The mastermind behind Le Grimoire is Sébastien Boudaud, based in a small French town called Cholet. The magazine was founded in 1992, Sébastien told STRIKE TO STUN, when a group of role-players called 'Western Barbarians' decided they should have their own publication. The first print run originally consisted of 25 issues - or 'tomes' in Le Grimoire's terminology. All the articles, rules, GM aids and scenarios in the first few tomes were written by Sébastien himself, but he soon found help when he asked for submissions by his readers. Today, his team consists of 10 contributors, although most of these are illustrators. So much of the writing is still up to Sébastien. "I am very proud," he says, "of the fact that most of my colleagues have become professionals, working for French RPG-publishers and magazines, or creating graphic novels."

Le Grimoire itself, though, is still a strictly non-profit affair. All contributors work for free, and there is no support from any RPG-publisher or Games Workshop. This does not preclude professionalism, though. Nowadays, the magazine is even distributed by 'Millennium', but until only a year ago Sébastien had sold Le Grimoire directly to over 110 shops in France and other countries. Nevertheless, Le Grimoire has sold over 27000 tomes since 1992.

Actually, their professional attitude entailed some trouble for Le Grimoire. Reading an article on them in 'Casus Belli', Games Workshop's Phil Gallagher became aware of the ambitious French fanzine and demanded a copy of issue #7. Funnily enough, the cover of that tome was in colour - a first in RPG fanzines - and showed a scantily clad amazon. Yet that wasn't the reason Phil Gallagher finally intervened, says Sébastien: "He told us to either limit our circulation or buy a licence from Games Workshop. The licence was far too expensive and much too constraining, so we didn't accept. From that moment, we had to slow down the frequency of our publications in order not to get into trouble with GW. Our tomes have in turn become thicker, from 56 to 72 pages to 100 pages and more".

Consequently, Le Grimoire's tomes approximated not only the volume, but also the status of official supplements. The issues started to focus on one particular theme. Thus Le Grimoire developed relatively unknown parts of the Warhammer World such as Araby, Lustria or Nippon. Two special tomes, "Arcanes Magiques" and "Manuel du Joueur" appeared, detailing dozens of new spells and careers, respectively, all lusciously illustrated and well-presented. Finally, Le Grimoire published a tome which was more voluminous than anything GW, Hogshead or Flame had ever produced - apart from the rulebook. At 222 pages, "Sartosa: La Cité des pirates" is a full unofficial supplement, detailing locations, careers, scenarios and much more in and around the pirate isle of Sartosa, Estalia, Tilea and the Border Princes.

"We worked hard at that," says Sébastien. "I did a whole lot of research on pirates by myself in libraries and on the internet. We also co-operated with the fans on the WFRP-mailing list. In the end, our team consisted of people from Germany, Denmark, England, America, Italy (for the articles on Tilea) and, of course, France. I don't think I could do it again. It was crazy, but the result was worth it." Sartosa sold well and is still very much in demand. Unfortunately, it is very unlikely that there will ever be an English translation of this or any other special tome by Le Grimoire. Clearly, Hogshead as well as Games Workshop would have to agree to that, and Sébastien says that Hogshead do not allow them to translate, edit and distribute their work in English. Furthermore, publishing background material on region which Games Workshop have not yet developed themselves, such as Nippon or Araby, would certainly cause legal problems.

Hence all those WFRP-fans out there who do not speak French will either have to limit themselves to enjoy the wonderful illustrations in Le Grimoire's tomes, or at least read our comprehensive reviews on their special tomes, soon to be published in STRIKE TO STUN. (mw)