Joe Dever (1956-2016)

Joe Dever died this week. I'm not greatly familiar with his work, but if you're a fan of gamebooks then you will already know much more than I could say anyway. He wrote what must be the most epic gamebook saga ever, and he was probably the first to use an original and fully detailed campaign setting and an ongoing character across multiple gamebooks. A true pioneer of the medium.

We didn't know each other very well. He wasn't part of the roleplaying social circle that included me, Jamie, Oliver Johnson, Mark Smith, Paul Mason and Steve Williams. Joe and I chatted a couple of times back in the '80s about gamebook ideas, but our paths had never crossed before that at Games Workshop, where he and Gary Chalk were working when they came up with Lone Wolf.

Gamebooks were big business then and every publisher was desperate to have their own series or three. I admired the solid design that Joe and Gary put into the underlying mechanics - the clear rules for where inventory was listed on the character sheet, things like that.

There's a tribute to Joe Dever over on Stuart Lloyd's blog and Paul Gresty has written this fan's-eye view of Joe Dever's work, a heartfelt paean to the priceless gift of fantasy that a good author can bestow.

You wait years for a Lone Wolf crowdfunding campaign...

No, not that Lone Wolf project, this one. This one has Gary Chalk art. Oh, but so did the other one. I'll tell you the first thing that sprang to mind:

"Nigel gave me a drawing that said eighteen inches. Now, whether or not he knows the difference between feet and inches is not my problem. I do what I'm told."

"But you're not as confused as him, are you. I mean, it's not your job to be as confused as Nigel."

Actually it's really simple. The other crowdfunder was for a new series of gamebooks set in Magnamund but not starring Lone Wolf. This, on the other hand, is a boardgame and it does star Lone Wolf, along with other famous characters from the books such as Giak Kootak and Rotzon the Cener. (I think that's him below with the big old book and the curtain rod.)

Confused? Maybe you should read Richard S Hetley's guest post about the Lone Wolf Boardgame on Lloyd of Gamebooks. That will explain everything. Go ahead, I'll wait.

What makes this special enough to be worth your hard-earned shards? Well, even if you're not a fan of the Lone Wolf gamebooks, any boardgame designed and illustrated by Gary Chalk is a must. Here's the guy who created the look and feel of Magnamund, who shaped the imagination of a generation of tabeletop gamers with his Games Workshop artwork & game design, and who has illustrated scores of beautiful books. On top of that he's a genuine gaming enthusiast himself with that rare combination: passion and talent, both turned up to 11.

For this Kickstarter campaign, Gary has teamed up with Megara Entertainment, who we might have mentioned before, and Greywood Publishing, the publishers of the very short-lived Fabled Lands RPG. The campaign has just one week left to run, and with your help it can still reach its target. Find out all the details here.

A marvellous night for a moondance

Some news for Lone Wolf fans. Autumn Snow, the new gamebook series set in the LW universe, has raised enough money to go ahead, and now has this appropriately autumnal cover by Gary Chalk. Speaking of which, as the season has come round again, here are my takes on the early, crisp fall and the darker, smoky time after Halloween. More on that tomorrow.

Chalk giant

Any excuse for a classic Gary Chalk cover from the Golden Age of White Dwarf. But it's a good excuse. Gary has got together with the guys at Megara Entertainment to launch a crowdfunding campaign for Autumn Snow: The Pit of Darkness, a new gamebook set in the Lone Wolf universe.

For once it's not Kickstarter but Megara's own home-grown crowdfunding platform. In effect you're pre-subscribing to buy a copy of the book when it's ready, and for 29 euros you'll get a PDF and a black-and-white hardback with two dozen all-new Gary Chalk pics, plus fillers.

The new book is by Martin Charbonneau and features the adventures of a female Kai monk. I mean nun. She begins her adventures by picking a thoroughbred from the monastery stables, so a bit of a risk taker, then - which is just as well, as it looks like this mission will take her to the Darklands and beyond.

Money raised will go towards the purchase of dipthongs, digraphs and apostrophes... but more importantly, to pay for those lovely illustrations, meticulous editing by Richard S Hetley, and the deluxe printing we've come to associate with Megara. Oh, and the whole shebang is being overseen by Joe Dever, who will check every detail to ensure this fits in as an official part of the Lone Wolf canon.

I'll finish with Gary's own words, as he knows this world better than almost anyone:

"It’s great to have the chance to go back to Magnamund again, although this time my drawings will be featuring a new character: Autumn Snow. The servants of the Darklords and the warriors of Sommerlund are some of my favourite subjects, so I’d better start sharpening my pencils." 

Read more about The Pit of Darkness here and you can place your order for a copy here.

Brymstone

Brymstone is a coastal town in north-east Ellesland, close to Thuland's border with Albion. Created originally by Robert Dale as the base for an ongoing campaign, it was suitable for a medium-sized party of characters around 5th rank and was intended to appear in DW Book 7 - except, of course, there was no Book 7. (What is it about those pesky half-dozens?)

A partial version of Brymstone ran in a short-lived fantasy gaming magazine that called itself Red Giant in order to show how it really wasn't overawed by White Dwarf at all. Red Giant appeared in 1990 but lasted only two issues. The RG publishers (one of whom was Gary Chalk, the illustrator of the Lone Wolf books) had no products to sell, unlike their rivals Games Workshop, and of course such a magazine on its own was not going to be self-sustaining. A pity, as it ran some fine articles before gravitational collapse reduced it to neutron dust.

RG's demise left the Brymstone campaign incomplete. And so the material, like the Ophis campaign pack, remains limbo-locked. It was nine-tenths ready for publication, but that last 10% leaves it largely unusable, even in blog form. All the same, I'll try and find some of the material that can work as a standalone. And for a much better (full-colour) map, pop over to Lee Barklam's site The Cobwebbed Forest.