Dice and Dummies

Guess What? Sylovia TNG is on its way!

2006-07-02T11:35:00.000-04:00

Who here remembers all my whining about one thing or another concerning my campaign setting. Well guess what, I say "stop being a bitch and get to work!" This Saturday, the eigth, there is DnD at my house. I'm going to be using normal DnD rules (aka quicksilver from memory), so you don't need to worry too much about me experimenting, at least not yet...

Pretty much, show up whenever you want, I'm gonna say it'll run from maybe 5 to whenever you leave. All I request is you bring a printed out character sheet, or if you have a laptop, bring that and be prepared to make one. The likelyhood of there being any roleplaying is slim. What is going to happen is you guys are going to make your character sheets, and we'll be doing some orientation for what Sylovia is, and whats happening. This will be important for everybody, especially for Bryan, since you'ven't done this before. Pretty much, feel free to think a little in advance about your character concepts, but pretty much do what you want, this is supposed to be fun for everybody, and I'm loosening up to maximize on that. Email me if you've got conflicts.

Remember, come prepared for DnD, I really want to get this prep stuff in this session I don't want to have to finish this another time. Thanks

A wee problem

2006-05-07T20:37:00.000-04:00

Well, you guys presumably recall TNG (save for Brian) and I've mentioned countless times how I'm working on it. Unfortunately, theres a major snag. Ya see... I like to tell stories. Its what I do, I'm a storyteller. But ya see, I don't like to tell stories that are interupted by an hour of rolling dice and consulting character sheets. I hope you now understand the problem. I want to do Sylovia TNG, but I'm gonna need some help figuring out how that heel I'm supposed to get the gaming in. I'm all up for saying "Come over to my house for three hours of narration in front of a fireplace" but I know that its also really fun to do some hardcore roleplaying. So, any ideas you have would be great, and as a preemptive strike, Pete, don't say anything stupid. Think before you post. Oh, and if anyone thinks of some sort of witty retort considering some lack of thinking on my part... well lets just say that if you do so, I hope you won't miss your eyes... because they'll be inside my scrotum. Just let that imagery sit in you mind for a few minutes.

Good guys and bad guys

2006-05-01T15:21:00.000-04:00

Alright, so I've been itching to write another one-shot for d20 modern, and I've finally decided to give in to the urge. I don't know exactly when, but I'll air it some time over the summer.
Just some background info. I promise that this time I'll actually finish writing the adventure. It should be better all the way around because I have a lot more experience this time than I have in the past. It'll be set in modern time, in a city (probably just in a generic opolisville, but maybe in an actual city) and it'll probably have the feeling of a drama or noir movie. I'm going to stick pretty strictly to a serious feel, which means no zombie, no hundred and ten year old janitors running around shouting in Zulu, and generally not that much tongue in cheek material.
I've got a good idea of what the general plot is going to be, but before I say anything, I want you all to answer me a very basic, albeit a very crucial question; would you rather play as bad guys or good guys?

My DM Style

2006-04-24T14:29:00.000-04:00

After reading the D&D article on Player styles I started to think about what my DM-ing style was. This thought was quickly abandoned as I had a lot of homework to do. When if went into my subconsious it met an older thought, "Should I include a main storyline in GTA:Sharn?" and the two became fast friends. In the short time they had together, they discussed much, but a cataclysm was to come. I got distracted, by something shiny.

whith my mind otherwise engaged the older thought could not support itself anymore, and it was fading. The new young thought saw the only opportunity to save iss friend, and consumed the essence of the older thought. Revitalized and greater than the sum of its parts, the newly converged thought moved its way through the deep recesses of my mind to the forefront, no longer a mere thought, but a revalation combineing a question, infformation, and now a full answer:

I'm not going to tell you guys if i'm including a main storyline or not

Instead of asking what your characters goals are, say 'Find the lost crown jewels' and then dribble out one hint after another so you guys follow a single line twords to end of the game.

Instead I will innundate you guys with information(If you ask for it) and let you choose your own path, with no guarentee that it will all work out.

We'll see how this all works out, but llet me know what you guys think

~Ryugu

An Idea - Portfolios

2006-04-24T12:20:00.000-04:00

I have been kicking around in my head for a while now the Idea of writing a "Player's Guide to Sharn" To help with my GTA:Sharn campagin. I have also thought of giving you guys placces to hold your character sheets, along with writing implements and note pads and paper. This would all come to a significant expenditure for 6 or 7 people.

Would you guys be opposed to the idea of each guy chipping in say 5 bucks for the relevant materials, and come game day have a shiny portfolio waiting for you?

~Ryugu

Sylovia TNG rehash

2006-04-23T19:32:00.000-04:00

If you recall, my last dnd related post was the "trailer" to my next campaign setting, which will most likely start this summer. Despite what is shown in that trailer, I most certainly will be changing some minor things, making the storyline of this campaign non canon to my first campaign. The impact of that is minimal, with this part of the campaign taking place much later than my first part. There will be some discrepancies, primarily due to the fact I want to work in some ideas and themes that were absent in the original, including a few things that serve as plot hooks, including The Tower. I'm not going to say much more, but the gears are turning, and things should be good!

Sadly, this has nothing to do with DnD

2006-04-09T20:32:00.000-04:00

I've been watching a movie or two (at this exact moment, Stephen King's Rose Red) and I thought of a funny idea. Imagine a horror suspense film in which through an interesting psychic phenomenon, one or more of the main characters could actually hear the soundtrack. Suddenly the characters would know "Don't go in that room" and things of that like. I'd love to see a zombie movie like that...

Quicksilver V1.0

2006-03-31T00:02:00.000-05:00

I am not ready to release Quicksilver V1.0 yet

I am however ready to talk abotu the shape of the eventual V1.0 release. We began with combat, and the quicksilver combat rules are what I call the Q.1 combat patch. Just a patch to fix a problem of time, but not yet part of a cohesive whole. In truth is should be called the Q.05 combat patch because it isn't done yet.

The skills would be Q.2, but they aren't done yet either. I'm not even sure where the Damage or the Rune magic fit into Quicksilver. I'm tired of using incomplete manifestations of the Quicksilver rules, and so I'm going to reveal all of my deep seated ideas about Quicksilver and ask for all of your input. I don't know where all of this is going to end, but i know where it will start, and that is with combat.

I'm just going to give you a broad overview of all the variants that Quicksilver will eventually call its own. Each one deserves its own post and its own disscussion, so if any of these things strike your fancy I'll spill the beans on how i got the idea for it, and where i'd like to take it. Da'aeron once described what I do as extrapolation, now I see just how right he was. I'm using the base D rules and extrapolating a new form of rues from them. These new rules require a guiding premise, something to say, "okay that fulfills the spirit of Quicksilver" I have a few ideas for that, but i'm asking for input there as well.

"Quicksilver is born of D Any D materials that conform to the 3.0 and 3.5 standard should be eligible for integration into Quicksilver"

"Quicksilver is intended to make mundane and unfun aspects of D quicker and make more sense."

"Quicksilver does go into a high level of complexity when needed, but only if the shape of that complexity reveals somethin where simplicty failed."

"Quicksilver may have a steep initial learning curve, but once the rules are learned they will be simple from there on out."

These are the guiding premises I use to write new quicksilver rules, and here are the barebones of the first generation of quicksilver rules

Combat Patch
Weapons:
Altered damage, altered attack, conceal ratings, Quality rating, Initiative changes, Hardness, Hp, Size
Skill alterations
Feat, skill equivalency
Roll and Role playing
Where do the dice end? Where do the Character sheets end?
Special Combat Actions

I am open to all forms of constructive criticism, all of you have played with me and my version of Quicksilver, I value your input

10 years baby!

2006-03-30T06:33:00.000-05:00

WHOOO!
Its the ten year anniversary of the American release of Resident Evil!
I demand we all spend this day in respectable silence for the assorted idiots who got killed way too easily by zombie dogs in the opening scene, and for the Directors who were beheaded for their crappy job of making the live action opening cinema scene, as well as the crappy dialogue.

