Yet Another Treasure Horde of TSR Ads

Treasure Trove of D&D Ads Part the 3rd: The Sears Catalog

Behold a time when RPG's were available in the Sear's Holiday Catalog (which I used to make check marks in to show relatives what I wanted for Christmas.) 

List of Ray Harryhausen Memorial Blogfest Posts

Well, it is Saturday afternoon. Our grand total for the blogfest was 19 Posts in the Blogfest! You can read them below.  Really it wasn't so bad considering that I gave everyone less than 48 hours notice!


Gothridge Manor 1

Gothridge Manor 2

HeroPress 1

HeroPress 2

Save VS Dragon

The Other Side blog

From the Sorcerer's Skull

Greyhawk Grognard

Raven Crowking's Nest

Raven Croking's Nest post 2 (DCC)

Tales From the Flaming Faggot

The Watch House

Dungeon Fantastic

Bat in the Attic

Kaijuville

Once More Unto the Breach

Roleplay-Geek

The Hammer Strikes

Zenopus Archives

Gamers & Grognards

Ray Harryhausen Memorial Blogfest: Teeth of the Hydra

It is a famous scene in the film and may have influenced the way that fantasy and gaming handle the un-thinking  undead in general and skeletons in particular!  We all remember Harryhausen's skeletons from Jason and the Argonauts well. They were summoned up by Aeëtes who sowed the teeth of the hydra, slain by Jason, after praying to Hecate to help him get his revenge for the theft of the Golden Fleece.  If you are reading this, I would say that the scene that followed provided much inspiration for games early in your life in which PC's battled against skeletons.  So here, in honor of the late Ray Harryhausen, I give to you instant necromancy in the form of the Teeth of the Hydra!

Teeth of the Hydra

It is known that there are rites which can garner the aid of certain dark deities to enchant the teeth of a hydra, slain by man, that they might be sown and grow into skeletons that may serve the ritualist.  A powerful magic-user might discover these secret rites.  However, it is said that many such teeth already exist, forgotten in the world.  Anyone who discovers these can cast them to the ground in the hope of gaining undead servants.  If the teeth are found, rather than created, there will be 1-10 such teeth.  When the teeth are thrown to the ground they will wriggle into the soil like worms.  Within one round skeletons will claw their way out of the earth.  These skeletons will be ready to fight upon the second round of their existence. The skeletons spring from the ground armed with scimitars or short swords and shields.

There is an 80% chance (+1% per point of the user's Charisma) that the skeletons will obey the commands of the user upon their creation.  The remainder of the time the skeletons will instead attack the user of the Teeth of the Hydra.  If the skeletons are not initially hostile, the check must be made again one hour later.  If this check is successful the skeletons will serve for a day, at which point a third check must be made.  At this point the skeletons will serve for a week.  After one week of service the undead servitors, and their equipment turn to dust.

Ray Harryhausen Blogfest!

Alright everyone.  As most of us are aware Ray Harryhausen passed away on May 7th.  As many of you know, I am hosting a blogfest this Friday in his memory.  You can write up anything you like for him, the inspiration of his work in gaming stating up one of his creations (monsters or anything that appears in a movie  he worked on.)  If you would like to take part, please email me at treewytchATyahooDOTcom.  Send the name of your blog, your content and a link to the blog.  I will do my best to get a series of links up by Saturday.  If we can get enough good articles and I can get the proper help (I'm looking at you Greg Gorganmilk) I would like to put them into a LLB style PDF as a Ray Harryhausen supplement.  

Dark Dungeons, The Movie

So... probably not the first place your seeing this, but we'll put it out here because we can.  We've all seen this:

Well, now with the magic power of Kickstarter (which can both bless and curse) it can become Dark Dungeons: The Movie.

Another Treasure Horde of Old D&D Ads

I've caught wind of a few folks on some of the message boards mentioning that it might be cool to see the later ads that were out for D&D.  Well here is a good helping of ads from the 80's & 90's!  I have included ads for the game itself, comics, video games and miniatures that were a part of the era (and snuck in an older piece or two...)