Here, the sandbox portion of Storm King’s Thunder fell flat. Once the adventure showed the menace of the giants, it left characters with no clear way to meet the threat. Instead, the characters could only run errands until they reached the adventure’s true start. The errands suffered from such weak hooks that DMs either needed to completely rework them or to face players dutifully following a course because the adventure expected it.Sadly, true.
Tuesday, September 26, 2017
Storm King's Sandbox
What DM David said about Storm King's Thunder:
Wednesday, September 13, 2017
Campaign Building
Interesting article on Creating a Player-based Tomb of Annihilation campaign. I thought it was particularly interesting in light of the work we've been doing this summer to accomplish the same end.
They take a more structured approach, but it feels like they had the same idea. It was also interesting (even if it doesn't surprise me totally) that their characters preferred pirates and tomb raiding, or a pulp-driven plot line.
It did raise a few thoughts. With all the work we've done, there is something to say for codifying it into a more useable form. Take the random thoughts and ideas and structure them into something that will have substance in game form.
I feel like we've done a lot of the work they talk about doing, but it is still somewhat shifting and formless. It feels like we would benefit from a similar approach. The advantage we have is that we've been asking the questions and discussing them. We've done the groundwork, but not resolved the details.
Perhaps we should try do that... but what questions would we ask? and what consensus would we find?
They take a more structured approach, but it feels like they had the same idea. It was also interesting (even if it doesn't surprise me totally) that their characters preferred pirates and tomb raiding, or a pulp-driven plot line.
It did raise a few thoughts. With all the work we've done, there is something to say for codifying it into a more useable form. Take the random thoughts and ideas and structure them into something that will have substance in game form.
I feel like we've done a lot of the work they talk about doing, but it is still somewhat shifting and formless. It feels like we would benefit from a similar approach. The advantage we have is that we've been asking the questions and discussing them. We've done the groundwork, but not resolved the details.
Perhaps we should try do that... but what questions would we ask? and what consensus would we find?
Thursday, August 3, 2017
Locations and Overview
The setting for this adventure is the Southern Ocean, specifically the western reaches of this ocean. The Western Ocean [for lack of a better name - hey: it's an accurate description at least!] lies west of the main continent. The mainland ends about 30 North, and directly south of the land (which extends, then, a couple thousand miles to the east) is this Southern Ocean.
The country dividing these two oceans is Vinar. Vinar is a peninsular, south of the inland sea where The Kingdom is (United Kingdom of Norfolk, Wessex and Suffolk, to the lawyers; The Kingdom to everyone else). The Kingdom is north and west of this inland sea - Vinar is to the south. Vinar itself is a mountainous land, with a range of very active volcanos down the far west coast, and a somewhat older range in the east. Between these ranges (that both run roughly north/south) is a high, dry plateau, mostly grasslands, famous for its cattle and horses. North and south of the highlands are fertile seacoasts, lands of hills and vines and olives and so on. Vinar as a whole is a united country in name, with a king - though in practice it is dominated by its great lords, with regional power bases. Culturally [since I am unimaginative and lazy and when in doubt, steal what I can from reality or elsewhere], Vinar is Iberian - mostly Spanish, probably some Portuguese in the south. So names in this area, and in the southern islands, tend to be Spanish in form.
Vinar, I say, is a peninsular, extending into the Western ocean, with the inland sea to the north [another thing I've never come up with a name for], and the Southern Ocean to the south. East of Vinar are a number of other countries, principalities, Duchies, the odd Kingdom - they have names like Ottovilla, Pallas, Olivo, etc. Directly south of the mainland, in this eastern direction, are a group of islands generally called the Shackled Islands - these are various sizes, some quite large, with varying degrees of civilization and political independence. They might be quite interesting, but that is not where this story is laid. South from these islands is the open ocean, for the most part. And east, rather east, is a long desert coast, that itself is interesting, but not part of this story.
Due south of Vinar, and to its west, are the islands we care about. Go far enough south south west, and you hit another continent, known, at least to clueless northerners, as the Jungle Continent. It is vast, mostly unexplored, and the northern parts, lying close to the equator, are very mountainous, volcanic and covered in jungle. It is indirectly relevant to our story, but we can leave it for now. Between this continent and Vinar lie a large number of islands. One is very large - 7-800 miles north to south, a few hundred miles wide, also volcanic and jungle covered - the equivalent, really of Chult in the Forgotten Realms. [Id say this is a strange coincidence that I invented this place and Ed Greenwood invented Chult, but since it is basically the Yucatan with the connections to the rest of north and south America submerged, coincidence might not be the word.] We will get there - though since someone else is doing the work of filling in Chult, I am quite happy to use what's in the book for this game.
The other islands are somewhat more important, at least in terms of defining what this part of the world works like. This entire area - from the Jungle Continent north to Vinar - is right on the edge of a couple plates: it is a ring of fire indeed. The continent, "Chult" and Vinar are all volcanically active - so are many of the islands between. And no surprise, then, that this whole spread of islands are called the Fire Islands. Within the Fire Islands, there are more divisions - people usually refer to four chains making up the Fire Islands:
The Barrier islands are the farthest west and north - they are smaller, scattered, forming a small crescent almost due west of Vinar. They are populated, but not heavily - many islands are either unpopulated, or left entirely to the natives, who have been living there for centuries, or millenia; areas that have been encroached by northerners or easterners are still small settlements, modest plantations, forts towns. Though like almost all of the Fire Islands, they are infested with pirates.
The Pirate Islands are located east of the Barriers and "Chult", directly south of the western part of Vinar. They have earned their name. Someday I will attempt a history of these places - the gist of it is that for the last century or two, these southern islands have been doing booming business in spices, coffee, tea, sugar, tobacco; there are also large gold, silver, diamond mines on "Chult" and the Jungle Continent. All these goods, so valued in the north (and the east, where several large cities and kingdoms thrive as well) need to be transported, and the ships transporting them make fine targets. Pirates have thrived in these islands, and have given them their name. The actual vehemence of the pirate enterprises may wax and wane, along with their level of political organization - but they are a constant presence. They are not the only presence - countries, like Vinar and Pallas and the Kingdom make claims on some of these islands, maintain fleets of official vessels and try to uphold the law - but none of these forces can eradicate the pirates, and most of them have long since stopped trying, completely. Pirates work with "legal" forces in various ways, making deals, striking alliances - it is all gray.
There are three or four islands here that are worth mentioning. First - San Marcos - this is located directly east of "Chult", and it is the closest thing to a complete pirate haven. The city of San Marcos is virtually run by pirates, a pirate council, which maintains peace on this island, and deals, almost like a government, with the outside world. Second, Isadore - this island is directly east of San Marcos, and is the closest thing to a stable law abiding place. It is owned by Vinar, specifically, the Count of Isadore, who in fact appoints a governor to run the place. The current count is named Govina, and stays int he Vinari capital enjoying his wine; the governor is named Falconi, and is a fairly competent and respected man. His power is concentrated in the northwestern part of the island, around the city of Porto Ringo; the larger city of Isadore, in the south east, is mostly run by a council of lords, appointed by the governor, or local merchants, or guilds, or the church. This island is fairly stable, but all this country is wild, and there are plenty of places along its coast for pirates to hide in. Third, is Barracuda Island, south of Isadore - it was once like San Marcos, a pirate city, though for a while it fell under the power of one pirate Madame LeTour - she provoked a war among the pirates and was chased off, leaving the island under the uneasy influence of Isadore and barely hidden pirate captains.
Finally, far south, directly east of the Jungle Continent, are the Forbidden Islands - so called because they have probably the most active volcanos of this very volcanic region. They lie near the equator, are covered in jungle, and have an evil reputation as the center of much of the slave trade, which unfortunately flourishes throughout the Southern Ocean.
And that is that. Here is a map, or the sketch of a map. The colors represent at least rough outlines of terrain and some of the civilization: brown and orange represent mountains and hills. Blues are usually rivers. Pink is for political boundaries. Yellow are trade routes, by land or sea. Red dots are cities and towns (though they are rather imperfectly marked.) All of this is bounded in the south by the equator, more or less; I think the northern edge of the map is around 35 degrees north.
The country dividing these two oceans is Vinar. Vinar is a peninsular, south of the inland sea where The Kingdom is (United Kingdom of Norfolk, Wessex and Suffolk, to the lawyers; The Kingdom to everyone else). The Kingdom is north and west of this inland sea - Vinar is to the south. Vinar itself is a mountainous land, with a range of very active volcanos down the far west coast, and a somewhat older range in the east. Between these ranges (that both run roughly north/south) is a high, dry plateau, mostly grasslands, famous for its cattle and horses. North and south of the highlands are fertile seacoasts, lands of hills and vines and olives and so on. Vinar as a whole is a united country in name, with a king - though in practice it is dominated by its great lords, with regional power bases. Culturally [since I am unimaginative and lazy and when in doubt, steal what I can from reality or elsewhere], Vinar is Iberian - mostly Spanish, probably some Portuguese in the south. So names in this area, and in the southern islands, tend to be Spanish in form.