This looks like blood. I hope it isn't Chris's blood.
You are the master of lock picking.
You were almost a Jill Sandwich! (good line in the remake)

Article-tastic

2006-03-30T00:03:00.000-05:00

Behold! I didn't mention it before because the article was still in its infancy, but Wikipedia has upgraded the Eberron article from a stub to a full fleged and fleshed out article!

Link to the Eberron Wikipedia Article

*personal note* sorry i haven't been in contact with anyone for the past week, all my housing plans for next year have been shot to hell, I am rebuilding them very quickly, but i'll post fully on my blog once i've got it all sorted out blog here: blog

A scurrilous guide to language in Eberron

2006-03-22T16:18:00.000-05:00

After episode 0 of Bryan's Eldeen Reaches campaign, some people were talking about swearing in DnD, and how most of the four letter words that we toss around detract from the setting. If other people are interested, I think it'd be really cool to make a small compendium of bad langauge for Eberron on this blog. We could do just words (i.e. Clank is a racial slur for Warforged), or words along with etymology (i.e. Swap is a racial slur for changlings. There used to be a practice in Sharn's brothels that if a client came looking for "something extra" that the manager couldn't provide, they would send in a Changling, refered to as a "swap" to sate the client's yearning. The practice isn't that widespread any more, but because of how many people go through Sharn every day, the term quickly picked up in other places.)

If we do do this though, what sort of vulgarities would we need? Racial slurs would probably be good. Where do we draw the line? Damn or curses is probably still fine. And what about words that are actually still connected with their meaning (for example, would we need an equivelant for shit?).

What do you guys think? Is this a bad idea to start with? Is it interesting but not worth the effort? Is it great? Comment on it, now!

Another Test

2006-03-19T22:30:00.000-05:00

Well Gentlemen this should be another landmark among our little group. I hope this works

You all should recive an email notifing you that this post exists. I have set up multiple things to have this stuff sent to you.

Now you should get notification of each new post...assuming this alll works right
*crosses fingers*

~Ryugu

My 'Lil Update

2006-03-16T22:28:00.000-05:00

Hey dudes. I've got a few things to talk about, so I hope you're wearing comfortable pants, because this'll be a lengthy post. I'm currently building a soundtrack for the one-shot I'm running, and that includes theme songs for each of your characters! Of course, I can't just assign songs to people; that's far too impersonal, and I want the songs to reflect on your characters as people. Consider this to be a part of the character creation process. I don't need songs now, but character concepts would be greatly appreciated as an appetizer! Just give it a little thought for now.

Secondly, Tim posed a good question to me yesterday: what are the technological limits in Starfall? The simplest answer that I can provide you with is that at the start of the game, the level of technological advancement will be about on par with that found in Eberron. That being said, don't expect to find Eberron-type technology copied and pasted into my campaign. So, no manifest zones, no elemental-bound vehicles, etc. *That* being said, a number of options in gear and gadgets will be made available to you over the course of the game. I know how much adventurers love their pointy/explosive/vibrating/vorpal toys. Just because the bad guys are especially tough doesn't mean you won't get fancy gear to annihilate them with.

On a related note, playing out a horror campaign well means that I have to try especially hard to fill two roles: the Avatar and the Storyteller. As the Avatar, I must represent everything that you, the PCs, are fighting against. After all, I am the Dungeon Master. It's my job to play all the Bad Guys. But in a horror campaign, it's a little bit more complicated for everyone, Player and DM alike. Allow me to speak as the Avatar of Horror for a minute: "I not simply going to try to kill you. No, no. That would be too simple. I will make you watch helplessly as I take away everything you ever loved or cherished, all that you hold sacred, and I will destroy it. After all hope is gone, and all you are left with are hatred and despair, I shall take those as well. In time, you will know nothing but emptiness, and it shall consume you. And there is nothing that you can do about it."

I have to be honest with you: I *won't* hold back. Your characters are going to be in some dangerous, fucked-up situations, and everything you hold dear will be on the line. However, this is where that Storyteller aspect comes in. If your character dies... well, that DOES suck, but just trust me, eh? Everything that I might do will have a purpose, and will contribute to the story as a whole. My job is to create, with all of your help, a high-paced-action-packed-mind-fuck-thrill-ride that skalds and bards will sing tales about forever after. So, I want you guys to think about your characters, and how you might roleplay them, given the following statement: "You pathetic mortals don't stand a chance. Oblivion is your fate, and your fate has been sealed. What are *YOU* going to do about it?"

Characters : Sharn

2006-03-14T23:59:00.000-05:00

Hello everyone DM Celestialbacon here and i've got more info, but mostly more questions for you guys about my campagin.

First, the new info, and then the questions.
There are five (+- 2) Major plotlines. Each one may, or may not have
annything to do each other, and each one is predicated on a world
spanning organization(how do I define world?) You DO NOT have to join
any of these storylines, or even find them. But I know what each of
these groups will do over a five year span(roughly) and if the playrs
simply standd there I know what they will do, this DOES NOT mean you
guys can't change things, in fact i can guarentee that the world will be
changed by your existence in it.

GTA:Sharn will be restating at episode 1 (not zero, that was just to get your feet wet in the world of quicksilver)

Like the email says, i'd like to know if you guys will be reprising your
roles. I already have a good ammount plannned around those characters,
and changeing them wouldn't destroy the world, but it will require me
to rethink things.

A word on character development: more
Each of your characters has a public face that everyone in the party knows,
and each of you have dirty(or not so dirty) secrets that you don't want
the rest of the party to know. I'd also like you guys to prepare
...well for lack of a better word personality. Each of you should get
to know your character, what they like and dislike, how they feel in
the rain, if they like strawberries, or if they break out in hives when
they see mithral because they man who killed their family wore mithral.
Speaking
of family they don't HAVE to die. Like Mookie says your characters
parents form the basis of their views in the world and keeping them
alive allows for a great deal more character development...however some
of your parents...do have to die, for story purposes. ...Hm i just
DM'ed myself into a corner.... darn

I've lost my train of thought, i'll post more later

Get my email?

2006-03-03T02:25:00.000-05:00

Just posting here to see if everyone got my email, about Friday the 10th. This is probably redundant since you guys probably check your email more than the blog, and I'm going to send out another email. So just in case you don't know, D&D at my house Friday the 10th 4PM until whenever and I do mean whenever. There is alot we can cover, so we can go as long as everyone wants. Email me with any questions or conflicts etc. etc. Also I mentioned you can start filling out character sheets (standard Eberron) if you want, I gave enough information to most of you so you can at least get started with name, background ability scores....speaking of which I never posted we are using the 28 point system as far as determining ability scores. If anyone has a problem with this then suck my ****. J/K seriously though if you have a suggestion( I know Rich has been learning many new concepts up at school) then run it by me.

So if you have any questions at all, no matter how big or small, please email me, or contact me in the most convenient way for you.(I can be reached telepathically Mon.-Fri. from 4PM to Midnight)

Save Points

2006-03-02T00:45:00.000-05:00

Hey guys, in the idea of Disscussion, here's a strange and interesting topic.

Save Points in D />
How would thy work?
Would they destroy the illusion of reality?

What good things could be gained from implementing such a mechanic?
What bad things would happen when such a mechanic is implemented?

How would you implements something similar which does not have bad elements?

I'll post my manifesto later, but for the moment just ignore your gut reaction of "that's a bad idea" and think about my questions. I'll give you guys the lowdown on my plans during break.

My piece of the pie

2006-02-19T21:10:00.000-05:00

Given the trailers of everyones' campaigns being posted lately, I figured I might as well add my bit.

My first Sylovia Campaign setting began in AF 239, and ended in AF 243.

