Are you a fan of classic 4X games and old-school play-by-mail strategy? If so, we have something special for you. Epimethean Challenge is a new game inspired by the original 1978 rulebook for Empyrean Challenge, the ambitious and legendary PBM game from Strategic Simulations. While it draws heavily from the spirit of the original, this is an all-new game—built from scratch, with no legacy code—designed to bring back the deep, strategic gameplay of its predecessor.

Right now, the game is in a rough alpha state, and we're looking for a small group of dedicated testers willing to dive in, explore the mechanics, and provide feedback. Expect a hands-on experience—this test game will be mostly hand-moderated, with turn orders and reports handled through Discord. If you enjoy working through the quirks of an early-stage game and helping shape its future, we'd love to have you aboard.

The test game officially begins on March 8 15h, and we’re keeping it small to make feedback and iteration easier. If you’re interested, join the Epimethean Challenge Alpha Test on Discord at https://discord.gg/6Gjfus84. Whether you’re a veteran PBM gamer or just love the depth of classic strategy games, this is your chance to help rebuild a legend.

Come be part of gaming history—again!

Hi! I am Alena, she/her, a transfem 20 year old. Hoping to play Empire: Wargame of the Century with any of you. I'll leave this brief and succinct

Just to say hi! I've got a lot of spare time on my hands nowadays and I am reflecting back on my youth...Saturnalia was an awesome PBM and I learnt a lot from it as a developing teenager!

Recent days have seen Mark Wardell, whom I have long affectionately referred to as the Mad Scientist of PBM, return to the forum, here, replete with several different new postings by him within the confines of this place. Truly, it does my heart good to see him plant the seeds of some new PBM conversations, here. It is long overdue.

Mark contacted me by e-mail, recently, and I actually still owe him a reply to the last of several e-mails that he sent to me. That reply will, hopefully, be forthcoming shortly. It wasn't all that long ago that I started pushing back from the PBM table.

I don't know if they actually qualify as true editorials, but the articles/postings that I deposit in this forum section have always been among my most favorite of PBM-related activities. Just thoughts spilled out onto digital paper, but they have long given me some semblance of purpose.

In truth, I am an older man than I used to be - older, though perhaps not entirely old, just yet. Within me, that dragon of PBM possibilities rages, even still. But even dragons must rest, from time to time. Even dragons slumber.

I no longer venture forth to the PlayByMail Discord. I think it likely that it with perpetuate itself. It seemed resilient enough, the last time that I checked. And if this proves, in time, to be an erroneous assessment, then just cast it atop the pile of Internet PBM relics from an earlier age, that others might perhaps stumble upon it in some future era.

Sometimes, words come easy. Other times, I must pry them from my fingertips. In no instance, however, do I fancy wearing PBM's past around my neck like a cement anchor. My personal preference is that PBM have a very bright future, indeed. There is an abundance of dead wood in PBM gaming, and dead wood has all the makings of a very bright fire, should one dare to ignite it.

I doubt that the Mad Scientist of PBM returned to this place after an extended absence, in the hopes of finding these PBM halls abandoned and deserted. But Fate is what it is, for better or for worse. Perhaps the Mad Scientist needs to tinker in his PBM lab, and bring to life some new PBM creature, that only he can truly envision.

And who better to understand the science of play by mail gaming than the Mad Scientist of PBM?

Welcome back, Mister Wardell! Long have I awaited your return. This PBM prophecy now stands fulfilled.

Once upon a time I was more active here, I was after all the last GM for the classic PBM game Galactic Empires. Over the years I have been slowly working on an update to that game, but never quite reaching the finish line. I will confess that I'm not there yet either, but I will make a commitment that Galactic Empires will be up and running by the end of 2024. 

What I'm looking for now are any past or future players and asking you to please reach out to me via PMs. And of course, replies here will also be addressed by me.

Thank you, have a great day.

quite

This morning, it's almost as if I have to force myself to write something about PBM.

Almost.

Somewhere in my mind, the old book Stone Soup nudged one of my memory glands (a little word play to start your Sunday morning off with), causing it to tumble inside the cavity that is my head. This, in turn, got me to thinking about stew - preferably of the beef kind. Yet, since I won't be enjoying any of that, today, let's aim for some PBM stew, instead.

