Archie Injects New Life Into Live-Action Zombies

When Jughead's beloved pet Hot Dog is killed in a hit and run, Jughead turns to the only person he knows who can help bring back his canine companion — Sabrina the Teenage Witch. Using dark, forbidden magic, Sabrina is successful and Hot Dog returns to the land of the living. But he's not the same... and soon, the darkness he brings back with him from beyond the grave begins to spread, forcing Archie and the gang to try to escape Riverdale!

There are some who say the zombie has had its day as a horror antagonist and should be left to rot.

Thankfully Disney doesn't listen to such naysayers and has greenlit a live-action adaptation of one of the finest, modern zombie stories in decades: Afterlife With Archie.

It is scheduled to debut on Disney Plus in Autumn 2027, which seems like the right time of year.

The show is based on the comic book series from 2013 by Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa and Francesco Francavilla, with Aguirre-Sacasa acting as showrunner.

Not only was it an incredible horror comic, but Afterlife With Archie was also one of the strongest character-led comics of recent years.

Unfortunately, as well as generating great critical acclaim, fan adulation, and a reputation for the sheer brilliance of the story and its visuals, the comic is also remembered for never actually reaching a conclusion.

Of course, the tale had to have a Lovecraftian twist in it!

Much like Doctor Who, it was never officially cancelled, it's just been on an extended hiatus... resting (in peace).

Only the first 10 issues of Afterlife With Archie were published and while subsequent ones were solicitated they never actually appeared.

Ironically, this was largely because Aguirre-Sacasa's career in television took off, with Riverdale and Chilling Adventures of Sabrina.

Let's hope that several episodes into the new streaming show, Aguirre-Sacasa doesn't get distracted by another 'better offer'.

Rumour has that more issues of the comic are also now "on the way", but no dates have been announced, and we'll believe that when we see it.

Of course, if the show 'overtakes' the story being told in the comics, we do run the risk of another Game of Thrones crash-and-burn. But let's not get ahead of ourselves.

I Never Set Out To Be A Funko Collector!

My most recent Pops!: Dunk and Egg

I have no recollection of when I first acquired a Funko Pop! or even which one it was, but now - like something out of the Twilight Zone they seem to be multiplying and filling every nook and cranny in the house!

Wikipedia says of the divisive little figures:

"In 2010, the Funko Pop! line was created. Funko Pop! vinyl line are figures modelled in a style similar to the Japanese chibi style. The figures have large squarish heads, disproportionately small bodies, and large, circular black eyes"

I know some people don't get the appeal, but I find them very cute (and affordable) manifestations of the various niches within my geeky hobbies.

My most recent acquisitions were Dunk and Egg from the excellent A Knight of The Seven Kingdoms and I was very excited to receive a random (one in six, I believe) chase variant of Dunk, dressed as a knight. Of course, this means, at some point I'll need to pick up the original Dunk in scruffy clothes figure.

Originally, I had a single shelf over the door into the gamesroom that was to be the home of my modest Pop! collection, but then more continued to arrive and the horde spread out. So now you can find on book shelves and on top of glass cabinets in several rooms.

Most have been removed from their boxes (one of Rachel's rules for my collecting habits), except for a handful they consider truly collectible (mainly Pops! related to the Mortal Engines movie, based on the book by Philip Reeve).

I'll get round to releasing Dunk and Egg soon, but, at the moment, they seem quite content boxed-up as they are.

A few aren't particularly well-balanced (and have a habit of jumping off shelves in the middle of the night) and so have to lean back on books, but mostly the figures are remarkably stable and remain where they're placed.

Frieren on the far left and He-Man on the right 

Clark Kent changing into Superman, and Krypto

Sue Storm and the Kerblam! Man, hiding behind Scooby-Doo action figures

Pops! have become so pervasive in our house that Rachel even got me a personalised one: me in Pop! form (see below):

That's me, that is

Superman and Lois Lane in flight

Keeping watch from on top of the new bookcase

My original shelf in the gamesroom - filled up very quickly!

