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3 games only ?    International Team only published 2 Role Playing Games and one extension: VII Legio, its extension Tablin and Magikon. Curiously, the serial number are R307, R308 et R351. Initially, the 307 was probably a distorted 301.    These games had little success. 3 extensions were initially planed for VII Legio but only one was published.    Magikon was only available in Italian / French. There was 2 releases of VII Legio / Tablin: one in French / English (with green text on the box) and one in Italian / German (with yellow text on the box).     Are these games real Role playing Games ?    The are real Role Playing Games but the rules, the players progress and the game master responsibilities are simplified. These rules seems to be written to be computer programmed. In 1983, I programmed VII Legio on a basic calculator Casio FX 702P with 2 software: one to create the universe and one to manage the players exploration.    Each player has the same kind of character: "an officer with its team" in VII Legio and a Magician Knight in Magikon. So the team work is not so much necessary as it is in Dungeons and Dragons: there are mainly individual quests in Magikon and in VII Legio, the space is large and the encounters between players unusual. VII Legio    VII Legio is probably the most beautiful Role Playing Game ever published in the world. The encounter guide is an art book of 56 pages, printed on a luxury metal grey paper. After years, my game has kept a smell specific to the ink used. A good part of this game is due to the Illustrator Silvio Cadelo. The box includes the encounter guide, 2 rulebooks (including 1 for the game master only), 2 game master screens, a set of spaceship sheets, a set of empty space maps.    The background is the following: The players are officers commanding a spaceship and exploring space. The goal is to discover planets and come back with experience points to get a bigger spaceship and make progress in the hierarchy until the supreme level of Fabius (Legio Chief Commander). At the beginning of the game, the player chose a personality between aggressive and diplomatic. The game master is called "Space Computer". he arbitrates and animates the game but he has only few initiative possibilities because everything is calculated with dice throws.        Each spaceship contains a maximum amount of components to be chosen between: a 3 men team, individual weapons, spaceship weapons, spaceship protecting shields, radars, computers, tanks. The number of radars indicates the maximum distance to detect planets. Each tank gives a movement factor of 5 squares (called parsecs) per turn. The movements are in a 2D space with a simplified 3rd dimension (4 levels distant of 4 parsecs). The number of computers indicates the number of new information on a planet's life available in one turn: 6 informations are needed to now exactly which alien race is on this planet. It's interesting to know which kind of alien lives on the planet to chose between an aggressive mission or a diplomatic/commercial one. It's easy to be lost in space. There are black holes and ennemi spaceships that may damage the spaceship. there are also phenomenons that will deviate the spaceship of some parsecs. So each travel back to the home planet is not always easy.        The crew is made of fighters and one specialized officer to be chosen between a Psi who detects deviations in space, a super fighter - the Princeps Robur, a scientist officer (sociologist or Physician). There are 40 different races of Aliens, from 3 different kind: mineral, vegetal or animal.    The game was presented in Jeux et Stratégie n°15 (June July 1982) Links:    VII Legio on Wikipedia Italy    VII Legio on Boardgamegeek    The user review of VII Legio by "The Goblin" on Boardgamegeek    Legio VII on Tric Trac    VII Legio / Tablin in the Spaceship board game list of Thomas Granvold     VII legio in la Tana dei Goblin    The rules of VII Legio in Italian Tablin    Tablin is an extension of VII Legio but the game mechanisms are different in several aspects. The game includes a luxurious book of 41 pages, with beautiful illustrations of Silvio Cadelo; a specific game master screen, and specific spaceship sheets.    