[Fanzine Focus XXX] The What on the Border Where?

On the tail of the Old School Renaissance has come another movement—the rise of the fanzine. Although the fanzine—a nonprofessional and nonofficial publication produced by fans of a particular cultural phenomenon, got its start in Science Fiction fandom, in the gaming hobby it first started with Chess and Diplomacy fanzines before finding fertile ground in the roleplaying hobby in the 1970s. Here these amateurish publications allowed the hobby a public space for two things. First, they were somewhere that the hobby could voice opinions and ideas that lay outside those of a game’s publisher. Second, in the Golden Age of roleplaying when the Dungeon Masters were expected to create their own settings and adventures, they also provided a rough and ready source of support for the game of your choice. Many also served as vehicles for the fanzine editor’s house campaign and thus they showed another DM and group played said game. This would often change over time if a fanzine accepted submissions. Initially, fanzines were primarily dedicated to the big three RPGs of the 1970s—Dungeons & Dragons, RuneQuest, and Traveller—but fanzines have appeared dedicated to other RPGs since, some of which helped keep a game popular in the face of no official support.

Since 2008 with the publication of Fight On #1, the Old School Renaissance has had its own fanzines. The advantage of the Old School Renaissance is that the various Retroclones draw from the same source and thus one Dungeons & Dragons-style RPG is compatible with another. This means that the contents of one fanzine will be compatible with the Retroclone that you already run and play even if not specifically written for it. Labyrinth Lord and Lamentations of the Flame Princess Weird Fantasy Roleplay have proved to be popular choices to base fanzines around, as has Swords & Wizardry. Not every fanzine is dedicated to particular roleplaying games.

The What on the Border Where? is quite possibly the oddest fanzine possible and either the weirdest or most basic treatment of B2, Keep on the Borderlands possible—if not both. What it is not, as written, is a gameable product. None of the constituent parts of the module appear in the fanzine. Not the Keep on the Borderlands itself, not the Caves of Chaos, not the river or the wilderness. None of it. So if it is not a new treatment of the classic Basic Dungeons & Dragons module that so many of entered into the hobby by playing, then what exactly is The What on the Border Where?

The What on the Border Where? is really two things. First, it is an exercise in memory, and second, via that exercise in memory, it is a way of revisiting old modules and making them playable again. The result is a tool for the Dungeon Master that she can use to create new adventures out of old ones, a way of combining the solo play of journaling with the preparation the Dungeon Master has to do in order to ready a scenario. The example used throughout The What on the Borde Where? is based on B2, Keep on the Borderlands, since it is already familiar to so may Dungeon Masters. Hence the name. However, the process can be applied to other adventures too.

So what does The What on the Border Where? involve? It starts by suggesting two exercises. First, going to the kitchen, opening the cutlery draw and memorising what is in there. Then closing the draw and listing everything in the draw. The second is get both the prospective Dungeon Master of The What on the Border Where? and a friend to think about a film, quickly write its plot on a sheet of paper, and then compare notes. When both done, compare the list with the cutlery draw in the first case and the friend’s description of the plot and yours with each other’s, and also with the actual plot. There will be differences, and the comparison is not correct them, but to highlight them, to see what that is new and how that is interesting. Once those exercises are complete, The What on the Border Where? asks the Dungeon Master to do exactly the same with B2, Keep on the Borderlands. Look at the map of the wilderness in the module which surrounds the Keep and the Caves of Chaos. Do that for two minutes. Then put B2, Keep on the Borderlands aside and draw the map from memory. Then do it again for the Keep. And again, for the Caves of Chaos.

Once done compare the maps and begin to populate them. If the same, use the original entries for the locations. If different, then create something new, whether using wandering monster tables and taking something from other sources. However, The What on the Border Where? does have monster tables of its own, this its only actual gaming content. Then play. Options included in The What on the Border Where? suggest ways in which the Dungeon Master can turn the process from a solo process into a collaborative one with tasks being swapped round from the Wilderness to the Keep to the Caves of Chaos, and so on, so that none of the players are fully aware of what the created adventure contains.

Physically, The What on the Border Where? is cleanly and tidily presented. Much of it consists of plain map pages with notes on how to draw the maps from memory and the appropriate map symbols as you would expect for a Basic Dungeons & Dragons module from TSR, Inc.

The The What on the Border Where? never explores the obvious issue between the playthrough of the original module and the playthrough of what is a simulacrum of the original module. Just how far does the new memory-based simulacrum of the module have to deviate from the original before it is no longer what was played? How many exercises does the Dungeon Master have to conduct on new simulacra after the first, before what she is left with is not really based on her memories at all and almost exactly unlike B2, Keep on the Borderlands?

The What on the Border Where? is about nostalgia, a big feature of the Old School Renaissance. Essentially, it is not replaying the adventure that you first played forty years ago, but about recreating your memories of it and what you think you played, and playing that. It is also playing with and upon our memories of doing so, but in a way that leads to the creation of something potentially different, whether because our memories are wrong or we have forgotten things about the module. Ultimately, it is telling the Dungeon Master that the details of what was played do not matter, but the memories of what was played do. Yet, is that achieving anything, except delving into memories of what was and reliving them once created? Is that a viable alternative to reobtaining the module, in this case, B2, Keep on the Borderlands, and simply replaying again? Will that not trigger those same memories with a playthrough decades since the last or first, along with new ones based upon the playthrough again of what was originally played, rather than what might just be an idea of it?