Ironclad (2011)

From the moment I stumbled over the intriguing trailers for this mighty mediaeval siege movie I knew I had to see it - totally unaware of the fact that Ironclad is based upon the 1215 siege of Rochester Castle.

Rochester Castle being right on my doorstep (after Tonbridge Castle, which is in my back garden, although doesn't have such a martial history) added a whole new element to this for me - knowing that I could easily go and visit the site where the real events took place.

But even without the local angle, Ironclad is an engrossingly powerful, visceral, bloody, muddy and brutal story that left me physically shaken after it had run its two-hour course.

Having been forced to sign the Magna Carta, King John (an insanely brilliant Paul Giamatti), enlists a horde of Danish mercenaries - led by Tiberius (Vladimir Kulich) - to take back his country and exact revenge on the barons who made him put his name to the "Great Charter".

However, he finds one obstacle in his way, the strategically crucial castle of Rochester on the banks of the River Medway, which bars his path to London.

Holding Rochester is William d'Albini (Brian Cox) and a rag-tag handful of soldiers, including the Knight Templar Marshall (James Purefoy), whoremonger Beckett (Jason Flemyng), cool archer Marks (Mackenzie Crook) and grizzled villain Coteral (Jamie Foreman).

A clever cocktail of the Magnificent Seven and Zulu, Ironclad is must-see material for gamers with its graphic demonstrations of the lethality of various hand weapons as well as its insights into 13th Century siege warfare.

There may be no fantastical, supernatural elements, but this stands high in the ranks of inspirational Dungeons & Dragons movies, for its sheer ballsy brutality and grimy verisimilitude.

It's by no means a historically accurate portrayal of the actual siege, but is gorgeously heroic and incredibly emotional and thrilling nonetheless, with breath-taking performances from all the cast.

Sometimes there is a bit too much "shaky-cam" and the camera can get a bit too close to the fighting on occasions to actually make out what's going on, but these are trivial issues when put up against the brilliance of this movie.

As you may have gathered, I rather like Ironclad.

I was always expecting it to be great - from the sporadic trailers I had seen on the 'net - but it went so far above and beyond my expectations that it would be remiss of me not to insist that everyone who loves low fantasy roleplaying games - or such fare as Game Of Thrones - should watch this as soon as possible.

Black Death (2010)

Fourteenth Century England is in the grip of the bubonic plague and bishop's envoy Ulric (Sean Bean) is leading a band of grizzled mercenaries to investigate rumours of an isolated village that has mysteriously remained untouched by the plague.

Driven by the belief that this 'miracle' is the work of an evil necromancer with the ability to raise the dead, they recruit novice friar Osmund (Eddie Redmayne) to guide them through the marshes that form the final stage of their journey.

However, all  are quite unprepared for what they find in the nameless village.

With strong overtones of Apocalypse Now (and its inspiration Heart Of Darkness by Joseph Conrad), and a sprinkling - because of its powerful religious motivations - of The Wicker Man, Black Death is a flawed gem.

While Bean growls his way through charismatically as the grizzled anti-hero Ulric (a fine addition to a portfolio that embraces Richard Sharpe, Ned Stark and Boromir) and Eddie Redmayne - star of the excellent Medieval drama The Pillars Of The Earth as well as many laudable movie appearances - is great as the conflicted priest, the film has issues with its pacing.

The award-winning Black Death is suitably grim and gritty visually, but misses opportunities on its journey to the village to further explore the horrific, apocalyptic world director Christopher Smith (of Creep and Severance - not that one, the 2006 film - fame) has crafted.

Ulric's party of coin-hungry soldiers are a gloriously dirty, stinking, vicious bunch of veterans, torturers and murderers, but they are also complex individuals rather than just cookie-cutter thugs, even though they are secondary characters on Osmund's journey of self-discovery.

There is a wonderful, unnerving scene when the travellers meet a party of flagellants heading in the opposite direction down river, but we could have done with a few more moments like this before the final act.

