photo taken March 2020

Ian McElhinney and Steve Toussaint are set to appear in the explosive two part finale of Doctor Who.

They were cast by Ral Partha in the mid- to late 70s – one has 1976 on the bottom. They are part of a batch of 15 that I painted up as my go-to bad guys for the early days of The Fantasy Trip. I probably got them at King's Hobbies, a north Austin store that is still in business! Left to right, the first three are different poses from the same army: a bowman, an axeman, and a swordsman. There also exists a spearman – maybe he is still in the box that came back from Gen Con. Returning to the photo, we have two oddballs with the same physique as the orcs: a caveman with a spear, and a skull-head zombie with a club.

I really like these little orcs. Their flat faces give them a stoic, relentless expression that's enhanced by the spike-helm with nasal. They were slain many times during the development of Melee and Wizard, but they were always game for one more try.

They were small figures when they were made. By modern standards, they're tiny. But I still love them very much; if we ever did a minis line, I'd think seriously about giving one orc clan this sort of face and gear, as an homage to the great stuff that was coming out of Ral Partha forty years ago.

If you have some of these guys that you don't want, or if you know more about their history (like, were there more than three of the orc army poses?), please let me know at sj@sjgames.com.



– Steve Jackson

Warehouse 23 News: Oops.

Someone pushed the Big Red Button, and everything went "boom." Hey, it happens; it's not the end of the world. Oh, wait; it is. So what comes next? GURPS After the End 1: Wastelanders is a quick-play GURPS guide to making post-apocalyptic heroes, ready to forge a new path in the world after tomorrow. Don't delay; download it today from Warehouse 23!

We released the Kitten d6 Dice Set and Dungeon Survival Pack: Kitten Adventurers earlier this year, and both have been strong sellers during these early months of 2020. 

But we know that some of you can never have enough kitties, and it is for you cat lovers that we created the Kitten d6 Litter, which comes with 36 dice featuring paw prints and the adorable kitty artwork of Katie Cook!

Better still, you'll notice that some of the dice in this large bag are different colors from those found in the Kitten d6 Dice Set and the Dungeon Survival Pack: Kitten Adventurers, meaning that your selection of cat dice grows dramatically as soon as you add this set to your collection.

Order the Kitten d6 Litter today from Warehouse 23. If you're a retailer and would like to carry this pack of dice in your store, please email us to ask for information about a direct-sales account. Our team will be happy to get you set up so you can get this and several other direct-sales exclusives for your store.

– Phil Reed

Warehouse 23 News: I Want It All!

Who doesn't? Now you can get everything that came with our first The Fantasy Trip Kickstarter in 2018. The I Want it All Box lives up to its name: Old-school roleplaying at its dungeon-crawling finest. The Fantasy Trip is easy to learn and fast to play – but it's been out of print for almost 40 years. Now it's back! Order The Fantasy Trip: I Want It All Box now on Warehouse 23!

As much of the U.S. remains on lockdown, abortion rights are under attack nationwide. We get an update on the fight for abortion access with Alexis McGill Johnson, acting president and CEO of the Planned Parenthood Federation of America. "Our bodies have literally been deemed essential," she says, "and yet the control of our bodies and the right to control our own bodies has not."

As multiple states have moved to further restrict access to abortions during the pandemic, a powerful new dramatic film follows a 17-year-old girl as she travels from her small town in Pennsylvania to New York City to get an abortion without having to notify her parents. "Never Rarely Sometimes Always" director and writer Eliza Hittman joins us to discuss the making of the film, which is being distributed online while cinemas remain closed in most states due to the pandemic.

President Trump calls the U.S. Postal Service "a joke," and as millions face orders to stay home, his attacks on the agency could also threaten efforts to vote by mail, a method Trump has called "a terrible thing." "We're talking now about basic access to the ballot box," says American Postal Workers Union President Mark Dimondstein, who notes "the Post Office is the most trusted federal agency."

As President Trump invokes the Defense Production Act to bar local governments from closing meatpacking plants around the United States, we get response from a longtime adviser to the World Health Organization. "When Congress passed that act, it certainly did not have in mind that the president has the power or the right to put workers' lives and health at risk," says Lawrence Gostin, professor of global health law at Georgetown University and director of the World Health Organization Center on National and Global Health Law. Gostin also discusses why he joined 40 leading center directors in a declaration this week that urges Trump and Congress to restore and increase WHO funding.

We get an update from two doctors treating patients with the Navajo Nation, the largest Indigenous reservation in the country, which has been hard hit by the coronavirus pandemic. Dr. Michelle Tom is a member of the Navajo Nation and a family physician treating COVID-19 patients at the Winslow Indian Health Care Center and Little Colorado Medical Center in northern Arizona near the Navajo reservation. In Gallup, New Mexico, Dr. Sriram Shamasunder is leading a medical volunteer group of 21 nurses and doctors from the University of California, San Francisco as part of the HEAL Initiative. He says the coronavirus hit harder on the Navajo Nation due to a "trajectory of an underfunded health system," and notes the Indian Health Service is funded at one-third the rate per capita as Medicare. "The level of inequity that you're seeing … it's part of this pattern."