Time has passed. The tide war, which resulted in the deaths of thousands, has left Sylovia a tired realm. Although the fear of the small folk has almost fallen into the realm of myth, the threat remains, and many behmous veterans of the war still dwell on those heroes who fell in the name of peace: Tao Kai, leader of the forces of both the LG Rebellion and the Tide Wars; Daiji Aishtor, a beacon of the Behmous people until his betrayal and death within Minos; Bragash Talcos, one of the two warrior brothers who assembled the behmous host that was key in the end of the war; and Mahul Towar IIX, the ruler of Mahul Towar, who struck out in vain to recover the mythical weapons lost by Tao Kai and his father. The secretive organization only known as “The Dark” continue to keep a vigil on the wastelands, fighting beyond death to keep the small folk at bay. The Deragen of Allos have spread East across the wastelands, forming a mercenary army in the slowly reviving wastes. The nations of Sidaujm and Mahul Towar are in conflict, both countries vying for resources, while Dazhor and Gigardcrest attempt to recover the lands ravaged by the war.

Mighty cities have fallen, and entire races have been decimated. The Blood plague ravages the Regaden, and even with the advances in medicine by the esteemed J’dor Plougsair, the Regaden continue to diminish in number, entire cities falling in mere days to the terrible affliction. The Suvini are of no consequence in Sylovia, children often growing into old age without having ever laid eyes upon one of the few surviving children of Subtergar.

People look upon Sylovia as a child looks upon an old man, obsolete, and no longer worth taking care of. With the works of engineering jumping foward in leaps and bounds, sailing ships have begun to depart Dazhoran docks, behmous warriors being trained to handle sails in place of sword. Explorations has become the new endeavor of the West, the landings at the islands south of Gigardcrest being the first great steps, and speak of journeys beyond the horizon in the works. In the now open cities of Allos, there is word of terrible monsters wandering the realms north of their territories, massive dark beasts hunting and killing entire parties of explorers.

Parties of trained warriors, many of which have served as the new first line between the nations and the small folk raiders, wander the trails and routes, hiring themselves out to all interested. Armies of reanimated behmous, gen, and suvini, led by small folk, strike at defenseless border towns. Many people thrive even in these dark times, such names as the Dariden family, the Talcos family, and the Ploughsairs live in wealth and power, their quick actions both aiding the reconstruction of nations both east and west, and helping to bring these nations together quickly enough to not only guarantee their temporary longevity, but that of these families.

Things have been dark, but a symbol of power and might has risen from the ashes of the ravaged world: Dazhai. This invincible creature, spoken of in both hushed tones and mighty hails, has returned to Dazhor with a band of three companions, single-mindedly seeking a band of warriors to aid him in his ventures. He speaks of a being even mightier than himself, which can only be reached with the aid of the mightiest people of Sylovia.

With the peoples of Sylovia thriving, suffering, and departing, the future is a shaky one, and the discoveries they are bound to make, will be more terrifying than anything they could ever imagine.

The year is AF 513. Welcome to Sylovia TNG

Share it with the world

2006-02-18T00:42:00.000-05:00

Wow. It looks like it's going to be a very DnD summer. We've got shit going down in Sharn, the Eldeen Reaches, Starfell, Sylovia, and ancient fucking Rome. Please please please tell me that somebody is going to run a Connecticon one-shot. I can understand not wanting to do homebrews there, but Eberron seems pretty popular (as we might be doing as many as three games set there). Actually, I could think of a lot of reasons you wouldn't want to DM at Connecticon. But really, is any one planning on it? Or even considering it?

Hey Look, a Post

2006-02-17T22:35:00.000-05:00

Richard just sent me an email today mentioning, among other things, that I never post on this blog. My reaction can best be summarized as "Woah shit, we have a blog."

I kept meaning to post something on here, but I've been juggling like eight different things every day these days. Thank God for vacation.

Anyway, since I have a week of vacation ahead of me, there's Nightwish blearing through my headphones and I'm far too tired to exercise better judgment, I feel now is a perfect time to talk about my summer campaign.

Yes, like seemingly everybody else, I want to run a campaign over the summer. I miss DMing, and I think I learned a lot from my past couple of attempts about what works or doesn't work. And I've been having this kickass idea bouncing around in my head for a campaign setting that I want to put out there:

It's basically a fantasized version of Ancient Rome. I'd pick and choose a few different races, but I can say right now that humans, elves and gnomes would definitely be in there, and most of the monster races with a few exceptions definitely would not. The level of technology would definitely be somewhat above what the Romans had, as would the level of magic, insofar that it would exist.

The main gameplay areas would be:

Aventium, and outlying provinces: Basically, the Roman Republic. Think all of the cultural, racial and economic diversity of Sharn, with even more blatant corruption, a far less efficient police force and a government that's about as stable as Ted Stevens' psyche (too obscure?). At the start of the campaign, there's a crapload of Carthaginian babarians (possibly halflings) at the gate, one of the two consuls has just died, and the other consul wants the senate to give him dictatorial powers so that he can beat back the invaders.

Akaea: Think Greece. Basically a bunch of city states scattered over a dozen different islands or so. Unlike in reality, the Aventines in this reality only control a few of the islands, either through outright occupation (to varying degrees) or restrictive trade agreements. They're eyeing the rest, although if they take their eyes off the islands they already have, they may lose them.

Aferius: Carthage, Persia, Egypt. Mostly halflings, although Egypt (Aegyptus) is probably more elven. Carthage is a huge military problem for Aventium. They have fucking elephants.

Britannica, Germanica: Duh. A few forests but mostly big open foggy green space with smelly (dwarven?) inhabitants that Aventium wants to conquer just for the hell of it. Of course, the locals may turn out to be a bit tougher to smash than Aventium realizes.

Clearly, the politics here would be a bit complicated, especially with all of the intrigue in Aventium, but I'll leave it up to the players whether or not they want to get into all of that. They could just as easily just higher themselves out to a single senator and smash stuff for him without giving too much thought about what his motives are.

Like with Richard's campaigns, this one would have a clearly defined arc, plotted out loosely ahead of time by me to span the three months of summer. I might be going away for a month in the middle, in which case I would abridge the arc, and most likely put a huge cliffhanger in right before I go away.

Right now here's how I'm thinking it would start out: the players all wake up to find themselves sharing a cell at the gladiatorial arena in some backwater province. Apparently, through some channel or another, they've all been betrayed and sold into slavery. From there they can either attempt to escape from the arena or stay and attempt to win their freedom through valor in the ring, but one way or another they're going to find themselves caught up in events larger than their own personal liberty.

One more thing, even though this post is already far too long: gods. I'll obviously be using the Roman pantheon, but the Romans had a habit of acknowledging other gods that weren't explicitely part of their pantheon. It wasn't unusual to find cults dedicated to gods imported from Africa or Europe in Rome. In that spirit, there will be a bunch of gods from outside the traditional pantheon. And they'll be far dumber, and far less aloof, than the gods you guys are used to. They'll take an active interest in the stuff that goes on, and use persuasion, bribery and seduction to get mortals to do stuff with no reason more farsighted than to piss off their siblings (who they'll probably be having sex with in a matter of days). I'm not sure whether or not the PCs might actually meet a god, but it would be nowhere near as unusual or exciting as it is in other campaigns.

Anyway, for those of you who actually made it all the way to the end of this post, what do you guys think?

Coming to Middletown, Summer '06...

2006-02-14T22:04:00.000-05:00

You awaken, screaming, from a nightmare you suddenly no longer remember. Terrified, you wrest the sweat-soaked blankets from on top of you, revealing a thick, tattered book. The cover is stained with a blackish crust, which you recognize in the flickering candle-light to be dried blood. Beneath the dried ichor, the cover of the book bears the title the Diary of Asphodel in neat, golden script. The first few pages of the book are smudged, illegible, or written in languages you cannot recognize. You can, however make out parts of the following entry:

"...he was so young. He could not have been older than a score of summers ... knew it was the right thing, the *right thing* to do. He had to be punished ... all of ... sins! His allies ... too late, just as ... fell from my blade, they watched him die ... I think they screamed, or maybe they cried ... cannot remember. They came at me, but the light from their torches fell upon me in the darkness ... the reflections of their blades ... saw myself ... white wings stained ... blood, tears falling from my eyes. I screamed ... horror. I could not let them see my shame ... see the angel I was, long ago ... showed them ... demon I became.