The film then features a drawn-out epilogue, detailing the aftermath of the events that take place in the village, which is just a shade too long and overbalances the narrative as it repeats the point it is making a couple of times.

But this doesn't stop Black Death from being a powerful indictment of the 'brainwashing' power of organised religion and the excesses it can drive someone to if they believe 'God' is on their side.

Ultimately, neither the believers nor the non-believers come out of this in a particularly good light, but at least the film raises the issue in the first place.

Those looking for some kind of medieval torture fetish fare will be disappointed. Although not overly gory, Black Death isn't without its moments of blood letting, yet the few instances of torture - or suggested torture - aren't depicted graphically.

Conversely, the one real extended fight scene - a battle between bandits and Ulric's men in the woods - is more akin to a barroom brawl (with swords, maces and whatever-comes-to-hand) than any sort of elegant or stylised swordplay.

Perhaps too much information is relayed to the audience through voice-over and exposition as well (the 'explanation' of what's going on to Osmund, in the misty marshes, is heavy with atmosphere but maybe a bit of an infodump of something we probably could have worked out for ourselves).

It's a pity that the end result of Black Death doesn't quite reach the film's ambitions, because it has the look and mood down perfectly, managing to be psychologically unnerving as well as viscerally exciting and mentally challenging.

War Comes to Westeros in House of The Dragon

It doesn’t get bigger than this. Season Three’s production is the most impressive yet, spanning nearly a year of filming and setting a new world record. Deep dive into its epic scale with co-creator and showrunner Ryan Condal, Emma D'Arcy (Rhaenyra Targaryen), Olivia Cooke (Alicent Hightower), Matt Smith (Daemon Targaryen), and more. Season Three of House of the Dragon premieres June 21 on HBOMax.

I don't like the wait between seasons, but it looks as though this will have been worth it. And we only have a few more days until we find out...

Hammer Of The Gods (2013)

Apocalypse Now meets Dungeons & Dragons in the brutal (if derivative) low-budget, Viking action flick Hammer Of The Gods.

Prince Steinar (Nashville's Charlie Bewley), arrives in England ahead of his own army, to meet up with his father, King Bagsecg (Game Of Thrones' James Cosmo), for a war on the Saxons - only to find that his father has already engaged in the enemy in battle and come off worse.

The dying king entrusts Steiner with finding his estranged first-born, the legendary Hakan (Da Vinci's Demons' Elliot Cowan), to take his rightful place at the head of the Viking hordes.

Steiner sets out with his best friend, Hagen (Clive Standen aka Rollo from Vikings), foul-mouthed berserker Grim (Michael Jibson), superstitious Jokul (Guy Flanagan), and his cowardly younger brother Vali (Theo Barklem-Biggs).

Along the way - like any good Dungeons & Dragons overland expedition - they have a series of random encounters (all resolved through the violence, of course) and join up with a friend of Hakan, Ivar The Boneless (Ivan Kaye aka King Aelle from Vikings) and his slavegirl Agnes (Alexandra Dowling aka Queen Anne from the BBC series The Musketeers).

Encounters with masked Saxons and party in-fighting see Steiner's adventuring group gradually  whittled down until he finally finds his mysterious brother - which is when things go really Apocalypse Now!

Hakan has 'gone native' - à la Colonel Kurtz - and is living in a cave with a mob of cannibalistic Picts who worship him as a god. He even has a scribe Ulric (Game Of Thrones' Francis Magee) on hand to record his proclamations, in homage to Dennis Hopper's photojournalist in Apocalypse Now.

Directed by Farren Blackburn (who gave us the awful Doctor Who Christmas Special: The Doctor, The Widow And The Wardrobe), Hammer Of The Gods does a pretty decent job of masking its budgetary restrictions by dressing up its action-driven plot with a general hand-wavy 'otherworldly' vibe.

