...

You guys do know that the whole Mazes & Minotaurs thing is meant to be an extreme alternate reality in which Greek myths launched the RPG movement and not Tolkien-esque fantasy novels, right?

Mazes & Minotaurs is a hoax, like Encounter Critical.  Except that Olivier Legrand never actually tried to fool anyone.

Quote from: Narf the Mouse;306994The M&M people are the *Only* ones I can remember claiming that their game came out first.

That's a joke. Here's the story behind M&M (from the M&M site):

The Whole Story or : the Mazes & Minotaurs Odyssey

Quote from: Akrasia;306973Slight nitpick: these probably should be classified as 'variants', since they deviate too much from the original game to be called 'clones'.  (I'm pretty sure that the authors would all agree with this assessment.)

Here's how I describe it on the M74 home page:

QuoteMicrolite74, like its parent game, Microlite20, is a trimmed-down, sub-miniature version of the Primary Fantasy SRD rules that has been designed to be quick and easy to play. The goal of Microlite74, however, is to recreate the style and feel of that very first ("0e") fantasy roleplaying game published back in 1974. If you are at all familiar with any game based on the 3.5 edition of the Primary Fantasy SRD, you will find Microlite74 easy to play and easy to run as a GM, but with an extra helping of "old school" flavor.

That is, it is a clone of the "style and feel and flavor" of 0e using a very light variant of the D20 system -- not a clone of the rules of 0e.  That said, it plays like a lightly house-ruled 0e did back in the mid-70s. You can pretty much drop in anything written for 0e with little change.

I was running a game of S&W but the players decided after a few sessions that they preferred M74 which boggled my mind as I can't really tell much difference between 0e, S&W, and M74 -- they seem like playing 0e with different DM's house rules to me. See Decision Time: Microlite74 vs Swords & Wizardry (and the posts linked to it) on my blog for more on this.

Ah - Guess I never delved far enough into M&M to get to the disclaimer.

one can run something dangerously close to CT from JUST the Mongoose Traveller SRD and the Judges Guild Screen off of DTRPG.

Snapshot profile of Swords & Wizardry as of May 30, 2009:
1) A free pdf of the game (standard for most clones): Swords & Wizardry Core Rules (pdf)

2) A storefront ( Swords and Wizardry's Storefront - Lulu.com ) with 1 set of variant rules (S&W WhiteBox is JUST the 0e LBB rules), 2 modules, a resource book on weird magic, 2 issues of a magazine, a book of monsters (several hundred, 186 are completely new), the Quick Primer for Old School Gaming (free), and a book of 600 city encounters.

3) Forum: Swords & Wizardry Forums Index page

4) Free download page at website: Mythmere Games » Downloads

5) Blogs:
    Skathros: The S&W Companion: Welcome to The Swords & Wizardry Companion
    Chgowiz: Chgowiz's Old Guy RPG Blog
    Grim: The Outlook is Grim
    Spike: Ubiquitous Orcs
    Bat: Ancient Vaults & Eldritch Secrets: the Old School Revolution is here
    MikeD: sword +1
    TheRavyn Beyond the Black Gate

6) Online Games
      Zendog's WhiteBox City Game  http://forum.rpg.net/showthread.php?t=454703

Quote from: Kellri;306909...
P.S. I've got a new server for most of my material, kellri.truculent.org

Ah, excellent!  :emot-cheers:

Something to note when listing which game emulates the feel of which:

Labyrinth Lord core emulates the feel of B/X.

Labyrinth Lord + Original Edition Characters emulates the feel and mechanics of Oe.

Labyrinth Lord + Advanced Edition Characters (coming out later this summer) emulates the feel of first edition as it was played by most people.

The Labyrinth Lord rules are extremely flexible, so we're excited to be working to round them out, make the game modular if you will, by adding supplements to give the feel of any edition you prefer. The best part is that players can choose to play characters of any edition, and right beside characters of another edition, because everything is completely compatible. So if one player likes things done one way no one has to compromise. One player could be an Oe style elf (from Original Edition Characters) and adventure right next to a half-orc assassin or a monk (from Advanced Edition Characters), or an elf or halfling as a race/class (from Labyrinth Lord core). Characters from all editions in one group. Or if you really want to test the flexibility of Labyrinth Lord, use the multiclassing rules in Advanced Edition Characters to play a race-class, like a dwarf, who is also a thief.

'There once was a Dwarf named Theif,
Who liked to knock out Teef.
He'd knock them out left;
He'd knock them out right.
He'd knock people who had heft;
He'd knock out people who tried to bite.
The reason for this outrageous situation,
Was not as obvious as stereotypicalation.
It wasn't that he liked situations that were hairy;
He just had an outstanding debt with the tooth-fairy.'

Added Chgowiz's Old Guy RPG Blog (http://oldguyrpg.blogspot.com/) to the list of Swords & Wizardry bloggers; that was a major omission from the list... :eek:

Quote from: Goblinoid Games;307211...
Labyrinth Lord core emulates the feel of B/X.

Labyrinth Lord + Original Edition Characters emulates the feel and mechanics of Oe.

Labyrinth Lord + Advanced Edition Characters (coming out later this summer) emulates the feel of first edition as it was played by most people.

The Labyrinth Lord rules are extremely flexible, so we're excited to be working to round them out, make the game modular if you will, by adding supplements to give the feel of any edition you prefer. The best part is that players can choose to play characters of any edition, and right beside characters of another edition, because everything is completely compatible. So if one player likes things done one way no one has to compromise. One player could be an Oe style elf (from Original Edition Characters) and adventure right next to a half-orc assassin or a monk (from Advanced Edition Characters), or an elf or halfling as a race/class (from Labyrinth Lord core). Characters from all editions in one group. Or if you really want to test the flexibility of Labyrinth Lord, use the multiclassing rules in Advanced Edition Characters to play a race-class, like a dwarf, who is also a thief.

This is a great overall structure!  I have a couple of copies of the LL core book, and used LL for a PBP game last year.  I'm really looking forward to "Advanced Edition Characters," and would probably use it instead of 1e if I ever ran a 1e-style campaign again.

In a way, IMO, it would have been nice had the OSR focused on something like this, instead of being so chaotic and dispersed.  Still, it's great that LL, S&W, OSRIC, BFRP, etc., are all 98% compatible with each other!

Link list created and updated.

Quote from: Kyle Aaron;306880The Big List of Links is for general rpg stuff, not specific game systems. With over 2,000 published rpgs, it'd just get too big to be useful.

Someone should host a list of retro-clone and tribute game links, just as John Kim does with free rpgs (though the retro-clones and tributes are usually free).

I was thinking a single link to the thread, not individual links.