#3.5 gnomes could talk to this

[lichlab]

One D&D: Expert Classes (Rogue Opinions)

Once again organizing my thoughts on the One D&D playtest, this time looking at rogues.

There's a lot I can say about rogues. I was a rogue in a 3.5 campaign. I was a gnome, who used magic to make myself tiny (with an amulet that let me fly). My daggers did 1 damage but the sneak attack more than made up for it. I had more skills than I knew what to do with so I got very good at Performance (Ventriloquism) and got a lot of mileage out of that. I remember that time very fondly.

I've also been a DM in most campaigns I've been involved with and any DM will tell you that no one will cause you more headaches than rogues (except for druids. I fear druids above all else). That's just part of the dynamic. The rogue wants to do something insane. You reluctantly allow them to roll for it, setting an unreasonably high DC. They succeed anyway and you have to live with it. That's D&D.

Anecdotally you do seem to run into a lot of problem players in the rogue class. I think a lot of them heard stories about wild shit rogues did and try to force it and just become a problem for everyone. You don't have to force it. Let it happen naturally. Don't try to be "that guy."

Rogues are the class DMs love to hate. We're natural enemies, locked in an eternal struggle until the end of time. I say all of this with love. I'm married to someone who always takes at least a couple rogue levels. They just can't help it.

Rogues have also historically been one of the "best" classes. Sneak attack means you can do a mountain of damage very consistently. Having a lot of skills (and extra bonuses to them) mean you have a lot of options in exploration and social encounters that others don't. They also tend to have a lot of defensive abilities that make it hard to punish them for their sins. (DM tip: give your bad guys the Sentinel and Alert feats.)

I don't talk about balance a lot because balance in a cooperative game is a tricky issue. Every class should be very good at doing what it's intended to do. Where things get tricky is when one class is too good at too many things, which leaves the rest of the party with fewer opportunities to be the star. I don't think that's inherently a problem with rogues, but it's something to watch out for.

So, all that said, let's look at some of the changes here.

Sneak Attack

There's a slight tweak to Sneak Attack that you might miss if you don't read it carefully. (I missed it the first time and only saw it because I saw some babies crying about it.)

There's a lot of different language here but the only substantial difference is that in the original version, you could use sneak attack on any attack roll once per turn. In the new version you can only do sneak attack damage when you take the Attack Action; which means that (unlike previously) you can't do that extra damage if you attack with a reaction or bonus action.

Personally I don't really see the need for this. In the live system, if you miss your Attack you still have some opportunities if you can attack with a bonus action or a reaction. I don't really think anyone benefits by taking that away. It's not as devastating as I've seen some people on Twitter insisting, but it does seem unnecessary.

Cunning Action

Cunning Action is the bane of many DMs (and I do say that in a loving way). It hasn't changed, but there are some slight tweaks to the dash and hide actions which are worth looking at.

While both the old and new versions of Dash mean effectively the same thing (outside of perhaps some carefully orchestrated edge cases) the new language is much cleaner and simpler.

Hiding gets a bit of an overhaul here.

Hiding has always been kind of a mess, and I've heard a lot of arguments over it. (A lot of would-be rules lawyers like to forget that first line "The DM decides when circumstances are appropriate for hiding.") It's kind of a messy process that relies a lot on interpretation, roleplaying, and what kind of mood your DM is in. The new rules try to simplify that.

So in the playtest version, you take the Hide Action to gain the Hidden condition. That's definitely simpler and cleaner. There are very clear circumstances under which you can take the Hide action, and it's spelled out very clearly what benefits the Hidden condition grants you.

Now, I don't like every part of this. Setting the Stealth DC for hiding at a flat 15 means that enemies the Perception skill of most enemies will be irrelevant. Maybe that's something they want to phase out. If so, I'm not a fan of it. Knowing that you're going up against more perceptive enemies changes your approach. You might be confident that you can creep past a group of dwarven miners; less confident if it's wood elf rangers who probably have Expertise in Perception. I feel like setting the DC at a flat 15 takes some important tools away from the DM and also makes it less rewarding to have extremely high stealth scores. If a 15 is the same as a 25, that insanely high roll doesn't feel nearly as good.

As far as the actual effects of the Hidden condition, I think I need to actually see those in action before I have a firm opinion on them. I also think a lot of rogues are going to struggle with the concept of "you have to have 3/4ths cover", and the arguments over what exactly that means.

Other Features

Most of the Rogue's features are the same. There are some minor tweaks in the language and some come at slightly higher levels but they still have all the staples. Uncanny Dodge, Evasion, Reliable Talent, Slippery Mind, and Elusive all remain. Slippery Mind even gets more powerful, giving you proficiency in Wisdom AND Charisma saving throws (instead of only Wisdom). The new Subtle Strikes feature is nice; everyone loves having advantage on most attack rolls.

Overall there are very few changes here. The tweaks are minor, outside of an overhaul to how hiding works (which is not specific to rogues). It feels like the design team was pretty happy with where rogues already were and didn't change much.

Thief Subclass

We also get a look at the thief subclass. The new version is distinctly superior to the old, and it looks like a lot more fun.

The new version of Second-Story work is cleaner and more potent. The new Supreme Sneak is also stronger, and you get it sooner.

The new Thief's Reflexes is definitely weaker than the old version (getting a second Bonus Action instead of an entire second turn) but that makes sense given that it comes at a lower level. I promise any rogue worth their salt will make that bonus action feel like a full turn.

What I really love here is the Use Magic Device feature. I adore the idea of a rogue who has stolen so much magical garbage they can mumble their way through a scroll or squeeze some extra juice out of a wand. It delights me.

Summary

There are some small changes here that I'm sure children on Twitter are whining loudly about. They're small changes, I promise. You'll be fine. You'll still get Sneak Attack most of the time; it's an unnecessary change but not a game ender. Some things are shifted around to different levels. None of that is a big deal.

The only thing here I have a real issue with is the Hide action and that flat DC 15. The more I think about it (and talk about it with my rogue spouse) the worse I like it. If I had to pick any one change to veto here, that would be it.

#d&d #one dnd

[redjennies]

What are your CR3 class/race/background picks ?

to be honest I do not think about D&D race literally at all. I have mostly played my dad's weird mix of 1e and 2e (as a kid) and 3.5 (as a teen/young adult) and so while I've played some archetypes like halfling rogue and gnome artificer and elven ranger, most characters I've played at any length have been human because like older editions were just set up in a way where playing humans was kind of the obvious choice. so now when I build characters for 5e, race is like an afterthought. I always go for class/subclass, a general idea of personality, and then whatever race I think (usually mechanically) complements what I've already created.

that being said here's some things I would like to see:

@captainofthetidesbreath has a very good post about a dual wield ranger build that I wholly support because fuck each and every single one of the haters of this class, I love rangers.

someone starts as a paladin because I also love paladins. @hit-it-or-crit-it already also has a very good post about how they would like to see an oath of redemption paladin of Avandra which I also very much like

I think Marisha would make a good paladin. I think Marisha has paladin energy as a person, but at this point I'm begging literally anyone to start as a paladin.

honestly Avandra is the sexiest god in the setting and I'd just like to see anyone follow her even if it's not tied to their class/subclass (like Mollymauk and the Moonweaver)

i would actually like to see another fighter over say another barbarian or rogue because I am of the opinion that this class is criminally underrated. it's super versatile. like I'm sorry but action surge is hot. Percy was hot even without the guns. I am a simple bisexual who thinks fighty people sexy.

shit let's get an echo knight up in here I don't care if it's another continent. give me Sam playing an eldritch knight. give me Marisha playing a rune knight. give me Travis jousting on a horse as a cavalier.

I realize most of what I am saying is swordy people, but shut up I like melee classes.

Liam should be The Cleric™.

regardless of class I think Laura could be a very hot melee fighty lady. she hasn't done it yet and I know she likes doing the lots of damage and anything with multiple attacks will be a plus for her. (honestly I think while Jester is iconic and Laura played her very well, cleric was just a bad choice for how Laura enjoys the game.)

I do not want a sorcerer. I cannot stress how much I do not want a sorcerer. I just don't really care for them and I cannot for the life of me explain why. I only liked Dariax as much as I did because Matt's young/dopey/halfling voice is so cute.

if we must have a rogue, I think it should be Travis. let him be a little gruff, a little streetwise, a little dexy, a little salt and pepper around the ears. wait what were we talking about?

#it's like 2 am but these are my thoughts #asks

[dmsden]

A History Lesson - Looking back at D&D’s history

Hullo, Gentle Readers. Well, this is the 5th Monday in March, and that means I get to write about anything I want! It’s also my birth month, which means it’s my anniversary of getting into D&D (42 years!), and that has me feeling nostalgic. Coupled with a discussion I had recently with some friends, I thought it would be fun to look back at the various editions of D&D and give you all a bit of history. I’m not going to get into Gygax vs Arneson or any of that. I’m only talking about the published game itself, not its creators or its storied origins.

The original D&D (or OD&D as it’s sometimes called) came in a small box. It had three booklets inside - Men & Magic, Monsters & Treasure, and The Underworld & Wilderness Adventures - along with reference sheets and dice. Each was softcover and roughly the same dimensions as a DVD/BluRay case. The game was pretty rudimentary - for one thing, it assumed you already had a copy of Chainmail, D&D’s direct wargame predecessor. It also recommended you have a game called Outdoor Survival for purposes of traveling through the wilderness. It had only three classes - fighting man, magic-user, and cleric - and nothing about playing other races. It did have the insane charts that 1st edition would ultimately known for, and it was possible to play a pretty fun game of D&D with it, as its popularity would come to show.

The game expanded through similar chapbooks - Greyhawk, Blackmoor, Eldritch Wizardry, Gods Demigods & Heroes, Swords & Spells. With the exception of the last one, each brought new facets to the game - new classes like Thief and Monk, new spells, new threats. It was clear the game was going to need an overhaul, and it got one.

I consider this overhaul to yield the real “1st Edition”, as so much of the game didn’t exist in those original games. The game split into a “Basic” game, just called Dungeons & Dragons and Advanced Dungeons & Dragons.

The basic game was a boxed set that included a rulebook, a full adventure module, and dice...or, well, it was supposed to contain dice. The game was so popular and new in those days that demand for dice outstripped production. My copy of D&D came with a coupon for dice when they became available and a sheet of “chits” - laminated numbers meant to be put into cups (we used Dixie Cups with the name of the die written on it), shaken, and a random number pulled out without looking. It was meant to introduce new players to the game, so it was a trimmed down version. Races were human, elf, dwarf, and halfling, and classes were fighter, cleric, magic-user, and thief. The box only included rules for going up to 3rd level, with the intention that players would then graduate into AD&D. This is where I joined, with the old blue cover box set and In Search of the Unknown, before Keep on the Borderlands even existed.

AD&D was the game in its full glory. Along with the races I mention above, we got half-elves, half-orcs, and gnomes. The four basic classes also had sub-classes, like paladin and ranger for the fighter, druid for the cleric, illusionist for the wizard, and assassin for the thief. There were rules for multi-classing, as well as “Dual-classing”, a sort of multi-class variation for humans only, which, when done in the correct combination, could yield the infamous bard...which didn’t actually yield any bard abilities until around level 13 or so.

This edition had 5 different saving throws for things like “Death Magic”, “Petrification & Polymorph”, “Spells”, and so on. It had the infamous Armor Class system that started at 10 and went down, so that having a -3 AC was very good!  It also had specific attack matricies for each class; you would literally look on a table to determine the number you needed to roll on a D20 based on your class, your level, and your opponent’s armor class. It was fun, but it was very complicated.

It also had some, frankly, shitty rules. There was gender disparity in terms of attributes, which my group totally ignored. Because the game designers wanted humans to be a competitive the game, and because non-humans had so many abilities and could multiclass, non-humans were severely limited in the levels they could achieve in most classes. In fact, some classes, such as monk and paladin, were restricted only to humans.

As the years went on, things got a bit muddled. It probably didn’t help that the rules in Basic D&D and AD&D didn’t perfectly line up. In D&D, the worst armor class was a 9. In AD&D, the worst armor class was a 10. All of this led to an overhaul, but not one considered a separate edition. AD&D mostly got new covers and new books, like the Wilderness Survival Guide and Dungeon Survival Guide, Monster Manual 2, and the Manual of the Planes. It got a number of new settings, too. In addition to the default Greyhawk setting, we got the Forgotten Realms setting for the first time, details of which had been appearing in Dragon Magazine for years, thanks to the prolific Ed Greenwood. We also, eventually, got the whole Dragonlance saga, which yielded the setting of Krynn.

In this new version, Basic D&D broke off into its own game system to some degree. Elf, Dwarf, and Halfling started being treated like classes rather than races, with specific abilities at different levels. Higher level characters could be created using progressive boxes - Expert, Companion, Master, and Immortal, each with its own boxed set and supported by Mystara, a completely different setting that got its own updates over the years. It was odd, because D&D essentially was competing for players with AD&D, and I remember arguments with friends over which version was better (I was firmly in the AD&D camp.)

In 1989, when I was in college, they finally brought forth 2nd edition D&D. This streamlined things a little. Armor Class still went down, but now attack rolls boiled into a single number called To Hit Armor Class 0, or THAC0. It made the whole process of figuring out what you needed to roll a bit less cumbersome, but it was still a bit awkward. The classes got a lot of overhaul, including making Bard its own core class. But what I remember best about 2nd edition was the boom in settings. This was the age of settings, and many beloved ones got started, including Dark Sun, Planescape, Ravenloft, and Spelljammer.

It was also the age of the “Complete Handbooks”. They brought out splatbooks about every class and race in the game, as well as books expanding several concepts for the DM, such as the Arms & Equipment Guide, the Castle Guide, and the Complete Book of Villains. There were also splatbooks about running D&D in historic periods, such as Ancient Rome, among the ancient Celts, or during the time of the Musketeers. The game got new covers for the rule books again, and a bunch of books about options started coming out. It was a boom time for books, but many people complained there was too much.

Without going too deep, TSR ended up in severe financial troubles. They declared bankruptcy, and there was real fear of the game going away. And then Wizards of the Coast (WotC) stepped in. They helped TSR get back onto its feet, and they helped produce some modules specifically engineered to help DM’s bring an end to their campaign...possibly even their whole campaign world...because something big was coming.

That something big was, of course, 3rd edition D&D. The game got majorly streamlined, and many sacred cows ended up as hamburger. AC finally started going up instead of down. Everything was refined to the “D20″ system we’ve been playing ever since. Races could be any class. There were no level or stat limits for anyone. After years of the game being forced into tight little boxes, it really felt like we could breathe. I had stopped playing D&D, but 3rd edition brought me back into the fold. I often say that 3E was made for the players who’d felt constricted and wanted more flexibility.

The trouble with 3E, and its successor 3.5, is that it was still a dense and difficult game for newcomers to get into. It’s been acknowledged that D&D essentially created many of the systems we see and know in other games - experience points, leveling up, hit points, etc. But trying to break into the experience for the first time was difficult. The look of 3E was gorgeous, but I understood that it must seem awfully daunting to someone who’d never played.

4E and its follow-up, Essentials, was an attempt to course correct that. They tried to make this edition incredibly friendly to new DMs, and, frankly, they succeeded. By creating player classes and monsters and magic-items that were all very plug and play, they did a great job of creating a game that someone who had never DMed before could dive into with no experience or mentor and start a game pretty easily. Encounter design was given a lot of ease, and there were promises of a robust online tool system that would help out with many of the more tedious aspects of playing.

There was also a lot of shake up in terms of choices. Suddenly, new classes and races were proliferating like crazy. We got the dragonborn, the tiefling, and the eladrin right in the core book, but we said good-bye to the gnome and half-orc at first. Suddenly the warlock was the new class everyone wanted to try. We got paragon paths and epic destinies that would really shape a character as time went on. The game went very tactical, as well, which some of us loved. The concept of rituals came into the game. Later books like the Player’s Handbook 2 and 3 gave us back gnomes and half-orcs, and also gave us minotaurs, wilden, shardminds, and githzerai. We got new psionic classes, brand new class concepts like the Runeknight and the Seeker...

But there was a tremendous backlash. People felt that, in making the game so very plug and play, they’d taken a ton of choice away from the players. Without the tools (which were never that robust, frankly), it was almost impossible to navigate the massive panoply of options. And, worse, it was harder and harder to develop encounters without those tools. People complained that the game had gone more tactical in order to sell miniatures and battlemats. Given that I have never played the game without miniatures and battlemats (since I started in the days when D&D was still half-wargame), I found this odd, but I also understand my style of play isn’t everyone’s.

The one argument I will never understand is that it didn’t “feel” like D&D, or it was somehow ONLY a tactical game and not a role-playing game any more. Again, given that the original game didn’t even call itself a role-playing game, this felt odd. Personally, I roleplay no matter what game I’m playing. If I’m playing Monopoly, I’m roleplaying, doing voices, and pretending to be something I’m not. I honestly enjoyed 4E, and I know a lot of folks who did, too. A lot of it may simply come down to style of play. But I also enjoyed all the games that came before, including Pathfinder. To paraphrase the YouTube content creator The Dungeon Bastard, “Does your game have dungeons? Does it have dragons? Great. I wanna play.”

