machfront
11th level Troll
Stalwart of the Trollbridge
"Let's go dark!"
Posts: 2,147
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Post by machfront on Jan 20, 2009 3:59:13 GMT -5
Wow, it's been months since I logged on to the Trollbridge, my how its grown. Excellent. This thread made particularly interesting reading... Holy cow! I wasn't posting much back when you were still here regularly, but oddly enough I'd recently wondered where you'd been. Welcome back!
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Post by dwayanu on Jan 21, 2009 0:05:25 GMT -5
I learned the other day that McEwan's Star Guard rules and models are still in production. Everyone and his dog has heard of D&D, but what's in the mass market is hardly recognizable next to the game of 35 years ago. Along the way, a lot of other games have come and gone. Yet -- even commercially -- SG endures, and T&T abides.
Is it being handled much differently than in the past? Is there any clear reason it ought to be so? Even if there is, I would still pause to count the blessings. We don't have to hunt eBay for books, and there's a stream of new stuff from "that company".
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machfront
11th level Troll
Stalwart of the Trollbridge
"Let's go dark!"
Posts: 2,147
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Post by machfront on Jan 21, 2009 4:19:27 GMT -5
You make a whole lotta sense there, dwayanu. I guess it isn't very much different production and distribution-wise. It's, at it's core, still very much the same game, which is a minor wonder considering other games and considering it's age.
Still, with the relative ease of publishing and of course the internet, you'd think it would be a bit more...I dunno...visable as well as being better supported from either FBI or FDP. *shrug*
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Boozer
4th Level Troll
Visit The Hobgoblin's Tavern today!
Posts: 299
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Post by Boozer on Jan 21, 2009 15:23:42 GMT -5
Thanks machfront, I've had a torrid last year but getting life back in order now and more importantly I'm writing for T&T again
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Post by gamepunk26 on Jan 22, 2009 13:45:16 GMT -5
It seems with the current popularity of indie games that either FBI or FDP would jump onboard. T&T is, after all, an independent RPG and just as good as any of the others out there today. It is innovative, open ended, and highly mutable. It is also one of the most affordable (especially if you get the 7.5 box. It is loaded.). Why must T&T be in such inept hands in this era of RPG rebirth?
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koraq
4th Level Troll
Posts: 355
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Post by koraq on Jan 22, 2009 14:00:31 GMT -5
FDP is a very curious beast. I don't understand what they are doing at all. Give "that guy" a shout and he might give you some idea of how it is to work with them.
FBI on the other hand is interesting. Rick have been around since 1970 and his company is not big and famous, but he has outlived all other game companies there are out there. (yes, there was a thread about it on rpg.net and Greg Stafford confirmed that apart from his old pals at Chaosium (the next oldes one) the oldest company out there is FBI) He must be doing something right, as a business.
Why is he no longer actually producing any RPG stuff though? To risky? To little money to be gained? Maybe I should just ask him.
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Post by dwayanu on Jan 22, 2009 17:01:00 GMT -5
IIRC, "back in the day," Flying Buffalo's main business (one in which it was a pioneer) was computer-moderated play-by-mail games. I wonder whether that's still so, perhaps updated to some kind of play-by-Internet format.
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Post by apeloverage on Jan 25, 2009 12:00:55 GMT -5
Maybe Flying Buffalo's lack of interest in role-playing games is the thing he's doing right.
(although why not do a d20-style license allowing people to make supplements but keeping a monopoly on the core rules).
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Post by Mhegrrrim Skulltosser on Jan 26, 2009 23:07:25 GMT -5
To those afraid of flying don't forget the train! There are a lot of challenges for us all. I hope there are some big lottery (or lotto) winners among this group. It is a fun trip. Here is my biggest gripe about T&T 7ed: Looking on Teri Bergquist's site I found an old style T&T character Name: Dihralk Nephu Class: Warrior Level: 8 STR 21; DEX 27; CON 25; IQ 18; LK 46; CHA 18; SPD 17 Check out his level... Hmmm poor b*st*rd dropped all the way back to L4 (if converted to T&T 7) What options do we have to restore Dihralk back to his position as a fearsome NPC?
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Post by castiglione on Jan 26, 2009 23:40:52 GMT -5
IIRC, "back in the day," Flying Buffalo's main business (one in which it was a pioneer) was computer-moderated play-by-mail games. I wonder whether that's still so, perhaps updated to some kind of play-by-Internet format. FBInc is still running its play-by-mail games, although I think most players play them by e-mail. Its PBM games were always its main line of business and T & T was always a side-line...which is odd, when you look at the production values of Sorcerer's Apprentice. There was also a time when they launched BLADE, the non-PBM-game wing of FBInc but that seemed to have faded away. I don't know how much of a business its PBM games are. FBI's big cash cow still seems to be Starweb, which has been in existence for a long time.
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koraq
4th Level Troll
Posts: 355
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Post by koraq on Jan 30, 2009 8:41:30 GMT -5
Yeah, it's correnct that the pb(e)m apparently is Ricks main business.
He said the reason he don't print RPG to any great extent is he has used the money for FreeRPGDay instead. I have no idea if it makes sense, but as apeloverage said maybe staying away from RPG is what he is doing right...
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unclecranky
5th Level Troll
(mutter...grumble)
Posts: 657
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Post by unclecranky on Jan 30, 2009 10:06:37 GMT -5
I had a bit of trouble locating this place the first time, but since then, I've been able to hop right to it. I've NEVER had trouble locating T&T based sites on the internet. You guys need to remember that when T&T was invented, Ken, Liz, and the rest were just kids, barely out of high school if that old, and were doing it as a labor of love. I think that Rick saw and admired their chutzpah, for want of a better word, and indulged them. It worked out very well, and nowadays, we still play the only game whose main focus hasn't changed from action/adventure to soap-opera-ish 'oh dear, I need to find my MOTIVATION for this outfit change'. T&T was and is, by the admissions of most of its creators, a sideline, something of a hobby, something of an obsession. All of that isn't to say that it hasn't been handled poorly at times, but at least its poor handling hasn't resulted in it being transferred from pillar to post, or becoming a 'young and restless' clone that way D&D did for a while in the eighties (followed by its being sold off twice like a used toy soldier at a flea market).
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Post by castiglione on Jan 30, 2009 22:48:45 GMT -5
If Ken St. Andre, Liz Danforth et al were all fresh out of high-school when they put together T & T and all those solitaire adventures...that's impressive IMHO, given how it's basically a set of house RPG'ing rules that gained cult status.
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machfront
11th level Troll
Stalwart of the Trollbridge
"Let's go dark!"
Posts: 2,147
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Post by machfront on Jan 31, 2009 0:36:36 GMT -5
I dunno. Isn't Ken in his mid to late 60s? That would put him as being born in the early 40s, which would put him out of high school in the early 60s. Therefore, that would put him in his early 30s when he created T&T. Same as Gygax's age when he penned D&D.
I just really doubt he's right now only in his late 40s-early 50s.
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Post by Porkbelly on Jan 31, 2009 2:59:53 GMT -5
That's right, according to Wikipedia he was begat in April 1947. Interesting that he's been a public librarian in Pheonix since '75 - always wondered what he did for a living, I can't see much money in rpg gaming unless you go all corporate. It'll be interesting to see how T&T develops as there really is some quality material being produced here - I think it'll be inevitable that Shipy and the ever-prolific Boozer (who granted gives away so much already) will get onto the pdf distribution network like Tori Bergquist is doing. Right now it feels like it's all being kept a little exclusive, for no good reason. Look at how Bledsaw (R.I.P.) revived Judges Guild.
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