Musings In Response to Knockspell #3

I got my copy of Knockspell #3 in the mail today.  I am a print fetishist and like real books, for many of the same reasons that James Raggi IV has so insightfully discussed.  As I always teach my college writing students, print sources -- real books -- are more permanent and credible sources of information than most web-based sources in part because someone (the publisher) ponied up the money to have the text fact-checked, copy edited, vetted, play-tested, etc. BEFORE it reached the public.  Don't get me wrong, I love using online sources as well, and (obviously) I have discovered and advocate the particular joys of reading blogs.  I think blogs and other online media forms are indeed the future, and in many ways are already the present -- there is an immediacy and interactivity to be found on the web that is invaluable for trotting out the newest and freshest raw ideas and getting valuable feedback.  Yet I do perceive a difference (for me anyway) between what I post and read in blogs and what I get in a fine print publication like Knockspell #3.  There is something, well, weightier about having that bound publication with shiny covers sitting there in my hand.  Like what's in there is somehow precious.  (I sound like Gollum.)

I cannot really give a content-specific "review" of the mag, for I am already planning to use some of the adventures and trap ideas from Knockspell #3 in my forthcoming Arandish campaign, and I don't want to spoil any surprises for players of mine who might read this.  I suppose the fact that I found three or four offerings (parts of two mini-modules, one trap, and the badass random ruin generator!) that are of immediate appeal and use to me, all in one issue, says a great deal about the quality of this publication and its contributors.  The variety of stuff packed into Knockspell #3's 64 pages is impressive -- there are three complete mini-modules, a few random tables and one random generator, a few theory articles, and two particularly strong entries: the Swords and Wizardry-based Magician Class and alternative magic system by Akrasia, and the vile (and thus highly appealing) Anti-Paladin class by Kellri.  I don't allow paladins in Ara, but now, reading Kellri's great re-imagining, I sure as hell am allowing anti-paladins!

Which leads me to my big "aha" moment with this magazine.  As I leafed through it tonight, really enjoying the alternative magic system devised by Akrasia and thinking about its potential applicability to Ara, I began to get my first palpable sense of what the original 1974-77 iteration of D&D might feel like to play.  As I have mentioned before, I came of age with the Holmes Basic Set followed closely by many years with AD&D.  So it is no wonder that upon my glorious return to the old-school gaming hobby I should gravitate toward Labyrinth Lord (a clone of Moldvay Basic, which follows Holmes) and Goblinoid's forthcoming Advanced Edition Companion (which provides AD&D content in Labyrinth Lord terms).  But now, with the arrival of Knockspell #3 at my door, I may be hearing for the first time the siren song of the original Gygax and Arneson version of D&D.  I am at least encouraged, based upon the quality of Knockspell #3 including its terrific Pete Mullen cover, that an investment in Black Blade Publishing's Swords and Wizardry Core Rulebook would be a sound investment once some more cash rolls into the old coffers around here.  I know I would enjoy reading the book -- I couldn't get enough of gaming rulebooks as a kid, and I suppose I am no different now -- and I might even get inspired to play the S&W system in due time. . . 

In the end, for me and my primitive cave-man mind, I still like to read things in hard copy, in print, especially important things like old-school retro-clone game manuals and supplements.  It makes the consumer in me happy to know that there are artful, high-quality products like Knockspell #3 out there for me and the other members of my hobby to enjoy, use, archive, and cherish. I highly recommend this product for any old-school gamer.