How have ... fallen so far? I have been stained ... much sin! I cannot purge ... within me, so I must ... from others. These mortals, whom I once swore to guide now die ... of me. The heavens are denied ... me ... forbidden. Locked away, beyond my reach. I must ... atonement. I must bing justice. My only way, the ONLY WAY BACK IS ... PAIN, BLOOD AND DEATH. THERE ... NO REST FOR THE WICKED. THE FIRES ... CLEANSE THEIR SINS, MY SINS ... SHALL RETURN TO THE HEAVENS, TO THE STARS.

THE FALLEN STARS HAVE SUNDERED THE EARTH. WHO SHALL SET THEM AGAIN IN THEIR CELESTIAL THRONES ON HIGH? LOOK ABOVE, LOOK ABOVE, AND KNOW THAT ONE LAST STAR HANGS, AWAITING THE SUN, THE MOON, AND THE DARKNESS ... AWAITING ITS DESCENT, AWAITING US ALL, AWAITING THE END ..."

Welcome to Starfall, an original horror campaign setting. Coming in Summer 2006.

Summer Campagin Voting begins

2006-02-14T20:26:00.000-05:00

One slightly off topic thing first, I need a name for the universe that all my campagins take place in. Bryan is considering using that world for his campagin, and Tom is thinking of a one shot there...it needs a name, we all built it so i'm open to names.

I've spoken to a few of you about what i'll be doing for the summer, but now i'm ready to tell everyone. You know how when you get a demo for a game it says at the begining "Actual release may vary from current product" Well that's what both GTA:Sharn and Mournlands was. Both were Demo's and I'm allowing you the players to choose which one I should run for the summer. Cyre was just a trial campagin, to get my creative juices flowing, Cyre won't be run in the conciveable future, hell i'll probably never get to it.

I'm allowing you guys to choose which campagin I run. Each person gets one vote (someone tell tim and ned about this, they never check the blog) to decide which campagin I run for the summer, why? Well I have two major things that i'll be working on in each campagin, the Setting, and the Engine. I can't work on four, but two is acceptable. There's already a book for sharn (Sharn: city of towers) but not for the mournlands, so i'll have to write it. Kinda like the setting books (sandstorm, stormwrack and frostfell) but slightly different. The book for Sharn is detailed but not enough for sharn so it will require major detailing.

As for the engines both campagins work off differnt offshoots of the Quicksilver engine. Sharn uses the "Requiem" module and Mournlands uses the "Enigma" module. What is a module? It's a big packet of variant rules culled from Unearthed arcana, other rulebooks, and my own twisted imagination. The highlights are thus:

Enigma: Strange convolutions of reality, including the runic magic system. (uses d20's)

Requiem: Gritty realism, as befitting the dank streets of Sharn (uses 3d6 in place of d20's)

Sharn will be even dirtier and grittier than you remeber, much more
real and fluid. The Mournlands will be crazier, and it will really
remake quite a lot of the world.

Whichever campagin is choosen it will restart back at the begining and you guys will not know IC anything, but you can keep your OOC knowledge (won't help much, but it might) If Sharn is chosen I will do my best to keep in IN SHARN. I make no such guarntee with the Mournlands. I have overarching storylines planned for both, but thi is a mutaully exclusive choice, Once you pick one campagin you can't go back to the other one.

I'm only one DM and I can't run both campagins at once. I've found my niche, and It's the Breland/Mournlands corridor. I'm at my best when I'm in my element so i'm going to run my campagins in that element.

Eldeen reaches Campaign--some more details

2006-02-07T01:50:00.000-05:00

I have no official name for my campaign yet, but it doesn't really matter right now. So for anyone interested in this campaign I'm going to give a bit more detail and a bit of a guide to what type of character to create. If you have any further questions feel free to E-mail me.

And one more thing this is a disclaimer for all future posts of mine...I type fast and am too lazy to proof read for spelling and grammer...there WILL be mistakes...live with it :P

So lets talk about the beginning of the campaign. The setting is the eastern pasture lands of the Eldeen reaches. This area lies between the edge of the towering wood and the border of Aundair(a river forms the border, I forget the name and my Eberron manual is on the other side of my room so...) Small farming communities dot the landscape in this area. The largest city in the Reeches (name escapes me atm) is located in this area. House Validis cntrols the city pretty much, tehy are the master breeders btw. To get a better idea of how I'm making this are in my campaign, the best comaparison for those of us who read LOTR, would be Rohan. The city being Edoras. Makes sense since this is an area of plains as is Rohan, and thge Rohirrim are great breeders of horses, house Validis are hte breeders of Eberron (obviously breeding more magical creatures as it is a more magical setting). Don't think I'm completely modeling it after Rohan with cahracters and stuff, I'm just saying the eastern pastures of the Reeches seems some what like an Eberron version of Rohan. Anyways...teh first adventure will most likely have you going against the bandit brotherhood that has gained a strong foothold in the region. As was said before the bandits formed because the region remained relativley lawless since the wardens of the wood were more focused on the the forested areas of the Eldeen reeches. While most of the drudic sects are self sufficent, usually surviving by hunting and gathering, they did recieve some supplies and provisions from the farmers of the eastern pastures. They are now starting to notice that they relied on these supplies more than they thought now that they've been cut off. This crisis is mostly affecting permanent settlements within the towering wood, namely Greenheart. With the possibility of losing the eastern pastures to the bandits (who would probably try to gain independence if tehy became powerful enough) and neigboring Aundair, who has now offered protection to the farmers in an attempt to gain thier allegiance and reclaim lost lands of thiers, the wardens of the wood have taken up arms and emerged from the towering wood to swiftly put an end to the bandit brotherhood and stop the conflict from becoming any greater.

Now I'll give some examples of classes and races that would fit in with this scenario.

Druid
Race-Human, Elf, Half-Elf, Orc, Half-Orc, Shifter
Plot Hooks: You could be a druid of the wardens of the wood, emerging from the vast towering wood to help protect your lands and the land itself. Not limited just to the wardens though, other druid sects are acceptable as there are many, and if you put the time into you can make up your own smaller druid sect since the Eberron handbook metions there are many smaller sects but does not list them all.

Ranger
Race-Human, Elf, Half-Elf, Orc, Half-Orc, Shifter
Plot Hooks: Same as druid but obviously using different methods. You would most likley be part of one of the many druidic sects of the Eldeen Reaches. I would like to see at least one person playing a ranger in this campaign, since they fit in so perfectly. Ranger skills will be needed. Tracking for instance will be very useful, not just for tracking enemies but for tracking an animal that you are huntig for food or for trophy. (yes there will be collectors and what not in settlements, who will buy skins and what not off of you...more on this in another post.)
So if you ever wanted to be a ranger before then now is your chance.

Fighter
Race-Human, Elf, Half-Elf, Orc, Half-Orc, Shifter, Warforged*
Plot Hooks: There are small local militias set up in some of the farming communites of the eastern pastures. Obviously a fighter could fit in here. In the larger communites it may even be possible that mercenaries were hired (nothing big time). That too could work. There are other possiblities if anyone thinks of more then don't be shy.

*A Warforged fighter could work. There aren't too many RP options though for background. The one that makes most sense would be your character came from Aundair, a veteran of the last war, and became a farm hand on one of the small farms. With the bandit crises he has once again taken up arms. Barbarian could work too.

Rogue
...About the same as fighter...

Barbarian
Could have the background like that of a fighter, or you could be from one of the druidic sects from the towering wood. I would like to see a barbarian in the campaign if anyone wants to paly one.

Sorcerer
This is the only type of arcane spell caster allowed in the campaign, unless it is a class that also is born with thier magical powers. Wizards and the like don't fit in very well. A possibility for a sorcerer could be thatt you were born in the Reeches into one of the druidic sects. At a young age you began to show your latent magical powers. Your family tried to hide it and you were told not to use this power. However curiousity got the best of you and you wanted to udnerstand why you were different. Delving into the ways of the arcane you have gained great magical ability but you are also looked upon as an outcast byyour peers. Most don't understand you and they fear that, some may even be openly hostile towards you.

