8 Fantasy Subgemres by Bob Worldbuilder

 Interesting take, the Low Fantasy is particularly interesting… I probably agree with a lot of it but….

And now I know what Cozy fantasy is. OK. 

Time 15:08 summary. 

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=LNauaDxuPgA

Commenter says:

Sword and Sorcery is “low fantasy high adventure. The actual setting is one where most people never encounter the supernatural elements. … examples Conan, dnd adventures like Against the Cult of the Reptile God, The Lost City, etc. 

My thoughts:

Older (and a ton of current) D&D campaigns at level 1 characters started off as Sword & Sorcery/ Pulp then evolved into High Fantasy pretty quickly.  Then if you got into higher levels, maybe that’s the newly defined “superhero fantasy” … kind of. 

Those three are all parts of the same thing to me. And the current internet ppl obsession with separating them is maybe too much. But I understand why they do it.

Now as far as the genres/ games that pull in modern (anything after the year 1500) technology or science fixtion… I definitely like to keep that very very separate.  

DRAGONBANE Description by a DM:

his is an introductory adventure for those wanting to try a new system, but still in keeping with high fantasy. Dragonbane trades the superpowers of heroic fantasy for more grounded stats and the freedom to develop your character as you want. Combat usually only lasts 3-4 turns, and monsters are particularly deadly and unpredictable.

My initiative preference so far

 Having played OSE and B/X style initiatives ONLINE with new ppl, I can't say I like it. It is too uncoordinated, and my turn has been skipped before. It's just not clear the way some DMs are doing it. 

1. Draw your movement.
2. Declare if spellsEtc. Sometimes they never ask (because low levels get so few spells). 
3.  Ranged. 

And then the old school guy who does make you declare spells, it still gets messed up (well partly b/c he started doing semi random initiative mixed in with B/X rules so it is super unclear what is right in his game). 

So my preference is good old 3rd edition or 5th edition cut and dry, everybody rolls, then you get your order. 

NOTE: Shadowdark Init is weird. The highest init roll goes first, THEN everybody goes clockwise. Can't say I prefer that. And how the heck do you do that online. And does that mean monsters always go last... except monsters do roll init. Now I'm confused. 

Popcorn Initiative in D&D

Sounds iffy to me, but someone on startplaying with 30 yrs experience is using it. Guy's name is Northern Dungeons on startplaying. 

https://theangrygm.com/popcorn-initiative-a-great-way-to-adjust-dd-and-pathfinder-initiative-with-a-stupid-name/

Well he uses it for "I like to use Popcorn initiative for exploration and skill challenges when there is an urgency or danger that opens up space for cinematic descriptions and allows equal opportunities for the spotlight."

Wild Kimgdom, the cougar vs porcupine

 https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=51dVcIaWrSA&t=388s&pp=2AGEA5ACAQ%3D%3D

This is the one I remember… pretty sure. Early on the young one attacks the porcupine and gets quills in a paw. 

MerricB, on AD&D and new D&D... he hasn't updated his site in a while

 MerricB, on AD&D and new D&D... he hasn't updated his site in a while, but lotsa good stuff as I recall. Totally agree with this one:

https://merricb.com/2025/04/24/i-want-magic-weapons-to-matter/?unapproved=41222&moderation-hash=3f148576cd007ea2439c57da4097c818#comment-41222

https://merricb.com/2014/10/22/add-review-c3-the-lost-island-of-castanamir/

Pathfinder 1e char builder online free

BTW, Sorc builds: https://rpgbot.net/pathfinder/characters/classes/sorcerer/#races

NOTES

• Staffs
• It’s difficult to recommend specific staffs without knowing your individual character, so instead I want to make a general endorsement of the concept of magic staffs in Pathfinder. If you are a 3.5 native, go read Pathfinder’s rules for staffs because they have improved dramatically.
• Staffs are a reliable, rechargeable source of extra spellcasting that can give spellcasters easy and reliable access to spells from their spell list which they might not want to learn, or which they might like to use so frequently that they can’t prepare the spell enough times in a given day. On days when you’re not adventuring (traveling, resting, etc.) you can easily recharge any staff even if you can only cast one of the spells which the staff contains.

 Super nice. Pathfinder 1e (super similar to 3.5e D&D) char builder:

https://www.trovetokens.com/anvil/

Only issue on my browser at least, is you gotta zoom out to see a long list of feats to hit OK at the bottom. But can easily copy paste text to read feat descriptions, so not bad. 

Feats to investigate:

Wings of Air

Eschew Materials (Sorc level 1)

Benthic Spell:

You can modify a spell that deals acid, cold, electricity, or fire damage to deal damage through high-pressure water instead. The spell gains the water descriptor, and you can either replace the spell's normal damage with bludgeoning damage or split the spell's damage so that half is bludgeoning and half is of its normal type. Creatures with damage reduction apply their damage reduction to bludgeoning damage from a benthic spell, but the spell counts as bludgeoning and magic for the purposes of bypassing damage reduction.<br />A benthic spell uses up a spell slot one level higher than the spell's actual level.

