April 1995 saw the publication of the 9th issue of Other Hands. Publisher/Editor Chris Seeman was joined by contributors Gary Hunnewell, Michael R. Hickman, Nadine Salim, Bernie Roessler, Martin Rundqvist, Deena McKinney-Martin, Mark Merrell, and James Owen. Frances Poon assisted with editing tasks. Lisa Disterheft handled layout and design. Artwork was provided by Sophia Caramagno and Patrick Wynne.
Editorial: We Are Not Alone
In addition to these unexpected new contacts, OH has itself been gaining in public visibility, and will most likely continue to do so through the end of this year. Already, we have been receiving inquiries about our journal from people who saw our plug in the back of The Kinstrife module. Many more will know of us a EasterCon in London and WorldCon in Glasgow, where our friends Chris Pheby and Michael Saunders (see OH 6/7) have agreed to sell copies. Finally, OH has recently joined the ranks of the Small Game Publishers Associatior (SGPA), “an association of small press publishers in the roleplaying industry, created for the purpose of providing a forum for members to exchange ideas, provide mutual support and assistance, and to promote small press and the roleplaying hobby.” Taken together, we hope that these developments will lead to a wider readership for OH and a true “globalization” of our efforts to build a world-wide network of Middleearth gamers.
And now to the introductions for this issue. We begin with the promised sequel to Michael Hickman’s article on Dúnadan religious ritual (OH 8: 6-13). In this issue, Hickman turns his investigation upon the Elves at the close of the Third Age. Once again, he has produced an excellent piece of analysis of great value to roleplayers, and we must once again thank the Tolkien Society for kindly giving us permission to reprint Hickman’s work in our journal.
Our next offering is a short piece on healers in Gondor by Nadine Salim, who will be making a contribution to the Southern Gondor module on this topic. Nadine has come up with some very original ideas about this ill-described group, and she and I would both be grateful if anyone has anything further to suggest or add to this essay. Who knows, maybe you’ll get your idea included in the module.
Bernie Roessler, a new subscriber to OH, has also given us a highly intriguing and original piece on the dynamics of Dwarvish population. Since neither Dwarves nor demography are my forte, I cannot comment on the logical or technical points of Bernie’s article, but as a gamemaster I am always appreciative when someone else has done the arduous paperwork. Many thanks!
I am pleased to announce that we will be able to maintain our “quota” of two adventure scenarios per issue for at least the next three issues. The circumstances of this are worth explaining. The existing Southern Gondor manuscript was unfortunately found to contain far too much adventure material for ICE’s comfort (a realm module is supposed to have about 10% adventure material and 90% realm description—as it stood, however, our manuscript had a 50/50 ratio). I have invited the authors of these adventures to have them published in OH. Although this solution is less than ideal (particularly since we cannot pay our authors), it seemed to me eminently preferable to consigning the bulk of this material (all of which is quite good) to the dustbin.
The first of these adventures which we are offering is by Martin Rundqvist, an anthropologist by training, who has designed a scenario to illuminate his ethnography of local Gondorian culture (in this case, that of the Daen-folk of Lamedon). Our second offering this issue is an independent adventure (not connected to the Southern Gondor project) written by Deena McKinney, editor of the role-playing magazine MOTiVE (see OH 8: 4). Like Martin’s piece, this scenario operates on a local level, dealing with Guild politics and the criminal elements of Minas Tirith during the later Third Age.
Well, I hope that you’ve all done your part to support The Kin-strife module by purchasing a copy at your local gaming store. We have been delighted to receive overwhelmingly positive feedback on it thus far. However, it is a rare occasion when a published text of this size is grammatically and conceptually without error, and The Kin-strife is no exception. Hence, I have included, as a guide to the perplexed, an errata list for the module.
These and other corrections have been sent off to ICE and will hopefully be incorporated into the module’s second printing (if and when that happens).
We hope you enjoy this issue and the many that are to follow, and we hope that you will all continue to support us with your subscriptions and submissions. We are, as always, at your service…
Chris Seeman
April 25,1995
You may download Other Hands Issue 9 for free either from Other Minds’ Other Hands archive or MERP.Com’s Other Hands archive.