1983
 Written by Phyllis Ann Karr
Cover Illustration by
published by Reston Publishing Company, Inc.
compiled and edited by Chaosium, Inc.
hardback book, 8.5”x11”
174 pages.
CONTENTS:
Over 700 entries in alphabetical order, taken mainly from Malory and the French Vulgate, and are cross referenced. Also included are genealogies, maps, and lists of family members, magic users, etc.
COMMENTARY:
I knew Phyllis from years earlier, when I was publishing my fanzine Wyrd. I had published one of her Arthurian stories and entered into a very pleasant correspondence during which I learned that she had compiled a list of references from Malory and the Vulgate.
At that time I was working on my Arthurian board game, King Arthur's Knights, and rather than do all the research myself I asked if she would draw up a list of people, places and things for me, which she promptly and generously did. I was really impressed by it! I'd never seen anything quite like it before.
I asked to publish it, and she agreed, on the provision that she had to fix it up a bit beforehand. I had no problems with improving the quality of anything, and naturally agreed. Several months later I got back the manuscript at about triple its previous length. And I loved it even more.
Chaosium had managed to swing a deal with Reston Publishing, a really large and slick outfit out in Virginia, where we would make a product and they produce, market and sell it. We put together The King Arthur Companion and it came out as a really gorgeous hard cover book—something we could never afford to do at Chaosium.
It sold well, went out of print, we stopped working with Reston.
1985
 Written by Greg Stafford
Cover Illustration by Jody Lee
Interior Illustrations by Lisa Free, Bill Keyes, Michael Blum
CONTENTS:
Play-aids12 pages (Winter Events, Battle Sequence, character sheets. etc.);
Player's Book 86 pages (character generation, game system, traits and passions, skills, combat, background. etc.);
Gamemaster's Book 16 pages (Magic, Creatures, Campaign outline, Bibliography, Scenario);
Characters Book 8 pages (27 NPC stats, common foe stats);
Color Map of Arthur's Britain;
Dice 6d6, 1d20;
Catalog of current Chaosium Products;
Response Card
COMMENTARY:
I began work on this in early '83. At first it was another BRP game, but I was dissatisfied with the BRP combat system, which I considered to be too detailed and time consuming for the type of game that I wanted. At first I was using the Resistance Table for all resolutions, but Ken St. Andre pointed out that there was a simpler way to go that didn't use any tables at all—the system that the game uses now. So a significant part of the elegance of the system is due to the insight of Ken.
I knew from the start that I wanted to use the Personality Traits. I had played with this in earlier games that I published (Thieves World, where it was used to record personalities but not resolve anything; "The Dragonewts March," where it was used to randomly determine what the creatures would do) but here I used it as a defining part of the game.
It was instigated because I was just fed up with players who played their character inconsistently, just to take advantage of whatever the situation was. The pre-eminent example is of the character who drinks everything in sight, but when the faerie queen gives him a cup of wine he puts it aside without a problem. I just wanted something to enforce consistency, even though it took some control of the character away from the player. After all, the literature was full of examples of individuals just being themselves, and getting into trouble for it.
The Passions came a bit later, after we'd tested it through some play. First, I had reread Malory, marking every example of Traits that I found in them (these later became the marginal examples). In that reading I noted that Passions were extremely significant in inspiring the knights.
More importantly, after about a year of writing and test play, the basic game system was in place. (I wasn't working full time on this—I was still president of Chaosium.) I was pretty content with it. However, I was appalled by the widespread ignorance among gamers of medieval society and ways, both of which I considered integrally important to the game. One time I played with some people who claimed to be knowledgeable about the Middle Ages and said they wanted to play “in the genre.” But during the game they insulted their liege lord and refused to obey him, in typical RPG player fashion, but SO incorrect for medieval tradition. I noted that they had no idea of the social standards of the time.
Thus I set to to compile the background that pervades the book. It's a good enough lesson on Medieval customs that several teachers have told me that they've used it in their classes as one of the best summaries available. It took me almost another year to write all that, extract the examples from Malory for play, and create the final map.
I was happy that when I took the game to DunDraCon one year, and imposed the behavior on players, the people who did know what the Middle Ages were about were happy about the imposed cultural rules. And I was glad of that, even though Roderick Robertson (who I met here for the first time) took me a bit to literally when I told the players not to worry about using the proper heraldry—he gave his knights arms of a "Pink Flamingo, proper;”"and his wife, Ellen, a "bunny with a sword and flower" on hers. Heck, those weren't as bad as the "head of Bullwinkle, erased" that Charlie insisted on using…
But at last I was content with the product and it went into production.
