Direbane is an abode to share artifacts, simulacra, histories, and other items of note related to ongoing years adventuring.
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Tuesday, February 18, 2020

Judge's Screen for Advanced Labyrinth Lord

(New screen in action!)
I have longed for an old-school Judge's screen for awhile now, and frequently modified the commercial screens when we gamed in v.3.5 and 5th edition. But I longed for a version of my first screen, Judges Guild's D&D "Judge's Shield" product.

Unlike modern commercial D&D screens, the Judge's Shield, like the later T$R AD&D "Dungeon Master's Screen," had information printed on both sides of the screen rather than player-facing artwork. While this wasn't super-useful except for the players sitting closest to the screen (ha, especially players like me who are nearsighted), the info was there so if needed someone at the far end of the table could shout out "Hey, so-and-so, what do I need at 5th level cleric to turn a wraith?"

(A weird note that the Judges Guild D&D "Judge's Screen" was apparently back in 1977 the highest sold Judges Guild item behind "City State of the Invincible Overlord" yet these screen are almost impossible to find on the used market. Granted they were not as well-made as the T$R version and had to be taped together (my original one is in pretty horrible shape, hey I was 13 years old), but I would expect to see one occasionally.

Shane Mangus over at "Swords Against the Dark" created way back in 2010 an "Advanced Labyrinth Lord screen" which I love and used for my first few Labyrinth Lord games.

I found there were a couple tables I was referring to often (monster experience awards, treasure hoards) that I would like on the screen. So, copied Shane's screen but instead of art on the player-facing side, I reprinted all the table's from Shane's screen. Then, on the game judge's-facing side, I replaced the panel with item information with monster experience point, monster hoard, poison list, and attribute stats.

Ha, then, because I am super nostalgic, I added yellow color same as the old "Judge's Shield."

I printed the resulting copies on 8 1/2 x 11 adhesive labels and tacked them on to an old "Call of Cthulhu" 3-panel screen and it works terrific. No one could read it at our ginormous (12 players!) convention game, it just looked good sitting there.

Modified Advanced Labyrinth Lord Judge's Shield (Black & White version)

Modified Advanced Labyrinth Lord Judge's Shield (Yellow background version)

Monday, February 17, 2020

Final San Ramon DunDraCon



A brief snippet of the gang's visit for the last DunDraCon to be held in San Ramon, California.

The gaming convention had prior been held at the Claremont Hotel in Berkeley, CA (1976-77), Lemington Hotel in Oakland, CA (1978), the Villa Hotel in Oakland, CA (1979-80), the Dunfey Hotel in San Mateo, CA (1981), and the Hyatt Hotel, Oakland, CA (1982 for DunDraClone, and 1983-91).

Our friend and D&D buddy Kevin alerted us DunDraCon was moving to the San Ramon Marriott Hotel in 1992 and we have held a game there every year except 2014.

We'll sorely miss it. Back in the 80s conventions were special occurrences rather than regular gigs until DunDraCon moved right into our backyard. It helped that DunDraCon (well, DunDraClone) at the Oakland Hyatt was my 3rd ever D&D convention in September 1981 after GrimCon III in May 1981 also at the Oakland Hyatt and Origins/Pacificon in July 1981 at the Dunfey Hotel in San Mateo.

Ha, we were sometimes the bad eggs, but damn we loved that convention hard for a long time...