Larry DiTillio has passed

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Akrasia

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According to RPG.net, Larry DiTillio has passed away.

Within the role-playing games community, DiTillio is probably best known as the co-author of the classic Call of Cthulhu campaign, Masks of Nyarlathotep.

Masks one of those amazing campaigns that I've read and read about -- and want to run someday...

Sad news. RIP Mr. DiTillio.
 
R.I.P.

I have fond memories of an article he wrote many years ago for Sorcerer's Apprentice magazine called 'The Titan's Tarot'. It made me really want to play in his game :smile:
 
Sad news.

This afternoon my group starts the new edition of MoN so his legacy is assured and I'll raise a glass to him this evening.
 
He also wrote for Babylon 5. JMS posted about him
 
Larry wrote for a bunch of Saturday morning cartoons as well. JMS’s Facebook post chronicles their work together, while also mentioning that gaming was his “real love.”

Fuck it. I’m running MoN with the video chat group. Let me see if I can get it in PDF somewhere.
 
I knew his name from the Fat Albert cartoon but never would have guessed it was the same person! Interesting career.
 
Some of his television characters, such as Granamyr and Lord Masque from He-Man and the Masters of the Universe, came from his game sessions or publications.
 
He also had his industry insider/gossip column "Sword of Hollywood" in Different Worlds magazine that I always got a kick out of.
 
May he rest in peace!

(I'd never heard of him but we've got to respect the late designers and authors).
 
I've played Masks of Nyarlathotep once and run it three times over the years, and it was a great and different experience each time. It's a perfect balance of giving the GM everything they need and leaving enough open to create a lot of freedom in how things resolve. It's an absolute joy to run.

I don't usually get worked up over RPG stuff, but it actually makes me angry that the current crew at Chaosium decided to improve and "streamline" (their word) it. And their idea of streamlining is to take it from a 224-page book to a 669-page two-volume set. Yeah. That's some great streamlining, guys. It even manages to drop a lot of previously clear connections between contacts. Some contacts that could refer PCs to multiple other contacts are now cul-de-sacs.

On top of that, one of the best things about Masks is the way that it revels in being high-pulp adventure version of the '20s while maintaining the deadliness and terror of Call of Cthulhu. Mike Mason, who oversaw the revision of Masks, is proud of the fact that they "fixed" the historical and archaeological errors in the campaign. It just shows a fundamental lack of understanding of what the campaign was doing.

It also throws in more hard-coded encounters (for example, the players get their bags stolen in an arbitrary way they are helpless to avoid, and have to engage with the 7E chase mechanics if they want to get them back) rather than trusting the GM to weave the elements presented together on his own.

Sorry to rant, but it pisses me off that Chaosium has so little respect for a book that has long been considered a model adventure design, replacing it with a glossy, bloated collectors edition.
 
Oculus Orbus said:
He also had his industry insider/gossip column "Sword of Hollywood" in Different Worlds magazine that I always got a kick out of.
Click to expand...
Totally forgot about that until you mentioned it. That and Gigi d'Arn's column were lots of fun.
 
Baulderstone said:
I don't usually get worked up over RPG stuff, but it actually makes me angry that the current crew at Chaosium decided to improve and "streamline" (their word) it. And their idea of streamlining is to take it from a 224-page book to a 669-page two-volume set. Yeah. That's some great streamlining, guys. It even manages to drop a lot of previously clear connections between contacts. Some contacts that could refer PCs to multiple other contacts are now cul-de-sacs.

On top of that, one of the best things about Masks is the way that it revels in being high-pulp adventure version of the '20s while maintaining the deadliness and terror of Call of Cthulhu. Mike Mason, who oversaw the revision of Masks, is proud of the fact that they "fixed" the historical and archaeological errors in the campaign. It just shows a fundamental lack of understanding of what the campaign was doing.

It also throws in more hard-coded encounters (for example, the players get their bags stolen in an arbitrary way they are helpless to avoid, and have to engage with the 7E chase mechanics if they want to get them back) rather than trusting the GM to weave the elements presented together on his own.

