Polymancer was a magazine covering roleplaying games and related hobbies such as miniatures, wargaming, and LARPs. The magazine was published in Canada by Polymancer Studios Inc. It was distributed across the United States, across Canada, in the UK, in Australia, and in New Zealand, as well as having hard copies archived with Archives Canada. The first issue was published in 2004 and it ran for 32 issues. Nature and content Polymancers articles and scenarios were written without reference to any specific rules system - there were a few exceptions to this rule where specific roleplaying game rule systems were referenced. The magazine for the most part was “system-independent” so that “players of different game systems could make use of them” The magazine covered many gaming genres such as fantasy, science fiction, horror, modern day, pulp. Most roleplaying game magazines at that time, just covered fantasy, in large measure due to Dungeons & Dragons, a fantasy RPG that was (and continues to be) the most popular RPG of its kind. Polymancer was different from many magazines that covered RPGs by being printed. Many gaming magazines such as Pyramid were only available online. The April 19, 2007 announcement that Paizo Publishing's license to produce Dragon and Dungeon magazines was to end in September 2007, without being renewed,"Paizo Publishing to Cease Publication of DRAGON and DUNGEON Magazines to continue through September 2007" left Polymancer as one of the few printed RPG hobby magazines geared towards consumers left (see the Wikipedia roleplaying game magazines category for a list). (Wizards announced that the two magazines will be replaced by a yet-unspecified "online initiative".) There was a complete adventure scenario in every issue of the magazine, which remained for the life of the publication as being “playable right out of the box.” A scenario map was included in each issue's center spread. There was also downloadable material to aid the gamemaster available on the publisher's web site for most of the scenarios. Articles in Polymancer tended to be long (over four pages) and the black and white illustrations differed from the color artwork found in Dragon. Polymancer was comparable to how Dragon was in the 1980s. The articles in Polymancer were eclectic but they appeared under a few regular headings: “Jousting With Words” was the editorial. An opinion piece by the editor. “The Lich’s Niche” was a ranting opinion column written in the form of an