1959-2020
I think I first met Pete in the Student Union coffee bar in St Andrews probably in 1980, introduced by NC. My recollection is of a round smiling face, a shock of curly hair, and possibly a red jumper – though the latter may be a memory glitch, a retcon from later years.
Over the next couple of years I met him occasionally on visits to St Andrews at the various role-playing games of the time. Then we shared a house outside St Andrews, Pitmilly Lodge West, along with GM, NC and MM – personnel changed at various times and the exact overlaps blur these days. Self-named “The 53 Boys” from the cost of the 53p bus fare to & from the pub, The Golf Hotel in Crail, where many a gaming plot was discussed and schemes invented over beer at our round table in the corner nook we favoured…
Thereafter we stayed in touch, mostly through the good offices of NC and the games we all played.
Given our common thread was gaming, I thought I might try to list Pete’s gaming personalities, his characters, as a reminder of the man himself.
As well as playing as a character Pete also had his own game, universally referred to as The Sea Buggers, though I think it had a Sunday name too (possibly South by South-West?). Set around Dartmouth in south-west England in a 1400s it had a mix of familiar locations and names with a fantastical environment and history that intrigued. The last game I have notes on was B36 in 2012. The Sea Buggers was much missed when constraints of, as Pete put it, ‘living out of storage boxes and a suitcase in rented accommodation’ put the game on hold.
Thanks for all the extra information and corrections from contributors.
Updated 2023-05-21: Orville Bucket in Steam Elephants (GG)
| Dates: | 2010s-2020 |
| Description: | Thegn of Gefndene |
| Game: | Wyrd of the Geats (NC) |
| Notes: | PL: The character Pete played in his final games over 2020. NC: Thegn Osgar-Lytelman certainly returns to Gefndene and his wife Nothgyth the Fair, heavily pregnant and expecting twins. I expect he lives happily ever after. |
| Dates: | 1980s-2020 |
| Description: | Wizard: black hat then white hat |
| Game: | Gedros (NC) & Old Empire (GM) |
| Notes: | NC: Paradoxides did originate in Gedros. He was Pete’s first ever character, rolled up in my Gatty flat after a night in the Brownhills, which culminated in both of us managing to fall in the sea. However, he became much more associated with Old Empire. |
| Dates: | 1988-2020 |
| Description: | Miner (dwarf) |
| Game: | Old Empire (GM) |
| Notes: | PL: An alternative character for when Paradoxides was busy elsewhere. A cheery helpful chap who Pete seemed to play as more directly himself than most characters. |
| Dates: | 1994-2020 |
| Description: | A Power: a person who could make or repair anything mechanical |
| Game: | Psionic Dwarves in Space (RGR) |
| Notes: | RGR: Pete’s character in Dwarves still is The Mechanic (we discussed and he wanted to stay in the game). He was based upon a Philip K Dick short story, the name of which escapes me, but the protagonist could ‘fix’ things. So when a child complained that his ‘intergalactic communicator’ didn’t actually communicate with aliens, the ‘fixer’, fixed it. So it did. For a Dick story, I recall it ended on a relatively optimistic note, with I think the hero being asked to develop a universal translator which not only did the words, but also the genuine truthful intent. So The Mechanic could build, or fix, anything. In a feeble GM attempt at game balance (pretty ludicrous in Dwarves) I put two restrictions. First that he could only ever build one of an item, and second that no one could ever understand how that item worked – so no replication. The player group soon worked out the small hole in that, and drove a coach and horses through by scouring the galaxy for ‘weird alien technology’, which as a ‘passing expert’ (I believe ™ JM from Mara, though I never played it) would explain could never be integrated with human technology, because… Indeed. So their spaceship, The Black Pig (named by NC) now prowls the universe at great speed (due to the weird alien energy technology The Mechanic installed) striking fear into all who see it. Which isn’t many due the the weird alien stealth technology that the Mechanic installed. It then blasts them with… but I think you get the idea. Amongst the other items that The Mechanic produced were The Welder’s (GG) spacefaring liftwood surfboard, and a mentally controlled throwing dagger. Putting The Welder and The Mechanic together did make for a good maintenance team. The Mechanic’s weapon of choice, was, of course, a Stillson Wrench. My personal favourite of his inventions was however The Garlic Gun. Searching for a way to defeat a vampire that kept insisting in turning to gas and departing the scene, Pete came up with The Garlic Gun, which fired a globe of, well garlic force, that would entrap the gaseous form. It worked (of course), and the Vampire was captured. I realise this is probably more than PL was looking for, but NC spoke about memories living on, and I’ve been smiling remembering Pete as I wrote this. The Mechanic arrived on Dwarves trip #30; I don’t have the exact date, but am pretty sure it was in 1994. The last game he played face to face was #286, in Sandhurst on the 21/5/2011; though we remained in irregular communication about The Mechanic throughout, and he remains on the Black Pig, no doubt tinkering with something or other at this very moment… |
| Dates: | late 2010s-2020 |
| Description: | Bishop of Priesthaugh |
| Game: | Old Empire (GM) |
| Notes: | PL: One of a new wave (a campaign level reset) of Old Empire characters in the late 2010s; from wandering sea-god priest to slightly unwillingly saviour and protector of the victims of a cult. I was looking forward to what Pete made of Olaf. |
| Dates: | 2017-2020 |
| Description: | Navigator, botanist and landscape gardener |
| Game: | Umbra Sumus (PL) |
| Notes: | PL: A marvellous character to hang (apparent) side-plots on, with the knowledge Pete would rise to the occasion with his own embellishments |
| Dates: | 2010s-2020 |
| Description: | A mountain tribesman |
| Game: | Safira (RB) |
| Dates: | 2010s-2020 |
| Description: | Tidesman, veterinarian and warrior |
| Game: | The Expendables (CP) |
and retired games.
