Having had a somewhat turbulent weekend, I did find some time on Sunday to begin to revisit Dragon Warriors (1985), the first book in the original three-book RPG of the same name. Of course, there are six books in total so it might take a little bit of time to fully re-read them all and explore the lands of Legend.

Having read about the two professions available, Knights and Barbarians, I took the time to roll up a Knight character and then dove into the combat rules. While I somewhat bounced off the “Armour Bypass Roll” mechanism on this reading (it seems a little clunky), I did have a strong nostalgic sense of having played this a lot in the mid-late 1980s. Memories of games and characters came back.

The best part of the book is the general tone and vibe that comes to a head in the example adventure at the back of the book. I want to run this adventure (again) for a group because it is so highly evocative of the Dragon Warriors vibe overall. There’s a darker and more folklore-based tone in this game that I deeply appreciate.

While I could happily run this old game – it’s very rules-lite and contains some great ideas – I believe that I will get more from it as a resource to mine the world of Legend for interesting fantasy stuff. The authors themselves admit (in the reprint edition) that:

“…the best Legend campaigns we’ve played in have used the GURPS system.”

Dragon Warriors, Serpant King Games (2011), page 11

I think that the idea of running games inspired by Dragon Warriors but powered by GURPS might well be the most likely way forward for me. That said, I would like to give the Dragon Warriors system a spin sometime, just for the sake of old times.

Game on!