Dungeons & Dragons 1983 Basic Edition, A Dark Fort Like Game Boy Game & News For My Gévaudan Setting
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Deep forests, giant mountains & weird dungeons.
I speak about TTRPGs, video games, music and what I like.
Summary
🎲Learning Dungeons & Dragons Basic Edition - 1983 Mentzer’s BECMI
💀Ghoul Thrasher: A Dark Fort/Mörk Borg Inspired Game Boy Dungeon Crawler
🧙🏼♂️What I’m Up To: Gévaudan Setting And A One Shot, The Elder Scrolls Series & Medieval Cities
🎲Learning Dungeons & Dragons Basic Edition - 1983 Mentzer’s BECMI
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| My BECMI 1983 French Basic D&D |
Some weeks ago, one of my good friends came to my house saying that he “got something” for me but I wasn’t expecting anything special.
Yet, it was truly special! He offered me a 1983 French edition of Dungeons & Dragons Basic Edition, the famous Mentzer’s Red Box / BECMI. What a surprise!
The story behind how he got the game was also pretty fun: he was looking for some stuff in a garage sale when he stumbled upon a red box in the back. Some letters were visible that said “Donjons…” (aka Dungeons). Curious, he asked about it. The seller showed him the box and my friend saw the amazing artwork by Larry Elmore with the white text “Donjons & Dragons” (So yeah, Dungeons & Dragons). He immediately thought of me and my love for TTRPG, so he asked the price.
The seller asked for only 3€, as long as the box goes to someone who will love it as much as he loved playing it. Fortunately, this is already the case!
When he gave it to me, I immediately opened it. Everything was still there, the original dice, the 2 booklets (one for the player, the other one for the game master), the character sheet and even another book: B6 - The Veiled Society (also in French) along with its paper mini figure and terrain! I was (and still am) so happy!
BECMI is 1983 Frank Mentzer’s revision of the D&D Basic Set created by John Eric Holmes in 1977. As its name suggests, it stands for Basic, Expert, Companion, Master and Immortals. Each of these iterations came within a colored box and are made for different character levels, with different kind of rule:
Red for Basic, for character level 1 to 3 (the one I got)
Blue for Expert, for character level 4 to 14
Teal for Companion, for character level 15 to 25
Black for Master, for character level 26 to 36
Gold for Immortals, for character level 37 or higher
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| Illustration from the BECMI’s Player book |
To be honest, I haven’t thought so much about learning the Basic D&D edition, as I’m already a lot into OD&D and Chainmail. But I can’t have a TTRPG book without reading it, so here I am, reading another game!
And it starts like no other TTRPG book I’ve read, with a beginner player solo tutorial. A tutorial in an old-school TTRPG? A SOLO ONE 🤯? Don’t be so hasty though, it’s not like your typical solo session and more like a Choose Your Own Adventure book. But still, this is pretty cool for the newcomer and first time Game Master.
On the contrary, the way BECMI introduces its rules will be pretty boring if you’re used to TTRPG rules. I find it not efficient at all to quickly get the information that you seek.
Another thing that is not my cup of tea, is the fact that rules are scattered around the various boxes. Don’t get me wrong, it makes sense that stronghold management and siege battle aren’t written in the first book, but it’s a bummer that outdoor rules aren’t shown before the Expert box. So, yeah, the Basic box is very…basic: level 1 to 3, only dungeons rules, little equipment and few spells. Perfect for new GMs that want to take their first step into the game, but they’ll quickly need the Expert book if they want to be able to master a standard outdoor game
If you are considering playing BECMI the analog way, note that the boxes are now very expensive (in France nonetheless) but Internet can be a great place from time to time and the PDFs are very easy to find (also in French 🥖). If I ever run the game, I’ll definitely print the Expert book!
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| Illustration from BECMI’s GM book |
The thing I love about this game is the fact that it is OD&D rules revisited. You’ll find the fast character generation, few classes and races as classes. Of course, there’s some differences, and not all tables use the same stats as OD&D. It can be a great way to put a step further into the old 1974 D&D rules without the brain tearing that is trying to understand the original rules, and, as it is planned, a great way to start your Game Master career as these rules are pretty simple and minimalist.
Not that it’s similar to OD&D but without the Chainmail part of it, even though there’s mass combat rules in the further boxes.
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| B6 - The Veiled Society cover |
As it is the case with most D&D editions, there are a tone of supplements/adventures for the Basic rules. As I said above, my Red Box was given with B6 - The Veiled Society, in French (Note that the “B” is for Basic in the D&D supplement. “A” is for Advanced D&D, etc.).
The Veiled Society is a city delving history, with a lot of political background and plots. It comes with paper mini figures and terrain and a huge city map.
I started to read and plan a game with B6 but as I’m not very confident in my GM skill at the moment, and as my players are still fairly new at playing TTRPGs, and have never played D&D, I thought that this module would be too political for me and them. I’ll keep it for later, as I love the idea of playing it with the paper minis and such. The story is also pretty interesting.
💀Ghoul Thrasher: A Dark Fort/Mörk Borg Inspired Game Boy Dungeon Crawler
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| “A monster attacks!” A Transition screen before a combat in Ghoul Thrasher |
As I play a lot of video games and as they are usually already well known, I only talk a little about them on the usual “What I’m Up To” subject now.
But some are new, or not so common and blend with stuff we love like TTRPGs and Old-School vibes.
This is the case with this new Game Boy game: Ghoul Thrasher. Yes, you can make a new game on Game Boy now!
There’s a really helpful engine to create games for the Nintendo famous handheld console called GB Studio and this is what Magic Quest Media used to develop this game.
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| A mimic! |
Ghoul Thrasher is a Roguelite in its core: it has permadeath, random generation, and deadly encounters.