That aspect doesn't work quite as well as in Valhalla Rising - which uses a very similar atmosphere for its own particular Viking take on Apocalypse Now and Aguirre, The Wrath Of God - but Hammer Of The Gods still delivers in the brutality stakes and a solid, unambiguous ending.

This isn't a cerebral meditation on life, fate and religion, but a well-acted, violent, low budget action movie about a band of Vikings on a cross-country quest for something other than treasure.

Final Trailer For New Season of House of The Dragon

Know Me, Know My Shelves

Works of, or inspired by, George RR Martin, JRR Tolkien and Jim Henson

Despite the heat wave plaguing our little corner of the world this week, I think I've finished organising my wonderful new bookshelves (put together for me by Rachel's dad last year).

As they are, the shelves are a pretty decent encapsulation of the inside of my brain, focussing on my favourite authors and favourite themes.

From Westeros to the World of Mortal Engines, via the Hyborian Age and Mega-City One, right through to the Planet of The Apes and the Wild West, this is a guided tour of my psyche and my primary, literary gaming inspirations.

Of course, these are not my only book shelves in the house, but are my most recently built and filled.

Pretty sure, now, there's no more room for any more shelves... although there's always room for more books.

Philip Reeve

Conan The Barbarian

Robert E Howard

HP Lovecraft and The Cthulhu Mythos

Westerns - there are more Western paperbacks in another cupboard

Judge Dredd & 2000AD (plus a sneaky little RPG that has yet to find a home)

Planet of The Apes

The Vikings (1958)

The Vikings, one of the most iconic movies from my youth, has been given a blu-ray upgrade in 2017, which I immediately pulled the trigger on.

While not laden with extras, it's still a worthwhile investment if you have such fond memories of this as I do.

Based on the 1951 novel by Edison Marshall and echoing the stories retold in The History Channel's Vikings series, this action-packed 1950's epic primarily focuses on the seething resentment between churlish and vain Einar (the immortal Kirk Douglas) - son of legendary Viking king Ragnar Lodbrok (Ernest Borgnine) - and strong-willed slave Eric (Tony Curtis).

Einar is already pissed at Eric for disfiguring his face (one of many stand-out moments in this marvellous movie), but then they both find themselves drawn towards the kidnapped English princess Morgana (Psycho's Janet Leigh), who is, in turn, betrothed to the odious King Aella (Frank Thring) of Northumbria.

Treacherous Northumbrian nobleman Lord Egbert (James Donald), a long-time ally of Ragnar, happens to know that Eric is actually the heir to the throne of Northumbria... as well as a son of Ragnar (and therefore half-brother of Einar).

He hopes to use this knowledge to his own advantage, while exacting revenge on Aella through Ragnar's Vikings.

Beautifully filmed in vivid Technicolour by Oscar-winning Sevenoaks cinematographer Jack Cardiff (who I interviewed while I was working for the local paper there), the Blu-Ray makes The Vikings look as fresh and new as possible.

Kirk Douglas has never looked more menacing, Tony Curtis more handsome, and Janet Leigh more gorgeous.

Supported by an incredible cast, with breathtakingly detailed practical sets, and shot at a variety of eye-catching locations around Europe, under the guidance of director Richard Fleischer (Conan The Destroyer; 20,000 Leagues Under The Sea; Fantastic Voyage; Soylent Green; Doctor Dolittle; The Boston Strangler etc), it's no wonder that this movie has stayed with me since I saw it on TV as a young kid.

As was the fashion with many vintage films, the ending is rather abrupt (once its central storyline has concluded) and leaves a lot of points unresolved that would have 21st Century audiences racing to the Internet to moan about or resolve through fan-fiction.

But this doesn't distract from the non-stop adventure that drives the narrative from the opening narration of Orson Welles to the final credits.

To modern sensibilities, raised on the likes of Game of Thrones, the largely bloodless fight sequences and the occasionally theatrical acting may feel a bit dated, but truly this is a wonderful, engrossing, two-hour historical romp.

And any gamer worth his salt, once he's seen Einar's "axe climb", will be wanting to recreate that sequence in his next Dungeons & Dragons adventure...

