Ravings of ageing gamer

Over the years I have tried various Age of Sail Wargame Rules.  Here is what I think of some of them.  Rules for Wargaming Author Arthur Taylor Published by Shire Publications Ltd 1971 & 1976    I first came across these rules back in the 70s.  I used the Airfix kits cut along the waterline to play them. These Rules were published as part of the little 'Discovering' series of books. Arthur Taylors main premise for all the rules in this book is that no dice are used.  Success depends on the players skill at seeing the potentialities of the board and not the luck of the dice. The only time dice are used is to set and possibly change the wind speed and direction. Ship orders are written at the start of each turn and there is no initiative system so I assumed moves and firing were done simultaneously. I remember a lot of ships were dismasted and crawling around on jury masts. Advanced and Basic There are only the basic rules.  No Advanced or optional rules are provided. Crew Th

 TSR Dark Sun   Back in 1991 TSR released a new campaign setting.  It was totally unlike any they had released before.  The whole feel of the world leant heavily on the artist Brom who produced a lot of the early artwork for it. The setting was called Dark Sun, and was a metal poor desert world that had had the life leeched out of it by over use of Magic.  It was nothing like the medieval fantasy settings we were used to and came with a new set of Races and Monsters.  There were also new Character Classes that reflected the world. Dark Sun was a harsh place.  Keeping track of your water became important.  Almost all the flora and fauna was out to eat you and the world was full of ancient towers, ruins and complexes that had been abandoned to the harsh environment centuries ago. There were several large city states ruled by Immortal Sorcerer Kings and run by their Templars who worshiped them as gods.  There was an uneasy truce between these Sorcerer Kings which allowed commerce to take

 The final Issue of Underworld Oracle that I have has made the jump to A4 in size.  It is Vol2 No 1 from Sept/Nov 79. It is A4 with a glossy cardstock cover and white pages. The outside of the cover has some Colour printing, the rest is in Black.  It has 20 Pages. The editorial mentions the changes and looks forward to the future in this new format. There is another Halls of Testing in this issue, this one is for Tumblers.  Tumblers are a character class printed in Underworld Oracle Issue 6. There is also a new Character Class, The Storm Lord.  A sort of Elements based Magic User although there are only a few weapon restrictions. In the letters page at the back they do mention publishing a collected volume of all the Halls of Testing dungeons though I have never seen this. Finally they say they are trying to commit to a Monthly publishing schedule so the subscription cost will be going up. Sadly I haven't seen any evidence of any issues produced after this one.