So a bit went on and I got a few emails, and this is where things really picked up. This is the first real start of the conversation, but it took a bit to get to with it. Bare with me as I give you everything.
Daniel's Question
Email 1
Cool, and its fine it took you a bit, until now I was away from a computer since dnd Friday.
Email 2
Also thanks for the help.
My Response
Always glad to help. I'm particularly good at world building...
Daniel's REAL Question
If that's an offer to help...
Although I'm not too worried about any of that yet, I haven't heard back from 3 of them. I also told them we wouldn't start until September to give me time to get my own computer and set something up.
How do you normally go about planning a campaign, I've generally just started with a planned adventure and improvise from there. Do you start out more concrete?
My REAL Response
Email 1
Well, it depends on what I'm running. TBH, I've been running Ronlin for so long that it is second nature to me, but that being said I love world building. I find that having a definitive idea of what the overall uberplot is can help. Dinner time. More later.
Email 2
Prepare yourself, this is a master course. So I'll be expounding at length.
When creating a campaign, there's a few key things to keep in mind. The Theme, The Underplot, and The Uber-plot. I'll address these in turn.
Theme of a campaign is the flavouring. It's the guns of Ronlin, the Katana of the Orient, or the Sacrificial Blade of the Aztecs. The theme of the campaign helps determine the other stuff. If I don't know the theme of the campaign, I'm wary. A solid theme on the campaign influences how it will go, a bad theme or one that is not strongly enacted can actually detract from a game. A theme doesn't have to be deep, it just has to be solid. For instance, if I were to run a GIJOE game, I would leave out cameos by the Autobots (even though they are a well established part of the Joe Cannon- haha pun), because it would dilute the theme of a realistic special forces game. However, a theme of Joes vs Transformers would be a very thin theme, but an awesome one.
The Under Plot is the stuff that is going on in the world that is not directly attributed to the PCs or their actions. A good underplot gives a campaign world a certain verisimilitude. If the players decide to get mixed up in it, fine, if not, then things still happen. A good example from Ronlin is the growing tension between the two kings. If you guys didn't get involved in it, it was still happening. The thing with a good underplot is that it gives NPCs something to talk about besides plot hooks or dreer lives. Under Plot is best described as 'what's happening where we aren't'. It is something that is heavily influenced by the theme. Talk about warring shoguns, the construction of a new temple complex, or the potential marriage of previous rivals. All good stuff, and it works best as things that aren't potential adventure hooks. Seriously, you throw a war or a uprising and the PCS are going to be all over that.
The Uber Plot is the least important one in world building, but the most important one in campaign building. It is the over all story arc of the campaign. This is the one that is best left until the PCs have made it clear what they do and do not want to do. There's no point in creating a grandiose campaign involving the destinies of dynastic rulers when all the PCs want to do is hunt dragons. The best example of Uber Plot to ever exist is the TV series X-Files. Most of the episodes are stand alone (as should most adventures), but every once in awhile one of the episodes had to do with the Uber Plot of the Aliens and Mulder's sister. The uberplot is basically the planned end of the campaign. I've had the end of the Ronlin campaign in mind since before you joined. We're about half to three quarters there. If you ever wondered why a campaign fizzles out, its down to uber plot. If the uberplot is not engaging enough, a campaign fizzles. The Ronlin campaign is engaging, because the uberplot (that you asshats decided on) of rebuilding a city is engaging. It is slowly undergoing a change, which you might have realized recently, but it is still the same uberplot. Previous uberplots I've had were Dragons controlling Thieve's Guilds, Deamons controlling the clergy of a city (which ended in a time tripping, planar thing).
Showing posts with label Dungeons and Dragons. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Dungeons and Dragons. Show all posts
Wednesday, August 7, 2013
Wednesday, November 21, 2012
Hello, Friends
Well, I still have nothing to say about Mordheim, however, I realized that I still have lots to say about Gaming and Life in general. So Cobblestone Chaos is going to go into general 'game' blog. Or perhaps table top games, or something along those lines.
To be honest, Mordheim will always be an important game to me, but I have a ton of trouble with GW's business practices nowadays. Mordheim kept me going for a bit longer after I basically gave up on GW. So kudos to that.
However, I have been playing a decent amount of D&D, which you've been seeing rage comics and session updates for. I've been rather lackasdasical about those. I hope to improve that, going forward. Especially since I am turning this blog into a more general direction. If you drop me, I completely understand, after all it ain't what you signed up for in the first place. So no offense taken if you bail.
However, my D&D campaign is very different from most of the others that I've run. The campaign is actually the 6th I've run in the same homebrew setting, some of which failed, but I've gotten people from all across my experiences of RPGs.
Doug; Doug was my first PC, ever. And my first DM. We kinda learned a lot about role-playing together. About one quarter of the important stuff in my campaign setting is actually due to his direct influence.
Po: Holy fuck, Po. He's a beast. He tends to play Monks (which annoys the piss outta me, but whatcha going to do?). He's one of the biggest min/maxers I've ever met, and that's saying something. His participating in a campaign makes it deadilier. He tends to be more RP mechanical in nature rather then strict just fluff.
Consadine: As he's known in internet circles, is rather newish to me in the terms of role-playing. However, I've known him for a number of years from the astro GW forum we were both part of. He likes playing more interesting characters.
Daniel: Daniel (not Dan) is actually Consadine's main DM IRL, but he brought him along for poops and laughs. I'm still learning his play style, but he's often the first to come up with innovative solutions for problems that are presented to the group- which is something that I love.
Eldest Child: My oldest son (all of 13) is playing in this group. They say if you want to have a player who plays the way you like to DM, you have to teach them yourself. That is very true. Even better to breed 'em.
The group started off fairly standard, go to ruined city and plunder. However, they've gotten the bright idea to unite the disparate groups in the city, and rebuild. It is proving...difficult.
However, what they tend to forget is that I like plot armor. A lot. None of them have yet to give me a reason to give them plot armor, but I'm waiting for ideas from them. That's the way things go. I have wheels that could potentially go, if they survive long enough. As of right now, its a good thing they all have back up characters and we've even created a splinter group for them to play when we get tired of the main group. However, I think that the Splinter Group is about to get a TPK this week, so we'll see. Until next time!
To be honest, Mordheim will always be an important game to me, but I have a ton of trouble with GW's business practices nowadays. Mordheim kept me going for a bit longer after I basically gave up on GW. So kudos to that.
However, I have been playing a decent amount of D&D, which you've been seeing rage comics and session updates for. I've been rather lackasdasical about those. I hope to improve that, going forward. Especially since I am turning this blog into a more general direction. If you drop me, I completely understand, after all it ain't what you signed up for in the first place. So no offense taken if you bail.
However, my D&D campaign is very different from most of the others that I've run. The campaign is actually the 6th I've run in the same homebrew setting, some of which failed, but I've gotten people from all across my experiences of RPGs.
Doug; Doug was my first PC, ever. And my first DM. We kinda learned a lot about role-playing together. About one quarter of the important stuff in my campaign setting is actually due to his direct influence.
Po: Holy fuck, Po. He's a beast. He tends to play Monks (which annoys the piss outta me, but whatcha going to do?). He's one of the biggest min/maxers I've ever met, and that's saying something. His participating in a campaign makes it deadilier. He tends to be more RP mechanical in nature rather then strict just fluff.
Consadine: As he's known in internet circles, is rather newish to me in the terms of role-playing. However, I've known him for a number of years from the astro GW forum we were both part of. He likes playing more interesting characters.
Daniel: Daniel (not Dan) is actually Consadine's main DM IRL, but he brought him along for poops and laughs. I'm still learning his play style, but he's often the first to come up with innovative solutions for problems that are presented to the group- which is something that I love.
Eldest Child: My oldest son (all of 13) is playing in this group. They say if you want to have a player who plays the way you like to DM, you have to teach them yourself. That is very true. Even better to breed 'em.
The group started off fairly standard, go to ruined city and plunder. However, they've gotten the bright idea to unite the disparate groups in the city, and rebuild. It is proving...difficult.
However, what they tend to forget is that I like plot armor. A lot. None of them have yet to give me a reason to give them plot armor, but I'm waiting for ideas from them. That's the way things go. I have wheels that could potentially go, if they survive long enough. As of right now, its a good thing they all have back up characters and we've even created a splinter group for them to play when we get tired of the main group. However, I think that the Splinter Group is about to get a TPK this week, so we'll see. Until next time!
Friday, September 7, 2012
Metagaming the Metagame.
As is well documented across the blog, I have a tendency to metagame. I like the metagame when it comes to RPGs. It's pitting the player against the DM, in a battle of wits. There's nothing quite like it. I've mentioned that if a DM gives me something that I'm going to use it, and well, I've taken that around the other side.
I love a feint within a feint, inside a trick. A few weeks ago, I told my current PCs in my Skype game that my friend Megan was designing a bad guy for the sandbox game of D&D we were running. That way they would run into it whenever they wandered into the wrong area. Those who know her are rather wondering what she's stated up.
However, Po started sending her emails just to be an annoyance today. So I thought that a bit of turnabout is fair play. I quicked up some stats for a 10th level thrikreen psion vampire. Then I 'accidentally' hit reply all to the wrong email thread. The email was something along the lines of; 'I fixed the formatting, please send me the psionic powers please, I need it for next week'.
So right now, I'm waiting to see if they take the bait and start stocking up on holy symbols, holy water, garlic, and other anti-vampire things. So during the middle of the game tonight, I'm going to post this blog post. So then they'll know kinda what's really going on. If they bother to check my blog. Evil? Maybe. Did I tell them that there was game info on the blog that they should use? Definitely. Will Megan and I laugh if they go in to face her baddy armed for vampires and encounter something else entirely, yes, yes we will.
A feint within a feint, within a dirty trick, and a tell that they have to pick up on. I'm not a nice DM, but I TOLD them what was going on.
Friday, July 6, 2012
Session Update; July 5th Rage Comic
So had another D&D session, and there's another rage comic session update. I also realize that I am not a very nice DM, since I keep putting my players in situations where they can get quickly over their heads. RIP Lucca!
Thursday, June 28, 2012
Session Update; Rage Comic 6/27/12
This is an adequate and unique session update. I hope the PC that did this more, or at least tells me if he wants attribution. Love the memes, ah, Rage Comics make everything funnier.
Friday, June 8, 2012
RPG Thoughts: On Line Play
Well, I took the jump. Went into online play. It was an interesting experience. I dug out my old homebrew D&D campaign, and we had a blast.
First a bit of background. Due to half my work group getting new jobs, I was at a loss. While I can still play stuff with the remaining, I was at a loss. So while talking to my buddy Consadine, who lives several hundred miles away, we hit on the idea of playing an RPG by Skype.
So I also decided to get a few more people involved. I invited Jim and Po, who had left work. Then I invited Consadine, since it was in part his idea. Finally, I invited Doug, who is probably one of my oldest friends, we've been playing D&D and other games together since 6th grade- he was especially important since he played in Campaigns II, III, and IV of the homebrew campaign.
Now, Jim didn't have a microphone to join via skype. And for the first session Po was having trouble with Skype (which was his own damn fault). So it was just Doug and Consadine for the first session. As first sessions go, it was pretty typical as RPGs go (I'll do up a quick write up, if readers and players want it). What made it unique was the stuff I learned.
1. Skype is excellent for decreasing the amount of tangents. Back in the day, I actually had a 'S.T.A.N.' jar. S.T.A.N. stood for 'Stupid Tangents a Nickel'. We would charge people who broke game flow a nickel. The clink of the nickel dropping into the glass jar was a nice sharp focus (and we occasionally cashed it out for pizza). With Skype though it, there were no tangents. Multiple people talking at once made for mass confusion, every one took turns talking. Even getting up to take the kids to bed or switching laundry didn't cause a big disruption.
2. Rolz.org is an amazing gadget. First off it allowed us to all join a room where we could see each other's rolls, but also had neat scripts for the weird unique type of die rolls I like. You could do roll-over (roll the highest on the die, add in and reroll), or drop the lowest result on a number of die. It was a great tool, and one that I think that everyone would want to use if they are playing online.