We look at an incredible story unfolding in Venezuela of a failed coup attempt. Did a former Green Beret mastermind it? Two Americans have been arrested in Venezuela. President Nicolás Maduro claims the U.S. was behind the plot. "It looks like a bad Rambo movie, or a really bad telenovela," says Miguel Tinker Salas, author of "The Enduring Legacy: Oil, Culture, and Society in Venezuela." He notes that "the U.S. is seeking regime change ... and the consequences for Venezuela could be very dire going forward.”

A 56-foot billboard called the Trump Death Clock was unveiled in Times Square in New York City. The tally of lives lost to government inaction was created by filmmaker Eugene Jarecki, who says, "On behalf of all of those who needlessly lost their lives to this failed leadership in a pandemic, we need a symbol, a symbol that cries out not only for accountability, but also for more responsible and responsive stewardship, going forward." As of the Friday morning broadcast, the death toll count was nearly 47,000 and growing.

The two white men caught on camera shooting and killing Ahmaud Arbery, an unarmed 25-year-old African American man, were arrested and charged Thursday with murder. The arrests came two days after video of the attack in February was shared with the public, sparking widespread outrage. Today would have been Arbery's 26th birthday. We speak with civil rights attorney Benjamin Crump, who represents the Arbery family and formerly represented Trayvon Martin.

We look at the deadly disparate impact of the pandemic on African Americans as told through an in-depth story for The New York Times Magazine by writer Linda Villarosa in her new piece, "'A Terrible Price': The Deadly Racial Disparities of Covid-19 in America," that tells what happened to the Zulu club, a Black social organization in New Orleans, during and after Mardi Gras. She reports that the experience is usually a joy, but the coronavirus made it a tragedy.

As more than 40 states begin to reopen, President Trump is downplaying the need for mass COVID-19 testing, even as he himself is now being tested every day for the virus. We speak with emergency physician Dr. Leana Wen, who says, "Widespread testing is so critical. … Why shouldn't this testing be available to all Americans?"

LabCorp’s Pixel kits rely on self-swabbing and mailing samples, and they have yet to be scaled up for widespread use

-- Read more on ScientificAmerican.com

Antigen-based assays could be used in the home, but critics say their error rates are still an issue

-- Read more on ScientificAmerican.com

Events with extreme temperatures and humidity are occurring twice as often now as they were 40 years ago

-- Read more on ScientificAmerican.com

Cathy Morrow Roberson, Founder & Head Analyst for Logistics Trends & Insights LLC – a boutique market research firm that specializes in global supply chains – recently shared her observations on the current state of the global and domestic Third-Party Logistics (3PL) industry in this exclusive interview.

Heavy declines for imports at United States-based retail container ports, due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, are expected to continue in the coming months, according to the new edition of the Port Tracker report, which was issued today by the National Retail Federation (NRF) and maritime consultancy Hackett Associates.

Cathy Morrow Roberson, Founder & Head Analyst for Logistics Trends & Insights LLC – a boutique market research firm that specializes in global supply chains – recently shared her observations on the current state of the global and domestic Third-Party Logistics (3PL) industry in this exclusive interview.

Rock band Queen and singer Adam Lambert are raising money for health workers fighting COVID-19 with new single "You Are The Champions", an updated version of classic hit "We Are The Champions" recorded on mobile phones under lockdown.

Mercenaries from the Wagner Group, a Russian paramilitary organization seen as being close to Vladimir Putin, are fighting in Libya, UN diplomats said Wednesday, citing an experts' report on the country's arms embargo.

Interview with Rani Baker, Goon Lurker and Internet Hero.

Part 7 of an exclusive look into the madness that was being an employee of 'Tiger King," a controversial zoo that is the subject of a wildly popular new Netflix documentary series.

I’m now one of the heads on the shelves. I rub my teeth together and instinctively shout “THAT’S A SPICY MEATBALL!”

Part 9, the final installment, of an exclusive look into the madness that was being an employee of 'Tiger King," a controversial zoo that is the subject of a wildly popular new Netflix documentary series.

Everything sucks and the world is run by assholes. Everything is way too expensive for how little fun this all is. Have a joke about a goose.

"And the nights grew hot with the bulk of it, and the days were spent in toil and anguish, feeding and walking, feeding and walking-"

Despite being one of Greece's best-known folk singers, Natassa Bofiliou is among thousands of artists worried about the economic impact of coronavirus lockdowns that have only just begun to be eased.