The Tablins are from an alien race who controls part of the Galaxy and who lived in hidden underground cities. The players mission is to explore and fight against non Tablin and to establish political contacts with the Tablins. There are no more hierarchy level and no more different spaceships as in VII Legio: each player is a Proconsul Specialis and he owns a Gladiator Spaceship. The Spaceship equipment is bought using mission points. The hyperspace travel becomes possible but the arrival place is inaccurate.        There are three Tablin variants - the Duel, the Nummos and the Fagan - and three mutants races, also called Socii or Sub Tablin - the Folii, the Alas and the Mag. In the galaxy zone under Tablins control, the player can also meet 15 other Alien races known under the generic name of Alia. On some life hostile planets, the player can meet 3 different kind of old Tablins robots: the Nonons, the Balts and the Insulae.        The goal of the game is to meet Tablins, who are hidden underground and coexist with an Alia race. The missions are made by a droid under player control and often ends with a duel type combat. When the mission is successful, it's possible to look for an underground path going to a Tablin City, then to explore this city. Depending of the city size, it's possible to find taverns, residential buildings, garrisons end even sometime a palace. Any encounter of a garrison is immediately followed by a combat but the other places are never hostile. The ultimate goal is to find a palace and to establish relationships by diplomacy, corruption or duel.. The Game overview:    Art director: Massimo Petrini - Ideazione: Marco Donadoni - Grafica: Nicoletta Pellegrata    Illustrazione Alieni: Silvio Cadelo - Illustrazione Componenti: Massimo Petrini    Testers: Claudio Villani, Mauro Lubrano, Fulvia Battana, Matteo Rosa, Andrea Mannucci    Antonio Toffoletto, Francesco Del Forno, Massimo Amati, Luigi Garlaschelli    Traduzione Francese: Edith Bayle - Traduzione Inglese: Susan Krof - Traduzione Tedesco: Christina Reichelt    The game was presented in Jeux et Stratégie n°20 (April-May 1983) near the announcement of the first Donjons & Dragons in French. Links:    Tablin on Boardgamegeek Magikon    The material aspect of Magikon is far beyond the one of VII Legio. VII Legio is luxurious, Magikon is minimalist: the box looks empty: 1 rulebook of 14 pages, 1 encounter guide of 14 pages, 1 game master screen and 3 sets of sheets (player sheet, magic composition sheet, maps). International Team clearly tried to produce a cheap game (150F - around 15 £ or 30$, 50% less than VII Legio). However, the rules are not to much simplified and each page is well filled. These rules give a generic direction and the game master may adapt them.        The 22 illustrations from the encounter guide are realised by Mauro Moretti and are beautiful, even if they are smaller than the one from VII Legio. Only the magic creatures are illustrated. There is nothing on the players or the village citizens.        The background is the following: Every 1000 years, the Great Master of the Shadow organizes a competition between the Magician Knights to chose who will succeed to him. Magikon is the name of the castle owner but he has been studying occultism and magic for years.    The game master is of course the Great Master of the Shadow. He animates the game, prepare the map and the magic spell distribution. He arbitrates results of combats, discovering etc. Each player is a Magician Knight with a good or evil orientation. By magic, he can also become an animal. He will explore the roads around the castle and find "risks", village and magic creatures. The player progress is build from experience points and a die throw that allows him to elevate in an upper level of the castle, that corresponds to the experience level of the player. The discovery of the 12 possible magic spell is also progressive.    