3. No more lost character sheets. Since everyone had to send me a copy of the Character Sheet, that means that I will always have one. Especially since they will remain forever inside my gmail, there's little to no danger of losing something.
4. Easy reference. While I didn't use it myself this session, I do plan on using links much more in the future. However, it was great that when I was talking about a primitive trombone, called a sackbut, Consadine was able to get into here. However, given that my PCs are going to be going to going into a territory that is thematically based on The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly, I'll have lots of chances to use those awesome Seirra Club pics of the southwest that are everywhere on the internet.
5. More importantly then with live gaming, it is important that everyone has a chance to catch up with everyone. This kinda harkens back to the first point, since there is really no chance for some talking when someone else is the primary player. This will also teach me to really spread around the love, there's nothing worse then sitting while someone is the center of attention, except perhaps not even being able to talk to your buddy while it is happening.
In all it went really well, but I can't wait until next week to pick up a new PC or two. It went so well that I think that I might expand the invite to a few others. However, that may prove difficult depending on the number of players. We'll see.
First a bit of background. Due to half my work group getting new jobs, I was at a loss. While I can still play stuff with the remaining, I was at a loss. So while talking to my buddy Consadine, who lives several hundred miles away, we hit on the idea of playing an RPG by Skype.
So I also decided to get a few more people involved. I invited Jim and Po, who had left work. Then I invited Consadine, since it was in part his idea. Finally, I invited Doug, who is probably one of my oldest friends, we've been playing D&D and other games together since 6th grade- he was especially important since he played in Campaigns II, III, and IV of the homebrew campaign.
Now, Jim didn't have a microphone to join via skype. And for the first session Po was having trouble with Skype (which was his own damn fault). So it was just Doug and Consadine for the first session. As first sessions go, it was pretty typical as RPGs go (I'll do up a quick write up, if readers and players want it). What made it unique was the stuff I learned.
1. Skype is excellent for decreasing the amount of tangents. Back in the day, I actually had a 'S.T.A.N.' jar. S.T.A.N. stood for 'Stupid Tangents a Nickel'. We would charge people who broke game flow a nickel. The clink of the nickel dropping into the glass jar was a nice sharp focus (and we occasionally cashed it out for pizza). With Skype though it, there were no tangents. Multiple people talking at once made for mass confusion, every one took turns talking. Even getting up to take the kids to bed or switching laundry didn't cause a big disruption.
2. Rolz.org is an amazing gadget. First off it allowed us to all join a room where we could see each other's rolls, but also had neat scripts for the weird unique type of die rolls I like. You could do roll-over (roll the highest on the die, add in and reroll), or drop the lowest result on a number of die. It was a great tool, and one that I think that everyone would want to use if they are playing online.
3. No more lost character sheets. Since everyone had to send me a copy of the Character Sheet, that means that I will always have one. Especially since they will remain forever inside my gmail, there's little to no danger of losing something.
4. Easy reference. While I didn't use it myself this session, I do plan on using links much more in the future. However, it was great that when I was talking about a primitive trombone, called a sackbut, Consadine was able to get into here. However, given that my PCs are going to be going to going into a territory that is thematically based on The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly, I'll have lots of chances to use those awesome Seirra Club pics of the southwest that are everywhere on the internet.
5. More importantly then with live gaming, it is important that everyone has a chance to catch up with everyone. This kinda harkens back to the first point, since there is really no chance for some talking when someone else is the primary player. This will also teach me to really spread around the love, there's nothing worse then sitting while someone is the center of attention, except perhaps not even being able to talk to your buddy while it is happening.
In all it went really well, but I can't wait until next week to pick up a new PC or two. It went so well that I think that I might expand the invite to a few others. However, that may prove difficult depending on the number of players. We'll see.
Saturday, May 26, 2012
RPG Thoughts: D&D Next Playtest Stuff
RPG Thoughts; D&D Next Playtest Stuff
As I have mentioned, I got the D&D Next Playtest stuff. Took me awhile to look through and figure out what I needed to so here's what I wanted;
As I have mentioned, I got the D&D Next Playtest stuff. Took me awhile to look through and figure out what I needed to so here's what I wanted;
"Notwithstanding the foregoing, you may publicly discuss your thoughts regarding the D&D Next Playtest Materials and your playtesting experience."
-From the Playtest Agreement
That's what I needed to hear. That means I get to talk to all of you fine readers about my thoughts on it. Now, make no mistake, I can't stand 4th Edition. I hate it, and I make no bones about it. As I've said, its a fine RPG, but it ain't D&D. D&D Next seems at first glance exactly what they were looking to do, mesh all of the editions into a game that appeals to the majority of players. However, over at the WotC forums, all the 4th Ed players hate it-so I'm liking it for no other reason so far. So let me get a bit more indepth, and these are just my first impressions after reading the materials and just slaughtering my kids in two encounters. I am going to talk about this in depth in a couple different categories.
The Playtest Materials.
1. First off, they were hard to get to. While they were released on Thursday, due to bad servers and demand, I got 404 errors until Friday morning. This seems to have resolved itself, mainly due to demand dying down, but it was a raw deal. When doing an open play test like this, you should expect TONS of demand.
2. The set up. The packet itself was a .zip with a bunch of files in it. Overall it was around 125 pages of material. Me, being, me, I had them printed at Fedex office (AKA Kinkos), though it seems they raised their prices, and it cost me nearly 15 bucks to print it all. I can read rules off the computer screen, but actually running an adventure, I need to have something tangible in front of me.
3. While it was bare bones, it was neatly presented, and the info was relatively easy to find with a little flipping. While I am not too enthused over the way that some of the info was presented, it wasn't a deal breaker.
4. B-2! While it is missing the 'Keep' part of 'The Keep on the Borderlands' it is an old school adventure. That's some classic game there. It makes me happy that it came back. It is just the 'Caves of Chaos' it was a nice nod to those of us who have been playing forever.
The Characters.
1. The playtest packet only contained the four basic classes (Fighter, Wizard, Rogue, and Cleric). However, they did have two different character builds for clerics. Now, there were NO character creation rules, and all the characters were pre-generated. I suspect that there will be a character creation play test at some later point.
2. The character sheets were good...sort of. There were a lot of places that are still behind the curtain, so to speak, so there were things that weren't properly explained. Just going off what is on the sheet, there were some things (like damage modifiers) that I couldn't fathom how they got to. There seems to be a Base Attack Bonus or To Hit Armor Class Zero in there somewhere, but it wasn't specifically called out, or explained.
3. While each sheet described how to level each character, there was no choice in the matter. I think this goes back to this is the 'combat' or 'monster' playtest, not the character one.
4. Hit Points are set instead of random. However, you can take a ten minute break and use your hit dice to regain some hit points. Its a nice change, it rather splits the difference between the no self healing of previous editions and the 'healing surges' of 4th.
5. Cantrips and Orisons (Sp?) are now at will spells. That's awesome, except for the fact that magic missile like it existed in 1-3.X is at will. WTF? Seriously a group that spammed wizards would be nigh-unstoppable. Seriously, if you have four wizards, that's 8 damage minimum guaranteed to hit every round with a max of 20. That's hardcore.
5. Cantrips and Orisons (Sp?) are now at will spells. That's awesome, except for the fact that magic missile like it existed in 1-3.X is at will. WTF? Seriously a group that spammed wizards would be nigh-unstoppable. Seriously, if you have four wizards, that's 8 damage minimum guaranteed to hit every round with a max of 20. That's hardcore.
The Rules.
Before Listing things, I want to talk a bit about the rules. There weren't very many of them, and many of them are basically slight variations of the same things that are in every edition. So I wanted to mainly talk about those things that are either A) Entirely New or B) New to Me.
1. Advantage/Disadvantage. This is one of the simplest yet most effective game mechanics I've ever come across. Basically, you roll 2d20, and if you are at an advantage, you take the higher, and if you are at disadvantage, you take the lower. It's simple, its clean, and its easy for everyone to get after about two tries.
2. Long Rest. If you take a long rest of 8 hours (IE go to sleep), you regain all of your hit points and magic back. Now, this upset some people, but I disagree. While I have not house ruled this, my PCs basically have always practiced this. Go fight, get hurt, return to base, heal. Get up, heal again if necessary, if not at full compliment of spells, take the day off. Get up, go back to fighting with full HP and full magic. This basically takes that extra day or two out of the equation. I have a feeling that many people probably already house-ruled this, OR their PCs were doing the same things mine were. In this edition whenever a PC goes to sleep I'm going to do the Do-do-duedue-DUE from Final Fantasy. There's fluff that basically states that your HP is not actual wounds, but your exhaustion from battle or whatnot, but really it doesn't need to be justified.
3. Themes and Backgrounds. These I believe are being brought from 4th ed, and I actually kind of like it. Background is nice, its basically an in-game back story that gives you an actually crunch thing. Themes though, I'm slightly wary of. Right now, it seems like a nod to 4th where everyone has a set party role (Defender, Striker, er, other stuff). I'm not a fan of the set party role. Without more character stuff, I'm not sure what this is really going to be like.
4. Simplify by diversification. Ability modifiers are MUCH more important in this game. There's no specific saving throws, its all by ability modifier. Then there is no scaling in the Difficulty Class for saves dependent on level. Then skills are all set at a certain rank. Skill rank+ability modifer+d20 is what you roll, that being said, I don't think that the DCs of skill tests are going to get ridiculously high.
5. No More Hand Holding. There's no sliding scale of appropriate encounters like there was in 3.X and 4. There are monsters, and you will not be able to beat them all. Run away. This is very old school. Each Monster has XP, no indication of what threat level they are. Learn quick.
6. Death Threshold. I really like this change. It went from -10 to Con+level. The stabilization rules are also more streamlined, and include a penalty for not succeeding. The flip side of that is that healing magic ignores those negative hit points, which is kinda dumb given how easy it is to get back up to full HP.
6. Death Threshold. I really like this change. It went from -10 to Con+level. The stabilization rules are also more streamlined, and include a penalty for not succeeding. The flip side of that is that healing magic ignores those negative hit points, which is kinda dumb given how easy it is to get back up to full HP.
My Issues.
Again, I want to stress this is a playtest, and there's a bunch I'm missing, but I still think I need to talk about this stuff.
1. Armor As Treasure. There's a ton of armor as treasure in this adventure. Especially like platemail (Room 27, 16). In previous editions it was handled one of two ways. In 1st and 2nd it was clearly spelled out that to use heavy armor like that, it had to be made to order. In third edition it was good for a particular body shape (elf, or dwarf). In this case, which is it? The availability of those heavy armors could be a huge difference in the game, especially since it is better armor then what the PCs have to start with.
2. Where's pick pocket? The Rogue has a 'stealth' skill, but that seems more like being sneaky rather then dipping your hand into someone else's coin purse.
3. The kobolds in the module do 1d4+2 damage with a dagger, but in the bestiary they do 1d4-2 damage with a dagger. Which one is the typo? An argument could be made for either type.
4. Light. The rules for light were simplified down to bright light, shadowy, and dark, the game really does not go into how much of a difference that makes. Shadowy seems to exist as a way to allow Rogues to hide in shadows, but there really aren't any more penalties for it. It says that it makes everything 'lightly obscured' but there is no real definition for what 'lightly obscured' means. Does it mean I can't target something in shadows with magic missile or what? I like only having three light levels, it makes it simpler, but there needs to be some clearer rules for what those light levels mean.
5. Technically, to play this, you MUST sign up for the playtest. This is a pain in my ass. I tried to get my eldest kid signed up to make it all kosher, but to sign up, I would have needed to send in a parental approval thing by snall mail or fax. What? C'mon! Let me sign the damn thing online, especially since I am a member myself! Stupid.
Well, that's all I got so far. I'll probably have more as I go along.
2. Where's pick pocket? The Rogue has a 'stealth' skill, but that seems more like being sneaky rather then dipping your hand into someone else's coin purse.
3. The kobolds in the module do 1d4+2 damage with a dagger, but in the bestiary they do 1d4-2 damage with a dagger. Which one is the typo? An argument could be made for either type.