Sorry to rant, but it pisses me off that Chaosium has so little respect for a book that has long been considered a model adventure design, replacing it with a glossy, bloated collectors edition.
Click to expand...

God, that sounds terrible. I'm glad that I didn't get the 7e version. If I ever get a chance to run Masks I'll use the 6e version that I already own...
 
Baulderstone said:
I've played Masks of Nyarlathotep once and run it three times over the years, and it was a great and different experience each time. It's a perfect balance of giving the GM everything they need and leaving enough open to create a lot of freedom in how things resolve. It's an absolute joy to run.

I don't usually get worked up over RPG stuff, but it actually makes me angry that the current crew at Chaosium decided to improve and "streamline" (their word) it. And their idea of streamlining is to take it from a 224-page book to a 669-page two-volume set. Yeah. That's some great streamlining, guys. It even manages to drop a lot of previously clear connections between contacts. Some contacts that could refer PCs to multiple other contacts are now cul-de-sacs.

On top of that, one of the best things about Masks is the way that it revels in being high-pulp adventure version of the '20s while maintaining the deadliness and terror of Call of Cthulhu. Mike Mason, who oversaw the revision of Masks, is proud of the fact that they "fixed" the historical and archaeological errors in the campaign. It just shows a fundamental lack of understanding of what the campaign was doing.

It also throws in more hard-coded encounters (for example, the players get their bags stolen in an arbitrary way they are helpless to avoid, and have to engage with the 7E chase mechanics if they want to get them back) rather than trusting the GM to weave the elements presented together on his own.

Sorry to rant, but it pisses me off that Chaosium has so little respect for a book that has long been considered a model adventure design, replacing it with a glossy, bloated collectors edition.
Click to expand...
You'd think the best move would be to reprint it as-is and just swap out the stats to reflect the latest edition.
 
Baulderstone said:
Sorry to rant, but it pisses me off that Chaosium has so little respect for a book that has long been considered a model adventure design, replacing it with a glossy, bloated collectors edition.
Click to expand...

Sounds a case of old-time fans who found themselves in position to fix everything they thought was wrong with a classic. They'd have been better off doing a reprint of the original with an optional and separate book with their supposed improvements. They really called increasing its size threefold streamlining?
 
Baulderstone said:
I've played Masks of Nyarlathotep once and run it three times over the years, and it was a great and different experience each time. It's a perfect balance of giving the GM everything they need and leaving enough open to create a lot of freedom in how things resolve. It's an absolute joy to run.

I don't usually get worked up over RPG stuff, but it actually makes me angry that the current crew at Chaosium decided to improve and "streamline" (their word) it. And their idea of streamlining is to take it from a 224-page book to a 669-page two-volume set. Yeah. That's some great streamlining, guys. It even manages to drop a lot of previously clear connections between contacts. Some contacts that could refer PCs to multiple other contacts are now cul-de-sacs.

On top of that, one of the best things about Masks is the way that it revels in being high-pulp adventure version of the '20s while maintaining the deadliness and terror of Call of Cthulhu. Mike Mason, who oversaw the revision of Masks, is proud of the fact that they "fixed" the historical and archaeological errors in the campaign. It just shows a fundamental lack of understanding of what the campaign was doing.

It also throws in more hard-coded encounters (for example, the players get their bags stolen in an arbitrary way they are helpless to avoid, and have to engage with the 7E chase mechanics if they want to get them back) rather than trusting the GM to weave the elements presented together on his own.

Sorry to rant, but it pisses me off that Chaosium has so little respect for a book that has long been considered a model adventure design, replacing it with a glossy, bloated collectors edition.
Click to expand...

That is an odd decision as the latest 7e CoC adventures (Reign of Terror and Peterson's Abominations) I've picked up don't suffer from any of those issues.

