What am I reading?

I check the blog daily to see if anything is going on and since its been a while since we've posted anything, it is time.

Two weeks ago we started a new campaign. Everyone is playing their new characters to the hilt and is eager to get back into the swing of things after taking most of August off. We'll be enjoying a small interlude as I attempt a TPK using a rather over-powered boss from an adventure path we have yet to play (we're missing people this weekend).

I continue to zip through novels. In the last couple months I've read about half of Michael Moorcock's Elric books, and the first Chronicles of Amber. I quite enjoyed the first one but I put the second Chronicles down about half way through book 2 (or book 7) and never picked it back up. Not sure why I didn't like the second as much. It just had a very different feel from the first series and I didn't get into it as much.

My grand plan is to read the entire Wheel of time series start to finish. The last time I did it was about 10 years ago which involved reading parts 1-10. With the final book being released in April, I figure it will take about 6-7 months to read the first 13 volumes again. I have yet to read part 13. What to read until I start my Odyssey in October? Poking through my digital book collection, I discovered that I had Brandon Sanderson's Mistborn series. It seemed logical that since he was finishing the Wheel of Time I should check it out.

I am pleasantly surprised. The first book was very enjoyable and I'm constantly trying to find time to work on book 2. The world is logical but mysterious, the "magic" systems make sense, and he writes interesting and realistic characters. The plots are well laid out and make sense, the point of views are easy to follow and he has good pacing. I'm always a bit apprehensive starting a new series because I tend to try to stick it out even when they are almost unreadable (I'm looking at you Steven Erikson). But at the mid point of book 2, I'm still quite happy with my decision to read them and I can honestly say I'm not really sure where he's going to take the series. I highly recommend it.

Narrativism...is that how it works?

I have never given much thought to the GNS Theory or the Threefold Model or any other theory related to rpg design, for two reasons. One, I don't care. My sole criteria for buying a game is how much fun I think it will be. Typically, I go for games with well-developed rules for combat (as I likes me some hackin' an' slashin') and lots of options for character building. A cool game setting helps too. The other reason is that I've never had a clear understanding of the different components of the models. I have a pretty good idea what Gamism is, largely because the classic example of Gamism is D&D in all its iterations. Typically, we talk about rpgs being non-competitive. There are no winners or losers. Compared to boardgames or CCGs, that's true. But clearly, games like D&D are competitive. You don't compete against your fellow players, but you do compete against the world controlled by the DM. Victory is achieved by gaining treasure or levels or in-game objectives, while defeat typically means character death. So, having established that rpgs like D&D are competitive, the gamism comes into play with issues such as game balance and setting victory conditions. Now sit down, you OSR guys. I played old-school D&D and there most certainly was game balance. Monsters were defined by level and typically, the deeper underground you ventured, the deadlier the monsters became. Game balance wasn't as strictly defined as it would become in later editions, but players still knew that they wouldn't face an ancient red dragon in the first level of the dungeon.

Likewise, I sort of understand what Simulationism means, although the definition seems a bit fuzzy when applied to modern games. Basically, simulationist games try to model the reality of the game world as accurately as possible. In older games, this typically meant modelling reality itself. For example, RuneQuest was more simulationist than D&D because it had hit location tables and armour-as-damage-reduction and other aspects which made combat more realistic (and more deadly). However, the broader definition means modelling a reality defined by the setting. If you had a game based on cartoon physics, for example, you would have to include rules that accurately model the fact that you don't fall after running off a cliff until you notice that you have done so.

Where the GNS Theory really breaks down for me is Narrativism. I have read the definition on Wikipedia and the best I could distill from the verbal diarrhea is that narrativism is role-playing, you know, all the stuff we do between fights. Deciding that your elven character doesn't like dwarves, knowing full well your buddy is going to play a dwarf, then playing up the conflict, that's narrativism. By this definition, every damn role-playing game ever written is narrativist, making it a fairly unhelpful term for defining game design characteristics. Now, there are games like Vampire: The Masquerade which are described as narrativist, or, I suppose, more narrativist than every other narrativist game. So, I assumed that meant you spend less time throwing dice and more time talking about your character's alienation. However, I have recently uncovered some information which suggests to me there is something more to narrativism than I thought. Reading up on the HeroQuest rpg from Moon Design (under license from Issaries), I found this little tidbit regarding the narrativist aspect of the game:

The game's mechanics are focused on quick resolution; Contests are resolved by comparing the results of two twenty sided dice, each tied to a character ability chosen by players and/or narrator. After the die roll, the participants work together to interpret the outcome in story terms.

So, apparently narrativism actually impacts game mechanics and conflict resolution and does it in the most pablum-spewing, self-esteem-building, non-confrontational way possible. It's like playtime at pre-school where everyone wins and ribbons are awarded for participation. Maybe I'm interpreting this wrong. Help me out, Storytellers and indie gamers, what does narrativism mean to you?

And please remember, I'm a science guy, so use small words.

-Rognar-

Balkanization of the rpg industry, pt.2

My previous post on the fragmentation of the tabletop rpg industry was picked up in this post over at one of my favourite gaming blogs, Whitehall ParaIndustries (someday I'll work up the courage to ask what the name means). Gleichman and I are in general agreement about the state of the industry, although I sense he is somewhat more pessimistic than I. However, we disagree about the relative importance of the D&D edition wars to the overall state of things. I actually believe the divergence of D&D 3.5/Pathfinder and D&D 4e is, on the whole, beneficial to the industry. I don't believe the rpg industry lost very many customers as a result of this. D&D fanboys got a whole new line of gamebooks to buy with the emergence of 4th ed. People like me, who were more or less satisfied with D&D 3.5 got Pathfinder. The beauty of Pathfinder is that for many gamers who didn't feel the need to either move to 4e or the Pathfinder Role-Playing Game, they could still purchase the adventure paths and use them with their old D&D 3.5 rules with only a small amount of tweaking. As a result, you have D&D 4e fans, Pathfinder fans and D&D 3.x fans still spending money on game materials.