When I visited the printer during its production I nearly had a heart attack when I saw the map. The color separations that we had sent to them had had a piece of tape on one of the sheets (each color had to be done on a separate sheet) and it was clearly visible there in France. "Want me to stop the press?" Richard asked. Of course he would have done it—I was paying, and would have had to pay again for his guys to do the printing plates, and print the maps again… I did a quick calculation of the cost, swallowed hard, and said, "No, keep going." No one ever complained about the "landing strip" in Normandy, and now you can tell if you have a first printing of the game by seeing if that is visible on your color map.
And so Pendragon was launched.
 Written by Greg Stafford
Cover Illustration by Tom Sullivan
Interior Illustrations by Lisa Free, Michael Blum, Billy Keyes,
76 pages
CONTENTS:
Gamemaster notes, notes on the setting of Britain, a magic system intended for the Gamemaster's use, Chronologies and notes for many main characters, a brief synopsis of the overall story arc ten pages of scenarios, three pages of annotated Bibliography, many coats of arms.
Cover illustration:
Interior illustrations: Lisa Free
1985. 76 pages.
COMMENTARY:
As usual, I had written far to much stuff to fit into the boxed game and keep it within a decent price point. We were always afraid of having games that were "too expensive." We'd recently had success with The RuneQuest Campaign, a compilation of odd bits and scraps, and so decided to put them all into this book, which was released quickly after the boxed game.
Much of this was later cannibalized to be parts of other books. "The Plot" was greatly expanded to become The Boy King; "Creatures" were included in later editions of the main rules, and "Encounters" were later in Blood & Lust.
1986
 Written by Greg Stafford
Cover Illustration by Steve Purcell
Interior Illustrations by Carolyn Schultz, Bill Keyes, Lisa Free, Mike Blum
80 pages
CONTENTS:
Nobility (duties and benefits of nobility, French Characters, Heraldry, Hosting Tournaments, Glory); Economy (Arthur's Britain, Taxes, Castles & Defensive Works); War (Raid, Siege, Invasion, Battle), Land Record Sheet to keep track of your fief's economics; large fold out, "Inside a Keep,"
COMMENTARY:
I knew after the initial release that I would need to provide more information about the upper echelons of society, even if only for the GMs. And of course, ambitious PCs would want to get to be barons and so on.
This book provided the first example of how a player who had a PC of Noble Knighthood rank would also have to take on some duties as a GM.
Some of this material had been intended for the 2nd edition.
I thought all of this was important, but my favorite part by far was the fold out interior view of a typical square keep, with descriptions of the rooms and their uses. My whole Medieval curiosity had been launched when I was about seven years old and I was looking at photos, many of which were of castles. I remember clearing thinking, "They had tall rooms then!" and wondering, "Why didn't they have any roofs?" This diagram was, in effect, the culmination and satisfaction of my research on that question.
 Written by Larry DiTillio
Cover and Interior Illustrations by Susan Seddon Boulet
44 pages
CONTENTS:
The Grey Knight scenario
COMMENTARY:
This is a scenario by Larry DiTillio, a TV writer who had already done some Call of Cthulhu material for Chaosium, as well as writing the "Sword of Hollywood" column for Different Worlds magazine. The scenario is derived from the Medieval Gawaine and the Green Knight but with a twist.
One of my favorite game moments was at a DunDraCon when Larry was GMing and I was playing, and I asked if my knight could do something or other and he told me I had to make some Trait roll, at which I questioned it. He looked me square in the eye and said, "It's your damn game, make the roll!"
I really liked the presentation of the scenario, which had synopses of the events in the margins along with relevant critical data, which made it easier for the GM to run the game after he'd read the adventure. To my regret, we were unable to maintain this format, because (as usual) we had too much stuff to cram into the later books.
1987
 Written by Les Brooks, Sam Shirley and Greg Stafford
Cover Illustration by Steve Purcell
Interior Illustrations by Susan Seddon Boulet
Maps by Caroline Schultz
48 pages
CONTENTS:
How to Use this Book, The Adventure of the Tournament of Dreams, The Adventure of the Circle of Gold
COMMENTARY:
This book has two fun scenarios in it, one by me and one by a couple of enthusiastic Chaosium fans from Richmond VA whom I had met at a convention, both of whom would later be working for Chaosium. They are, of course, Sam Shirley and Les Brooks. I was hoping that this, and Grey Knight, would inspire people to send in more of these scenarios, and while some people did, we continued to receive more background material than scenarios. This is common to all the games Chaosium ever published, except Call of Cthulhu.
1989
Here's one of the great mysteries of gaming! Second edition Pendragon. I have read a couple of places where people swore they've seen a copy of it. I'd like to get a hold of one myself to complete my collection!!
But I never will. There never was a second edition.
