RAGNAROK 59

Regular readers and followers of this Blog will know that earlier this year I joined The Society of Fantasy and Science Fiction Wargamers (SFSFW). I have been a regular purchaser of the societies magazine Ragnarok, and even had an article published, but had never joined as a full member.

All this changed when I read some comments on the Flintloque inspired Yahoo site - The Notables, (see this link for more details). Then yesterday I received my first issue of Ragnarok as a member - issue 59 for Winter 2012 through the post.

I will admit that I was a little disappointed - as I read it all from cover to cover in one evening - I would have liked it to have been bigger, with more pages, more articles, more images, but those that were included were great fun to read and have already given me a great deal of inspiration and ideas for future games.

Of note were two articles that I thought were very well written and full of intriguing scenario ideas. the first was Aftermath, written by Alan Patterson and covers a multi-player Fantasy game that takes place immediately after a huge battle. The tailored race or objective orders were very well written and I feel would lead to a very good interactive game. The Barbarian orders of Follow Ox (Ox being a giant), were particularly intriguing.

The second article called Fall of the Goblin Empire was the winning entry from a SFSFW contest and was written by Mark Caldwell. The rules set Goblin against Goblin but with a twist - The battles took place as aerial engagements, Balloons, Dragons, Gliders, Rockets etc. I can think of nothing more haphazard than a Goblin in a flying machine, a guarantee of fun and chaos. I thought the nine pages of rules were simple, but effective and great fun to read - for example each race was given different states of mind - the Halflings had three, they are Smokin, Drinkin, Sleepin, well done Mark.

Other articles covered Star Trek, Aeronef, Kill Zone and Traveller as well as a Every World Needs a Hero (Superhero gaming) and a look at the works of Cordwainer Smith.

Steve Bleese (editor for a third time) has a plea on page one - asking for additional members and articles, are you up for it? Can you join or supply content? Details of how to join SFSFW can be found here.

Tony