The What on the Border Where? is at best an interesting idea in memory recreation that is never really explored and is reductive is what it creates. At worst, it is a complete waste of time, one that adds nothing to B2, Keep on the Borderlands as a module and does not guarantee that Dungeon Master will have anything worth running at the end of it. Ultimately, it might just be simpler to order a copy of B2, Keep on the Borderlands and play that and so create new memories.

Brilliantly Sunny Handouts

As well as introducing players to the cosmic horror of H.P. Lovecraft and the concept of playing ordinary persons—or investigators—pitched stopping the entities and their servants borne of an uncaring universe, Call of Cthulhu introduced something else. And that is, clues, and in particular, their associated handouts. For Call of Cthulhu is a literary game and an academic game, a game in which clues come in the form of letters, diaries, newspaper clippings, excerpts from Mythos tomes, and more. Which of course, means that they can all be copied and cut out for the players and their investigators’ perusal, and from the clues found, so push the play of the game forward. As scenarios and then campaigns grew in complexity, then so did their clues, and then so did their handouts...

Of course, the first sophisticated handout for Call of Cthulhu would arguably be the match book for the Tiger Bar in the Shanghai chapter of Masks of Nyarlathotep, and in some ways, just as Masks of Nyarlathotep has remained the preeminent campaign for Call of Cthulhu, so its handouts have remained as correspondingly important. Thus to accompany the most recent edition of the campaign, updated and adjusted for use with Call of Cthulhu, Seventh edition, The H.P. Lovecraft Historical Society has created the Masks of Nyarlathotep: Gamer Prop Set. With its one hundred and more props and handouts, this—even in its standard form—is a gorgeous looking collection and would deservedly go on to win the 2019 Ennie Award for ‘Product of the Year’. (Note that Reviews from R’lyeh has only had a chance to examine the Masks of Nyarlathotep: Gamer Prop Set and is not ashamed to admit that it would like to write a review of this and other prop sets.)

However, not every campaign or scenario warrants so lavish a treatment, but over the years there have been many efforts to support Call of Cthulhu’s use of handouts as props. For example, Chaosium, Inc. published the Beyond the Mountains of Madness Game Aid, which collected all of the handouts and supporting material for the pre-millennium campaign, Beyond the Mountains of Madness. Similarly, Pagan Publishing published GM Packs for many of its campaigns, such as that for Realm of Shadows. Many of these extras have become highly collectible, with correspondingly high prices, even though in some cases, they have not amounted to much more than a few sheets of paper.

Alongside this, another trend has allowed the Keeper to create more and more of her own handouts—the use of the personal computer and inexpensive Desktop Publishing software. Previously, a Keeper might have written out a handout and then soaked it in tea before drying it out in the oven to get that effect of its being old, and whilst she might still do that today, she is just as likely to create something her computer—a letter, a diary entry, a newspaper article, a map, and the like. This also means that publishers can do the same, whatever their size. So it is with Dave Sokolowski and Weird 8, who has released the Sun Spots Prop Kit, a set of handouts for the 2016 scenario, Sun Spots. Set in 1926, west of a wintery Boston in the resort town of Red Valley where sun-worshippers are taking advantage of the unseasonably warm weather and a father—accompanied by the investigators—have come to retrieve his daughter, whom he believes to have fallen into immoral company. Of course, nothing is as it seems, for that immoral company turns out to be sun-worshipping cultists, more and more of whom flocks to the town the heat grows and grows, threatening burn it—and more—down.

The Sun Spots Prop Kit is a simple envelope, inside of which are just four items. The first of these is the first of three maps in the Sun Spots Prop Kit. This is an A3-sized, double-page spread of the town, drawn in topographical style, and done as the sort town map you might find at a tourist office or a hotel. It even comes with marked and numbered location as well as list of adverts down one side. This gives it a lovely verisimilitude. The second prop consists of several entries in the daughter’s diary over a couple of sheets and they are nicely presented with a slightly rough and idiosyncratic feel to the handwriting. The handwriting is large and easy to read, but with elements that make it just a little harder to read in places—just like the handwriting of you or I.

The second map—and third prop—is a simple plan of the town of Red Valley. This feels much more a handout rather than an in-game map like the first one, but is clear and simple. The likelihood is that this map was designed to accompany the third map—and fourth prop, an elevation map of the valley around the town of Red Valley. Now in Sun Spots, only the fourth prop was included in its pages, rather than including a map of the town. So, the Sun Spots Prop Kit certainly fixes that omission. Of the two maps, the elevation map is the only one done in full colour and it has a pleasing delicacy to it matching the area maps of the period.

Physically, the Sun Spots Prop Kit is solidly presented. All four items are printed on weighty paper stock and feel good in the hand. 

The Sun Spots Prop Kit is smartly done and all four props have a lovely feel to them. Now if you have a copy of Sun Spots, then the truth is that the props in the Sun Spots Prop Kit are not entirely necessary to play the scenario. However, they do add a degree of verisimilitude when running the scenario—especially the tourist-style map and the diary. Which means that the Sun Spots Prop Kit does what it is intended to do and that is, help make the play Sun Spots all the better.