I should be working on Issue #33 of PBM Chaos, but I really have no inclination, whatsoever, to do that. Part of me keeps on asking me why I bother with any of this stuff, at all. For some reason, a piece of me always seems to want to know why - as if there even needs to be a reason why. It's a hobby interest, after all. Something to be tinkered with and piddled with, just whenever the mood strikes, you might say.

And so it was that I found myself browsing back and forth through the January-February issue of Paper Mayhem. It's an amateur-looking issue. Paper Mayhem was still a newsletter, back then. I don't recall, offhand, what issue number marked the "official transition" from newsletter to magazine. Subscriptions advertised in this issue were eight dollars per year for six issues. Purchase of a single copy would set you back a buck seventy-five ($1.75). Being Canadian and being a subscriber would inflict an additional two dollars to the subscription prices, as issues had to go out as first class mail, and Paper Mayhem was already shipping copies to American subscribers by way of a bulk rate permit, normally. Normally, huh? I wonder what exceptions there were to that general rule of thumb?

Advertising rates? Glad you asked. Full page ads would cost you twenty dollars per issue, ten dollars for half-page ads per issue, and a one-quarter page ad would hit your wallet for a mere five dollars per issue. And in case you were wondering about classified ads, those would cost you one dollar per classified ad, with a limit of a mere ten words.

At this time, Paper Mayhem's editor was C.L. Derbacher, Jr.

There was a guaranteed circulation of 500 copies per issue. It's a pretty sad reflection that PBM Chaos can't even approach that figure for a free digital PBM publication sent directly to your e-mail inbox, all these many years later, Huh? Que será, será.

One of this issue's general announcements was for a PBM network. Hey, that sounds somewhat familiar, huh? Didn't I list something similar as a New year's resolution for 2024? The more that things change, the more that they remain the same. Could a modern day PBM network be beneficial to the PBM industry and PBM hobby? Absolutely. What are the realistic chances of it ever happening, though, and in a meaningful way, at that? Oh, if I had to guess, and it's purely a guess, probably somewhere around zero percent. It would definitely be a good time to be wrong.

There's much irony to be found in the omnipresent "time shortage" that continues to cripple the PBM industry. Communication, particularly effective communication, requires a persistent investment of time. And since the PBM industry seems to suffer from a self-inflicted time shortage, one of the first and foremost of deficiencies that manifests itself is an approach to communication that I would characterize as nothing short of crippling. Does anyone out there really and truly believe that PBM doesn't take it on the chin, due to its communication failures? It isn't uncommon, at all, to encounter comments by PBM gamers lamenting about how PBM companies fail to communicate. This doesn't mean that PBM companies never communicate with anybody, but rather, that communication failures and communication voids very much remain a part of the PBM landscape in today's day and age. This is not a distant and ancient problem.

The January-February 1984 issue of Paper Mayhem was described by the issue as "issue number four of the Paper Mayhem Publication." This issue mentions, in one of its General Announcements/News Releases that Jim Robinson, President of Paper Games (a new PBM company) was in the process of developing its first PBM game, which would be called Swords of Pelarn, and that it should be available by April of 1984. The following issue, which was Issue #5 of Paper Mayhem, there's a full page ad for a PBM game called Swords of Pelarn. Inquires about that game should be sent to . . . wait for it . . . Midnight Games.

Huh? Say, what?! What happened to Paper Games? My, how quickly things happened in the PBM industry back then! Thank God we don't have to worry about that, anymore, huh?

PBM was definitely a more fast-paced place, decades ago. Compared to back then, today's PBM industry is routinely outpaces, by snails, turtles, and sloths. What an odd fit it is, indeed, in today's more hectic-paced world. Keep that in mind, anytime you might wonder why so many people seem to think that PBM is dead or dying. How ironic it is that PBM used to be the cutting edge of gaming, particularly multiplayer gaming, and now it can't seem to keep up with any other sector of gaming.

