The Fastaval Survival Guide

So you think you're ready to go to Fastaval. You think you're cool and you do L3375p3@k.. You've got dice and a spiky do. You're not ready! It's a jungle out there. full of ginormous evil monsters that eat your mom's monsters for breakfast. And pretty girls of the opposite sex - most with a much higher IQ than you.

• Follow this link to check out Fastaval: the most popular Danish roleplaying event which take place each easter...

• Follow this link to a completely unofficial but still useful guide for first time visitors to the event.

Or maybe you really don't think any of that and just want to know what to do to be properly prepared for the call of the FSTVL. You've come to the right place: I went in the olden days when the penguins were real birds and the GMs ate players they didn't like. I know stuff! (Some of it I may even remember!)
I had my first FSTVL in 1995 and here be the documents to prove it.

1995 and 1997 participant's certificates from FSTVL.

Total cost including this, that and stuff: about 140 DKR each.

(about 2 $ and half a pint of lager in today's money)

In those days we used to pay the organizers in glass beads

and pieces of painted bone - and they liked it!.

The map is from the back of the '95 version

and suggests hidden treasure in rooms 2 and 38...

(Click to embiggen)

Note that though the prices were low in those days

the number of activities were even lower.

So overall the price hike may not be as bad as it seems

 

Anyways... The organizers of this year's event have very kindly put a nice guide for first time participants on their web-site. It's in Danish so theres that. It's a good guide though.

• With a bit o' luck this link could take you there.

What you really need to know, you ll have to read here to find out. You'll need garlic and stakes,, painkillers and pain. There be dragons off course but they are mostly invisible and should be ignored. Should you be of the cyborg persuasion I strongly recommend bringing your own charger.

The problems with dice and how to solve them...

If you're into role playing games you probably own a lot of dice. Most players love them but lets face it; they are not without problems. They make a lot of noise and they have a very annoying tendency to roll off... Often they end up under furniture or in dark and distant corners never to be found again.
I have devised a simple and very inexpensive solution to both those problems.

(Click image to view larger version.)
You need one of those small and extremely light trays they use for selling certain fruits and vegetables in you local supermarket.
The ones you're looking for are made from some sort of synthetic foam that might be made of polypropylene (or 'flamingo' as we call it in Danish) They are about 1/5 of an inch or 4 mm thick and come in different shapes and sizes. Since they are made for packaging of food I assume they are fairly nontoxic. Also they are water, cola and coffee resistant.
As you can see this one used to contain fresh whole ginger (ingefær)...

The point is that this material has amazing sound dampening properties. Not only that but the trays have raised edges that reduce the risk of dice getting lost.
The damping properties of this foam is so impressive in fact that I find the whole dice rolling experience slightly unsatisfactory.

What I do is this: I glue a piece of thin cardboard or - as in this case - photographic printing paper to the inside bottom of the tray. You could probably use a postcard to good effect. The cardboard improves the rolling experience without adding to the noise. You can use colors and motives that you like and find inspirational to your game.

It's an extremely simple solution to a couple of annoying problems. It works quite well and it costs virtually nothing to make.
What's not to like?

THIS.IS.EVEN:MORE.OLDSKOLE!

I have been playing RPG's for many years and one of the things everybody seems to remember from the early days is the red box Dungeons and Dragons set.
I'm almost certain that I have one of those lying around somewhere but I just recently found this:
The Blue Dungeons and Dragons Expert set.
The Front:

The inside cover sporting fancy blue print. This seems to be the 1983 edition...

Close but no cigar: The resurrection spell. - (Correction: A closer look suggests that the drawing is intended to illustrate the "Speak with the dead"-spell on the same page. But still no cigar!)

And maps obviously. Several in fact. There be Bugbears hiding in the hexagonal forrests as this one clearly shows.

Wikipedia tells us that this was the third Dungeons and Dragons Edition and that 1983 brought us the Basic Set (red box), Expert Set (blue box), Companion Set (teal box, levels 15–25), 1984 Master Set (black box, levels 26–36), and (in 1985) Immortals Set (gold box, levels 36+). [Link]
I remember the red, the blue and the teal sets. I believe that one of my co-players had the black guide-book but I remember the color as a dark brown... The Immortals set I had only heard about in those days.

THIS. IS.OLDSKOLE! I

There has been a lot of talk about old-school games going on in Danish RPG-circles. Do we like it? Is is it good or evil? Am I old-school enough? or far too much?

My take on the matter is this:
"That's not "old-school" - *This* is "Old-school"!"

Følg dette link til Vimeo...
:o)

next up: steam punk!

We need heavy brass tubes. We need fog, dust and smoke. We need the Iron fist of the Inkvistioners of The Holy Fatherchurch. We need the secretive Royal Enforcement Agency Lamncers (REALs) We need darkness and light and deep, deep down we need the secret and terrible creations of Dr. Frank Stone.
I welcome you to the center of the universe, the capital of the British Empire the great city of Newdon.

and now to something completely the same

This post is in in English for no obvious reason. I have decided that from now on that's what most posts will be. I have been a staunch proponent of writing games, scenarios and other RPG-stuff in Danish rather than English. Because English isn't cooler or better than Danish, and that's still how I feel.
But I have just returned from Fastaval and I have seen a new light. Considering my target ordience audience English is OK and it's used as a first or second language by almost twice as many* as Danish is.
So there!
*Yes I know! I know!