As a sidenote, in the months leading up to 4E’s release, a lot of internet videos were released by WotC emphasizing the nature of change and talking about differences in the rules. They also released some preview books showing the direction they were heading. WotC must have anticipated that people were going to find this edition very different indeed. They also cleverly brought in some very funny folks - Scott Kurtz from PVPOnline and Jerry Holkins & Mike Krahulik from Penny Arcade - and got them to play D&D for podcasting purposes. Looking back, this must’ve brought in a lot of listeners who might never have played D&D and given them a reason to try it out.

After its release, WotC clearly noted that missteps had been made, as this edition of the game was losing them players. They began work on what they referred to as D&D Next, and, this time, they did massive amounts of playtesting, some of which I participated in.

I don’t feel like I have to describe 5E to any of you, Dear Readers, as you could go to virtually any store and pick it up. I am a big fan of 5E’s simplicity and elegance, and I suspect this is the edition of D&D we’re going to have for some time to come, especially given its popularity. Given the effect of podcasts like Critical Role (and I might save an article on Critical Role’s importance to D&D until my next Freestyle article), D&D is likely more popular now than it’s ever been, with a much wider and more diverse audience than ever before.

I know I’m painting with broad strokes here, but I hope this was, at least, entertaining, and maybe you learned something, Gentle Readers. Until we next meet, may all your 20s be natural.

[thetownsendsw]

Predictions for Critical Role Campaign III

The Mighty Nein’s adventure is coming to a climax ladies and gentlemen, and that means a whole new world is on the way! Campaign 3 should be on the horizon in the coming months, and we’ve all got our assumptions about who and what the cast will want to play next. So, I thought it was time to put up my predictions for Campaign 3 class choices.

In order of current seating arrangement:

Travis: Fjord was very much him dipping his toe into spellcasting, Warlocks being a good intro class. We’ve seen him try out a couple other options in one shots (and firmly reject the very concept of Wizards) and my money’s on a Cleric for C3. It was an option he considered for C2, I think he’ll enjoy playing a somewhat worldlier character, and the healer roll suits him, since even as Grog a lot of his turns were “I run 50 feet and dump a potion down someone’s throat.” Definitely he’ll be one of the beefier Domains, something with armor and weapon proficiencies, just to start out with a tanky vibe. (On the other hand, maybe he’ll go Artificer just to complete the triad of “fucks with cursed swords” “powered by cursed swords” “makes cursed swords!” (Forge Cleric might be a good middle ground?))

Laura: She outright said in a Talks that she “doesn’t wanna play a Paladin,” which is a shame really because I think the class would suit her. It’s got that tanky hit-things-and-they-die vibe you can tell she’s eager for, and it’s got that high-charisma face-of-the-party deal that you can tell she really enjoyed with Vex. But, unless Fjord’s occasional smites in the back half of this campaign have changed her mind, smart money’s on Barbarian. Like I said, hit-things-and-they-die, plus most of her one-shot xtrs have leaned toward dumb brutes. Mamma wants to SMASH. (also, the look on her husband’s face when she says “I would like to Rage” will be adorable and we all know it)

Liam: Liam has apparently said he wants to go through all the “classic” D&D classes, which he’s kinda done through post-VM oneshots, but probably he wants to explore each over a whole campaign. So just for the sake of contrast, I’m gonna say Fighter. It’ll be a cycle, you see: first a Rogue who “doesn’t know shit about magic,” then a Wizard who “is not physically capable,” a Fighter who “doesn’t know shit about the Gods,” and lastly a Cleric who “is not stealthy.”

Sam: Sam and Liam have made it clear that Liam picked Sam’s new race and class, meaning we could go anywhere with this one, but I think it’s a fair shot that Liam pulled the same “you should have some of this same fun I just had” as last time, and demand a Wizard. Besides, Sam has said he misses the musical aspect of Scanlan, and Wizards boast the only explicitly musical non-bard class in the game: the Bladesinger. I’ll also say (and I don’t even know if Sam or Liam are aware they’ve been doing this) if Sam’s tradition stays up of playing what in 3.5 were “favored” race-class combinations, (gnome bard, goblin & halfling rogue) means he might very well be an Elf.

Ashley: She’s the hardest to get a read on, but given that she’s played two characters so far with very different connections to the divine, I really hope she plays a Warlock. Honestly, given the sheer love Matt’s clearly put into Fjord’s arc this last campaign, I feel like someone’s always gonna want to be some kind of Warlock from now on, but maybe this is me enjoying the drama more than they do…

Taliesin: He’s gonna be a Rogue. After his reaction to the Critmass oneshot, and the Owlbear, he’s going Rogue. He’s gonna be an oddly wholesome gothy edgelord about it, and we’re all gonna have a good time.

Marisha: Early on in C2 I thought “She’s really enjoying the physicality of Beau, she’ll probably be a Rogue next season.” But after seeing her rage a bit against Beau’s lack of utility, and re-watching Campaign 1 and seeing how much she liked futzing with Keyleth’s spells (“But what if I cast it like this?”) I think she’s gonna go Sorcerer. She’s gonna homebrew some metamagic options, she’s gonna finally play someone with social skills, she’s gonna have a good time.

Aside from that, my big hope for C3 is that we get more character connections out of the gate. This campaign it always felt like nobody knew who the hell anybody else was, when these long-established relationships from C1 (the twins, Grog and Pike being these odd couple adoptive siblings) were so much fun! I don’t need it to be quite the same, honestly what I’d really hope for is a parent-child relationship. Imagine the jokes if Sam is Marisha’s dad…

#critical role #critical role spoilers #crit role #mathew mercer #cr campaign 2 #cr campaign one #cr campaign 3 #just to recap: #travis willingham #cleric #laura bailey #barbarian #liam o'brien #fighter #sam riegel #wizard #bladesinger #ashley johnson #warlock #maybe? #taliesin jaffe #rogue #marisha ray #sorcerer #I reserve the right to be dead wrong #watch it be an all monk campaign #matt searching dnd beyond for anything immune to stun

[spaceorphanssecondbreakfastclub]

SO’s January Reads

Hey guys! So, one of the things I want to do with the blog is talk about the books I’ve read over the past month.  Not only will it keep me reading, but maybe someone will find a new book to check out!  I’m going to try to do these regularly, posting on the last Sunday of the month.  

January Reads: 

Title: House in the Cerulean Sea Author: TJ Klune Genre: Fiction; Fantasy

Goodreads Summary:  A magical island. A dangerous task. A burning secret. Linus Baker leads a quiet, solitary life. At forty, he lives in a tiny house with a devious cat and his old records. As a Case Worker at the Department in Charge Of Magical Youth, he spends his days overseeing the well-being of children in government-sanctioned orphanages. When Linus is unexpectedly summoned by Extremely Upper Management he's given a curious and highly classified assignment: travel to Marsyas Island Orphanage, where six dangerous children reside: a gnome, a sprite, a wyvern, an unidentifiable green blob, a were-Pomeranian, and the Antichrist. Linus must set aside his fears and determine whether or not they’re likely to bring about the end of days. But the children aren’t the only secret the island keeps. Their caretaker is the charming and enigmatic Arthur Parnassus, who will do anything to keep his wards safe. As Arthur and Linus grow closer, long-held secrets are exposed, and Linus must make a choice: destroy a home or watch the world burn.

My Review: 

Upon this being a rec from the company I work for, several of my coworkers kept recommending it to me.  I ended up reading it in three days.  

This is an incredibly beautiful book. While uniquely its own, there are shades of Harry Potter, X-Men, and Umbrella Academy among other things. It kind of sits on a line of between reality and fantasy, and is less of a plot driven novel, and more of a character study on letting go of what's considered normal, and embracing the strange person you are on the inside; as well as being a novel about finding a family, and finding the good in people no matter who they are. It's a quick read (read it in three days!), but its simplicity is a fault. It's positivity is one of its touchstones, and I appreciate that a book can be moving and not rely on tired darker or grittier tropes. It's also a good read for all ages, and a book parents could read with their kids.

Rating: 5 Stars

***

Title: Red, White, and Royal Blue Author: Casey McQuiston Genre: Romance; LGBT

Goodreads Summary: First Son Alex Claremont-Diaz is the closest thing to a prince this side of the Atlantic. With his intrepid sister and the Veep’s genius granddaughter, they’re the White House Trio, a beautiful millennial marketing strategy for his mother, President Ellen Claremont. International socialite duties do have downsides—namely, when photos of a confrontation with his longtime nemesis Prince Henry at a royal wedding leak to the tabloids and threaten American/British relations. The plan for damage control: staging a fake friendship between the First Son and the Prince. As President Claremont kicks off her reelection bid, Alex finds himself hurtling into a secret relationship with Henry that could derail the campaign and upend two nations. What is worth the sacrifice? How do you do all the good you can do? And, most importantly, how will history remember you?

My Review: 

This is a sweet, light-hearted LGBT romance -- an easy read if you're looking for something to escape into for a few days. It's a bit on the tropey side, but that's where the fun is, and the characters are engaging and fun to spend time with.  If you’re a big fan of fanfiction, this has all the trappings of really good fanfiction (though I’ll admit, maybe cause it’s published fiction, it’s not going to be as explicit as a lot of fanfiction usually gets).  

 My only real criticism is the number of pop culture references and celebrity name drops go a little overboard. Sometimes they feel shoehorned in to make it seem more 'now', which is just going to end up dating the book in the long run. Also, the American political stuff feels a little idealistic, especially after the tumultuous election we’ve had, but that’s not really the heart of the book.   

Otherwise, while it's not going to win a Nobel Prize for literature, it's still a lot of fun.

Rating: 4 stars

***

Title: Truly Devious Trilogy (Truly Devious; The Vanishing Stair; The Hand on the Wall) Author: Maureen Johnson Genre: YA; Mystery

Goodreads Summary:  Ellingham Academy is a famous private school in Vermont for the brightest thinkers, inventors, and artists. It was founded by Albert Ellingham, an early twentieth century tycoon, who wanted to make a wonderful place full of riddles, twisting pathways, and gardens. “A place,” he said, “where learning is a game.” Shortly after the school opened, his wife and daughter were kidnapped. The only real clue was a mocking riddle listing methods of murder, signed with the frightening pseudonym “Truly, Devious.” It became one of the great unsolved crimes of American history. True-crime aficionado Stevie Bell is set to begin her first year at Ellingham Academy, and she has an ambitious plan: She will solve this cold case. That is, she will solve the case when she gets a grip on her demanding new school life and her housemates: the inventor, the novelist, the actor, the artist, and the jokester. But something strange is happening. Truly Devious makes a surprise return, and death revisits Ellingham Academy. The past has crawled out of its grave. Someone has gotten away with murder. The two interwoven mysteries of this first book in the Truly Devious series dovetail brilliantly, and Stevie Bell will continue her relentless quest for the murderers in books two and three.

My Review: 

Truly Devious:   I love the mystery aspect of it -- it's definitely intriguing, and as someone who's read a lot of mystery novels, I'm glad the mystery in this isn't glaringly obvious. It did, at times, feel like a ton of set-up, but because this is the first book of a trilogy, that does make sense. The teen angst/drama aspect felt a little much at times, and I wish there was more of some of the side-characters who only seem to pop up when the plot needs them, but this is minor nitpicking and overall, this book was an incredibly fun read.

The Vanishing Stair:  The mystery is still incredibly intriguing as it unfolds in more detail in this one, and Johnson's ability to unwind what's going on is fantastic. I still have a few minor quibbles -- I think this one starts out slower, since it's saddled with recapping the first book, and there are times when I feel it's a little padded (I'm not sure this needed to be stretched into three books, but trilogies, I'm sure, make more money), but I don't think that detracts too much from the overall story. I do, also, wish that some of the side characters (Janelle, Nate) had more to do, at times they kind of feel like window dressing, and there because Stevie's world needs more people in it. But overall, it's still a fun read, and an intriguing mystery.

The Hand on the Wall:  Better than the second one, doesn't quite capture the magic and mystery of the first. Overall, this trilogy was a fun little mystery with a lot of cool (albeit sometimes underdeveloped) characters. I still think it should have been one, larger novel, as this one, too, feels like there's a lot of padding. And I have a few smaller issues with how certain things were resolved (a lot of conclusions felt like leaps to get there for the characters, even if overall the 'mystery' made sense), while some things I wanted more closure on (what happened to Francis? they alluded to her in book 2, but never closed the door on it). I'm also not a fan of the romance in this book -- it never really clicked for me, and often felt like it was there to keep the plot going. But these are all pretty easy reads, and there are a lot of fun things, too. I'm curious as to how the author handles these characters in her next stand alone novel.

Rating: Truly Devious - 4.5 Stars; The Vanishing Stair - 3.5 Stars; The Hand on the Wall - 4 Stars

#sbc bookclub #house in the cerulean sea #red white and royal blue #truly devious

[zichiandhisnonsense]

I see at least one (1) person is interested in my bad DM ramble, so that’s good enough for me! I shall shove this ramble under a readmore too because it gets preeeetty long

Okay, so cut back to 2015/16, my last year in university. I stumbled upon an advertisement in my classroom for the campus’ d&d and board gaming group. I thought “y’know what? I’ll give it a go, I do play d&d online but I have yet to experience an in-person game, y’know?”

I had no idea what I was about to experience.

Now, the first session was an experimental piece. Everyone played munchkin, a couple of board games, got to know each other etc etc, there was also 2 DMs and so we got split up into groups. Once we were acquainted with each other, we learned it was d&d 3.5 and we learned the groups we were playing in, it was time to pack up and let the LGBT society have the room. Everyone would make their characters and e-mail the DM if we got stuck and he was nice enough to trust we wouldn’t cheat, but that would be his only redeeming quality as DM... Well, that and he didn’t force an over-powered DMPC.

Now, as this was a new group and there were plenty of newbies, I rolled a dwarf cleric named Halrin Stonebeard and I kept my backstory and personality simple. (Clan halls raided by dragon, took up adventuring to become strong enough to challenge dragon & find allies). I normally play wizards, but I figure I would play a supportive role who could buff, heal and protect my allies.

Let’s cut to the start of the first session, we all meet back up and learn a bit about each other’s characters, the only woman in the group was playing a halfling rogue, who would later become a close friend of Halrin. They both acted as the voice of reason and caution but were able and willing to bash some heads in. Then there was the next player, a pretty fun and boisterous guy who was playing a Half-Orc Monk who basically maxed strength and did what he could for everything else. There was also two newbies. One newbie played an elf ranger, with a massive focus on using the longbow and the other one was a gnome cleric. Now, the DM immediately had a gunning for the gnome cleric, purely because he was a gnome and the DM hated gnomes. Never mind it was a newbie who he made feel like he made a terrible decision, but nothing comes out of it for a while... There were a few other players but this is now 3 years ago and I can’t remember them all, unfortunately.

So we gather round the table, level 1 characters ready and all eager...

Aaaand we all begin in a dungeon

Now, this is a massive pet peeve of mine. The ‘begin in a dungeon’ thing had been done to death in my online games, literally everyone who DM’d had done some form of it and I had grown so damn bored of it. And I’ll be honest, it’s a terrible way to start with completely new players. ‘Hey, all those cool abilities you just got? I’ll be taking those away.’

So we were all chained up and struggling to get out. Naturally, HR (Halfling Rogue) escaped with ease and the HoM (Half Orc Monk) busted his way out. Everyone else was basically ‘well fuck looks like we’re stuck here’ until the other two saved us. Naturally, HoM was the MVP for this first section, suffering no penalties due to having no reliance on equipment. He punched his way through and we all just sorta followed behind.

At some point in the dungeons, we come across a guard dog who does some serious damage to one of the newbie players. Not wanting to hurt the dog, I try non-lethal damage on the creature and actually get lucky. As fun-flavour text, I claim I suplexed the dog. Keep this bit in mind. I dealt non-lethal damage to a dog that nearly killed one of the newbies. 

Cut forward to the end of the dungeon, we are met by a platoon of dragon rider knights. (I’ll admit, back then me ‘DMPC Mary Sue alert’ alarm went off) They explained that the whole dungeon was a challenge set by the local king/lord and having escaped, said ruler wished to speak to us. We got all our gear back and were ‘escorted’ by the dragon knights. It felt a little (a lot) railroading, but I didn’t sweat it at the time.

Now here comes the first ‘bad dm’ alarm. The first call that made me go “dude, what the fuck” at this guy. So one newbie player -the elf ranger- was finding the whole march-in-silence thing to be kinda boring and decided he wanted to pet one of the dragons. The DM allowed him.

“The dragon bites your hand off”

No save. No ‘what’s your ac’, just straight up hand bitten off. Now as a reminder for you guys, this newbie player was intending his ranger to be an archer. And archery requires two hands to pull off. And he just got one bitten off. His character is basically screwed, stuck to using a longsword and nothing else.

And the DM won’t go back either, what’s said is said or w/e. So with that out the way we’re suddenly at the king’s chambers. Y’know, no opportunity for any players to react to this utter bullshit. And we get given our main quest.

The ruler’s scouts report a large orc army approaching from the Northeast and he wants us to scout the army and maybe delay it while he mobilizes his forces, or something. I don’t remember the exact wording but key concept was “Orc army” “help pls”. Never mind the fucking dragon-rider platoon right next to us. Given how it’s the obvious main quest we accept, and we get given magical items to aid in our quest.

I can’t remember what everyone else got, but thankfully the DM wasn’t enough of a dick to give the one-armed ranger a longbow. I remember that I got a “Ring of Healing”. Basically, whenever I cast a healing spell, I healed an extra 10%, rounded down.

Now, let’s pause again and quickly talk about that.