"Ultimate Victory is Non-Negotiable"

Season Two was the fuel. Season Three is the fire. Go behind-the-scenes of the new season with co-creator and showrunner Ryan Condal, Emma D'Arcy (Rhaenyra Targaryen), Olivia Cooke (Alicent Hightower), Matt Smith (Daemon Targaryen) and more. Season Three of House of the Dragon premieres June 21 on HBOMax.

The Dragons Have Taken Flight, The Long Wait Is At An End

Snow White And The Huntsman (2012)

Snow White And The Huntsman is the classic tale of Snow White given the full-on Lord Of The Rings treatment.

Director Rupert Sanders was clearly taking lessons from Peter Jackson with his presentation of a fully-developed fantasy world.

Unfortunately, for all its sumptuous production values, the script by Evan Daugherty, John Lee Hancock and Hossein Amini is quite flawed - the pacing is rather measured, to put it politely (most would call it slow), the magic mirror (a key element of the story and a great special effect) is forgotten about a third of the way into the story, and the central characters of the Huntsman (Chris Hemsworth) and Snow's childhood sweetheart, William (Sam Claflin) both serve the same role in the movie. This duplication of roles is further highlighted by the script's failure to resolve either character's personal journey.

And all that brings us to Snow White herself. Kristen Stewart may have the whole Twilight thing under her belt and is reasonably easy on the eye, but she is totally devoid of charisma in this movie - this is never more evident than in her "rousing speech" to her father's subjects hiding out in the castle of Duke Hammond (Vincent Regan).

She is supposedly whipping them up into a frenzy of rebellion against the evil queen Ravenna (Charlize Theron), but totally fails to sell it. I couldn't imagine an army following her to the supermarket let alone into battle against a powerful, magical foe.

That said, the film gave us a well thought-out back story of how the witch Ravenna usurped Snow White's father and took over the kingdom - even if we are supposed to believe that for the decade (or longer) that Snow was kept imprisoned, the lone rebel Duke Hammond - father of William - was able to hold out against the queen and her mastery of the dark arts.

When Snow comes of age (and thus the queen is no longer "the fairest in the land"), she escapes captivity and flees into the well-realised Dark Forest.

Ravenna summons The Huntsman to track Snow down, on the promise that she will bring his dead wife back to life if he delivers. Realising that the queen's offer is an empty one, the Huntsman instead helps Snow to escape the forest and head towards Duke Hammond's castle.

On the way they are captured by the seven dwarf bandits - who count a number of famous faces amongst them: such as Ian McShane, Bob Hoskins, Ray Winstone, Nick Frost and Toby Jones.

And the dwarves are another strength of the film. Once you get over the initial shock of seeing such well-known faces on the bodies of little people, they are wholly convincing and wouldn't look out of place around the table at Bag End when Thorin and co pay a visit to Bilbo Baggins.

The dwarves then escort Snow and the Huntsman to their final destination, and play an integral part in the princess's scheme to get her kingdom back and avenge her father's death.

But of course the stand-out performance of the piece is Charlize Theron as the evil queen, who not only acts Kristen Stewart out of the picture but looks every inch the majestic evil sovereign, whatever make-up effects are piled on her to show the ageing cost of her magic.

There are even, early on, strong suggestions of an incestuous, Game Of Thrones-style relationship between Ravenna and her (twin?) brother Finn (Sam Spruell), but this, ultimately, being a children's movie that particular sub-plot also goes nowhere - although there is definitely a link of some kind between them as demonstrated when the Huntsman slays Finn.

Stylistically Snow White And The Huntsman is a visually impressive retelling of Snow White story, but the script has serious, basic issues that really should have been picked up during the film's development.

Sleeping Beauty (2014)

Years before they became a byword for cheap, blockbuster cash-ins (i.e. mockbusters), the first movie I discovered by The Asylum was a fantasy film (simply called Dragon, I believe) in the discount aisle of Woolworths in Tonbridge (which shows just how long ago it was).