Tenkar’s visuals hexcrawl

  https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=ZvtpLCcN6FY&t=162s

Forest: Lightning split oak w old nails hammered in it  

Hills: a line of standing stones like broken teeth. 

Swamp: a half sunken shrine w candles still burning somehow .

Plains: an abandoned wagon circle, grass grown tall inside it. 

Right  by mountains, a black seam in a rock that blows cold air. 

Mystara Newbie Summary. And OSE vs. Mystara

 The official fan website for Mystara, whatever that means. Ppl seem to like it though, and I like the "newbie" summary: https://pandius.com/guide/index.html

And I like what they say here: https://www.reddit.com/r/osr/comments/i8xpnx/questions_regarding_mystara_and_ose/

• Second what’s been said already. The Newbie’s Guide to Mystara is a good place to start for an overview of all the countries. The GAZ series does have tons of detail relating to rules and mechanics OSE doesn’t use, such as skills, but you can ignore most of them if they don’t apply to your game. The Hollow World is not known to people on the surface, so you can basically ignore it if you like.
• 
  
• The default starting place Karameikos and it was the first gazetteer published, so you could pick up the PDF and see what you think.
• 
  
• Mystara has tons of detail, including extensive history and lore, and good maps. What’s good about it is that you can take or leave as much of it as you want. Or, if you prefer, just leave a lot of it vague as in the earliest days of the setting when it was just called the Known World.
• 
  
• The weirdest thing about Mystara, in my view, is the substitution of immortals for traditional gods. That be hacked, too, of course. You can just decide to make them regular gods or use different pantheons.

Their bit on Shadow Elves:

• It should be stressed that the shadow elves are not evil per se. True, they hate the surface elves, as well as dwarves and humanoids and almost any outsiders. They have traditions that may seem savage when viewed from the outside. Within their own society, however, the shadow elves are honourable and supportive of each other. Crime is practically unknown, and for one shadow elf to betray another would be a sin worthy of the worst surface dweller. 

I've heard of this, what is it again: https://lamentationsmystara.blogspot.com/

OSE (but Mystara related) stuff...

Not sure what this is yet: https://furtivegoblingaming.blogspot.com/2024/08/land-of-mist-is-what-mystaraint.html

• OK, it's a Mystara-light setting for OSE. 
• Well... other than calling them drow, the rest isn't too far from normal fantasy or normal D&D or Mystara I think. And since the drow didn't exist in Mystara, it was the ... what... shadow elves that weren't exactly always evil, even tho in the arcade game they were obviously evil:
• "There are aquatic elves, nonevil drow who venerate the moon while still remaining mostly subterranean"

   

Shadowdark new spells I like, maybe other creepy stuff

From the witch/ knight of St. Ydris book:

Tier 1:
Oak, Ash, Thorn -  My comment: I just like the name of this one. 

Tier: 1, Range: Self, Duration: Focus. For the spell's duration, faeries, demons, and devils can't attack you. These beings also can't possess, compel, or beguile you.

Tier 2:

Bogboil - My comment: yeah, good name. Good swampy witch feeling. 

Tier: 2, Range: Far, Duration: 5 rounds. You turn a near-sized cube of ground within range into a muddy, boiling bog of quicksand. A creature stuck in the bog can't move and must succeed on a Dexterity check vs. your spellcasting check to free itself.

Wild Kingdom and unusual pronunciations

 Learn all the alternative pronunciations for words from the Wild Kimgdom host, Marlin. He says “sloath” for sloth. Looked it up, yep acceptable. 

It’s not the first time I’ve noticed it. 

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Anygt0YxQjo&t=266s

Btw, they mention the no longer called African country of Rhodesia in a couple of early episodes  … now called Zimbabwe.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rhodesia

OSE's art from Carcass Crawler 1 is good

 Let's see, I want to comment on these. The mushroom man, some weird thing (I think they call it a mutoid, basically a mixed up beastman), and then in the 2nd drawing a cool view of the underground mushroom world from a hole up in the ceiling of a giant cavern. That one very much reminds me of the recent Legend of Zelda game on the Switch where you go down into "The Gloom"... that whole place had a great vibe. Dark and creepy... torchlight was a big deal. 

They also have a deathknight looking guy and a ranger type (warden class) that have great art. 

Gygax’s real castle

Gygax’s real castle is the module 

 CASTLE ZAGYG

By Troll Lord Games for C&C. Castles and Crusades. 

Also the Maure Castle from Dungeon magazine, written by Rob. 

Via comments https://m.youtube.com/shorts/FMOKqg46GsM

Info here also https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=bjkzhJYEkc0&t=205s from Books Bricks and Boards guy. Around time 3:45. 

Mutual of Omaha’s Wild Kimgdom show on yt

 Man this show is maybe even better to see now than back in the day. Incredible footage. You feel bad for the animals, but this show reached so many people, it surely kept untold numbers of animals from going extinct. 

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=NK1oEBmgdaU&t=1308s&pp=2AGcCpACAQ%3D%3D

On this one https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=8dDBlsSU7Us&pp=0gcJCYcKAYcqIYzv

… at Time 19:30 is the double lasso trick I was using to move the gaint rats in DnD (OSE with Ryan).  I knew it’d work. :)