Vinar, I say, is a peninsular, extending into the Western ocean, with the inland sea to the north [another thing I've never come up with a name for], and the Southern Ocean to the south. East of Vinar are a number of other countries, principalities, Duchies, the odd Kingdom - they have names like Ottovilla, Pallas, Olivo, etc. Directly south of the mainland, in this eastern direction, are a group of islands generally called the Shackled Islands - these are various sizes, some quite large, with varying degrees of civilization and political independence. They might be quite interesting, but that is not where this story is laid. South from these islands is the open ocean, for the most part. And east, rather east, is a long desert coast, that itself is interesting, but not part of this story.
Due south of Vinar, and to its west, are the islands we care about. Go far enough south south west, and you hit another continent, known, at least to clueless northerners, as the Jungle Continent. It is vast, mostly unexplored, and the northern parts, lying close to the equator, are very mountainous, volcanic and covered in jungle. It is indirectly relevant to our story, but we can leave it for now. Between this continent and Vinar lie a large number of islands. One is very large - 7-800 miles north to south, a few hundred miles wide, also volcanic and jungle covered - the equivalent, really of Chult in the Forgotten Realms. [Id say this is a strange coincidence that I invented this place and Ed Greenwood invented Chult, but since it is basically the Yucatan with the connections to the rest of north and south America submerged, coincidence might not be the word.] We will get there - though since someone else is doing the work of filling in Chult, I am quite happy to use what's in the book for this game.
The other islands are somewhat more important, at least in terms of defining what this part of the world works like. This entire area - from the Jungle Continent north to Vinar - is right on the edge of a couple plates: it is a ring of fire indeed. The continent, "Chult" and Vinar are all volcanically active - so are many of the islands between. And no surprise, then, that this whole spread of islands are called the Fire Islands. Within the Fire Islands, there are more divisions - people usually refer to four chains making up the Fire Islands:
The Barrier islands are the farthest west and north - they are smaller, scattered, forming a small crescent almost due west of Vinar. They are populated, but not heavily - many islands are either unpopulated, or left entirely to the natives, who have been living there for centuries, or millenia; areas that have been encroached by northerners or easterners are still small settlements, modest plantations, forts towns. Though like almost all of the Fire Islands, they are infested with pirates.
The Pirate Islands are located east of the Barriers and "Chult", directly south of the western part of Vinar. They have earned their name. Someday I will attempt a history of these places - the gist of it is that for the last century or two, these southern islands have been doing booming business in spices, coffee, tea, sugar, tobacco; there are also large gold, silver, diamond mines on "Chult" and the Jungle Continent. All these goods, so valued in the north (and the east, where several large cities and kingdoms thrive as well) need to be transported, and the ships transporting them make fine targets. Pirates have thrived in these islands, and have given them their name. The actual vehemence of the pirate enterprises may wax and wane, along with their level of political organization - but they are a constant presence. They are not the only presence - countries, like Vinar and Pallas and the Kingdom make claims on some of these islands, maintain fleets of official vessels and try to uphold the law - but none of these forces can eradicate the pirates, and most of them have long since stopped trying, completely. Pirates work with "legal" forces in various ways, making deals, striking alliances - it is all gray.
There are three or four islands here that are worth mentioning. First - San Marcos - this is located directly east of "Chult", and it is the closest thing to a complete pirate haven. The city of San Marcos is virtually run by pirates, a pirate council, which maintains peace on this island, and deals, almost like a government, with the outside world. Second, Isadore - this island is directly east of San Marcos, and is the closest thing to a stable law abiding place. It is owned by Vinar, specifically, the Count of Isadore, who in fact appoints a governor to run the place. The current count is named Govina, and stays int he Vinari capital enjoying his wine; the governor is named Falconi, and is a fairly competent and respected man. His power is concentrated in the northwestern part of the island, around the city of Porto Ringo; the larger city of Isadore, in the south east, is mostly run by a council of lords, appointed by the governor, or local merchants, or guilds, or the church. This island is fairly stable, but all this country is wild, and there are plenty of places along its coast for pirates to hide in. Third, is Barracuda Island, south of Isadore - it was once like San Marcos, a pirate city, though for a while it fell under the power of one pirate Madame LeTour - she provoked a war among the pirates and was chased off, leaving the island under the uneasy influence of Isadore and barely hidden pirate captains.
Finally, far south, directly east of the Jungle Continent, are the Forbidden Islands - so called because they have probably the most active volcanos of this very volcanic region. They lie near the equator, are covered in jungle, and have an evil reputation as the center of much of the slave trade, which unfortunately flourishes throughout the Southern Ocean.
And that is that. Here is a map, or the sketch of a map. The colors represent at least rough outlines of terrain and some of the civilization: brown and orange represent mountains and hills. Blues are usually rivers. Pink is for political boundaries. Yellow are trade routes, by land or sea. Red dots are cities and towns (though they are rather imperfectly marked.) All of this is bounded in the south by the equator, more or less; I think the northern edge of the map is around 35 degrees north.
Tuesday, August 1, 2017
Early Thoughts on New Campaign
I have to start with an apology. I started out the year full of ambition - full of gaming plans, ideas, hopes - both for playing and for writing. Instead? well - tell the truth, I haven't been all that far off in the real world. We have managed to play - not as steadily as we'd like, but close to what we managed at the end of last year. I've run - the fire giant lair, anyway. Ive been plugging away at developing other campaigns, and developing the world. A lot of that can end up in stories, instead of games - but that's fine. So the beginning of the list has gone all right. But the bottom - blogging? audio-visual? no nothing like that; the opposite of it. And that tends to undermine some of the things I have done - it is fine to work on building adventures and writing stories, but if I never get them even finished enough to put on blog, where does that leave me?
So - sorry about all that. And now, let's start trying to fix it. Let's start by thinking about a new campaign.
With Tomb of Annihilation coming in the fall, with its lost world setting - it is tempting to start setting up a new campaign, that can get us there. The book/adventure path is set in Chult, the jungle island south of the Forgotten Realms usual settings - which for once is almost perfectly congruent with our home brewed world. And perfectly congruent with the ideas I have had for adventures. I have been jonesing for pirates for a while - in the past, I tended to set those stories in the north, up with Lenay and Bayport and such. Thats good, but you want buried treasure and shipwrecks and pirate towns and maroons, and that stuff tends to work better when people don't freeze to death after 15 minutes in the water. So tropics, you know. I'd never worked much on the southern parts of my world in the past - the last couple years, I have. Last fall I used the south seas as setting for another stab at Nanowrimo - hitting my marks even! (though not coming close to the end of a story). It's been in my mind for a while, and an official adventurer path is perfect.
So what now? We've started the process, putting together ideas for what to play, for characters - I have been working over the setting, filling it in, trying to make the whole Southern Ocean feel real. So what I am going to try to do here, now, is start putting these things up, where we can use them as resources.
(Though doing so points out the fact that I have never actually put together any kind of document on the rest of the world, that any other person could use. I've been building this world for 35 years - I should share some of it.)
Anyway. Start here - the general idea of the campaign is this: Characters go south, into the islands south of the mainland, west of the southern ocean. These islands are tropical - running roughly 30˚N to 10˚N (there is a vast continent, full of jungles and mountains south of the islands) - most volcanic, some of them still active. In the middle of this - extending north from the southern continent - is a big island that is almost identical to Chult - jungles, volcanos, lost and mysterious interior, etc. The idea is, the Characters come into this area, for whatever their reasons. Whatever their purposes, they are somehow washed up in an archipelago west of this Chult-like island. Maybe they are shipwrecked - maybe they have been shanghaied, who knows - they have to work their way across these islands, then over to "Chult" in time to start the official adventure path.
I'll come back to this. Thoughts on who the characters are, details about the setting, and so on. But I want to get it started and I want to start writing about it as we go.
So - sorry about all that. And now, let's start trying to fix it. Let's start by thinking about a new campaign.
With Tomb of Annihilation coming in the fall, with its lost world setting - it is tempting to start setting up a new campaign, that can get us there. The book/adventure path is set in Chult, the jungle island south of the Forgotten Realms usual settings - which for once is almost perfectly congruent with our home brewed world. And perfectly congruent with the ideas I have had for adventures. I have been jonesing for pirates for a while - in the past, I tended to set those stories in the north, up with Lenay and Bayport and such. Thats good, but you want buried treasure and shipwrecks and pirate towns and maroons, and that stuff tends to work better when people don't freeze to death after 15 minutes in the water. So tropics, you know. I'd never worked much on the southern parts of my world in the past - the last couple years, I have. Last fall I used the south seas as setting for another stab at Nanowrimo - hitting my marks even! (though not coming close to the end of a story). It's been in my mind for a while, and an official adventurer path is perfect.
