Swordtag

Cover art by Mike Bjornson

Swordtag is a set of rules for a fantasy live-action role-playing game (LARP) published by The Adventurers' Guild in 1988 in which players take on character roles, dress in "play" armor and fight each other with boffer weapons.

Gameplay

Swordtag is set of basic rules for a fantasy LARP. Players can be one of nine character classes, largely drawn from Dungeons & Dragons, such as thief, mage, warrior, or bard. (In the updated Swordtag II booklet, this was increased to fifteen character classes.) The booklet gives an outline of combat and magic, and provides instructions on how to construct a boffer weapon or create a wand of light from a paper towel tube and a flashlight.

Publication history

The concept of Swordtag was created by Brett Dougherty and was published by The Adventurers' Guild in 1988 as a digest-sized booklet with artwork by Mike Bjornson titled The Adventurer's Guild Swordtag Rulebook. This was followed two years later by the updated and expanded Swordtag II – The Gamebook.

Reception

In his 1990 book The Complete Guide to Role-Playing Games, game critic Rick Swan was largely dismissive of the first edition of Swordtag, noting, "Swordtag is more of an outline than an actual game; in spite of some engaging ideas, there's barely enough information to stage a brief encounter, let alone an entire adventure." Swan concluded by giving the game a poor rating of only 1.5 out of 4.

Stewart Wieck reviewed Swordtag II - The Gamebook in White Wolf #27 (June/July, 1991), and noted that the most useful information was how to construct equipment such as helmets, shields and swords. Wieck concluded by giving this booklet a rating of 4 out of 5, stating, ""Overall, it's relatively simple to pass judgment on this product. If you're interested in Live-Action gaming, then this is a fine way to find out more and get involved immediately."