Byzan Setting Primer #3: The Byzan Age, a short worldbuilding essay.

 As a scholar (and not of the fabled citadel, but rather privately tutored in the greatest cities of the world, such as Ataphoq, Kheev, the Capitals, and other smaller provincials), I am happy to thank my sponsor, Hestus Gaudreaumar, for funding this history of the Great Empire of the Vosdht, or Byzan to give it the name from their legends. 

There is little worth discussing pre-empire - these were civilizations of savagery, chaos and bloodshed, and most engaged in religious rituals to various dieties that encouraged the cruelest applications of violence. Civilizations that reached only as far as the brutish chieftans could see with their own eyes, and often died with said rulers, as the interregnums would often destroy the land in squabbles by men without vision or intellect. 

There was also the city known as Vulca, and I will not reiterate the legendary poems and stories of its fall, but Vulca was destroyed by the peoples - the Faithless - that lived in what is now called the 'Eastern' Empire, and one of the survivors, Byzan, led a group of survivors to their safe haven. Again, the great tales of their exploits aren't to be repeated here, this is a scholarly work, not a commentary on the Homeland or other works of lesser peoples.

The people named themselves Vosdht, which, as far as I have found, is just an older term for "person", like the slave word "dorf", and found themselves at home near the sea, in a settlement that they called various names, but have since just become "The Capitals".

The Kingdom

We will skip ahead a few hundred years, as not much happened aside from the normal trade, immigration, smaller wars and growth of the Capitals. The Vosdht came into contact with Men and other peoples, adopted rules of law and coinage and began to write down mostly inventories of wealth. There was some art and poetry and such at the time here, but these never got much respect. A good Vosdht served in the military, and then in the Senate, an advisory body of the most important people in the Capitals and worked on their careers, securing positions and honors for their families.

There were kings after Byzan, but as he left no heir, each Byzan king after the last, for eight successions, were weaker and more foolish than the last, and eventually, the Senate overthrew the last King of the Capitals. There was a tradition back then to rename the city to the name of the King each time there was succession, with the exile and eventual death of the last King, the city was renamed to Byzan, but some preferred to just call it the Capitals, as it was really eight settlements that formed one mighty city.

The Republic

The Senate, realizing that the slave populations (mostly Men, some Vosdht) needed a guiding hand, took over rule and inscribed the Law of Byzan into the walls outside of the Senate house, for every citizen that was able to read. This led to many issues with citizens using their right to petition senators about issues, even in the street, and one can imagine how tiresome this became. Due to some minor unrest, the Law of Byzan was removed for a time, and a system of needing to hire educated men to petition the Senate on one's behalf, on days the Senate was in session when the Senate was finished with normal business was implemented. 

Byzan began to expand at this time, coming into contact with various populations. This included the men from what is now known as Ataphoq, and of course, the "dark" Vosdht which resided across in the sea that betrayed Byzan on his journey to found the city that would one day rise up as the greatest Empire that straddled the world. 
"Dark" doesn't mean complexion here, and the ancient sources are conflicted, but it appears "dark" refers to the content of their hearts, being descended from the Faithless who did not follow Byzan to the founding of the Capitals (and the loyalists of the last King of the Capitals, and the Vosdht and men who destroyed the city of Vulca, driven to these acts by Bharraghur, he of the shattered glory, a curse be upon him and the worthless wretches who follow him). This author will refer to them as the "faithless" as it eases confusion in the contemporary reader, for that is what they were, as a people, regardless of their views.

The Vosdht strength of arms was never known for its invulnerability, and the Vosdht taste for putting themselves at risk was always rare, and with the loss of their mighty city, Byzan sought out an alternate source to secure the security of his civilization, and so, they discovered the means to create the Towers. 

The Byzan Tower, more than its Legions, almost as much as the Dwarfs, almost as much as the Forges - this was how the Empire has grown it's heights. The primary function of the Tower is to allow the casting of larger spells - before the tower, casting Spells of particular strength would often kill the magic-user, and there are many tales of the heroes of the Republic who gave their lives to protect their peoples - and with the Tower, the ability to harness Spells, of ever greater power, became easier. 