First of all, I actually knew what I was doing with my character, and Halrin had a lot of protection/defending spells prepared, shield of faith and whatnot. I knew that it’s better to spend 1 spell to give a buff that blocks damage, than to heal some of the damage taken, so it’s not the best item anyway.

Then I re-read that. 10%, rounded down.

For those who don’t know, in d&d3.5, cure light wounds (the only healing spell I know) heals 1d8+your cleric level HP, not +wisdom. And we were level... 1.

1d8+1 = 9 max. And it rounds down.

This ring was literally useless to me right now. Even when we levelled up and my cure light wounds healed 1d8+2, that was a 10% chance this ring would activate. It was pathetic.

Okay, so let’s cut a few sessions as the party travels to the potential battlefield to meet with other defenders of more or less filler. One-Armed Ranger is constantly screwed over because when we level up, Rangers in 3.5 get two choices: Specialize in Archery (which is no longer an option) or specialize in...

... Two Weapon Fighting. So yeah, he picks archery on the hope that he can get his hand healed as a reward for saving the town and go back to his original archer-build, not half a fighter.

But anyway, time passes, in game and irl. I end up missing a session due to illness, and when I come back, half-orc monk is dead, revived as a zombie.

Basically, the party reached the frontier, only to find the orcs beginning to attack and most/all of the defenses gone. It was so obviously the DM trying to TPK us. But the Monk managed to pull something off, what exactly I don’t know, but he did it with three natural 20s in a row and successfully routed the orc army, but died in the event.

However, he didn’t stay dead, because death was missing. Yeah, I was fucking confused too.

See, what we didn’t realize/weren’t told was that the 2 DMs were working on a shared universe idea, and both groups were running around on separate parts of the world. The other group had apparently done something that caused death to go missing, which meant that souls were not being taken to the afterlife and were remaining on the material plain. Of course, the monk took a fuckload of penalties (charisma and constitution being the worst-hit) but he considered it a fair trade, saving the party from a TPK.

I think, however, that’s when the DM began secretly harbouring a grudge and determined to fuck us over so hard.

So cut forward to a few sessions, and the gnome cleric dies. When his spirit is unable to pass on, it inhabits the body of a rabbit.

Yes, the spirit doesn’t return to the body, the DM has the gnome become a rabbit. And you thought the elf got fucked over? Oh boy were you wrong. The gnome now had no damage output. He couldn’t use weapons, his claw attack was “one damage” and even worse, he couldn’t use 99% of his spells. The player successfully managed to keep one language, sylvan (which no one else spoke) but the DM then said because he had paws and not hands, he couldn’t cast any somatic components, which is more or less all cleric spells. Worse still, because of this death-curse, he couldn’t just kill himself and roll a new character. He was stuck, for two sessions, unable to do anything.

Even better, at the start of the next session, the DM revealed he had ‘made a mistake’. The mistake? The monk wasn’t supposed to return to his body, so his character, at the start of a session, got retconned out of existence and he had to spend the first half of the session making a new character.

The session after however, I think the grim repear was rescued/replaced, so the gnome was basically “I climb up and jump” and killed himself. He said he’d have a new character ready for the next game...

He never came back. I wonder why.

Also, the half-orc monk player was now playng a lawful evil hobgoblin knight, and I think he had decided to fuck with the GM as much as possible in retaliation for the bullshit he had to deal with.

Now, let’s cut a few more sessions, and at some point, the ranger has the opportunity to heal his hand. He goes through with it... And ends up with two left hands.

At this point, the player decided to reroll a new character and says his elf is retiring, traumatised and damaged by the experiences. He says he’ll have his new character ready for the next game...

He never came back. You guys sensing a pattern here?

So some time after that we get to an interesting sub-story that some of us are actually interested in. The starting town with the dungeon had been taken over by a lich and we were asked to put a stop to it. Naturally we were all eager, being good-aligned players and/or in it for the lich loot. At this point, we are joined by a few new players. Alongside out dwarf cleric, halfling rogue/fighter and hobgoblin knight, we have a half orc druid who is “really fucking old” (and I’m worried the GM is secretly rolling for ‘dies of old age’ every night), and the other two players... Okay, so it got a bit weird here.

So, a friend of the DM decides he wants to have a go at DMing, and in order to give him a taste and because the DM is getting bored, this guy takes over the game. The DM isn’t like “hey, run a one-shot” or “hey, run a published module”, he goes “hey take over this game that I know all the solutions for and is half way through and everyone is level 7 and things are super complex”.

Surprisingly, the new-DM is pretty competent for the one session he runs, and I think he deliberately changes some things to prevent former-DM from screwing things up. But yeah, former-DM and his girlfriend decide to join in and holy fuck their characters were... Well...

So, DM played a human paladin, but he played him as like a private investigator, who would get to the bottom of a case and find the truth, instead of a crusading knight. I was actually pretty impressed... Until he basically took control of the party and inserted himself as the leader, which was a role myself and halfling-rogue had been sharing as the ‘sanest party members and only surviving original members’. His girlfriend played the DM’s secretary... And was basically a super-smoking-hot everybody-loves-me elf sorceress. I was almost tempted to change Halrin from bisexual to gay just to avoid her deus-sex-machina’ing me, but fortunately it was just kept to the DM.

So, with our rag-tag bunch of misfits, we infiltrate the castle using all of our skills. The castle siege was perhaps one of the most fun things we ever did and everybody got to have a role in doing something, whether it was the druid inspiring the horses in the stable to run amok, the rogue sneaking in and lowering the drawbridge, the knight and myself bottle-necking the lich’s minions and the sorceress getting some fireballs into the bottleneck.

So, the siege ends and the guest-DM is done, back to the old DM! His girlfriend also disappears, I guess she got bored or something, but that’s not my problem. The DM has it so that they leave to help the surviving townsfolk escape while we combat the lich.

The lich fight is actually pretty awesome, all things considered. I basically got to go super sayan with the spell “divine power” and the battle was an epic clash... And then...

And then...

And. THEN.

The DM fucks up the entire game by revealing that “SURPRISE, THE LICH IS YOUR FAULT!”

So, remember that dog I non-lethally took down? At the start of the game? Dealing NON-LETHAL DAMAGE?

IT DIED FROM IT’S NON-LETHAL WOUNDS.

And apparently, the dog was the court mage’s favourite pet, so obviously, the court mage TURNED HIMSELF INTO A LICH TO REVIVE HIS DOG.

THAT WAS THE REVEAL.

THE ENTIRE LICH THING WAS OUR FAULT.

SHAME ON YOU PLAYERS, FOR NON-LETHALLY KILLING HIS DOG.

I was literally speechless at the table, and told the DM, to his face, “you’re just making shit up, aren’t you?”

Oh, and the session immediately afterwards, he made me kill a demon baby that the male half orc gave birth to.

And in the same session, he tricked the hobgoblin knight into killing two gnomes because with the information provided, it’s what his knightly vows would have him do... and made lose all of his knight powers.

AND WE AREN’T EVEN DONE, GUYS.

[cutelarien]

A messy chat with the members that survived Diavolo (-Trish, +oc) 

Yes I'm still writing things related to my oc from jjba. I just can't take it out of my mind.

.

An adventure in the kitchen

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• Phase zero: The idea •

_ Panni...

_ Hum?

_ Let's do something together?

_ We're always doing things together...

_ I know. I'm talking about us, Guido and Giorno.

_ ... What do you have in mind?

_ Hum... Let's cook!!

_ D- Did you train your... cooking skills while I was gone?

_ Nope! But all we have to do is follow the recipe, right?

_ Were you following it last time?

_ ... Hehe... C'mooonn! With your help I'm sure we can make it! And I think Giorno is a good cooker.

_ What made you think that?

_ Instinct ✨

_ *sigh* Fine...

_ YEAH-

_ BUT! You'll only open and cut the dough, and you'll do exactly, precisely what I tell you to do.

.

• Phase one: Inviting the boss •

_ Giorno!

_ Yes, Chiara?

_ Yes ,sir!!

_ Will you be free tomorrow?

_ Well... - checks on his schedule - Yes... For now. Why do you ask?

_ For now don't! You will be! Because we're going to make our own pasta tomorrow!

_ When you say "we" you're talking about who exactly?

_ What a silly question. I'm talking about me, Panni, Guido and you!

_ Hum... For lunch or dinner?

_ Dinner!

_ Okay then... Wait... You know how to make pasta?

_ It's a simple recipe, don't worry about it.

_ Right... Okay! It seems fun.

_ Yes!

* Hight five with Fugo *

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• Phase two: inviting Mista •

_ Huumm?

_ Let's cook together tomorrow? We're making pasta!

_ Guido!

_ Are you insane?! You can barely make a toast and you want to make pasta??!

_ Aaaah! I know that! That's why I'm responsible only for the dough, and we're gonna use a machine for that! A manual machine.

_ And who actually is gonna make the dough and the sauce?

_ Panni and Giorno!

_ Giogio???

_ Yep!

_ Does he know about your curse?

_ Nhaaaaaah! Shut up! You're joining or not? If you're not helping then you won't eat.

_ That's unfair!

_ It is not!

_ Tisk... Fine! I'll be sure you don't screw up with everything.

_ Heh...

* Angry high five with Fugo *

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• Phase three: buying the ingredients •

_ Chiara... What is this?

_ I know what it is, I'm asking why you took this.

_ For the sauce!

_ Clove... Is written here, can't you see it?

_ Chiara... Have you ever tasted clove before?

_ Nope.

_ You know what sauce we're doing, right?

_ Yes... Bolognese.

_ Did you read the recipe?

_ I... But I thought that it would taste better if we put more spices!

_ Look, Chiara. You know your reputation. So please... Just take what is on the list. Nothing else.

_ Humpf!

* Chiara and Fugo took one hour to buy all the ingredients they would need. *

.

• Phase 3.5: in the fancy kitchen •

_ C'MON GUIDO!! SHOW ME YOUR STRENGTH!! KEEP TURNING THIS CRANK!!!

_ I'LL CRUSH YOUR FINGERS YOU STUPID GNOME!!!

_ Fugo, taste this. Do you think it needs more salt?

_ Hum... A little bit.. I guess..

_ Jesus... QUIET YOU TWO!!

_ Maybe we could heat the water already for cook the dough.

_ Y- Yeah... How are you guys doing there?

_ We're cool! Half of the dough is ready for cook!

_ Half??

_ Yes, Guido.

_ But there's two more... I'm not helping on the last one.

_ Uuugh..

_ Then now is just finish the sauce and cook the dough. Oh, the chesse...

_ I already grated the cheese, Fugo.

_ Ow... Thanks, Giorno... By the way, did you guys elect me as chef?

_ I have Passione to take care of, don't look at me. I think you're doing a great job.

_ Who else would be? Guido?? HAHA! No way!

_ Damnit Chiara! I'm not that bad at the kitchen! Gimme a break!

* They had a great time and finished the recipe. *

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• Final phase: Degustazione •

_ Does Chiara really helped on this? Damn... It's really good!

_ Thanks, Guido! I'll share the recipe with you later.

_ Don't keep all the credit to yourself, Chiara.

_ You're right. I actually thought I would regret this.

_ Glad you didn't!

_ Of course not! We did a great job! I told you, Panni, that with your help we could make it!

_ We should do this again.

_ I agree with the boss!

_ Will I be the chef again?

_ Yes! *They said it together*

_ Oh god *sigh* I'll prepare myself for that.

#my thing #jjba oc #part 5 #shitty chat #this is supposed to be a little confused

[cyberkevvideo]

Throne of Night Theory Builds Part 7: The Masters of the Deep of Book 5

Didn’t know if I’d be continuing this series of theory builds, but finally had a sudden spark of inspiration regarding how you’d make the final picture of Book 5 a viable encounter for a party of 15th level characters.

While i admit I was expecting something more than aberrations being the final boss, it does kind of make some sense that they’d be pulling some strings. Especially aboleth. They can never have too many slaves. That said, they’re only a CR 7. That’s not exactly going to be a threat to a level 15 PC, let alone four of them (or more, depending on the storyline you’re running). And given the designs we’re seeing, there’s no way that any of the creatures we see are a  veiled master. No, it couldn’t possibly that easy. Doesn’t help that they’re not OGL either, so it does make sense that it’s not them. But, I did discover a way to make them at least a moderate threat.

For space reasons, cropping the encounter build.

Again, all images shared here were done by the forever fantastic and amazingly talented Michael D. Clarke, aka SpiralMagus.

EDIT: Cleaned up the build and made it look prettier.

Book 5 discusses how the party learns that there’s something far worse than just a war with a drow army, or dealing with corrupted dwarves. People and caravans are going missing, and strange aberrant creatures are being spotted by nearby watering holes. It’s up to the party to investigate what’s going on, and travel the sunless sea.

By this time in Book 5 of Way of the Wicked, the party had to face off against a CR 20 encounter. It was just one NPC, so it wasn’t much of a threat. I’ve done my own revisions for that encounter and made note of it in my Way of the Wicked category, but I’m banking on the idea that Gary likely repeated his own encounter builds. At least for the difficulty level. So if that’s the case, then the final encounter that we essentially see in the the picture is three huge aboleth underneath a boat carrying the party.

That said, that’s the last picture we see for the update. Michael has also done art for what looks like a nightwave, also CR 20, so that could also be a final encounter, or was something that was come up with to help balance out the a lack of XP before then.

I’ve been racking my brain trying to figure out how to make aboleth a threat, and then I happened to talk to a buddy who had just finished running Shattered Star for his group, and everything finally made sense. Being a D&D 3.5 player, I had access to the Monster Manual, and something in the back of mine recalled that the aboleth had two versions of itself in it. Sure enough, the aboleth mage right there. It’s on the SRD as well. Combine that with me further researching aboleth in the Lords of Madness book, and I had finally figured out how one could make a viable opponent for the party.

Well, to be fair, there’s three of them in the picture. Add their combined encounter level of 20 to the fact that you’re fighting them in their element, and it’s probably a CR 21. However, if your group is particular wilful and enchantments won’t be doing much this encounter, the aboleth will quickly realize this and teleport away in some manner. They’re not going to allow themselves to slaughtered so easily. They’ll come up with a plan and try again later. The party has definitely got their attention though, and their next bout will be much different.

ABOLETH MAGE    (CR 17; 102,400 XP) Unique Advanced aboleth enchanter 10/loremaster 3 LE Huge aberration (aquatic) Init +8; Senses darkvision 60 ft.; Perception +23 Aura despair (30 ft., 12 rounds), mucus cloud (5 ft.) DEFENSE AC 31, touch 14, flat-footed 26 (+3 armor, +4 Dex, +2 deflection, +1 dodge, +13 natural, –2 size) hp 280 (21 HD; 8d8+13d6+199) Fort +15, Ref +14, Will +22 OFFENSE Speed 10 ft., swim 60 ft. Melee 4 tentacles +20 (1d6+9 plus slime) Space 15 ft.; Reach 15 ft. Spell-Like Abilities (CL 16th; concentration +21)   At will—hypnotic pattern (W-DC 17), illusory wall (W-DC 19), mirage arcana (W-DC 20), persistent image (DC 20), programmed image (DC 21), project image (W-DC 22), veil (W-DC 21)   3/day—dominate monster (W-DC 26) Arcane School Spell-Like Abilities (CL 12th; concentration +20)   12/day—dazing touch Enchanter Spells Prepared (CL 12th; concentration +21)   7th—empowered cone of cold (R-DC 27), heightened chain lightning (R-DC 27), mass hold person (W-DC 28), power word blind   6th—disintegrate (F-DC 25), mass suggestion (DC 27), maximized lightning bolt (R-DC 26), quickened mirror image   5th—feeblemind (W-DC 26), heightened hold monster (W-DC 26), empowered lightning bolt (R-DC 25), quickened magic missile, teleport, wall of force   4th—ball lightning (R-DC 24), confusion (W-DC 25), crushing despair (W-DC 25), dimension door, greater invisibility, maximized magic missile, moonstruck (W-DC 25)   3rd—dispel magic, displacement, heroism, hold person (W-DC 24), lightning bolt (F-DC 23), suggestion (W-DC 24), wind wall   2nd—blur, bull’s strength, eagle’s splendor, fox’s cunning, hideous laughter (W-DC 23), resist energy, touch of idiocy   1st—alarm, bungle (W-DC 22), charm person (W-DC 22), expeditious retreat, glitterdust (W-DC 20), magic missile (2), shield   0 (at will)—arcane mark, daze (W-DC 21), mage hand, resistance Opposition Schools divination, necromancy TACTICS Before Combat If the aboleth mage is aware of intruders, it casts blur, bull’s strength, eagle’s splendor, resistance, and heroism. Once it knows what type of creature it’s facing, it considers resist energy and greater invisibility. During Combat An aboleth mage always tries to subdue prey first, as they are always in the market for more slaves. On the first round, the aboleth mage activates its aura of despair then uses a quickened dominate monster and a mass suggestion to have everyone not give in to hostility and jump in the water for a relaxing swim. Arcane spellcasters are their primary target of feeblemind. If a ranged specialist is present, the aboleth uses their quickened mirror image and shield spells. An aboleth mage will attempt to coat potential slaves in slime or have them affected by the mucus cloud. Anyone unaffected by enchantments is instead attacked with evocation spells. Morale An aboleth mage refuses to die in battle. They are aware that not all creatures are affected by mind control, and will teleport away for a time once they are below half their hp. They will carefully think about they will proceed going forward. The stronger the creature, the higher quality of slave. STATISTICS Str 28, Dex 18, Con 28, Int 28, Wis 20, Cha 20 Base Atk +12; CMB +23; CMD 40 (can’t be tripped) Feats Empower SpellB, Eschew Materials, Greater Spell Focus (enchantment), Heightened SpellB, Improved Initiative, Iron Will, Lightning Reflexes, Quicken SpellB, Quicken Spell-Like Ability (dominate monster), Scribe ScrollB, Skill Focus (Knowledge [dungeoneering]), Spell Focus (enchantment), Spell Focus (evocation), Weapon Focus (tentacle) Skills Acrobatics +27, Appraise +13, Bluff +19, Diplomacy +17, Heal +25, Intimidate +22, Knowledge (arcana) +24, Knowledge (dungeoneering) +24, Knowledge (geography) +24, Knowledge (history) +24, Knowledge (local) +24, Knowledge (nature) +24, Knowledge (planes) +24, Linguistics +22, Perception +23, Sense Motive +19, Spellcraft +24, Stealth +13, Survival +12, Swim +28, Use Magic Device +16; Racial Modifiers +8 Swim Languages Aboleth, Abyssal, Aklo, Aquan, Common, Draconic, Dwarven, Elven, Gnome, Ignan, Infernal, Protean, Terran, Undercommon, plus 7 languages SQ arcane bond (amulet), enchanting smile +4, lore +1, secret (dodge trick, knowledge of avoidance) Gear amulet of proof against detection and location (bonded item), bracers of armor +3, headband of vast intellect +2 (Heal), ring of protection +2, rod of metamagic (extend), “Tome of the Deep Masters” spellbook SPECIAL ABILITIES Mucus Cloud (Ex) While underwater, an aboleth exudes a cloud of transparent slime. All creatures adjacent to an aboleth must succeed on a DC 23 Fortitude save each round or lose the ability to breathe air (but gain the ability to breathe water) for 3 hours. Renewed contact with an aboleth’s mucus cloud and failing another save extends the effect for another 3 hours. The save DC is Constitution-based. Slime (Ex) A creature hit by an aboleth’s tentacle must succeed on a DC 23 Fortitude save or his skin and flesh transform into a clear, slimy membrane over the course of 1d4 rounds. The creature’s new “flesh” is soft and tender, reducing its Constitution score by 4 as long as it persists. If the creature’s flesh isn’t kept moist, it dries quickly and the victim takes 1d12 points of damage every 10 minutes. Remove disease and similar effects can restore an afflicted creature to normal, but immunity to disease offers no protection from this attack. The save DC is Constitution-based.

