Congratulations to Bards and Sages Publishing on the release of the Karma Roleplaying System Core Rules Book! After a series of supplements, potential players now have access to the basic rules of the game.

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The Harn roleplaying game, both system and setting, is one of those games that seems to have been around forever. Publisher Columbia Games, however, continues to release supplements and the latest is Grave-Wights, a free 4 page PDF article put out in time for Halloween (even if this post wasn’t). Known for its gritty approach to a low-magic medieval setting, Harn is also about detail. Case in point, another recent supplement for HarnWorld contained detailed stats for domestic cats, as well as this information:

Habitat & Hunting

Domestic cats hunt in the twilight hours. They hunt vermin and birds. They can live in any habitat, but have a preference for warm areas.

Domestic cats prefer stalking their prey and jumping down upon it. A cat’s leap gives it more than sufficient height against vermin, although the tactic does not work as well against birds.

A female is fertile after 4-10 months. The gestation period is about 60 days. The average litter is 3-5 kittens. Males are fully grown after 5-7 months. Female cats den together. Males tend to leave one clowder and join another on a whim. Domestic cats rarely hunt together, but they return at least a portion of their kills to the clowder for the kittens.

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This nifty ring is useful for keeping track of life counters or hit points, depending on what gets your geek on.

It says that it counts from 0 to 99, but any fool can see that you can count from -999 to +999 on it.

A little quiz: Say you had two of these rings, one in each color. How high could you count?

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Brisbane, Australia: Thieves break into a private home and steal a 17th century hand-carved ivory chess set. (source)

Appleton, WI: RPG store owner suspected of having sexual relationship with 15 year old girl customer. (source)

Martensdale, IA: Self-described video, board, and LARP gamer kills elderly couple by running them off the road with his car at a high speed. Claims not guilty of vehicular homicide, because he hadn’t had more than six beers and some acid tabs. (source)

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Perhaps it’s just me, but I’ve been noticing more of these recently. Maybe the passing of Gary Gygax has something to do with it. Whatever the reason, here’s a few more references to the cultural influence of Dungeons & Dragons:

In an interview with The National Post about his Pulitzer Prize winning novel, The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, author Junot Diaz describes how he drew on his past to write about a socially awkward Dominican teen who likes science fiction, comic books, and D&D.

A recent article in Forward reviewed the latest young adult novel by Mattue Roth, Losers, in which we encounter another outcast protagonist who listens to indie music, reads comic books, and plays Dungeons & Dragons.

The Spazmatics, an 80s cover band, cites Star Wars, Dungeons and Dragons, Rick Springfield, Billy Idol, The Cure, and Flock of Seagulls as their influences.

Houseguest is a band with a musical style that I’m not qualified to explain. In an interview with the Cleveland Scene, the group’s singer, Theodore Mallison, explained with this quote how little he cares about the convenience of labels, “I’m really into medieval history, and there’s a void in my life because nobody around here wants to play Dungeons & Dragons.”

The animated television series, Futurama, has mentioned the game before. However, a soon-to-be-released feature, Bender’s Game, in this case transports the characters to a fantasy setting where Bender becomes a knight, Leela is a centaur, and Fry a dragon. An extra feature available on the DVD is called “Dungeons & Dragons and Futurama.”

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There’s now another format option for Trail of Cthulhu, the Gumshoe-based RPG. This one might be considered a bit extravagant, but somehow it seems thematically appropriate. At IPR, it is now available leatherbound for $89. However, quantities are extremely limited. At the time of posting, there were only five remaining.

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As Yehuda has pointed out before, be this a lesson for you publishers… Cool new stuff gets you coverage on the news blogs. And the cool stuff keeps flowing from One Bad Egg. This time we’ve got Half-Dead, a race of beings infected with necrotic magic, who “hound their foes relentlessly, driven to action by the horror of their condition.” Perfect, of course, for your Halloween D&D game—oh, come on, I know that’s what you’re doing Friday night. And if you pay attention, I understand the company has a few more horrible treats coming over the next couple of days.

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The latest release from One Bad Egg delivers on the company’s promise to enhance your 4th Edition D&D with options that build interesting stories. Shrouded Paths: The Unbroken is about what happens when a Paladin loses faith but manages to return stronger than ever. It includes a new paragon path, a new magic item, a monster template, and a faithless angel.

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The latest in Highmoon Media Productions’ Heroic Moments series sees our heroes fighting monsters spawned by a young girl’s mutant powers and overactive imagination, and fueled by large quantities of sugar. Oh gosh, it must be Halloween!

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Gold, the “web series that does double damage”, is a production about professional RPGers coming this fall. It is written by David Nett & Andrew Deutsch, from a story by David Nett.

Carpe DM.

View the trailer

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