History: Challenge Magazine

Those of you who have been gaming longer than 15 years will probably have come across the magazine Challenge that was put out by Game Designer's Workshop. Started in 1986 the title was intended by GDW to be their in-house magazine to support their own game lines.

Challenge #26 Incorporating the Journal of the Traveller's Aid Society

At the point that Challenge was being set up, GDW only had magazine style support for the Traveller line in the form of the Journal of the Traveller's Aid Society. The JTAS (as it was known) was a digest sized magazine that fitted the format of the rest of the Traveller line but there was a desire for something larger that could provide larger deck plans, world maps, better illustrations and cover more than one game. With Twilight 2000 having been released in 1984 there was a growing need for greater coverage and rather than having a separate magazine for each line a combined format was a better solution. The format arrived at was a standard magazine format of 8.5" by 11".

Originally discussed and then announced formally in JTAS 22's From the Management column the magazine was supposed to be released in 1985 but was delayed until 1986. When released in 1986 it started at issue number 25 (huh? I hear you say.)

When initially released it was Challenge Magazine: GDW's Magazine of Adventure Gaming Incorporating the Journal of the Traveller's Aid Society. Since the last issue of JTAS published before the new format was #24 the decision was made to continue the numbering scheme.

Issue 25's 48 pages covered both Traveller and Twilight 2000 articles, with the Traveller JTAS sectioned off in the magazine for those who were only interested in that setting. A highlight of the issue was a draft of minatures rules for Twilight 2000 and, amusing to look back on it now, a page of code in Applesoft Basic for the Apple II for a sector generator. Cutely it even had you type in remarks to indicate that it was copyright GDW. Oh the days, well it was 27 years ago.

The magazine continued to support solely Traveller and Twilight 2000 until issue 27 where support for their new title Traveller: 2300 (it was a while before they dropped the Traveller from the name) was added. In these days the title increased from it's initial 48 pages for #25 to 52 pages from #26 onwards.

Issue 30 was the first time they published articles on non-GDW house titles, in this case it was an article on Building the Perfect 'Mech for FASA's Battletech game. It was at this point that the magazine size increased to 68 pages.

Over the rest of the run the magazine added more and more articles on other games and began to become more of a general RPG magazine for science-fiction gaming (incidentally something in the original JTAS #22 announcement they stated wouldn't happen.) Over the years to follow the size of the magazine would fluctuate usually between 84 to 100 pages in size with non-GDW game lines taking up more and more space. It proved to be very popular with the fans and print numbers increased steadily through it's lifespan.

The tagline Incorporating the Journal of the Traveller's Aid Society was dropped with issue 34.

Occasionally they would have themed issues, such as #46's Horror Issue, #52's Bestiary Issue or #59 Mysteries Issue.

Challenge #52, Special Bestiary Issue

Over the years it would cover such games as

• Traveller in all it's incarnations
• Twilight 2000 and follow up
• 2300 AD
• Command Decision (GDW's WWII miniatures game, though this wasn't heavily covered)
• Dark Conspiracy
• Cyberpunk
• Shadowrun
• Call of Cthulhu 
• Space 1889
• Star Wars
• Various settings for GURPS
• Star Trek
• High Colonies
• Battletech
• Cyberspace
• Ghostbusters International
• Nightlife
• Tales from the Floating Vagabond
• Torg
• It Came from the Late, Late Show
• Renegade Legion
• Paranoia
• Cadillacs & Dinosaurs (yes this was a real RPG)
• Warhammer 40,000
• Albedo

Unfortunately production of the magazine ceased with the closing of GDW in 1996 after issue 77 was distributed. The closure was claimed as financial difficulties by designers and freelancers but Marc Miller attributed a lot of it to burnout of too much pace sustained over too long a period of time.

Challenge #77, the final issue

All in all it was a great run for a great magazine. Varied and generally of very high quality I recommend you check it out if you ever get the chance to pick up some hard copies. They generally circulate on eBay for relatively low prices, usually cover price or less.

If PDF is more your thing then they are all available on DriveThruRPG.com for $2.44 or $3.00 each. Alternatively if you want them all then for the excellent price of $34.00 (that's 64c each) you can get the entire collection.

And if you're interested in seeing more of what is in Challenge, a very handy index can be found on DriveThruRPG.com

Using the 36 Dramatic Situations

A couple of days ago I posted the list of the 36 dramatic situations, but what I didn't do was show any examples of them in use. I thought today I'd just walk through a couple of examples with a few game systems  on the inspiration that the results would give me.

Game: Babylon 5
Roll 1 - 5: Pursuit

The fugitive doesn't have to be fleeing a misunderstood conflict here, but it's an option.

Scenario A: A rogue telepath has come to Babylon 5 in search of the underground railroad that can smuggle him away from the every watching eyes of the Psi-Corp. Of course, where there are telepaths involved the Psi Cops won't be far behind and are willing to turn the entire station upside down and everyone's lives to recover the telepath or stop them. The characters are hired to help the pursued, or are command staff on the station caught up in the entire drama. Optional extra: the telepath accidentally scanned someone and knows some dark secret that could bring down governments/expose dirty secrets/provide an unfair advantage to one of any number of corporations (maybe InterPlanetary eXpeditions is after them as well.)

Scenario B: It is the characters being pursued rather than getting caught up in a pursuit. On a previous mission they killed a Narn in the course of their actions. Now the Narn's brother has declared a Blood Oath against them and will not stop until the characters are dead. He hasn't found them yet, but they hear someone is looking for them and has a bad attitude.

Game: Aces and Eights (or any western RPG)
Roll 4 - 5: Necessity of Sacrificing Loved Ones

Scenario: The players are sheriffs or deputies of a small town when they hear about a local land baron forming a grudge against the owner of the local hotel. The grudge is not justified and the baron is obviously in the wrong. Things escalate to the point where the barons men are sent to town on the instruction to kill the hotel owner, however in order to keep the players out of the way they have first kidnapped the wife or child of one of the characters. Now they need to decide what they're willing to sacrifice for law and order, their family or the law.

Game: Star Trek
Roll 2-5: Abduction

Scenario: A member of the crew has been abducted from the ship by a newly encountered alien race that a treaty for a valuable resource (dilithium?) has just been signed with. It turns out that this is a normal part of their culture after a treaty, to take a hostage from each side to help secure the treaty and they fully expect the Federation representatives to randomly take one of their people involved as well. It is up to the players to resolve the situation without breaking the treaty.