Tome of the Deep Masters Protections Average lock with arcane lock (DC 35), symbol of laughter on the first page of the book (Will DC 25), symbol of stunning on the last page of the book (Will DC 28), and the 5th- and 6th-level spells are hidden with secret page. The special word is “succumb” in Aboleth. The book and pages are made of leather and completely waterproof. Spells contained within are all prepared spells plus: all Core cantrips; 1st—erase, identify, mage armor, memory lapse, protection from good, unseen servant; 2nd—arcane lock, bear’s endurance, cat’s grace, darkness, knock, magic mouth; 3rd—nondetection, protection from energy, secret page; 4th—black tentacles, dimensional anchor, resilient sphere, stone shape, symbol of laughter; 5th—cone of cold, dominate person, dismissal, fabricate; 6th—geas/quest, greater dispel magic; 7th—symbol of stunning

-------------------------------------------------

If what’s on the update page is correct, then that should complete Book 5.

These are my own designs for how I think things might go, and can be changed or ignored entirely. It was just something I wanted to do for myself. The itch has once again been scratched for the time being.

#michael clarke #gary mcbride #throne of night #adventure path #dwarf campaign #drow campaign #drow elf #drow #elf #dwarf #pathfinder #pathfinder 1e #D&D #dnd #dungeons & dragons #Dungeons and Dragons #book 5 #fire mountain games #SpiralMagus #dark elf #Michael D. Clarke #roleplaying #d20 #roleplaying game #deviantart #deviant art #ttrpg #pathfinder rpg #kickstarter #pathfinder roleplaying game

[maychorian]

Hi there! I was wondering if you could help me a little? I know nothing about d&d (i think it might be an online rpg but i'm not even sure about that) and while reading The Storyteller and the Thief I've stumbled across some unfamiliar words.. so well if it's not too much a bother, could you give me a crash course on it? Anyway, thanks a lot for writing and sharing your wonderful works, and I hope you have a good day/night! :)

Oh, my dude, absolutely. If any terms I’m using are not making sense, please let me know. I’m trying to keep the language as fantasy-generic as possible so anyone can enjoy the story even with no familiarity with DnD, but if I’m falling down on that job, tell me how so I can fix it.

Anyway, Dungeons & Dragons is a tabletop roleplaying game. Typically you play with a group of people in real life, though there are ways to do it online, too. One person will be the Dungeon Master, in charge of running the game, roleplaying non-player characters, directing the plot, choosing the monsters, generally keeping track of everything, and arbitrating the rules. Everyone else creates a character, which includes rolling or devising a bunch of numbers to describe the character’s physical and mental abilities, their skills, and how much damage they can do with their weapons. GOOD character creation also includes making something of a backstory for your character and deciding on personality traits, though those can obviously evolve over time, and usually do.

Part of creating a DnD character is choosing a class and a race. Typical races include human, dwarf, elf, half-elf, halfling, gnome, and half-orc. There are many, many other playable races, but those are the classics from 3.5 edition, which is what I started with. The most basic classes would be fighter, rogue, cleric, and wizard, but again there are lots more, like bard, monk, ranger, paladin, and so on. 

Character alignment is also a big deal in DnD, on two different axes–Lawful to Chaotic and Good to Evil. You’ve probably seen charts on tumblr describing characters on a character alignment grid, and there are some pretty good explanations out there, so I won’t get into it. It’s not really a factor in my story. Obviously some characters are good and some are evil, as are some gods and goddesses, but I don’t plan to ever describe the characters’ alignments and have it affect the story at all. Class is important for the people of my world to understand themselves and their roles, but they don’t think of themselves as being chaotic good or lawful neutral or anything like that. They just are who they are.

The basic mechanics of the game involve rolling multi-sided dice to determine whether or not an action succeeds. By far the most common action is to roll a 20-sided die, called a d20 for short, and add any modifiers from your character sheet. Other dice are rolled to determine other kinds of effects, but when you hear someone talking about a Natural 1 or a Natural 20, that means they hit one of those numbers on the d20 before adding any modifiers. A Nat 20 is a critical success and always works, sometimes in spectacular ways, and a Nat 1 is a critical failure and can cause total disaster in the story. 

The randomness, within a certain range, is what gives the game much of its charm. You can have an incredibly powerful and well-balanced character who should be able to cut through any situation with ease, but if the player rolls a Nat 1, things can go south incredibly quickly. Or, conversely, you can have the wimpiest minion on the planet roll a Nat 20 and succeed at whatever they were trying to do in astonishing ways. You never know exactly what’s going to happen, which makes it distinct from just straight up sitting around a table and telling a story with your friends.

But, at its best, Dungeons & Dragons is about a collaborative story told by the Dungeon Master with the help of the players and the choices they make. It’s not a competitive game. No one wins, unless you all win together. (Though some people do PLAY it like it’s a competitive game and the point is to get as much money and trinkets as possible and to accumulate the most power. People who play the game that way are called Munchkins, and they are mostly twelve years old.)

I’ve been playing DnD and lots of other tabletop roleplaying games with various friends and family members for over ten years, and I highly recommend it to anyone who thinks they might remotely like it. That was a very basic crash course, but I hope it helped. Please do let me know if you have any other questions, or if you have specific terms you don’t understand from The Cycle of the Five Lions. My story is based very loosely on the fantasy conventions of Dungeons & Dragons, but it’s really supposed to stand alone.

#askbox #c5l #dnd #Anonymous

[yeahwesaidthat]

TWWS: The Best of D&D

Ladiiiiiiiies and gentlemeeeeeeeeeeen! Welcome to the ultimate showdown: THE BEST OF D&D!

This post contains the best of the best of the D&D/RPG posts over the years of TWWS, all the way from the beginning. At the end of the post, there will be a link to a survey where you can vote for your favourites in each category (other/3.5e, 4e, and 5e) and nominate MVPs for each category. If the person you want to vote MVP has only been referenced as “Player,” just note down what quote they’re responsible for. A week from today (or until enough of you fill out the survey), Round 2 of the competition begins.

Everybody roll for initiative!

Overheard During Other RPGs

During Hackmaster, about a bottle label: SB: “It says ‘Thou shalt not question the DM over inane shit!’”

Overheard During D&D 3.5e

Unarmed damage?: MM: “It’s the difference between a slap and a bitch-slap.”

So wrong it's right: MM (IC): “I like your spunk.” KH (OOC): “So does [gay player].”

Rogue equipment: KB (IC): “I need [boots] that are…soft-sounding.” MM (IC): “We have socks.”

Describing a character: SO: “She is built like a brick shithouse.” DM: “She shits brick houses.” Bubbles: “She makes brick houses shit bricks.”

When the party has two rogues: KH (IC): “I can find it!” KB (IC): “I can find it better.”

RD (IC): “[Wizard], if you do not stop right now, I will arrest you for terminal stupidity, and I can assure you, I will find a law against it!”

A discount on services rendered: SO: “What’s 75% off of ‘I run and do whatever you ask without question’?”

Calling for divine help in very specific situations: MM: “Please state your current medical emergency.” KB: “Head-splosion.” SO: “If you have been stabbed, press one. If you are currently being stabbed, press two.” MM: “If your head’s detonated and you’ve launched into a wall, press three.” RD: “Why did you press three? We never expected anyone to press three!” SO: “We don’t know what to do in this medical emergency! Please dial again!”

IO: “[Wizard] is going to say - ” KB: “Can I tell you why this is a bad idea?” IO: “No.”

Proper procedure when everything goes to hell: RD: “[Cleric] goes outside and makes a magic circle, sits in it, and cries.”

KH (IC): “That stupid fucking son of a flea-ridden bitch cunt wizard - ” MM (IC): “Oh, him.”

How to pray to the god Ao: KB, KH, and MM: “I throw my hands up in the air sometimes sayin’ heeeeey-oh! I worship Aaaaaaa-o!” Bubbles: “[The wizard’s] gaaaaaaaay-o!"

Overheard During D&D 4e

SIDE NOTE: A Quiplash commentary on D&D 4e: A more environment-friendly alternative to toilet paper - 4th ed character sheets

What we think we saw - again?: Player: “If it looks like a duck, quacks like a duck, and weighs the same as a duck, it must be a witch.” KH: “It’s a witch.” RJ: “Build a bridge out of 'er!”

Healing needed: Player: “I have a mess kit, will that help?” WS: “Only if you want to make a mess.”

Captain: “Neverwinter ho!” Dwarf: “Hos? Where?”

SB: “Eventually you end up at the most popular stall in the market.” Player: “Porn?”

About attacking a character that may or may not be good: SB: “Wait, what’s your alignment?” Player: “Lawful Paranoid.”

Taunting the kraken: Player: “Your tentacles are so short even an anime girl wouldn’t take 'em!”

Questioning the legitimacy of an NPC: SB (IC as Priest): “I have a degree in polytheism from the University of Phoenix Online!”

Making sure it’s really dead: SB: "You kick the head and it goes sailing through the open door of the tomb. You hear a voice in the darkness go ’Gooooooooal!’”

Killing the undead: SB: “Congratulations, you choked something to death that doesn’t breathe.”

Mass undead murder: Player: “We made a ghoul-ash. An evil gumbo, really.”

Architecture: Player: “I like big buttresses and I cannot lie.”

Interesting kills: SB: “You decapitated him with a bludgeoning weapon.”

About flying books: Player 1: “The window opens in! How do they fly out?” Player 2: “They’re paperbacks."

Player: “Thank God I decided to engage the dragon in melee.” MW: “You’ll never hear that in any other D&D campaign ever again.”

Player: “Is the food still on the table?” Three Of Us: “DON’T EAT IT!!!”

Overheard During D&D 5e

Annoying Teen: (about his character) “Would he still hate me?” AD: (not about his character) “I think everyone hates you.”

Don’t mess with a dire bear: JI: “There’s one inside who attacks the bear…" (rolls) "...and misses horribly ‘cause he shits his pants.”

JI: “He doesn’t have 100 hit points. He has 95.”

Demonic insight: KH: “I say in Infernal, ‘Peace! We mean you no harm!’” JI: “There’s no word in Infernal for ‘peace.’” Retroactive Edit: Demons actually speak Abyssal. Devils speak Infernal.

Animal form disadvantages: AD: “I’m going to bite [the zombie].” Everyone Else: (mass noise of disgust)

JI: “You feel a pinch in your mind as if she’s flipping through your yellow pages.” AD: “That’s got to be a euphemism for something.” ST: “Oh, yeah, baby, turn my yellow pages.” JB: “Turn to ‘F’ for fun.”

What happens in every religious venue in every D&D campaign ever: JB: “Here is the church, here is the steeple,” KH: “Open the door, and here are the zombies.”

KH: “Did you sneak off to her house in the middle of the night?” ST: “Does that sound like something I would do?” KH, AD, and CD: “Yes.”

JI: “You guys came in here - ” AD: “ - like a wrecking ball - ”

Post-adventure considerations: KH: “[Rogue] wouldn’t know what to do with her life.” AD: “She can bail herself out of jail.”

Switching to melee for a change: CD: “Let’s see if this ‘offense’ thing you do all the time really works.” (rolls a critical hit)

The logistics of being swallowed by a sea monster: ST: “Am I going to take damage if I move further along his digestive tract?”

EC: “If you had leprosy and your ears fell off would you be a deaf leper?”

Identifying mysterious cults: KH: “What’s the Cult of Howling Hatred?” EC: “The Westboro Baptist Church, obviously.”

DR: “Apparently your god has personally intervened due to your badassery.”

A Mass Effect cameo on a dexterity check for dancing: EC: “If you roll a one, you dance like Shepard.”

EC (IC): “So what you’re saying is that it’s very dangerous and we shouldn’t go in. I’ll take point.”

Things to worry about in combat: KH: “You don’t have enough hit points to take it like a man, honey.”

The ends justify the means?: Bubbles: “Did you have fun role-playing an interrogation?” DR: “You guys are fucked up.”

KH: “How do you stun-lock a Terrasque?!?” JB: “Fourth Edition.”

ST: “Do we have to kill them before we eat? I hate murdering on an empty stomach.”

About a revenant and a possible lover: EC: “Well the beast is committing necrophilia and the necro is committing bestiality…” DR: “What happens in Faerun, et cetera.”

Rolling high on a seduction check: DR: “Frankly, I didn’t think you’d go down this road.” KH: “Oh, I went down all right.”

More on the seduction roll: Bubbles: “Try to convince her to come with us. The way she came with you last night.”

About a nonviolent kua-toa: Player: “He’s a paci-fish.”

About dealing with face-hugging enemies: CD: “You swung at yourself and missed?” AD: “I swung at myself and missed.”

ST (IC): “I’ll be staying in the boat unless you have need of my specific skills.” CD (OOC): “Dying first is not a skill.”

About cultists: DM (IC): “They are water people. Maybe they’re just going with the flow.”

About a minotaur who keeps missing: DM: “At least when you put a bull in a china shop he’ll break shit.”

About bottles of brandy: EC: “I have two questions: how many of them are there and how many of them can I carry?”

Ideas so bad they’re good: KH: “We’re gonna blow up the temple with the distillery.” F: “The temple, the lich, half the plot…”

About going forward: KH: “Against our better judgment.” DM: “What better judgment?” KH: “Good point.”

About shooting arrows: KH: “'Nock’ yourself out.”

About using a lot of magic: JS: “We’re blowing a big load here right now.”

JS: “You wanna go up the shaft?” ST and T: “That’s what he said.”

About flirting with an efreet: JI: “Below her waist is a trailing cloud of black smoke, so you’re not getting anything.”

Questioning the guardian imp: Player (IC): “What happens if someone disturbs the sarcophagus before your time is up?” WS (IC): “There’ll be six more weeks of winter.”

MR (IC): “Trying to undercut me on my quest to restore my former glory?” KH (IC): “You have no glory to restore.” Other Players: “Oooooooh!” SW: “Quick, someone cast heal!”

When talking with a spirit: MR (IC): “You can’t just ask someone if they’re dead! That’s incredibly rude! The correct term is ‘mortally challenged’!”

After a petrifying encounter with some basilisks: BC: “I always thought she was stone-hearted.” KT: “I dunno, I thought she rocked.” JS: “I am going to kill all of you.”

What to do with windmills: KH: “If we had a lance, we could go tilting.” MR: “Cavalier idea.”

Quest priorities: Player 1: “No one’s going to pay us to do it right now. It’s not worth the attention.”

JF: “Roll to see if you hit me by accident.” KH: “Oh, I’d hit you on purpose.”

K’s paladin chastising A’s paladin about her sex habits: A (IC): “I thought you were the paladin of joy!” K (IC): “Not that kind of joy!”

About a previous edition of D&D: KH: “[What] the hell couldn’t you do in 3.5?” SW: “Win.”

KH: “Technically you’re underage.” ST: “That’s never stopped me before.” AD: “You or your character?” ST: “Do I have to answer that?”

