#Valerie Valusek

[oldschoolfrp]

Flight to the Star Kingdoms -- The party commands a fleet of ships at sea, passing through a magical storm into a void between worlds (Valerie Valusek, D&D module M1: Into the Maelstrom, TSR, 1985)

[dndhistory]

294. Linda Lowery - HeartQuest #5: Moon Dragon Summer (1984)

The first of only two HeartQuest books that were published in 1984, and the penultimate in the series that will soon be dropped, it's a fun little gamebook mixing fantasy adventure and romance in a D&D context.

Most of the novelties come with the new illustrators, Larry Day for the cover and Valerie Valusek for the interior art, both of which are pretty excellent, and add real value to a book that is pretty hard to find these days.

The main story tells of a warrior princess, Summer, who is a real badass with a sword who wants to take on a Moon Dragon who kidnapped her grandmother. She has been promised in marriage to a local merchant, but on the way to defeat the dragon finds a sexy wizard with whom romance might flourish. Another fun addition to the series.

[haaaaaaaaaaaave-you-met-ted]

Interior Art from Dragonlance: Dragons of Autumn Twilight by Valerie Valusek

[miniaturegiantspacerat]

The instant you enter the chamber, sparks fly from the fingers of an incredibly ancient elven wizard. The sparks don't do any particular damage, but they certainly serve notice that you're not welcome here.

Glancing quickly around the magician's combination laboratory and library, you see many magical items: floating potion bottles, spellbooks, scrolls, a five-pointed star and circle inscribed on the floor, jars of spell components, and even several pairs of mysterious eyes peering at you from atop a bookshelf. And watching each move you make is a small, curious reptile, clearly the familiar of the wizard.

Suddenly the sparks change color, and you sense that they are steadily becoming more dangerous. Do you want to quickly try to talk to the wizard? Turn to 113A. If you want to use your own magical weapons against the old elf, turn to 68D. Or do you want to pretend he's not there, and just look around as quickly as possible and get out? If that sounds good to you, turn to 92A.

The wizard's laboratory is one of the first rooms you can access from the faerie king's throne room. Unsurprisingly for this book, it is full of ways to teleport yourself somewhere else before you get a good look at everything.

Scan from Faerie Mound of Dragonkind, 1987, published by TSR, out of print.

[vintagerpg]

The Arms and Equipment Guide (1991) continues the historical re-enactment trajectory of the DMGR sourcebooks. It is exactly what it says: a big book of weapons and equipment.

This one has gotten a lot of use at the tables I’ve played at. True: the mechanical differences between all the various weapons and armors are minimal in the best case, but there is something to be said for pouring over page after page of lists, kitting your character out with the perfect ensemble. It’s a nerdy fashion show, in a way. And so unrelentingly useful — I can’t think of another D&D book that is so explicitly utilitarian. Also, as someone who regularly plays thieves, I appreciate the amount of attention that is paid to thieves’ tools.

Some very nice art from a big pool of artists, all rendered with an eye towards accuracy. I kind of love it when this sort of conservative take on fantasy art collides with, say, a drow war party checking out a beholder corpse. Valerie Valusek’s lizard steed barding is a fave.

[randomtangle]

Splatbook Saturday: PHBR1 The Complete Fighter’s Handbook

Ah, The Complete Fighter’s Handbook the splat that started it all. Not the first splat ever, no no no, but the first Splat in the Player’s Handbook Rules Supplement series for Advanced Dungeons & Dragons 2nd Edition.

Published December 1989 by TSR

Blurb:

Who says fighters are the poor cousins of the AD&D game? No one will say it aloud after reading the Complete Fighter’s Handbook; 128 pages of mind-expanding advice on how to make your fighter the leanest, meanest threshing machine for leagues around. New weapons, new proficiencies, new fighting styles, and “Fighter Kits” make this optional AD&D accessory a useful item for players and DMs.

What did it add, you ask, my loyal, plentiful followers? Nothing but the most important and groundbreaking mechanics in 2E! Let’s dive in. (Enjoy this artwork from the book, by Valerie Valusek:)

Kits

Kits are like subclasses. You have the option of choosing a kit a character creation, or if your DM agrees, applying one ex post facto when kits are introduced to your game. Fighter’s has Warrior Kits, open to all the Warrior classes (Fighters, Paladins & Rangers). What does a kit do?

Description: What it says on the tin.

Role: What niche in your game you can expect a character with this kit to fit in to.

Secondary Skills: You aren’t using this. (Required or suggested Secondary Skills.)

Proficiencies: It can alter your character’s weapon and nonweapon proficiencies, giving bonus, required or suggested proficiencies.

Equipment: A kit can alter your equipment, placing special requirements on what you can and cannot use or own.

Special Benefits: This is the stuff you came for. Special rules to help your character better fit the archetype they are going for.

