Captains, Magicians, and Incredible Men

First: a disclaimer. This is not a review – it’s a preview. Although I derive no direct commercial benefit from the book in question, I am connected with the company which produces Hideouts & Hoodlums, and I’ve written a published adventure module for the game (see sidebar on the right of this page).

As I’ve mentioned many times before, Hideouts & Hoodlums is a tabletop roleplaying game based on superhero comics of the Golden Age (1938 to the early 1950’s) with a secondary, rather unique, conceit. Back in the 1970’s, when Gygax and Arneson created the First Fantasy Roleplaying Game Which Was Totally New, Unique, Awesome, And Changed The Gaming Universe Forever™ (I hope that satisfies the trademark lawyers), what if they’d been fans of old school comics instead of fantasy literature? What would their trailblazer roleplaying game have looked like?

Hideouts & Hoodlums Roleplaying Game – New issue of The Trophy Case!

I neglected to mention this a couple of weeks ago when it hit the virtual newsstands — the latest issue of The Trophy Case, the quarterly Hideouts & Hoodlums RPG newsletter, is here! And, best of all (and most unusually), it contains not one single blessed word cribbed from The Big Blog o’Fun!

Hideouts and Hoodlums: The Trophy Case Vol. 2 No. 1 has arrived!

It’s that time again! The Trophy Case, the quarterly magazine supporting the Hideouts and Hoodlums roleplaying game, hit the virtual racks at RPGNow earlier this week, so head over there right now to pick up your free copy! The new issue is the biggest one yet and is chock full of goodies, including articles which can be read and enjoyed by non-gamers as well as an item or three which can be used in any comic-based superhero RPG.

Hideouts & Hoodlums roleplaying game: Sons of the Feathered Serpent is finally here!

Finally – my much-ballyhooed first Hideouts & Hoodlums RPG adventure module, Sons of the Feathered Serpent, is now available for purchase! Crammed within its 47 action-packed pages, written by yours truly, you’ll find all kinds of pulpy Golden Age comic goodness, like gangsters, femme fatales, zoot suited pachucos, dangerous robots, weird science, flying snakes, ray guns, poison gas, newsies with slingshots, a generous helping of sex and violence, an alligator or two, a mad scientist, and even some flaming poultry. Yes, that’s right — flaming poultry!

New! Trophy Case #7! And it’s FREE!

The new issue of The Trophy Case just hit RPGNow! It’s free and it’s fun!

In this latest issue, you’ll find the newest tweaks and rules for the Hideouts & Hoodlums 1940’s adventure roleplaying game — including the new (and complete!) Aviator class, plus improvements to Scientists and Mystery Men. There’s also an interview with yours truly about the forthcoming H&H module Sons of the Feathered Serpent.

Even if you’re not an H&H player, there’s still some good reading in its pages. Scott Casper includes some nice capsule descriptions of a lot of 1940’s comic book characters, plus a writeup of a recent adventure in the legendary Reuter Mansion, and Scott provides some comic book news and previews!

Best of all, The Trophy Case is FREE! FREE, I say! Go download your very own FREE PDF of The Trophy Case at RPGNow!

Have fun! — Steve

Hideouts & Hoodlums RPG: The Trophy Case #6 is out now!

Great Scott Games has released the latest quarterly issue of the official Hideouts & Hoodlums magazine: The Trophy Case #6 is available now, and it’s free for download!

Suspension of disbelief

You start with a blank sheet of graph paper, a pencil, and a few ideas.

Anyone who’s run a roleplaying game (at least those who did so before the days of computers and pre-printed cardstock “terrain tiles”) has been here. You begin by staring at the blank sheet for a few moments, then you start to fill in walls, rooms, and passages. It doesn’t matter whether you’re creating a subterranean dungeon for a sword-and-sorcery game, a secret missile complex for an espionage campaign, or a science-fiction space station, the basic process remains essentially the same. You’re playing at being an architect, taking a stab at designing a believable physical structure. That’s the easy part.

NEW Hideouts & Hoodlums Supplement!

Great Scott Games has just released the new supplementary rulebook for the Hideouts & Hoodlums roleplaying game. While the title Better Quality is derived from the title of a 1940’s comic book, the supplement’s contents remains true to that title.

Speaking for the record

I’ve been doing Google searches on “Hideouts & Hoodlums” to see what people are saying about my favorite retro-clone pulp/superhero RPG, and for some silly-assed reason I’m getting listed on RPG sites as one of the authors of the game.