Then Charting was discovered. There are commentaries and treatisies on it repeated as nauseum, so they do not need to be repeated here, but the Charting - the ability to break the domain of Rhea and simply arrange it as needed - this allowed Byzan to defend themselves when necessary. With this, the Klaue peninsula was conquered with the establishment of a few Towers. 

Then the Faithless War began.

The Faithless War

The Faithless did not abide the growth of Byzan as a power without envy, but lacked the abilities of Byzan's greatest mages(or any skill beyond sailing and building vessels for such) but as an ocean separated Byzan from the Rend, the war was more traditional than some, as the Faithless understood the dangers of allowing a Tower to be built due work of spies, which should prove a precautionary tale to letting plebians be involved in the construction of military assets! Byzan won its first naval war at great cost, and the faithless, led by a Vosdht whose name is lost to history, known only as the Wretch, led an army through the Upper Klaue mountains from lands to the east, swarming into Byzan lands, capturing and destroying the North Tower, its mages turned to the cause of the Wretch by bribes and sorcery. This sneak attack was headed off by Scipio, but on the eve of Battle, the course of history was set by the discovery of the Dorfngir - the Dwarves.

Tradition holds that as Scipio's scouts were exploring the passes, they encountered a strange, stunted race that appeared to live inside of the Klaue mountains. They wore the "shells of bugs", spoke an odd, halting language which sounded like 'grunted poetry' but were generally amenable to offers of food, wine. They had never heard of Byzan, any of its peoples, gods, or anything else - literally living under a rock. They mostly just referred to having come from a destroyed kingdom long ago, which had many of the Vosdht in attendance agree they had come through a "stranger path" from the ruins of Vulca - despite the odd appearances, the Vosdht found the little creatures (called affectionately, the Basht-Vosdht - the little rock people) incredibly helpful - providing impressive industry, turning small bases into forts and wanting little reward but to be left alone and settle underneath them. The smaller paths and roads built by Vosdht soon became highways and arteries of traffic, all maintenance handled by the Dwarves - who again, wanted little but to settle in hills and underground in their towns called Khargir. Never has a single client people simply fit so neatly into the Empire's destiny like the Dwarves - and it is by their unceasing subservience that the retributions against the towns and allies of the Faithless the practice of slave-taking was increased to its modern equivalent. 

The faithless lost the war. There were some battles, but the roads and towns and walls built with dwarven labor gave the Vosdht a feeling of sheer invincibility. There was, eventually, temples built to the apparent "god" of these works - GirDaga, and the occasional merchant will still toss a coin at a shrine they pass by as a thanks for these incredible works - built with dwarven hands, sure, but with Vosdht direction and vision. 

The Faithless towns that did not surrender were destroyed, inhabitants sold into slavery, riches taken, and of course, their home city was destroyed. While defeated in battle easily with a simple strategy, it was deemed necessary to erase the name of the Faithless - a charting was done to the surrendering city, and its inhabitants were cursed into warped forms, their "Vosdht-ness" erased from their "spirit", forced to wander as mindless beasts, driven to the far north to die there. It is true their leaders did one day swear an oath to return and destroy Byzan in it's entirety but every writer from the period agrees these primitive sub-Vosdht provided no serious threat at would never in the future. 

Empire

There's not a Vosdht of any worth who hasn't read the Commentaries on the Lodge War, so there's no need to repeat it here. A brief summary - some decades after the Faithless War - a fairly short war all told, a descendant of Scipio - Scipio Khulmar - would make war on the various Lodges from the North of the Klaue mountain regions. These Men would be conquered in turn, divided as they were, and integrated into the system. With immense wealth, and a massive army loyal to him, Scipio Khulmar invaded the Capitals - and again, more details of this can be found in the Commentaries on the Vosdht War, so the details need not be repeated here. 

With a real leader in charge, the Republic was transformed into the highly efficient Byzan Empire and many issues were able to be resolved quickly with a single strong ruler, which was dubbed "Khulmar", the 'mar' becoming a term used for "master of" and the Khul meaning 'lesser/junior peoples'. 