This brings us to the OSR. I think the big question that needs to be asked is when did these guys drop out? Gleichman believes this exodus resulted from the release of D&D 4e. That doesn't ring true to me. Sure, the OSR movement seemed to coalesce sometime around 2008, judging from the start dates of many of the most high-profile old-school blogs, but these guys seem no more enamoured with 3e than 4e. If the OSR is a response to 4e, why scurry all the way back to '74 or '77? No, it appears more likely that the old school guys were lost to the rpg industry for much longer and there is not much the industry could do to keep them spending. The one big mistake WotC did make with respect to the grognards was to remove the old edition pdfs from circulation. Selling out-of-print games doesn't keep game designers employed, but giving up an easy revenue stream makes no damn business sense whatsoever.

So where do I think we're heading? Well, I think eventually WotC will abandon the traditional tabletop rpg industry altogether, leaving Pathfinder and maybe Warhammer as the flagship games. The Dungeons & Dragons brand still has some value, so I think it will still exist in some form. The real carnage I think will happen among the second teir companies. There are simply too many of them selling too many products to a market that is not growing. Many of the casualties will probably not die completely, but will contract into one- or two-man operations selling pdfs and POD or turn into living dead companies like Palladium Books, selling one popular game over and over again to a small, but fanatical following. The industry won't die, but nobody is going to get rich either.

-Rognar-

Balkanization of the rpg industry

When I started playing tabletop rpgs back in 1981, there were only a handful of games that anybody ever played in my little corner of the North American continent. Most everybody played something from TSR as their main game, be it AD&D, Basic D&D, Gamma World, Star Frontiers or something more fringe like Boot Hill. Some people played Traveller, although I never knew any personally. A few adventurous types even dabbled in games from Chaosium or FGU, but you typically had to go to conventions to try them out.

Of course, we all knew about other games like Original D&D or Empire of the Petal Throne, but they were really more myth than reality. Even back then, a set of the OD&D books would have been something akin to a hockey stick used by Rocket Richard, more of an heirloom than something you would take out to the local rink for a game of shinny. Other games like GURPS or MERP which would garner a lot of attention were still a few years away.

I mention this because in gaming circles, the early '80s are often described as the golden age of tabletop role-playing. It seems, the trpg community has been wringing its hands in existential dread ever since. Every new development, from the parting of ways between Gygax and TSR to the rise of CCGs to the demise of TSR and the emergence of online gaming has been greeted with a new round of doomsaying. Now, I agree with those who say the tabletop rpg industry is in decline, but I don't think any of the reasons usually cited are responsible. I think the big problem is fragmentation of the market. I'm not talking about the OSR and the edition wars here. The OSR guys have their own little thing going on and good for them. As for the WotC v. Paizo melee, both are big enough to nourish the industry and a little healthy competition is good for both companies. No, I'm really talking about the second tier of game publishers. The most egregious example is what is currently going on with RuneQuest.

Back in the day, RuneQuest, released in 1978, was a pretty popular game in some quarters. Not D&D popular, but it held its own and allowed Chaosium to become a major player, especially with the 1981 releases of Call of Cthulhu and Stormbringer. The Basic RolePlaying system used by Chaosium today is based on the d100 game mechanic developed for RuneQuest. In the early editions, RuneQuest was intimately tied to the Glorantha setting, but in 1984, a new edition (3rd ed.) published by Avalon Hill, broke that connection and the game went into decline. Eventually, Greg Stafford, the original designer of Glorantha, reacquired the rights to RuneQuest under his own company, Issaries. Issaries later licensed both RuneQuest and Glorantha to Mongoose, which released two editions, the second of which is, in my humble opinion, the single best-designed tabletop role-playing game ruleset ever devised. It should be noted that Issaries also publishes another game, called HeroQuest, which is mechanically very different from RuneQuest, but which also uses the Glorantha setting (confused yet?).

Jump ahead to 2011, Mongoose has just ended its licensing agreement with Issaries (note, by this time, Chaosium is completely out of the picture). However, it is justifiably proud of its MRQII rules and wants to continue to support them. Enter Legend, a rebranded version of Mongoose RuneQuest II. Interestingly, Mongoose owns the rights to the Stormbringer license, having acquired them from Chaosium in 2007, so for a few years, Stormbringer, renamed the Elric of Melniboné Role-Roleplaying Game, and RuneQuest were reunited using the same ruleset. Anyway, we now throw in another monkeywrench. Peter Nash and Lawrence Whitaker, the two game designers most intimately associated with MRQII, have left Mongoose to form their own company called the Design Mechanism and wouldn't you know it, they promptly acquired the rights to RuneQuest and Glorantha with the intention of releasing RuneQuest 6 next year. Meanwhile, Mongoose, has several IPs, Deus Vult, Wraith Recon, Age of Treason and Elric of Melniboné that all use the Legend game engine. With that many properties, chances are none are going to get the support they deserve. Indeed, based on the release schedule Mongoose recently put up on their site, it looks like the newly-published Age of Treason campaign setting may be left to wither on the vine.

