Playtest Dungeon Crawl game

[BogNoggin]

Hope to find 2-4 players for a game of dungeon exploration.

It would be very minimalist but I can see potential for fun and a game that is quick and easy.

I wrote and named it but have not played.

Rules are cobbled from some old snail mail games from early 80's, mostly inspired by Heroic Fantasy by Flying Buffalo.

It was the early era of home computers, MS-DOS, etc. and the PBM companies were just starting to create programs.

A player would order a certain number of Turns for a few bucks and get a rules packet with an Order sheet.

They would send the Orders in using some simple code commands and the program would process results, including encounters with the other thousands of players in the matrix.

They would send a printout your mailbox, you could read it (not hugely exciting by the looks of it) and you'd repeat until your party died or you graduated to final maze and went into some legendarium.

I have a minimalist mapping system for it.

Here is a link to the rules, which are not perfect but free. Happy to answer any questions.

Apologies in advance for the small print. I erred a bit there but when I print a physical copy I wanted something light.

https://archive.org/details/p-l-u-n-z-l ... 7/mode/2up

[spanningtree]

I always wondered what those PBP systems were like. Back in the day I saw the ads in Dragon and other 80s role play mags, never tried one. Sounds kinda like nethack, long distance.

Have you seen: https://crawl.akrasiac.org:8443/#lobby

[BogNoggin]

Hi @spanningtree.

I was just researching the game I used to make mine and am surprised to see that its ongoing sine 1984.

Truthfully I used the same rules and format. I did a complete rewrite and changed some mechanics and added a few of my own but its close enough that objection might be raised.

RPG rules cannot be copyrighted as I understand, only text writing, art, etc. Names are trade marked. I did not simply lift the text so likely not an issue, but I had no idea it was still active.

That game was Heroic Fantasy by Flying Buffalo, later sold to another company. Good Wikipedia read as it gets into the rules and includes a huge list of others.

The link you provided is neat. Looks like maybe you have to know some programming? I couldn't make much of it but minimalism is growing on me. And I used to run Aftermath and Bushido!

Internet Archive actually has a ton of claims against it because people scanned and uploaded a huge number of old games including TSR. Chainmail is there in its original text with the Balrog, the Against the Giants series, etc. All the first 3 AD&D rule books are there. If you should browse there there is an incredible board game there called Lords and Wizards, written and designed in mid 70s by a kid in high school. He sold it to a game company but that one is somehow now public domain I THINK.

Im currently using the archive to house documents as I work on a retro clone of Mazes and Monsters. Its been done but Im having a blast with it.

Have you played that game you linked me to? I'd like to have a closer look at it.

[BogNoggin]

Heres one back at ya. I like this old MS-DOS game there. It works well unlike alot of them.

https://archive.org/details/msdos_Fantasy_General_1996