4. Light. The rules for light were simplified down to bright light, shadowy, and dark, the game really does not go into how much of a difference that makes. Shadowy seems to exist as a way to allow Rogues to hide in shadows, but there really aren't any more penalties for it. It says that it makes everything 'lightly obscured' but there is no real definition for what 'lightly obscured' means. Does it mean I can't target something in shadows with magic missile or what? I like only having three light levels, it makes it simpler, but there needs to be some clearer rules for what those light levels mean.
5. Technically, to play this, you MUST sign up for the playtest. This is a pain in my ass. I tried to get my eldest kid signed up to make it all kosher, but to sign up, I would have needed to send in a parental approval thing by snall mail or fax. What? C'mon! Let me sign the damn thing online, especially since I am a member myself! Stupid.
Well, that's all I got so far. I'll probably have more as I go along.
Thursday, May 17, 2012
RPG Thoughts: Online Gaming
RPG Thoughts; Online Gaming
So my work game group has fallen apart. Jim and Po are moving on, and I for one cannot congratulate them enough. I'll miss them, and to be honest, losing my last two vets is a blow. Being left with just Tom and Megan does not make for great gaming. Two people is a very small group, and we don't have anymore days where we are all together, but the bosses aren't. So no more big games like Mordheim (the boss would frown on us putting up a table when the big bosses could see).
I don't really want to lose this group of gamers. I've lost a lot of groups over the years, and I really don't want to lose this one. So I am going to try and start an online D&D game via Skype. It seems like an easy fit. I can sit there and DM, and they can listen and respond. I've done quite a few things with group chat in Skype, and it will be an interesting thing to run a D&D game. It has a built in file send so that I can send quick maps to people for combat.
Ah, combat, that's the interesting thing. I've found lots of online dice rollers, but none that allow others to see your roll. I know that it is possible, since the old WoD chat games had one. That's a minor concern though. If it comes down to it, we can find other ways of doing rolls.
I am looking forward to returning back to my homebrew campaign. I always found it rewarding. I can't wait to introduce some new players to it. This will be an interesting experiment. Have any of you my faithful readers done anything similar?
So my work game group has fallen apart. Jim and Po are moving on, and I for one cannot congratulate them enough. I'll miss them, and to be honest, losing my last two vets is a blow. Being left with just Tom and Megan does not make for great gaming. Two people is a very small group, and we don't have anymore days where we are all together, but the bosses aren't. So no more big games like Mordheim (the boss would frown on us putting up a table when the big bosses could see).
I don't really want to lose this group of gamers. I've lost a lot of groups over the years, and I really don't want to lose this one. So I am going to try and start an online D&D game via Skype. It seems like an easy fit. I can sit there and DM, and they can listen and respond. I've done quite a few things with group chat in Skype, and it will be an interesting thing to run a D&D game. It has a built in file send so that I can send quick maps to people for combat.
Ah, combat, that's the interesting thing. I've found lots of online dice rollers, but none that allow others to see your roll. I know that it is possible, since the old WoD chat games had one. That's a minor concern though. If it comes down to it, we can find other ways of doing rolls.
I am looking forward to returning back to my homebrew campaign. I always found it rewarding. I can't wait to introduce some new players to it. This will be an interesting experiment. Have any of you my faithful readers done anything similar?
Friday, March 23, 2012
RPG Thoughts: Coming Home
In RPGs all things are cyclic. I find myself going back to the same themes over and over again. The stuff I like doesn't fit everywhere. What I like is weird. There are few games that work, so I keep going over it. There seems to be no way around it.
I think I have to go home.
Way back in 1992-1993 somewhere along there, I created my own gameworld for D&D. Something designed specifically to hold the weird stuff that I like. There's guns, and psychics, and a vaguely steampunk feel . It works, because it was designed from the ground up with all of that in mind. When you just toss that stuff in, it feels wrong and out of place. That's why psionics and Forgotten Realms doesn't really work, it comes off as alien.
Since I created the world, I've used it to run more successful campaigns then any other game world. Three massively successful ones, two that phased out due to real world concerns. The thing is that I keep advancing the timeline, and things change. The actions that PCs take change the world. I love that about it. PCs become important NPCs in future campaigns. It's the best of all worlds.
My main problem is how much actual background info is missing. My mind ain't as sharp as it used to be. I remember characters, and a vague map. City names, and politics are all gone. It's sad. I remember the rules clear as day. That's the easy part. I had to spend so much time on the rules, getting the balance right that I'll probably never forget them. Besides the capital city (Crynin), the rest of it is gone. I'll probably search through all my old papers for any scrap of info, and try to dreg my friends minds, see what they remember.
What I am thinking of though, is finally going ahead and making a PDF of the game. I am tempted to actually go ahead and do up a full game guide and maybe get it professionally printed or self published so that I have a nice hardback of it. Something to remember from. I did a quick logo. Let me know what you think.
I think I have to go home.
Way back in 1992-1993 somewhere along there, I created my own gameworld for D&D. Something designed specifically to hold the weird stuff that I like. There's guns, and psychics, and a vaguely steampunk feel . It works, because it was designed from the ground up with all of that in mind. When you just toss that stuff in, it feels wrong and out of place. That's why psionics and Forgotten Realms doesn't really work, it comes off as alien.
Since I created the world, I've used it to run more successful campaigns then any other game world. Three massively successful ones, two that phased out due to real world concerns. The thing is that I keep advancing the timeline, and things change. The actions that PCs take change the world. I love that about it. PCs become important NPCs in future campaigns. It's the best of all worlds.
My main problem is how much actual background info is missing. My mind ain't as sharp as it used to be. I remember characters, and a vague map. City names, and politics are all gone. It's sad. I remember the rules clear as day. That's the easy part. I had to spend so much time on the rules, getting the balance right that I'll probably never forget them. Besides the capital city (Crynin), the rest of it is gone. I'll probably search through all my old papers for any scrap of info, and try to dreg my friends minds, see what they remember.
What I am thinking of though, is finally going ahead and making a PDF of the game. I am tempted to actually go ahead and do up a full game guide and maybe get it professionally printed or self published so that I have a nice hardback of it. Something to remember from. I did a quick logo. Let me know what you think.
Saturday, March 10, 2012
Philosophy and Games: SVC II
As per always, I do not always put what I am trying to say in the clearest of terms. Occasionally anger does that to me. Thanks to the responses, I've had some more stuff to chew on. I'll try to work it out a bit better this time. First acknowledgements-
@Matt: Excellent points, enjoyed the blog, thought I'd stick around. Your bit about the beddernaut is the exact type of thing that I love. That's what I want to see in every campaign, if not every session.
@Mark: The thing is the swimming example is both excellent and terrible. I might know how to swim (freestyle, backstroke, doggystyle, missionary...wait a second...), and my character does not. The point is that my character should at least be able to TRY to swim. There may be a massive penalty, but the character should be able to try it.
The point I was trying to make, and I did so rather poorly is that there is a difference between the rules and the background. Hell with it, I'm just going full out wargamer here, Crunch and Fluff.
Crunch is hard rules. I love me some hard rules. The thing is though, hard rules are not the be-all end-all in a RPG. The thing is that you cannot be married to the rules in a RPG.
Fluff is background, and story, and character stuff. This is far more important then hard rules in an RPG. In a wargame, the only reason you need to kill something is that it belongs to the other guy. Fluff is extra, its superfluous. An RPG without fluff is nothing more then a small scale combat system that doesn't really work out.
The problem is where do you divide the two? That's where I have the problem most of the time. In a wargame, I want rules that are hard and fast with no wiggle room. In a RPG, I want lots of wiggle room. The thing is that I put the emphasis in both as GAME. They are both doing the same thing (beat the bad guys!) but in very different ways.
A wargame is a tactical experience, with very broad strokes that are (supposed to be) very clear cut.
An RPG is a romantic experience, painted in loving detail with rules that are designed to allow the most freedom.
They are different, but I have a massive background in both. Love me the RPG, love me the wargame. There's a bleed over from one to another, though. That's where I draw the line. I play RPGs like wargames, and wargames like RPGs.
The thing that will always be a problem is the metagame. The metagame in wargame is straight forward, know your rules, know your opponent, seek the loopholes, spam effective units, use the math to your advantage, and knowledge is power. In an RPG it is much more evasive, character knowledge vs. player knowledge, rules vs. story, player's play style vs. GM's play style.
That's where I get into trouble. I will always use the straight forward wargame metagame, every time. That's what gets me into trouble, and creates needlessly long responses that require much clarification. Allow me to elaborate for my RPG playing friends, then counter point with an explanation for my wargaming buddies (huzzah for synonyms).
The Wargamer's Metagame:
Know Your Rules- This is an absolute must. If you don't know the rules, you will not have a great play experience. Granted your friend teaching you the game will not take advantage of your lack of rules knowledge, but most people are not going to point out that you are not including your all your advantages. Its not in their best interest for them to do so. It's an oppositional system, they all are.
Know Your Opponent- If you know someone's playing style, then you are one step closer to winning. If you know they tend to press an advantage too far, you can trick them into making an error. This can win you games.
Seek the Loopholes: A loophole in the rules is an advantage. It might be something as simple as an equipment choice that no one else takes, to a specific odd build that normally isn't allowed, but is under certain conditions. Your opponent will not expect these, and that is an advantage to be pressed. Oddly enough, I learned this lesson in an RPG from another character's paladin (Jean-Luc Stormslayer, I'm looking squarely at you!).
Spam Effective Units- If one thing beats down your opponent, then two is better. Six is bestest. Why take something that dies easily? More killing for better points.
Use Math to your Advantage- This is key. Crunch the numbers before you sit down to play a game. Figure out what is cheapest and most effective for the game you are playing. It might be some simple mathhammering, or it might be as complex as figuring out the dollar cost to buy the unit compared to how many points you get for it to how many points it kills on average.
Knowledge is Power- Durrrr. Seriously, if I know everything about the rules for my army, the rules for your army, and I can figure out what units you always leave in reserve, then I can make better choices which means that I win more games.
The RPG Metagame:
Character Knowledge vs. Player Knowledge- To be honest, this one is one that I've always struggled with. Without sitting down and RPing out ever waking second of character's life there is no way to know what that character knows. I generally assume if its in a rulebook, your character knows it. Of course, that might be wrong. I've had numerous PCs try to work out the secret of gunpowder (or in one notable game where there was gunpowder-nitroglycerin.)
Rules vs. Story- How far do you let the rules go? Do you forbid actions due to the rules, or allow them due to the story? Personally, I like the Rule of Cool, if it is awesome, I'll allow it.
Player's Play Style vs. GM's Play Style- This is another loaded issue. In each game I play, I take my player's styles into account. If I am a player, I have to adjust my way of playing to the GM that I am playing with. Everyone is a bit different. My buddy Po is a take no prisoners type of DM with a nasty streak, whereas my friend Warlock is a story telling sandbox DM, my oldest friend Doug is a start where you will lets see where it ends up type of DM, my other buddy Zack is a very philospohical GM for story teller. Each type of game I play with them I play very differently. When I am being the DM/GM/ST what have you, I know that in my normal game groups that Tom will ineptly play a glass cannon who can barely remember the rules-but loves making things go boom, Megan will play an odd character with lots of personality, and Po will find every loop hole in the game to make a killing machine (if I let him). So I have to play a very different type of game that allows each one of them to enjoy the game.
Now, I probably muddied up the waters a bit with this explanation. Let me highlight some of the problems that result from my particular stances when it comes to RPGs.
1. Character Knowledge vs. Player Knowledge- I fucking hate this one. Seriously, the most frustrated I ever was in an RPG was because of this. I was playing with a new DM in a pre-made dungeon. The way to open a door was to light some torches for the eight schools of magic in a certain order. Due to playing for years, I knew exactly what we had to do. I knew the schools of magic. I told the rest of the gang the key to it, and the DM told me that my character (a thief) would not have that information. Since I had said it, but no one could act on it, we got stuck. No further. Never went back to that game. I don't want to be stopped from sharing. If you want to give another character credit for it, fine, but I figured it out, even if my character didn't. That's one thing that Mark had mentioned. If I am playing a dumbass with a Int score of 3, it shouldn't effect our ability to work the game. I've had DM's that have wanted me to roll to see if my character could figure out what I did. That's a game breaker.