Sorcerer will be hard to play in this setting and will require good RP, so don't go this route if your not up for the challenge. Also I'm going to limit this character type to one, as I don't want to end up having a party of outcast sorcerers running around the forest..errr...

I probably missed some classes and races, but it's late and I'm tired, tell me if I missed anything that you find important or that you really want to play.

...yeah I just rememberd clerics and monks...they could fit in but it might be hard. Try to stick with the races and classes metioned above.

Sylovia TNG not Dnd

2006-01-25T15:46:00.000-05:00

As mentioned in "The War on RPG's", I've been in a bit of a rut when it comes to Sylovia. I've been looking at it objectively, and I think my main personal issue is that I just can't stand DMing with DnD rules. Quicksilver is a great improvement on 3.5, of course, but as I've mentioned, its difficult to get a good blend of story and gaming. Unfortunately, I've realized I really enjoy Sylovia because of its capacity to be the vehicle of my storytelling. And, in response to a self posed question, I could never put it down on paper, it just wouldn't be storytelling if you just write it, it loses that wit and spontanity. What I currently propose is a bit much, and I personally don't like the sound of it, but it seems like the only way I'm going to get this done. Forget character sheets. Forget game rules. Forget all of those things. At least until I get a good grasp on things, If I'm going to GM, I'm going to do it exactly how I want. I'm not into GMing, I'm into storytelling. Ever notice how its next to impossible to do detailed customization of a character following Dnd rules? I'm trying to change that, by getting rid of any and all restrictions. Such a system won't work on any sort of large scale (aka, not just anybody can "GM" in this way effectively), But I think I'm up to the task. Many of you have played opposite of my screen. Let me know what you think.

Upcoming Campaign....need my D&D fix

2006-01-24T01:49:00.000-05:00

Hey hows it going folks....good? Really? Ok thats good to hear. You sure now? Ok now that we've gotten the formalities out of the way lets get down to business. If you didn't look at my name or don't know my user name (I know I don't post much.....) This is Bryan. I've been playing D&D for a while now and have only DM'd once....was kind of interesting, we were using epic level characters in a very non-epic setting :P Anyways I've decided that teh time has come for me to get back behind the screen and this time for real. I've been working on a campaign for over a month now, I've even been buying D&D books and what not( much easier than reading them in .pdf format imo) . I'm doing a lot of preparation for this campaign and it probably won't be ready for a couple of months, maybe not until early summer. So to get to the point I was wondering if anyone will be interested in my campaign, I can promise you all that I'm much more mature and responsiblke when I'm hosting the session (so no need for worries Ned).

You probably would all like to know what my campaign is all about. For one it's an Ebberon campaign and I will probably be using quicksilver rules. The setting is primarily the Eldeen Reaches, The Shadow Marches, and the Demon Wastes...maybe a few other areas too. I figure this will be an interesting setting as it's very different from the Urban setting of GTA Sharn (this may be running parrallel to that campaign and in the same time line btw, still talking to Ri....err Ryugu). The back story of this campaign is there is turmoil in the eastern pasture lands on teh border of the Eldeen Reaches and Aundair. The Wardens of the Wood have not been offering much protection to the farmers of these lands and becasue of that a small uprising has taken place, in the form of a bandit group, wroking name being the 'Defias Brotherhood' (WoW refernce). Different farming communities are taking different sides, and now Aundair is offering its protection in an attempt to reclaim these lands that once belonged to the kingdom. With the threat of losing the commodities provided by the farmers to teh east, the Wardens of the Wood and some of the lesser druid sects have set out to stop the now powerful Defias Brotherhood in order to stop any greater conflict. An attack is being planned on a major Defias encampment which also happens to be in ancient ruins that the gatekeepers seem very concerned with....and so the adventure begins....

That is just a brief summary of the campaign backstory, if anyone has read anything about Eldeen Reaches, Shadow Marches etc. I do plan on incorporating much of what is written about these regions in the campaign (The Gatekeepers, Fey, Cults of the Dragon Below). The demon wastes will also paly an important part in the campagin. I'm also thinking of making some new rules for the campaign, because of the setting, there may be a survival in the wilderness aspect involved (maybe thing Metal gear Solid 3 for those who ahve palyed it). That is not set in stone though.

So tell me if you're interested adn I can post more about character classess and stuff like that. I plan on holding the campaign at my house which about a stones throw away from Ri...ahem...Ryugu's house. I have a pretty nice setup for D&D in my room, at least I think so. Also before I start this campaign I do want to get some other D&D in possibly using pre-written adventures, just to see how we all work together with me behind the screen. Ryugu said he is writing a mini-campaign he will be using up at school, so I may borrow that once he writes it. I believe it takes bplace in the Lzzhar(sp?) Principalities.

Well that's all for now, tell me what oyu think and I'll keep you all updated.

"The Blind Roll"

2006-01-20T12:52:00.000-05:00

This is a subject that has caused me a fair biy of confusion and concern in D&D. If the DM calls for Sense Motive checks when an NPC is speaking, then it seems to be a complete giveaway that the NPC is lying. So we can assume that the PC's must call for these checks themseves. But lets face it, very few PC's will want to call for such checks with every single NPC they meet and every single conversation. As such i'm using a variant originally presented ...somewhere I forget where. I've adapted it and expanded it for use in other situations. I call it "The Blind Roll"

The premise what using guards. There are 8 guards in a room. 2 are standing guard, 4 are playing cards and two are asleep. The article presents a system for dealing with NPC's or PC's in various mental capacity.

The Guards who are actively looking for enemies get to "take 10" on their perception checks. They are doing their job and actively looking for trouble. They can't "take 20", but that gets into my alternate rule system with boredom and repetative task, that is outside the scope of this article.
The guards who are playing cards aren't actively taking part in checking for trouble, but they can still hear and percieve. they are allowed to "take 0". The idea is that the N/PC's ability to perceive danger is unchanged(skill ranks) but they aren't actively looking for trouble.
If one of them has an exceptionally high perception check, its possible for him
to see enemies before the actively looking guards.
The sleeping guards are uncouscious, but can still be awakened by loud noises, or bright lights. The are forced to "take -10" again, an NPC with a VERY high perception could awake ffrom a sound sleep before the normal guards, but it is unlikely, that's why usually one person is left awake "taking first watch" so that someone can take advantage of the +10 roll for being consious

Thoughts?

Testing a blogging client

2006-01-19T11:16:00.000-05:00

Hello everyone, This is me testing a new blogging client. It's a Firefox plugin, and i've got it set up a one single button right next to the address bar. With one click it opens a window for me to add a post to either of my two blogs. This is awesome. I've also gotten the google web accelerator, and the google safe browsing applications. They are very useful, you should go get them.

I need to figure out how to leave comments on this...hmm another topic for another day *shrug*

Arisia

2006-01-12T19:32:00.000-05:00

Hey everybody, Tab here. Just lettin everybody know that I'm out of here for this weekend. I'm going to Arisia in Boston, and it is going to rock! I've got more money than I'll need to buy whatever I want, do whatever I want, and science fiction whatever I want... yeah... Anyhow, I'll probably be so busy doing stuff there that I'll explode, but I'll probably update this when I get back Sunday night. ITS GONNA ROCK!!!

BWAARGHHHHHHARDCORE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!11

OH my fucking god my weekend totally baped! I bought so much stuff, I walked in with $250, walked out with $10. Oh man, and one of the things I found and bought that totally rocked: fuzzy d20's for my car! HARDCORE!!! Oh man, I watched so many movies, and anime, and more movies, and I watched a couple movies two or three times in different combinations of dubs and subs! Oh, and I bought a hardcore sword! And throwing knives! and BUTTONS!!!! BBQAWAEGFEGERRGHHH!!!! AND DICE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! BWAEERH

Action Points, now with actual luck

2006-01-08T12:04:00.000-05:00

So the other day I was over at Richard's house and I made a comment to the effect of, "Action points are an inappropriate representation of luck." If I remember correctly, he gave me a weird look.

