News — TSR

What can I say about the 2nd Edition DMG that isn’t great… well, probably that I think the artwork selection is subpar.  I guess that question wasn’t so hard after all J This book, however, is perhaps the single most important text in my gaming library for the simple fact that it was what I used to hone and perfect my skills as a Dungeon Master.  Sure, I owned a copy of the AD&D 1E Dungeon Master’s Guide, but that book was like an unintelligible codex when I first started playing D&D, and since I’d begun with Basic and the...

Do you ever have one of those moments when you have to make a choice and it is nearly impossible to do so?  You know, like when someone asks your favorite movie and you can’t possibly answer, then you counter with ‘how about action movies, or horror movies, etc.’ and then when faced with that it is still almost impossible to answer?  Yeah, well sometimes choosing pieces of artwork from classic AD&D modules is just like that for me. It was no different for TSR’s I1 Dwellers of the Forbidden City. Produced in 1981, the module is an interesting study...

In 1986 TSR came out with the 3rd Edition of Gamma World as they tried to drive sales of their new ACT [Action Table] combat system.   The effect, while dramatic in the box itself, falls incredibly flat when compared to say, The Red Box that helped revolutionize gaming just three years before. I have to wonder what happened during this period, as I can only assume TSR was at its absolute height here, and yet both this product, and Marvel Super Heroes, don’t really add anything artistically to the genre other than rehashing Marvel’s artwork or in the case of...

The cover piece of Dragon Magazine #159 is actually called ‘The Privateer’, but to me and my old DM Mark, it will always be known as ‘What’s a clever captain to do?’ which is the bio write-up of the cover design that appears on page 4. That tag line has been the inspiration for pretty much everything I’ve ever done in the AD&D Spelljammer setting because no matter what I encounter, I always first ask myself that question, and trust me it makes EVERYTHING more palpably fun! [Special Note: I played a version of Spelljammer last summer and the entire...

I feel like I should be toasting or something as this will be my very first post concerning classic TSR modules.  Sure, this one is a bit remote, being a UK production, but still U1: The Sinister Secret of Saltmarsh has a very special place in my heart. Back in late 1989 I’d gone away to university and decided that I would leave all the trappings of my youth behind.  That meant I was going to completely remake myself in a place where no one knew me.  It might have worked too, except that as I studied one night in...