2.Rules vs Story- The last sentence leads to this one. Stats are only part of a character, part of the story. My character's lack of knowledge should not penalize me. Like I said, if you want to give credit to the wizard instead of the barbarian, fine. However, the rules are a framework to give an outline to the story. I never want to be told that I cannot do something unless it is physically impossible for my character to do it. I might not succeed, but I should be able to try.
3. Know Your Rules- Damn straight. I expect people to have a grasp of the rules. I expect them to have some basic working knowledge of what they can do. I give leeway to the neophytes, but vets I expect more. Use those rules to build the character you want to play. Even Bognar Bloodaxe, the most carefully constructed killing machine I ever had the pleasure of killing was built and crafted from rules to help create a character.
4. Knowledge is Power- At the end of the night, when I come home my wife says; 'Did you have a good timing playing your game tonight?'. She doesn't say; 'Did you have a rewarding collaborative storytelling experience?'. Roleplaying Games are games. There are no winners and losers. Bullshit. There is a loser, The DM. The DM should lose. That's the thing. The DM provides a framework and a reason to go out and do something, but it's a bit of a newspeak double-talk. This is the real power knowledge that some people forget. Do I like building out that story? Hells yes. The point is that it is a game. If someone leaves me a way to get more knowledge, I will use that. It might be as simple as reading the campaign guide, or reading the novels associated with the world. There are times though when shear buffonary leads me to more knowledge. You leave a map sitting IN PLAIN SIGHT. I'm going to use that knowledge. If you didn't want me to know that, then you wouldn't have left it out. I'm not going to go digging through your bag, but if you leave it out on the table, well, that's your problem.
5. Know Your Opponent- This is one that I take I abuse all the time. It's the whole Player Style vs. DM style thing, but worse. I can do it, I just can't do it on the fly. For instance, Warlock, my old HS DM ran something recently, and I updated a character and went to town. We ended up defeating something that we really weren't supposed to. Whoops. I wasn't thinking about his story telling sandbox and building an alliance or getting information, I was thinking about his tendency to make things up on the fly and short changing his villains. I knew that if we pressed on, we'd kill it, easily. We probably ended up loosing some valuable information from that encounter, but eh, we killed it dead.
The thing is that I like to do things that are fun, for me. I work that into every game I play. In a RPG the crunch is built to support the fluff, and in a wargame, the fluff is built to support the crunch. Its a dichotomy of games. The thing is in the RPG I want to do stuff that isn't explicitly covered in the crunch. That's why I'm playing an RPG rather then a wargame. Well, I think I've elaborated enough, and I got some new spray paint to check out. Terrain on Monday!
@Matt: Excellent points, enjoyed the blog, thought I'd stick around. Your bit about the beddernaut is the exact type of thing that I love. That's what I want to see in every campaign, if not every session.
@Mark: The thing is the swimming example is both excellent and terrible. I might know how to swim (freestyle, backstroke, doggystyle, missionary...wait a second...), and my character does not. The point is that my character should at least be able to TRY to swim. There may be a massive penalty, but the character should be able to try it.
The point I was trying to make, and I did so rather poorly is that there is a difference between the rules and the background. Hell with it, I'm just going full out wargamer here, Crunch and Fluff.
Crunch is hard rules. I love me some hard rules. The thing is though, hard rules are not the be-all end-all in a RPG. The thing is that you cannot be married to the rules in a RPG.
Fluff is background, and story, and character stuff. This is far more important then hard rules in an RPG. In a wargame, the only reason you need to kill something is that it belongs to the other guy. Fluff is extra, its superfluous. An RPG without fluff is nothing more then a small scale combat system that doesn't really work out.
The problem is where do you divide the two? That's where I have the problem most of the time. In a wargame, I want rules that are hard and fast with no wiggle room. In a RPG, I want lots of wiggle room. The thing is that I put the emphasis in both as GAME. They are both doing the same thing (beat the bad guys!) but in very different ways.
A wargame is a tactical experience, with very broad strokes that are (supposed to be) very clear cut.
An RPG is a romantic experience, painted in loving detail with rules that are designed to allow the most freedom.
They are different, but I have a massive background in both. Love me the RPG, love me the wargame. There's a bleed over from one to another, though. That's where I draw the line. I play RPGs like wargames, and wargames like RPGs.
The thing that will always be a problem is the metagame. The metagame in wargame is straight forward, know your rules, know your opponent, seek the loopholes, spam effective units, use the math to your advantage, and knowledge is power. In an RPG it is much more evasive, character knowledge vs. player knowledge, rules vs. story, player's play style vs. GM's play style.
That's where I get into trouble. I will always use the straight forward wargame metagame, every time. That's what gets me into trouble, and creates needlessly long responses that require much clarification. Allow me to elaborate for my RPG playing friends, then counter point with an explanation for my wargaming buddies (huzzah for synonyms).
The Wargamer's Metagame:
Know Your Rules- This is an absolute must. If you don't know the rules, you will not have a great play experience. Granted your friend teaching you the game will not take advantage of your lack of rules knowledge, but most people are not going to point out that you are not including your all your advantages. Its not in their best interest for them to do so. It's an oppositional system, they all are.
Know Your Opponent- If you know someone's playing style, then you are one step closer to winning. If you know they tend to press an advantage too far, you can trick them into making an error. This can win you games.
Seek the Loopholes: A loophole in the rules is an advantage. It might be something as simple as an equipment choice that no one else takes, to a specific odd build that normally isn't allowed, but is under certain conditions. Your opponent will not expect these, and that is an advantage to be pressed. Oddly enough, I learned this lesson in an RPG from another character's paladin (Jean-Luc Stormslayer, I'm looking squarely at you!).
Spam Effective Units- If one thing beats down your opponent, then two is better. Six is bestest. Why take something that dies easily? More killing for better points.
Use Math to your Advantage- This is key. Crunch the numbers before you sit down to play a game. Figure out what is cheapest and most effective for the game you are playing. It might be some simple mathhammering, or it might be as complex as figuring out the dollar cost to buy the unit compared to how many points you get for it to how many points it kills on average.
Knowledge is Power- Durrrr. Seriously, if I know everything about the rules for my army, the rules for your army, and I can figure out what units you always leave in reserve, then I can make better choices which means that I win more games.
The RPG Metagame:
Character Knowledge vs. Player Knowledge- To be honest, this one is one that I've always struggled with. Without sitting down and RPing out ever waking second of character's life there is no way to know what that character knows. I generally assume if its in a rulebook, your character knows it. Of course, that might be wrong. I've had numerous PCs try to work out the secret of gunpowder (or in one notable game where there was gunpowder-nitroglycerin.)
Rules vs. Story- How far do you let the rules go? Do you forbid actions due to the rules, or allow them due to the story? Personally, I like the Rule of Cool, if it is awesome, I'll allow it.
Player's Play Style vs. GM's Play Style- This is another loaded issue. In each game I play, I take my player's styles into account. If I am a player, I have to adjust my way of playing to the GM that I am playing with. Everyone is a bit different. My buddy Po is a take no prisoners type of DM with a nasty streak, whereas my friend Warlock is a story telling sandbox DM, my oldest friend Doug is a start where you will lets see where it ends up type of DM, my other buddy Zack is a very philospohical GM for story teller. Each type of game I play with them I play very differently. When I am being the DM/GM/ST what have you, I know that in my normal game groups that Tom will ineptly play a glass cannon who can barely remember the rules-but loves making things go boom, Megan will play an odd character with lots of personality, and Po will find every loop hole in the game to make a killing machine (if I let him). So I have to play a very different type of game that allows each one of them to enjoy the game.
Now, I probably muddied up the waters a bit with this explanation. Let me highlight some of the problems that result from my particular stances when it comes to RPGs.
1. Character Knowledge vs. Player Knowledge- I fucking hate this one. Seriously, the most frustrated I ever was in an RPG was because of this. I was playing with a new DM in a pre-made dungeon. The way to open a door was to light some torches for the eight schools of magic in a certain order. Due to playing for years, I knew exactly what we had to do. I knew the schools of magic. I told the rest of the gang the key to it, and the DM told me that my character (a thief) would not have that information. Since I had said it, but no one could act on it, we got stuck. No further. Never went back to that game. I don't want to be stopped from sharing. If you want to give another character credit for it, fine, but I figured it out, even if my character didn't. That's one thing that Mark had mentioned. If I am playing a dumbass with a Int score of 3, it shouldn't effect our ability to work the game. I've had DM's that have wanted me to roll to see if my character could figure out what I did. That's a game breaker.
2.Rules vs Story- The last sentence leads to this one. Stats are only part of a character, part of the story. My character's lack of knowledge should not penalize me. Like I said, if you want to give credit to the wizard instead of the barbarian, fine. However, the rules are a framework to give an outline to the story. I never want to be told that I cannot do something unless it is physically impossible for my character to do it. I might not succeed, but I should be able to try.
3. Know Your Rules- Damn straight. I expect people to have a grasp of the rules. I expect them to have some basic working knowledge of what they can do. I give leeway to the neophytes, but vets I expect more. Use those rules to build the character you want to play. Even Bognar Bloodaxe, the most carefully constructed killing machine I ever had the pleasure of killing was built and crafted from rules to help create a character.
4. Knowledge is Power- At the end of the night, when I come home my wife says; 'Did you have a good timing playing your game tonight?'. She doesn't say; 'Did you have a rewarding collaborative storytelling experience?'. Roleplaying Games are games. There are no winners and losers. Bullshit. There is a loser, The DM. The DM should lose. That's the thing. The DM provides a framework and a reason to go out and do something, but it's a bit of a newspeak double-talk. This is the real power knowledge that some people forget. Do I like building out that story? Hells yes. The point is that it is a game. If someone leaves me a way to get more knowledge, I will use that. It might be as simple as reading the campaign guide, or reading the novels associated with the world. There are times though when shear buffonary leads me to more knowledge. You leave a map sitting IN PLAIN SIGHT. I'm going to use that knowledge. If you didn't want me to know that, then you wouldn't have left it out. I'm not going to go digging through your bag, but if you leave it out on the table, well, that's your problem.
5. Know Your Opponent- This is one that I take I abuse all the time. It's the whole Player Style vs. DM style thing, but worse. I can do it, I just can't do it on the fly. For instance, Warlock, my old HS DM ran something recently, and I updated a character and went to town. We ended up defeating something that we really weren't supposed to. Whoops. I wasn't thinking about his story telling sandbox and building an alliance or getting information, I was thinking about his tendency to make things up on the fly and short changing his villains. I knew that if we pressed on, we'd kill it, easily. We probably ended up loosing some valuable information from that encounter, but eh, we killed it dead.
The thing is that I like to do things that are fun, for me. I work that into every game I play. In a RPG the crunch is built to support the fluff, and in a wargame, the fluff is built to support the crunch. Its a dichotomy of games. The thing is in the RPG I want to do stuff that isn't explicitly covered in the crunch. That's why I'm playing an RPG rather then a wargame. Well, I think I've elaborated enough, and I got some new spray paint to check out. Terrain on Monday!
Wednesday, January 11, 2012
Industry Notes: Joining the Mob of 5th Edition Blog Posts!
Well, it seems the vast majority of people have already started blogging about 5th edition of D&D, and how it is a make it or break it edition. This might be true. The thing is I expected a lot of vitriol. That doesn't seem to be happening. Maybe its because I don't read anything 4th ed, or maybe there is just a lot of hope in the air. Lots of people are seeming to have their own opinions on what 5th needs to be.
Right now, I've signed up for the playtest, and hopefully I'll be selected. If I am, I'll probably have to get an honest to god group together. Not kids, not a group for playing at work, but a real 'Let's get together and play group'.
The thing is that I need more information. Chances are the only thing that is currently on the table is; Roll a d20 to hit and maybe a class/level system. Those are the only two things that I can think of that have been in every edition. There's a simple elegance to that, though. At the end of the day though, I need more crunch. The rules cannot be evaluated until they've been seen. The thing is that everyone and their RPG playing mother is talking about is what kind of direction that 5th Edition needs to go in.