For the record, Hideouts & Hoodlums is Scott Casper’s baby, and I am NOT one of its authors. I am, however, Hideouts & Hoodlums’ Head Cheerleader.

“The Vindicators” chapter index

For my visitors who want to read my 1930’s pulp/”mystery men” serial The Vindicators, but don’t know where to find the previous chapters, I’ve indexed them in this post.

The Green Dusenberg

For those who came in late…

The time is the 1930s. A string of lethal tenement fires is plaguing the town of St. Nicholas, Maryland. A vigilante team of costumed “mystery men” known as The Vindicators investigating the suspected arsons discover an old subterranean bootleggers’ hideout which is now being used for some other unknown purpose. One of the team, Jed Singletary (a.k.a. The Twilight Phantom) has just made another interesting discovery at the county records office…

The Paper Trail

For those who came in late….

The time is the 1930s. The city of St. Nicholas, Maryland is being plagued by a series of lethal tenement fires; arson is suspected, but no arrests have been made. Meanwhile, business has been slow for private investigator Doug Davis, giving him a lot of free time on his hands. One afternoon while bending a bar rail at a local tavern, Davis is attacked by a drunk whose clothes smell like gasoline. Suspecting an involvement with the tenement fires, Davis searches the man’s pockets after the fight and discovers an address for a building in the warehouse district of town. [Part One]

And a whole lot more “GI Jive”

This site looks to have everything that archive.org has, and then some:

Background music for WWII-era superhero campaigns

We interrupt our regularly scheduled Villains & Vigilantes character profiles for this news flash:

Back from vacation

I’ve returned from my vacation, which came just in the nick of time. As a writer/editor by trade, I’d reached a point at which I was really sick and tired of the writing process and very much needed a break. It was tough enough to meet my paid professional commitments; as for the “hobby” stuff, I couldn’t even think about this blog without wanting to throw up.

It’s been a hectic last two weeks.

Hideouts & Hoodlums encounter charts; Steel & Glory update

I left out a house rule for Hideouts & Hoodlums in my last blog post: player characters don’t die until they reach -10 H.P. As I said, I’m pretty anti-”PC mortality”.

The new issue of The Trophy Case, the quarterly H&H newsletter, came out the other day; you can get your free copy at RPGNow. I found this item from the newsletter kind of curious:

House rules for the Hideouts & Hoodlums RPG

I don’t get around to posting much anymore. I do so much writing in my full-time job that I haven’t felt much like writing in my spare time lately. I’ll bite the bullet today, though, to post up something I’ve wanted to do for quite a while: my “house” rules for the Hideouts & Hoodlums superhero roleplaying game.

For everybody running WWII superhero campaigns…

…and especially for Scott Casper of Hideouts & Hoodlums fame (who I’m sure will appreciate this):

Pulp Gamemastering essentials

April Fool’s Day on the Intrawebs really sucks. On this day each year you have to sift through mounds of stupid crap to get to a small portion of worthwhile stuff. I suppose one could argue that such is the case every day, but it’s especially true each April 1.

So please allow me to try to present something at least marginally useful on this day: a list of “essentials” for gamemasters who wish to run roleplaying games set during the heyday of the pulps, the period from (roughly) 1931 through 1946 or 1947.

The Trophy Case #3 is out!

Yesterday saw the release of the new issue of the Hideouts & Hoodlums RPG’s quarterly magazine The Trophy Case. I’m pretty excited about it, and not just because I wrote about 30% of it (heh) but because there’s some major kickass stuff packed into its pages.

The flower girl

Tibet…

The sky was a blinding blue, but the only thing Jed noticed was the depths of Wei’s impossibly dark eyes. They stood together on a rock ledge high above the green flowered valley hidden among the Himalayan peaks. It was a landscape painted from an artist’s dream, but all Jed could see was Wei.

Look what just came out!

I woke up this AM with the idea that I was going to play the next segment in my solo Hideouts and Hoodlums campaign today. But, of course, one thing led to another and after I finished my various and sundry work-related duties I discovered that the day had slipped away.

So there I was late this afternoon, checking online to see the delivery status of my latest CMG order

An interesting discovery

St. Nicholas, Maryland. April 2, 1936…

From the shadows across North Howard Street, Doug Davis peered at the warehouse and waited for total darkness. He was determined to check out the building’s contents, but he wasn’t going in alone; he’d brought reinforcements.