The map is of course hidden. It is made of a network of roads around the castle. The GMS put 30 magic points at least distant one from the other of 4 squares, 20 village distant of 5 squares, 20 "risks" distant of 5 squares. At the beginning of the game, the players are moving on a horse or a donkey, with a movement potential of 10 (or 7) squares. There are 10 different kind of "risk": tree fall, crack, ford etc. When not successful, the player may be wounded or lose his horse. In each village, it's sometime possible to meet a simple citizen, a bonesetter (physician like), a blacksmith (who provides horses or donkeys), an innkeeper. The different magic creatures are described by 3 chapters: the background, the attitude (hostile or friendly), the gift (what they can give to the player). The game overview:    Magikon is a game for 3 to 7 players from 12 years on.    Time of Game: from 1 to 4 hours    Art director: Massimo Petrini - Ideazione: Marco Donadoni - Grafica: Nicoletta Pellegrata - Illustrazione: Mauro Moretti    Sviluppo: Roberto Bonsi - Testers: Massimo Amati, Francesco Del Forno, Luigi Garlaschelli, Mauro Lubrano,    Andrea Mannucci, Matteo Rosa, Antonio Toffoletto, Claudio Villani.    The game was mainly presented in Jeux et Stratégie n°26 (April-May 1984) Links:    Magikon on Wikipedia Italy    Magikon on Drosi.de    Magikon on grottadimerlino Mauro Moretti    I did not find any information on Magikon illustrator "Mauro Moretti". It's clearly an usual name with more than 10000 answers on google. Mauro Moretti also illustrated Mafia (International Team) and Alesia (Jeux Descartes): 3 very different graphic styles. Silvio Cadelo    Silvio Cadelo was actor, illustrator and cartoonist. His artistic progress is well described in a French book called "Cadelo - Décollages". I have the book edited by Dargaud in 1986 (with the frog). But there is also a more recent one edited by Casterman. This book is easy to find and he espacially includes a long part on the monster serie from the book "Introduzione alla zoologia Fantastica" and from VII Legio and Tablin. The art of Cadelo is various, as we can see in the book or in the 3 following pictures - you can click on each picture for a better quality.        The book "Introduzione Alla Zoologia Fantastica" was published in 1980. Its a beautiful rare book and i am very proud to have one copy. This book clearly influenced the concept of VII Legio and Tablin. This period is the beginning of Silvio Cadelo's career.        I suggest you to take visit to Silvio Cadelo on his web site: www.cadelo.com.    About science fiction monsters from the beginning of the 80s, of course, the master is the Swiss designer and illustrator H.R. Giger who created the monster and the background of the movie "Alien" and won an Oscar. If you have the opportunity to go to Swiss, in gruyeres, you can visit his museum. You can also visit his web sites: www.hrgiger.com and www.giger.com. Alien followed a collaboration between Giger and Alejandro Jodorowsky on a movie project for Dune that did not succeed. On this subject, there are several sites including Jodorowsky's Dune, The movie you will never see and a Giger interview. Later, Alejandro Jodorowsky will also become a cartoonist. Some price (2004-2006): Game N° EBAY Price EBAY Country Date VII Legio + Tablin 5921967116 EUR 61 Italy 25 sept 2004 VII Legio 5922397118 EUR 35,50 France 30 sept 2004 Tablin 5930031141 EUR 20,50 Italy 5 nov 2004 VII Legio 5931436072 EUR 20,50 France 8 nov 2004 VII Legio 5932967734 EUR 21,51 Germany 14 nov 2004 VII Legio 5934053015 EUR 36,50 France 18 nov 2004 Tablin 5934550998 EUR 40 Italy 20 nov 2004 VII Legio 5934551703 EUR 40,50 France 20 nov 2004 VII Legio 5934551807 EUR 35,50 France 20 nov 2004 VII Legio 5934820617 EUR 19,50 Germany 21 nov 2004 VII Legio + Tablin 8705711562 EUR 61 Italy 12 oct 2005 VII Legio: only the encounter book 8722616367 EUR 16,50 France 22 nov 2005 VII Legio 8731820270 EUR 75 Italy 11 dec 2005 VII Legio 8731820270 EUR 89,70 Italy 29 apr 2006 Tablin 6028099192 EUR 51,50 Spain 16 jan 2006 Tablin 8753036223 EUR 134 Italy 24 jan 2006 Magikon 5935169347 EUR 49 Italy 18 nov 2004 Magikon 5951903710 EUR 26,51 France 1 feb 2005 Magikon 5236655721 EUR 21,50 France 18 sept 2005 Magikon 5241788898 EUR 20 Italy 21 sept 2005 Magikon 8761867015 EUR 17 France 12 fev 2006 Magikon 6061112566 EUR 30 France 1 june 2006

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