The majority of the talk is mainly about branding, product distribution, and other business like things. Those decisions won't come any time soon. They won't come until much later, and while I really like what some people are talking about, I have no idea if the development team will actually look at them. I am probably hindered in my views since I don't hang out at WOTC or read any 4th ed stuff.
What I am more interested in is the crunch. The development team has been silent about the crunch. There's no rules. There's nothing beyond an announcement. So I want to talk about what I think will probably be the sacrosanct, the stuff that won't go away.
1. Roll a d20. Let's face it 3.X has been called the d20 system for a reason. The D20 is as iconic to D&D as the unique shape of an American Football is to the NFL. You walk around with a D20 and everyone knows that you play RPGs and exactly which RPG you play.
2. Classes. I don't think that the class system will go away. What classes will there be? That's a great question, but I think that at the very least there will be the Four Archetypes- Warrior, Wizard, Priest, and Thief. Change the name, change the edition, they are the same four dudes. Even the other classes are more or less of the others blended together for a different combo (for example;Paladin= Warrior Priest).
3. Races. To be honest, there's quite a bit open when it comes to races. There are only three true races. Humans, elfs, and dwarfs. Hobbits, Gnomes, Tieflings, and Dragonborn (WTF?) are all optional. Some of them are downright silly (Dragonborn), but beyond the HED anything else is strictly optional.
4. Armor Class will still be Ascending instead of Descending. This is one of the stupidest arguments I've ever come across. People will blast me and state that I'm in favor of addition over subtraction, or some other such non-sense. At this point we have had two editions of Descending, and two of Ascending. I think that for sheer ease it will stay ascending. Especially since there was no cap on the ascending AC. Seriously, Neg Ten as the best? The only way that I could see Descending making a comeback is if ALL armor class was negative, and it was then a modifier to your roll. It would still be silly.
5 Signature Monsters will remain the signature monsters. Illithids, Beholders, Drow, and chromatic dragons will be part and parcel of the game. They are D&D- without them, it just isn't the same. Chances are given the way that the past few 'starter' sets have gone, it will be an abandoned mine with goblins, kobolds, and a few orcs with a hatchling chromatic dragon in charge. That's probably what the initial rules will contain.
Now, that's the only things that I will go to the bat with. I think those are going to be the things that remain. Now, if I were to speculate as to what was POSSIBLY going to be in 5th Edition, I think that the following will be there.
1. The Durations of 4th Ed. To be honest, this was about the only thing I liked about 4th Ed. The duration of stuff was through a single encounter, instant, day long, or permanent. That made sense. How often did you really need a particular spell to last beyond the encounter? Not often, hell, most of the time we ended a spell because the combat had ended. Not only that, but the minutes long durations of some spells were just dumb. Combat rarely lasts multiple minutes.
2. Miniatures. This is too big of a revenue stream to ignore. I'm sorry, but cheap plastic minis are here to stay. However, I do think that they will stop the random blister type thing, and go with a more established grouping.
3. Feats/Powers, these have now become part and parcel of the game. They are expected as the 'what cool thing can my character do?' part of the game. I do think that they will work a bit differently then in 3.X or 4th, how, I'm not sure, but they will be different.
4. The class/race min/max for a role in the group. This is something that had always kinda been around, but has been really reinforced by games like WoW. This was really apparent in 4th ed, and I think that it is here to stay (unfortunately). The fact that they are 'strikers, leaders, and artillery' makes them more like the HQ, Elite, and Heavy support of WH40K then a RPG. Should a group work together? Of course, but it should not be game breaking if everyone in the group decided to play a rogue.
5. Monster Builds. This started at the end of 3.5 and continued onto 4th, and it is something that I liked a lot. Instead of just having the 'basic' monster of the MM, there was a the footsoldier, the sergeant type, the chieftain type, and the shaman type. There was always a mention of something like that, for instance in 2nd it would be written as 'For evey 10 (X) encountered, one will have 3HD'. So instead of us having to do the brain work to figure out the stats for something like that, it was already provided to us. This made plug and play easier, since not everything had to be done over and over again.
6. Epic level gaming. Since it started with some real rules in 2nd Edition, epic level play has become more and more common. I don't think it will be going anywhere. As for it being in the main book like in 4th Ed, that I cannot say, but there will be something for it.
So those are the things that I think are very likely to appear in 5th Ed, but there's one last category that I want to talk about, the stuff that I think definitely will NOT appear in the new game.
1. Flumphs.
2. Card based system. Saga was great for Marvel Super Heroes, but it failed utterly for DragonLance the 5th age.
3. Ability/skill/non-weapon proficiency checks where you have to roll UNDER your ability score. Those were just dumb and made the game weird. Works amazingly well for Alternity, not so much for D&D.
4. Adult Content rules. FATAL, anyone?
5. Some old school cash. I mean it. Some of the other 'not appearing' were jokes, but this one is totally serious. There's tons of people out there who already have lots of gaming material. Anyone who tells you that you must have more then the core three to play is lying. You can play a game with the core three infinitely. There are many of us out there who having been merrily playing whatever edition that they feel comfortable with for years, and have not and will not buy any more books. In my own case, unless they come out with the books for an affordable price around my birthday, I probably won't be buying them. Will I read them? Of course, but I'm probably not going to plunk down any hard earned money for them. I'm not the only one. The problem with books is that they are good forever as long as they are well taken care of. For many of us, there's just no need for them. It's not like many other games where you need the latest and the greatest rules to stay competitive (cough-40K-cough).
6. Greyhawk. I'm sorry to see this happen. Greyhawk was a fantastic world, one that I never played, or even delved that hard into, but I liked the concept of the 'Original D&D World'. I liked that, and I'm sorry to see it go away. 5th might revisit some of the old campaign settings, but I doubt that GH will be one of them.
Right now, I've signed up for the playtest, and hopefully I'll be selected. If I am, I'll probably have to get an honest to god group together. Not kids, not a group for playing at work, but a real 'Let's get together and play group'.
The thing is that I need more information. Chances are the only thing that is currently on the table is; Roll a d20 to hit and maybe a class/level system. Those are the only two things that I can think of that have been in every edition. There's a simple elegance to that, though. At the end of the day though, I need more crunch. The rules cannot be evaluated until they've been seen. The thing is that everyone and their RPG playing mother is talking about is what kind of direction that 5th Edition needs to go in.
The majority of the talk is mainly about branding, product distribution, and other business like things. Those decisions won't come any time soon. They won't come until much later, and while I really like what some people are talking about, I have no idea if the development team will actually look at them. I am probably hindered in my views since I don't hang out at WOTC or read any 4th ed stuff.
What I am more interested in is the crunch. The development team has been silent about the crunch. There's no rules. There's nothing beyond an announcement. So I want to talk about what I think will probably be the sacrosanct, the stuff that won't go away.
1. Roll a d20. Let's face it 3.X has been called the d20 system for a reason. The D20 is as iconic to D&D as the unique shape of an American Football is to the NFL. You walk around with a D20 and everyone knows that you play RPGs and exactly which RPG you play.
2. Classes. I don't think that the class system will go away. What classes will there be? That's a great question, but I think that at the very least there will be the Four Archetypes- Warrior, Wizard, Priest, and Thief. Change the name, change the edition, they are the same four dudes. Even the other classes are more or less of the others blended together for a different combo (for example;Paladin= Warrior Priest).
3. Races. To be honest, there's quite a bit open when it comes to races. There are only three true races. Humans, elfs, and dwarfs. Hobbits, Gnomes, Tieflings, and Dragonborn (WTF?) are all optional. Some of them are downright silly (Dragonborn), but beyond the HED anything else is strictly optional.
4. Armor Class will still be Ascending instead of Descending. This is one of the stupidest arguments I've ever come across. People will blast me and state that I'm in favor of addition over subtraction, or some other such non-sense. At this point we have had two editions of Descending, and two of Ascending. I think that for sheer ease it will stay ascending. Especially since there was no cap on the ascending AC. Seriously, Neg Ten as the best? The only way that I could see Descending making a comeback is if ALL armor class was negative, and it was then a modifier to your roll. It would still be silly.
5 Signature Monsters will remain the signature monsters. Illithids, Beholders, Drow, and chromatic dragons will be part and parcel of the game. They are D&D- without them, it just isn't the same. Chances are given the way that the past few 'starter' sets have gone, it will be an abandoned mine with goblins, kobolds, and a few orcs with a hatchling chromatic dragon in charge. That's probably what the initial rules will contain.
Now, that's the only things that I will go to the bat with. I think those are going to be the things that remain. Now, if I were to speculate as to what was POSSIBLY going to be in 5th Edition, I think that the following will be there.
1. The Durations of 4th Ed. To be honest, this was about the only thing I liked about 4th Ed. The duration of stuff was through a single encounter, instant, day long, or permanent. That made sense. How often did you really need a particular spell to last beyond the encounter? Not often, hell, most of the time we ended a spell because the combat had ended. Not only that, but the minutes long durations of some spells were just dumb. Combat rarely lasts multiple minutes.
2. Miniatures. This is too big of a revenue stream to ignore. I'm sorry, but cheap plastic minis are here to stay. However, I do think that they will stop the random blister type thing, and go with a more established grouping.
3. Feats/Powers, these have now become part and parcel of the game. They are expected as the 'what cool thing can my character do?' part of the game. I do think that they will work a bit differently then in 3.X or 4th, how, I'm not sure, but they will be different.
4. The class/race min/max for a role in the group. This is something that had always kinda been around, but has been really reinforced by games like WoW. This was really apparent in 4th ed, and I think that it is here to stay (unfortunately). The fact that they are 'strikers, leaders, and artillery' makes them more like the HQ, Elite, and Heavy support of WH40K then a RPG. Should a group work together? Of course, but it should not be game breaking if everyone in the group decided to play a rogue.
5. Monster Builds. This started at the end of 3.5 and continued onto 4th, and it is something that I liked a lot. Instead of just having the 'basic' monster of the MM, there was a the footsoldier, the sergeant type, the chieftain type, and the shaman type. There was always a mention of something like that, for instance in 2nd it would be written as 'For evey 10 (X) encountered, one will have 3HD'. So instead of us having to do the brain work to figure out the stats for something like that, it was already provided to us. This made plug and play easier, since not everything had to be done over and over again.
6. Epic level gaming. Since it started with some real rules in 2nd Edition, epic level play has become more and more common. I don't think it will be going anywhere. As for it being in the main book like in 4th Ed, that I cannot say, but there will be something for it.
So those are the things that I think are very likely to appear in 5th Ed, but there's one last category that I want to talk about, the stuff that I think definitely will NOT appear in the new game.
1. Flumphs.
2. Card based system. Saga was great for Marvel Super Heroes, but it failed utterly for DragonLance the 5th age.
3. Ability/skill/non-weapon proficiency checks where you have to roll UNDER your ability score. Those were just dumb and made the game weird. Works amazingly well for Alternity, not so much for D&D.
4. Adult Content rules. FATAL, anyone?
5. Some old school cash. I mean it. Some of the other 'not appearing' were jokes, but this one is totally serious. There's tons of people out there who already have lots of gaming material. Anyone who tells you that you must have more then the core three to play is lying. You can play a game with the core three infinitely. There are many of us out there who having been merrily playing whatever edition that they feel comfortable with for years, and have not and will not buy any more books. In my own case, unless they come out with the books for an affordable price around my birthday, I probably won't be buying them. Will I read them? Of course, but I'm probably not going to plunk down any hard earned money for them. I'm not the only one. The problem with books is that they are good forever as long as they are well taken care of. For many of us, there's just no need for them. It's not like many other games where you need the latest and the greatest rules to stay competitive (cough-40K-cough).
6. Greyhawk. I'm sorry to see this happen. Greyhawk was a fantastic world, one that I never played, or even delved that hard into, but I liked the concept of the 'Original D&D World'. I liked that, and I'm sorry to see it go away. 5th might revisit some of the old campaign settings, but I doubt that GH will be one of them.
