Castle Oldskull Module 13: Oldskull Gonneslingers

Hello everyone, Castle Oldskull is a well-regarded RPG supplement series, designed to sync with Gygaxian, old school, and Wizardly tabletop role-playing games. If you play tabletop, you’ll sync in quickly. If you’re a retro videogamer, you might see influences from Archon, The Bard’s Tale, Dragon’s Lair, Gauntlet, Mail Order Monsters, Phantasie, Telengard, Temple of Apshai, Tunnels of Doom, Ultima, Wasteland, Wizardry, and Zork. If you’re a game designer, writer, or programmer, you’ll find lots of creative material that can fuel your own projects, with inspirations for dark fantasy characters, encounters, monsters, plots, settings, spells, treasures, and random generation. I’m keeping prices dirt cheap here for those who find me, please enjoy and spread the word!

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For those who wish to know the exact specifics: This is a 146-page illustrated book, produced as a supplement to Old School Essentials, which is a direct translation of the classic 1981 Moldvay/Cook Basic/Expert version of the world’s classic Fantasy Role-Playing Game (FRPG), as created by Gygax and Arneson and originally published in 1974. This book can be most directly used with Holmes Basic (1978 blue book), B/X (1981 blue and red books), Mentzer BECMI (1983 red books with four supplementary boxed sets), or 1E Advanced (hardcover volumes originally published by TSR, 1977-1979). If used with 5E, conversion work would be required. This book is not a standalone game.

Oldskull Gonneslingers, the 50^th volume in the Castle Oldskull supplement series, focuses on a new firearms-oriented character class, the Fusilier. Contents include: [1] an introduction to the concept and its developmental history; [2] an historical essay covering the use of firearms in the 1970s FRPG; [3] details concerning the Gygaxian approach to anachronistic missile weaponry in the FRPG; [4] a campaign timeline that highlights gonne- and technology-related events in folklore and mythologized history; [5] details on the gradual and controlled introduction of gunpowder to an FRPG campaign; [6] notes on the cloud city of Laputa, the cloud castles known as Laputa Shards, and the Laputan colony of Corvinia; [7] mechanics of the Fusilier class (ability scores, hit dice, saving throws, experience progression, etc.); [8] role-playing notes pertaining to Fusilier progression and honorifics; [9] notes on Laputan spirit deities; [10] details on gonneslinger armor, shields, and other equipment, such as holsters, bandoliers and accelerants; [11] game rule details on six tiers of arcane firearms and 33 subtypes, from firepots to hand bombards; [12] rules concerning the ritualistic attainment of gonnes by the worthy; [13] rules for the limited purchase of restricted firearms technologies and related material; [14] details on rounds and reloading, including 4 types of pulver (arcane gunpowder) and 12 types of ammunition; [15] guidelines for Fusilier retainers and followers; [16] detailed combat rules for loading, firing, reloading, cascading shot damage calculations, misfires, and clearing jams; [17] details on all Fusilier special abilities (Aimed Shot, Clear Jam, Makeshift Repair, Aura of the Embers, Quickdraw, Nerves of Steel, Trick Shot, Rapid Reload, Deadeye Shot, Shock Fire, Brimstone Glamours, Mephitic Shot, Pyremantle, Cinder Spirit); [18] notes on 15 Fusilier-specific spell-like magics; [19] a campaign lore appendix pertaining to Robert Browning’s Childe Roland to the Dark Tower Came; [20] a campaign lore appendix pertaining to Edgar Allan Poe’s The Masque of the Red Death, as it relates to Castle Oldskull, the Chaos Plague, and the King in Yellow; [21] an About the Author section; [22] a Legal section as required by the OGL; and [23] a back cover. In addition to section divider graphics and headers and footers, this volume includes 80 illustrations inclusive of front and back cover, supporting 39,900 total words of text. (By way of comparison, Stephen King’s The Dark Tower I: The Gunslinger is a 55,376-word volume.)