So what now? We've started the process, putting together ideas for what to play, for characters - I have been working over the setting, filling it in, trying to make the whole Southern Ocean feel real. So what I am going to try to do here, now, is start putting these things up, where we can use them as resources.
(Though doing so points out the fact that I have never actually put together any kind of document on the rest of the world, that any other person could use. I've been building this world for 35 years - I should share some of it.)
Anyway. Start here - the general idea of the campaign is this: Characters go south, into the islands south of the mainland, west of the southern ocean. These islands are tropical - running roughly 30˚N to 10˚N (there is a vast continent, full of jungles and mountains south of the islands) - most volcanic, some of them still active. In the middle of this - extending north from the southern continent - is a big island that is almost identical to Chult - jungles, volcanos, lost and mysterious interior, etc. The idea is, the Characters come into this area, for whatever their reasons. Whatever their purposes, they are somehow washed up in an archipelago west of this Chult-like island. Maybe they are shipwrecked - maybe they have been shanghaied, who knows - they have to work their way across these islands, then over to "Chult" in time to start the official adventure path.
I'll come back to this. Thoughts on who the characters are, details about the setting, and so on. But I want to get it started and I want to start writing about it as we go.
Sunday, February 5, 2017
Classes We Have Used
Came across an interesting thread on EN World: Classes nobody wants to play.
The thread doesn't reveal a lot in general, except that different groups have different preferences and habits - though it's shocking to see multiple people claiming no one wants to play a wizard (or bard or druid.) But it got me thinking. We've had time to play a bunch of characters - 2 groups to 5th level, a couple others to 4th (or 3rd anyway) - even some one off groups to 2nd or 3rd - so we've got a decent sample size. And while we have our own idiosyncrasies in what we play, we've tried a pretty wide variety in 5E - so I thought I might see what I can learn from it.
(There is also this: we did this in ADD - made up tons of characters, played a fair number of them up; 3E we made up plenty of characters but didn't really play them. 4E - we might have made characters, but we ended up playing the same handful all the way through - none of us played more than 3 or 4 characters to any level (except David and Thomas, at the beginning.) Something about 5E - and those earlier editions - seems to make you want to make up characters, and play them...)
Anyway: a very unscientific survey of classes and what we've played.
• Barbarians
Inky
Magyar (goliath I played once...)
(Were there others? Was BPC a Barbarian?)
- I am actually rather surprised how few we've played. Though Inky tends to make a big impression, so it feels like we've done more. They feel very strong, at least at low levels - able to soak up damage like nobody's business. But for some reason, we haven't made a lot of them up. We never did, really - but given how tough they are at low levels, it's a bit surprising.
• Bards
Nancy
Chet
Dallas
Buster
- We have run out some of these. I have, and David. I like bards: I'll come back to them when I talk about other classes, I think - but they are extraordinarily versatile. They can mix it up (Nancy was the brawler in the sneak-into-the-village thing we played); they can cast, and cast either offensively or support; they heal - they boost the party. We haven't always gotten to play the full personality possibilities of them, but there is that as well. They are very good, and I think they make other classes seem redundant.
• Clerics:
Claire
(Misty)
Luth
Opus
Geldon
- This is interesting. we started out with clerics, the way we always do - but lately, we've kind of stopped using them. You have to have someone back there to heal - but having discovered the joys of druids and bards, we've tended to drop clerics for them. Claire and Luth are almost characters we’re stuck with - if I hadn’t been playing and running, I would have made Claire into Nancy, I think - and I noticed the last time David needed a healer he made a bard (Buster). Bards and druids are more fun. On the other hand, there is Geldon - who is a real, memorable character - almost unheard of with clerics. Oliver did it by virtue of always being there - and Eugene did some of it by being evil - and Geldon manages it, entirely by the way Ryan plays him. At this point, I would imagine unless someone had a strong character concept for a cleric, we would almost always go with bards or druids, or even a paladin or ranger, over a cleric...
• Druids:
Boedicca
Dzurkha (played with Wendell and Holmes)
- Playing 2 druids past 3rd level is 2 more druids than we have played, period, in 35 years. Once you saw Boedicca in action, why would you want to play a cleric again? I admit, I don't know how this is likely to work out once they start shape-shifting and all that - because I don't know how that works, yet. But odds are, it just makes them that much more interesting.
• Fighter:
Bono
Angus
Queequeg
Wendell & Holmes (All right - Carvallon and Arness, however they are spelled)
Tuffy
Ildebrun
- We have certainly taken to our fighters. We've played a mob of them. They are the staple, of course - but they are worth it in this version. And though a couple other fighter types have made an impression (Inky and Violet), we haven't done a lot of that - we've defaulted to fighter and not regretted it. Here's the real thing: for one of the default classes - all those fighters we have are as well distinguished from each other as any kind of class has been. Bono is a two handed tactician; Angus is a brute; Quequeg is an eldritch knight; Tuffy's a straightforward two handed champion - almost a 4E dual wielding ranger build; Ildebrun is a straightforward enough brawler, but with interesting racial abilities; and David's eladrin are a two weapon fighter and a two handed fighter. They are all distinct, in their personalities, as far as we've played them - but tactically, as well - which is what fighters do. It's the class that, so far, has produced the widest range of styles and flavors - that's a fascinating development in itself. We didn't do that with fighters in the past - we've always favored rangers and paladins, and let fighters be simple sword and board men - they got something right here.
• Monk:
Ichi
(Someone else might have made one up, though I don’t remember.)
- Another class we never played much in the past. Some experimenting in 5E, not much more. We haven't done much here - might depend a bit on how things start developing, or if someone else tries one too. Ichi is promising (especially when I start getting his kensei powers) - we'll see.
• Paladins:
Atilla (in two versions)
Edge (briefly)
- Another one we haven't done a lot with, though they are fine as a class. Attila got a lot more interesting when I remade him into a goliath - Edge didn't really get time to develop. They are all right, though they don't really feel like paladins until second level.
• Thieves:
Bill
- This is the strangest thing. I might be forgetting someone, but I think Bill is the only thief we have played so far. We leaned on thieves heavily in 4E - Perry was one of the major characters there (the definitive 4, really: Oliver, Hank and Perry, and Theresa - Vjarne, Fighting Eagle, etc., came and went too much to be definitive like that). We loaded up on thieves, especially hybrid thieves - Nancy, Dermind, one or two of Jim’s hybrids, all had some thief in them. But in 5E, we have not used them at all - other than Bill, who is definitely second fiddle to Inky. I don’t know if this is the kind of dungeon we’ve played - as accident of wanting to try out other classes - or something else. But it is notable.
• Rangers:
Violet
(and BPC maybe?)
- Violet is a fine character - 5E version of Theresa, basically, with most of the same virtues. But she's the only one we've played (I think) - odd. We loved rangers in 1E (Geronimo being, you know, The Man, after all) - I loved them in 4E, to distraction. So why aren't we playing them now? I can see some reasons: the big one is that the reason for playing a ranger has been usurped a bit by both fighters and bards. Bards get the finesse fighting and spell casting and do it better than rangers; fighters let you specialize in archery or two handed fighting, and you get all those neat options fighters give you. There’s not a lot of evidence that a ranger would be better than either of those. It's hard to give up the spells of a bard or the options of a fighter to play a ranger.
• Sorcerers:
- I don’t think we have played a single sorcerer yet - not for more than a one off here or there. They may come eventually - they are like they have always been - they should be all right. But so far - again, they are hard to justify against a bard. They get more offense in their spells - but bards cast the same way,they can heal, and they are much better fighters - why not play a bard? Bards have replaced a lot of classes.
• Warlocks:
- Another one we haven't used, or have used very sparingly. (I vaguely remember trying one - maybe...) They seem like a lot of work, and it's hard to justify picking them over the other spell caster options.
• Wizards
Milo
Alexis
Spencer
Fred
- Wizards are very solid in this version. You get all the spells (though you have to make choices - but you can change your choices). They can blast, buff, control - they are good at it. I'm not sure they are all that exciting - at low levels, as usual, they are kind of afterthoughts - but once you get second level spells - and especially third - they start to be indispensable. Less personality maybe than they could have - but they are just way more useful. For what they do, they are still better at it than Bards (which I would not say for any other spell casters except druids.)
So there it is: what we play and what we don't play. We play lots of fighters, in a lot of different styles - we use wizards like we always have - we have used bards regularly - we had clerics, but have shifted toward druids and bards lately - and we've had a handful of memorable rangers, barbarians and so on, but not a lot of those characters. We have avoided sorcerers and warlocks completely - and have almost shockingly not run thieves.
