All three of you, if you missed it, will be happy to hear… Labyrinth Lord is coming back swinging. I’ll direct your attention to the words of Doctor Dan Proctor hisownself:
Labyrinth Lord second edition is set for release in Q1 of 2023. Its release will be concurrent with a new solo adventure (the writing stage is currently almost finished). These products will be released directly to the public, not via any fundraising effort ahead of time.
Later, there will be a second edition of the Advanced Edition Companion, and if the public desires it, these books will be compiled to create a second edition of Advanced Labyrinth Lord. All editions will remain in print, but clearly labeled with our vendors as to which books are first or second edition.
Goblinoid Games will continue to publish additional adventures and other works regularly going forward.
Between this and the other parts of the announcement (some of which were buried on Faceskronk, but surfaced on Reddit) it sounds like this second edition will move closer to the core “as written” B/X experience a la OSE since, as the intervening years have shown, the earliest RetroClones’ efforts to change thing around a little (e.g., 1st level Clerics getting spells, varied or dropped level titles, &c.) to avoid lawsuits are no longer needed.
In any case, that my original fav-o-rite clone of my original fav-o-rite RPG is being revivified makes me happy. Hopefully it puts a smile on your faces, too. Now let’s hope that Mutant Future gets brought along for the ride…
Hey! I count as two!!!
Saw the announcement and it’s a little weird to have LL run for a second iteration when OSE is crushing it right now. Seems like someone just drove by with a Camaro and someone else said… we should do a trans am…
Do you think this will be different enough to stand up from the shadow of OSE?
Hey there, all two of ya!
It’s definitely an odd timing thing. But I’m hopeful LL2e will offer something wonderful and unique and can thereby find a place in this new world of OSR behemoths. I’ll certainly be supporting it myself. I’m loyal, if not always smart 🙂
It will absolutely be interesting to see what Doctor Dan has up his sleeve. He’s a smart cat and I can’t believe he’d come charging out of the shadows to face the current gorilla if he didn’t have a plan. But even then, there’s always room for more muscle cars on the RPG roads.
Right on… Consider me convinced into a copy when it drops.
Heck yeah! Dan’s the man and I’m confident it’ll have good value!
I have the original. Good stuff… even today!
Great news, Mr. Pao, I agree!
LL as it is, though, is pretty close to the way we used BX mashed up with AD&D in the early 80s. First level clerics getting spells, and the higher level spells available to the players. Those are some of the reasons we’ve been using LL as the clone-of-choice for our current campaign instead of OSE.
There’s absolutely nothing wrong with OSE, I really love the stuff they’ve done and picked up print/PDF of most of the NG releases, but I’m not militant/religious about strict BX rules.
I’d also buy a second edition LL that hews closer to BX, but we’ve gotten a lot of good gaming out of the current rules, warts and all.
GM! How are ya? I hope all is well with you and yours, amigo!
I was never one to have a problem with any of the changes that were made in LL/AEC. Heck, I even kinda liked some of them. And like you, many of them reflected a more accurate picture of how my group played back in the day as well.
But I remember hearing many voices griping about the differences, so I thought it was worth noting that such things will be “rectified” in LL 2e. At the very least it explains why DP’s considering it an actual separate edition.
As for OSE, I’m fond of it and own most of the stuff myself. When LL went mostly moribund it was easier to get folks to look at OSE. Heck, I even bought the little booklets when it was B/X Essentials. I’ve used countless bits of Gavin’s pre-OSE stuff (which was, unsurprisingly, written for LL) in things I’ve run. So I definitely see this as a “the more, the merrier” situation.
My love of LL is partly nostalgic (funny, given all the people who claim that LL & the others only exist because of nostalgia), but I do love it and I’ll definitely, definitely pick it up. But they can get my original LL books from me when the pry them out of my cold, dead hands 🙂
I was excited to hear this. LL showed me what I missed all those years ago when I skipped BX, which is now my favorite iteration of D&D.
Hey amigo! I credit LL for doing a lot of the lifting to bring B/X into the public eye of the OSR for sure. Many of us started with B/X, but many more did not, given its relatively short lifespan. It’s just so dang good, and LL made that abundantly clear with its cleanup and reorg efforts (efforts since expanded upon so nicely by OSE). I’m jazzed that Doctor Dan is back in the game, and I raise a glass to your cultured tastes!