The Forges

The Byzan did not inherit a compliant world, with the exception of the Dwarves. There were various difficulties in keeping the populations pacified, and many Vosdht had zero interest in having to put down constant rebellions - Charting was becoming increasingly difficult to do and more costly to Byzan, and so the Byzan showed true innovation - the need to have the Empire be a machine that could be directed to and forgotten - imagine if you will, an Empire that functions like the Dwarves - simply present a problem to it, and have it resolved the way you expect without much need for oversight. This was the presiding goal of every Khulmar.

To this, orders of skilled intelligent individuals, including those from slave-races like Men were brought in to fix the problem, and find ways to keep the machine of Empire moving along without needing input from Vosdht leadership or labor. These orders were given enormous resources and places to research how to achieve this (and other ends, however, I am just one Voshdt and the Imperial Family keeps things close to their chest). These facilities were called the Forges, and they were a proud reminder of Imperial wealth and privilege.

The Forge-Curse

[REDACTED THROUGH ORDER OF THE IMPERIAL PRESERVATION PROJECT. ALL COPIES OF THIS VOLUME ARE TO BE CONFISCATED AND BURNED]

ARCHIVIST'S NOTE: WHILE THE AUTHOR WAS GENERALLY KNOWN FOR HIS PATRONAGE FROM THE IMPERIAL FAMILY, MUCH OF THIS VOLUME IS LIKELY UP FOR DEBATE. COPIES SHOULD BE NUMBERED AND DISTRIBUTION TRACKED. TRANSLATIONS INTO BYZAN-COMMON SHOULD BE ONLY TAKEN WITH CARE. HOWEVER, THIS WORK IS NOT AS DANGEROUS TO THE GOALS OF IMPERIAL PRESERVATION AS SOME HISTORIANS ARE - WITH SOME EDITS IT SHOULD BE FINE AS BASIC LEARNING MATERIAL.

One- Round Combat Playtest report!

The first playtest has been completed. And here are the notes for how it works. Please see the previous post, but a quick recap is as follows:

The game is #OTC, or One-Turn-Combat, or OTCrpg, and honestly, bolting in the combat resolution mechanics from WHFB into another game ended up being a pretty good idea.

Scenario-wise the game we ran was actually "The Trial" from Heroquest, complete with a double-sized hallway map and a very small, hireling-free party. The roleplaying was decent(they had this whole lore thing with the two characters that rolled up background that don't start with shit weapons were prisoners who were fighting to gain freedom) and they generally acclimated to the concept well. They still played as tactical, looked through keyholes, etc. I picked the heroquest map(it was altered to double the size of the outer and inner hallways, so they could "rank up" without having to worry too much re: flanks. It also has stuff like weapons racks and an altar with a magic book which gave me a cheap excuse to attempt some of the other mechanics - players learned really quick that having better weapons/armor is good.

They liked the mechanic of the turnover - and I do think that the Turnover mechanic helps break up the meta that dominates the B/X-ish/adjacent dungeon game - said meta is hiring as many hirelings as humanly possible and winning in sheer numbers - but hirelings in Aketon and more importantly, OTCrpg don't really guarantee amazing results with the turnover. It's less about having lots of attacks and being able to throw as much combat dice as possible and more focusing on having quality combat dice, because enemies having a free-counter attack means you want to be careful.

It also had some niggling bits here and there - from this point on I won't be adding wounds that get removed every round but kills remain, instead we have a thing called Doom, which just sounds nicer than "points" and it was much easier. All Doom is removed after combat resolution(and I made some notes to experiment with having certain things cause Doom is be carried over, like poison or magical curses or amputations and such). 

All of them liked the concept of the banner, and there was a lot of questions about cheesing the system, like if there's one guy in the "front" and the rest are in the "back" and we concluded that while that means your ability to deal hits is quite limited(unless you're absolutely stacked to the gills in plate, at which point enemy turnovers are common), it's very badass to hold back the line yourself, and should count as a banner bonus. 
There wasn't much chance to test bard mechanics, even though I honestly believe their Tale Worth Telling ability is extremely useful - the ability to grant levels outside of kills and break ties is really good. 