Issue #6 (May-June 1984) of Paper Mayhem says, in its GameLine News & Updates section that Schubel & Son celebrates its 10th Anniversary in PBM gaming that yea. Thus, Schubel & Son got its start way back in 1973, in case any of you out there in the PBM shadows might have ever wondered when they burst onto the PBM gaming scene.

By Issue #6, Paper Mayhem, in the words of its then-editor, was "closing in on the 1000 mark for general circulation." Clearly, I'm doing something wrong.

Skipping over to Gaming Universal Issue #2 (The Magazine of Play By Mail Adventure), the Industry Bulletins section looms large starting on Page 335. Dubbed "Company and game news from the major PBM moderators," we find the following PBM companies listed (this issue with its thick front cover was the January/February 1984 issue):

Adventures Design Group, Inc., Central Texas Computing, Inc., Clemens And Associates, Inc., Emprise Game Systems, Flying Buffalo, Inc., Jabberwock Enterprises, Inc., Superior Simulations, Viking Games, and World Campaigns. Thus, apparently, if this issue is to be believed, there were nine "major" PBM moderators active at that early stage of the PBM year 1984.

This PBM stew is not the buffet all-you-can-eat variety. Instead, you only get a single serving size. I hope that you enjoyed it, while it lasted.

In life, we do many things as a matter of habit. We habituate ourselves to a lifetime of habits. PBM gaming is but one of them.

Take myself, for instance? I have a habit of writing about PBM gaming. In fact, I write about PBM more than I play PBM. And maybe that's one of the problems? Perhaps I should play more and write less.

Or better yet, perhaps I should not write about PBM, at all?

That sounds odd, huh? It even seems quite counter-intuitive, at first glance. But the whole point of PBM is not to play PBM games, simply because PBM games exist.

Or is it?

Not in my book, certainly. My mind continually runs the gauntlet that is thinking about play by mail gaming. The three letters, PBM, are quicker to type, than are the then letters and two spaces that comprise play by mail. Yet, those three letters were chosen to stand for that term, as a way to distinguish in a nutshell gaming via a particular medium. Yet, way back when, PBM also basically stood for hundreds and hundreds of different games that there were no board game equivalents of, for the most part.

And this worked well, for quite some time.

But what about now? What about here in the current era, an era that seems quite dystopian, compared to many different aspects of what life was like back when play by mail gaming was booming?

You are able to read this, at all, because technology changed. Now, there are easier ways to write, than what existed way back when. There are quicker forms of communication, now compared to then, without question. Yet, when the play by mail gaming industry prunes itself almost to the point of non-existence, there ends up being considerably less to write about, to talk about, to ponder.

My sister's recent death did not turn out to be a PBM revelation. But then again, no one ever really expected it to. In fact, she probably was never even aware that PBM gaming existed. She did like receiving letters in the mail from me, in recent years, but those are few and far between. And now, the opportunity to send her more is gone forever.

While PBM Chaos readers wait with bated breath (ahem!) for the next issue (#33) of that PBM quasi-publication to land in their e-mail in-boxes, here I site typing this nonsense, instead of doing something that is more PBM-constructive, you might say.

But so what?

The world is in no danger of ending, because if it. And PBM gaming is not in danger of dying because of it, either.

Again, so what?

The PBM industry doesn't appear to be inclined to save itself, and I'm certainly in no shape nor position to save it from itself. The temptation is great to just unilaterally declare that I have simply run out of things to say about play by mail gaming, but a part of me somewhere deep inside of me knows that such simply isn't true.

But then again, so what?

If PBM gaming were to enjoy a massive resurgence, would I even cover it? Would I dare even try to report on it? Or would I toss my literary meanderings on the subject of PBM to the wind, and dive right back in to this particular field of gaming?

Probably not.

Then why should anyone else out there reading this herald their own return to play by mail? Maybe they shouldn't.

Or maybe they should.

On the one hand, I don't really care what anyone else thinks, but simultaneously, I very much tend to enjoy learning what they think. Again, we're talking about PBM gaming, here, folks. Don't get lost, just because I take you on a long and winding stroll to nowhere.

Because the current PBM state of things is a lot like being nowhere, right?