So, what is the point I'm trying to make here? I think I represent pretty much an ideal customer when it comes to the gaming industry. Tabletop rpgs are my primary hobby. I don't own an Xbox or a World of Warcraft account. I've played Magic: The Gathering once and even that was with a borrowed deck. I go to maybe five movies a year. But I spend a lot of money on games, many I will probably never play. I am the kind of customer a game publisher wants to keep happy. What the rpg industry doesn't want to do is to confuse the hell out of me! Almost every game I have invested heavily in over the last few years has gone through some kind of similar trauma to that described above. CthulhuTech, Cthonian Stars, Eclipse Phase, d20 Modern, Septimus, an endless litany of failures and lack of support, some terminal, some temporary, but in every case, I stopped buying the game. Only the Star Wars Saga Edition (and, of course, Pathfinder) managed to survive to what I considered an appropriate conclusion and I bought every single book. What I'm saying is, please gaming industry, show me some commitment. I wouldn't buy a car if I thought the automaker was going to hand off the model to another company which would completely redesign it and stop making parts that fit my vehicle. Likewise, I don't want to invest in a game if I think the company is going to abandon it half-finished.

-Rognar-

Ed. note: The real reason for this post, I just bought Age of Treason and it looks there won't be any supplements for it in the next 10 months at least. I am not amused.

Myth-A-Con Gaming Report, 2011

For 40 bucks, I was able to attend a three day gaming convention in Calgary called Myth-A-Con. I only spent two of the three days because that's about all I can handle in a single weekend. I constantly ate food (awesome hamburgers, sub-par baked goods) and rolled dice for roughly 20 hours of gaming. Here is a report on the new gaming systems that I tried.


Shadowrun: Awesome genre. I loved the mesh between magic and technology. It was awesome to be in the middle of a gang war. The rolling mechanic was a little bit bulky with all the 6 siders, but it was not really a hindrance to the game. Bruce was a really good DM for this one. No minis were used; it was all old-school in your head combat. I played a car thief that had an awesome van with a mounted heavy machine gun. Yeah, we did a totally cool drive-by shooting and threw a captured orc gangbanger out of the speeding van.


Savage Worlds: This version of Savage Worlds was set in the 1930s. It was sort of an Indiana Jones/ Mummy type of setting. The DM (Mike?) was pretty good. He knew the game system and was able to add lots of flare to make the game believable. The game system was all exploding d6s. You only get 4 hits until you die, but you can use little story points as re-rolls to help you survive gun shots and crocodile attacks. I liked the exploding dice but I thought the system was a little bit bulky. We used little miniature paper cutouts and a little photocopied grid to roughly show the position of our guys for combat. Very cool genre, so-so game mechanics. I played Buck, a sexist, over-the-top man's man that led an expedition to the rain forest to snatch a gem from the natives.


Dresdin Files: I wish I could make a better judgment on this system, but the person running the game didn't really know what they were doing. Very disappointing. The genre was really cool, though. Vampires, undead, demons and that sort of thing running around the modern world. I played an emo-kid that wanted to turn into a white vampire that fed off of depression. At least it was fun to play an emo kid. I modeled the kid after the South Park goth kids. The DM used dice and a piece of paper to roughly position our pcs for combat. The system used a cool and very simple system for resolving combat: 1-2= fail, 3-4= nothing, 5-6= success. Successes cancel failures and viceversa. I need to play this game with an experienced GM to really get a better feel for it.


Eclipse Phase: This was the coolest game at the con. I loved the simple percentile dice system. I loved the genre, BIGTIME. I played a computer hacker that was working for a major corporation and got to hack elevators, security doors, cameras, and other high-tech thingys. I think I have found my new favorite role-playing game for space D&D. The DM was fantastic. No minis were used. This was all old-school in-your-mind combat. Cant's say enough good things about this game. Please go to http://eclipsephase.com to check this game out.


Legend of the Five Rings: I am a sucker for Asian themed games so this one was instantly appealing to me. The GM was really good at building intrigue and was really good at promoting role-playing by giving out pre-gens that had certain quirks and mandates. I played a samurai retainer that needed to protect another PC, was jealous of another PC, and despised other PCs. Role-playing in this event was a lot of fun. Combat in Lot5R is all 10 sided dice that explode. The exploding thing is really fun, but the system is really bulky. Hit points are complicated and counting up 9d10 with 7 players in the party made for very slow combat. Combat was all old-school in-your-mind. The DM was quite good, but sort of evil. We failed in our quest, and he put the blame of the failure squarely on the shoulders of on poor PC.

Playing these games over the weekend was really a terrific experience. I got to know a bunch of new people, and learn lots of new games. I also learned that I put way too much emphasis on tactics and miniature combat in my homegames. I love combat with the guys, but doing so much role-playing this weekend reminds me of the pleasures of role-playing, mystery solving and creative, critical thinking. I will surely be adding more of these elements to my home games.

Rippin' on Changeling: The Dreaming

Zack and Steve are back and ready to revisit the World of Darkness. Aww, Changeling: The Dreaming, how adorable.

Changeling: The Dreaming

-Rognar-

Age of Treason campaign setting for MRQII/Legend

Mongoose recently terminated its license to produce RuneQuest and any related Gloranthan material. However, it is still quite happy with the MRQII rules and intends to continue supporting the game under the new brand Legend. The first product under the new branding (even the core rules aren't released yet) is Age of Treason - The Iron Simulacrum campaign setting. Age of Treason centers around the Taskan Empire, a collection of city-states with a decidedly Roman flavour. Ruled by a God-Emperor, who has been in seclusion for centuries and speaks to his court through a golem-like entity known as the Iron Simulacrum, the Taskan Empire is a potent and enlightened nation at the height of its power. This is in contrast with the frequent fantasy rpg trope of a campaign world living in the shadow of an ancient golden age. The golden age of the Taskan Empire is now. However, as with all great empires, the fall begins long before it becomes apparent to all. Rivals from beyond her borders grow more confident, while would-be rulers from within grow restless and the masses, comfortable in their prosperity, are none the wiser. It is up to the player characters to battle the treasonous forces that seek to undermine the Empire...or perhaps, join them.