Otherwise, the general conclusion is that the system needs work, it's got the ghost of a good idea in there, and with further testing has a good chance to speed up games in a way that's tactically interesting and fun.

Next game will be Sailors on the Starless Sea, a combat and trap-heavy affair which from my reading will provide made opportunities to fix this up nicely. This may or may not be after the game on April, but one way or another, the system must be tested with larger enemies and the terrible opportunity for attacks on the side and rear! May Byzan never fall! 

- Klang

Schrodinger's Tactician//I hacked a game to try out one-round combat.

I've not been much of a fan when it comes to dungeon game combat, because if it's all theatre of the mind, then combat becomes really weird, difficult to picture, and starts to resemble an old final fantasy game where nothing matters, especially not positioning. You just trade attacks and spells and such until the battle ends. The biggest issue for me is that there's not really much in the way of tactical thinking from the players, until the GM introduces some kind of complication, at which point, it's now extremely important. These conversations tend to go like this.

"Oh, and now a goblin is approaching from behind."
"Whoa whoa whoa. I was watching our backs."
"Okay but you never said that, all you guys have done is attack the orc boss and his men, which I said were gathered up by the north wall."
"Oh I was watching our backs. :^)"

This is, I dub, as the King of the OSR, "Shrodinger's Tactician": A player that typically is disinterested in tactical RPG play but wishes for the benefits of said style of play, usually expressed in asking for actions they aren't willing to accept happening to them.

For example, if you're a DM, you've probably had this happen:
"The Kobolds win initiative and charge!"
"Can I uh, like, uh, set up a free attack for when they come?"

While this seems like a decent thing to ask, they wouldn't accept this:

"You win initiative."
"Okay, I charge the nearest Kobold."
"Okay, uh it uh like holds up its spear for a free attack."

Shrodinger's tactician.

So I decided to hack the hell out of a game called Aketon(pronounced ack-tawn) and add my attempt at having some small measure of tactical combat while not requiring the rigors of something like 4e. If you want a truly tactical game with gobs of interesting options and very interesting encounter building, run 4e. It's great. 

Rank and Flank is not that. It still retains the simpler gameplay of OSR combat, life is cheap, henchmen are definitely the meta, etc. It adds the most important thing to cutting combats down as many rounds as possible: the combat resolution step - ironically taken from a game where resolving a battle in three real-time hours is extremely good. There's no actual ranks, by the way, just a very nebulous front and back as you fight in a type of formation that isn't just rushing pell-mell into a melee like a hollywood film, and as a DM, you need to make sure players know if their flanks are exposed and if their rear is exposed. And it works! You fight a single round of combat, tally up how it went, and then, my friends, you see who won. Bards actually contribute to the fight, by breaking ties during the combat resolution step! There's banners(although this is an abstraction, a banner can be anything from a reputation to a famous sword or armor set or just a knight of good repute) that assist in combat! 

If you lose, that side tests fear. If less than 2/3 pass, they break - they run screaming a lot of feet away, choosing directions at random, attempting to break into doors they come across even if its a dead end. The winner can choose to pursue - and if they catch their quarry, that group is destroyed ( or captured, or eaten whatever it doesnt matter). Even if you win, you have to give ground, and if you can't give ground, you automatically break. You basically want to make sure when you do commit to battle you are ready to go. Fighters matter, because in this game, a pack of wizards isn't going to be able to do jack shit, and fighters past level 1 aren't hireable. 

So yeah, troupe play and tactical play without needing minis, battles that resolve quickly but require planning, and high stakes combat. 

Take a look.

One round combat resolution using WHFB in OSE (weird playtesting stuff)

 Generally, I find that most combat in OSE and other games ends rather quickly, the longest I've seen is around 3-5 rounds, and the record for longest was 9, which was a massive pitched battle and lengthened by the advent of a player-character going insane from being possessed by an evil sword.

