Happy New Year & Happy Sale

Happy New Year you all! Three Line Studio and TLB Games are extending their Christmas Special Sale! Some call it Christmas every day, we call it starting 2018 on a high note, especially if you have gamers in your circles! RPG (Role Playing Games), D&D (Dungeons & Dragons), game theory, we have it all covered for those special occasions in the year ahead! TLS is no random shop: it is the publishing house and agency of one of the original D&D members, American author and game designer Robert J. Kuntz!

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You really want to check out our range of competitively-priced quality original products, you will not find them elsewhere!

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Here is a short item selection:

El Raja Key Archive, NOW FROM ONLY $14.95

Dave Arneson's True Genius treatise, NOW ONLY $14.95

Sunken City adventure module, NOW ONLY $6.99

El Raja Key Archive by Robert J. Kuntz

Rob Kuntz is a living legend and El Raja Key Archive is here to prove it. Now ask any of the people in the know within the Role-Playing Games (RPG) community, and they will agree. I also witnessed it first hand when Rob and I attended Lucca Comics & Games 2015, of which he was a special guest. Rob Kuntz is up there with Dave Arneson, the creator of Dungeons & Dragons® (D&D®), and Gary Gygax, he who made it all happen from the maproom to the boardroom, and from the figurines to the seven-figure profits. Meanwhile Rob's name will forever remain associated with the legendary Castle Greyhawk and his no-less-legendary character, Robilar. So yes, we are about stuff of legend here.

A timeless piece of gaming that is set to become a collectible!

Although Rob was one of the youngest in the original crew, back in the early 1970s, his formative years in Lake Geneva (WI) amongst a bunch of creatives and visionaries, shaped his style, honed his craft and nurtured his talent. Bear in mind that Rob has never sold out. He has remained true to his core values, and not lost sight of the power of creativity as a game designer, and imagination as a gamer - and how to unleash them both and keep them up. Rob has never ceased to be a prolific author and designer either. When he's away from the public eye, you can be sure he's holed up at home working on a project.

Throughout his career that spans more than 40 years, Rob has authored an impressive number of adventure modules and has consistently remained a firm RPG favourite amongst his loyal fan-base and those Original D&D® (OD&D®) afficionados.

Gem of many designs! The Sunken City adventure module has an original artwork by Jim Roslof.

Tread carefully for Rob doesn't want to be typecast. To associate him solely with the world of RPG would be to deny him his versatility. He branched into new territory years ago, as a screenplay writer and a novelist, and now as a game design theory author, with a few books in the pipeline!

Rob's brand new company, Three Line Studio partnered with TLB Games earlier this year in order to capitalise upon his impressive intellectual property. As a starting point, they produced El Raja Key Archive, a retrospective of his early work, brought together under the DVD project as The Collected Maps, Manuscripts, and RPG Artifacts of Robert J. Kuntz.

Rob's classic RPG adventures: imagination unleashed!

Fans are rewarded with four editions to choose from: Basic, Standard, Deluxe and Collector's. Psst, if you want to feel spoilt and special, go the extra mile and stretch your dime: treat yourself to the Collector's edition!

The DVD is a must-have, not only for the die-hard OD&D® aficionados and Rob's loyal fanbase but also to a new generation of gamers looking to explore the origins of D&D® and their legendary adventures. 

El Raja Key Archive DVD is a testimony to Rob's 40-year+ legacy, packed-full with fascinating OD&D® material that harks back to the origins of the game. With Christmas only four weeks away, this is one experience that will make you think (and strategise!) outside the box. Happy gaming y'all!

Source: All imagery via TLB Games.

The Jim Roslof Auction

Yesterday I took part in an interesting eBay auction organised by our friends over at The Collector's Trove, that of the late Jim Roslof's personal collection of sketches, studies, illustrations and other fine art collectables which he produced over a prolific 30 year-span, including for TSR (Tactical Studies Rules), the legendary Lake Geneva, Wisconsin-based company that unleashed fantasy role-playing game and brought us Dungeons & Dragons. Jim Roslof (1946-2011) was TSR talented Art Director, and headed a team of 12 accomplished artists who together lent TSR products their strong visual identity, and in doing so, influenced fantasy art at large to leave a lasting and distinctive all-encompassing legacy that includes calligraphy, illumination, engraving and cinematic images - a legacy which is still relevant today.

In the light of this, needless to say that the auction was a call to action for hardcore fans of D&D, strategy and war games, and for fantasy art collectors alike and Roslof aficionados. Jim's wife, Laura Roslof, an artist herself and a former TSR employee, made this possible by partnering with The Collector's Trove for the auctioning of Jim's treasures. Each numbered lot comes with its own unique Certificate of Authenticity signed by the lady herself.

As an aside, forgive me for quoting a 'cracking' anecdote relayed by The Collector's Trove in their auction listings:

'Laura, during her tenure, (...) was so successful with catalogs, reaching out to military organizations, service member periodicals, and military base exchanges that she turned the operation from a money-losing endeavor into a profitable one. As a result, the company's chief executive, Brian Blume, promptly fired her. He explained that the catalog operation was supposed to be a money-losing department for the tax write-off! He then re-assigned her to the Pre-Press Department where they did want to be profitable.'

I placed a number of (frantic!) bids on three separate items, including the Hippogriff (pictured above) and the figures kept creeping up. I soldiered on in the auction fever, placed a maximum bid but got outbid both financially and by the 7-hour time difference. The Hippogriff eventually sold off for $214.50. I am a little despondent because my fondness for the creature had increased more fondly along the way and I did covet that piece of art but that's the way it goes. All the best to Griff in his new life, and I am certain he will be lovingly looked after.

Source: All photography via The Collector's Trove. (1) TSR AD&D Monster Cards Hippogriff Original Study Colored Ink on Parchment, 1982, Unsigned Jim Roslof and TSR AD&D Monster Cards Hippogriff Original Study Ink on Parchment, 1982, Unsigned Jim Roslof. This is Jim's initial work on his Hippogriff Monster Card art. Auctioned off for $214.50. (Photography lightened up by Mirabelle). (2) The cherry on the auction's cake was the TSR D&D Module X1 Isle of Dread Back Cover Art, Unused Original Final Paint on Illustration Board, Unsigned 1985 Jim Roslof. Auctioned off for $3,828.00. Another covet of mine and a testament to classic fantasy art mastery, but sadly way out of my bidding league!