| Dates: | 2000s-2012 |
| Description: | Later Baron F—; Victor of Rome, Champion of Kent, etc, etc. |
| Game: | Lyonnesse (NC) |
| Notes: | PL: the player character the game came to revolve around the most, through his relentless, though slightly reluctant, rise from hedge knight obscurity. |
| Dates: | 2006-2012 |
| Description: | The richest man in England |
| Game: | Gin Lane (PL) |
| Notes: | PL: Despite Pete being able to use his character’s immense wealth to buy out whatever problem faced the player party, his portrayal of foppish distraction bordering on imbecility kept Milord’s riches from overwhelming the other players’ enjoyment of the game and indeed greatly enhanced ‘period feel’, in the GM’s opinion. |
| Dates: | November 2007 |
| Description: | International Navigator (i.e. Navvy) |
| Game: | Steam Elephants (GG) |
| Notes: | GG: “He took part in The Smugglers (Part II). Following the discovery of smuggled giant spiders and the boiler explosion of a traction engine in Part I, he was one of a large group tasked with staking out the Freeman Goods Yard. When the Steam Aeronef Mary landed there and immediately took off again, having been hijacked, they pursued it a short distance to where it landed for a second time among a large congregation of carters.” |
| Dates: | 1990s-2004 |
| Description: | Physician |
| Game: | Pyrates (PL) |
| Notes: | PL: Pete provided me as GM an “instant diagnosis” table for use when the Doctor himself was not available to give his reassuringly expensive Opinion: one roll for the affliction, the other for the peccant part, giving such gems as ‘a [twisting] of the [Lungs]’ or ‘a [rotting] of the [Nervous Fibres]’. Dr Hawley spent a some time dead as a haunt on the pirates’ ship, until partially reincarnated by the blackest of magics of the ship’s bokor (magician) Newton Whamphrey (GM), but remained in good humour throughout despite the trying circumstances of a body not his own. |
| Dates: | 1980s-2000s |
| Description: | The Dynamite Man |
| Game: | The Bad & The Ugly (NC) |
| Dates: | 1990s? |
| Description: | Solicitor and commissioner of Oathes |
| Game: | Pyrates (PL) |
| Notes: | PL: I fail to recall why Smoothe remained tied to the Carribean and Dr Hawley took over the wider adventures in Pyrates; there was a reason, in game, why Pete had two characters and it wasn’t character demise. Whatever, I have a faint memory of some piece of clever dealing with contracts and the law that were, in effect, Pete’s noted personal fast-talk skill. |
| Dates: | 1990s? |
| Description: | a guardsman of Lynarven |
| Game: | Aulm (JM) |
| Dates: | 1984-90s |
| Description: | One-armed mercenary Dutch cavalryman |
| Game: | New Jerusalem (PL) |
| Notes: | PL: Pete’s second, longer-lasting NJ character also had a misfortune, quite coincidentally I’m sure, in close proximity to Gustav Volger. A close fight and a risky shot into the melee that struck the unlucky Dutchman, rather than his opponent, shattering his arm. Fortunately the battlefield surgery that followed left, on a very lucky roll, ‘a lovely stump…’ Nothing daunted, soon after this Pete was busy regaling a select audience in an alcove of Whibley’s café on College St with a demonstration ‘how to load a long horse pistol one handed’ with a rolled copy of The Guardian standing in for the pistol, clamped in his armpit ‘as I still have my upper arm’ as he mimed pulling the ramrod, cleaning the barrel, charging the pistol with powder from his flask (a saltshaker from the table), etc, etc and most convincingly narrated. What he was not aware of, though NC noticed looking past him into the open room beyond, was the curious glances of other patrons straining to see if there was indeed present a one-armed man with an interest in antique weapons. |
| Dates: | 1980s-90s |
| Description: | Dwarf |
| Game: | Talgor (SB) |