When we would have plans for product we would assign it a stock number, and sometimes we would announce that to the distributors so they would be ready for it. They'd put it on their lists, heck, sometimes they'd solicit for it even though we'd told them that we wouldn't be doing it for another year or so. But in any case, once the number was assigned, we could never change it even if we decided to cancel it for some reason. Thus came into existence good ol' CHA2701-X.
It had been planned to be the same game system, but reorganized a bit to have a character generation book, to be called The Knight's Book, a player's book called The Nobles Book and the GM book, The King's Book.
But we had decided that we wouldn't be making games in boxes anymore. The boxes were expensive—I think they cost us $1 each, which meant that they added $7 to the retail price. Also, if we shipped a game in a box, with dice, then the duty was really high, raising the cost significantly for our fans in Oz. Books had no duty whatsoever. (Sometimes we would take the dice out of the boxes and ship them over, and send the dice separately.) But we also realized that most of the people who would buy the game already had dice, or could buy them at the same store where they bought the game. So we pretty much stopped making boxed games.
And there went 2nd edition Pendragon, into the bin of lost and mysterious games.
1990
 Written by Greg Stafford
Cover Illustration by Mike Weaver
Interior Illustrations by Carolyn Savoy, Lisa Free, Gus DiZeraga, Arnie Swekel, Tyanna Byerts, Michael Blum.
208 pages.
CONTENTS:
Welcome to Pendragon, What Your Character Knows, Character Generation, Your Family, Glory and Ambition, Game Mechanics, Ideals and Passions, Your Home, Wealth, Chivalric Duties, Scenarios, Characters and Creatures, Appendix
COMMENTARY:
One of the keys to staying in business as a publisher is having a revised edition to a successful product. That way it remains in print, and maybe the loyal fans will also get the new edition, to stay updated, and the borderline skeptics might buy it, figuring maybe it was better now. Of course, sometimes this effect backfires when a game changes so much that the old timers dislike the new one (see RQ3).
Well, Pendragon hasn't fallen into that particular hole. The game system hasn't changed radically from the first to the fifth editions.
This edition, however, did have some notable changes. The one first was the elimination of the five languages and five cultures that had been in the 1st edition. I had found, though continued play, that those things only interfered with game flow and pleasure. And anyway, the literature form which it drew so much never had different languages (of course, they never had Picts and Saxons either, but what the heck.)
Also, this was a book, not a box. Everything was in one place.
 Written by Greg Stafford
Cover Illustration by Sue Krinard
Interior Illustrations by Arnie Swekel, Carolyn Savoy
Map, Celtic Decorations by Gus DiZeraga
136 pages
CONTENTS:
Introduction, Advanced Character Generation, The Lands, The Peoples, Ambitions, Women, Religions, Wealth, Grand Events, Magic and Faerie, Appendices, Map (approx. 22" x 34") of Britain
COMMENTARY:
This is the first appearance of the extended character generation system that was later included in the 4th edition Pendragon rules. Grand Events, the final chapter, gives details on visits to court, running tournaments and hunting for adventures. Includes regional maps, illustrations, coats of arms.
1991
 Written by Greg Stafford Cover Illustration by Michael Weaver
Interior Illustrations by Arnie Swekel, Gus DiZeraga, Kevin Zucker
136 pages
CONTENTS:
synopsis of early history, an adventure in the Forest Sauvage, and various GM notes, a year-by-year description of events, synopsis of subsequent events, character descriptions and sheets for the major figures of the legend.
COMMENTARY:
Some people complained that they didn't really understand how to run an ongoing epic campaign. Most games just had the PCs as the center of the universe, with not a lot going on outside of their adventures. I wrote this to illustrate how to have the campaign history going on, and integrate the PCs into it. Also, the early years of Arthur's campaign were pretty scripted, and this is the script.
This is my first effort at a year-by-year description of events in Britain. There are some background events, but the real adventures begin in the year 510, with the "Adventure of the Sword in the Stone," and end in the year 531, which was the starting date of the Chaosium edition of the game. Subsequent events were also briefly noted.
I hoped that this book would show GMs how to run a campaign. In case it didn't, I started to imagine how I might explain the whole life of King Arthur in such a way.
Sam Shirley had submitted a scenario long ago, gotten hired and proof read some early books, and was now the line editor for Pendragon, in charge of executing my desires for the line by this time.
 Written by Greg Stafford, Katherine Kerr, William Bridges
Cover Illustration by James Halloway
Interior Illustrations by Arnie Swekel
Maps, Celtic Decorations by Gus DiZeraga
128 pages
CONTENTS:
Introduction, Common Knowledge, Gamemaster Information, Map of Pendragon Cambria, Carlion-on-Usk, Stories, The Adventure of the Dolorous Wyrm, The Ad venture of the Best Wine in the World, The Cambrian War, Cambrian War Handouts, The Adventure of the Paulag Cat, Sources, Character Sheet.