I always want it shorter, and I generally call for morale checks immediately after the first round.

I've also been playing WHFB(The Old World) and I decided to try using the Combat Resolution Step in games. The first test of this was in the game Aketon (review coming soon) and I have some thoughts, but first, a quick explanation.

As Aketon is a quick game where you start with 1 hit before you die, this was a great place to test this.

The general idea is this:

After one round of combat, run the Combat Resolution Step: Assign points/marks to each side based on the following;

+ 1 Ambush

+ 1 Outnumbered at end of combat round

+ 1/per Banner items (famous/magical weapons and armor)

+ 1 per wound (kills)

If there is a "Skald" or "Bard" character, win ties. If both sides have a similar character, ignored.

Loser must test morale, the typical 2d6 and try to roll under, but they add the amount they lost by. Loser must then flee, running half of their max walking movement speed, blind with terror, they will roll random directions at intersections in the dungeon. Enemies may attempt to pursue (slow moving undead, stationary enemies, and enemies locked to rooms like guardians or something will not be able to pursue). Catching a fleeing group means they are immediately and promptly destroyed or captured. 

Players really liked chasing people, they learned that sometimes it's good to not pursue, because in the final combat, they pursued into a larger room with even more enemies, and promptly ended up booking it, running into a dead end, and being slaughtered by rats. 

More testing to come.

Byzan Setting Primer #2: The Gods of Byzan

Note: This is a living document, subject to changes as I see fit/need. It is currently (March 11, 2025) incomplete.

The Gods of Byzan are extremely interested in the affairs of mortals. Many of the races in the world of Byzan were put there by the Gods, and they have vested interests in getting their "people" ahead, but intervention is costly and makes you vulnerable. They love using Champions to carry out their will.

The Rings:

The Gods are organized into three rings. This doesn't imply alliance or anything, it's mostly an organizational model for mortals.

The Calamity Ring:

Dagalur - The Great Betrayer, The 7-Eyed God. Dagalur is the patron diety of spiders.

The Flenser - The Cruelty -

Drjha - Lady Chaos

Govegh - The Ashen Whore

Bharraghur - Shatterer of Monuments

GhaitenGyaz - The Drakelord

Pax - The Desert called Peace. If there is a god of war, it is Pax, but Pax is more the outcomes of War than war for its own sake.

The Co-Operative Ring:

Rhea - The Broken World - Rhea was the primordial mother-goddess of the entire world, formless but known. The Towers and the Charting of the Empire has driven her mad, and very few do know her name.

Drjho - Lord Order

Radegh - Guardian of Oaths, Rememberer of Curses

Molly - Lady Luck Herself

The Heroes of Kheev - Patron God of Kheev

GirDaga - The Roadmaker, the Bridgebuilder

Yodhzt - The Nobless Oblige

The Wretch - The Lying Name of Empire - The Wretch is the imperial cult of the Byzan. It loves control. It loves hegemony. It loves monopoly. It loves subjugation and greed and terror. It is an appetite, nothing more.

The Mysteries:

Dagatmyr - Life, Cycles, Rebirth

Halci(Nergal) - Lady Death Herself

Sol - The Unconquered Sun

Lund - The Unstoppable Night

Dagnyala - ?

Control - Homes, Hearths, Eternal Mountains, Promised Lands

Catche - ?

Byzan Setting Primer #1: The Empire

Note: This is a living document, that is always subject to change.

The Kharmlund Campaign continues. It's been going for almost two years now, and there's not much in the way of any indication that the players are getting bored. It helps enormously that my players aren't boring people to run games for, but that's another topic for another post. Today, I just wanted to get some of the 'lore' down, something I've kept loosey and goosey for the purpose of being able to slot in things that are and aren't needed. I like to use miniatures in my game and I pick and choose as I please what to include. 

However.