Basically, I see action points as being very incomplete. Sure, sometimes in battle you land a hit that you really shouldn't have, but you get lucky (not like that, you're gross) in normal day-to-day life a lot more often. You find some money on the ground. You're in the right place at the right time for something, or when you're running late for the lightening rail, the train just happens to be running late leaving the station.

I've though of one type of situation where you could use an action point to affect non-combat luck. Lets say you need to infiltrate a castle or something, but the party rouge is out of commission. The party really hopes that, by some stroke of luck, they forgot to lock the front gate. The DM could roll a wisdom check for someone inside the castle to see if they remembered to lock the gate, but first, a player could spend an action point to raise the DC of the check by 1d6 points.

I don't know how it could work in other situations. So what do you guys think? Is my idea in some way fundamentally flawed? If so, tell me how and how I could fix it/why I'm stupid. If not, how do you think it could apply to other situations?

-Mercutio

Underwhere?

2005-12-23T22:07:00.000-05:00

Okay, I've got this question, and I figure I'd post it here for ease of answering. What exactly is the underdark? All I know is that it's an underground place and a lot of nasty things run around there. I really want to learn more about it, because Illithids and Drow are two of the coolest entries in all of the monster manual.

What I want to know is who all lives down there, who visits there, how do they interact with other places, where and what exactly is it, etc? Just all around basically explain it.

Thanks.

Flatline and Languages

2005-12-18T19:19:00.000-05:00

In an attempt to preform the web-forum equivalent of CPR, I just though I'd share these two links I found today with you. I though they were pretty cool. Hopefull you will too.

The Drow/Common Dictionary- http://php.iupui.edu/~asimmon/drow.html

Learn Elvish in 10 minutes- http://www.starchamber.com/paracelsus/elvish/elvish-in-ten-minutes.html

Both are really good sites (like I said), including not only a lexicon, but also grammar rules and the like. Enjoy.

-That merry prowler of the 'net

more December campagin

2005-12-05T16:29:00.000-05:00

Okay, this is it

The December campagin is a Gestalt based Quicksilver campagin.

Normal magic classes, Sorceror, Wizard, Cleric, Druid, Paladin, Bard and any class that uses magic is Restricted. Magic does nto work properly in the Mournlands. No one is sure why(PLOT HOOK) So the Use of Incarnum and Runic magic has been adopted. These two forms of magic are ccalled the "Art of the Mind"

Melee and Creation is prevalent among the warforged, Artificers , though small in number do show up among the LoB's forces. Artificers Infusions still work, but no one is sure why(PLOT HOOK)

the Runic and Incarnum rules will require an extra element of Teaching, so please tell me , either here, or through email

OMGSPLOSION!

2005-11-22T23:14:00.000-05:00

So, I know we've really only covered Dungeons and Dragons stuff thus far. But I'm going to jump off the rails a bit, and go into another very popular WotC tabletop role-playing game, d20 Modern.

Some of the people on here have been to one or both of the d20 Modern one-shots I've hosted. I won't lie, they weren't all that good. This mainly stems from the fact that I'm an inexperienced GM (not DM, GM), and that I was a lot more lazy than I like to admit when creating the sessions. However, I still think that most people had a lot of fun. I know I did.

Anyway, when I analyzed what one of the main problems with the adventures was, I realized that there was no real sense of place. Basically everything that happened was something that the players said or fought, or something that an NPC said or did. The players didn't get any chance to poke around and get a feel for the setting. I dunno, maybe they would tell you something different, but in retrospect, that bothered me. So I got this great idea. What if I just made this one huge, awesome city, and plopped the characters in the middle of it and let them do whatever they want. I would have the city completely fleshed out and have the stats for the beginning of some potential adventures.

Of course this would require me coming a long way in my GMing skills, and it would be a lot of work. But I think it would be really awesome if I ever did it.

So here's what I'm thinking. Ichor City. Imagine New York combined with Neo-Tokyo combined with Metropolis combined with Gotham City combined with London combined with a modern day Sharn. Then make it twice as awesome. As fucking huge as this city would be, it would really only be a suburb of another city called Reclu. Think about how in Star Wars, the Death Star is the size of a small planet. And it's orbiting a huge celestial body, which is actually only a moon to an even huger planet. Ichor city is sort of like that. And it's awesome. It's got everything. For example, Ichor city has;
* Pirates
* Ninjas
* Biker Gangs
* Superheroes/Vigilantes
* Rock Stars
* Zombies
* Mechs
* The Mafia
* Hackers
* Crazy scientists, all sorts of technology, plenty of bad guys to get, the worlds largest comic books shop, and everything you could ever want in a city.

So, my reason for writing is this. First of all, what do you think of this idea. I'm pretty sure I'm already aware of all the difficulties with it, but if you think of something along those lines, feel free to post it. Also though, what would you like me to put in the city that would make it really really cool for you? Spies? Space Ships? Dinosaurs? Right now I'm trying to decide if I should use base d20 rules, or use Urban Arcana rules (which include non-human races and magic). On one hand, magic is difficult and it could easily take the focus off all of the other aspects. But on the other hand, the mental images of a gang of Dwarves in the Hell's Angels and two wizards in black trench coats dueling in the middle of a busy freeway are just way too cool. Opinions? Ideas? Anecdotes? Haikus? Death Threats? Comments? Ratings? Links? Questions? Flamethrowers? Leave a comment.

New books and new games

2005-11-19T16:12:00.000-05:00

Books -- I've had my eye on Magic of Incarnum, and teh Spell Compendium for a while. I have been deficient on the Area of magical learning for too long. I've known magic from the DM's point of view mostly. The kind of magic that is "Okay I need this to happen from this NPC...okay it happens." nothing to vested in the rules, and I need to change that.

Magic of Incarnum however looks to be something new nd very cool. I hope it doesn't turn into 3 editions Psionic rules... Where it always feels tacked on and not completely integrated... But I think i have the answer for that. In terms of Eberron Incarnum is the bridge between the soul and magic, and it was first pioneered by the Illumians, (Incarnum , Illumians it works doesn't it?) , it was first approached clinically by the Illumians a few other races were born into it however. (i've never read MoI but I can guess that wizards has put a few races in there that can use Incarnum by their racial properties.

Some of these new thoughts and developments are as a result of my thinking of my december campagin... I need a name for it

RPG smithing

2005-11-16T20:45:00.000-05:00

Quite frankly, who amongst us hasn't memorized the mass majority of the rules of 3.5 Dungeons and Dragons? I sure as hell have, and everybody's got their own problems with it, and some deal with it differently than others.

In seventh grade, way before I got into D&D, I made up a game I can't remember the name of. Pretty much, you would play it in groups of two, and each person would have a character. In the one game I played of it, I was a black sorcerer (and I looked an awful lot like the dark magician from... Yugioh. (groan)), and my opponent was a dwarven warrior, mounted upon a firebreathing dragon. Pretty much, each of us would take a turn, stating what awesome looking move we'd use to try and kill our opponent, and then they'd counter in a similiar way. By the end of the game (which actually lasted about a month, since we'd do it during track practice), I was riding a giant zombie bat, and I had nuked the island we had started off on.

The game was fun because it had absolutely no game mechanics beyond the existence of turns, and we pretty much made up cool spells and awesome techniques. Unfortunately, if you want to have a game of D&D, it can't be that simple. Game mechanics have been thought up that quite frankly only do a lackluster job of making things well thought out. How often have you thought to yourself "Man, I wish I could do Such and such a Move from Insert video game name Here." Quite frankly D&D in its current mechanics only allows for oh so much development. Ryugu's new Quicksilver (from what I know is in it), takes a good step in improving 3.5's mechanics. My rules are much simpler, and quite frankly don't do as much, but also improve a few small things. Hell, I occasionally go to my Inquisitor Rulebook (games workshop) for ideas for rule changes, and also think up ways to improve that games mechanics. There are so many different game systems, with mechanics emphasizing different aspects of gameplay, that its quite difficult to make a system that fast, easy, or fun, let alone all three.