Special Hindrances: These are to make sure that you don’t just get to be a Warrior but better.

Wealth Options: Kits can change your starting gold, sometimes also applying restrictions to it.

Races: What races are allowed to play this kit.

The Kits included in Fighter’s are the Amazon, Barbarian, Beast-Rider, Berserker, Cavalier, Gladiator, Myrmidon, Noble Warrior, Peasant Hero, Pirate/Outlaw, Samurai, Savage, Swashbuckler and Wilderness Warrior. I’d go into them here but honestly 1. You should read about them yourself! And 2. They’re each worth their own post.

Combat Rules

Fighter’s introduced a lot to the combat rules. First off, it changed proficiencies and specialization. 

Weapon-Group proficiency was introduced, with Tight Groups and Broad Groups.

Tight Groups cost 2 slots and you’d become completely proficient with a small group of weapons, such as Axes (Battle axe and hand axe), Bows (Long, Short, Daikyu, Composite Long and Composite Short) or Clubbing Weapons (Belaying Pin, Club, Foot- and Horsemen’s Maces, Morning Star and Warhammer), with the largest group being Polearms (21 weapons, but they’re polearms so it’s not that notable).

Broad Groups cost 3 slots and you’d get a large group, like Blades (basically any sword) or Pole Weapons (Polearms + Spears). Pretty neat!

But what is really interesting is Fighting Styles! There are four fighting styles: Single-Weapon Style, Two-Handed Style, Weapon and Shield Style, and Two-Weapon Style. Characters can specialize in these styles, but only single-class warriors could specialize in multiple. I’ll talk about the styles in a different post.

Melee Maneuvers

Fighter’s introduced more melee maneuvers. Before we had only the Called Shot. Now that was expanded with rules for certain types of called shots (Striking a Specific Body Part, Smashing Something Being Held, Bypassing Armor, and “Special Results”) and there’s other maneuvers now, too! (Disarm, Grab, Hold Attack, Party, Pin, Pull/Trip, Sap, Shield-Punch, and Shield-Rush.) Punching and Wrestling got specialization capability (with slightly different rules) and Martial Arts was introduced.

Equipment

New weapons, new magic items, new armor, piecemeal armor and armor durability were all added. I needn’t list them here since many appear in a different book I plan to cover later, but I can assure you, they’re cool!

Everything Else

Fighter’s gave suggestions for combat and some weapon, armor and blacksmithing stuff in the front! Really good stuff.

Conclusion

The Complete Fighter’s Handbook is possibly the most essential book of the PHBR series, giving us beautiful additions to combat, introducing kits, and having all the little sprinklings of quality rules throughout, not even mentioning the classic artwork. I definitely suggest buying it, if you want to improve your game.

Thanks for reading! Until next time!

[elfimagic]

Artist: Valerie Valusek

Book: City of Greyhawk (I think I have this in my folder I forgot where X_X )

[noontide-apparition]

Dragonlance Chronicles: “Dragons of Autumn Twilight”

interior illustrations by Valerie Valusek

[jesawyer]

Hi Josh, I like to dabble in ttrpg design. There's a store near my house that has a giant stack of issues of Dragon Magazine from mostly the 90s. I didn't get into RPGs until much later. Did you ever read that magazine? If I was going to buy some to analyze or try to play, are there any authors or artists or modules you'd recommend I keep an eye out for?

Yeah, that was the era when I was reading Dragon, Dungeon, and Polyhedron a lot. I don't have any of my old issues anymore, but I do reference the .pdfs from time to time.

Issue 148 is memorable as the Deck of Many Things issue, which had printed sheets of cards to ruin your campaign. That's a Ned Dameron cover. Ned did a lot of nice art for TSR/Dragon, including a lot of the priests in the 2nd Edition Forgotten Realms Faiths & Avatars/Powers & Pantheons/Demihuman Deities series. He also did really beautiful pen and ink drawings in the Hall of Heroes supplement.

Daniel Horne also contributed some really nice work to Dragon, including the cover to issue 126, which served as the inspiration for Sagani in Pillars of Eternity.

Other artists who did things in a variety of rule/sourcebooks and Dragon/Dungeon at the time were Tom Baxa, Valerie Valusek, Jim Holloway, and Stephen Fabian.

One other issue of Polyhedron sticks out in my mind especially, #150, which featured an art nouveau stylization of Spelljammer. No offense to Jim Holloway, who did much of the art for Spelljammer (and also a TON of Paranoia art), but his style never really seemed like a great fit for for the setting. Art nouveau Spelljammer was really appealing to me.

[bugbearbrothers]

Dungeon Magazine issue 9 features cover art by Valerie Valusek, 5 low level and one mid-level adventure.