Since then I have remained firm in my belief that although they're not exactly known for quality productions, The Asylum is at its best when working in the fantasy genre.

That said, Sleeping Beauty isn't up to the pulpy, B-movie calibre of, say, an Arrowstorm film, but it still has its moments.

Directed by Casper Van Dien, who also appears as King David alongside his wife, Catherine Oxenberg as Queen Violet and his daughter Grace Van Dien as Princess Dawn aka Sleeping Beauty, the film is a liberal reworking of the fairy tale that starts in Disney territory then caroms off into its own little world.

To complete the family atmosphere on set, Maya Van Dien (daughter of both Casper Van Dien and Catherine Oxenberg) appears as a totally random addition to the story - a young girl called Newt (Aliens, much?) who has survived inside the enchanted castle and gives aid to Princess Dawn's rescuers.

Events initially unfold as they do in Disney's Sleeping Beauty cartoon, with the Three Good Fairies bestowing gifts upon the newborn Princess Dawn (although the guards' ill-fitting helmets and the treasure chests that look like cardboard boxes give away that this isn't the Disney version).

But then busty, yummy-mummy, evil witch queen Tambria (Olivia d'Abo) - whose invite got lost in the post - turns up and zaps Dawn with the familiar curse, then proceeds to blow up the good fairies.

In The Asylum's version, Dawn is raised alone in a castle tower, educated by her parents, and kept away from spinning wheel needles (several on-the-nose double entendres involving the word 'prick' got my hopes up this was going to be a wittily-scripted comedy; it's not), until just before her 16th birthday. And what do you know? She only gets tricked by Tambria into pricking her finger and falling asleep (taking the whole kingdom down with her).

A century passes and in a neighbouring kingdom, a servant called Barrow (Game Of Thrones' Finn Jones) discovers fragments of a map and a message leading to the cursed castle. Now, I'm not sure exactly who wrote this as Princess Dawn (as is suggested) is, of course, in a magical sleep.

I presumed it was actually an elaborate trap set out by Tambria - who has also been trapped inside the castle and unable to harm her slumbering nemesis - but this is never made clear.

Barrow's master is the obnoxious, privileged, bullying Tory-boy Prince Jayson (Edward Lewis French), who, learning of Barrow's discovery, decides to lead his coterie of yobbish mates on a jolly wheeze to rescue the treasure in Sleeping Beauty's castle and claim that kingdom for his own.

Again, it's never exactly clear how much this neighbouring territory knows about the curse on King David's land or the power of the wicked sorceress Tambria who now rules (kind of) there.

Given that it's just "over the mountain" from Jayson's realm, the general knowledge of the whole "asleep for a century" scenario seems rather vague.

Of course, Tambria isn't going to make things easy and throws a scaly pliosaur, a giant lizardman, a legion of shadowy wraiths and a never-ending army of zombies at the adventuring party that's coming for the treasure (and maybe the chance to snog a sleeping 115-year-old princess).

A particularly wonderful aspect about Jayson's loathsome cronies is, given that they are supposed to be trained fighters, just how cowardly they are. Their go-to tactic when confronted by any monster is "run away, run away".

The only one who shows the slightest bit of decency towards Barrow, and some backbone, is Gruner (Gil Kolirin) - who may be a commander or captain or something in Jayson's army, again it's not very clear.

The adventuring party gradually gets whittled down as they wander, seemingly aimlessly, around the same sections of castle and overgrown garden, until the final confrontation with Tambria.

By this time, Jayson has switched sides (or is he bluffing?), Newt has popped up and disappeared in a cloud of cryptic warnings several times, and Gruner and Barrow have bonded.

I'm not entirely sure who Sleeping Beauty is aimed at as there's some gore (Tambria pulling the head off of someone and dragging out their spine comes to mind) and an uncomfortable, rape-threat moment where a couple of brothers in Jayson's gang discover a magically sleeping servant woman in the castle kitchens. Thankfully Barrow steps in before that goes too far.