Wouldn't that be great? If you could just roll one die, see if you hit, and then just not have to roll any more dice? Wouldn't it be great if you could have a character who could melt into shadows and shoot energy blasts from his hands, without having to kill five bajillion orcs and multiclassing in thirty prestige classes? How about being able to make a game that has a average playthrough time of forever? I've evolved from game system to game system, slowly gaining better insight into the ideal gaming experience. Unfortunately, I'm not there yet. I started with video games (which lack flexibility in gameplay and story), I've played table top wargames (too expensive, too long to roll the dice), And I've played Tabletop RPGs (Inquisitor, too expensive, too difficult, but good gameplay and an emphasis on RP instead of balance, which actualy works), and from freshman year in high school I've been in D&D.

Within that I've made steps foward, first as a reader, then a player, and then a campaign setting creator and DM/GM. Whats the next step? I'd say its making new game mechanics, and thats gonna be a long one. Ryugus already up to his elbows in it, so we can all only really wish ourselves the best of luck in our own ventures into RPGsmithing.

The Next Few Posts (And The Last Few Posts)

2005-11-16T02:08:00.000-05:00

We are al here because we have something to offer the group. I invited you all to join this blog, because we game together, and we work well together.

As the co-ordinator I feel a sense of Responsibilty over this blog, and I want to see it serve a useful purpose. This is an open call to Anyone who hasn't posted yet, or not even joined yet(BRYAN!) to do so.

Post a new Topic.
A Question that has been troubling you,(What are Magebreed animals anyway?)
Or a fact that you think is interesting (The bloodlines of the Dragonmarks seemed to exhibit the properties of the Marks even before the marks existed...)
Or a crazy idea{Gosh I love these} (Hey I wanna play a Dark Orc Bard/Black Dragon Disciple/Kensai worshipper of Tiamat!)

New posts are great, And any topic is welcome, even If its a little off topic (Conneticon)

And as for the old posts, don't leave them to languish! Many of them can become very viable and intersting libnes of reasoning. so take a monet to scroll down and see what the former offferings are

Above all else, post what you think, I don't care if they are half-formed thoughts either, just throw them out there!

Just One of Those Days...

2005-11-15T10:02:00.000-05:00

As a DM, one of the worst feelings you can have is the stark realization that you've been giving your players the wrong kind of gaming style and campaign. My current setting, a homebrew I call the Starfall Campaign Setting, has been an RP-heavy, half-horror/half-comedy (odd combination, I know, but I'll get to that) amalgamation of just about everything I've ever wanted in a campaign. The focus of the campaign revolves around the illithids' journey back through time from their future empire to the present world (go read Lords of Madness if you haven't already). Thus far (after what I think has been 5 or 6 sessions) it's been a bit light in combat and mechanics-heavy action. I figured this would be the better route for the game, as about half the players have very little or no d20 experience at all. The setting itself is rife with dark, gritty action and plot twists and turns (the illithids and their kaorti servitors, dealings with elves who sold their entire race into the service of Hell, and most recently the literal fall of the deities from the Outer Planes), but the sheer nature of the wacky relationship that my players and I have with each other allows for all sorts of random hijinks. I thought this had been enough. I mean, I was certainly enjoying myself. But there would always be a player or two who would be staring off into space, or falling asleep in the middle of the session (yes, this really happened), or any of a myriad of non-game-related activities. I always felt like it was something I wasn't doing right, something that would make the players look like they were actually interested in the game. Last night was what did it for me.

Before I actually start bitching about specifics, let me just say right off the bat that I love my players to death, they're some of my closest friends here at UCONN, and I can't blame them for not being as participatory as I'd like, but these are just the circumstances that have been getting me down recently.

Anyway, on to last night's game. There are six active players in the game. One did not show up at all because he said that he had some homework to do. Fine, I said. That kind of thing is to be expected. The would have started late because I had a meeting to go to beforehand (normally starts at about 7, I got there a little after 8). One of the players, who should've arrived at 8, shows up at 9:30 only after I called him. He said he thought I was supposed to call him to tell him what time the game was. Alright, I can accept the blame for that, but a little initiative on his part would have been nice. For the first 15-or-so minutes of the game, I get the latecomer caught up with the session's background information, one of the players is preoccupied with Splinter Cell 3, and another is playing Dark Age of Camelot. Quickly enough, though, they finish up and we get the game fully underway. About halfway through (a little before 11, I think), one of the players gets a call on his cellphone, and disappears for about 1o minutes. I shrug it off. He returns, and tells us that he's leaving to visit his girlfriend on the other side of campus. I am certainly dismayed by this, as we're now down to 4 out of 6 players and I have to RP 5 different characters (3 NPCs following the group and the 2 PCs not present). For the remainder of the session, one of the players stares off into space, one participates actively, and the remaining two alternate between participating and keeping each other preoccupied (they're going out together). I try to keep the action up with a solid, classic dungeon crawl style of adventure, as light on RP and heavy on hack-and-slash as possible (this is difficult for me as I'm not good with keeping game mechanics straight). One of the players, agitated, requests that we conduct combat "normally" (as per PHB rules as written) because my slighty-modified way of doing combat (similar but not identical to Quicksilver rules) is "chaotic and confusing." Further disheartened that my attempts to make things better only make things worse, I agree to his request, and a short time later, the boss battle commences.

It took less than two rounds for the PCs to utterly, completely, totally trounce the bosses. The enemies were an ogre mage (CR 8), a juvenile black dragon (CR 7), and an 2nd-level ogre barbarian (CR ~5). Half of the party was ecstatic that they had crushed the opposition so quickly, the other half was angry that they barely had the chance to even smack the bad guys at all. I just had a major headache and wanted to go home.

What my players wanted all along was a dungeon-crawl. Last night was my attempt to reconcile my past mistakes and give them what they wanted. I failed. I realize that I can't please all of my players all the time, but it would be nice to have a session where, for at least a little bit, everyone seems interested in the game, where I don't get players staring off into space, or leaving in the middle of the session, or showing up dramatically late, or playing video games, or looking extremely bored. I no longer care if my story ideas are all tossed onto the scrap heap, or if every adventure from now on has to be a linear kill-monster-get-treasure. Because that's what they want. They TOLD me that's what they want. Quoted from one of my players at the end of last night's session: "I want to do a classic-type, real adventure, with big monsters, dark dungeons, and an overarching bad guy that we have to fight against. I want to stab monsters and get treasure." Fine. If that's what they want, then that's what I'll give them. I just want my players to start having fun again.

Marks, Dragon or otherwise

2005-11-13T00:53:00.000-05:00

Dragonmarks are what make Eberron. They are the only thing that keep its houses in power, and they provide amazing RP to use.

Any ideas for a new dragon mark? I've been muddling over this one for a whileand i haven't come up with anything yet. I saw on the D&D boards that somebody came up with the dragon mark of Prophesy; I really like that idea.

Then I tried to come up with a framework for how a Dragonmark works.

Minor scaleable power(Arcane mark, up to Symbol of *Blank*)

Adaptable power (Mage armor, and others)

not combat oriented. (see below)

The dragonmarked houses revolve around thie mark with subtle powers, they are economic powerhouses, that make little things in life easier, and make the big things possible.

any ideas for new marks?

Conneticon

2005-11-11T15:16:00.000-05:00

yes, I know a great many of you went to this Con, and I was thining ahead. I was thiking about playing D&D there, but I definately wouldn't want to do it alone, frankly i'd rather not be cast into the auspecies of some GM who i've never seen before. Or, somebody from our group could GM. That would also be fun.

Also :COSPLAYING!

Peter d: I've had three ideas, the first involves you. We should both go a Szark Sturtz. One of us evil, the other good.

Idea two: I go as the Maestro

Idea three: I'll need volunteers to go as Oblivion Folder! *see most recent Dominic Deegans*

Sylovia TNG

2005-11-08T16:52:00.000-05:00

Heres the deal: Last summer I abrubtly ended my Sylovia Campaign Setting's first campaign. The quality of the sessions were decreasing, and quite frankly I was dealing with three groups of PCs doing different things at different times, and it was far too difficult, thus causing the aforementioned problems.

Its been about four months, and now I intend to make a triumphant return, in a way that should be quite satisfying.