Oh, sure, there's still PBM games left. There's quite a few of them, in fact. There's probably more than most might realize, if they were inclined to look, at all.

Imagine if all PBM companies and PBM GMs and PBM games consolidated into a single entity. What would that look like? Would it be the salvation of play by mail gaming? Probably not.

Or just for the sake of thinking for thinking's sake, imagine if no single entity in PBM gaming ran more than a single PBM game. Now, would that save PBM gaming? I seriously doubt it.

Some recent PBM efforts seem have collapsed. Some PBM undertakings appear bent on imploding. And all the while PBM Chaos remains, unsurprisingly, in a state of perpetual chaos. Well, at least the name seems to fit, huh?

Where is PBM Chaos Issue #33? No idea. It's in stasis. It must be, because no real progress of consequence has been made on it. If I wanted to just kill it, I could do that quite easily. I think that the real problem is that I'm not really sure what it is that I want to write, what I want to publish. Maybe I really just need some new hobbies.

But what's wrong with this hobby?

Nothing. Everything. Who knows? Who cares? Why bother?

Yesterday, Randy Ritnour of Takamo fame wrote over in the PlaybyMail.Net Discord, "I am going to try to get additional content to each issue of PBM CHAOS online magazine. If anyone wants to place messages, empire notices, or trash talk (keep it clean), please email the messages to me and I will add them to my Takamo Updates."

Of course, if you don't ever go there, then you don't end up reading things like that. In fact, it would be very easy to miss out on all kinds of different PBM-related things, if one chooses to not enter the PBM Matrix, so to speak.

But who am I to talk? After all, I've sort of "detached" myself from a variety of different PBM places in recent years.

Say what?

No doubt, it's Richard Weatherhead's fault. Or Wayne "Smitty" Smith's fault. Or Richard Lockwood's fault. Hell, it might even be Daniel J. Fisher, Sr.'s fault. No way that it could jsut be my own fault, right?

Yeah? Well, what about you? Whose fault is it that you have become so detached from play by mail gaming in recent years? If only we could capture in a bottle Wayne Smith's enduring vigor for the PBM games that he continues to clench tightly to. Now, that would be something, something indeed!

But we can't.

At least, I can't. Maybe you can. Perhaps it is you who possesses a certain ability to connect with others, in such a way as to ignite within them a curiosity, a spark, an energy that can kickstart something within them that will set the stage for a new golden era in PBM gaming here in the modern era.

But no one really expects that, now do you?

The Internet is everyone's favorite whipping boy, these days, in spite of the fact that the Internet is the very thing that allows you to maximize your PBM gaming pleasure, currently. Without the Internet, you couldn't read this. Without the Internet, PBM Chaos would never have been brought into existence. Without the Internet, no one would even know or realize that Richard Weatherhead still owes me that article about Austerlitz PBeM.

Yeah, well, I've got to write about something, you know.

Hey, what can I say? It's a habit.


.

Well it's been going on a few months now so it's not exactly new, but I am always on the hunt for new players:

Welcome  to Science City, the most incredible metropolis on Earth. Here mad scientists do battle with sorcerers; pterodactyls vie for airspace with flying cars. It's survived aliens dropping rocks on it and  extra-dimensional invasions. The town’s been torn apart and stitched back together again and who knows what is coming next? If you can make it as a super hero here, you  can make it anywhere.

You just wouldn't want to.

It's Science City, it’s 2034, weird is the new normal and the populace wouldn’t want it any other way.

Science City is rated 2-2-2, or PG-13 if you don’t know what the three numbers mean. Our Discord server is here, please feel free to stop by and say "hello!".

I started sending the following e-mail letter to PBM companies and PBM GMs, yesterday. I sent it to about a dozen different ones, and I'll continue to send it out to other PBM companies and PBM GMs in the coming days. I'll probably scatter this task out over a couple of weeks or so, and then wait to see who all responds or doesn't respond:

For those of you that use the GTac Assistant, you may find that there are some long lists of choices that can be used when customizing maps. I'll post those lists here for anyone who wishes to see them...
(BTW, these lists are coming from the release that's pending, so a very few names are new and will be available shortly.)