daniel's Maps to my already-too-large list of my own Patronage. Seriously though, check out his Patreon and enjoy the freebies he's made available.

Free GM Resource: Ruins of Arduin Swords & Wizardry Campaign Supplement

The most popular game my buddy and I played (i.e., his favorite) at North Texas RPG Con was Swords & Wizardry. Because of his interest (he actually bought a rulebook, which was highlighted years ago as a Free GM Resource).

I've been poking around a bit, looking for some PC sheets, and came across this awesome homebrewed Swords & Wizardry campaign.......that has been published as a 65 page PDF.

Ruins of Arduin is the name of the blog where the author shares this supplement of the same name. I've just barely scanned it, but I'm looking forward to reading this later.

Head on over to Ruins of Arduin and check it out!

Free GM Resource: A Twofer of Judges Guild Goodness, Both Old & New

I've never hidden the fact that I'm a HUGE HackMaster fan. While I don't get to play the current edition pretty much at all, I did get a lot of gaming in on the earlier, technically 1st, edition which we all called 4th Edition Dungeons & Dragons. The HackMaster development team described HackMaster as "50% 1st Edition, 25% 2nd Edition, and 25% Home Rules"

.....Anyway, you're probably wondering where I'm going with this.

I like playing OSR games, and I also like Zines. The only thing better than an OSR Zine is an actual Zine from back in the day. If you're one of my 12 regular readers you know I picked up a whole bunch of Judge's Guild stuff on my last day at North Texas RPG Con. So I guess I have a good start towards my collection.....I think?

The first Free GM Resource I want to share this week is the Judges Guild Booty List. With the indexes contained there I can see what issues I'm missing in my new collection. Not nearly as much as I thought I would be missing.

Now that's the "old" Judges Guild. The new Judges Guild has some rules, some maps, and a Character Generator available for download.

North Texas RPG Con: Day 4 Report

The last day of a con is always a bit bittersweet. I didn't have any games scheduled, but my buddy had heard about a morning game he wanted to get in on, so we woke up way too early, grabbed breakfast, and was good to go in case the game started at 0900.

North Texas RPG Con: Day 3 Report

Ok folks, this is a down & dirty day 3 report because it is almost 2 AM, I want to game in the morning, and I'm beat.

Had a "straight" Dungeon Crawl Classics game right after breakfast, a game with the esteemed Tim Kask, then a charity auction, then a 1st Edition AD&D game with Lloyd Metcalf , then the wild & crazy Midnight auction.

The only "haul" from today were three items I won at the Midnight Auction. These pics are fuzzier than I'd like and I really should explain, but it is almost 2 AM......

I'll try to cover everything in a convention wrap-up post. Until then.....good night.

North Texas RPG Con: Day 2 Report

Today was a busy day at North Texas RPG Con. It's late and I have an early game tomorrow, so this will be a brief brief, as it were.

Started the morning with a Swords & Wizardry game, specifically the Mythrus Tower setting for low level PCs. The game was run by the main man himself, Matt Finch. We finished a bit early and we were to have a good four hours until our next scheduled game, but we had a different Swords & Wizardry Mythrus Tower game as an ad hoc session with another GM.

We got about an hour before our next game, which was a BX d30 centric game. I bit the big one by failing a saving throw for Dragon's Breath in the final encounter. Actually I made the 1st roll, kind of, but since the die skipped out of my designated Die-Rolling-Zone I didn't count it and re-rolled appropriately, going from a 17 to a 4. Still had a lot of fun, so no big loss.

I just realized that my gaming buddy Shad has not lost a game or PC yet this convention......the bastard. He's in bed snoring away right now and it'd be too easy to break out the bowl of warm water........

Today's "haul" of gaming goodness was me going for quality over quantity. I picked up the World Map and Gazetteer for $15. I just really liked the map. I thought the adventures were a bit much at $10 a pop, but I'll probably break down and buy them anyway. I also try to pick up some new art pieces at every convention. If I can afford it I'll go for an original over a print. I managed to pick up Doug Kovacs' "Knight Dragging Ogre", which is in the core Dungeon Crawl Classics book. It isn't a large piece, but I really like it. While I love his work, most seems to scream "DCC" to me, so this piece strikes me as more system neutral.

North Texas RPG Con: Day 1 Report

Day 1 of North Texas RPG Con is finished, at least for me. The day started with and unexpected run to Walmart for deodorant because for some inexplicable reason the deodorant was missing from my pre-packed ditty bag. I travel a lot for work so I have my toiletries pre-packed and I should be good to go. No biggie since I didn't schedule any games until the afternoon.

I picked my buddy up at the airport around 1230 and after check-in and lunch we played our first game of the con, which was War Pigs. I started out the game at a severe disadvantage, but by playing defensively until the end I managed to almost win.......my buddy finally got his Naval Gunfire to work right and waxed me just as I was about to take out his tank full of troops. It was more fun than I had expected and I could see War Pigs be a good first-step for getting kids into war-games, assuming that was a goal.

Later we played in a Planet Meat adventure (I think it was part of a new supplement) for Dungeon Crawl Classics. It was hella gonzo and just off-the-way crazy....and fun. I'm usually more of a fan of "serious" RPGs, but if you get to play in one of Doug Kovacs' games......DO IT! I don't think I'd enjoy him as a regular GM, just because of a clash of styles, but I'll be the first to say that I could not run, even with a Co-GM, the number of players he does while having everyone enjoy the game. We had one survivor in the game and it sure wasn't my poor PC, but again I did make it almost to the very end. I ended up missing a critical Luck roll by 1, or we could have had two survivors.

Not too much loot picked up today. I had a set of metal dice, including a d30, to give to my favorite d30 Table Generator, Richard LeBlanc, Jr./New Big Dragon Games. He, in turn, gifted me some of his new stuff, which I am so looking forward to viewing/reviewing.

Not a bad 1st day of the con.......