COMMENTARY:
From the start one of my original intentions had been to present books that gave great detail for the various regions of Enchanted Britain. This was the first, giving details of Cambria, or as moderns have it, Wales. This, like the other regional books, also presented adventures for the post-530 period—the time of High Adventure when knights would just go off and find fascinating and dangerous challenges.
Whenever I wrote a supplement, I tried to make it as a model for others to follow. This was the model for subsequent regional books.
Since this was a combination of both sixth century and Medieval history I combed through dozens of sources to get the information, though a few sifted to the top of usefulness. The criteria I used to include material was to include anything in or before the Middle Ages. Thus if something was after 1500, then I didn't use it, no matter how tempting. Hardly anything is certain about the Sixth century history, and the storytellers relied upon their contemporary knowledge to provide setting, and so I started with what we know of Medieval history to name kingdoms and tribes. Ghost stories, folklore, legend, archeology and faerie lore fleshed out the enchanted geography.
Also, whenever I made a supplement, I have tried to reveal some new way to playing the game. Sure, there are always the episodic adventures, and I included several of those here. But here is the Cambrian War scenario. This is based on the wars of King Edward I and his conquest of Wales. Here King Arthur takes the part of King Edward, and leads the main invasion up in the north, whose facts are briefly given in case the knights just follow him.
But my favorite scenario is the Bulith Campaign, where a PC is in charge of a secondary theater of the war. It's really different form normal scenarios. Each year the local chiefs approach him for gifts, and then various among them approach with problems they are having, generally with the occupying forces under the commander's charge. He has to make command level decisions, allocate resources, and try to placate local tribal lords to establish British rule among these wild tribesmen. It's nearly impossible to please them all, and he'll have to right whoever is unhappy. But I found it to be very entertaining and challenging, and quite out of the ordinary for rpg adventures.
 Written by Greg Stafford, Paul Cockburn, Suzanne Courteau, Garry Fay, Leonard Wilson, Sam Shirley.
Cover Illustration by Stephen King
Interior Illustrations by Arnie Swekel
Ship Illustrations by Daryl Midgette
Maps, Celtic decorations by Gus DiZeraga
128 pages
CONTENTS:
Gamemastering Tips, Getting About (including ships), The Adventure of the Heart Blade, The Adventure of the Castle of Tears, The Adventure of Morgan le Fay's Challenge, The Dukedom of Angleland, The Adventure of the Stygian Stallions, Short Adventures, Bibliography, Introductory Handouts, Lover's Solo Handout, Character Sheet.
COMMENTARY:
Sam Shirley was editing the line by then. I have always enjoyed the editorial coordination, but hated the detail work, which he was good at. He would deal with the authors, artist, AND do the layout. That's a lot of work for one guy! He did it well!
I'd assign a temporary name for supplements. I was irritated that this particular title made it all the way through the process though. Lust, after all, wasn't really a passion we wanted to crow about in a title.
But it didn't negatively affect sales.
Sam was doing a major job on the line by this time. He told me, "I rewrote many of the adventures in these books. Truth is, working with the authors on these books was a lot like teaching a college course in how to write Arthurian roleplaying fiction. I wrote a lot of mail explaining how to structure the narrative & often ended up rewriting large portions myself."
By this time I was leaving much of the work to Sam, including soliciting the work, dealing with unsolicited submissions, as well as art assignments, editing and so on.
1992
 Written by Greg Stafford, Geoff Gillan, Sam Shirley, Michael Trout
Cover Illustration by Stephen King
Interior Illustrations by Arnie Swekel
128 pages
CONTENTS:
Introduction, Gamemaster Information, Hadrian's Wall, Places of Interest, On the Road, Short Adventures, The Adventures of the Perilous Forest, The Adventure of the Waste Lands, Pendragon Releases (list), Starting Handouts, What People Say (handouts), Guide to the King's Road (handout), Character Sheets; also, Pullout Map
COMMENTARY:
This book is, more or less, the Regional Adventure book for Cumbria. It names people and gives a map and descriptions for the Medieval, ancient and legendary sites of the land north of the Humber and south of the wall.
The King's Road scenario here is one of my favorite Pendragon scenarios (along with the Bulith War) because it's so different from others. Most scenarios have a plot to them, with something to solve. But this one is very much for the wandering, questing knights. It is very much an example of how I prepare for the impromptu parts of my games, or for wandering quests in general.
For the players, it starts with a map of the road from Eburacum to Carduel, noting places to stay and so on. Of course, it's a little bit out of date, but otherwise useful to follow.