There's certainly an attempt at a Dungeons & Dragons vibe in the latter stages of this movie (torch-lit exploration, traps etc), but despite constant references to Barrow's map, there's never any real feeling that the adventurers are navigating a convincing, contiguous environment.

One minute they are stuck on one side of a lake, the next there's a bridge; they talk about going to certain places, but are next seen elsewhere.

This also isn't some hallucinogenic, dreamscape either, but simply a combination of poor directing, editing and scriptwriting.

The low-budget monsters aren't too bad though; the giant lizardman (despite being a cheap CGI creation) is quite interesting and the various undead have the added bonus that Tambria keeps resurrecting them every time they get nobbled.

As well as the many, many plot holes in the story (some of which I've alluded to above), more often than not the dialogue is delivered in quite mannered ways; now I'm not sure if this is director Van Dien trying to create a "fantasy Medieval" ambience but it doesn't really work.

Budgetary limitations abound in this version of Sleeping Beauty (there's no big dragon showdown at the end, for instance) - both in the effects and script - but it's an okay way to pass 90 minutes, if there isn't anything better on TV.

CAMPAIGN AUTOPSIES: Will I Ever Learn?

Photo by Giancarlo Revolledo on Unsplash

When the Tuesday Knights came into being I was the de facto gamesmaster, running a deliciously vanilla fantasy campaign in my homebrew setting of Tekralh.

However, I don't feel my gamesmastering chops really began to take form until May 2014 when Pete handed me the reins of his nascent Chronicles of Cidri campaign.

Pete had been running this, for a few months, using the old The Fantasy Trip rules, but I updated that to a retroclone of the system, Heroes & Other Worlds.

I have to confess that the mechanics were rather too "dice pooly" for my liking, but they really worked well in the context of our campaign.

I ran Cidri for the better part of three years, building up to a delightfully OTT apocalyptic climax.

This campaign remains my personal gold standard, a target I now wish to aim for again - and hopefully excel - when I'm finally allowed to return to the head of the table.

The Tuesday Knights' membership has changed a lot since those days, we've lost some people and gained more members, which means tastes have changed as well, but I still feel these "revelations" hold water and I really should adhere to them.

I wish I'd had the foresight to conduct an autopsy on our Cidri campaign when it wrapped, dissecting my thoughts on why it worked, but I think I was just basking in the adulation of my players... and so it never crossed my mind to attempt the kind of surprisingly perceptive analysis that I had with these earlier efforts that hadn't worked out.

As will be clear by now I've started work on my latest attempt to run an "open-ended" campaign for the Tuesday Knights, but this time with a new rules set (Twilight Sword) and a superficially-familiar fantasy setting.

This will actually be my fifth or sixth attempted campaign since the Tuesday Knights first started gaming back in August 2008.

So, what went wrong with my previous games?

TEKRALH I: The first game I ran for the Tuesday Knights started as heavily houseruled version of Castles & Crusades (with a large dose of Hackmaster and Arduin) and it worked really well to start with...

Until, for no readily apparent reason, I decided to switch horses mid-stream and changed the rules system to a by-the-book version of Labyrinth Lord. The characters were severely de-powered and the game turned into a meatgrinder of TPK after TPK.

Within a few sessions all the fun that we'd had at the start of the campaign was sucked from the campaign. Eventually, I had to pull the plug on the game as it wasn't getting anywhere.

When we started the players were giving me nice backstories for their characters, with plot hooks etc, but by the end I was lucky if they'd give their characters names as they knew their life expectancy had become so limited.

MORAL: If it ain't broke don't fix it.

KNIGHT CITY I: Next up was my Villains & Vigilantes campaign, set in Knight City. This was driven almost entirely by the naïve dream of trying to recapture the magic that Steve, Pete, Nick and I enjoyed with our original V&V games back in the '80s.