The thread doesn't reveal a lot in general, except that different groups have different preferences and habits - though it's shocking to see multiple people claiming no one wants to play a wizard (or bard or druid.) But it got me thinking. We've had time to play a bunch of characters - 2 groups to 5th level, a couple others to 4th (or 3rd anyway) - even some one off groups to 2nd or 3rd - so we've got a decent sample size. And while we have our own idiosyncrasies in what we play, we've tried a pretty wide variety in 5E - so I thought I might see what I can learn from it.
(There is also this: we did this in ADD - made up tons of characters, played a fair number of them up; 3E we made up plenty of characters but didn't really play them. 4E - we might have made characters, but we ended up playing the same handful all the way through - none of us played more than 3 or 4 characters to any level (except David and Thomas, at the beginning.) Something about 5E - and those earlier editions - seems to make you want to make up characters, and play them...)
Anyway: a very unscientific survey of classes and what we've played.
• Barbarians
Inky
Magyar (goliath I played once...)
(Were there others? Was BPC a Barbarian?)
- I am actually rather surprised how few we've played. Though Inky tends to make a big impression, so it feels like we've done more. They feel very strong, at least at low levels - able to soak up damage like nobody's business. But for some reason, we haven't made a lot of them up. We never did, really - but given how tough they are at low levels, it's a bit surprising.
• Bards
Nancy
Chet
Dallas
Buster
- We have run out some of these. I have, and David. I like bards: I'll come back to them when I talk about other classes, I think - but they are extraordinarily versatile. They can mix it up (Nancy was the brawler in the sneak-into-the-village thing we played); they can cast, and cast either offensively or support; they heal - they boost the party. We haven't always gotten to play the full personality possibilities of them, but there is that as well. They are very good, and I think they make other classes seem redundant.
• Clerics:
Claire
(Misty)
Luth
Opus
Geldon
- This is interesting. we started out with clerics, the way we always do - but lately, we've kind of stopped using them. You have to have someone back there to heal - but having discovered the joys of druids and bards, we've tended to drop clerics for them. Claire and Luth are almost characters we’re stuck with - if I hadn’t been playing and running, I would have made Claire into Nancy, I think - and I noticed the last time David needed a healer he made a bard (Buster). Bards and druids are more fun. On the other hand, there is Geldon - who is a real, memorable character - almost unheard of with clerics. Oliver did it by virtue of always being there - and Eugene did some of it by being evil - and Geldon manages it, entirely by the way Ryan plays him. At this point, I would imagine unless someone had a strong character concept for a cleric, we would almost always go with bards or druids, or even a paladin or ranger, over a cleric...
• Druids:
Boedicca
Dzurkha (played with Wendell and Holmes)
- Playing 2 druids past 3rd level is 2 more druids than we have played, period, in 35 years. Once you saw Boedicca in action, why would you want to play a cleric again? I admit, I don't know how this is likely to work out once they start shape-shifting and all that - because I don't know how that works, yet. But odds are, it just makes them that much more interesting.
• Fighter:
Bono
Angus
Queequeg
Wendell & Holmes (All right - Carvallon and Arness, however they are spelled)
Tuffy
Ildebrun
- We have certainly taken to our fighters. We've played a mob of them. They are the staple, of course - but they are worth it in this version. And though a couple other fighter types have made an impression (Inky and Violet), we haven't done a lot of that - we've defaulted to fighter and not regretted it. Here's the real thing: for one of the default classes - all those fighters we have are as well distinguished from each other as any kind of class has been. Bono is a two handed tactician; Angus is a brute; Quequeg is an eldritch knight; Tuffy's a straightforward two handed champion - almost a 4E dual wielding ranger build; Ildebrun is a straightforward enough brawler, but with interesting racial abilities; and David's eladrin are a two weapon fighter and a two handed fighter. They are all distinct, in their personalities, as far as we've played them - but tactically, as well - which is what fighters do. It's the class that, so far, has produced the widest range of styles and flavors - that's a fascinating development in itself. We didn't do that with fighters in the past - we've always favored rangers and paladins, and let fighters be simple sword and board men - they got something right here.
• Monk:
Ichi
(Someone else might have made one up, though I don’t remember.)
- Another class we never played much in the past. Some experimenting in 5E, not much more. We haven't done much here - might depend a bit on how things start developing, or if someone else tries one too. Ichi is promising (especially when I start getting his kensei powers) - we'll see.
• Paladins:
Atilla (in two versions)
Edge (briefly)
- Another one we haven't done a lot with, though they are fine as a class. Attila got a lot more interesting when I remade him into a goliath - Edge didn't really get time to develop. They are all right, though they don't really feel like paladins until second level.
• Thieves:
Bill
- This is the strangest thing. I might be forgetting someone, but I think Bill is the only thief we have played so far. We leaned on thieves heavily in 4E - Perry was one of the major characters there (the definitive 4, really: Oliver, Hank and Perry, and Theresa - Vjarne, Fighting Eagle, etc., came and went too much to be definitive like that). We loaded up on thieves, especially hybrid thieves - Nancy, Dermind, one or two of Jim’s hybrids, all had some thief in them. But in 5E, we have not used them at all - other than Bill, who is definitely second fiddle to Inky. I don’t know if this is the kind of dungeon we’ve played - as accident of wanting to try out other classes - or something else. But it is notable.
• Rangers:
Violet
(and BPC maybe?)
- Violet is a fine character - 5E version of Theresa, basically, with most of the same virtues. But she's the only one we've played (I think) - odd. We loved rangers in 1E (Geronimo being, you know, The Man, after all) - I loved them in 4E, to distraction. So why aren't we playing them now? I can see some reasons: the big one is that the reason for playing a ranger has been usurped a bit by both fighters and bards. Bards get the finesse fighting and spell casting and do it better than rangers; fighters let you specialize in archery or two handed fighting, and you get all those neat options fighters give you. There’s not a lot of evidence that a ranger would be better than either of those. It's hard to give up the spells of a bard or the options of a fighter to play a ranger.
• Sorcerers:
- I don’t think we have played a single sorcerer yet - not for more than a one off here or there. They may come eventually - they are like they have always been - they should be all right. But so far - again, they are hard to justify against a bard. They get more offense in their spells - but bards cast the same way,they can heal, and they are much better fighters - why not play a bard? Bards have replaced a lot of classes.
• Warlocks:
- Another one we haven't used, or have used very sparingly. (I vaguely remember trying one - maybe...) They seem like a lot of work, and it's hard to justify picking them over the other spell caster options.
• Wizards
Milo
Alexis
Spencer
Fred
- Wizards are very solid in this version. You get all the spells (though you have to make choices - but you can change your choices). They can blast, buff, control - they are good at it. I'm not sure they are all that exciting - at low levels, as usual, they are kind of afterthoughts - but once you get second level spells - and especially third - they start to be indispensable. Less personality maybe than they could have - but they are just way more useful. For what they do, they are still better at it than Bards (which I would not say for any other spell casters except druids.)
So there it is: what we play and what we don't play. We play lots of fighters, in a lot of different styles - we use wizards like we always have - we have used bards regularly - we had clerics, but have shifted toward druids and bards lately - and we've had a handful of memorable rangers, barbarians and so on, but not a lot of those characters. We have avoided sorcerers and warlocks completely - and have almost shockingly not run thieves.
Sunday, January 22, 2017
Gaming Ambitions for 2017
Welcome, 2017. I want to write a bit about things I want to do this year, related to gaming. Always optimistic, but I think circumstances may make more of this possible this year: it is something to aspire to at any rate.
1. The obvious thing is the play. Online, in person, the usual suspects, and if possible, getting involved in other games - anything. This as player, DM, both, either - just being involved in games, more often - as close tsoweekly as possible - is going to make my life a good deal happier.
2. I specifically want to run. I have three adventures pretty well worked out in my head - I have to get them on paper (or the computer) and run them. I've talked about these enough: there's the Fire Giant thing we've been poking at the last couple months, with the Bono/Inky/Milo party... There's a pirate/jungle adventure I have been working on, and have a good deal of material for... and I want to redo the House on the Cliff adventure for 5th edition. Some in person, some online - work out which is convenient, and get on with it.
3. Related to that - I want to develop these adventures, and try to turn them into something concrete. Into artifacts (as they like to say) - to write them up and put them in a tangible form, that can be shared. I would like to get into the habit of doing this - not just with my ideas, but other people's. Work on publishing (however modest an audience we might have for these materials.) The act of creating them is the goal - anything more is gravy.
4. I also want to develop the world of our games. I have been playing for 35 years and almost from the beginning, I started making up a world to ply in. I have a ton of material - maps and stories and history and social and cultural essays and information - that I have never quite managed to get from my head (and my computer and piles of paper) to somewhere other people can use them. (Other than a few posts here.) I want to do this partly just to get it into tangible form, to have done something - but also to make it possible to develop it, as a group. For all the info I have, the world is bigger than my ideas of what is in it - it would work better if we could all work on it together. Whether adding areas to the core - developing areas I have done nothing more than drawn and named - or filling in what's there - the more the merrier, I think.
