Dragon Magazine #277 + Map-a-Week

Alright, let's get busy with Dragon #277. As you can see from the cover, this one is about futuristic fantasy, such as magical steampunk. There's plenty to go over, so let's not waste any time.

We start off with ads, of course. Scale Mail is the first content we get, and I notice that there is a lot of commentary on the font choices for the new version of the magazine. Some of the things that irked me are getting other people just as irked. There's also stuff on the 'new' rules as the letters are now from people reading the Player's Handbook and Dungeon Master's Guide.

The Profiles article today is on an old-school editor, Kim Mohan. Kim was the editor of Dragon Magazine from issues 29 to 113, so 1979 to 1986. And there is an absolute ton of great material in that run of Dragon, all of the D&D stuff of course for 1st edition (2nd edition wouldn't start until around issue 140) except for a smattering of BECMI material, plus tons of stuff for other games such as Traveller, Star Frontiers, and Marvel Super Heroes. Sadly, Kim passed away a couple of weeks before Christmas in 2022. Another titan gone.

Lots of ads, then the Previews page. Forge of Fury, Living Greyhawk Gazetteer, and Pool of Radiance: Attack on Myth Drannor are the highlights. I'll cover the third one of those later this month. There is also a Star Wars RPG coming out, but that's beyond the scope of what I'm covering. But it was getting a big release and promotion, with three products coming out in November 2000. There were also three novels released, two for the Realms and one for Dragonlance. I've never read any of them.

Our first actual article is the Countdown to the Realms, which is on page 38. And page 39 is another ad. They really went all-out on advertising in this era, didn't they? The Countdown is discussing Heroes and Villains, as well as giving a few tidbits of information on what's coming in the new Campaign Setting book next year. There are fifteen prestige classes listed, which is nine more than appeared in the Dungeon Master's Guide. They are: Archmage, Champion, Devotee, Disciple, Giant-Killer, Harper, Hathran, Hierophant, Purple Dragon Officer, Red Wizard, Runecaster, Seeker, Shadow Adept, Shadow Thief, and Spellfilcher. Some of those are pretty obvious as to what they're going to be about; others will be totally new, and I'm looking forward to seeing them. We also get some details on the subraces of elves and what their ability score mods will be, as well as a brief writeup of a sample Realms villain, Scyllua Darkhope of Zhentil Keep. This is a fallen paladin with 15 levels, so no pushover. I wonder if she ever appeared again. Doing a quick check, yes, she did, in Shadowdale: The Scouring of the Land in 2007. So, a long ways off.

Comic, more ads...Ah, the Age of Steam. So, this is basically Steampunk D&D. Or Victorian-era Shadowrun. The most important additions to the game include tech for medicine, transportation, and communication...as well as guns, of course. There's advice on how to incorporate the core character classes into this setting, as well as recommended reading. The Victorian-era setting makes it easy to pull adventure ideas; just read Doyle, Dickens, Verne, Wells for the true Victorian feel, and writers such as William Gibson, Barbara Hambly, and Roger Zelazny who all wrote steampunk or Victorian-era fiction. The Victorian era was a time of conquest and exploration, so there's going to be plenty of stuff to do.

And now we get to our Map-a-Week tie-in: Greyhawk 2000. Yes, they've turned Greyhawk into a modern setting, complete with fighter jets taking on dragons and making half-elves and half-orcs legit races called the silvaan and the breed after centuries of interbreeding. The two Urnst countries are now united, and Greyhawk City is now the fantasy equivalent of New York City, complete with suburbs and a population of about 10 million. The dwarves have an empire that controls all of the mountains from the Barrier Peaks to the Hellfurnaces, with a population of about 120 million plus 1-3 million gnomes.

Oh, and Iuz is gone. How? Nuked. Literally. Nuclear and biochemical carpet-bombing ended Iuz's Empire and turned it into an uninhabitable wasteland. Mix that with wild magic, and nobody goes there. The survivors of the destruction have become mutant nomads, and the former Empire of Iuz is now the Daemon Scar lands. And there's a transportation system called 'The Chute', which is a magic-driven dimensional accelerator transport system that is now the primary method of long-distance travel on Oerth. It's like a magic subway combined with the Back to the Future DeLorean. Once that baby hits 47 miles an hour in that 314-yard tunnel, you're going to see some serious...well, you get it.

So, there's lots of changes, of course, but you can still run games from the core books with just a few additions, such as Knowledge (computers) and Profession (pilot). Religions work differently, if you want them to. New feats can easily be developed, as well as new spells that reflect the technological advancements. We also get stats and descriptions for various new weapons, such as dimensional rifles, elven biotech weapons, and dwarven firearms. All in all, there's a lot of interesting ideas here that could be fun for a short-term game. Maybe the regular PCs get hit with a magical portal that takes them elsewhen rather than elsewhere. Lots of fun stuff to do with this.

Next up is an article on Fantasy Futures. This one isn't nearly as specific or detailed as the Greyhawk 2000, but it's basically ways to change your campaign to fit a different historical time period than the typical medieval knights and castles. These are futures, not pasts, so no ideas on the Roman Empire or Ancient Egypt. Instead, we get the Renaissance, where primitive firearms are slowly replacing bows and crossbows, and armor is becoming less important. Religion definitely plays an important role once the Reformation happens, too. Then there's the Age of Steam, which is basically the steampunk stuff we saw earlier, and Modern Magic, which is basically 20th-century tech plus magic. So, Greyhawk 2000.

Alright, the next article (no ads in between!) is Elements of a Hero, and it's just statblocks for characters from the Lost Years of Merlin fantasy series of books. I have never read of these or even heard of them, so I can't really comment on this other than to say that these are good examples of building mid-level characters for 3rd edition.

Last for today, we have another Unusual Suspects article. Last time we read about interesting ideas for barbarians, paladins, and rangers; this time around it's bards, sorcerers and wizards. Each of the demihuman races get a couple of ideas for how to incorporate the race-class combination, so there are dwarven bards, gnome sorcerers, and halfling wizards here. There are some great ideas in here, like elven bards who lead primitive tribes, or dwarven sorcerers known as 'runecarvers', and half-orc evokers that support their barbarian brothers on the battlefield. Be afraid.

Okay, that takes us to the halfway point of the issue, so we'll finish it next time. But before that, let's get our latest Map-a-Week entry in here:

This one is just called 'Side View'. As you can see, it's continuing the futuristic motif, depicting an underground complex under a modern-looking city. Do with it what you will.