Saturday, December 31, 2011
RPG Thoughts: Maths Vs. Rule of Cool
Apparently someone has noticed that I've been placing random labels in my blog posts. Excellent. My plan to conquer the internet is working. Slowly but surely. Muahahaha!
Anyway, I have a topic, Maths vs. The Rule of Cool. For me, this is something that I take very seriously. I love tinkering with systems and rules to get the most bang for my buck. I spent all of last week looking over spell dimensions for Wall of Stone, Stone Shape, and Animate Object to figure out something. I use the Math inherent in the system to do something cool. One of these days, I'm going to post up my plans for those spells. That's me.
My kids on the other hand, are totally different ball of wax. They don't care so much for the math. They want to do cool things, and they want to have cool things happen in their games. That's the great thing about new gamers, they just want to do the awesome thing, not necessarily the right thing in the situation.
So a bit of a campaign update. I had locked them up in a dungeon that they managed to escape from. Now, since the Spelljammer campaign has landed in Forgotten Realms, there were certain things that I wanted to include to make a signature FR adventure.
1. An extraordinarily high level NPC.
2. Drow and the underdark.
3. Zhents.
Now, I had already decided that the people who had captured them were Drow, and one of their fellow prisoners was Drizzt Do'urden. Haven't worked in the Zhents yet. Now, the kids were totally unimpressed with the name drop. Which took me by surprise, but totally shouldn't have, since they haven't read the hundreds of novels that have him as a main character.
So, I missed out on the Rule of Cool for them. My normal group would have been overjoyed. I had an ace up my sleeve though. Looking through the D20srd, I found something neat, an Ettin Skeleton. A two headed skeleton was cool, but not cool enough. Here's where I went against my natural inclination to make a more memorable session.
To make the two-headed skeleton cooler, I decided to extend the rib cage down to the hip bones, with a cage door. Inside the 'rib cage', I put a bunch of dwarves. So the Ettin skelly would open the door, and then throw on of it's captives at the kids. Literal dwarf tossing. It was funny in a horrible un-politically correct way.
Technically, an Ettin Skeleton is a Large creature, and a dwarf is a Medium creature. At best a Large creature could fit ONE dwarf in its rib cage. However, Rule of Cool trumped rules in this one case. It was fun, the kids enjoyed killing it slowly while the NPC Drizzt killed off the other one that was there just for him.
The whole time they kept doing cool stuff. The halfling tried to use a grappling hook to scale the thing, and the elf got grabbed and tossed at his friend. Would this have happened with strict rules intrpretation? Probably not. Would the kids have had as many laughs with it? No, most likely not.
Anyway, I have a topic, Maths vs. The Rule of Cool. For me, this is something that I take very seriously. I love tinkering with systems and rules to get the most bang for my buck. I spent all of last week looking over spell dimensions for Wall of Stone, Stone Shape, and Animate Object to figure out something. I use the Math inherent in the system to do something cool. One of these days, I'm going to post up my plans for those spells. That's me.
My kids on the other hand, are totally different ball of wax. They don't care so much for the math. They want to do cool things, and they want to have cool things happen in their games. That's the great thing about new gamers, they just want to do the awesome thing, not necessarily the right thing in the situation.
So a bit of a campaign update. I had locked them up in a dungeon that they managed to escape from. Now, since the Spelljammer campaign has landed in Forgotten Realms, there were certain things that I wanted to include to make a signature FR adventure.
1. An extraordinarily high level NPC.
2. Drow and the underdark.
3. Zhents.
Now, I had already decided that the people who had captured them were Drow, and one of their fellow prisoners was Drizzt Do'urden. Haven't worked in the Zhents yet. Now, the kids were totally unimpressed with the name drop. Which took me by surprise, but totally shouldn't have, since they haven't read the hundreds of novels that have him as a main character.
So, I missed out on the Rule of Cool for them. My normal group would have been overjoyed. I had an ace up my sleeve though. Looking through the D20srd, I found something neat, an Ettin Skeleton. A two headed skeleton was cool, but not cool enough. Here's where I went against my natural inclination to make a more memorable session.
To make the two-headed skeleton cooler, I decided to extend the rib cage down to the hip bones, with a cage door. Inside the 'rib cage', I put a bunch of dwarves. So the Ettin skelly would open the door, and then throw on of it's captives at the kids. Literal dwarf tossing. It was funny in a horrible un-politically correct way.
Technically, an Ettin Skeleton is a Large creature, and a dwarf is a Medium creature. At best a Large creature could fit ONE dwarf in its rib cage. However, Rule of Cool trumped rules in this one case. It was fun, the kids enjoyed killing it slowly while the NPC Drizzt killed off the other one that was there just for him.
The whole time they kept doing cool stuff. The halfling tried to use a grappling hook to scale the thing, and the elf got grabbed and tossed at his friend. Would this have happened with strict rules intrpretation? Probably not. Would the kids have had as many laughs with it? No, most likely not.
Wednesday, December 28, 2011
Philosophy and Games: Math Makes Worlds
Ok, so I missed another Monday Night Mordheim, again... Blame it on Christmas burn out. I should be back on target for next week. Back to what I was thinking about though.
Math Makes Worlds.
Every game, RPG, CCG, and wargames is built on a math base. The amount of math and how it is applied. Never has this
simple fact been more apparent to me then last Friday.
See, last Friday, I got to do something that I haven't been able to do in a long ass time. I got to re-unite with my old
High School D&D group. This was interesting, and I'll get to the maths in a moment, but I have to explain myself a bit first.
This was a very cross edition game. With my wargaming background and love of OSR blogs, I have a very first edition mindset. The game started and was primarily played in 2nd edition. The game rules we were using was 3.5 since that was the last time we all were together enough to play. And the DM and about half the other players have been playing mainly 4th ed since it came out.
This is the part that I get to about maths. The thing is that all of these editions of D&D are D&D (except 4th, but that's neither here nor there, and possibly a blog post in and of itself). The game world we were playing and sharing in was shaped through its various incarnations by not just the cool fluff that the DM was reading, but the hard crunch.
Every game's hard crunch, the maths that build the system influence how the game is played. Call it the degree of abstraction. It's a bit of an inverse rule though, with a bit of re-curve backwards. For my love of maths, my lack of a grasp of the simpler stuff precluded me from taking more advanced mathematics, so I am probably using the words wrong. Regardless of my mangling of the words, the point is there.
The degree of abstraction is how much rule detail is in a game. The less rules details, the larger picture a game has and also how less realistic that the game is. Then it re-curves backwards if you have too much detail in the rules, it bogs down and becomes usable only as a small scale combat simulator.
That's interesting. So let's see if I can talk this out in a way that makes since. Many wargames are considered rule heavy, but in all honesty, they aren't. Seriously, especially when compared to the average RPG.
Let me do a compare and contrast. WH40K, is a 250 page rule book, and we'll say a dozen books that when you take out the fluff and pretty pics you get maybe 25 pages of rules. That's a grand total of 550 pages of rules. Conversely, the basic rules for D&D are ALL crunch and there are three necessary books that are all around 250-300 pages, so about 750-1200 pages of rules, easily twice that with 40K, especially since no one needs all the rules for 40K for any given game.
That's a bit much, and not a little bit misleading. It's quite a bit misleading. The thing is that fluff aside, its the mechanics that build the game. There are some people that would argue that some RPGs lack a deeper feel because of a single mechanic, like Star Wars D6 or World of Darkness. However, the lack of differing systems doesn't make it less of a indepth system. It goes back to the reflex curve again. The reflex works both ways.
Math Makes Worlds.
Every game, RPG, CCG, and wargames is built on a math base. The amount of math and how it is applied. Never has this
simple fact been more apparent to me then last Friday.
See, last Friday, I got to do something that I haven't been able to do in a long ass time. I got to re-unite with my old
High School D&D group. This was interesting, and I'll get to the maths in a moment, but I have to explain myself a bit first.
This was a very cross edition game. With my wargaming background and love of OSR blogs, I have a very first edition mindset. The game started and was primarily played in 2nd edition. The game rules we were using was 3.5 since that was the last time we all were together enough to play. And the DM and about half the other players have been playing mainly 4th ed since it came out.
This is the part that I get to about maths. The thing is that all of these editions of D&D are D&D (except 4th, but that's neither here nor there, and possibly a blog post in and of itself). The game world we were playing and sharing in was shaped through its various incarnations by not just the cool fluff that the DM was reading, but the hard crunch.
Every game's hard crunch, the maths that build the system influence how the game is played. Call it the degree of abstraction. It's a bit of an inverse rule though, with a bit of re-curve backwards. For my love of maths, my lack of a grasp of the simpler stuff precluded me from taking more advanced mathematics, so I am probably using the words wrong. Regardless of my mangling of the words, the point is there.
The degree of abstraction is how much rule detail is in a game. The less rules details, the larger picture a game has and also how less realistic that the game is. Then it re-curves backwards if you have too much detail in the rules, it bogs down and becomes usable only as a small scale combat simulator.
That's interesting. So let's see if I can talk this out in a way that makes since. Many wargames are considered rule heavy, but in all honesty, they aren't. Seriously, especially when compared to the average RPG.
Let me do a compare and contrast. WH40K, is a 250 page rule book, and we'll say a dozen books that when you take out the fluff and pretty pics you get maybe 25 pages of rules. That's a grand total of 550 pages of rules. Conversely, the basic rules for D&D are ALL crunch and there are three necessary books that are all around 250-300 pages, so about 750-1200 pages of rules, easily twice that with 40K, especially since no one needs all the rules for 40K for any given game.
That's a bit much, and not a little bit misleading. It's quite a bit misleading. The thing is that fluff aside, its the mechanics that build the game. There are some people that would argue that some RPGs lack a deeper feel because of a single mechanic, like Star Wars D6 or World of Darkness. However, the lack of differing systems doesn't make it less of a indepth system. It goes back to the reflex curve again. The reflex works both ways.
Wednesday, December 14, 2011
RPG Thoughts: Rule of Cool
Well, hello, again wide world of blogging! I realize that sometimes I'm just talking to an empty theater, and my hits go up with the vitriol. I don't like being that guy. Seriously, I don't. It comes too easy for me, I am by nature an angry person, and dear god does GW bring it out in me sometimes. This is why I love to write about the type of stuff that I am about to write about.
I like to play RPGS, (dur), and my kids are starting to get into them as well. Eldest child has a fairly regular D&D 4th ed game that he's involved in (gah!), which has nothing to do with me. Which is both a blessing and a curse. The kids started the group and I was contented to stand aside. Eldest child and his friends needed to get their games in without a meddling old dude. My dad was never a gamer (even though he did introduce me to all the stuff that lead to gaming), and it is a tad creepy with an old dude playing with a bunch of middle schoolers. That's my thoughts on it. However, Eldest Child's best friend had an uncle who disagreed. So he's running their group, which is why they play 4th ed. That's fine. I really have no problem with that, especially since he brought in some more kids around the same age to play. So bigger group is a good thing.
So here I am trying to not to be the only adult in a room full of kids, and boom! They go get an adult to run the game anyway! Now, here's the thing. I can deal with the not being the adult, I can deal with the not being the DM, I can even deal with them playing with 4th ed. So, what's my problem with it? I'm not too sure. See? Like I said, anger comes easy. Regardless, I wanted to play a game with my kids, and just my kids.
So I've been looking over stuff to play. I finally decided on the one thing that could really keep a campaign going for a long haul and not get too caught up in the long term adventure.
Spelljammer.
They both rolled up rogues. Halfling and Elf respectively. One focused on talking, one on actual stealing stuff. Dropped an anchor on them from the sky, they climbed it and now they are on the Rock of Bral. Which is an excellent starting place.
Where I plan on taking it, though is the best part. I'm going to do the Grand Tour of the old TSR stuff. Hit all the major campaign worlds, giving them a 'signature' adventure in each place. I'm not sure where they'll go, or in what order, but I'm going to make up some good stuff. The point is to capture the feel of each game world.
So right now, I'm just spit balling ideas before I send them anywhere. Listing things that make each world special. Here's the list so far;
DragonLance: Krynn. Kender, draconians, dragon riders. That scenario practically writes itself, doesn't it?
Forgotten Realms: Toril. Drow, Zhentarim, and ridiculously high level NPCs. Might take a bit more thinking.