Age of Treason introduces a few new rules to distinguish it from the standard MRQII ruleset. Most obviously, Common Magic is no longer available to everyone. This was always controversial anyway, being a feature of the Glorantha campaign setting that elicited strong feelings on both sides. My own feeling is that magic should be rare. When every blacksmith and barmaid knows a few minor spells, it creates a feeling of magic as being mundane and ordinary. So, I'm gladdened by this change. Common Magic doesn't exist as a discrete type of magic in the campaign setting, rather being mixed in with other sources of power and cultural factors. The other major types of magic from MRQII, namely Divine Magic, Spirit Magic and Sorcery are all present, however. Another important change is the addition of a new characteristic, Social Status (SOC), in keeping with a general emphasis on intrigue and social interaction prevalent in the setting.

While it is generally expected that most players will be citizens of the Empire, other races are possible. Interestingly, there are only humans in this world, but some are so different from the mainstream that they might as well be different species'. For example, there is a brutal race of barbarians called the Orcs of Kasperan who practice human sacrifice on a massive scale to appease their vile gods. Although technically human, their physical appearance and brutal behaviour are certainly congruent with D&D-style orcs.

Religion in the setting is complex and integral to every aspect of the campaign. By virtue of being a citizen of the Empire, everyone has a Pact with the Imperial cult. However, there are other gods which characters may also form into Pacts with and, indeed, any character wanting to use Divine Magic will have to do this as the Emperor has not achieved full divinity and cannot grant spells. In keeping with the RuneQuest tradition, there are all manner of mystery cults and funeral clubs to join. All worship is understood to be transactional. A character agrees to worship a particular god, granting power to that divine being, in exchange for some measure of favour in the present and protection in the afterlife.

It's all pretty cool stuff and a bit of a departure from the standard fantasy campaign setting fare. The book itself is 200 pages, hardcover with all black-and-white interior art and fairly striking cover art. It includes a 70 page mini-campaign to get you started and sells for about $40. For fans of MRQII, it's a pretty solid investment.

-Rognar-

Phineas and Ferb

OK, this post has nothing to do with gaming. I have two small children and its a struggle to find TV for them that does not make my eyes bleed or brain rot. While on vacation and staying at the in-laws I had to find some new TV for the kids to zombify them and keep them from driving me insane.

Most of the shows were junk but I did stumble across Phineas and Ferb. Created by the same guys that created Rocco's Modern Life and wrote for the Family Guy, it works on multiple levels. I laugh at stuff all of the time and my oldest just looks at my and asks what was so funny.

Most episodes follow a similar plot. P&F are deciding what to do with a day of summer vacation and end up building something crazy. Their older sister Candace is constantly trying to "bust" them to their mother. The second plot involves the pet platypus Perry who happens to a secret agent. Each episode he has to go stop the evil doctor Doofenschmirtz from building his latest "inator". The battle always ends up destroying and removing any trace of whatever Phineas and Ferb built that day just before their mother shows up which makes Candace look crazy.

Most episodes have a short little song of a style matching the episodes theme. There are some great lines. Ones which stand out include "Karl, keep up the good work and you may make unpaid intern". "I was part of the resistance but I'm so good at resisting, I started resisting them."

My latest obsession - MRQII and Elric

Ever since I picked up RuneQuest II from Mongoose last year, I've been looking for a suitable setting for it. I finally found what I was looking for when I bought the Elric of Melniboné Core Rulebook last week. Although published last year, I never really felt compelled to give it a look until recently and I'm glad I did. Now I will confess, I've always found the Elric saga a bit of a hard slog. While not especially complicated plotwise, Moorcock's writing has, for me at least, always been easier to put down than to pick back up again. I have read all the books in the Elric saga, but it took years. Having said that, the setting of the series is impressive. Melniboné and the Young Kingdoms is quite possibly the most perfect campaign world possible for a dark fantasy rpg and Mongoose has done an admirable job of bringing it to life.

Not surprisingly, the book starts off with some 35 pages of history and geography of the Young Kingdoms. Though probably not necessary for most players, GMs will find some useful background in here for running a campaign. The second chapter deals with character generation. Human is the default race and many GMs may decide just to allow humans. However, rules are included for playing Melnibonéans, Half-Melnibonéans and several minor humanoid races from various time periods including a race of extinct giants called the Karasim, a winged race called the Myyrrhn and a primitive, dwarf-like race called the Pukwadji. In addition to the new races, new cultures are added to supplement the four already provided in MRQII, Civilised, Barbarian, Nomad and Primitive. The new cultures are Melnibonéan, Poor, Outlaw and Wanderer of the Time Streams. The first three are pretty self-explanatory, but for those who have not read a lot of Moorcock's stories, the last one might need some explanation. The world of Elric is just one of many in Moorcock's Multiverse, known as the Million Spheres. The worlds of the Million Spheres are connected to each other by several overriding concepts, such as the Eternal Champion, who is destined to fight for Balance in each world. Besides Elric, other manifestations of the Eternal Champion include Dorian Hawkmoon, Earl Aubec and Corum. Some characters, including Elric himself, have been able to transport themselves between worlds within the Million Spheres, while others do so unintentionally. Characters who shift from world to world are Time Stream Wanderers. Needless to say, such characters are a challenge for both players and GMs. Also included in this chapter are new skills, such as Dreamtheft, Rune Casting and Witch Sight. Most of these new skills relate to the unique magic systems in the game (see below).