Quite frankly, my last campaign was a rapidly moving story, and I was unable to have a session without the presence of all members, which allowed some great times, and prevented the whole "what happened last time?" problem. My new campaign, caringly titled Sylovia TNG (the next generation), will be a quite different format. For those of you not yet involved, heres some important information. First off, the majority of the adventure will take place within a single city, a major trading site in the East of Sylovia, Bazaar. What makes this campaign an improvement over the last is its format, very open ended, but with a central location. Each member of the "party" is a citizen of the city, ideally living there for the majority of their lifetime. None of the characters need to be connected, but they can, and this allows for any type of character interactions.

Another thing that I'm emphasizing, and this will be familiar to those of you with any experience with White Wolf products. A major part of your character will be their backround. Since a certain part is already determined (location), this allows incredibly detailing. Having a full fledged family, friends, clients (depends on occupation), enemies, and connections in a city allows both you (and me) to be like, "I go to my brother's blacksmith shop and ask about the weapons prices in the city" or "Your grandmother shows up, and asks you to investigate your second cousin once removed's murder."

Another thing that makes this all interesting is this: You do not need to show up for a session, at any time. If you say "I can't come to D&D for two months because I got grounded," that won't be a problem, because then your character will be busy with their own life to help with the groups problems.

Your character basics (class and such) will be determined by me at the beginning, before character creation (you'll all be between level 1 and 3, NPC classes only), with the classes chosen based upon your character's backround. This is done to represent that you're all regular people, although theres a good chance you'll start gaining levels in PC classes in no time.

Depending on time and such, Ryugu's Quicksilver rules may or may not be used, and who knows what other rules of my own will be thrown into the mix (Laws of Dazhai is their name).

I'll be sending an email with a link to this post to all people I imagine will be interested in this, but I know there are some people I don't have the email addresses of, as well as people I might not even know. Feel free to foward the email and any other information that might be important (like who the hell I am) to anyone who should be notified of this kinda stuff.

-Tab

December Mini campagin framework

2005-11-07T20:36:00.000-05:00

My last day of classes at WPi is Dec. 15, and my first day of classes is Jan 12

I intend to get some hardcore D&D in during that time, and thus I introduce my Mournlands(Not Cyre) campagin

much talk has been about the Lord of Blades,and fuck it i'm going to do a whole damn campagin about him.

Every will be Warforged
Heavy changes made to Magic in general, to take into accoutn the mournlands
This will be the first campagin under the QuicksilverV0.5 rules and there will be some...rather weird changes. (note the magic changes are NOT a Quicksilver change, just for this campagin)

Five warforged sub-races(this number may fluctuate, but at least 3)

Alterations to melee combat (ore details once I get all the details hashed out)

Story: can't tell you much because most of it is revealed IG, but simply put, the Lord of blades has many more followers than anyone thinks, and there are two things about the Mournlands that interest him. Fallen Cyre's magical wealth, and the Current Horrors of the mournland, and their uses.

This will be a campagin where everyone gets ridiculously overpowered, but.....(MWAAHAHAHA!) your free to interpret that for yourself

More when I get more time!
~Ryugu~

Purpose of this blog

2005-11-03T22:47:00.000-05:00

we will all disagree at some point in this bloog
we will all have differing opinions
we will argue and debate the merits of Eberron vs Faerun v Sylovia vs (random homebrew campagin that (peter/richard) makes up)

at no point will any of that debate be out of spite (duh)

don't feel bad about disagreeing with people, when you disagree you force the other person to articulate thier point, and thus refine their point

Debate good

me no make sense

me go write paper for school

Counter

2005-11-02T19:35:00.000-05:00

Heres the thing. Theres a bajillion things going on at any given time in a campaign setting. There are people rallying for troll rights and such. But heres the other thing: nobody really is interested in that. If your character, lets say Jadestone mcwhatshis name is walking down a street in sharn, and hes heading to Brians antique shop, the DM isnt going to mention the three guys preaching the word of the purple dragon, it just isnt important. I'm sorry, but you've got a valid point about how lots of things in history involve the common people, but remember this as well, would you rather be a nameless soldier in a handful of battles, or a man who does something unique and important. Thats the entire purpose of DnD, and all other roleplaying games. Oh, and on a side note, more of that sort of thing will be in my next campaign. Did I just counteract everything I just said?

Gygax's modern life?

2005-11-01T23:45:00.000-05:00

Hey Guys, it's 11:45, do you know where you kid is? Yeah, I'm in front of the computer posting stuff onto a DnD blog. Starting....now.

Something that's always struck me about the core Dungeons and Dragons Player’s Handbook is that it doesn't really feel...real. To me. You have to understand that probably all of you are going to disagree with me. This is just random musings. Anyway, I look at the PHB and really the only difference I can tell from dwarven culture and elven culture is that dwarves live underground and use a lot more iron. I actually had a discussion with a friend about this, and he pointed out that they couldn’t really cram that much cultural stuff into a straight-up rulebook. That's the roll of campaign settings. While I do tend to agree with him, campaign settings still leave stuff out. Basically everything I read, feels like classic medieval culture, with the only real conflicts being massive wars between races. Don't get me wrong, it's not all the same. Eberron and Dark Sun and Sylovia do a really great job of mixing it up, but they don't really fundamentally change things. Again, in my opinion.

Lets take a different sort of campaign setting. Lets say...an Advanced Placement History Book. Open it up to nearly any page and it's filled with stories of conflicts among normal, common people. The gold rush, Jim Crow laws, the Protestant Reformation, the Red Scare, the Bay of Pigs...thing, hippies, the Russian Revolution. Sure you've got World War Two and Viet Nam, but not every single thing that happened was some huge epic battle. Now, some of you may prefer it that way. After all, why would you want to get bogged down in the details? You've got those at home. I just feel that a fuller level of immersion could be reached if we put more "little things" in our DnD worlds. Maybe local alchemists strongly disagree with a widely held belief, or there's a particularly vociferous group campaigning for Trolls' Rights. Maybe the dwarven mayor or council leader is (gasp) a vegetarian, or some crazy foreigners want to open a nudist camp.

I dunno, it's really late, so I'm not sure I'm fully explaining my self. Post any questions you may have. If enough accumulate, I'll just re-write this all together. And no, there's no particular point to this post. It's just a thought, and maybe it can be your thought the next time you sit down to DM.

P.S. I love DnD and pretty much all campaign settings I've ever played in. This is just a shortcoming.

To infinity, and beyond! ...unless there are vampires there.

2005-10-25T19:29:00.000-04:00

Quite frankly, this "blog" (groan) is a good idea, and itll really contribute to my severe dnd withdrawl, since due to the insanity of school, i havent gotten anything accomplished, and if someone says "hey, wanna do something in a month" i respond "sorry, i have school work to do" Thats right, my life sucks. Anyways, on to dnd. Those of you who know of my DMing probably also know that my next campaign in the works takes place in my normal place, and is pretty much revolving on the development of character backrounds, making the gameplay, at least in the beginning, really RP heavy (those of you who were in the Vampire forum know what i'm talking about). Pretty much, I'd love some input on how i can get this pregame part of the task out of the way without having to deal with the equally busyness of my players... Wow, i feel like i said nothing. whatever.
-Tab

First (Real) Post

2005-10-25T16:57:00.000-04:00

In terms of where i see this blog going, I see it being a kind of looing glass into a collective workspace for D&D and other RPG;s but hey the sky is the limit. It starts with just me, but i've already asked my closest D&D associates to join me here. Will they? i have no clue, but they each have had great ideas in the past, and D&D has always been a communal effort between players and DM's. This blog is no different. Except we aren't all around the same table, but we are around our computers. This allows for us to post lots anf lots of text, and let thhe other people view at their leisure, but it has disadvatages as well. We lose the closeness, the interpersonal relations that made the game great.

However, I think it is possible to do a little background work here, to increase the fun at the next sessions. That way, when it comes time for the games, we'll have all the mechanics blcoked, and balanced out, so we can get straight to the fun.

~Ryugu

Test

2005-10-25T15:41:00.000-04:00

test