Roslof’s Climber: 2023 Reflections on Taking Risks
Roslof’s Climber: 2023 Reflections on Taking Risks
by Harley Stroh
There is a Jim Roslof illustration in the AD&D Dungeoneer’s Survival Guide of a warrior ascending a sheer cliff. He is girded in ungainly platemail, a sword and great helm slung over his back alongside a longbow and quiver.
Whether he is ascending or descending is unclear. Or perhaps he is at the end of a traverse, about to make a last desperate leap to safety. However Roslof imagined him, the tension is palpable – the warrior about to peel off of the cliff to his doom, pitching into the dark trees far below.
It’s easy to find empathy with Roslof’s Climber. All of us know someone who spent the last year clinging to existence by a fingernail’s breadth. Some reading these words might be that someone, the Climber desperate to make the leap to safety.
But as artists, writers, and judges, there’s another read to the illustration: that it is important to be on the cliff, making risky artistic choices. It would be easy, after twenty years of publishing, to settle into staid rhythms, producing the same adventures again and again. To play the hits, and stick to familiar paths. The difficult, more interesting choice is to continue to press ourselves – to make each new module as if it were your first, to stretch for new mechanics, to offer judges and players epic new horizons to explore and stories to tell.
The last year at Goodman Game has been the latter: the release of DCC Dying Earth, with its radical new spellcasting mechanics, dense, florid illustrations, and wealth of supplemental adventures; the quantum leap in logistics with a new warehouse, new shipping partners, and new cons; the exercise in madness that is DCC 100. (How does one even produce a spinning module? How do you bid that out?)
In each of these instances, and a hundred more, we had a choice to make: settle for what was known, safe, and predictable, or continue to scale the cliff. And each time we chose the cliff.
Standing at the end of 2023 feels like a moment to pause and reflect. To balance on a ledge for a moment, shaking out our worn muscles as the cool air dries the sweat on your brow. To take a moment to look down and see how far we’ve come, but also to look up, and revel at the challenges ahead. To give thanks for the friends that have joined us, mourn for the ones we’ve lost, and redouble our efforts to make each adventure, each illustration, fully worthy of your gaming table.
And in 2024, to start up the next pitch with wide-eyed wonder for all the vistas ahead. We’re excited to have you along for the climb.