After a brief chapter on currency and equipment, there is a discussion of metaphysics. The eternal conflict between Law and Chaos is central to Moorcock's stories. Powerful forces on both sides struggle through their mortal proxies to control the Multiverse, while the somewhat quieter force of Balance seeks to ensure neither comes to dominate. The Eternal Champion typically works toward greater Balance, although in the case of Elric, it is not his original intention. Next follows a section on magic. There is no Common Magic, but Sorcery and Spirit Magic do exist in the game. Two other types of magic, Dream Magic and Rune Magic are also introduced. Rune Magic is not unlike Sorcery except for the obvious addition of runic symbols during casting, but Dream Magic is quite different and rather unique to the Elric stories. There are two types of Dream Magic, Dreamtheft and DreamQuesting. The former involves the theft of someone else's dreams for the benefit of either the Dreamthief or a client. Stolen dreams can provide insight into the dreamer's personality and motivations, can aid in the solution of a dilemma into which the dreamer might have some insight or even allow the recipient of the stolen dream to improve a skill which the dreamer possessed. DreamQuesting, on the other hand, allows a dreamer to travel to alternate worlds or distant time periods to experience real events. It is a particularly popular pastime for Melnibonéans, which is why their capital city of Imrryr is known as the Dreaming City.

A large chapter on cults is next. Cults play a big role in the various versions of RuneQuest as a source of knowledge, both magical and mundane. Typically, every character will belong to a cult. The cults in the Elric of Melniboné Core Rulebook revolve around the various Lords described in the Elric saga. These include the Lords of Law and Chaos, the Elemental Lords and the Beast and Plant Lords. The book finishes with a chapter on monsters and prominent NPCs, another on tips for GMs and a final one on playing the game in other eras beyond that covered in the Elric saga. All-in-all, it's a pretty solid core book. It is well-written and, perhaps even more importantly, given Mongoose's track record, well-edited. The interior art is sparse and all black-and-white, but competent. If you like RuneQuest II and seek a campaign setting that doesn't have any Ducks, this may be just what you're looking for.

-Rognar-

Ultimate Combat, what's awesome?

Hot off the presses, I have my new copy of Ultimate Combat and I'm hungrily chewing through it. I won't go into a discussion of the Gunslinger class or the firearms rules since we have gone over those in some detail here, here, here and here. Suffice to say, the second version of the Gunslinger playtest is pretty much the final version. I'm also not going to talk about the Ninja and Samurai classes, since I simply have no interest in them. Instead, I'm going to pick out the juicy bits that immediately caught my eye and which make me want to use them in a future build.

Archetypes:
I'm not a big fan of archetypes. It's not that I don't like the options they provide, it's just that they typically require replacing a superior class feature with a more specialized and, therefore, inferior one. So, for an archetype to pique my interest, it has to replace a class feature that doesn't impress me to begin with. Two archetypes fit the bill for me, the Crusader Cleric and the Spellbreaker Inquisitor. Not surprisingly, both archetypes come from classes that, in my opinion, need all the help they can get. The Crusader archetype allows a cleric to give up some spellcasting ability in exchange for additional feats, including feats such as Weapon Specialization and Greater Weapon Focus which are normally limited to Fighters. Even sweeter is the Spellbreaker archetype. I would never play an Inquisitor unless I was using this version. You give up Monster Lore (nice, but not awesome) as well as all those annoying teamwork feats and the Solo Tactics class feature in exchange for a bunch of saving throw bonuses against spells and the ability to make the DC for rolls to cast defensively higher for enemy spellcasters. As they say on the interwebs, it's full of win.

Feats:
There are several awesome feats in the new list, but given there is a gigacrapload of feats in Ultimate Combat, It's not surprising. Here are a few of my favourites.
Hammer the Gap - great for piling up the damage at high levels, each hit as part of a full attack gets a damage bonus equal to the number of previous successful hits.
Dimensional Agility, Dimensional Assault and Dimensional Dervish - the Monk and the Magus will have great fun with this combination as it allows you to use dimension door or abundant step with far more tactical flexibility.
Clustered Shots - Oh come on now, total damage from full-round ranged attack added before DR is applied, because you know, archery really is underpowered in Pathfinder.
Pin Down - you get an AoO against an opponent attempting to withdraw or a 5-ft. step, if you hit, he takes no damage, but he can't move. No escape for you, little wizard.
Guided Hand - although it requires Channel Smite, not exactly the most must-have feat around, being able to replace your Str or Dex modifier with your Wis modifier on attacks with your deity's favoured weapon is worth it for clerics who already have to spend precious build points on both Wis and Cha.

That's it for now. I will have more to say as I digest more of this tome. I have to say, it appears, at first glance, to have much to offer.

-Rognar-

Summer Reading

I am going on vacation next week. Not a vacation I am especially looking forward to although I'm sure it will have some enjoyable moments. I am expecting lots of down time when I am not chasing children trying to prevent their early demise. Since I will be computer free it will be a chance to catch on my reading. In the last few months I've reread the entire Song of Ice and Fire series. At long last the final book of the Wheel of Time series is out in April 2012 and I figure it will take at least 6-7 months to reread the entire series before I pick up the final book. I have until October or so until I begin that odyssey and so I have a few months to fill.

There are tons of influential books that I've never read so why not fill my vacation with them. I'll be reading them on my iPhone which is not the ideal media I'm quite used to it now and people can't snoop at my reading materials. First up is Elric. I started last night and I'm already over half way through Elric of Melnibone. It's a pretty easy read compared to Martin.

When I tire of Elric, Zelazny's Chronicle's of Amber will follow. Beyond that, I have no idea. Those two series alone could keep me going for a long time if I read them all.

Fantasy Flight Games gets Star Wars

So, the worst kept secret in the gaming world has at last been revealed, Fantasy Flight Games has acquired the rights to the Star Wars franchise. Ever since WotC dropped the licensing rights and Mongoose rather oddly revealed that they didn't get the license but that another company did, speculation has been that the other player had to be FFG. No other company seemed to be big enough to afford it, except possibly Paizo and they never seemed to be a good fit for Star Wars.