[rmdreier]

1993 SC The Swordsheath Scroll: The Dwarven Nations Trilogy Vol 3 (Dragonlance Saga) Dan Parkinson Cover by Tim Hildebrandt. Interior by Valerie Valusek. $5 free Media mail shipping in the United States. 📚📚⚔️🧙‍♂️🐲 #dragonlance #danparkinson #timhildebrandt #valerievalusek #dungeonsanddragons #dwarvennationstrilogy #advanceddungeonsanddragons #roleplaying #roleplayinggames #fantasybooks #booksofinstagram #bibliophilelife #bookstagram #instabooks #igbooks #bookseller #booklife #booklover #bookish #bookillustration #bookaneer #bookaneer4sale #bookaneerbargainbin (at Dodge Center, Minnesota) https://www.instagram.com/p/Bu19mDcH9Pj/?utm_source=ig_tumblr_share&igshid=jhuze1axk2pb

[oldschoolfrp]

Belthar is a land of high mountains and green valleys perched atop a planet shard. Rivers reaching the rim fall into the void miles below, forming clouds that rise back up above the land. A secret cavern holds the Belthan war fleet, 30 galleys pulled by blue dragons. (Valerie Valusek, D&D module M1: Into the Maelstrom, TSR, 1985)

[dndhistory]

297. Kate Novak - HeartQuest #6: Lady of the Winds (1984)

With cover art by Ben Otero and excellent interior art by Valerie Valusek, Lady of the Winds is the last and, it turns out, probably the best of the HeartQuest series. With  a long playtime (it took me about 1 hour and 30 minutes to finish the book, rather than the usual 30 minutes), it tells the story of a peasant young woman who leaves her house to become a wizard.

As the game goes on the romance part of it turns into a romantic triangle, at the same time as Ivee, our heroine, has to learn how to do magic safely. It's quite a well written book and its no surprise that even though the HeartQuest series is over, Kate Novak will return several times to the D&D world with her own novels often in collaboration with her husband, Jeff Grubb. 

Now a rare book, with a tiny print run, which has reportedly been sold recently for some hundreds of dollars online, it's definitely worth tracking down if you can get it, as probably the best of the series. It's a pity that it also marks the end of these books.

[haaaaaaaaaaaave-you-met-ted]

Dragonlance: Dragons of Autumn Twilight - Book Two Interior Art by Valerie Valusek

[miniaturegiantspacerat]

"Please to enter, sir," a voice sounds suddenly. You hesitate as you realize that an armor-clad elf is standing before you, but his gesture is welcoming, not threatening.

Beyond the elf, at the far end of the room, rises a huge dragon throne. Seated on it is a small, wizened figure that you immediately recognize as the faene king. This is his realm you have entered. How will you fare here?

As you stare at the king, a glass is thrust almost into your face. A leather-clad dwarf peers up at you, offering you a glass of liquid that smells like ale - a welcome smell, indeed!

Other intriguing things scattered around the room catch your eye - a lute, a bottle that appears to be floating in midair, roast meats - but you know that you have to deal with these people first. Will you stop and talk to the elf (9D), take the goblet from the dwarf (32C), or go directly to the faerie king (71A)?

A two page spread and the first room that you encounter in Faerie Mound of Dragonkind (1987, TSR, out of print).

[vintagerpg]

The M-series of modules, for use using the black Master Rules box set for basic Dungeons & Dragons, sure is odd. This is M1: Into the Maelstrom (1985), in which the PCs become embroiled a game of sport between three immortals and wind up sailing into space, sort of, on a journey that sort of mirrors the Iliad and the Odyssey. There is a sorceress who turns people into chickens! Its weird! And four years before Spelljammer!

I am a sucker for flying ships. Not, like, space ships. Sailing ships that fly. There are a lot of them in this, part of a naval engagement that gets sucked into the Star Realms by the magic of one of the immortals. However, I struggle to get a grip on this one. Too much stuffed into too small a package, too little that is inspiring enough to extrapolate on on my own. The whole first part of the adventure is just an elaborate excuse to get the players (and some warring nations) to get boats in the water. The villain, the immortal Alphaks, who is a “roaring demon” (a Balor) may have his lair in a volcano, but he feels pretty second rate. Also, his name is Alphaks. What kind of name is that?

Which is weird to me, because in general I feel like author Bruce Heard has an iron grip on his understanding of the Known World (he did, after all, helm the Voyage of the Princess Ark – which is a flying ship! – serial in Dragon Magazine, which functioned as a extension of the Gazeteer series). Perhaps it is down to the Master rules being unwieldy?

On the other hand, if Spelljammer and the Princess Ark exist because of this confusing and underwhelming adventure, well, then it is OK in my book.

Anyway, kind of a humdrum Jeff Easley cover. But I quite enjoy Valerie Valusek’s interiors.