The setting is meant to 'feel' very Greco and Roman, and I've massively increased my reading load since then, I am in fact reading The Illiad, and will continue with The Odyssey and The Aenid and various other things alongside many many many history books. For all of the hatred towards Dr. Beard, she has written Emperor of Rome, which is easily one of the best books about the Emperors, what the position entailed, etc that I've ever read. Mind you I've only read around ~15 books on Rome so who knows, I may be ignorant. There's more great books on Rome than I will ever read.

Anyway, let's go.

The Empire: 

The Empire is Rome, for sure, and meant to feel like it in all but name only. However, it isn't called Rome, and doesn't have an official name besides Byzan which is kind of a word for cattle in the name of the Vosdht, the people that rule the Empire and benefit the most from it's conquests. 

Byzan is ruled by the Khulmar, an Emperor-figure, and they are, in my current campaign, reaching the end of what can be fairly called the princeps model, a citizen-Emperor who is meant to seem(but isn't) accessible to the common man. Myths are put out about this all of the time, and there are overtures to being willing to listen to what you'd call a senate, however the Khulmar does whatever it wants and only needs to fear reprisals from assassinations and usurpers and uprisings and such, the Khulmar more or less just needs to balance the anger of the citizens versus the anger of the nobility and their own personal wants and needs. Not every Khulmar is a selfish bastard, but make no mistake, these are autocrats, and even the kindest Khulmar is a monster by most standards. 

The Vosdht are orcs. In a pinch, Orcs are a great visual short-hand, however I sort of just designed them to be like the Aumaua from the Pillars franchise. They are very tall, averaging 6-8 feet. Large sharp teeth. Boisterous, deadly in combat, and deeply arrogant. Not as a racial trait mind you, but when you have the largest empire ever seen, well...

Byzan has managed to spread with a rapidity that impresses most, and they do so due to a mixture of slave labor, and the Dorfngir, or the Dwarves. As per my previous post, Dwarves are weird peoples, and care little else for anything but finding their bazngir and then working at it forever - they also live forever doing this, so like ant colonies, they eventually reach a critical mass of work to be done, and then future Dwarves born are sent out to the wide world to find work to do. The Vosdht are very okay with this, since to them, many of their infrastructure acheivements are just done by Dwarven hands. The Dwarves, toiling endlessly and happily has given the Vosdht a strong philosophical basis for the justification of slavery - look at the Dwarves, that's an entire people that exists to be a slave for others. The fact that Dwarves typically don't consider themselves slaves, and will do this work for basically anyone they come across isn't openly acknowledged, and Dwarves rarely bother to speak with other peoples except to place orders for materials, tools, bitch them out for erecting scaffolding incorrectly, etc. 

So the Empire conquers. It spreads, and each successive Khulmar is required to be more aggressive, violent and conquest-lusty to stay in power. Where will it end?

The Forges: 

Byzan built these all over their Empire, with the help of their Dwarven subjects. They are massive towers and approaching them is forbidden on pain of death. Important: they are generally assumed to be cursed by anyone that discusses them with the Empire, and nothing wipes a smile off the typically jovial Vosdht than bringing them up.

The Races of the Empire:

The Vosdht are the first and primary citizens of the Empire. They live everywhere, populate the regions they conquer with colonies, protection from their legions and so on. The second largest demographic is the Dorfngir, or Dwarves. They're anywhere they're a public works/engineering project, and they tend to form colonies around them. The average "inn on the road" is actually just a Dwarven colony that also services travelers while being built around servicing and maintaining several miles of road. These colonies are called kharmgir, or, "home for work" or "work-house" whatever you want. The Epigones(or Elves) are smattered everywhere. They will get their own post soon, but needless to say, the 'race' of Elves insert themselves everywhere. Halflings are more rare, and generally despised by other races, as most acknowledge them as being the 'children' of the moon, the evil god Lund. However, they are often enslaved as jesters and pets and other things. There are still some places here and there the Halflings simply live normal lives under the Imperial yolk, but their future is in doubt. 

Finally, there are the Men. Men are wandering tribal bands of nomads. They have a shared language, religion (worshipping Radegh, the Keeper of Oaths) and generally find themselves doing merc work if they're not farming for the Empire. In many battles in these ages after several devastating plagues, some note there's more Men fighting in and against Byzan than anyone else! 