Well at last, the cat is out of the bag and the first announcement of new product lines include both a tactical ship-to-ship minis game called X-Wing and the Star Wars: The Card Game ccg. Although there is no announcement of a tabletop rpg at this time, there is a suggestion that one is in the works.

-Rognar-

Some declarations of my own

I'm not usually much for memes, but I can't resist any opportunity to inflict my opinions on the public at large (or at least the miniscule subset of it that actually reads this blog), so when Joseph Bloch and, later, Zachary Houghton posted about their personal gaming preferences, well, I felt compelled to join the fun. Please note that the following represents only my opinions, and does not necessarily reflect those of my fellow contributors (although they are welcome to add their own).

On game design:
I love "kewl". I know that as a 45-year old gamer who first started playing D&D in 1981 and has been continuously playing tabletop rpgs for three decades, I don't really fit the demographic profile of a new school gamer. But I am. I love to min/max, but I also love to play suboptimal characters just to see what I can get out of them. I am a powergamer. Character background, story arc, narrative, none of these things mean very much to me beyond providing a framework in which my character can develop. I don't care what is going on four kingdoms over and I don't care what happened 2000 years ago, unless that information is relevent to what my character is attempting to accomplish. It's a bit odd, since I am history buff, but I guess it's because I only care about real history. I like a lot of options for character design. I know a lot of old school types prefer to personalize their characters outside of the rules, but I want tangible game effects from the decisions I make. I want to know that choosing a two-handed sword over a longsword and shield will have some meaningful consequences.

I definitely fall into the simulationist camp when it comes to game design. Even though I have played some iteration of D&D for most of the last 30 years, I have always chafed under some of the more gamist aspects of the game. I've never liked AC, preferring something like the BRP system in which armour reduces damage, but not the chance to hit. I also don't really like the power curve of class-and-level games. No character should ever be so powerful as to be able to confidently take on an entire army. I prefer that players never be completely confident of the outcome of any fight. Even a lowly goblin should have at least a slight chance to seriously injure any PC with a lucky shot.

I am comfortable with Tolkienesque player races, but I'm also willing to entertain divergence from those templates as long as they're not too weird. Gloranthan elves and dwarves, for example, would certainly be "too weird". I don't care for subraces, however, unless they are radically different and only serve as evil alternatives to the PC races, such as drow or duergar.

On setting:
I'm a bit of a stickler for consistency in setting design. For example, I don't like Asian settings in general and I certainly don't like them freely intermingled with my pseudo-European medieval D&D setting. No knights and ninjas for me, thank you very much. I do like the inclusion of firearms of the appropriate technology level for a High Middle Ages European milieu, but I've never been satisfied with any of the efforts to incorporate them into D&D. It seems impossible to model the advantages of firearms using the D&D rules, without making bows completely obsolete, so they are inevitably underpowered and overpriced.

Oddly enough, my gaming history and my personal preferences on setting are, once again, at odds. I am a sci-fi guy. I'd prefer a rail gun and a powered exoskeleton over a longsword and a suit of chain mail any day. Yet, somehow I always end up slinging spells and swinging battleaxes. I guess fantasy is simply more conducive to my hack-and-slash style of gaming.

On pronouns and gender issues:
I always use the male pronoun. I find reading a game book that switches back and forth from male to female pronouns to be very distracting. I don't have any problem with female gamers, but my group is all-male and we like it that way (and so do our wives, I'm sure). Game night is boys night out. We don't have to suck in our guts or tighten our sphincters. Most importantly, we don't have to censor ourselves and worry that what we say might offend the ladies.

On politics and religion:
I am a Canadian conservative. That means I'm of a different breed from our friends on the right of the American political spectrum. It means, for example, that I believe religion is something best not discussed in polite company. I don't want to know how you did the nasty with your wife last night and likewise, I don't want to know how you scored with your personal savior on Sunday. Having said that, there are some similarities which have implications for my gaming experience. I despise moral relativism. Some things are just plain wrong and no amount of cultural sensitivity training is going to change my mind about that. This means the morality in my world may seem a tad Victorian to some. There are good guys and bad guys. Sure, there are some occasions of moral ambiguity, but inevitably, my heroes prevail, though the price of victory may be steep. It also means I don't really like playing in evil campaigns. That's not to say I haven't done so and I've been told by reliable sources that I can whip up a pretty awesome villain when situation demands, but it's always well outside of my comfort zone. I'm very pro-military and my games always have a healthy dose of righteous smackdown by the thin olive drab line. If I can find some way to stick a tank in there, mores the better (I know most guys are into fighter jets, but I'm a tank guy). I'm queasy about violence against women and children. Such violence exists in my campaigns, but I always prefer to leave the details to the imaginations of my players. Needless to say, any character, be it NPC or PC, will encounter swift and brutal judgement from the appropriate authority for perpetrating such violence. On the other hand, if a paladin wants to thrash some bad guy to within inches of his life, so be it. Men are expendable and evil men even more so. Waterboard the terrorists to your heart's content, boys.

On technology:
Whatever. Use it if you want as long as it doesn't grind things to a halt. In our group, we have a mix of technophiles and technophobes (ok, that last category is mainly just me) and it seems to work fine. There are laptops and iPads operating cheek-and-jowl alongside dice and pencils with no problems. Of course, no one has spilled a bottle of Dr. Pepper on someone's keyboard yet.

-Rognar-

Cowboys and Aliens would make a great game

I went to see Cowboys and Aliens last night. It was excellent. For older nerds like me who find the screen-filling CGI, eye-searing lens flares and nausea-inducing jerky camera effects of today's sci-fi movies to be a bit too much sensory overload, Cowboys and Aliens is a nice change. That's not to say this isn't a F/X-heavy film, but it isn't the visual assault and battery that most big budget sci-fi movies are these days. I won't reveal any spoilers, because there are some genuine surprises in this film, but I will say the acting was pretty good. Daniel Craig was excellent and Harrison Ford was decent in an unconventional role for him. While not exactly a villain, his character certainly was a nasty piece of work.