Then the Gamemaster has the usual Places of Interest for the setting, similar to those in other regional books. Then he gets character information for the many lords along the way, some friendly, others less so, and also for the information that they will share out on various adventures thereabouts. Of course, different people know different things, or share different information, and so the player knights have to piece together facts as they go. But the key is that they can ask, at each stop, "Where's the Adventure hereabouts?" and the scenario has the information in the form of short scenarios and the aforesaid Places. So it is entirely up to the players to determine what they will do. Some of the adventures can't be resolved without solving another one first, or maybe even two. For instance, don't just go and fight the dragons directly! It's death. But secret keys to their destruction can be found elsewhere.
Other more standard adventures are included, and a description of Hadrian's Wall.
 Written by Martin Bourne, Peter Corliss, Mike Dawson, Garry Fay, Mike Manolakes, Sam Shirley
Cover Illustration by Stephen King
Interior Illustrations by Arnie Swekel, Jaime Lombardo, Ron Hill, Terri Midgette, Kerie Campbell
CONTENTS:
Introduction, The Adventure of the Spectre King, The Grand Tourney of Logres, The Adventure of the Werewolf, The Adventure of the Ghost Knight, Cambridge, The Adventure of the Helmed Knight, The Adventure of the Horned Boar, Character Sheets
COMMENTARY:
By this time the game had gotten known to a large enough pool of competent writers that I didn't feel compelled to do all the work. Sam had largely taken control of the line and was doing a great job at it. This book of six excellent adventures is tribute to that.
1993
 Written by Greg Stafford, with Sam Shirley
Cover Illustration by Stephen King
Interior Illustrations by Lisa Free, Gus DiZeraga, Carolyn Savoy, Arnie Swekel, Teanna Byerts, Michael Blum, Gus DiZeraga
352 pages
CONTENTS:
Welcome to Pendragon, What Your Character Knows, Character Generation, Your Family, The Lands, The Peoples, Glory and Ambitions, Women, Game Mechanics, Ideals and Passion, Religions, Your Home, Wealth, Chivalric Duties, Magician Character Generation, Magic and Faerie, Scenarios, Characters and Creatures, Appendices, Index
COMMENTARY:
Reprinting a book was always difficult. To sell it for a reasonable price we'd have to print a significant number, in the thousands. But we couldn't print too many, because if they didn't sell then our cash would be sitting on the warehouse floor; and if they never sold, then it was just throwing money away. Furthermore, we had to pay the printer in 30 days, and so we'd have to sell enough copies in the first month to pay for the whole print run. In those days everything was sold to distributors, who sold to stores, and if it wasn't a new item then they just didn't order a large enough number to pay for the print run. So things often went out of print, and stayed that way. But we couldn't have the core rule book out of print because without it no one bought the supplements; and the core book usually sold five to seven times more than the supplements.
So we would always try to have a new edition, to boost those initial orders. Pendragon was no exception, and so when the core rule book was out of print we decided to reprint it in a gigantic new volume, putting into it significant contents from other books that were also OP, and including "everything needed to play." No rules were changed, no game changes made.
I'm not entirely satisfied with the reorganization I arranged, but it is what it is. At least it had an index.
1994
 Written by John Carnahan
Cover Illustration by Stephen King
Interior Illustrations by Wayne Reynolds
128 pages
CONTENTS:
Introduction, Irish Landscape, Irish People, Irish Magic, Irish Character Generation, Irish Storytelling, Afterward, Irish Character Sheet, Map.
COMMENTARY:
This is the "region book" for Ireland. This is a combination of sixth century and Medieval Ireland, layered over the deep legendary landscape of the Emerald Isle. It's got a lot of information for the natives.
The initial submission played heavily on heroic Irish legends, but these were so powerful that the heroes outclassed knights. That would have detracted from the spirit of the core game, so I had John revise it so they were less powerful. I had played in that setting several times, and I just loved being an Irish satirist. We considered making it its own game, separate from Pendragon but using the system. But we never put that book into print. Some in the company just didn't think there would be sufficient market for a Heroic Irish setting.
COMMENTARY:
This was the title of the proposed and unfinished supplement dealing with Faerie and its inhabitants. I had done some work on it, and had several contributions for it, largely stats for the denizens and monsters. But we could never quite pull it together with scenarios. We had assigned the number, though, and so this is a blank in the list of products.
1995
 Written by Chris Lampard, Roderick Robertson, Tom Rogan, Eric Rowe, Dave Williams.
Cover Illustration by Stephen King.
Interior Illustrations by Arnie Swekel.
Maps by Darrell Midgette.
128 pages
CONTENTS:
Introduction, Common Knowledge, Gamemaster Information, Caledonian Tribes, Religion, Spirits, The Places, A Pictish Campaign, Short Adventures, The Adventure of the Treacherous Pict, Modular Battle System, Bibliography, Character Sheet, Map.