Dark Sun: Athas. Technically not accessable by Spelljamming, but fuck it. Psionics, Thri-Kreen, Gladiators, and life destroying magic. What's not to love?
Greyhawk: Oerth. Old School. I'm thinking a dungeon with lots of death traps.
Birthright: Aebrynis. Yes, I had to look it up. I owned this game, and I couldn't remember it. Though a bit of intrigue, politics, blood lines stuff, and those weird halflings and elves they got.
Mystara: Mystara. Well, that's a good question. Mystara was a big melting pot of everything. I could literally shove anything in here, and it would fit. Going to think a bit to get something signature.
Ebberron: Ebberron. Damn, I know nothing about this game except for warforged. That should be easy to work in, though.
That's a good start. I might expand it a bit. I mean Kara-Tur, Maztica, and Al-Quadim are now technically part of Forgotten Realms, but I think that with a bit of spin, they would be fine to use as a base for a different planet and do something.
Now, the really fun part, I've created the crew of the ship they will be traveling on. The Lady Danielle Ashley II. The Captain is a half-elf paladin who went to the stars because of the following conversation;
Paladin; Milord! I wish for your daughter Lady Danielle Ashley's hand in holy matrimony!
Lord: Go to hell!
Paladin: Verily! I shall go to the place that evil dwells to smite it!
1st Mate: He's being a dick, that's not a real quest!
Paladin: Is this true, milord?
Lord: Fine. Go to the stars and bring me some stardust!
Paladin: Verily! I shall go to the stars themselves and bring back the glittering majesty that is the firmament of the universe!
Then he went to the stars and found out that they are made of dirt, or portals to the elemental plane of fire. Neither of which is actually a great thing to take home to try to impress your future inlaws. So he's still out looking for something that is suitably impressive. I'll have more on the rest of the crew later, after I introduce the kids to them. They are all created and stated out, just waiting to be introduced.
I like to play RPGS, (dur), and my kids are starting to get into them as well. Eldest child has a fairly regular D&D 4th ed game that he's involved in (gah!), which has nothing to do with me. Which is both a blessing and a curse. The kids started the group and I was contented to stand aside. Eldest child and his friends needed to get their games in without a meddling old dude. My dad was never a gamer (even though he did introduce me to all the stuff that lead to gaming), and it is a tad creepy with an old dude playing with a bunch of middle schoolers. That's my thoughts on it. However, Eldest Child's best friend had an uncle who disagreed. So he's running their group, which is why they play 4th ed. That's fine. I really have no problem with that, especially since he brought in some more kids around the same age to play. So bigger group is a good thing.
So here I am trying to not to be the only adult in a room full of kids, and boom! They go get an adult to run the game anyway! Now, here's the thing. I can deal with the not being the adult, I can deal with the not being the DM, I can even deal with them playing with 4th ed. So, what's my problem with it? I'm not too sure. See? Like I said, anger comes easy. Regardless, I wanted to play a game with my kids, and just my kids.
So I've been looking over stuff to play. I finally decided on the one thing that could really keep a campaign going for a long haul and not get too caught up in the long term adventure.
Spelljammer.
They both rolled up rogues. Halfling and Elf respectively. One focused on talking, one on actual stealing stuff. Dropped an anchor on them from the sky, they climbed it and now they are on the Rock of Bral. Which is an excellent starting place.
Where I plan on taking it, though is the best part. I'm going to do the Grand Tour of the old TSR stuff. Hit all the major campaign worlds, giving them a 'signature' adventure in each place. I'm not sure where they'll go, or in what order, but I'm going to make up some good stuff. The point is to capture the feel of each game world.
So right now, I'm just spit balling ideas before I send them anywhere. Listing things that make each world special. Here's the list so far;
DragonLance: Krynn. Kender, draconians, dragon riders. That scenario practically writes itself, doesn't it?
Forgotten Realms: Toril. Drow, Zhentarim, and ridiculously high level NPCs. Might take a bit more thinking.
Dark Sun: Athas. Technically not accessable by Spelljamming, but fuck it. Psionics, Thri-Kreen, Gladiators, and life destroying magic. What's not to love?
Greyhawk: Oerth. Old School. I'm thinking a dungeon with lots of death traps.
Birthright: Aebrynis. Yes, I had to look it up. I owned this game, and I couldn't remember it. Though a bit of intrigue, politics, blood lines stuff, and those weird halflings and elves they got.
Mystara: Mystara. Well, that's a good question. Mystara was a big melting pot of everything. I could literally shove anything in here, and it would fit. Going to think a bit to get something signature.
Ebberron: Ebberron. Damn, I know nothing about this game except for warforged. That should be easy to work in, though.
That's a good start. I might expand it a bit. I mean Kara-Tur, Maztica, and Al-Quadim are now technically part of Forgotten Realms, but I think that with a bit of spin, they would be fine to use as a base for a different planet and do something.
Now, the really fun part, I've created the crew of the ship they will be traveling on. The Lady Danielle Ashley II. The Captain is a half-elf paladin who went to the stars because of the following conversation;
Paladin; Milord! I wish for your daughter Lady Danielle Ashley's hand in holy matrimony!
Lord: Go to hell!
Paladin: Verily! I shall go to the place that evil dwells to smite it!
1st Mate: He's being a dick, that's not a real quest!
Paladin: Is this true, milord?
Lord: Fine. Go to the stars and bring me some stardust!
Paladin: Verily! I shall go to the stars themselves and bring back the glittering majesty that is the firmament of the universe!
Then he went to the stars and found out that they are made of dirt, or portals to the elemental plane of fire. Neither of which is actually a great thing to take home to try to impress your future inlaws. So he's still out looking for something that is suitably impressive. I'll have more on the rest of the crew later, after I introduce the kids to them. They are all created and stated out, just waiting to be introduced.
Wednesday, December 7, 2011
RPG Thoughts: Plot Help
I recently got a message from a friend of mine, and he gave me the OK to share it with you guys:
From Consadine:
I found the Steal This Hook! section on the WotC website, not too shabby. I've given the players the Etched With Mystery one; already dealt with the druid, now on their way to the one that tends a glassware shop. Problem is I'm not too sure how to make it exciting. The others are easy. Organized crime, hermit = dungeon crawl, missing body can be tied into the organized crime. But a glassware shop?
My Reply:
Glassware shop is EASY! Just think about the type of people who need glass...
1. The obvious is to include a Minotaur, the proverbial bull in a china shop. A little obvious, but think about it. Etchings while mainly done by glassblowers, are also used in Scrimshaw. The minotaur came across one of his buddies' horns with an intricate design, and wanting to find who killed his buddy is seeking out places where the work is done. The guy who commissioned the scrimshaw will have more information.
2. Glasswork is also used extensively by mages. Cool idea for a rod of lightning. Perhaps the PCs run into a mage who needs just one more thing for his wand...and if they bring him enough, he can make two of them- one as payment for services rendered. Into adventure!
3. The holy water maker needs more flasks, but the glassblower is stacked with other orders, perhaps something the PCs can do can either make the work go quicker, or find another way to get the holy water where it needs to go. Now, WHY does this cleric NEED all that holy water?
4. The Noble's Kid: THe PCs enter the glassware shop as the keep and a young nobleman are agruing. The kid apparently broke one of his parents glass sculptures. He needs to replace it before they come home next week. The keep can do the work, but wants payment, but the noblekid can't afford it. However, he knows where he can get some treasure, if there just happened to be someone around who could help him.
5. Golem Bits: The stained glass golem is almost finished, but the glass keep needs more red sand from a certain beach in order to finish it for the church. Go forth for sand in a very dangerous area!
6. Tied together: Have the thieve's guild there shaking down the keep for a protection payment. This imbroils the PCs in thieve's guild politics, which will lead to the other warforged.
7. Impish Nature: There's a radient mephit in the shop breaking stuff, because it makes such pretty prisms. Or a bunch of them. Whatever suits needs.
Personally, I love unique locations like that. I never would have thought of a glassware shop as a place to begin an adventure, but as the saying goes, the more unique the start, the more memorable the adventure. Just as an FYI; he decided to go with #6.
From Consadine:
I found the Steal This Hook! section on the WotC website, not too shabby. I've given the players the Etched With Mystery one; already dealt with the druid, now on their way to the one that tends a glassware shop. Problem is I'm not too sure how to make it exciting. The others are easy. Organized crime, hermit = dungeon crawl, missing body can be tied into the organized crime. But a glassware shop?
My Reply:
Glassware shop is EASY! Just think about the type of people who need glass...
1. The obvious is to include a Minotaur, the proverbial bull in a china shop. A little obvious, but think about it. Etchings while mainly done by glassblowers, are also used in Scrimshaw. The minotaur came across one of his buddies' horns with an intricate design, and wanting to find who killed his buddy is seeking out places where the work is done. The guy who commissioned the scrimshaw will have more information.
2. Glasswork is also used extensively by mages. Cool idea for a rod of lightning. Perhaps the PCs run into a mage who needs just one more thing for his wand...and if they bring him enough, he can make two of them- one as payment for services rendered. Into adventure!
3. The holy water maker needs more flasks, but the glassblower is stacked with other orders, perhaps something the PCs can do can either make the work go quicker, or find another way to get the holy water where it needs to go. Now, WHY does this cleric NEED all that holy water?
4. The Noble's Kid: THe PCs enter the glassware shop as the keep and a young nobleman are agruing. The kid apparently broke one of his parents glass sculptures. He needs to replace it before they come home next week. The keep can do the work, but wants payment, but the noblekid can't afford it. However, he knows where he can get some treasure, if there just happened to be someone around who could help him.
5. Golem Bits: The stained glass golem is almost finished, but the glass keep needs more red sand from a certain beach in order to finish it for the church. Go forth for sand in a very dangerous area!
6. Tied together: Have the thieve's guild there shaking down the keep for a protection payment. This imbroils the PCs in thieve's guild politics, which will lead to the other warforged.
7. Impish Nature: There's a radient mephit in the shop breaking stuff, because it makes such pretty prisms. Or a bunch of them. Whatever suits needs.
Personally, I love unique locations like that. I never would have thought of a glassware shop as a place to begin an adventure, but as the saying goes, the more unique the start, the more memorable the adventure. Just as an FYI; he decided to go with #6.
Saturday, December 3, 2011
RPG Thoughts; What's Your Number?
I've played a lot of RPGs over the years. And I do mean a lot. So I was thinking of doing a list. Since I have trouble remembering the names of everything I've played I enlisted the help of the Wikipedia List of RPGs. This list I wrote is a bit like a little black book for me. There's the one night stands and brief dalliances, and then there's the loves of my life. It's very interesting to reflect back on these games. Maybe someday I'll do a little piece on each one of these, but not today.
How I qualify if I've played a game;
1. Time Played as a Player. I have had to play either multiple sessions or at least one 6-8 hour marathon session.
2. Ran the game. If I DM'd/GM'd/ST'd a game, regardless of how long that game lasted, it counts.
3. Owned the game. This one is iffy. However, I think it counts if I owed at least 3 supplements for a game, regardless of how much I actually played it. I can reasonably account this, at least in my mind, because owning that much means that I MEANT to play it at some point but never got around to it.
The List in Alphabetical Order;
Aberrant
Advanced Dungeons & Dragons (1st and 2nd)
Adventure!
Alternity
Big Eyes, Small Mouth
Call of Cthulthu (5th)
Changeling; The Dreaming
DeadLands
Dungeons & Dragons (Basic and 3rd Ed)
Earthdawn
Exalted
Heroes Unlimited
Hunter: The Reckoning
Kindred of the East
Mage: The Ascension
Marvel Super Heroes (Saga System)
Mech Warrior
Middle Earth Role Play
Palladium Fantasy Role-Playing Game
Paranoia
Rifts
Shadowrun
Star Wars RPG (2nd Ed d6 and d20)
Tales from the Floating Vagabond
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and Other Strangeness
Traveler (or is it Megatraveler? I have no idea, it was 15 years ago)
Trinity
Twilight 2000
Vampire: The Masquerade
Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay
Werewolf: The Apocalypse
Wraith: The Oblivion
So, that's 32 games. All of them fit into those three broad categories as I've mentioned above. I didn't count the different editions, that would be cheating, and it would fluff my numbers. Not that it needs any padding. Looking at it though, there are several games that are really all the same system, notably all the Palladium stuff and all the White Wolf stuff. I guess you could say if you played one, you've played them all. There are significant system and game differences that I feel that they are worth placing in separately.