All these elements are blended with dungeon crawling, exactly like games which inspired Pelle Nilson to do his Dark Fort solo TTRPG. And Ghoul Thrasher was also inspired by stuff like this, Dark Fort and Mörk Borg included.
This really is what the game is all about: harsh combat, raw and amazing pixel graphics, doomy music, gloomy dungeon rooms and evil creatures and mimics!
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| A wraith, not the thing you want to encounter while delving into a dungeon |
The core gameplay is quite simple : as in Dark Fort, you start with a random weapon and a random item then you are granted with some HP and silver. Oh, and you are called Gnargoth!
Next, you enter the Citadel (aka the dungeon).
You will delve into this place room after room. Each room can get you a random encounter, from gruesome monsters to dice gambler, chest with treasure that can be Mimic, potion maker to a market guy. It even has the Castle Rat leader Rat Queen, who heals you while the band’s music blasts its heavy guitar riff in a 8 bit demake.
Each combat is straightforward: attack or flee. The only stuff you can do during this phase is to choose if you use a potion or not. This is one of the core game designs of this dungeon crawler: when to use or buy potions.
Of course, you’ll stumble across a variety of stuff to choose while delving into the Citadel. But, be aware, things can be deadly pretty quick!
The leveling system is also inspired by Dark Fort: you gain more HP and a boon/buff from a list you can check while pressing the Select button.
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| Castle Rat’s Leader Rat Queen! |
Ghoul Thrasher is a true gem for those who love the gloomy/doomy RPG games.
It’s available on itch.io to play directly in your web browser.
A ROM is also available for those who want to play it in their emulator of choice and there’s also a physical version for all the nerds that still have their original Game Boy / Game Boy Color at home (I’m in this description and I like it).
🧙🏼♂️What I’m Up To: Gévaudan Setting And A One Shot, The Elder Scrolls Series & Medieval Cities
In my very first newsletter, I spoke about how I’m doing a system agnostic OSR setting based on a famous French event: The Beast Of Gévaudan, which killed between 82 to 124 people back in 1764-1767. A weird story involving a probable tamed animal (a big wolf or even a hyena) by a probable serial-killer. This is still subject to speculation though, like Jack The Ripper, it could be something else, but it’s not really known.
This story has been a huge inspiration for me since I was a child, even though I’m not living in this part of France. I love the eerie folk-horror rural vibe that came from it.
That’s why I’m working (more than slowly) on this setting.
A week ago, I got the in-laws at home. I was in the mood to try my newly acquired BECMI D&D (see above) with them along with a “B” module. Of course, as I already got B6 - The Veiled Society, I tried it, but as you may read above, I wasn’t confident enough to master it. I’ve also read B2 - The Keep On the Borderlands but, like B6, I keep it for later.
But then came an idea: why not make a simple one-shot story based on my Gévaudan setting ?
When I master a game, I’m always struggling with improvising dialogue and translating the English stuff to my French player, so here, I will write the story and all the dialogues in French.
For the rules, I will use Cairn. I never used it, but it is so simple and with the proper vibe for such a story.
Unfortunately, I didn’t have the time to finish writing it before my family in-law left. But, it leaves me with the time to finish it at my own pace, draw stuff for it, and even polish it for an eventual further release (also in English though)
It helps me get a foot on the ladder though, and that’s a good thing.
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| The Elder Scrolls 2 Daggerfall - Original |
As usual, I played a lot of games in two weeks:
Ghoul Thrasher (Game Boy) : (See the subject above 😉)
The Elder Scrolls V Skyrim Anniversary Edition (Switch) : The Elder Scrolls V Skyrim is one of my favorite games ever, if not the favorite. I love the sandbox feeling of it and I’m always playing it. There’s almost no month where I don’t pick my switch and play for a few hours. I finished the Dawnguard DLC last week and now I’m starting the Dragonborn one. I love this new setting where this DLC takes place, inspired by The Elder Scrolls III Morrowind weirdness (giant shrooms and Lovecraftian beasts!)
The Elder Scrolls II Daggerfall Unity (PC) : The second entry in The Elder Scrolls series is one of a kind. It’s probably one of the best sandbox RPG games you can find. The fact that it was entirely ported to Unity Engine and that there’s a huge mod community makes a whole new game for you to enjoy, with cool graphics and stuff to do. I tweaked some shaders and graphics to make it beautiful yet retro with a CRT shader on top of it. What a mood!
The Elder Scrolls I Arena (PC) : The very first edition of The Elder Scrolls series. Yes, I love this series enough to play 3 different games at the same time, because they are all very different. This one though doesn’t have a unity port and I’m playing it on DOS, the old-school way like it was 1993. It’s raw, but has an unmatched vibe for me. I didn’t go far at that time, but it was fun nonetheless!
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| Rochefort-en-Terre village center |
As we live near Brittany, we love to go there with my SO to visit beautiful medieval cities and walk into the forest. Now that we have our own converted van, it’s even easier to leave home and stay at night around those places.
Last weekend, we visited La Gacilly (Gasilieg in Breton, Brittany’s own language), a beautiful city with lots of paved roads and old houses, blended with modern stuff and photo exhibits scattered around the town. It was fun, despite the rain!
Also, we visited, yet another time, our favorite village ever: Rochefort-en-Terre (Roc’h-an-Argoed in Breton). This medieval city is small but more than beautiful with paved roads everywhere, old houses from centuries ago and flowers everywhere. There’s a castle, old wooden doors, big old trees and even a Fantasy/Fantastic/Dark museum called Naïa to add the cherry on top of this place. Naïa was the name of the local witch. Yes, this place is awesome!
That’s it for this week!
Let me know if you enjoyed this article, if you played/read/watch any of the stuff I mentioned this week 😀
See you!
Cheers !
Sleepdrifter
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