(I was thinking about this playing Storm King's Thunder: I don't care much about the Forgotten Realms - I mentally translate all those published worlds to my own, fit the towns onto my maps, or - sometimes - just tack their maps onto my maps.) Doing that could help us get this game going - but only if you can build up some kind of world of your own that you have some investment in. I need to get this thing into a form that can, in fact, be worked with...)
5. I definitely need to blog more. I have to get a post in here every month at least - every week if I could... at some point, it might be worth changing this to something more public, too - linking out and interacting with other blogs. Maybe not this one, since this tends to be rather insular, a conversation about how to play, specific to what we are playing - but something like it. But to do that, I think I need to have the material, and keep producing material... We'll see. But I still need to write here more.
6. I would like to try to get some kind of audio-visual thing going. A podcast, a video blog, something - whether conversations about the game, or gamecasts, or something else. This is another thing I don't quite think I'm ready to unleash on the wide world, but I want to start doing something like this. Figure out the logistics, the technology, figure out what you have to do to make these things good - and practice them.
(This is one of the areas where work is not helping: because things like that do come up there - but the material is so mind-numbingly awful, and the kind of hypercriticism that has become the norm is so maddening, doing some kind of presentation at work ends up not teaching you to speak in public, but making the thought of speaking in public horrifying. Every time I do something like that, I think about what I want to be talking about, and it drives me nuts. So I have to find a way to start doing those things on a topic that interests me. Like - D&D!)
7. Finally, I need to write. Obviously, some of this is included in the comments above - I need to write up adventures, write up the world (in a shareable form), write for the blog - but I also have to write fiction. I always have, of course - but I have to do two things I have not done: 1) I have to actually finish something - this would be a miracle... 2) I have to do it more openly. NaNoWriMo did this - talking about my project and others was very satisfying - and very helpful in keeping the story moving forward. I didn't finish it, no surprises there, but I passed 50,000 without rewriting it four times - that's a step in the right direction all my itself. So - in short: I want to work on stories - and talk about them, both the writing process and the actual stories. (This, I should say, also relates the world building, since I am mainly talking about fiction set in this D&D world.)
And that is it - for now anyway. I could be really ambitious, start talking about all the things I want to do: Build Models! Publish! watch more video stuff! get involved in other people's games! - but that might be a bit much. If I can do the 7 things above - not well, or bringing anything to a conclusion, just doing them - that will be an excellent start, something to build on...
1. The obvious thing is the play. Online, in person, the usual suspects, and if possible, getting involved in other games - anything. This as player, DM, both, either - just being involved in games, more often - as close tsoweekly as possible - is going to make my life a good deal happier.
2. I specifically want to run. I have three adventures pretty well worked out in my head - I have to get them on paper (or the computer) and run them. I've talked about these enough: there's the Fire Giant thing we've been poking at the last couple months, with the Bono/Inky/Milo party... There's a pirate/jungle adventure I have been working on, and have a good deal of material for... and I want to redo the House on the Cliff adventure for 5th edition. Some in person, some online - work out which is convenient, and get on with it.
3. Related to that - I want to develop these adventures, and try to turn them into something concrete. Into artifacts (as they like to say) - to write them up and put them in a tangible form, that can be shared. I would like to get into the habit of doing this - not just with my ideas, but other people's. Work on publishing (however modest an audience we might have for these materials.) The act of creating them is the goal - anything more is gravy.
4. I also want to develop the world of our games. I have been playing for 35 years and almost from the beginning, I started making up a world to ply in. I have a ton of material - maps and stories and history and social and cultural essays and information - that I have never quite managed to get from my head (and my computer and piles of paper) to somewhere other people can use them. (Other than a few posts here.) I want to do this partly just to get it into tangible form, to have done something - but also to make it possible to develop it, as a group. For all the info I have, the world is bigger than my ideas of what is in it - it would work better if we could all work on it together. Whether adding areas to the core - developing areas I have done nothing more than drawn and named - or filling in what's there - the more the merrier, I think.
(I was thinking about this playing Storm King's Thunder: I don't care much about the Forgotten Realms - I mentally translate all those published worlds to my own, fit the towns onto my maps, or - sometimes - just tack their maps onto my maps.) Doing that could help us get this game going - but only if you can build up some kind of world of your own that you have some investment in. I need to get this thing into a form that can, in fact, be worked with...)
5. I definitely need to blog more. I have to get a post in here every month at least - every week if I could... at some point, it might be worth changing this to something more public, too - linking out and interacting with other blogs. Maybe not this one, since this tends to be rather insular, a conversation about how to play, specific to what we are playing - but something like it. But to do that, I think I need to have the material, and keep producing material... We'll see. But I still need to write here more.
6. I would like to try to get some kind of audio-visual thing going. A podcast, a video blog, something - whether conversations about the game, or gamecasts, or something else. This is another thing I don't quite think I'm ready to unleash on the wide world, but I want to start doing something like this. Figure out the logistics, the technology, figure out what you have to do to make these things good - and practice them.
(This is one of the areas where work is not helping: because things like that do come up there - but the material is so mind-numbingly awful, and the kind of hypercriticism that has become the norm is so maddening, doing some kind of presentation at work ends up not teaching you to speak in public, but making the thought of speaking in public horrifying. Every time I do something like that, I think about what I want to be talking about, and it drives me nuts. So I have to find a way to start doing those things on a topic that interests me. Like - D&D!)
7. Finally, I need to write. Obviously, some of this is included in the comments above - I need to write up adventures, write up the world (in a shareable form), write for the blog - but I also have to write fiction. I always have, of course - but I have to do two things I have not done: 1) I have to actually finish something - this would be a miracle... 2) I have to do it more openly. NaNoWriMo did this - talking about my project and others was very satisfying - and very helpful in keeping the story moving forward. I didn't finish it, no surprises there, but I passed 50,000 without rewriting it four times - that's a step in the right direction all my itself. So - in short: I want to work on stories - and talk about them, both the writing process and the actual stories. (This, I should say, also relates the world building, since I am mainly talking about fiction set in this D&D world.)
And that is it - for now anyway. I could be really ambitious, start talking about all the things I want to do: Build Models! Publish! watch more video stuff! get involved in other people's games! - but that might be a bit much. If I can do the 7 things above - not well, or bringing anything to a conclusion, just doing them - that will be an excellent start, something to build on...
Tuesday, December 13, 2016
The Unexpected
Running a game is hard. What I'm finding from trying Storm King's Thunder is a new lesson in difficulty!
I love the book. I think it has wonderful options, I'm a sucker for giants, and the scale is as large as the adversaries. Unfortunately, the scale is enormous, and it has a multitude of options... and it leaves the DM and players to choose them. I knew there were three possible giant attacks on towns to choose from for the second chapter, and expected each to explain the lay of the land, then say "this is what happens when the giants attack." I'm finding there's a big difference between "the giants attack" and "this is how to run the encounter when the giants attack." I was expecting the latter, and the gave me the former.
Just to make things more exciting, I thought we'd have a setup encounter or two this week, then face the town attack at the next session... with time to prepare. Our party bypassed the setup encounters with little incident or fanfare, and there we were in town, being awakened by a screaming drunk who'd seen looters.
I thought, "this was always a possibility, I'll just look over the instructions for running the encounter, and figure out a way to make it work as we go." That's when I noticed the instructions were essentially "the giants attack." Now, there was more to it. The giants attack in three locations, treated as separate encounters, and once two of them are thwarted, the third runs. And so on. But let's get real. This battle is set inside a walled settlement with an 8-10 mile radius from the town to the walls. How do you treat for scale? How do you account for town guards and militia? Do the five character have to defeat all 6 giants, 8 bugbears and 60 goblins, or will the guards help somehow?
I pulled it out, and it seemed to go well, but it felt like it could have been more, but I just don't know how. I tried to prepare encounters for the session, and they were avoided. I expected to have directions on running the printed encounter, and there were none.
That's the essence of running a game, though. Anticipating two or three possibilities and preparing for them in as much detail as you can, so all you need to do at the table is make it happen. Then, when everything goes sideways, scramble to pull something together from thin air and expectations.
This adventure is much more open in concept than I thought it would be, so I need to better prepare beforehand in order to be ready to improvise when called on to do so. That is fine, it's just important to know it needs to happen. I wasn't ready for that this week, but next week I will be. It is a fun setting, with tons of options, and it will be fun exploring them, bearing in mind that prepping will be needed.
I love the book. I think it has wonderful options, I'm a sucker for giants, and the scale is as large as the adversaries. Unfortunately, the scale is enormous, and it has a multitude of options... and it leaves the DM and players to choose them. I knew there were three possible giant attacks on towns to choose from for the second chapter, and expected each to explain the lay of the land, then say "this is what happens when the giants attack." I'm finding there's a big difference between "the giants attack" and "this is how to run the encounter when the giants attack." I was expecting the latter, and the gave me the former.