COMMENTARY:
Another "region book," this time for the wilderness of the north. I had hoped to have the entire island detailed with these books. We never got to Cornwall, or much of Logres in such detail.
Pictland is a crazy place for horse-bound knights to go adventuring, but who can stop a PC? And much of the information is suited for player characters, but naked tattooed Picts were more than a little difficult to fit into the genre easily. But it provided tremendous color for the GM who wanted to portray these savages.
I was not scrutinizing everything for the books, with Sam in charge, and so I wasn't very familiar with the contents. Today, looking this book over to write this, I realize that I just played in one of these scenarios in my latest campaign, with Fergie Game Mastering.
1996
 Written by Chris Hind, Robert Andersson, Christer Edling
Cover Illustration by Stephen King
Interior Illustrations by Elise Fowler, Jared Osterhold, Chris Hind and Judy Routt
128 pages
CONTENTS:
Introduction, The Perilous North Sea, The History of Thule, The Wild Northern Land, The Map of Thule, Lords of the North, The Adventure of Hrothgar's Hall, The adventure of the Barrow-dragon, Sources, Handouts.
COMMENTARY:
The sixth century was a time of tremendous turmoil in Europe, and the era when many famous lived who became centers of the great Medieval legends. Of course we know about King Arthur, but it was also the time of Beowulf, Deitrich of Bern and Sigfried and the characters of the Ring Cycle. I'd always wanted to get those other famous guys into the Pendragon game somehow. Land of Giants was part of that effort.
This is a regional book for Scandinavia. It's quite extensive and detailed, and the original submission was scrutinized and corrected by a couple of Swedish Pendragon fans for accuracy. The adventures are taken from Beowulf. The depth and breadth of this book make it possible to play natives in their own local campaign.
Sam, always overworked with many projects besides Pendragon, had enlisted other help on this. We find Roderick Robertson doing the editing here, under Sam's direction.
1997
 Written by James Palmer, Greg Stafford, Michael Trout, Mark Angeli, Ben Chessell, Judy Routt and Liam Routt
Cover Illustration by Stephen King
Interior Illustrations by Elise Fowler, Mark Angeli, Jason Badower, Judy Routt
CONTENTS:
Introduction, Noble Lands, Grand Events, Fortifications & Encounters, Heraldry, Of Allies and Enemies, Inside a Keep, Appendix
COMMENTARY:
This was a replacement for Nobles Book, and contained a lot of new and more detailed information on the activities mentioned in that and other books. I didn't like the new economic system—it made too much profit. I never wanted to emphasize the economic game anyway. But the events, mews and kennels, and the hunts and tournament materials are excellent and provide tremendous amounts of colorful detail for the GM or players who want it.
1998
This was a bad year for Chaosium. We would have gone bankrupt if we'd been a normal business instead of a glorious art house dedicated to the art of making games. It had happened before, and we'd survived.
But one consequence was that we had borrowed money from here and there. One time we used the Pendragon line—its name and its products—as collateral for a loan. When it came time to pay this off I had a discussion with my partners, during which they rejected repayment of this relatively small payment, thus defaulting the collateral to Peter Corliss. I was greatly distressed by this loss, and it was a major contributing cause for my departure from Chaosium shortly afterwards.
Shortly after that Chaosium was broken up into four different entities. I left, with ownership of Glorantha and all things related to it, and started Issaries, Inc. Eric Rowe got ownership of much of the Wizard's Attic inventory that had been accumulated as Chaosium expanded its retail sales base. He started a separate fulfillment company, with the same name. Chaosium continued with its Cthulhu and Stormbringer lines.
Pendragon went on, under the Green Knight Publications. I asked to be the line editor, but was turned down. For several years I didn't have any interaction with the game whatsoever.
1999
I did not publish or work on this product.
I did not publish or work on this product.
 Written by Roderick Robertson
Cover Illustration by Paul M. Carrick
Interior Illustrations by Ann-Catherine Loo
Maps by Bob Fetterolf
148 pages
CONTENTS:
Introduction, Saxon Culture, the Saxon Chronicle, Southeast England: the Saxon Shore, Creating Saxon Characters, Haestingas, The Battle of Badon, Raids and Encounters, New Rules, Bibliography, Pendragon Place names
COMMENTARY:
I had approved the assignment of this book to Roderick long before it ever came out. I wanted a mini-campaign of Saxons that would have a band of savage, blood-thirsty Saxon warriors out for a great Glory quest, which would end in their deaths at Badon. That got done.
I had also wanted a section of scenarios for their sons—orphan kids with resentment against their overlords—who had to be brought into the fold of King Arthur through exemplary behavior of chivalric PCs. Many things confounded this section from ever being done, but the high quality of the first part made this section seem extraneous when the product was finally done under the aegis of Green Knight.
