Rended Press

As of today, the OSR OGL BLOGOSPHERE MONSTERS PROJECT has 53 entries! w00t! Remember, today is the last full day to add your creature to the file! I'll close the file sometime during the afternoon of August 1, probably around 5 pm CST. Remember: This is open to any creature you've posted on your blog at any point in 2012! You have one last day to do the cut & paste! Note: Please only share material that you feel comfortable appearing in a half-assed, crazy, DIY fan compilation. And don't forget about Community Project #2: The Young Green Dragon Over the Next Hill ! Garth needs some love, folks. We've only keyed about 1/3 of the encounter.

As of today, the OSR OGL BLOGOSPHERE MONSTERS PROJECT has 26 40 entries. I'll close the file sometime during the afternoon of August 1. Remember: This is open to any creature you've posted on your blog at any point in 2012! So come on, people. Do the cut & paste! Note: Please only share material that you feel comfortable appearing in a half-assed, crazy, DIY fan compilation.

I've updated the Quick-n-Dirty Creature Creation dice drop table based on feedback from Chris Creel . He suggested I move Cthulhu to a corner ( Bad Cthulhu! Go think about what you've done! ) so that it's not so easy to drop a die on that box. I've also plunked in a special attacks table at the bottom, again by Chris' suggestion. You can download the updated PDF via my Dropbox: Quick-n-Dirty Creature Creation Dice Drop Table EDIT: This dice drop table works great with the d80 table Porky just posted!

I've gone dice drop table crazy! Telecanter asked for it , so I've rolled out another dice drop table. You can download this new PDF via my Dropbox: Quick-n-Dirty Body Location Dice Drop Table

[EDIT: the table has been updated ] Because Telecanter asked for it , here is a Quick-n-Dirty Creature Creation dice drop table . I've altered his idea a bit; instead of using colored dice, I've gone for a "drop all the dice" method. Still, this should present some interesting results. Here's an example from the chart: The Zewaltyrabhundle The head looks like a zebra mussel, with a rough-textured, calcified covering. It's difficult to discern exactly how it senses and gets around the dungeon, but it does. Its tough, squat body is covered in dark skin covered with short, wiry, hairs and in truth it sort of resembles a walrus. Its forelimbs are small and fur-covered with strong claws useful for digging, as on a platypus, while its hind limbs are those of a jackrabbit---good for hopping away at high speed or for powerful kicking. The prehensile tail resembles that of a spider monkey, and gives the creature an extra attack. When it barks, it sounds like t

Here's a head-scratcher for you: why is there a dearth of Weird West RPG -specific adventure supplements? Sure, there are lots of fan-made adventures, encounter seeds , and support material for Deadlands that you could adapt, but why aren't there more specific adventure material for the Weird West RPG ? Is it because it is too rules lite that folks don't think it is worth sharing their ideas? Yes, there was the successful Weird West Indegogo Campaign , so there will be minis, Weird West Character Cards, and a few maps by Matt Jackson --but these are ancillaries to actual adventures & setting materials themselves! Simply put, we need more Weird West RPG specific gaming material. I've combed the OSR web to assemble a Google Docs compendium of what little material specific to the Weird West RPG I could find. I didn't ask permission from all you bloggers--but I've provided links to the source pages to give credit where credit is due. You can find

I received a nice surprise in my mailbox yesterday: a print copy of Dylan Hartwell's Labyrinth Lord compatible adventure module The Veiled Invocation . He had announced he was giving away some RPG stuff on his blog, Digital Orc , and I think that this is part of that giveaway. So, coolness and much praise to Dylan for sending me this awesome gift. And this morning I learned that you, too, can get your hands on a print copy! Dylan has decided to do a print run of The Veiled Invocation . At $3.99 (US), it's a reasonable price for a module that you could actually use to run a mini-campaign. Heck, I could even see this used as material sprinkled throughout an already existing campaign as a long-running side quest. The hook for the adventure is an NPC hiring the PCs to find and return several missing pages of a document. To do so, the PCs must travel far and wide across a sandbox setting. There are several specific nefarious locations and much room for a creative DM to flex h

I'm not one to beat dead horses before they are truly dead. But there's a horse over here that's whinnying away due to neglect. Community Project #2: The Young Green Dragon Over the Next Hill is still breathing. It might be on life support, withering slowly away, but it's still hanging in there, at least for now. Come on by and pay your last respects. Or maybe some kind soul can hit it with a defibrillator and bring it back to life. And here's something to sweeten the deal: If we finish this community project by this Labor Day, I'll submit BOTH community projects as events for KantCon 2013 --no matter how gonzo #2 gets. This would be my first attempt at DMing at a con. Those who know me know I run loose and gonzo as a player at cons, so you can imagine how I might actually run something. I'd probably run these under Labyrinth Lord or Swords & Wizardry Whitebox rules, but I just might go all Encounter Critical on players' asses, too--depends