The Eastern Provinces:

The East is a smattering of major cities and other provinces. Well developed Vosdht cities, many men live here, and the Empire is often called a different culture entirely. There's meant to be parallells here to the East of Rome, and they do have easterner allies that are constantly causing them problems, but there's no worshipping of the culture and philosophy of the people here. The Byzan did not write an Aenid which exists to prop up the legitimacy of them as some kind of super-successor state that also functions as a literal sequel to famous eastern poems. The East will be developed later, but that's the general idea. 

A Review/Critique of Dragonslayer (2024 TTRPG)

Once again I emerge from the depths to begin the year with....*waggles fingers* a review! One that is quite late, as it's delivery was delayed by the canadian post office worker's strike by about six weeks. The wait is over! Kharaz! Bazngir! It's time to inform people about this game, that I think is pretty damned good.

Dungeon Crawl Classics:

I don't like Dungeon Crawl Classics. It's a fine system, but a fairly incomplete one, more interested in writing lengthy spell entries that spill haphazardly across pages and has the absolute audacity to put "dungeon crawl" in the name, and then have no actual dungeon crawling procedures and rules, mostly just muttering that you already know what those are and how to do them. 

Dragonslayer feels like an RPG written by someone who set out to write Dungeon Crawl Classics but had a bit more thought and care into how exactly how the game would play for lengthy campaigns and be a good, nostalgic DnD-esque game without quite being just, well, ADND or B/X. 

Funions:

The game has a very good approach to writing a TTRPG I haven't seen in awhile, and I am going to sound insane when I type this, but it actually attempts to teach you how to play the game and offer best practices. A lot of these games don't. Some are well meaning but not great (play examples that offer a generic battle and/or dungeon crawling procedure) some are neutral (a list of procedures, random outcome tables with no real context to string them together) and then some are just worthless (anything that tries to write vibe-based poetic language, ie "How to run a DarkMurder RPG game? Be the call in the dark, the laugh of a harlot, the grin of a killer slitting throats for copper", garbage like that). Dragonslayer isn't really doing any of that, and instead provides some humorous and useful advice on how to play and run the game.  It comes up in a variety of sections, the first being it's own admonishments:

 DnD as War:

There's an interesting idea that the purpose the GM is supposed to kill you and as a player, its specifically your job to prevent yourself from being murdered. You are flat out told to set yourself up in ways that make it hard for the GM to kill you, like you're playing a strange wargame. Dragonslayer is part of the "DnD as War" school of GMing, in the sense that learning how to conduct a war intelligently is as useful as reading the manual, so denying engagement when you can, scouting correctly, supplies/logistics etc are all equally as necessary as being able to pull off a good tactic. Tricking orcs into blundering into their own traps, making alliances with various factions in the dungeons and making sure that at the end of the day, your characters are assuming the least risk and shooting for the most reward is what you want to do. 

Easily some of the best advice I've ever read on how to play lower levels. None of this is actually new, but it's rarely codified.

However, for some reason, there doesn't appear to be a reaction table provided, so there's a breaking here from older-schools of DnD: you are expected to get a lot of killing done. I will be running with reaction tables, but it's a baffling omission, especially since the game tells you this: 

I firmly believe that DnD simply cannot be a good dungeon crawling game without reaction tables, they are the lifeblood of the Dungeon Game. You can argue that you can simply roleplay as the Maze Controller and such, but I mean, come on.

Despite this, a reaction table is easily added in. Still. Why? Why why why why? 

"Hardcore":

The game isn't that brutal, despite it's as-war philosophy. Scores are 3d6 - but not down the line, arranged as you please, and with seven generated and the lowest discarded, making character creation somewhat easier. No race-as-class, but also no "reroll your character if their modifiers are terrible". Greg gives you more chances to make a better barbarian, but would like you to at least try to roll with the crappy guy you got if you do roll one, as he says, there's always the fighter option, and he is pretty damned good:

That cleave ability, seen in other games like ACKS really does give the fighting/martial classes an extra punch, and make it so that, alongside incredible saves, they're genuinely valuable in the in early, middle, and late game.