I kept thinking, as I watched, how cool this would be as a game setting. There were great character types, such as the gun-totin' preacher man (played by Clancy Brown), the ruthless, wealthy rancher who owns the town (played by Harrison Ford) and the honest sheriff who has to walk a fine line (played by Keith Carradine).

The best part of the film is that there aren't any obvious dumb plot devices. The aliens are tough SOBs and the relatively primitive technology of the humans is no match for them. The only effective weapons the humans have are the aliens' own arrogance and a bit of stolen alien technology.

Also, since the aliens land in the American southwest, you know they didn't come for the water. Go see it. You won't be disappointed, unless you need a Michael Bay or Roland Emmerich special-effects explosion to feel truly alive.

-Rognar-

Pathfinder Minis

I was a bit late to the mini game. I have a bunch of reaper minis I painted myself but I own zero monsters. It seems that Paizo has started their own mini line. The first big set will be available at Christmas with a Rise of the Runlords set out next summer (which also suggests that they'll be reprinting RotR for Pathfinder).

I'll probably pick up a case for Christmas. Buy it from Paizo and they throw in a free huge black dragon which looks pretty damn cool.

Weird War II monster factory 3

The "Widowmaker" demon is the most powerful of the common extradimensionals and the only one to demonstrate any significant intelligence. Though apparently unable to direct the actions of the lesser abominations, widowmakers are able to use the natural instincts of these monsters to their own advantage. They will use the extremely aggressive racknees and devil dogs as cannon fodder before moving in to mop up any survivors. Besides their enormous ripping claws, the most terrifying aspect of the widowmaker is its mind blast attack, which can render several foes helpless before the demon moves in to rend its victims limb from limb.


STR 5D6+9 (ave. 26-27)
CON 3D6+6 (ave. 16-17)
SIZ 5D6+9 (ave. 26-27)
INT 2D6+6 (ave. 13)
POW 3D6+3 (ave. 13-14)
DEX 2D6+3 (ave. 10)
APP 1D6 (ave. 3-4)
Move: 8 Hit points: 21-22 Damage bonus: +2D6
Armour: 4 pt carapace
Attacks: Claw 50% 1D10+db (bleeding)
Skills: Dodge 30%, Hide 30%, Jump 20%, Listen 35%, Sense 50%, Spot 35%, Stealth 20%, Track 30%
Powers: Super Sense (Infrared Vision) 2, Mind Blast

-Rognar-

Weird War II monster factory 2

Devil Dogs are the second most common of the dimensional horrors, after racknees. The size of a riding horse, but with the ferocity of a badger, devil dogs are a nightmare of fangs and claws. They are not as fast as racknees, so they often fall upon victims already crippled by the smaller, faster abominations that precede them. Otherwise, they use their greater strength to hunt prey which has managed to find some protection from racknees, such has locking themselves in a car or room.


STR 4D6+3 (ave. 17)
CON 3D6 (ave. 10-11)
SIZ 3D6+6 (ave. 16-17)
INT 5
POW 2D6 (ave. 7)
DEX 2D6+6 (ave. 13)
APP 1D6 (ave. 3-4)
Move: 10 Hit points: 13-14 Damage bonus: +1D6
Armour: 2 pt hide
Attacks: Bite 50% 1D8+db (bleeding)
Skills: Dodge 40%, Hide 30%, Jump 50%, Listen 35%, Sense 50%, Spot 35%, Stealth 40%, Track 50%
Powers: Super Sense (Infrared Vision) 2

-Rognar-

Weird War II monster factory 1

This new series of posts will reveal new monsters created for my "Tommies at the Gates of Hell" Weird War II campaign for BRP. Only monsters that have already appeared in the campaign, now into its third session, will be presented.

Though details are sketchy at this point, it is clear that Nazi scientists have released some kind of monster apocalypse upon the war-ravaged European continent. The carnage has been horrific. The Allies are in full retreat, leaving civilians behind to face an onslaught of horrors from some alien dimension. Whole nations have been depopulated, including Germany itself.

Small pockets of survivors struggle daily against the waves of alien abominations that sweep across the land, including a small group of British soldiers and Belgian civilians near the city of Rochfort. This is where the story begins.

The Horrors:

Racknees are six-legged arachnoids the size of large dogs, but with the speed of a race horse. Though not displaying any discernible intelligence, racknees are exceedingly cruel. They rarely kill their prey immediately, preferring instead to take one or two large bites from the victim's legs or flanks and then moving on, leaving the wounded person or animal to bleed out.


STR 2D6+6 (ave. 13)
CON 3D6 (ave. 10-11)
SIZ 1D6+3 (ave. 6-7)
INT 5
POW 2D6 (ave. 7)
DEX 3D6+6 (ave. 16-17)
APP 1D6 (ave. 3-4)
Move: 12 Hit points:8-9 Damage bonus: none
Armour: 2 pt carapace
Attacks: Bite 50% 1D10+db (bleeding)
Skills: Dodge 50%, Hide 40%, Jump 50%, Listen 35%, Sense 50%, Spot 35%, Stealth 40%, Track 30%
Powers: Super Sense (Infrared Vision) 2

-Rognar-

Rippin' on...World of Darkness

Zack and Steve are back. I've never heard of this particular White Wolf offering, but I never was a WoD fan anyway.

Mummy: The Resurrection

-Rognar-

Ultimate Combat Cometh!

This is the time of year I probably hate most as a gamer. All of the good stuff is getting released at GenCon and there are sneak previews all over the internet.