D: “We’re gonna make the Underdark great again!” ST: “We’re gonna build a wall - a really big wall in the Underdark, and we’re gonna make the gnomes pay for it.” A: “We pay for everything already! Screw you!”

About a character who caught fire: T: “He’s not rolling initiative; he’s rolling on the ground.”

T (IC): “Let’s go before the men’s egos get us killed.”

JB (IC): “My god believes in good opportunities. Not dying is a good opportunity.”

Passing on some bad news: JI (IC): “[Chief] not sick!” AD (IC): “He was when we were done with him.”

To a healer: KH (IC): “I don’t suppose you have a cure for the common cold?” JI (IC): “I’m not a miracle worker.”

Reassuring a woman scorned: AA (IC): “Go tell her - all men dogs.” JI (OOC): “Says the cat.”

To the tune of “Like a G6”: ST and KH: “Roll a d6, roll a d6!”

KH: “Of course it’s always about dirty sex - I’m a bard!” AD: “The hell are you two talking about down there?!”

To a mindflayer, about a stupid character: KH (IC): “I’d offer you his brain to eat, but I don’t think he has one.” JS (IC as mindflayer): “I don’t eat junk food.”

MGW: “It’s Tza…Zsa…his name is Jasper.”

Saying goodbye to the barkeep: MR (IC): “I’ll be back visiting the northern parts soon.” KH (OOC): “And then you can visit her southern parts.”

About a questionable NPC: ST (IC): “I would never dream of hurting you!” KH (IC): “I would.”

About prison visitations: JB (IC): “How often is it that a [gypsy] walks in here voluntarily?”

Failing a romance/persuasion check: AA: “Ooh, she cast Zone of Friend!”

Preparing for a swamp adventure: CD: “I want to buy some insect repellant.” AD: “What, your personality doesn’t drive them away?”

About a magic boat: JB (IC): “I saw it grow!” ST (IC): “Are you sure you didn’t rub it? That sometimes happens with wood.” JB (IC): “You would know.” ST (IC): “You wouldn’t.” JB (IC): “Tell that to my two children.”

About an injured drow: MGW (IC): “Look at that poor girl! She has a black eye! You can’t see it, ‘cause her skin is black, but still!”

Last-minute aliases: RD (IC): “Unfortunately, no, my name is Dick Ballsenshaft.”

To a half-orc and Sir Bearington, regarding weirdness: MGW (IC): “…but for me to assume you’re in a loving relationship with a talking bear is where we draw the line?!”

Wisdom for stealing magic items: KC: “Anything that glows goes.”

About fleeing: RD: “I’m going to run like an Amazon employee during the holidays.”

MGW: “You were doing so well until everybody died.” JF: “D&D in a summary.”

Once more about fleeing: RD: “A smart man knows when to run like a little bitch.” J: “Why do you think that’s the first thing I did?”

Recapping the previous session: A: “There was a shitshow, but we got away with it.” S: “So the usual, then.”

About creature size: MR: “Is an ettin large or huge?” MGW: “I think he’s just large.” A: “He’s probably large but pretends he’s huge.” AS: “Typical guy.”

When a pervy character is disgusted by a perv: RD: “Dear Kettle, I have an issue with your current hue. Signed, the Pot.”

A: “He told us to send a message.” KH: “A sword in the stomach is a message.” SW: “The Lannisters send their regards.”

The pervy paladin: A: “I used Lay On Hands. I healed him.” KH: “Yeah, but where did you lay your hands?” MGW: “Wherever she wanted.”

About our tactics: SW: “We put the 'fun’ in 'dysfunctional.’”

About possible activities: MGW (IC): “I know you’re a tiefling, but we’re all the same color in the dark, right?”

Interesting weapon material: MGW: “You all take a moment of reflective silence.” JB: “Nah, I’m just cleaning my bone.” KH: “Technically that’s a moment of reflective silence.” KC: “Not if you’ve seen the barbarian do it.”

Scrying like bad cell reception: KH: “Switch to AD&D.” JB: “Can you scry me now?”

About the taste of human: SW: “You would know.” A: “Nah, I don’t swallow.” MR: “This conversation is making me uncomfortable.”

Wrestling prep: MR (IC): “I want a good, clean fight.” A (IC): “No we don’t.” JB (IC): “What’s a clean fight?” A (IC): “It means you have to take a bath first.” JB (IC): “What’s a bath?”

MGW: “There’s a bridge that looks like it may have collapsed at some point.” JB: “Is it a-bridged?”

Beautiful references (read in Rorschach’s voice): AA: “I’m not grappled with YOU,” ST, AA, and KH: “YOU’RE grappled with ME!”

About remaining spells: KH: “I have three 1st-level slots and one 2nd-level slot.” CD: “Those are 'keeping people alive’ slots.”

Dealing with extra-limbed gorillas: ST: “Uh-oh! They must have been forewarned!” AD: “What makes you say that?” ST: “Forewarned is four-armed.” AD: -_-

Negotiation skills: AD: “It’s just me trying to bullshit him.” JI: “Why don’t you make a bullshit check?”

Trying to figure out if the staff is necromantic: CD: “We could kill a mouse in front of the staff. We could kill a mouse with the staff. How much is it to buy a mouse?”

JB: “Anyone die while I was gone?” SW: “Not on the outside.”

Wizarding limits: JS: “You may not polymorph your zombies into t-rexes.”

Zombies aren’t too smart: BC (IC): “Bobs, attack the closest gnoll!” Bobs: (run at gnoll party member) KH (OOC): “Et tu, Bob?” JS (OOC): “If this doesn’t belong in your blog, I dunno what does.”

Far too relatable: JS: “Twenty psychic damage.” BC: “I’ve taken more psychic damage from my mother.”

Worst-laid plans: KH (IC): “I have a very bad feeling about this.” MR (IC): “You should.”

Our go-to combat tactic: MR: “Are we going to stupid the guy to death?”

Zing!: MGW (IC): “If you join me, I can make you the greatest dwarf who ever lived.” TP (IC): “I am the greatest dwarf who ever lived.” Whole Table (OOC): “Ooooohhhhh!!!”

Another verbal duel with a sea god/character class limitations: KH: “I would say 'what is a god to a nonbeliever,’ but I’m a cleric.”

Activating the mysterious device: BC (IC): “We did it! I wonder what we did?”

Business as usual: KH: “This seems like a bad idea, but go ahead.”

Old adages: MR: “No plan survives contact with the enemy.” (IC) “But then, no enemy has survived contact with us!” (OOC) “Was that quote-worthy?” KH: “Yes.”

KC: “She can ride me. I don’t care.” KH: ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°) KC: “…I’M A BEAR IN ARMOR.”

Advantageous druidic inanity: KC: “Are you still riding the flying bear?” MR: “It’s flying now?” KC: “Yeah, he flew up to unlock the door.” AS: “…So he’s a flying bear with armor…”

Spell modifications for humourous purposes: MR: “Using a Dex[terity] save for Zone of Truth means they’re literally dodging the question.”

About a wild, crazy, out-of-left-field hypothesis: RD (IC): “I figured if you pulled something that big our of your ass there’d be bleeding involved.” MR (IC): “…That’s between me and my proctologist.” SW (OOC): “Did you take fire damage for that? That’s like Taco Bell levels of burn.”

As is per usual: MR: “We may have once again survived this by the skin of bullshit.”

Take the survey and vote for your favourites!

#twws #that's what we said #d&d

[micahbhunter]

:D yay, a fellow DnD'er!! What do you play as, and do you have any artwork of them?

Yay! Hey there!

Sadly I don’t have any art of my characters, but I’m tempted to put a chart of all of them. I have so many that I play, since our group runs so many campaign’s and gives everyone a chance to DM (we actually just halted my campaign for now and just started a new one)

I guess I’ll list them from class, race and level

Teal'o Hopefield. D&D 5th Edition. Homebrew, Monster Hunter inspired. Tiefling, Bard. Level 13 College of Lore.

He’s my fat lovable Tiefling Bard who tries to solve everything with kindness and food. He’s probably my highest level character from my longest running campaign and I love him. I even have a Heroforged miniature of him.

I’m actually working on a more elaborate back story from him right now, which I’ll post later and I’m tempted to take a level in Cleric with Sune (Forgotten Realms goddess of love and beauty) as his deity, since our old group needed a cleric. Plus I love the idea of him being a traveling minstrel writing powerful love ballads and helping with match making after retiring from monster hunting lol

Madcap the Magekiller, also know as “Squishy”D&D 5th Edition. Homebrew. Myconid, Soulknife level 7? Seeker.

Another fave of mine from a heavy homebrew monster campaign a friend ran. I really can’t remember what level he got to? Maybe level 7? Because I know I got all my cool stuff for my class than. He started off as a regular old myconid (which are completely neutral and only speak telepathically) than got captured by a warlock and experimented on (slightly less natural and now can only live by absorbing magic) and was than sold to into slavery to goblins. To make a very long hilarious campaign story short ( I’ll tell more later if asked ;) ) he than met a troglodyte barbarian and a thri-kreen (think antro-mantis that likes to eat elves) ranger along the way and they traveled through the Underdark into an active volcano, fought some drow (whom the trog hit on the only princess while the Thri-Kreen ate her family), punted gnomes into lava, roasted some mind flayers and ate their brains, got stuck together while fighting a gibbering mouth, had the most amazing use for a swan boat ever and disturbed a gnome grave site after the trog peed on an grave marker and had to fight several very angry gnome spirits, than finally got to the end where they fought and sealed a volcano goddess into a silver snuff box. Also the trog is now a god/chosen one…flying mad with power somewhere in the world with Madcap, who the trog literally drove him insane through out the campaign doing stupid shit that got us all in trouble and turned him evil because of it. So now he wants to experiment on everything, like his former master did to him!….he also has a fire peytron that he hatched from an egg on top of the volcano that he rides. Lol that campaign was so insane! I wanna go back to it some day just to see what happens to those three.

Anacharis Delevanti, the Jasmine Bard Pathfinder 3.5 Homebrew, Legend of Zelda inspired.Merfolk. Another Bard (duh), level 7. Dervish Dancer.

Online campaign with some friends from my hometown and their buds on Skype. I play a posh, pompous pretty boy who was born to nobility with a jerk of a father who’s an Ambassador to the world’s capital, that didn’t like him out of his 14 brother and sister’s because he wasn’t “pure blooded”. He basically told his dad to fuck off and traveled to the capital to make a name for himself, which he did! He had a giant tea/poison empire that got destroyed after mysterious forces burned it all down (they killed his butler!) and started the campaign with basically nothing but what he could salvage from the wreckage. He’s a lot of fun to play because he’s so spoiled and flamboyant and the only male and neutral character in the group of good hearted females and is constantly bickering with the dirty wild and Russian dwarf raised ranger (my sister’s character).

Plus he’s one of my only characters that is asexual and aromantic, though very charismatic to all. Oh right and he’s also a belly dancer that sleeps with a night mask and a plush octopus names Mr. Scallops :D

The DM always starts the campaign with a fish joke at his expense lol.

Dross, aka Mithras Oakeneye, from the Salt Wolf Clan.D&D 5th Edition HomebrewGhostwise Halfling. Necro-Druid. Level 2. Circle of the Deathbloom.

One of my most serious and somber characters that I’m currently playing. Ghostwise Halflings are more tribal in nature and Dross lived in a very strict one that hated he practicings the “Old” and “Forbidden” ways. Basically a form of druidism and necromancy that made new plant life from the corpses of dead bodies. The only friend he had was the son of the head elder, who was also the most skilled Hunter that stood up for Dross. But when the clan faced an orc skirmish, his best friend died protecting him and Dross used all his power openly to save the clan. Without the elders son to protect him, the rest of the elders exiled him, stripping him of his former name (hence why he took the name Dross) and smashed his sacred clan item, which usually if a Ghostwise Halfling lost said item, they would have to go on a quest of atonement. He still has his but he used the pieces to turn them into a boulder opal stone pipe. He than made a flower from his former best friends remains and is sailing, with others, to a new land so he can plant it at an ancient tree, per his friends dying wish to see it.

He’s the most creepy character I’ve played. He doesn’t talk, only to one person at a time telepathically (Ghostwise powers, yo!) and is covered in his own eco system of mushrooms and moss and plants that are living on his arms and back. His eyes are a dull white but he can still see and his former reddish brown hair is now black from all the stuff living off him. He erie and smells of earth and loom. Plus probably hasn’t showered in like, 10 years lol

And that’s it! I have more characters from one-shots and small campaigns but those are my main four so far!

I’ll put up more later if people ask me lol and feel free to ask more about any of the one’s I listed and the campaigns their in!

Or tell me about yours. I love talking about D&D and character lore, so,much!!

#micah's ramblings #d&d #d&d 5e #pathfinder #pathfinder 3.5 #table top gaming #Dungeons and Dragons #my characters #micah b. hunter

[lonleygirld]

Bullies....

thematureapprentice / November 28th, 2018

Are the men we work with bullies, or just guys treating everyone like trash as a joke like men do?

Today I pulled my toolbox out of the spray booth. Some point after morning tea a 2IC came up to my bench and kicked it while my bosses were talking to me about my job. I was heart broken by this....

I spent nearly a month and so much unpaid over time not getting home till 7pm fixing up this busted down toolbox to call my own because I can't afford a new one. Here come mister "pink is gay" from a previous post of mine and just randomly kicks it.

This didn't really do anything to it except it now has a black smudge from his boots on it. But like who does that, who just comes up and kicks someones shit like that. What if I went to his bench and threw something he owned on the ground does that mean I'm just "playing" or "mucking around" as he would call it.

I though this guy was decent just maybe a week ago when he was acting very greatful and what not for me and the others for staying back 3.5 hours to get a job done so his team could get it out on time. But no I just went straight back to thinking he is a old homophobic bully.

I get friendly banter, I get digging at each others mistakes to take the piss out of it. I do this every day with my team. But to just walk up and kick someones property, would be where I draw a line.

So, he walked up kicked my hard work and I just look at him and say, "You are an absolute dick head". He replies with, "What, why". I told him how I spent 4 hours just painting that tool box and that's just painting it, lets not even add the hours of sanding and pannel beating to get everything straight and looking nice.

He decides to reply with "Looks a bit rough, couldn't you do any better", I get that this was a joke I guess but I bit back with, "Just like your face eh". Now like I told cutie at lunch this guy looks like an old grumpy garden gnome, legit if you saw him it's the best description ever. He responded with, "I'm sorry I couldn't hear that". To which I responded, "That's a shame considering the size of your ears".

Now my bosses thought this was hilarious and laughed at him, but I guess the old gnome got a little butt sore and decided to walk away while pulling my toolbox behind him. He took it all the way to his department and I just carried on with my work. Did he expect me to chase him like a little sad child to get my belongings back? Or be just as butt sore that he took it.

I honestly didn't care, if he wanted to be that jerk he was doing that to himself. Sure my pride in my work fell and I didn't want to be at work anymore. But is that because I'm soft and can't cut it in a "Man's industry". Or just because I really care about the things I put my effort and time into and people are just ass holes and really shouldn't have a job that allows them to interact with other employees.

Now cutie wants me to file a complaint, because she sees it as bullying and something similar but not so similar happened to her before I started there. Literally disgusted about how work dealt with her thing. But anyways....

I don't know, I'm not looking forward to work tomorrow. Because he came over to my bench after lunch and grabbed the handle of my toolbox and wiggled it around as he said, "Do you know why I put it over there?". I had so much anxiety building up from this I could have had a break down at work. I just I'm so tired, I do so much, I don't deserve this petty childish bullshit. I'm not a child despite being an Apprentice, doesn't mean you can treat me like one. I told him that I did not care, and he proceeded to come closer and lean on my bench right next to me. He asked what was wrong if I was upset cause he was playing/mucking around with me. I just kept doing what I was doing, didn't look at him and said. "Dude just go away, I don't want to talk to you", he asked me why again and I just ignored him. I was about to either slap him or just go walk to my car. This ass hole actually got into a fight last friday like, dude pull ya head in okay. If someone tells you they don't like being addressed to as "OI" then maybe you should just accept that and leave it be, instead of acting like a child about it and getting into a play school fight. Man IDEK.

So yeah that happened today, I didn't want to stay back at work today to finish it. I lost my creative spirit and motivation to give a fuck.

In fact, I came home cried simply because I am just so exhausted and under appreciated and fell asleep in my recliner for about 2 hrs. Now I guess I'm finally gonna go have a shower, maybe cry a little more, hopefully fall asleep and I guess deal with work tomorrow.

Was thinking bout messaging one of these guys on snapchat from tinder, but honestly. I don't want to be that person right now. I know I need someone, but I got me. I don't know why I share half the shit I do on here. I feel like it helps at times, but then I feel like it's a waste of time. No one reads these, no one cares. Maybe I should just stop and keep shit bottled up like I did before him, before my life kicked me in the guts, before the cops and before knowing everything. Maybe I'll look back and read all this shit and think, D you have serious issues girl, you're such a loser. Ha I already think that 💜.

My last therapy session for the year is on Monday and that couldn't come soon enough.

Bye I guess xx.