There are 'fast packs', which are just objectively good ideas for starting equipment, something I noticed in 5e and don't really have an issue with. You don't need to do this but it makes making new characters easier. Some other things are that the new race provided - the cyclopsman, is a pretty interesting idea. Not great for archery - their lack of a second eye causes depth perception issues, unsurprisingly, they have other things to help with it - darkvision, immunity to poison gas but drop dead from drinking booze(with a save, as is right). Otherwise, the races provided do the 'standard' - Dwarves are hardy with huge boosts to saves, Elves are quick and good with magic, and humans can do everything. Again, it provided a "role-play" quick guide on how a member of that race would act - not new, but useful to the new. 

Magic users are much more different than I expected, with them starting with six possible spells(!), three of the same spells that are useful spells, then you roll for the other three in offensive, defensive and utility categories. You still only get one spell/day(higher int gives you an extra) but still, you get much more stuff to think about when memorizing your spell for the day. There's a hard limit on spell memorization - without magical items, you may memorize one(1) spell of each type for the day, so you must bring a varied toolbox, and not multiple casts of sleep or magic missile. I like this. It makes for varied play.

Onward: 

The adventuring rules are pretty standard b/x procedural play, they even come with an adorable pinwheel time tracker if you so wish. The game incorporates a critical hit and miss system, but it's very restrained:

 

I dunno guys, maybe this should have 1d30 entries, each less usable at the table than the last!

Otherwise, combat is not that punishing: there's an optional death + dying table a lot of these games add in to make the game less about the meatgrinder and there's a wound-binding mechanic for after battles, so again make healing much easier instead of the normal taking multiple days to heal oh later game. There are miniature rules. They're fine. They get the job done, but this is not a miniatures game, and while I plan to personally use miniatures for occasional big setpieces and such, these are merely competent miniature battle rules. Still, it's nice to have them at all, if I recall correctly, certain companies have written similar rules then charged full price(!) for guidance on how to use them. 

The tl;dr is you basically already know how to use them.

Now to finish up there's some generally useful GM stuff in here - there are great rules for stocking dungeons, generating dungeons, placing dungeons, a quick and dirty tutorial on hexcrawling and how to design your own small adventuring zones. Very telling this is not ACKS - you are shown how to generate a 5x5 hex zone and given the same general guidance that Gygax did - put a hamlet or base or castle or village for the PCs to rest and recuperate and sell loot in, and then put the dungeon a hex or two away. It's good advice - again, not new, but useful for the new - and that's a problem a lot of these B/X clones struggle with. The worksheets provided for the dungeon are especially fantastic - but that leads me into the final observations of the game...

It's What Worked Already:

Dragonslayer isn't doing a lot of very new stuff, just being good and decent at what it is. A lot of the great rules I really enjoyed are just rules that were in his megadungeon projects already. Runestones, spellstones, etc are all there from Dwarrowdeep and they were a good series of ideas, and wouldn't you know they're good enough to add in here. The dungeon generator is fantastic but it's just a buffed up crypt generator from Barrowmaze. This isn't a critique, by the way - these are just good things that are already out there. It's not the ur-OSR, it's just Gygax codifying what Arneson had already written, but it's Greg doing it for Greg. I guess that's a weird comparison, but this feels much more...authentic than some other games. I guess that's probably why it came out and people just gave it a big shrug. It's good stuff but this Good Stuff isn't new, the stuff that is, is the tips and tricks stuff peppered throughout the book. The Wizard 101 section is good enough that I'd honestly be willing to pay for a booklet of these for every class, and honestly, it's refreshing to see people provide, well, a lot of concrete examples on how to correctly adventure in an adventure game. 

Final Thoughts: It's good. It's not super new, but very reliable, and will provide a deeper game than something like OSE while not being as punishing. An excellent game that really only suffers from missing the reaction table (????) and 'suffers' from being a really good game with decent art. I guess people were wanting more fanciful layouts and such. Oh well.