Need a floor plan of a building? Or a ground plan of a castle or church? I got you covered. Here are some free maps via Wikimedia Commons . These maps are either in the public domain or are available under a Creative Commons license: Floor Plans Ground Plans

In case you are living under a rock, there is a lot of controversy about this year's "Best Free Product" nominees for this year's ENnie Awards. As Justin Halliday explains quite well , this award category is a farce—all but ONE of the free products are either quick-start rules for a for-pay product, promos for paid products, one-day free downloads, or, of all things, a conversion guide between campaign settings. And all of the nominees except for that conversion guide are from established, commercial publishers. Seriously—and especially in regards to that conversion guide—WTF?!? I have lots of free PDFs from RPG/OSR blogs and small-press or indie publishers and yet NONE of them were nominated. Why wasn't Secret Santicore nominated? Why not Heroes Against Darkness ? Or the  Hills Canton Compendium ? Or the  Lands of Ara Compendium . Or Blackmarsh for God's sake? I think it's time to start a fan based award system modeled on the The People's

In August of last year , I announced I was working on compiling all of the wee beasties that taichara has posted on her blog, A Hamsterish Hoard of Dungeons and Dragons . Today, I am happy to announce that this project is now complete! Taichara has reviewed this file and gives it her blessing, so you can now click below to download the PDF from my Dropbox account:   A Hamsterish Hoard of Monsters Click here to download, too! Please consider signing up for Dropbox (and installing the Dropbox software) via this referral link . Dropbox gives you 2GB of FREE online storage. For every person who signs up and installs the software to sync a Dropbox folder to a Dropbox account, I get a free 250MB of storage. This storage space is what I use to keep serving up all these delicious morsels of RPG goodness.

Coming soon—as in later this week!

[2012-07-17 Update: Now we are up to 24! Keep 'em coming, guys!] As of today, the OSR OGL BLOGOSPHERE MONSTERS PROJECT has ten entries. Ten. 10. WTF? Come on, people--comb your blogs and do the cut & paste. I'll leave the file open until the end of July. If you've posted a beastie to your blog, cut & paste it into the file. Let's get this thing cranking. I know it's mid-summer. I know you are tired and blogged out. But I also know you got more than 10 creatures hiding in your blogs. Per Tim's suggestion . . . LET'S OPEN THIS SUCKER UP TO ANY CREATURE YOU'VE POSTED SO FAR THIS YEAR! Note: Please only share material that you feel comfortable appearing in a half-assed, crazy, DIY fan compilation.

Despite being one of the most viewed posts this month, the OSR OGL Blogosphere Monsters Project only has 10 contributions. Come on, folks! I've read a lot of blog posts in June that were about new creatures. Definitely more than 10. So, you know, come on and add your creature to the file.

Hey Guys! Take a break from your Google+ hangout game and fill in a room of our newest community project: The Young Green Dragon Over the Next Hill .

I don't have a campaign going. But I'm finally getting around to answering Jeff's questions: What is the deal with my cleric's religion? He just really likes potatoes. Where can we go to buy standard equipment? The dwarves forge. The evil dwarven forge. It's the forge that's evil, not the dwarves. Poor dwarves. Where can we go to get platemail custom fitted for this monster I just befriended? Did you not read the answer to the second question? Moron. Who is the mightiest wizard in the land? Thumbtwiddle. Who is the greatest warrior in the land? It's a toss up between Buttercup and Holgrofth Snaggletooth. Who is the richest person in the land? Bob. But he doesn't know it. Where can we go to get some magical healing? Shhhhh . Magic is frowned upon here. But there's a witch in the eastern hills of Frogssothmuthth who might be able to help you out for a price. Where can we go to get cures for the following conditions: poison, dise

Over at The Signe of the Frothing Mug , Josh posted two articles about designing and running 0-level characters. These were originally going to be part of a fanzine Josh was working on called The Grognard that, in Josh's words "went the way of the dodo." I've compiled the two articles into a PDF via Google Docs. You can grab it at the link below from my Dropbox account: 0-Level Characters: A Guide

On this day in 1996, a smart-aleck Marine, a nerdy computer programmer, and an alcoholic redneck saved the world from alien invaders. May the world always be grateful for their sacrifice.

[EDIT: Come on, folks! Don't just be a bunch of lookie-loos--add your creature to the file!] Hey! Here's a crazy-batshit-insane idea! Let’s collect a month’s worth of monsters from the OSR blogs! Below is a link to an editable Google Docs word processing file. Copy & paste any creatures you’ve posted on your blog during the month of June 2012 into this document, including the stat block. Include a link back to the page on your blog where it originally appeared. Insert a page break after adding your creature. I’ll leave this document here, open for two weeks (until July 16). After that, I’ll close the editing, alphabetize the entries, slap in the OGL and post a PDF for download. And then I'll start a new file for July! OSR OGL BLOGOSPHERE MONSTERS PROJECT Note: Please only share material that you feel comfortable appearing in a half-assed, crazy, DIY fan compilation.