Just to make things more exciting, I thought we'd have a setup encounter or two this week, then face the town attack at the next session... with time to prepare. Our party bypassed the setup encounters with little incident or fanfare, and there we were in town, being awakened by a screaming drunk who'd seen looters.
I thought, "this was always a possibility, I'll just look over the instructions for running the encounter, and figure out a way to make it work as we go." That's when I noticed the instructions were essentially "the giants attack." Now, there was more to it. The giants attack in three locations, treated as separate encounters, and once two of them are thwarted, the third runs. And so on. But let's get real. This battle is set inside a walled settlement with an 8-10 mile radius from the town to the walls. How do you treat for scale? How do you account for town guards and militia? Do the five character have to defeat all 6 giants, 8 bugbears and 60 goblins, or will the guards help somehow?
I pulled it out, and it seemed to go well, but it felt like it could have been more, but I just don't know how. I tried to prepare encounters for the session, and they were avoided. I expected to have directions on running the printed encounter, and there were none.
That's the essence of running a game, though. Anticipating two or three possibilities and preparing for them in as much detail as you can, so all you need to do at the table is make it happen. Then, when everything goes sideways, scramble to pull something together from thin air and expectations.
This adventure is much more open in concept than I thought it would be, so I need to better prepare beforehand in order to be ready to improvise when called on to do so. That is fine, it's just important to know it needs to happen. I wasn't ready for that this week, but next week I will be. It is a fun setting, with tons of options, and it will be fun exploring them, bearing in mind that prepping will be needed.
Sunday, August 21, 2016
Playing Comments
Getting going on Roll 20 is a good idea - this is a chance to start playing regularly. Still seems to take longer than it should - I think a lot of that is just getting used to everything involved. we take a while to get started when we play in person; we're figuring out the logistics of the online site; figuring out the technology, and so on. It should smooth out and speed up with time.
Though even so: it didn't feel as long as it was yesterday. Once we got started, it rolled along pretty nicely. At least, I completely lost track of the time. I was actually surprised when Ryan said we'd been playing for 4 and and half hours - I had to look around, and notice it was getting dark... So we must be doing something right.
I think a big part of it was that main encounter. Probably the reason it took as long as it did, and why I didn't notice the time at all. It did take a long time to play, but for good reasons. We made plans - it didn't seem unusual at the time, but looking back on it, I can't help wonder how long it's been since we made plans before we charged into a fight? I don't know if we ever had the habit, but we've lost it lately. This time, though, we did. Not just plans, but plans aimed at avoiding the usual hack and slash stuff: create a distraction - grab a prisoner... All of which went off, more or less to plan. Not only that, but we used a much deeper pool of abilities than usual - the familiar - the grappling - the distracting spell (instead of the usual attack spells.) Attempts at stealth; critical failures. All very satisfying, especially now that we're done and I can think about it.
Finally - I'm very pleased with my character. I wanted to bring him in here because I want to play a bard, and this party seemed to need one, someone who can cast a little, fight a little, back the others up a little. And I wanted to play Chet Morton, bug gommy farm boy with a sharp tongue and a fondness for pranks.... I took tavern brawler for a feat because I thought it might be funny: Chet tackling people on the battlefield, that kind of thing. But having it, suggested the idea of grabbing an orc - and when we played it: damn - that's a cool ability. Collaring someone and dragging him off across the field? That feat lets you hit (with an improvised weapon or unarmed), then grapple as a bonus. There's no cost to hanging on to someone - so once you have them, you can pummel them, try to push them prone, attack someone else, grapple someone else, cast a spell - it has many applications. It's not a great way to do damage, I suppose - so it might not be so useful for a straight fighter, especially when you are fighting enemies who mean business - but it it a fine way to control the battle field. And the rules are, in fact, pretty straightforward. 5E has been bragging about making those rules usable - they did. And this one - unlike knocking someone prone or disarming them - brings immediate and obvious benefits to you and problems to them. I'm glad I stumbled onto that Tavern Brawler feat...
Though even so: it didn't feel as long as it was yesterday. Once we got started, it rolled along pretty nicely. At least, I completely lost track of the time. I was actually surprised when Ryan said we'd been playing for 4 and and half hours - I had to look around, and notice it was getting dark... So we must be doing something right.
I think a big part of it was that main encounter. Probably the reason it took as long as it did, and why I didn't notice the time at all. It did take a long time to play, but for good reasons. We made plans - it didn't seem unusual at the time, but looking back on it, I can't help wonder how long it's been since we made plans before we charged into a fight? I don't know if we ever had the habit, but we've lost it lately. This time, though, we did. Not just plans, but plans aimed at avoiding the usual hack and slash stuff: create a distraction - grab a prisoner... All of which went off, more or less to plan. Not only that, but we used a much deeper pool of abilities than usual - the familiar - the grappling - the distracting spell (instead of the usual attack spells.) Attempts at stealth; critical failures. All very satisfying, especially now that we're done and I can think about it.
Finally - I'm very pleased with my character. I wanted to bring him in here because I want to play a bard, and this party seemed to need one, someone who can cast a little, fight a little, back the others up a little. And I wanted to play Chet Morton, bug gommy farm boy with a sharp tongue and a fondness for pranks.... I took tavern brawler for a feat because I thought it might be funny: Chet tackling people on the battlefield, that kind of thing. But having it, suggested the idea of grabbing an orc - and when we played it: damn - that's a cool ability. Collaring someone and dragging him off across the field? That feat lets you hit (with an improvised weapon or unarmed), then grapple as a bonus. There's no cost to hanging on to someone - so once you have them, you can pummel them, try to push them prone, attack someone else, grapple someone else, cast a spell - it has many applications. It's not a great way to do damage, I suppose - so it might not be so useful for a straight fighter, especially when you are fighting enemies who mean business - but it it a fine way to control the battle field. And the rules are, in fact, pretty straightforward. 5E has been bragging about making those rules usable - they did. And this one - unlike knocking someone prone or disarming them - brings immediate and obvious benefits to you and problems to them. I'm glad I stumbled onto that Tavern Brawler feat...
Sunday, August 7, 2016
Mike Mearls on the Rules
I will put this up here: link from the Sage Advice tumbler (collecting D&D rules tweets) summarizing something Mearls' talked about at GenCon. Gist of it: that streaming and such have shifted the emphasis on game design from rules, and what people talk about in online discussion boards, to how games are played at a table.
It's intriguing, partly because of how it marks the changes in game design, but also in how it notes the changes in the internet's culture. Bulletin board-like things favor talking about the rules - how to build characters, how to exploit the rules - I can see that, skim through ENWorld - or back on the WOC forums, a place like Stack Exchange, and so on. People there talk about how to build better characters - not how to make a session flow, how to play an encounter and so on. But watching people play teaches you to play a different way (Mearls says) - true enough.
I am not all in on the new ways: I vastly prefer reading to watching, at least as far as people sitting around a table playing D&D goes - and I like the detailing you had back in 3E, to invent and work out characters. Though as Mearls mentions - that was ideal for inventing and detailing characters when you weren't playing. Playing - most of that stuff fades. If you get to playing right, you can do the things you had a skill check for in 3 without a huge amount of difficulty - you have the flexibility.
Anyway - a very nice summary of what they are thinking about with 5e, and the effects of changes in the internet, and the way people share their games online.
It's intriguing, partly because of how it marks the changes in game design, but also in how it notes the changes in the internet's culture. Bulletin board-like things favor talking about the rules - how to build characters, how to exploit the rules - I can see that, skim through ENWorld - or back on the WOC forums, a place like Stack Exchange, and so on. People there talk about how to build better characters - not how to make a session flow, how to play an encounter and so on. But watching people play teaches you to play a different way (Mearls says) - true enough.
I am not all in on the new ways: I vastly prefer reading to watching, at least as far as people sitting around a table playing D&D goes - and I like the detailing you had back in 3E, to invent and work out characters. Though as Mearls mentions - that was ideal for inventing and detailing characters when you weren't playing. Playing - most of that stuff fades. If you get to playing right, you can do the things you had a skill check for in 3 without a huge amount of difficulty - you have the flexibility.
Anyway - a very nice summary of what they are thinking about with 5e, and the effects of changes in the internet, and the way people share their games online.
Friday, July 8, 2016
Adventure Ideas
I have a couple, though they need some work. I have ideas for a dungeon crawl involving giants - well suited for the Bono/Milo/Inky crew, a bunch of bruisers as they are... I have some ideas about setting it up that I have to work on as well. I was thinking you could do a lot of background stuff by making up Information Cards - 3x5 cards with a fact or event or rumor or whatever written on them. You collect a bunch of them, then pass them out, when characters do something - when time passes, or they roll a check, or they look for something or ask a question. I think adventures turn into campaigns, and build character personality and so on by building the world around the adventure - building that stuff out is a way to do it. Though in the end - it's all to get that bunch to go fight giants and monsters and whatnot...