2000
This was published by Green Knight, and I had no part in its history.
This was published by Green Knight, and I had no part in its history.
2001
This was published by Green Knight, and I had no part in its history.
2005, Rebirth
 Written by Greg Stafford
Cover Illustration by Michael Phillippi
Interior Illustrations by John Bridges, Talon Dunning, Eric Hotz, Larry McDougal, William O'Conner
232 pages, hard cover
CONTENTS:
Introduction, The Pendragon Realm, Character Generation, Family and Fatherland, Stats and Skills, Game Mechanics, Combat, Ambition and Faith, Matters of Wealth, In the Future, Characters and Creatures, Scenarios, Battle, Tournaments
COMMENTARY:
In early 2004 I received a call from Stewart Wieck of White Wolf. We were old friends--I've known Stewart for a couple of decades. He asked if Chaosium was interested in putting Glorantha, Cthulhu and King Arthur on their upcoming pdf site. I explained to Stewart about the breakup those several years past. He asked how I felt about not having Pendragon anymore, because he knew how I felt about it. I mentioned that it'd been years since anything had been done with Pendragon. About a month later Stewart called me and announced that White Wolf had purchased Pendragon from Green Knight, and that he would sell it to me for what they paid for it plus $1 I was quite touched by this generosity, but admitted that I didn't have the money for such a thing. Stewart said he had thought as much, and continued.
"Then," he asked, "Would you be interested in doing a new edition for White Wolf?"
"Sure!" I said, immediately. "Of course!"
"There's one other thing," he told me. "We think it needs a campaign book. Would you also be willing to do a full campaign book for it?" I wasn't sure if I ought to faint for happiness, dance, or only whoop for joy!
"Of course!" This was a dream come true.
Stewart explained that he wanted a return to the having all PCs start as Christian knights from Salisbury, to maintain, in large part, simplicity and also to retain the literary origins (there are no Saxons, Picts or Scandinavians in the literature.) No magician PCs.
Sure, he's the boss. No problem for me. I like the simplicity. So I began work. Since it was all Christians, I did decided to add two types of Christians, for some variety.
Shortly afterwards Stewart called again. "My editorial staff says we have to have an option for women knights," said. "They say we'll be skewered if there isn't."
OK, not problem. "But if we are doing that," I said, "Then we ought to at least have Pagans too. A lot of people are uncomfortable playing Christian knights, for whatever personal reason they may have. So if we are having women, we should have Pagans too."
He agreed.
We discussed several other issues as well, the biggest being the "tink tink boom" problem of combat, with the lethality of critical hits. I explained my position on that, and he agreed with me that it is important.
I met the deadline without problem. I didn't change that much, after all. And man o man was I happy! Still am!
2006
 Written by Greg Stafford (minor sections by Doyle Wayne Ramos-Tavener, Jeff Kyer, David Hazlett.)
Cover Illustration by Michael Phillippi
Interior Illustrations by John Bridges, Jeff Holt, Brian LeBlanc, Larry MacDougall
432 pages
CONTENTS:
Introduction, Rules Expansion, Chapter one-King Uther Period, Chapter Two—Anarchy Period, Chapter Three—Forest Sauvage, Chapter Four—Boy King Period, Chapter Five—High Adventure of the Wastelands, Chapter Six—Conquest Period, Chapter even –Romance Period, Chapter Eight—Tournament Period, Chapter Nine—Grail Quest Period, Chapter Ten—Twilight Period, Appendix One—Creatures, Appendix Two—Enchantment Period, Appendix Three—The Goblin Market, Appendix Four—Religions, Appendix Five—The Ladies of the Lake.
COMMENTARY:
The size and nature of the book was set, but the content left to me. I had been thinking about this book for years. I'd collected the library of references. Of course, now I had to drag all those books out of storage and find the right parts. But it was a delight.
I'd long decided I would keep the Boy King format. Heck, I kept huge parts of the book! No need to reinvent the quintain.
I was working along at a steady clip, feeling good and content, maybe a thousand to fifteen hundred words a day. That's a good clip for original work. One day I sat down to estimate when I'd be done at that rate and with a deep shock realized that I would be far, far past my deadline at that rate.
Now, as a published and editor the one complaint that I often had was about writers not keeping their deadline. To me, making that mark is the mark of a professional. Stewart had said I could extend it if I wanted to, but I felt my moral authority was at risk here!
So I set to with desperate determination. I basically did not thing but write, eat and sleep for the rest of the time. And man, I cranked! Two thousand words, three thousand. I found that if I did four thousand I couldn't work the next day.
I have to say, I surprised even myself to see how much information I remembered, how quickly I could find the precise book, and how well I could write if I set my mind to it.