[zippdementia]

Part 57 Alignment May Vary: White Plume Mountain and the Death of a Friendship

We should have realized something would go wrong. From the time we entered the Mountain, he wasn’t himself. Or maybe he was more of himself, everything exaggerated. But we had grown too used to that look in his eye, too used to the shrill laugh, too used to everything coming out okay in the end.  ~ The journals of Nysyries  

Today’s blog post is difficult to construct. As I explained last time, we are taking a break from the main campaign to do a side quest inside the classic White Plume Mountain Adventure. The players meet with the Dwarves of the Wyvernwatch Mountains, who agree to send mercenaries to help Brindol but also mention that three legendary weapons forged in the Kingdom of Rhest (and partially responsible for the Kingdom’s downfall) were given to the dwarves for safekeeping generations ago... and now have been stolen! The thief seems to want people to come find the weapons, as he left instructions in the form of a riddle for where the weapons would be kept.

Enter White Plume Mountain, an infamous and still active volcano set in the heart of the Wyvernwatch. The dwarves agree begrudgingly to give the players directions to the Mountain with the promise that they will find and not keep the legendary weapons. To sweeten the deal, they offer a Wish spell upon the return of the weapons. With this, the players make their way to White Plume, entering it only to be greeted by a mischevious and seemingly all-powerful gnome calling himself Keraptis and welcoming the players to his “playground.” His instructions are clear: there are three paths, each leading to another of the weapons. The players need only pass his devious traps and monstrous guardians in order to retrieve the weapons. He also, in response to Tyrion’s boasting that Tyrion is going to beat up the gnome, turns our Blue Bard Tyrion polka-dotted and gives him a Bob Ross afro before disappearing. Begin dungeon!

White Plume Mountain has a very good conversion in Tales of the Yawning Portal and is pretty much a straight dungeon crawl. There is no need to cover every random encounter or detail of its trap rooms here. I had planned for this to be a quick side quest to give the players some cool weapons and buff them up before facing the final rush of the horde. My blog post would have covered some of the changes I made to the dungeon and then moved us back to the main plot with minimal fuss.

As it turned out, White Mountain was a huge turning point not only for all of our characters, but even for our group as a whole. So I have some explaining to do. I’m not going to cover every moment of White Plume Mountain. Let’s start where I intended, however, and talk about some important changes.

The Big Change: Weapons

Each of the three classic weapons hidden in White Plume Mountain has problems that left me feeling unable to use them in my campaign in their original form. First of all, for every weapon I decide to use the old legacy system (from 3.5 I think?) where weapons level up with the characters. So know that these all start as +1 weapons and will eventually grow to +3, with more powerful abilities. I’ll post a link to the redesigns below.

Blackrazor is the one with the most drastic change. Unless your party is going to be going up against epic-level challenges or you are going to be basing the rest of your campaign around this weapon or you are running a solo campaign, it is too powerful to use as is. The reason is that ability to gain temporary hit points. Already innately powerful in DnD 5, most temporary hit point abilities seem to average around 10 or 15 extra hit points. I could see 25 to 50 being reasonable at higher levels. But the ability to gain temporary hit points equal to the original hit points of the monster you killed and the fact that the player gets advantage on all attacks while having these temporary hit points can quickly break a slower paced game. There are some major weaknesses to the weapon, like the inability to hit undead and its propensity to turn its users completely insane, but from a purely mechanical standpoint, my game isn’t ready to withstand its full power yet. So I nerf that for now, having it grant 10+monster’s CR temporary hitpoints upon the monster’s defeat. Again, this will level up in time. I also change the weapon to a Longsword, as this is meant for Aldric Alright.

Wave is a little easier to work with. Mostly here I’m just trying to simplify things. Force cube is one of my least favorite D&D 5 abilities just because of how complicated it is and everything you have to remember. So I pull that as one of its constant abilities and replace it with some extra damage. This weapon is meant for Nysyries.

Whelm is the sad step child of the bunch. A cool little weapon, but with an awful penalty of being at disadvantage for everything you do outside during the day. Okay, so fair enough to say that most of D&D does take place underground or inside, but I’m not quite ready to put this major restriction on my players yet. So this weapon I replace entirely with one out of a third party Legacy Weapons book, the Heartcarver. I intend it for Tyrion, who has a thing for axes. I don’t end up using the stats for Heartcarver because something happens, something we will discuss next, but I’ve provided the first level of Wave and Blackrazor here for review. Keep in mind they will power up later and at a later date I’ll post the full tiered stats, but for now I want it to be a bit of a mystery for my players.

I’ll also throw in a brief mention about one possible encounter in the dungeon, and that is Sir Bluto sans Pite. That fight against him and his knights is incredibly deadly. Like, I’m not sure what the intentions of the designer was in that fight except that players should avoid it altogether. You need to find some way to make this fight doable. Maybe Sir Bluto is willing to let the players go if they bribe him or agree to give him one of the weapons (in which case he’ll follow them with his knights to the location of the next weapon and fight the players if they get it and don’t give it to him). Maybe Sir Bluto is arrogant and has his knights fight the players two or three at a time, hanging back until the end to finish them off himself. Maybe he challenges their strongest fighter to a dual, saying if that fighter can defeat him (take him down to 20 or less hit points), he’ll let everyone go. Maybe you expand the river and turn the whole scene into a chase, where the enchanted river flows by an illusionary forest, where the knights fire arrows at the players in their boat and then Sir Bluto gets in his own boat and gives chase with two of his knights, the two teams having to face off against each other as they ride the river rapids. Do something here, because this is otherwise a very frustrating fight unless your party has five or more players in it.

My players encounter the river, but Nysyries uses her spy fly (a little drone-like device that flies up the river to see what’s over there) to spot the attackers and they avoid the whole scene altogether.

Death of a Friendship

Today, news reached me in the form of a song called the “Blue Bard’s Ballad” that my old friend and companion, Tyrion Talltame, last of his name, has perished somewhere in the far east. The song is frustratingly unclear as to the exact manner of his death, ending simply with “he strode forward into fire and smoke, his shadow stretching to the sky, and the final words he ever spoke, they’ll never catch one small as I.”    ~ Diary of Karina, Mistress of the School of the Sworn

Dungeons and Dragons is a game played among friends and it moves to the mysterious tides of those friendships. Sometimes it waxes and sometimes it wanes. The bluntest way I can say this is that our friendship with Tyrion’s player has been waning for a while and it finally snapped during White Plume Mountain.

Handling the break up of a friendship without ruining your game of Dungeons and Dragons is not a subject I see talked about often. Maybe it’s somewhat superstitious, like we don’t talk about it because are afraid to invite that occurrence in. Or maybe we simply don’t like to think, or can’t think, of losing long friendships. Most likely I think it is because every situation is different, every group of friends different, and there is no advice that anyone can give that can be directly applied to this kind of situation.

For instance, in our group, I could point to certain behaviors of Tyrion’s player: a propensity to speak over the other players, ignore their ideas, become irritated if others were in the spotlight, and having extreme and borderline violent outbursts when his characters would die. I could speculate on certain things that were said recently and commitments to the game that were broken that gave us all the impression that he no longer was invested in the game. I can take responsibility myself and say that his gaming style had recently become something I wasn’t comfortable with as a GM, finding myself consistently locked into a “challenge” battle with him where his behavior would make me feel not like we were collaboratively telling a story but were instead competing to win the game, an impossible position to be in for Dungeons and Dragons where there is no such thing as winning... well, aside from everyone going home having had a good time. Maybe that was the key thing: not everyone was leaving the table anymore feeling like they were having a good time.

But the reasons go beyond this. I think the best way to explain it came from a conversation I had with another friend just last week about the incident. I am in my mid-thirties now, and the friends I have I value greatly. The people I chose to spend time with these days are people that I hope to have in my life for however long I am given to live it. At the same time, those friends are also well into or approaching their thirties and they are firming up who they are as people. Not that their situations in life will not change, or that they will not continue to grow as people and friends, but the core of who they are is now plain to see. The seed has split and we see the type of tree they are. And the person who played Tyrion, having now shown his shape, is not someone that I feel I can stay friends with. The rest of the group agreed. And so, after Tyrion died, we cut him out of the group and have continued to play with two.

These are hard words to type, made harder still by the fact that he may be reading these words. I believe he will not take them well. In his mind, he is the victim here, perhaps even a martyr for having stuck out the game until he was kicked out. He essentially told me afterwards that he doesn’t need friends who abandon him. From his own perspective, he is not incorrect. From my perspective, there are no victims or martyrs here. There are choices. The rest of the group, myself included, made the choice to remove him from our lives. We own that choice, we take responsibility for it. I only hope that he learns to take responsibility for his.

As grave as all that is, the actual death itself is almost humorous in its telling. Tyrion had been tackling White Plume Mountain like a wrecking ball. The first big trap, a hallway which heats up metal armor and weapons and requires some careful planning to make it through safely, he bolts down before the group can formulate a plan. This places him alone at its end where nearly a dozen ghasts wait to tear him to shreds before the party can catch up. No, this is not where he dies, believe it or not! This is where he gains a feather beard in a hilarious roll of his chaos armor (which, when hit, allows the player to use a reaction to activate a random wild magic). The ghasts leap at him, he unleashes the full might of his armor and... POOF! Feathers explode out of his face in a colorful beard. It’s a pretty great moment.

The actual death comes later, during the unusual Ziggarat aquarium room. For those who haven’t seen the room, it’s pictured above, a tiered step down of enclosed cages with various deadly monsters inside and a door at the bottom tier. The room is an unusual puzzle. Really, it’s about not overthinking it and removing the need to kill every monster. The real trick is getting to the bottom tier and just running through the door. It might sound stupid, but it’s a meta-challenge to gamers that challenges them to test the environment, learn that the monsters are docile as long as their area isn’t entered, and then to make the choice to skip confrontation. Skipping confrontation was a very cool and self-aware message to players back when White Plume came out. It is maybe less relevant today, but no less challenging.

Aldric and Nysyries are actually on the verge of figuring this out, using fish they got earlier in the dungeon to feed the top layer of monsters and observe their behavior, when Tyrion decides to smash the glass. The problem with this is that it then locks the bottom door behind a wall of force and now the players will have to at least fight the manticores.

I won’t go through every facet of this room. There are some very cool moments, like when Aldric makes a mighty leap into the manticore’s lair, jumping over one of the aquariums where the deadly (and literal) sea-lions live, just barely avoiding being snatched out of the air by a leaping sea-lion. Nysyries encounters a wight on the upper level, a random encounter who sneaks into the room behind her, and takes it on one-vs-one while transformed into a giant scorpion! Singlehandedly, she takes down the wight while Aldric faces off against three starved manticores by himself and actually holds his own.

Tyrion at this point is on the upper level. The manticores have had their wings clipped, so they can’t fly up to get him. Nysyries is fighting the Wight and doesn’t need help. The manticores have injured him down to three hitpoints with their tailspikes, but nothing is targeting him now that they are distracted by Aldric, a much more accessible piece of food inside their cage. Tyrion has leisure to heal himself, or to keep launching arcane bolts down into the manticore arena to support Aldric. So what he does next doesn’t make sense to us.

“I use misty step to jump inside the manticore cage!” he declares.

Well, there’s a few problems with this. First of all, the cage is actually outside of the range of misty step. He’ll land on the edge of the lowest aquarium level, and it has been well established by this point that that level has leaping sea-lions who will definitely attack anyone who goes there. Even if he survives this, there are three high-health manticores in that cage looking for an easy meal and who get three attacks a turn. Tyrion is asking to be torn to shreds by going in there with only three hit points.

Maybe he wanted to be in the spotlight. Maybe he was secretly tired of playing Tyrion, though his reaction to what happens next would suggest otherwise. Maybe he simply believed that he couldn’t die.

What happens next is Tyrion the Blue Polka-dotted Bard with a Bob Ross afro and a feather beard poofs in a cloud of smoke, appears on the edge of the aquarium, is immediately stuck from behind by a sea-lion, topples face first into the manticore’s cage, and is devoured by the nearest starved manticore who then burps up a burst of feathers.

When I tell the story to outsiders, they laugh. It’s a classic D&D style mishap, the ignominious and pointless death of a character, the sort of thing that you tell jokes about as you roll up your new character. And it is funny, I can’t help but chuckle even now as I type it. But it is also a little bitter, that it marks the death not only of a long-standing party member, but also of a friendship.

Further Changes: 2 person party

From here on out, we are a two person party. We have not added anyone else to the group, nor do we have a desire to just yet. And it turns out that a two person party is really a lot of fun!

Some benefits include being able to give each character more attention and more roleplaying moments. Challenge becomes something more interesting, too. You can highlight individual monsters more easily, since players are now more easily outclassed by the action economy, and can hand out more unique and interesting magical items, as they are less likely to break the game’s challenge completely. Combat goes faster and players are encouraged to come up with more interesting solutions to situations rather than “we run in and kill it” because that tactic is now potentially dangerous.

On the DM side, it does require a bit of tweaking to adjust fights where necessary, or to roleplay monster behavior so that they aren’t using their most deadly attacks and options each round. In White Plume Mountain, it leads to a couple of major changes in the dungeon:

The Oni Fight: The Oni who guards Blackrazor is a tough opponent and while Nysyries and Aldric could probably defeat him, it is not a sure thing. Possible death seems a harsh thing to put into the game right after such an impactful departure from Tyrion, so I mess with this encounter a lot. As written in the module, the Oni is in disguise as a Halfling, but unlike in the module he is not particularly interested in fighting the players. He despises the gnome who trapped him and has decided to take his command “guard Blackrazor and challenge those who would seek to claim it” more literally and leaves the nature of the challenge up to the players. Aldric chooses to arm wrestle and so they do. The Oni is not totally good natured though, so they do it over small orbs of annihilation which will decimate the hand of whomever loses. We drag this contest out over several Strength rolls, myself keeping track of the number of successes each party gains (big wins, like +5 or +10 over the opponent, count as multiple successes) until Aldric finally drives the Halfling’s hand down into the sphere. In this way, they win the encounter and are able to claim Blackrazor. I don’t let them linger, though: the Halfling is beginning to turn into his true form, compelled to fight them, and the players flee before he can fully transform. The Gnome congratulates them and moves them back to the start of the dungeon.

The Vampire Fight: The fight for Whelm (or in this case, Heartcarver) is against a vampire, an incredibly dangerous foe at this level and one that Aldric, weilding Blackrazor, would not be able to hurt. I just don’t feel that this fight is one that my two person party can win, so I decide to mix it up. When Tyrion dies, the Herzou demon that has lurked inside of him since Haggemoth’s Tomb finally is freed. It barely has time to gloat, however, before the Gnome appears and fascinated by the creature, decides to abscond with him. Really, he is imprisoning the demon in place of the vampire, enjoying the fact that the players will have a chance to fight against the thing that empowered their old companion. More on that later.

Encouraging them to go after all Three Weapons: One obvious question with only two party members is why even care about going for the third weapon? One could claim that they won’t receive their Wish reward unless they claim all three weapons but, really, the players don’t intend on returning these items anyway, though they are wary of the dwarves coming after them to retrieve the weapons. So I sweeten the pot. The Gnome tells them that if they get all three weapons, he will be so delighted that he will cast a massive illusion to make everyone agree that the players have always been the rightful owners of these powerful items. That’s a big incentive, but Nysyries asks for another favor on top of it: “Can you remove the curse that makes me feed on the souls of men”?

She is referring to the blood curse put on her by the Rusalka of the Wytchwood, Tywin’s wife and Jorr’s daughter, the one that forces her to feed every three days on the soul of a male humanoid or else face losing her druidic powers forever.

This is very interesting and as a GM I take it as a clear character goal for Nysyries. So I do some quick adjustments to Heart Carver and the gnome tells Nysyries that the blood bond is too strong for him to affect directly but that the third weapon they seek has the power to break such bonds.

“I can promise to transport you to where the woods wytch is once you retrieve the weapon,” he giggles. “That much I can do.”

And with that, we have our deal.

The Cream of the Crop: Key Moments in White Mountain

There are some key moments that I don’t want to skip over, things that were just too well roleplayed to not share.

Aldric’s Sacrifice: Like all of the sentient legacy weapons, Blackrazor demands something in order to be attuned to. In its case, it wants a sacrific, a show of its new owner’s devotion to it. I honestly don’t have any particular idea in mind when I ask this of Aldric. Obviously it has to be something he can do now, so he can use the awesome weapon in this dungeon. I’m thinking maybe he will offer a body part, or something metaphysical, like the memory of the names and faces of his old mercenary troop. So when he tells Nysyries he will be right back and leaves the dungeon for a moment, I am not sure what to expect. I’m trying to think what he is getting. Aldric is a Cavalier, the new fighter archetype from Xanathar’s Guide. He has some decent magical items that go along with the class and support his role as a mounted warrior. Any of these would be a big sacrifice if he were to let them go.

Then he comes back into the dungeon. And he’s carrying a bloodied saddle. What he’s done dawns on me, then. “OH SHIT,” I say out loud, genuinely heart struck. For years, Aldric has only had one companion, besides his own need for revenge, and that companion was his lovely mare, Enopi, whom he has just slain in his quest for revenge.

The Death of Knick Knack: There is a nasty puzzle in this dungeon (one of many) where a hallway heats up metal and ends in an encounter with ghouls and ghasts. The party is in the process of figuring this puzzle out when, bored and tired of puzzles, Tyrion rushes headlong into it, using dimension door to bypass most of it. That’s fine, except then he’s left alone to fight the ghouls and ghasts. The other players curse and rush into the trap to catch up. They survive the trap, but the ever talkative Knick Knack does not. Having some metal on him, he is melted into nothingness and his last words of banter are spoken as his spirit leaves the door knocker: “Make sure... you put this... in my book...”