| Notes: | NC: He played a dwarf in Talgor, famous for tobogganing down a chimney on the back of a shield. Again the name escapes me. RGR: His Dwarf in Talgor (at least one of them) ended up with his head on a pole in Liantor quay, alongside KD’s elf in that most disastrous of expeditions. KD: Oh how I remember Liantor Quay… I still have the handwritten note from SB announcing that Pete and I had lost our characters. It was the con at Cracoe in the Yorkshire Dales I’m almost certain, and after the worst was over we all went to the Old Hall Inn in Threshfield to recover. We left SB behind sorting out the aftermath and eventually someone drove up from Cracoe and delivered the note. We were drinking pints and commiserating and although we knew the party had foundered we didn’t know the outcome for each individual character. Steve’s note informed us that Ar-Valedhel and Telsen (I think that was the name of Pete’s dwarf) had not survived. The next day or two we re-rolled characters and as we had each originally made the rolls for elf and dwarf, SB allowed us to keep characters of these races with the result that I got the usual massively unfair elf bonuses for my new character Estellin. This really pissed Pete off (understandably!) and it was the only time I ever saw Pete genuinely angry as opposed to ‘in character’ grumpy. I don’t recall the new dwarf’s name but I have a feeling that Pete didn’t play much thereafter, though whether that was because of the disappointment or just a natural consequence of us all being further apart I don’t know. It’s great that Pete lives on through his characters as well as our memories of him. A testament to the hyper-reality that is FRP. I look forward to bumping into his Mechanic occasionally in RGR’s Psionic Dwarves in Space. NC: Telsen, that was it. I’d forgotten about Liantor Quay (I wasn’t there – I expect Sigtrygg was in the forced labour camp by then). The tobogganing dwarf must have been the second one, since I'm pretty sure that incident occurred during the series of Talgor games we played in Harrogate. I find myself wondering whether perhaps it was Ranulf and that Pete transferred him into Old Empire when it became apparent that Talgor was not going to run again, and Paradoxides became too busy and important to go on adventures. RGR: Yep, Telsen it was. Not sure if the shield riding was in Talgor itself, or out in the wilderness. NC: It was out in the wilderness somewhere. |
| Dates: | 1980s-90s |
| Description: | a very large man |
| Game: | Burgeis Herath (NC) |
| Dates: | 1980s-90s? |
| Description: | from the southern lands |
| Game: | Shemel (NC) |
| Dates: | 1981-84 |
| Description: | He was notable for losing several toes to frostbite (CD) |
| Game: | Zalibar (CD) |
| Notes: | NC: Losing toes in Zalibar wasn’t a great differentiator. I lost toes too. Digit loss in the marshes over winter was a common fate as I recall. Bonamy Byers rings a bell though – very Pete kind of a name. |
| Dates: | 198x-84 |
| Description: | Martyr of the Revolution |
| Game: | New Jerusalem (PL) |
| Notes: | PL: On being accosted by the Calvinist Guard – the Gestapo of New Jerusalem, used to terrified submission by their victims – in the early, supposedly quiet and subtle stage of an attempted putsch by the hardliners, Henryk demanded a receipt when they tried to seize his weapons on the streets of the town without a signed warrant from the High Preacher, fast-talking them to a standstill over the lack of Godly lawfulness of their actions, so they tried to escort him to custody still armed. JM: Didn’t he die by being blown off the top of the clocktower of the the town hall when a barrel of gunpowder exploded in an unexpected and distinctly unwelcome fashion at the very moment of victory? Volger only survived that because he was lying on the floor sawing through another councillor's throat at the time, whereas poor Pete was standing upright and closer to the barrel. PL: Yes. Definitely a game of Triumph to Tragedy. Read all about it [here]. I’m just trying to bring to mind who fired the pistol shot which ignited the spilled gunpowder… |
| Dates: | 1982-3 |
| Description: | Hasinji Monk |
| Game: | Bushido (JM) |
| Notes: | NC: Pete also had a notable character in JM’s Bushido campaign […] an unflappable Hasinji monk with a tsetsubo. PL: Ah, yes indeed. As another Hasinji monk at the time I recall our begging and battle chant: “Hasinji Monk! Hashinji Monk! Rah! Rah! Hasinji Monk!”. And the two monkpower “War-Door” shield we carried one time. |
Bargain the Bent
| Dates: | 1980s |
| Description: | Dwarf |
| Game: | Old Empire (GM) |
| Notes: | NC: a gay dwarf who never took a backward step, and consequently died, was his first Old Empire character |
Clint Westwood (?)
| Dates: | 1980s |
| Description: | a member of the Marvin Ackroyd Boys |
| Game: | Mara (JM) |
| Notes: | MH: Was Pete’s character in Mara Clint Westwood? IM was Bumphrey Hogart and I was Arm Neilstrong. |