Miscellaneous GM Game Notes:

History:

Sometime during high school, a small group of folks from Brownsville PA began playing D&D.  That group included me (Chad C.), Paul B., Roxanne R., Tom G., and many others.  After playing D&D for quite a while, I ran across a game called Champions.  It was similar to D&D but was based on superheros.  I had been a comic book fan for many years, so I picked up the game and we started a campaign which eventually became known as the Guardians.  We formed a hero group and had quite a few adventures over a series of months.  The Guardians were based in Pittsburgh.  The players in this game included me, Paul B., Tom G., Robert C., Greg M., and others.  Champions was a very fun game, but the rule system left a bit to be desired.  The Guardians campaign eventually fizzled.

Well in about 1986, I stumbled onto a new superhero roleplaying game called DC Heroes in a Waldenbooks store in Uniontown, Pa. Robert C. and I decided it was time to get another hero game started, so we bought the game and recruited some of the old Guardians and some new friends to give it a try. We played the game almost nonstop for two summers, then quite frequently for another eight years.  The game is still (technically) going on -- we never decided to quit!

The first two summers, we played in Brownsville and Uniontown, PA.  The first game ever was played in the summer of 1986, at the home of Paul Bridges (with his mom yelling down the stairs periodically to keep quiet).  Ralf C. was the GM.  Jeff G., Paul, Chad C., Greg M., and Roxanne R. were there.  Rox never played again, but the rest of us went on to form what later became known as AlertForce.  The rest of that summer, we played at Paul's house, at Chad's Grandmother's house, at Jeff G.'s house, at Tim M.'s house, and even at the home of Bill J. in Uniontown.  We played at least three to four times a week and had a blast.  Late that summer Chad C. took over the GM duties. 

We continued to play sporadically through the school year, and the next summer we started up again quite frequently.  Bill Jacobs had moved away, but we played at most of the other places quite a lot.  Jeff G. took over GM duties during the summer, and Bryan Seaton joined the campaign this year as well.

After 1987, we continued to play, albeit less frequently.  After 1988, we played only sporadically, although the campaign had several times of renaissance, when we would play a lot over a short time period.  Tim M., Bryan S., and Paul B. have all undertaken GM duties over the years.  Many other folks joined our campaign, including Tom G., Diane and Linda M., Steve A., Jeff and John B., Shawn and Christine R., and Richard "Dickie" W.

The last series of adventures took place in 1996, at the home of Chad C. in Cranberry, PA.  Chad took up the GM duties once more, and this time detailed chronicles of the game were kept (refer to the History section of this archive to read them).  As of the date of the writing of this history (August, 2001) we had not played since 1996, although at least this archivist maintains hopeful that AlertForce is not dead, but just awaiting another rebirth.

As far as histories go, in 1993 I put together a hard-copy using xerox technology, containing copies of many of the images which are scanned herein.  I also undertook at that time to create some written histories of the campaign, and some descriptions of the characters.  The text from that work was, in large part, re-scanned and included as part of this archive.  The 1993 book was the first instance of the use of the terms "Era1" etc.  This was my way to simplify the different timeframes of the campaign, and may not be 100% accurate as to how events originally transpired, but I did my best.

In around 1995 or so, I even attempted a short story about AlertForce (see the Extras section of this Archive to read it).  It basically chronicles a danger room adventure of some of the original members, and I think it turned out quite well.  It has been published on the web, as part of a website called "Wyvern Library," a self-publishing location for amateur writers and artists, which allows readers to leave comments.  You will be interested to note that a number of comments have been made about the story, all favorable.  So you can take some pride in the fact that some of the AlertForce adventures have been read and appreciated by people out there in the world.

In 1996, I took a stab at creating a web page containing an AlertForce Archive, in honor of what was then the tenth anniversary of our campaign.  Many of you have seen that web page, and I will also report that the page has been linked in a number of other websites around the country which relate to DC heroes.  A number of complimentary e-mails have been received, indicating that our site is one of the better campaign archives around.  That site has fallen into a state of non-accessibility, however, as the webspace required for it has increased, and my access to that account has been sporadic.  I used the original 1996 website as the skeleton to create this new comprehensive AlertForce Archive, and hope someday to have the gumption to put this whole thing (and its many many megs of content) on the web somewhere and let the world in on all the AlertFun.

I hope you will all consider this archive as my gift to you, as thanks for the many hours and years of fun I have had participating in our AlertForce adventures, as well as drawing our characters, and even writing about them.

-Chad C.
August 2001