And I hit that deadline, and reread it and made corrections, and got it in on time. The biggest problem turned out to be that I'd done TOO MUCH work! This is something I've done over and over in my writing career. I hit the word count, but the space limitations for the book didn't take into account the large number of maps I would include. Yoiks!
I urged Stewart to just make it larger, but the price point had been set and announced, and those distributors hate changes. Thus the NPCs got bumped, then the index. Ugh. At least the index is available free online, as a pdf
For the NPCs I did it again. Too much work done! Stewart had wanted it to be free, but there was just too much that had to be put into it for a professional package, hence a small charge instead of free.
So, when I sent in the manuscript I felt really satisfied at fulfilling a goal that I had set decades ago.
Not as satisfied as having the book in my hands, though.
I've been playing the campaign since then. I've found some error, some mistakes. Some are mine, some are editorial. I hope there'll be a second edition. It'll have some new stuff, some corrections. Maybe the index!
It'll be even better.
Written by Greg Stafford
48 pages
CONTENTS:
Introduction, Definitions, Your Manor, Your Retinue, Your Peasants, Manorial Improvements, Religious Donations, Other Glorious Expenses, Manorial Record Sheets, Narrative Economic System, Complete Landholding System, Appendices, Index.
COMMENTARY:
The Book of the Manor came about because White Wolf is big business, and the need to concentrate resources is great. Pendragon, while well loved, is not a Major Project, and there would be difficulty in diverting resources to it. Yet, it is well loved, and so Stewart has licensed me to create and sell supplements to the game in support of the 5th edition.
The Book of the Manor is the first one. It is a combination of things I have used in my own campaign, plus things that people have requested in the list and forums that I participate in.
It centers on the knightly manor. It explains what it is, shows examples, explains personnel and so on. And it solves a couple of ongoing issues for players.
One issue at hand is always which economic system to use, Nobles Book or Lordly Domains? The latter, being more recent, is more widely available, but I have always felt it too easily allows knights to make big profits each year.
And one thing that people often asked for was more information about what their characters could spend their money on. Some of these guys were talking about details of jewelry (“Just getting a £3 ring isn’t enough. I want to know exactly what I’m giving to my paramour.”) However, those kind of small details are easily worked out. I wanted to use the opportunity to continue to shape the game.
So a large part of the Book of the Manor is my latest version of the economic section. I’m quite pleased with it and how it integrates into the game system, yet presents a real challenge to the players. And it doesn’t easily give away money1
But even more pleasing to me is the entirely brand new section on additional things to be built for the manor. These are divided into Manorial Improvements (fortifications, chimneys, better Halls, etc.); Structures (roads, wells, mills, etc.), that keep peasants happy; Investments (orchards, sheep herds, gambling house, etc.), that might make money; Enhancements (Hunting Lodge, Almshouse, Ornamental Garden, etc.), that reinforce the knight’s personality by giving opportunities to roll on skills, traits or passions; and Religious Donations (churches, sacred groves, temples, etc.), that advance religious and spiritual abilities.
Other financial issues are explained as well, such as borrowing money.
In all, I’m quite pleased with it. Check here to purchase your own copy!
Written by Greg Stafford
The biggest single complaint about the 5th Edition is the restricted base from which characters may come: Salisbury. The reason for this is simple: this is for starting players. We wanted to give a lot of information about one place, and a fair idea of the complexities of life that a starting knight would know. Thus Salisbury is presented with some detail about the personalities, the places and so on.
This book takes the opposite approach. It assumes familiarity with the game and with Medieval concepts, and allows player knights to come from anywhere in the Arthurian world.
"The Arthurian World" is defined as
- places mentioned in the literature (where knights are said to come from)
Thus: modern Great Britain, Ireland, France, Hungary and "Saracen Land."
- places where Arthurian stories are known to have been written during the Middle Ages.
Thus: Germany, Denmark, Spain, Italy, Byzantium, etc.
Also New:
- a wider variety of offices that a character's father may have held
- variable equipment for the entire range of campaign history
- specialty skills or Traits for the various nationalities, so that each of them has some unique ability. Thus the Aquatanians are skilled at Venery, the Danes at Seamanship
- amusing Starting Luck Tables for every people, plus women
- religions, including Arian Christian, Orthodox Christians, Neoplatonists, Manicheists, Catharism, Judism, Saracens, etc.
One important point: the Cymri are weighted slightly to have more to begin points to begin with. Minimaxers should choose them. The "off-island" people are exotics, not treated as if they were just ordinary folk from Britain. Playing one of these fellows means playing a strange outsider, where half the game will be to learn how your own way differs from these fabulous Britons. It is more difficult for some (like the Danes who can't even ride well) than it will be for others (Byzantine can adapt quickly).
SEE MORE HERE. Take me right to Greg Stafford Pendragon Publications
|