Another idea, that might work nicely on Roll20, would be a maritime adventure where everyone starts with Nothing. Basically the idea is - the PCs are all locked in the hold of a ship. They could get there different ways - maybe they are prisoners; maybe they are stowaways. They could be prisoners of pirates, they could be pirates themselves, they could be passengers on a ship, etc. The idea though would be that the ship they are on is taken by pirates - then caught in a storm, and abandoned by the crew, leaving the PCs trapped in the hold/brig etc. With no gear, no tools of their own, etc. They would have to get out of the hold, deal with whatever is left on the ship, maybe get to shore before it sinks, etc., while collecting the equipment they would need to operate.
That would be the starting point: once underway, it could stretch out into a full maritime themed adventure. Fighting pirates and sea creatures, searching for the people who locked them up maybe, getting involved in whatever intrigues they find. I think it has potential...
Another idea, that might work nicely on Roll20, would be a maritime adventure where everyone starts with Nothing. Basically the idea is - the PCs are all locked in the hold of a ship. They could get there different ways - maybe they are prisoners; maybe they are stowaways. They could be prisoners of pirates, they could be pirates themselves, they could be passengers on a ship, etc. The idea though would be that the ship they are on is taken by pirates - then caught in a storm, and abandoned by the crew, leaving the PCs trapped in the hold/brig etc. With no gear, no tools of their own, etc. They would have to get out of the hold, deal with whatever is left on the ship, maybe get to shore before it sinks, etc., while collecting the equipment they would need to operate.
That would be the starting point: once underway, it could stretch out into a full maritime themed adventure. Fighting pirates and sea creatures, searching for the people who locked them up maybe, getting involved in whatever intrigues they find. I think it has potential...
Sunday, June 26, 2016
New Dropbox files
I finally had a good breakthrough with my Character records for Filemaker, so I uploaded the files to Dropbox.
I figured out how to filter spells by class and level.
I figured out how to filter spells by class and level.
Sunday, June 12, 2016
Upcoming Giant Path
The Rod of Seven Parts. Is this something from the new book, or just something from Acquisitions, Inc.? It sounds like something that would fit with the story as previewed, and certainly would fit with an element I've been working on, so maybe we could use it. It would give us an element to design around in anticipation of the book. It would also give us an item to work into (as separate pieces) each of our adventures. And, a reason to bring the separate groups together down the road.
Saturday, April 9, 2016
Dropbox folder with useful files
I've finished combining spell card decks into one big file. I've put it on Dropbox with other files I've set up: a form-fillable PDF character sheet; the master spellbook; and individual class spell deck files. Anyway, the link is below if anyone is interested. I use documents to go to put the pdfs on my phone. The spellbook file works great there (its better in Adobe Reader, but you can open it in Reader once it is on the phone). I've got bookmarks in it for level and individual spell (alphabetically).
Dropbox folder link
Dropbox folder link
Sunday, March 13, 2016
Map Inventory 2
Not a bad idea: so here goes.
Paizo Flip Maps:
Bigger Tavern (Just broke down and bought this - very neat)
Ancient Dungeon
Thornkeep Set (2 maps: Enigma Vaults/Dark Menagerie & Forgotten Laboratory/Sanctum of a Lost Age)
Bandit Stronghold
Pathfinder Lodge
Town Square
Slum Quarter
Village Square
Red Light District
Seedy Tavern
Warehouse
Watch Station
Thieve's Guild
Monastery
Deep Forest
Pirate Island
Pirate Ship
Mountain Pass
Swamp
D&D Maps:
Shattered Keep set (3 flip maps)
Haunted Temples (3 maps)
Market Square/Griffen's Roost Inn
(Plus a couple of the real old ones, though I don't know where I put them.)
Map Packs - I have a lot of these, but they are all mixed up - not easy to inventory them. I know I have these:
Sea Caves
River System
Lost Island
Ambush Sites
Shops
Boats and Ships
Wizards Tower
Waterfront
(And a couple more I think...)
Other Sets:
Legend of Drizzt tiles
4 of the D&D Dungeon Command board game sets - Sting of Lolth, Heart of Comyr, Blood of Gruumsh & Tyranny of Golbins
2-3 of the tile sets: The city one for sure; probably Shadowghast manor; everything else is too jumbled to know what's there...
Paizo Flip Maps:
Bigger Tavern (Just broke down and bought this - very neat)
Ancient Dungeon
Thornkeep Set (2 maps: Enigma Vaults/Dark Menagerie & Forgotten Laboratory/Sanctum of a Lost Age)
Bandit Stronghold
Pathfinder Lodge
Town Square
Slum Quarter
Village Square
Red Light District
Seedy Tavern
Warehouse
Watch Station
Thieve's Guild
Monastery
Deep Forest
Pirate Island
Pirate Ship
Mountain Pass
Swamp
D&D Maps:
Shattered Keep set (3 flip maps)
Haunted Temples (3 maps)
Market Square/Griffen's Roost Inn
(Plus a couple of the real old ones, though I don't know where I put them.)
Map Packs - I have a lot of these, but they are all mixed up - not easy to inventory them. I know I have these:
Sea Caves
River System
Lost Island
Ambush Sites
Shops
Boats and Ships
Wizards Tower
Waterfront
(And a couple more I think...)
Other Sets:
Legend of Drizzt tiles
4 of the D&D Dungeon Command board game sets - Sting of Lolth, Heart of Comyr, Blood of Gruumsh & Tyranny of Golbins
2-3 of the tile sets: The city one for sure; probably Shadowghast manor; everything else is too jumbled to know what's there...
Wednesday, March 9, 2016
Map inventory
I've started a list of the maps I've got, so that maybe I won't keep trying to buy the same one. For Flip-Mats, we have Pirate Ship, Pub Crawl, Hill Country, Warehouse, Cathedral, Waterfront Tavern, Theater, Dungeon, Bandit Outpost, Flooded Dungeon, River Crossing, Wastelands, and Darklands.
I also have 7 Map Packs downloaded, Ancient Forest, Jungle, Boats & Ships, Waterfront, Magic Academy, Lost Island, and Dungeon Chambers. We also have two actual decks, Sea Caves and Graveyard.
I also have 7 Map Packs downloaded, Ancient Forest, Jungle, Boats & Ships, Waterfront, Magic Academy, Lost Island, and Dungeon Chambers. We also have two actual decks, Sea Caves and Graveyard.
Friday, January 15, 2016
Dungeon Masters Guild
I can't pretend that this isn't interesting, though I don't really know what it means: Dungeon Masters Guild announcement.
And the site: Dungeon Masters Guild.
And Open Game License updates as well.
And the site: Dungeon Masters Guild.
And Open Game License updates as well.
Thursday, January 7, 2016
Monster Etiquette
I've been thinking about play testing parts of the adventure I'm working on, and wondered about what approach a "monster" would take in a fight. They could be given any motivation, I suppose, but it struck me that they probably work better if they are more aggressive, hitting hard early.
I was really thinking about NPCs, and how they might be run differently than PCs. As a PC, there is a tendency to be conservative about powers, like spells and special abilities. We try to hang on to them, waiting for an optimum time to use them, or the right level of fear or desperation to strike. But if you run an NPC that way, with the quickness of most battles, you're likely to leave powers out there unused. It seems more likely that they'll blast you right off with a fireball, then run down their list doing as much damage as they can. It might be more logical for them to play like a PC, make defensive moves, wait for the right opportunity to exploit, but what fun is a Wizard NPC that dies without blasting off its carefully prepared spell list.
I guess there would be reason to be selective if you intended to use the character as a recurring NPC, but even then, unless you wanted to use it over and again during the course of one day, you could reload it however you wanted anyway between uses. It's hard to envision a situation where you wouldn't just let the party have everything you had from round one.
One balancing factor should be that a party of NPCs should match pretty evenly with a party of PCs, making them more difficult to overcome than an ordinary "monster" and allowing the fight to draw out, but they don't seem to play out that way often. I don't know if it is a question of mismatched party strength, say four 3rd level characters against three 2nd level NPCs, or underdeveloped NPCs, but my sense is that they resolve about as quickly as any fight. I think we have a tendency to fear harming our characters, and so underplay encounters to protect them from death or severe damage. I noticed myself being tempted to do this with Thomas' character, and had to remind myself that going to zero HP isn't fatal, it is unconsciousness.
Perhaps pulling the stops would open up the need for PCs to pull the stops on themselves as well, gobbling up resources to survive the fight and come out on top. That poses an interesting question: what if we ran a party of PCs against their own doppelgängers to see just how explosive a battle could be had? Prep potions, scrolls, etc., go in full on, and do everything to survive while destroying the opponent. We note how brief fights tend to be, but what if you had a balanced set of opponents, using every available resource to fight as long a battle as possible? How long could it go? How would it look after the typical two or three rounds?