Nysyries breaks: Speaking of demands, Wave (which goes to Nysyries) wants only one thing—devotion to the sea god, Poiseden, whose power forged it and whose divine hands once wielded it. Nysyries agrees, this seems easy enough, but she do’esnt realize how complete the devotion is. She now worships and believes ONLY in Poiseden, who claims her soul as his own. Poor Nysyries: she has had her soul bargained and affected at least three times in this adventure. This latest bargain shatters her agreement with Nazragul and in a sudden moment of sharp clarity, she is free of his influence, reverting from Lawful Evil to Lawful Neutral alignment. This will have heavy implications in the finale of the adventure as she now no longer feels compelled to retrieve and use the soul jar to decimate Brindol.

Random Encounter: I roll a few random encounters while in White Plume Mountain. It’s a dungeon from the days where this is part of the expectation of the dungeon crawl and we have some fun with bugbears, a wight, and an invisible stalker during the players’ time in the mountain. The last random I roll is a pair of gagoyles and with one casting of Blight, Nysyries shows that they are simply not a match for her and Aldric. Now, I am not against a good figbht to break up the pacing of a dungeon crawl, but fights that feel like they are cannon fodder just don’t appeal to me. Yes, yes, they use up spells so fights against bosses are harder, but anytime I feel myself getting bored as a DM I take it as a red flag that the adventure needs a twist.

Thus, the Gargoyles stop fighting and begin arguing amongst themselves:

“Hey, Bruce, these guys are pretty tough. Maybe they could help us”?

“Shut up Lenny! We agreed we’d do this on our own. It’s our home, it’s ours to defend.”

“Yeah, I know, but they are really tough. It’d be nice if they’d help us. And they do kind of owe us for attacking us like that. Look, my left wing is totally shattered Bruce!”

Yes, these are Lenny and Bruce (I know, it was the first two names that came to mind), two mated gargoyles who have lived in White Plume since before the gnome infested it with monsters and turned it into his own personal fun house. Now the two, having made a promise to each other ages ago that they would make this their home and not let anyone come between their love, are determined to take on the cosmically strong gnome and reclaim their home!

It’s a sad little hope, as the gnome will doubtless turn them into dust—or his puppets—but they make an impression on the players, who agree to have them along, thinking at the very least they can soak some damage or show them the way past any traps. I think it also goes to show that players like variety, too, and that random encounters don’t always have to end in two sides hitting each other until one dies.

Boots of Lava Walk: I think I mentioned in a previous blog post that one of Aldric’s magical items are boots of lava walk which make him resistant to fire damage and his feet immune to it? Then it also bears mentioning that the group comes across a room where they have to leap from platform to platform over a pool of bubbling lava.

Nysyries turns into a quetzalcoatl and flies over the lava, carrying another monster they won to their side: a Flesh Golem that Aldric names Brutus, and who loves Aldric like he is his creator. There isn’t much time to develop this relationship though, as Nysyries is knocked off course by an exploding geyser of lava which damages her enough to transform back into her draconic form. Lenny and Bruce save her, but Brutus tumbles to his fiery death in the lava and Aldric is left to find his own way across the lava room. This goes fairly well, as it is a series of atheltic checks he makes while the room explodes in lava geysers behind him, and Aldric is very athletic. But on the last roll, he rolls incredibily low and there is only but one situation that can arise from this (pun intended): the lava explodes underneath Aldric and he rides the lava geyser to the top of the room and leaps off to makes the final jump to the platform at the end of the room.

Laying Old Plots to Rest: the fight against the Herzou (whose health I have buffed) is just as epic as I wanted it to be. It starts with everyone expecting a vampire (I leave the coffin as it is in the original module, and Lenny and Bruce also know that a vampire usually lives in here). But when Aldric opens the coffin, he sees instead the body of Tyrion laying in the coffin. The gnome, Keraptis, appears and taunts the players with their final challenge (freezing Lenny and Bruce in place as they try to assault him). Moments later, the Herzou emerges from Tyrion’s corpse and attacks.

Fang, claw, and blade clash as Aldric and the Herzou rush at each other. The Herzou gets the best of this match up, criting on Aldric and throwing him across the room to slam into Nysyries. Lenny and Bruce leap to the rescue, each of them grabbing onto the Herzou and holding it in place while Aldric charges it again and Nysyries launches her moonbeam. But this only lasts a short time. The Herzou crushes Lenny’s head to dust in his hands and holds Bruce up to the moonbeam, using it to destroy him. Then he prepares to engage Aldric again.

This is the turning point of the battle. Nysyries casts contagion on the Herzou, inflicting it with slimy doom forcing it to be stunned after it takes damage. And between moonbeam, one critically failed roll, and Aldric still pounding on it, the Herzou remains stunned for four rounds, just taking massive damage during this time. But not enough to kill it. Now completely enraged, it shakes off the contagion and charges Nysyeries, who has retreated from the room into a small hallway. Aldric tries to leap at the Herzou to stop its approach, but it swings around and knocks him aside with another critical hit, flinging him unceremoniously across the room. Then it proceeds after the terrified Nysyries.

Nysyries uses her staff of swarming insects to create a wall of locusts, but the insects do little to hamper the Herzou, who ignores their stings and bites and comes through them like parting a curtain, his fanged mouth open wide to bite Nysyries in two. He charges, intending to knock her back into the lava room and cast her into the lava after taking a couple of bites out of her. They roll opposing strength rolls, the Herzou adding +8 to his roll for this charge and getting a total of 20...

... and Nysyries rolls a natural 20 and adds her strength, beating the Herzou by a slim margin. Against all odds, she plants herself and bears the brunt of the demon’s charge, holding it back.

As she does so, she hears a snippet of song coming down the hallway, sounding as if it emanates from the Herzou itself: “Smash the rock, crack the rock, bash the rock!”

Tyrion, She thinks, recognizing the verse and the voice. But no, Tyrion is dead. This is but the echo of him. It is enough though. It grants her bardic inspiration and she uses it to drive her trident, the powerful Wave,up through the Herzou’s mouth and into its brain, killing it.

As the demon dies, its body dissolves in a pool of hot flesh and blood, in the middle of which is the handaxe, Heartcarver. Heartcarver was once the handaxe of a young woodsman who fell in love with a dryad. His story was destined for tragedy, as his fellow woodcutters burned the dryad’s forest out of jealously. They used the young man’s own axe to fell the Dryad’s tree, inadvertently laying a terrible power upon the weapon. It eventually passed into the hands of the royal family of Rhest, who knew of its powers and how to wield them. And it, like Blackrazor and Wave, played an unknown role in the fall of that kingdom.

With this fabled axe in hand, Nysyries steps back towards Aldric, who is a little peeved that she and not he got the killing blow on the beast. But as they step towards each other, the cavern walls shift and blur and suddenly they are out in the forest, the final laughter of the gnome echoing in their ears:

“Thank you so much for playing my game! Hee hee hee!”

“Aldric.” Nysyries hissed the name through clenched teeth, trying to draw the bearded man’s attention back to her. But it was no use. He continued walking towards the woman half submerged in the water, pulling at his breeches as he moved forward, everything else forgotten. Even Blackrazor lay discarded back by the gnarled tree roots that snaked together to form a bridge extending partway into the lake.

The woman was beautiful. Never had a word more closely fit a creature, as if it had been invented for her, by her, invented for her use and traded out to others by her permission alone. The water lifted her skirts and they floated about her. Beneath them was a color that suggested pale, naked, skin and hinted at pleasures lying in wait for any who would join her in the lake.

But Nysyries knew better. This was her patron, after all, the creature she was bound to. She had tasted blood and death for her. Now she ran along the root bridge towards Aldric, who was being drawn into the woman’s embrace. She heard Aldric gasp in surprise as the woman’s lips closed over his and her long black hair rose from the water like a living thing to ensnare him and pull him under. His eyes were rolled back in his head. His lips were flecked with blood. As for her, her neck was exposed as she tilted her head to watch him sink under the water.

Nysyries brought the Heartcarver down on that uncannily perfect neck. It was smooth like sanded stone and, like stone, it did not break under the axe’s touch. Instead a fleck of blood beaded under the small cut Heartcarver had made and the woman looked up with eyes that promised death.

“Traitor,” she said, not loudly, but with all the menace of an approaching storm.

“Aim for the heart,” a voice said in her mind and without thinking on it, Nysyries adjusted the Heartcarver to her other hand and swung sideways as the woman reached for her. The axe bit into the woman’s chest and this time blood exploded out, the torrent like a wine casket split in two. Aldric began to cough and he pulled himself out to shore, scrambling away from the water that was deepening to a dark red behind him.

The woman wept. But she lived. Nysyries wanted to strike her again, to make sure this was ended, but the woman pulled away, clawing her way to shore after Aldric. Aldric grabbed Blackrazor and made to cut her down, but the sword spoke: “No!” it said. “Do not touch her. She is tainted. Tainted by my brother.” And for once, Blackrazor sounded afraid.

So it was that the woman of the lake lay herself down, her eyes wide and staring at the sunset lit canopy of trees above her. In time, Nysyries stood over her, but before she could lift Heartcarver again, the woman sighed.

“Twyin?” she said, the name a question. “I... see you. Do you see our son? He looks like you, Twyin. He looks strong.”

Nysyries waited, but the woman said no more. Nysyries felt a weight slough off of her. She knew the curse was finally ended.

“I’ve had better dates,” Aldric said.

#dungeons and dragons #Friendship #White Plume Mountain #Red Hand of Doom #Conversion

[kayawagner]

Gnome Stew Notables – Avery Alder

Welcome to the next installment of our Gnome Spotlight: Notables series. The notables series is a look at game developers in the gaming industry doing good work. The series will focus on female game creators and game creators of color primarily, and each entry will be a short bio and interview. We’ve currently got a group of authors and guest authors interviewing game creators and hope to bring you many more entries in the series as it continues on. If you’ve got a suggestion for someone we should be doing a notables article on, send us a note at [email protected]. – Head Gnome John

Meet Avery

Avery is an experienced game designer interested in bringing meaningful and easy-to-learn games to a wider audience. Emphasizing collaboration and games where players decide ‘what is possible’, Avery’s games work to realize the potential for roleplaying games to challenge our politics, transform our lives, and bring about social change. Her works include: Monsterhearts, The Quiet Year, Ribbon Drive.

Check out Avery’s Kickstarter for Dream Askew//Dream Apart

@dreamaskew on twitter

Talking with Avery

1.) You have a new game out! Tell us about your latest game on Kickstarter. It’s called Dream Askew?

Yes! My latest project is on Kickstarter now! It is actually a split book with two games that are sort of companion games. I wrote Dream Askew, which is about a queer community amid the collapse of civilization, where the characters are influential people and explore what they would do with all the potential and scarcity that they now have. It is explicitly about a marginalized community banding together, and acknowledges that the apocalypse won’t reach everyone at the same time. I like that all of that possibility could be really hopeful… Benjamin Rosenbaum’s game Dream Apart is about being members of a Jewish shtetl in 19th century Eastern Europe. Both are designed as diceless and gm-less games that are good for seasoned players but are also beginner-friendly.

softcover, full colour, half-letter (5.5 x 8.5), approx. 100-180 pages

2.) Tell us a little bit about yourself and your work.

I have been designing games since high school and have explored a lot of different themes and approaches, but I keep coming back to themes of self-doubt, troubled communities—with conflicts like ideological differences—and relationships, queer community, and the post-apocalypse or exploring what would happen after the collapse of civilization. My games don’t focus on despair and suffering though. They focus on finding out where hope survives in that process.

I am really proud of my game Ribbon Drive, which was a freeform game that used songs from music playlists brought by the players to inspire the scenes and framing that players responded to in the game. For me, this game was about players coming in with a vision of the future—the places the game would go—and learning how to re-examine, and eventually let go of, that vision.

In 2012 I released probably my most popular game, Monsterhearts, where players are teenage monsters—both literally and metaphorically. They are teens making sense of their changing bodies and social worlds, while being monsterous creatures with their associated behavioral traits. This game had a lot of queer themes, with monstrosity standing in as a metaphor for a lot of things, but especially queerness. Sexuality and its confusing abiguities are core mechanic for the game.

I also designed The Quiet Year, which is a map drawing game about a community that has survived the collapse of civilization and is trying to rebuild. It is sort of a combination of board game, world building, and and abstract poetry exercise!

3.) Can you tell me a little bit more about how you make those thematic choices? Are these intentional and goal oriented? More personal?

I think it’s a mixture of personal interest and goal. I have lots of ideas and start working on lots of games and then abandon most of them…so the ones that have a burning need to be created are the ones that make it through. They are the games with themes I find really compelling, and that do mechanical things that push back against prevailing design trends…or build on those trends. There was a period in the indie design community when every design revolved around scene-level conflict resolution mechanics, and play pushed toward these conflicts in every scene. Ribbon Drive was designed as a game where you didn’t have conflict, and even when there were obstacles you could take a detour. You couldn’t use traits in the same scene that you introduced them. I think it’s important to have games about learning humility and self-reflection, not just conflict. One factor in choosing these elements is that they feel like a timely contribution to the community at a meta- level. Play can serve to promote belonging to a world working towards revolution and looking really critically at our own goals and actions. The games I design that make it to production really further that…it’s not coincidental.

4.) How did you get into games? Was there a memorable or meaningful gaming (or design) experience that encouraged you to get involved?

I have always been excited about games. D&D 3.5 was my first RPG experience. I was in a logging town where there weren’t a lot of opportunities, but with D&D I was able to imagine a world bigger than my small town. I was playing with a group of boys who were all smarmy know-it-alls, and would argue that the one GM-ing was wrong or could have done better. The games would always fizzle. From the get go I could see the potential in the medium and see us all having trouble accessing that potential, and with all our play styles wanting really different things. So I started designing my own games pretty quickly to try to see how to make the play experience better. I released my first game a month after I graduated high school.

5.) Who did you look up to when you got started in the industry? Or who do you look up to now?

Paul Czege wrote My Life With Master, the first indie role playing game I ever ordered, and it was the game that introduced me to tight minimal design. In that game, you play as a minion to an intimidating master—a figure like Dracula or Frankenstein. There was the tension of wanting to do something for your master while also knowing you can’t escape them, but slowly developing curiosity about the townsfolk and the bravery and competence to overthrow the master. Your character was represented by only a few stats: Self-Loathing, Weariness, and Love for the townsfolk was all the definition that you needed. Czege’s focused, minimal, tight, thematic mechanics really informed the kind of designer I became.

6.) Are there any important changes you see (or would like to see) occurring in the industry?

I have seen more games by and about women, which is really exciting. I see women designers getting a spotlight more often and also more queer themes being included in stories—both by queer designers and by designers working to exclude fewer people from their stories. I also see a push for diversity generally, and more conventions thinking about diversity of guests they bring out…But I see most of that push for diversity in ways that focus on gender and sexuality and not on race. I’ve seen panels on bringing diversity to the games industry that are all white, so I’d want more designers of color to be given guest spots at conventions and to get their work spotlighted more often. And maybe more attention on decolonization led by indigenous people in the community. From a design perspective, the thing I’d really want to see are games accessible to new players and that play in a few hours (ex. Jason Morningstar’s games point a way forward). I work to design games that are mechanically simple, but they still typically require a lot of high concept thinking and take 3-4 hours. There aren’t many games that play in just one or two hours.

7.) I’m glad you mentioned the time commitment that many RPGs take. Are there other ways these games could be more beginner-friendly?

In terms of a way that a book presents its concepts, not using acronyms is huge! Acronyms make it really imposing. In terms of design, games that require less math and that explain the concepts in the same place that you find them on the character sheet make them more accessible, so new players aren’t just looking down and seeing all these numbers. For play, thinking about making spaces accessible to new parents since many people have young children. In terms of themes, I think that as designers and storytellers we need to be really mindful about what themes will make sense to a general audience, and which are recursive tropes and memes that gamers have developed that are inscrutable to the outside world…like the progression of rat killing in sewers to becoming a demi-god doesn’t make sense to people who don’t already know it. If you are going to tell those stories and want them to be welcoming to new players, you really have to spell it out for new players…and what else might they know that looks similar. We like to think that these stories are like Lord of the Rings, but they really aren’t. The model for a D&D character arc is outside the usual.

I think a thing that comes up with my work is that people who are long time gamers have more trouble connecting thematically with what I’m writing than people who haven’t played RPGs before. For example, with Ribbon Drive, if you are coming in from D&D and Pathfinder as a point of reference to this game you are going to stumble more because really obvious cultural touchstones for some aren’t necessarily gamer touchstones, so people stumble over them.

8.) I am very excited for your new project. Can you tell me a little more about it before I let you go?

One of the really cool things about this Kickstarter project is the way Dream Askew & Dream Apart are in dialogue. They both are about marginalized communities that have created this place of belonging and possibility, while at the fringes of society. They build off the same themes but take them to really different places; in one case taking those themes in the context of a group that really existed, while the other is about a more fantastic range of possibilities. One asks you to build upon and explore your relationship to history, and the other asks you to imagine and build a world together. I’m interested in ways these games are both very similar and very divergent, and compliment each other and tease out the themes and possibilities of each. With Benjamin, thinking that if this project is about them both being a type of game, we’ve included a chapter on designing this type of game—encouraging people to continue exploring community, development, and juggling tensions and choices though game design. The book is not just a manual for how to play a game but is a manual for how to play a particular kind of game, as well as a piece that encourages you to design and explore further on your own.

