With a very un-D&D cover, this issue of the RPGA newsletter has some good information for AD&D players and more and more it’s becoming a newsletter aimed to the more expert player and DM, and those interested in the inner workings of TSR, interested in collecting modules and so on. This actually ends up making Polyhedron a pretty invaluable resource for anyone trying to do a project like the one that I am doing here. 

An example of how useful Polyhedron comes immediately on page 3, where in the column “Notes from HQ” we get information on upcoming releases and stuff that they are working on, towards the end the table of available and “coming soon” modules is also pretty useful. For the DM we get Notes for the Dungeon Master by Frank Mentzer which continues his covering of how to deal with Deities in the game. He says something I agree with, and which the game would shift to in later editions, that the idea of having players fight gods is generally a bad idea, and that it makes more sense to have Deities as these beings which are more removed from the combat action, particularly as killing gods willy nilly will often greatly affect a campaign world. So, I’ll say it here: I think the whole Deities and Demigods stuff was a mistake, having 200 hp gods faffing about for players to kill is just silly.

Mentzer also continues his column on Mapping from Square One, from the previous issue and his Spelling Bee column covers Druid Spells.  Gygax contributes a column on player/DM relations and ideas of escalation and blackmail, reiterating his dislike of “Monty Haul ” games, high-level murder hobo stuff that makes for pretty unfun stories. Lastly, and a good article for people who always wanted to know how this was processed, we get instructions on Tournament Scoring and Rating for Judges and Players.