Monday, December 21, 2015
Adventure Outlines
One way to use this blog is to work out the background to actual adventures we manage to play. Given schedules and such, actual game time can be scarce, and when we have it, we're likely to want to get into the meat of the adventure when we can. Fighting, exploring, doing stuff - reasonable enough. But this is a good forum to work on the rest of the campaign - to use real world downtime to build out the glue for the adventures we are playing.
So this weekend: the party went back into the mine, from above this time - found an old pit, an open shaft, with tunnels and works leading down into the mine from the other end from the main entrance they used before. They descended, and then found 3 ogres (or an ogre and 2 half ogres), accompanied by a flock of flying kobolds - they defeated this lot fairly easily. They got a wand of magic missiles from one of the half ogres, then found a stash of stuff the ogres had been keeping. They found a treasure pile with 1500 or so coins (30 pounds, more or less), plus various objects. They also found human parts, though nothing recognizable. They headed into the mines, but were confronted by a black pudding that they saw first, so they decided to go out the way they came.
That's where we left it - and probably fairly complete unto itself. They still have options - to keep looting the mines, if they were of a mind to continue; or to go back to town and get their reward (assuming they can convince the family and/or the law that they have the leg of Black Bart.) Or - other possibilities, depending on what they have a mind to do.
In general - there are many stories lurking in this area: the pirates could use dealing with, and might be at Clamdigger Cove. There are factions in the area who would be trying to get a strong party like this one is proving to be to help them with various schemes - from fighting pirates to fighting each other. The pirates themselves are always looking for men. And the general lawlessness of the area would encourage new groups of monsters to infest the place. Once word gets around that someone has killed off the orcs living in the mine, there are likely to be other monster groups looking to give it a try for themselves.
So this weekend: the party went back into the mine, from above this time - found an old pit, an open shaft, with tunnels and works leading down into the mine from the other end from the main entrance they used before. They descended, and then found 3 ogres (or an ogre and 2 half ogres), accompanied by a flock of flying kobolds - they defeated this lot fairly easily. They got a wand of magic missiles from one of the half ogres, then found a stash of stuff the ogres had been keeping. They found a treasure pile with 1500 or so coins (30 pounds, more or less), plus various objects. They also found human parts, though nothing recognizable. They headed into the mines, but were confronted by a black pudding that they saw first, so they decided to go out the way they came.
That's where we left it - and probably fairly complete unto itself. They still have options - to keep looting the mines, if they were of a mind to continue; or to go back to town and get their reward (assuming they can convince the family and/or the law that they have the leg of Black Bart.) Or - other possibilities, depending on what they have a mind to do.
In general - there are many stories lurking in this area: the pirates could use dealing with, and might be at Clamdigger Cove. There are factions in the area who would be trying to get a strong party like this one is proving to be to help them with various schemes - from fighting pirates to fighting each other. The pirates themselves are always looking for men. And the general lawlessness of the area would encourage new groups of monsters to infest the place. Once word gets around that someone has killed off the orcs living in the mine, there are likely to be other monster groups looking to give it a try for themselves.
Wednesday, December 16, 2015
Unique Treasure
One of the things I find both a little disappointing and maybe inviting, from a world building perspective, is the rather poor selection of items in 5E D&D. I can see they are trying to rein in the crazy magic of some of the previous versions, and simplify the rules and mechanics of fighting and such - but one of the side effects is that there is a fairly small list of weapon and armor types. If you want to limit magic, but still offer interesting things for people to find, it starts to be hard to do. You can work in expensive items - pate mail armor is obvious (which is why I made a set of plate one of the main parts of the treasure when we went into the dwarf mines), but it's one of the few items that works that way. There are ways - silvered weapons work - you can offer things that are particularly well made, which are more expensive. But they don't have mechanical advantages. A set of gilded armor might be worth 5 times as much as a regular set - but doesn't protect you any more. (Silver, at least, gives you the ability to hit some things - lycanthropes, some undead, and so on.)
So the challenge is to find things that are interesting for people to find, or carry. You can do some of it by giving things histories - names for swords or daggers, or stories behind them ("this is the sword carried by Lord Seamus McGlue at the battle of Old Navy"), or details and ornamentations. Those things create a sense of detail in the world - they don't really give any mechanical advantages, and that's a bit disappointing. I wish there were rules for things like masterwork weapons (from 3E) - or for more variation in weaponry. A way to distinguish a scimitar from a cutlass, a broadsword from a longsword, or rules to use all the 50 varieties of polearms some of the older books described. There may be ways to do some of this - distinguish a throwing dagger from a stabbing one, say - creating a non-magical +1 for a throwing dagger maybe (balanced by something like, -1 damage when not thrown; something like that.)
It's something to think about. And another thing to think about might be working out more story hooks for objects. Not always with weapons - but maybe there are repercussions to wearing a cloak or suit of armor that once belonged to Lord Seamus McGlue. There is some room in the DMG for things like works of art - some of that could be interesting. I poked at this a bit - the magic dagger belonging to the dead magic user, that is an heirloom, worth more for its place in their family than as a magic weapon. And there is Inky's suit of armor - which promises something, somewhere along the line. It's all something to work on.
So the challenge is to find things that are interesting for people to find, or carry. You can do some of it by giving things histories - names for swords or daggers, or stories behind them ("this is the sword carried by Lord Seamus McGlue at the battle of Old Navy"), or details and ornamentations. Those things create a sense of detail in the world - they don't really give any mechanical advantages, and that's a bit disappointing. I wish there were rules for things like masterwork weapons (from 3E) - or for more variation in weaponry. A way to distinguish a scimitar from a cutlass, a broadsword from a longsword, or rules to use all the 50 varieties of polearms some of the older books described. There may be ways to do some of this - distinguish a throwing dagger from a stabbing one, say - creating a non-magical +1 for a throwing dagger maybe (balanced by something like, -1 damage when not thrown; something like that.)
It's something to think about. And another thing to think about might be working out more story hooks for objects. Not always with weapons - but maybe there are repercussions to wearing a cloak or suit of armor that once belonged to Lord Seamus McGlue. There is some room in the DMG for things like works of art - some of that could be interesting. I poked at this a bit - the magic dagger belonging to the dead magic user, that is an heirloom, worth more for its place in their family than as a magic weapon. And there is Inky's suit of armor - which promises something, somewhere along the line. It's all something to work on.
Monday, December 14, 2015
Party Names
This is just something that occurs to me - something that should be easy, but for some reason is not. Adventuring bands, when they work together for a while, or when they have pretensions of importance, or when people get the fear of them, or they do great deeds - should get names. Mercenary companies used to have names - The White Company; The Varangian Guards or the Swiss Guards; down to the Flying Tigers or Blackwater - they still do have cool names. Gangs too - Crips and Bloods and The Firm, the Winter Hill Gang, Cosa Nostra, ISIS. Fiction of course does this nicely - Robin Hood and his Merry Men... the Order of the Phoenix.. the Second Sons... The thieves guild of Waynesburg comes off kind of bland. I came up with a bunch of gang names for Waynesburg, somewhere along the line - street gangs, rivals to the guild, these were: The Green Boys, the Yellowjackets, The Crimson Daggers, the Blood and Guts...
Adventuring associations should do something like that too - either naturally, because they have been going it awhile, or, probably, because someone wants to give himself airs. It's something to think about. Like a ship's name - you need your NPCs and outlaw bands to have some kind of identity. A lot of this, I think, is what ends up creating a sense of continuity in a setting - the interrelated groups, some official, some outsiders, everything in between.
Though for some reason it's hard to do, for me. I think it tends to come in bunches - you wrestle and struggle, then a flood of names come, just like that. Like when I was kid, and made up band names - sometimes it was hard - then sometimes you come up with 20 in a study hall. Anyway - it's a little detail I want to try to work into the game more - into the campaigns. Along with things like pirate ships - villages and village leaders - NPC parties as such - lords and their lands - guilds and their names - and so on.
Adventuring associations should do something like that too - either naturally, because they have been going it awhile, or, probably, because someone wants to give himself airs. It's something to think about. Like a ship's name - you need your NPCs and outlaw bands to have some kind of identity. A lot of this, I think, is what ends up creating a sense of continuity in a setting - the interrelated groups, some official, some outsiders, everything in between.
Though for some reason it's hard to do, for me. I think it tends to come in bunches - you wrestle and struggle, then a flood of names come, just like that. Like when I was kid, and made up band names - sometimes it was hard - then sometimes you come up with 20 in a study hall. Anyway - it's a little detail I want to try to work into the game more - into the campaigns. Along with things like pirate ships - villages and village leaders - NPC parties as such - lords and their lands - guilds and their names - and so on.
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