News — Star Frontiers

Like every single non-D&D title TSR had in the mid-1980s, Star Frontiers met a quick and profound end.  I lamented it leaving the hobby, especially with the inclusion of Zebulon's Guide to Frontier Space, but those were the breaks for Boot Hill, Gangbusters, Gamma World, and this beloved science fiction series.  Whatever the case, I still love to take a look at the 'color' of the game and imagine what could have been if Easley, Elmore, Parkinson, Caldwell, Truman, Roslof, Trampier, and Holloway had gotten another half dozen years to create inside the frame.  It is one thing we will...

It would be very hard to count all the words written about artist David Trampier, the bulk of which revolve around half a dozen pieces of artwork known to pretty much every old school gamer. You all know what I’m talking about, the 1E Player’s Handbook, the original DM’s Screen, the hunchback Hill Giant, Emirikol the Chaotic, Wormy, and arguably many more. Still, these are all spot illustrations or stand-alone covers as Tramp was ever sharing space with other contemporaries of his day.I mean really, what would it have been like to have Tramp do ALL the art inside a...

I’m a big fan of Star Frontiers, which is strange because I’ve only ever played in a single campaign of it in my life. Still, that Alpha Dawn Elmore cover always drew me in, and I have everything ever produced for it just because I love to look at it, flip the pages, and imagine ‘what could have been’ if I’d just had more opportunity and drive to make something happen in this game. Instead, I played the hell out of Robotech, but that is another story.Anyway, back to Star Frontiers. In 2004 Wizards of the Coast produced D20 Modern’s...

There are two gaming supplements that I adore more than most, and oddly enough they were both released by TSR in 1985. Each could be considered by the multitude of fans as anathema to the traditional mechanics of the games in which they appear, but I just never saw that. The first of these is of course the Unearthed Arcana for AD&D, and I’m not going to get into that here, but the second is going to be the focus of this particular article. Zebulon’s Guide to Frontier Space Volume 1 [and sadly there would never be another volume] was...

Today I’m going to take a look at one of my favorite games, Star Frontiers.  The oddity of that claim is that I’ve really only played Star Frontiers once, for a single two month campaign back in 1988.  Therefore, I can only see Star Frontiers as appearing so high on my list of favorite games for one reason, the artwork. The second boxed set, Knight Hawks, brought forth a series of space adventure modules that continued to feature great artwork and one of the best would have to be the 1984 release of SFKH1 Dramune Run. Written by another of...