Almost from the start things went wrong with this campaign due to the simple fact that we weren't all singing from the same hymn sheet. It wasn't anyone's fault in particular, but when we were teenagers we were all (except for Nick) avid comic book readers and had reasonably similar tastes in comics and superheroes.

Thirty years later, tastes had changed and the sort of scenarios I wanted to run (e.g. dimension hopping, cosmic stuff) didn't sit comfortably with some of the players, who were expecting more straight-forward supervillain bashing.

There were also problems with the rules (from the clunky combat table at the game's heart to the peculiar diversity of character's random power sets), but ultimately these were just the straws that broke a very unhealthy camel's back. I think we could have overcome these if everyone had had contiguous ideas of where the game should be going.

MORAL: Make sure everyone is on the same page.

TEKRALH II: I thought I'd found a winner when I came across D101's Crypts & Things (a sword & sorcery variant of Swords & Wizardry) as I thought this kind of human-centric adventure game was the way to go.

The simple problem with this very short-lived campaign - and it had nothing to do with the rules - was I had just discovered A Song Of Ice & Fire!

I was in the grip of Westeros-fever and spent all my time thinking about developing the wider world, quickly losing sight of the intimate adventure I should have been running for the players. 

This would have been fine if the player-characters were all high-up members of House Stark or House Lannister, but they were actually 1st Level D&D proto-adventurers and tunnel grubbers.

Instead of developing scenarios or stocking dungeons I was researching medieval legal systems, clothing, cuisine, bartering etc My eyes were fixed on the horizon rather than the gamestable in front of me.

MORAL: Intimate, not epic.

SHADOWDARK: I only ran this for one session. The players told me afterwards that they loved it, but something about it just didn't click with me.

At the time I was working on my overcomplicated Frankengame monstrosity of assorted houserules all stapled together with my own ideas from decades of gaming.

As it happened, "my" system and Shadowdark shared some similar ideas. It's just Shadowdark did them more elegantly, more streamlined. So I should have been happy!

To this day, I have no idea why I bounced off of Shadowdark so hard, when - upon initially reading the rules - it felt like such a perfect fit for my style of gamesmastering. 

However, I'm glad I didn't drag this game out and euthanised it before people got too invested in the campaign.

MORAL: If you're going to kill off a game, kill it quickly.

KNIGHT CITY II: Last year - before the osteoarthritis in my back knocked me off my feet for more than six months - I started a new V&V campaign (this time with some houserules to avoid some of the issues we'd encountered mechanically last time).

I provided the players with pamphlets before hand introducing the setting and - hopefully - suggesting the style of game I was hoping for.

But, once again, it didn't take long to realise that we had four players all pulling in different directions. This meant, for instance, that the opening scenario - which should have taken one or two sessions to wrap up - was heading into its fourth month when I had to retire from the field.

At its core, the problems with this iteration of Knight City were exactly the same as before, even though the make-up of the group at the table was different.

Superheroes are such a broad genre that they can mean diametrically different things to different players, no matter how well you think you've spelled out your personal vision.

And a central element of that clash of ideologies lies at my own feet. Over the decades (I've been reading comics since I was a wee nipper, and a collector since I was a teenager), my personal beliefs about what makes a good costumed crimefighter have become so embedded in my psyche that I'm not only unable to clearly explain my "vision" (surely everyone else sees superheroes the same way, right?) but I get frustrated when my players don't automatically share the same "vision"!

Just because it's a beloved reading and viewing genre for me doesn't mean I can run it as an open-ended, forever campaign. In fact, I'm probably too emotionally invested in the genre for me to brook any deviation from my perceived "one true way".

To top that off - again ignoring my mistakes from previous failed campaigns - I'd gone full "Game of Thrones" on Knight City and obsessively detailed every borough, with hundreds and hundreds of locations. Most of which, the players bypassed when creating their character backstories. 

It's almost as if I'd totally ignored every single misstep I'd made previously as a gamesmaster and was trying to crash on regardless.

MORAL: Learn from your past mistakes. Pick a game genre that everyone understands.