Sounds a bit like when Spielberg went back and 'fixed' things he didn't like in Close Encounters, thankfully he realized those 'improvements' were mistakes and went back and restored the film back to its original cut.
 
Baulderstone said:
I've played Masks of Nyarlathotep once and run it three times over the years, and it was a great and different experience each time. It's a perfect balance of giving the GM everything they need and leaving enough open to create a lot of freedom in how things resolve. It's an absolute joy to run.

I don't usually get worked up over RPG stuff, but it actually makes me angry that the current crew at Chaosium decided to improve and "streamline" (their word) it. And their idea of streamlining is to take it from a 224-page book to a 669-page two-volume set. Yeah. That's some great streamlining, guys. It even manages to drop a lot of previously clear connections between contacts. Some contacts that could refer PCs to multiple other contacts are now cul-de-sacs.

On top of that, one of the best things about Masks is the way that it revels in being high-pulp adventure version of the '20s while maintaining the deadliness and terror of Call of Cthulhu. Mike Mason, who oversaw the revision of Masks, is proud of the fact that they "fixed" the historical and archaeological errors in the campaign. It just shows a fundamental lack of understanding of what the campaign was doing.

It also throws in more hard-coded encounters (for example, the players get their bags stolen in an arbitrary way they are helpless to avoid, and have to engage with the 7E chase mechanics if they want to get them back) rather than trusting the GM to weave the elements presented together on his own.

Sorry to rant, but it pisses me off that Chaosium has so little respect for a book that has long been considered a model adventure design, replacing it with a glossy, bloated collectors edition.
Click to expand...

Surely you must be mistaken, nuChaosium can do no wrong. :blah:
 
Voros said:
Sounds a bit like when Spielberg went back and 'fixed' things he didn't like in Close Encounters, thankfully he realized those 'improvements' were mistakes and went back and restored the film back to its original cut.
Click to expand...
As wrong as that was, at least it was Spielberg messing with it. This is like an entirely different director stepping in decades later to fix the mistakes Spielberg made in Raiders of the Lost Ark.
 
Armchair Gamer said:
Some of his television characters, such as Granamyr and Lord Masque from He-Man and the Masters of the Universe, came from his game sessions or publications.
Click to expand...


Granamyr is originally from Isle of Darksmoke. Bit of trivia: Darksmoke was originally called Greysmoke, which I'm guessing it was decided sounded a bit too like Grayskull, hence the change.
 
Baulderstone said:
Pisses me off that Chaosium has so little respect for a book that has long been considered a model adventure design, replacing it with a glossy, bloated collectors edition.
Click to expand...

(quietly removes the book from his wish list)

But to keep the focus on DiTillio: The Masks of Nyarlathotep is almost certainly the single most important non-TSR RPG scenario ever published. And it might even edge out those early TSR modules. Its innovation, impact, and legacy is unparalleled.
 
Baulderstone said:
As wrong as that was, at least it was Spielberg messing with it. This is like an entirely different director stepping in decades later to fix the mistakes Spielberg made in Raiders of the Lost Ark.
Click to expand...
Maybe, but this is an obvious improvement on the original:
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I am a big supporter of Chaosium, although I agree that the new Masks of Nylathotep is a huge mistep.

Sure it looks great, but the price of far greater than what most people will pay for a capaign - currently it will set me back about AUD $255 - $ 260 (approx USD $180), not including postage.

That's just ridculous.

I understand if this was for a 'deluxe' version or a 'collector' version, with a slimmer version there for the masses. The original version was much more affordable - I doubt the 7E version will get many new fans, it looks like it is purely meant to be eye-candy for grognards.

I like the look of it, but really wish they would also publish a 'standard' version - perhaps just the previous version with some new colour plate artwork here and there, and with CoC 7E stats.

I have already two versions of MoN that came out during the CoC 6E era, a softcover and a hardcover.
Considering conversion between the editions is so simple, I cannot see the need for another one.

I'll be happy just to keep these versions by Mr Larry Ditillio :thumbsup:
 
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