To be more honest with you though, I think it would be beneficial to list my top games in sheer amount of play time. These are the ones that I keep coming back to over and over again. This is in order from most played to least, a top five so to speak.
1. Dungeons and Dragons; With the sole exception of 4th Ed, I've logged more time playing variations of D&D then any other game. Multiple campaigns lasting multiple years, both as DM and as a player.
2. Star Wars; Yet another edition spanner. I've had more characters in d6 then I've GM'd, and this is the game that we all really cut our teeth on in High School. We made so many mistakes and learned how to actually PLAY an RPG on this game.
3. World of Darkness: I'm just going to lump these all together, because the big three (Vampire, Werewolf, and Mage) would crowd out the rest of the list. Besides we did a lot of crossover campaigns with this.
4. Alternity; Regardless of my love of Star Wars, this is the TRUE everything Sci-Fi game. We've run Star Wars, Star Trek, Space Marines, Ringworld, Lost in Space, Transformers, and other things that were vaguely Sci-Fi with it and didn't have a game of its own.
5. Marvel Super Heroes (Saga): I love this game. It didn't do well at all in sales, but it had the single best supplement ever- 'The Reed Richards Guide to Absolutly Everything'. I find myself always going back to that game anytime I want to do any type of super hero game. Stating out Green Lantern and Superman is fun...
So, what's your number? And more importantly, what's your REAL number?
How I qualify if I've played a game;
1. Time Played as a Player. I have had to play either multiple sessions or at least one 6-8 hour marathon session.
2. Ran the game. If I DM'd/GM'd/ST'd a game, regardless of how long that game lasted, it counts.
3. Owned the game. This one is iffy. However, I think it counts if I owed at least 3 supplements for a game, regardless of how much I actually played it. I can reasonably account this, at least in my mind, because owning that much means that I MEANT to play it at some point but never got around to it.
The List in Alphabetical Order;
Aberrant
Advanced Dungeons & Dragons (1st and 2nd)
Adventure!
Alternity
Big Eyes, Small Mouth
Call of Cthulthu (5th)
Changeling; The Dreaming
DeadLands
Dungeons & Dragons (Basic and 3rd Ed)
Earthdawn
Exalted
Heroes Unlimited
Hunter: The Reckoning
Kindred of the East
Mage: The Ascension
Marvel Super Heroes (Saga System)
Mech Warrior
Middle Earth Role Play
Palladium Fantasy Role-Playing Game
Paranoia
Rifts
Shadowrun
Star Wars RPG (2nd Ed d6 and d20)
Tales from the Floating Vagabond
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and Other Strangeness
Traveler (or is it Megatraveler? I have no idea, it was 15 years ago)
Trinity
Twilight 2000
Vampire: The Masquerade
Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay
Werewolf: The Apocalypse
Wraith: The Oblivion
So, that's 32 games. All of them fit into those three broad categories as I've mentioned above. I didn't count the different editions, that would be cheating, and it would fluff my numbers. Not that it needs any padding. Looking at it though, there are several games that are really all the same system, notably all the Palladium stuff and all the White Wolf stuff. I guess you could say if you played one, you've played them all. There are significant system and game differences that I feel that they are worth placing in separately.
To be more honest with you though, I think it would be beneficial to list my top games in sheer amount of play time. These are the ones that I keep coming back to over and over again. This is in order from most played to least, a top five so to speak.
1. Dungeons and Dragons; With the sole exception of 4th Ed, I've logged more time playing variations of D&D then any other game. Multiple campaigns lasting multiple years, both as DM and as a player.
2. Star Wars; Yet another edition spanner. I've had more characters in d6 then I've GM'd, and this is the game that we all really cut our teeth on in High School. We made so many mistakes and learned how to actually PLAY an RPG on this game.
3. World of Darkness: I'm just going to lump these all together, because the big three (Vampire, Werewolf, and Mage) would crowd out the rest of the list. Besides we did a lot of crossover campaigns with this.
4. Alternity; Regardless of my love of Star Wars, this is the TRUE everything Sci-Fi game. We've run Star Wars, Star Trek, Space Marines, Ringworld, Lost in Space, Transformers, and other things that were vaguely Sci-Fi with it and didn't have a game of its own.
5. Marvel Super Heroes (Saga): I love this game. It didn't do well at all in sales, but it had the single best supplement ever- 'The Reed Richards Guide to Absolutly Everything'. I find myself always going back to that game anytime I want to do any type of super hero game. Stating out Green Lantern and Superman is fun...
So, what's your number? And more importantly, what's your REAL number?
Friday, September 23, 2011
Off the Beaten Cobblestones; Hope and Disappointment
So, the other day, I had to run down from the store I was shopping to hit an ATM. On the half block walk to the ATM, I saw the former facade of the train store (they moved), and there was a flyer on the door. It was for a gamestore! A gamestore opening in my neighborhood! If the place was halfway decent, I would be able to get some games in without having to go to the gamestore in the college area where parking was expensive, or the crappy gamestore that had NO parking, or the good gamestore in the north hills, which was a half hour drive! I was geeked! Then I did an internet search on it. I found their website.
http://gamegodtemple.com/
Wow. Total let down. Black text on white background. That wouldn't have flown in the days of geocities. Now, there's tons of places to get html script, not to mention free WYSIWYG editors. While that in and of itself is bad, that's not the worst. There is no mention of wargames...at all. Lots and lots about WoTC stuff. Magic, and D&D 4th Ed. It chills me to the bone. A gamestore without miniatures. I'm going to have to do an expedition there to really take a look at it. I was geeked, but now I am apprehensive.
So let me break it down;
1. Black Writing on white background. This is just plain old laziness. It is the modern equivalent of putting up a sign that you painted with spray paint on a piece of old particle board.
2. No real list of store hours. From reading all of the posts, I now know that they are open on Fridays and Saturdays from noon-10pm. What about the rest of the week? God help them if they aren't open on Sundays. That's like asking not to make any money.
3. No true list of products. Reading their announcements I can see they do a fair amount of card games, and some D&D 4th Ed, but that doesn't make a game store. A WoTC store, yes, game store no. Seriously, do they even carry dice? Or games from other companies? Kids like the Fantasy Flight 40K RPG, do they carry it? How about snacks? Though, they choose a really bad area for that, since they are between a McDonald's and a grocery store (which is mentioned in thier website), but gamers are LAZY.
4. No information about what kind of game area they have. Do they have folding tables for their card games, or a separate area for Roleplaying games?
5. What is the deal with the political commentary? WTF? I play games so that I don't have to think about religion or politics or any of that real world Bull Shit. Either make it funnier or don't bother.
6. Where's the pics? I realize that I'm not a big person on pics, but seriously, at least take a picture of your front door so that people know when to stop on the right street.
7. What games are you allowed to play there? Seriously. This may not even be an issue for them, or one they haven't even thought of. But all of us wargamers know that if you show up at a GW with a bunch of Maulifaux, you are going to be asked to leave.
8. About the only thing they did right was keeping in theme for the posts, some sort of gaming god. Cute. I like it, others might not, hence on the list.
9. I'm posting this short of one day of a month after opening. If the store hadn't opened yet, I could excuse this type of thing as they get stuff sorted, but nope.
10. The tournament page has two listings. Both for MtG. Look, I've been around gamestores, Magic pays the electric bill. I realize that. The issue I have here is that there is a date when the tournament is, and the cost of the tournament, but there is no start time and end time. Man, tournaments should be something that are really well planned, and booked well in advance. Not just about two weeks worth.
Ok, ten things that I mentioned that could be improved. I'm half scared that this is being run by someone that I actually know. This webpage could be done better in blogger, or wordpress, or hell, even in word pad. I'm half tempted to offer to pimp their site in exchange for hosting my kids games every week, or half a box of GW skeletons, or one whole box of Mantic ghouls. It would still look like amateur crap, but it would look like amateur crap that was trying. Seriously, I was going to wait until tomorrow to and stop by after work with Megan. She was going to buy dice (yeah, she's falling into that addiction).
Now, I have to go by and see if it is even worth showing anyone else. That would be a travesty. In all of my years, I've seen several gamestores go under. The Comics and Gaming Dungeon, Helm's Deep, both gone. From just this webpage it ain't going to last very long at all. Even the crappy gamestore has a facebook (and looking at that it doesn't seem as crappy now).
Wow, I was really a bastard to a place I haven't even been to, haven't I? I should give them the benefit of the doubt.
http://gamegodtemple.com/
Wow. Total let down. Black text on white background. That wouldn't have flown in the days of geocities. Now, there's tons of places to get html script, not to mention free WYSIWYG editors. While that in and of itself is bad, that's not the worst. There is no mention of wargames...at all. Lots and lots about WoTC stuff. Magic, and D&D 4th Ed. It chills me to the bone. A gamestore without miniatures. I'm going to have to do an expedition there to really take a look at it. I was geeked, but now I am apprehensive.
So let me break it down;
1. Black Writing on white background. This is just plain old laziness. It is the modern equivalent of putting up a sign that you painted with spray paint on a piece of old particle board.
2. No real list of store hours. From reading all of the posts, I now know that they are open on Fridays and Saturdays from noon-10pm. What about the rest of the week? God help them if they aren't open on Sundays. That's like asking not to make any money.
3. No true list of products. Reading their announcements I can see they do a fair amount of card games, and some D&D 4th Ed, but that doesn't make a game store. A WoTC store, yes, game store no. Seriously, do they even carry dice? Or games from other companies? Kids like the Fantasy Flight 40K RPG, do they carry it? How about snacks? Though, they choose a really bad area for that, since they are between a McDonald's and a grocery store (which is mentioned in thier website), but gamers are LAZY.
4. No information about what kind of game area they have. Do they have folding tables for their card games, or a separate area for Roleplaying games?
5. What is the deal with the political commentary? WTF? I play games so that I don't have to think about religion or politics or any of that real world Bull Shit. Either make it funnier or don't bother.
6. Where's the pics? I realize that I'm not a big person on pics, but seriously, at least take a picture of your front door so that people know when to stop on the right street.
7. What games are you allowed to play there? Seriously. This may not even be an issue for them, or one they haven't even thought of. But all of us wargamers know that if you show up at a GW with a bunch of Maulifaux, you are going to be asked to leave.
8. About the only thing they did right was keeping in theme for the posts, some sort of gaming god. Cute. I like it, others might not, hence on the list.
9. I'm posting this short of one day of a month after opening. If the store hadn't opened yet, I could excuse this type of thing as they get stuff sorted, but nope.
10. The tournament page has two listings. Both for MtG. Look, I've been around gamestores, Magic pays the electric bill. I realize that. The issue I have here is that there is a date when the tournament is, and the cost of the tournament, but there is no start time and end time. Man, tournaments should be something that are really well planned, and booked well in advance. Not just about two weeks worth.
Ok, ten things that I mentioned that could be improved. I'm half scared that this is being run by someone that I actually know. This webpage could be done better in blogger, or wordpress, or hell, even in word pad. I'm half tempted to offer to pimp their site in exchange for hosting my kids games every week, or half a box of GW skeletons, or one whole box of Mantic ghouls. It would still look like amateur crap, but it would look like amateur crap that was trying. Seriously, I was going to wait until tomorrow to and stop by after work with Megan. She was going to buy dice (yeah, she's falling into that addiction).
Now, I have to go by and see if it is even worth showing anyone else. That would be a travesty. In all of my years, I've seen several gamestores go under. The Comics and Gaming Dungeon, Helm's Deep, both gone. From just this webpage it ain't going to last very long at all. Even the crappy gamestore has a facebook (and looking at that it doesn't seem as crappy now).
Wow, I was really a bastard to a place I haven't even been to, haven't I? I should give them the benefit of the doubt.
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