I think it is really important to say that, in addition to Dream Askew & Dream Apart being rich games with powerful themes, I think they are really fun. Fun games that are for anyone. The first time I played Dream Apart we were high-fiving and laughing…it was just so fun to play!

Thanks for joining us for this entry in the notables series.  You can find more in the series here: and please feel free to drop us any suggestions for people we should interview at [email protected].

Gnome Stew Notables – Avery Alder published first on https://supergalaxyrom.tumblr.com

[swipestream]

Gnome Stew Notables – Avery Alder

Welcome to the next installment of our Gnome Spotlight: Notables series. The notables series is a look at game developers in the gaming industry doing good work. The series will focus on female game creators and game creators of color primarily, and each entry will be a short bio and interview. We’ve currently got a group of authors and guest authors interviewing game creators and hope to bring you many more entries in the series as it continues on. If you’ve got a suggestion for someone we should be doing a notables article on, send us a note at [email protected]. – Head Gnome John

Meet Avery

Avery is an experienced game designer interested in bringing meaningful and easy-to-learn games to a wider audience. Emphasizing collaboration and games where players decide ‘what is possible’, Avery’s games work to realize the potential for roleplaying games to challenge our politics, transform our lives, and bring about social change. Her works include: Monsterhearts, The Quiet Year, Ribbon Drive.

Check out Avery’s Kickstarter for Dream Askew//Dream Apart

@dreamaskew on twitter

Talking with Avery

1.) You have a new game out! Tell us about your latest game on Kickstarter. It’s called Dream Askew?

Yes! My latest project is on Kickstarter now! It is actually a split book with two games that are sort of companion games. I wrote Dream Askew, which is about a queer community amid the collapse of civilization, where the characters are influential people and explore what they would do with all the potential and scarcity that they now have. It is explicitly about a marginalized community banding together, and acknowledges that the apocalypse won’t reach everyone at the same time. I like that all of that possibility could be really hopeful… Benjamin Rosenbaum’s game Dream Apart is about being members of a Jewish shtetl in 19th century Eastern Europe. Both are designed as diceless and gm-less games that are good for seasoned players but are also beginner-friendly.

softcover, full colour, half-letter (5.5 x 8.5), approx. 100-180 pages

2.) Tell us a little bit about yourself and your work.

I have been designing games since high school and have explored a lot of different themes and approaches, but I keep coming back to themes of self-doubt, troubled communities—with conflicts like ideological differences—and relationships, queer community, and the post-apocalypse or exploring what would happen after the collapse of civilization. My games don’t focus on despair and suffering though. They focus on finding out where hope survives in that process.

I am really proud of my game Ribbon Drive, which was a freeform game that used songs from music playlists brought by the players to inspire the scenes and framing that players responded to in the game. For me, this game was about players coming in with a vision of the future—the places the game would go—and learning how to re-examine, and eventually let go of, that vision.

In 2012 I released probably my most popular game, Monsterhearts, where players are teenage monsters—both literally and metaphorically. They are teens making sense of their changing bodies and social worlds, while being monsterous creatures with their associated behavioral traits. This game had a lot of queer themes, with monstrosity standing in as a metaphor for a lot of things, but especially queerness. Sexuality and its confusing abiguities are core mechanic for the game.

I also designed The Quiet Year, which is a map drawing game about a community that has survived the collapse of civilization and is trying to rebuild. It is sort of a combination of board game, world building, and and abstract poetry exercise!

3.) Can you tell me a little bit more about how you make those thematic choices? Are these intentional and goal oriented? More personal?

I think it’s a mixture of personal interest and goal. I have lots of ideas and start working on lots of games and then abandon most of them…so the ones that have a burning need to be created are the ones that make it through. They are the games with themes I find really compelling, and that do mechanical things that push back against prevailing design trends…or build on those trends. There was a period in the indie design community when every design revolved around scene-level conflict resolution mechanics, and play pushed toward these conflicts in every scene. Ribbon Drive was designed as a game where you didn’t have conflict, and even when there were obstacles you could take a detour. You couldn’t use traits in the same scene that you introduced them. I think it’s important to have games about learning humility and self-reflection, not just conflict. One factor in choosing these elements is that they feel like a timely contribution to the community at a meta- level. Play can serve to promote belonging to a world working towards revolution and looking really critically at our own goals and actions. The games I design that make it to production really further that…it’s not coincidental.

4.) How did you get into games? Was there a memorable or meaningful gaming (or design) experience that encouraged you to get involved?

I have always been excited about games. D&D 3.5 was my first RPG experience. I was in a logging town where there weren’t a lot of opportunities, but with D&D I was able to imagine a world bigger than my small town. I was playing with a group of boys who were all smarmy know-it-alls, and would argue that the one GM-ing was wrong or could have done better. The games would always fizzle. From the get go I could see the potential in the medium and see us all having trouble accessing that potential, and with all our play styles wanting really different things. So I started designing my own games pretty quickly to try to see how to make the play experience better. I released my first game a month after I graduated high school.

5.) Who did you look up to when you got started in the industry? Or who do you look up to now?

Paul Czege wrote My Life With Master, the first indie role playing game I ever ordered, and it was the game that introduced me to tight minimal design. In that game, you play as a minion to an intimidating master—a figure like Dracula or Frankenstein. There was the tension of wanting to do something for your master while also knowing you can’t escape them, but slowly developing curiosity about the townsfolk and the bravery and competence to overthrow the master. Your character was represented by only a few stats: Self-Loathing, Weariness, and Love for the townsfolk was all the definition that you needed. Czege’s focused, minimal, tight, thematic mechanics really informed the kind of designer I became.

6.) Are there any important changes you see (or would like to see) occurring in the industry?

I have seen more games by and about women, which is really exciting. I see women designers getting a spotlight more often and also more queer themes being included in stories—both by queer designers and by designers working to exclude fewer people from their stories. I also see a push for diversity generally, and more conventions thinking about diversity of guests they bring out…But I see most of that push for diversity in ways that focus on gender and sexuality and not on race. I’ve seen panels on bringing diversity to the games industry that are all white, so I’d want more designers of color to be given guest spots at conventions and to get their work spotlighted more often. And maybe more attention on decolonization led by indigenous people in the community. From a design perspective, the thing I’d really want to see are games accessible to new players and that play in a few hours (ex. Jason Morningstar’s games point a way forward). I work to design games that are mechanically simple, but they still typically require a lot of high concept thinking and take 3-4 hours. There aren’t many games that play in just one or two hours.

7.) I’m glad you mentioned the time commitment that many RPGs take. Are there other ways these games could be more beginner-friendly?

In terms of a way that a book presents its concepts, not using acronyms is huge! Acronyms make it really imposing. In terms of design, games that require less math and that explain the concepts in the same place that you find them on the character sheet make them more accessible, so new players aren’t just looking down and seeing all these numbers. For play, thinking about making spaces accessible to new parents since many people have young children. In terms of themes, I think that as designers and storytellers we need to be really mindful about what themes will make sense to a general audience, and which are recursive tropes and memes that gamers have developed that are inscrutable to the outside world…like the progression of rat killing in sewers to becoming a demi-god doesn’t make sense to people who don’t already know it. If you are going to tell those stories and want them to be welcoming to new players, you really have to spell it out for new players…and what else might they know that looks similar. We like to think that these stories are like Lord of the Rings, but they really aren’t. The model for a D&D character arc is outside the usual.

I think a thing that comes up with my work is that people who are long time gamers have more trouble connecting thematically with what I’m writing than people who haven’t played RPGs before. For example, with Ribbon Drive, if you are coming in from D&D and Pathfinder as a point of reference to this game you are going to stumble more because really obvious cultural touchstones for some aren’t necessarily gamer touchstones, so people stumble over them.

8.) I am very excited for your new project. Can you tell me a little more about it before I let you go?

One of the really cool things about this Kickstarter project is the way Dream Askew & Dream Apart are in dialogue. They both are about marginalized communities that have created this place of belonging and possibility, while at the fringes of society. They build off the same themes but take them to really different places; in one case taking those themes in the context of a group that really existed, while the other is about a more fantastic range of possibilities. One asks you to build upon and explore your relationship to history, and the other asks you to imagine and build a world together. I’m interested in ways these games are both very similar and very divergent, and compliment each other and tease out the themes and possibilities of each. With Benjamin, thinking that if this project is about them both being a type of game, we’ve included a chapter on designing this type of game—encouraging people to continue exploring community, development, and juggling tensions and choices though game design. The book is not just a manual for how to play a game but is a manual for how to play a particular kind of game, as well as a piece that encourages you to design and explore further on your own.

I think it is really important to say that, in addition to Dream Askew & Dream Apart being rich games with powerful themes, I think they are really fun. Fun games that are for anyone. The first time I played Dream Apart we were high-fiving and laughing…it was just so fun to play!

Thanks for joining us for this entry in the notables series.  You can find more in the series here: and please feel free to drop us any suggestions for people we should interview at [email protected].

Gnome Stew Notables – Avery Alder published first on https://medium.com/@ReloadedPCGames

[kayawagner]

Gnome Stew Notables – Avery Alder

Welcome to the next installment of our Gnome Spotlight: Notables series. The notables series is a look at game developers in the gaming industry doing good work. The series will focus on female game creators and game creators of color primarily, and each entry will be a short bio and interview. We’ve currently got a group of authors and guest authors interviewing game creators and hope to bring you many more entries in the series as it continues on. If you’ve got a suggestion for someone we should be doing a notables article on, send us a note at [email protected]. – Head Gnome John

Meet Avery

Avery is an experienced game designer interested in bringing meaningful and easy-to-learn games to a wider audience. Emphasizing collaboration and games where players decide ‘what is possible’, Avery’s games work to realize the potential for roleplaying games to challenge our politics, transform our lives, and bring about social change. Her works include: Monsterhearts, The Quiet Year, Ribbon Drive.

Check out Avery’s Kickstarter for Dream Askew//Dream Apart

@dreamaskew on twitter

Talking with Avery

1.) You have a new game out! Tell us about your latest game on Kickstarter. It’s called Dream Askew?

Yes! My latest project is on Kickstarter now! It is actually a split book with two games that are sort of companion games. I wrote Dream Askew, which is about a queer community amid the collapse of civilization, where the characters are influential people and explore what they would do with all the potential and scarcity that they now have. It is explicitly about a marginalized community banding together, and acknowledges that the apocalypse won’t reach everyone at the same time. I like that all of that possibility could be really hopeful… Benjamin Rosenbaum’s game Dream Apart is about being members of a Jewish shtetl in 19th century Eastern Europe. Both are designed as diceless and gm-less games that are good for seasoned players but are also beginner-friendly.

softcover, full colour, half-letter (5.5 x 8.5), approx. 100-180 pages

2.) Tell us a little bit about yourself and your work.

I have been designing games since high school and have explored a lot of different themes and approaches, but I keep coming back to themes of self-doubt, troubled communities—with conflicts like ideological differences—and relationships, queer community, and the post-apocalypse or exploring what would happen after the collapse of civilization. My games don’t focus on despair and suffering though. They focus on finding out where hope survives in that process.

I am really proud of my game Ribbon Drive, which was a freeform game that used songs from music playlists brought by the players to inspire the scenes and framing that players responded to in the game. For me, this game was about players coming in with a vision of the future—the places the game would go—and learning how to re-examine, and eventually let go of, that vision.

In 2012 I released probably my most popular game, Monsterhearts, where players are teenage monsters—both literally and metaphorically. They are teens making sense of their changing bodies and social worlds, while being monsterous creatures with their associated behavioral traits. This game had a lot of queer themes, with monstrosity standing in as a metaphor for a lot of things, but especially queerness. Sexuality and its confusing abiguities are core mechanic for the game.

I also designed The Quiet Year, which is a map drawing game about a community that has survived the collapse of civilization and is trying to rebuild. It is sort of a combination of board game, world building, and and abstract poetry exercise!

3.) Can you tell me a little bit more about how you make those thematic choices? Are these intentional and goal oriented? More personal?

I think it’s a mixture of personal interest and goal. I have lots of ideas and start working on lots of games and then abandon most of them…so the ones that have a burning need to be created are the ones that make it through. They are the games with themes I find really compelling, and that do mechanical things that push back against prevailing design trends…or build on those trends. There was a period in the indie design community when every design revolved around scene-level conflict resolution mechanics, and play pushed toward these conflicts in every scene. Ribbon Drive was designed as a game where you didn’t have conflict, and even when there were obstacles you could take a detour. You couldn’t use traits in the same scene that you introduced them. I think it’s important to have games about learning humility and self-reflection, not just conflict. One factor in choosing these elements is that they feel like a timely contribution to the community at a meta- level. Play can serve to promote belonging to a world working towards revolution and looking really critically at our own goals and actions. The games I design that make it to production really further that…it’s not coincidental.

4.) How did you get into games? Was there a memorable or meaningful gaming (or design) experience that encouraged you to get involved?

I have always been excited about games. D&D 3.5 was my first RPG experience. I was in a logging town where there weren’t a lot of opportunities, but with D&D I was able to imagine a world bigger than my small town. I was playing with a group of boys who were all smarmy know-it-alls, and would argue that the one GM-ing was wrong or could have done better. The games would always fizzle. From the get go I could see the potential in the medium and see us all having trouble accessing that potential, and with all our play styles wanting really different things. So I started designing my own games pretty quickly to try to see how to make the play experience better. I released my first game a month after I graduated high school.

5.) Who did you look up to when you got started in the industry? Or who do you look up to now?

Paul Czege wrote My Life With Master, the first indie role playing game I ever ordered, and it was the game that introduced me to tight minimal design. In that game, you play as a minion to an intimidating master—a figure like Dracula or Frankenstein. There was the tension of wanting to do something for your master while also knowing you can’t escape them, but slowly developing curiosity about the townsfolk and the bravery and competence to overthrow the master. Your character was represented by only a few stats: Self-Loathing, Weariness, and Love for the townsfolk was all the definition that you needed. Czege’s focused, minimal, tight, thematic mechanics really informed the kind of designer I became.

6.) Are there any important changes you see (or would like to see) occurring in the industry?

I have seen more games by and about women, which is really exciting. I see women designers getting a spotlight more often and also more queer themes being included in stories—both by queer designers and by designers working to exclude fewer people from their stories. I also see a push for diversity generally, and more conventions thinking about diversity of guests they bring out…But I see most of that push for diversity in ways that focus on gender and sexuality and not on race. I’ve seen panels on bringing diversity to the games industry that are all white, so I’d want more designers of color to be given guest spots at conventions and to get their work spotlighted more often. And maybe more attention on decolonization led by indigenous people in the community. From a design perspective, the thing I’d really want to see are games accessible to new players and that play in a few hours (ex. Jason Morningstar’s games point a way forward). I work to design games that are mechanically simple, but they still typically require a lot of high concept thinking and take 3-4 hours. There aren’t many games that play in just one or two hours.

7.) I’m glad you mentioned the time commitment that many RPGs take. Are there other ways these games could be more beginner-friendly?

In terms of a way that a book presents its concepts, not using acronyms is huge! Acronyms make it really imposing. In terms of design, games that require less math and that explain the concepts in the same place that you find them on the character sheet make them more accessible, so new players aren’t just looking down and seeing all these numbers. For play, thinking about making spaces accessible to new parents since many people have young children. In terms of themes, I think that as designers and storytellers we need to be really mindful about what themes will make sense to a general audience, and which are recursive tropes and memes that gamers have developed that are inscrutable to the outside world…like the progression of rat killing in sewers to becoming a demi-god doesn’t make sense to people who don’t already know it. If you are going to tell those stories and want them to be welcoming to new players, you really have to spell it out for new players…and what else might they know that looks similar. We like to think that these stories are like Lord of the Rings, but they really aren’t. The model for a D&D character arc is outside the usual.

I think a thing that comes up with my work is that people who are long time gamers have more trouble connecting thematically with what I’m writing than people who haven’t played RPGs before. For example, with Ribbon Drive, if you are coming in from D&D and Pathfinder as a point of reference to this game you are going to stumble more because really obvious cultural touchstones for some aren’t necessarily gamer touchstones, so people stumble over them.

8.) I am very excited for your new project. Can you tell me a little more about it before I let you go?

One of the really cool things about this Kickstarter project is the way Dream Askew & Dream Apart are in dialogue. They both are about marginalized communities that have created this place of belonging and possibility, while at the fringes of society. They build off the same themes but take them to really different places; in one case taking those themes in the context of a group that really existed, while the other is about a more fantastic range of possibilities. One asks you to build upon and explore your relationship to history, and the other asks you to imagine and build a world together. I’m interested in ways these games are both very similar and very divergent, and compliment each other and tease out the themes and possibilities of each. With Benjamin, thinking that if this project is about them both being a type of game, we’ve included a chapter on designing this type of game—encouraging people to continue exploring community, development, and juggling tensions and choices though game design. The book is not just a manual for how to play a game but is a manual for how to play a particular kind of game, as well as a piece that encourages you to design and explore further on your own.

I think it is really important to say that, in addition to Dream Askew & Dream Apart being rich games with powerful themes, I think they are really fun. Fun games that are for anyone. The first time I played Dream Apart we were high-fiving and laughing…it was just so fun to play!

Thanks for joining us for this entry in the notables series.  You can find more in the series here: and please feel free to drop us any suggestions for people we should interview at [email protected].

Gnome Stew Notables – Avery Alder published first on https://supergalaxyrom.tumblr.com