Last year it was Paizo's Advanced Player's Guide that had me all worked up and this year its Ultimate Combat. Ultimate magic came out in the Spring and it was good but wasn't stuffed full of awesomeness as I had hoped. Some of the previews already have me drooling. It looks like they are making monks awesome and throwing lots of bones to most of the other melee type classes.

Of course even after I have it in my hands, I'll have ideas for dozen of awesome characters. Although, as I will be DMing next, I could slide them in and throw them at the players...

What is the future of manned space exploration?

With the end of the Space Shuttle program and no new generation of manned space vehicle on the horizon for the United States, those of us who care about the future are naturally concerned. Sure, the Russians have their Soyuz program and the Chinese seem to have every intention of being the second country to put a man on the Moon, but without the Americans in the game, it seems the exploration and eventual colonization of the Solar System is becoming ever more the realm of science fiction. I have heard some suggest the future of American manned space exploration is actually better off without NASA. They believe private companies like SpaceX can do it for less money. I don't doubt that private enterprise can handle routine low Earth orbit operations such as launching satellites or shuttling personnel to the International Space Station, but are we ever going to see a manned mission to Mars, for example, from a private company? I seriously doubt it. Where is the profit in it? There's little evidence to suggest there are any resources of value to us on Mars, at least in the short term. No question, the resources of the Solar System are vast. One can imagine limitless solar energy or asteroid mining for all the raw materials the human race would need for the next ten thousand years, but these are extremely long-term efforts. Most financiers don't want to invest in projects that won't see a return for centuries. So what is the future of manned space exploration? I see three scenarios.

One, we let the Chinese do the heavy lifting for awhile. In other words, we do nothing. It's definitely the path of least resistance and there is no law of the universe that says the future belongs to English-speaking peoples. Maybe the first space colonists will speak Mandarin.

Two, we get NASA back in the game. This is certainly a possibility, especially if the Americans get shocked by the successful launch of a manned Chinese lunar mission. It seems to be a question of timing and the current American debt crisis. Will the Americans pull themselves out of their malaise in time to get their space program back on track before the Chinese get too far ahead? It's hard to say, but in my experience, it's never a good idea to bet against the Americans.

Three, turn space exploration into a non-profit, charitable endeavor. Wait...what? Admittedly, this is an unconventional idea, but I think there are a lot of people who would like to contribute to space exploration. First, there are private individuals. Millions of Americans (and Canadians) who dream about our future in space might be willing to make small tax-deductible donations to a manned space program. Even more importantly, big investors could benefit from tax incentives as well in order to get access to the billions of dollars required for manned space flight. I envision a manned mission to Mars involving some input from NASA, private companies like SpaceX and non-profit space exploration organizations working together. If we don't want to see the future of the human race shaped by the regressive, totalitarian regime in Beijing, this may be the only way.

Thoughts?

-Rognar-

Yay! More RuneQuest

As mentioned previously, Mongoose has unburdened itself of RuneQuest and Glorantha, but will continue to publish its MRQII rules in a new game called Legend. Now, two of the game designers that worked on MRQII have started their own company and negotiated the rights to RuneQuest from Issaries and will release a new edition, RuneQuest 6, next year. This will make four major tabletop rpgs in print, Basic RolePlaying, Call of Cthulhu, Legend and RuneQuest 6 based on the BRP game engine. Does this represent a renaissance for the venerable system? My guess is probably not. I don't get the sense that a gritty and realistic game like BRP appeals to the younger gamer looking for the anime-inspired hyperpowerful characters wielding ridiculously oversized weapons. Still, it seems the game has endured and continues to attract a following. I just hope they don't oversaturate the market.

-Rognar-

Rippin' on D&D 3.5 monsters

Zack and Steve really reached out for an odd one this time, the Monster Manual IV. Dragonspawn, oh the horror!

Monster Manual IV

-Rognar-

Paizo Ascendant

The Paizosphere is all abuzz about this forum posting. The big boss lady at Paizo is certainly a source of some authority, so it's taken as at least somewhat credible. A few blogs have taken up the discussion, noticing, among other things, that Pathfinder occupies the top 2 spots on the fantasy gaming bestsellers list at Amazon.com. Well, the domination is even more pronounced here in Canada. The Amazon.ca fantasy gaming list has Pathfinder holding down the top 5 spots and 6 of the top 8, with no WotC product appearing until the 9th spot. Now, as others have noted, these numbers may be deceiving. WotC has been moving toward a different business model recently, with a greater emphasis on online, subscription-based gaming. It seems clear, however, that as far as traditional tabletop role-playing is concerned, the type of gaming in which a group of friends gather around a table to drink Mountain Dew (or, in my case, Coke Zero) and throw dice, increasingly, the game of choice is Pathfinder (especially in Canada).

-Rognar-

Michael Bay - I just can't quit you

So I went to see Transformers 3: Dark of the Moon 3D over the weekend. I've seen every one of the movies in the series despite having absolutely no attachment to the franchise at all. I was too old to embrace the Transformers when they were first introduced and, quite honestly, I find the idea of hyper-advanced robots that transform into pickup trucks and tapedecks to be ridiculous. Yet, despite the mountain of criticism directed at him from many quarters and the lack of quality material to work with from either the source material or his actors, Michael Bay does one thing better than anyone in the business. He knows how to direct a kick-ass action sequence. If you can endure the interminable sections of the film in which Sam Witwicky (Shia Lebeouf) bemoans his miserable life (despite being on his second supermodel girlfriend), the payoff is well worth it, as the climactic battle sequence for the salvation of the human race is simply awesome. Disengage your brain and enjoy the eye candy.

-Rognar-

New Pathfinder books announced

Not surprisingly, the next hardcover Pathfinder rulebook to be released after Ultimate Combat will be another bestiary. More interesting is what Paizo just announced will follow, the Pathfinder Advanced Race Guide. I am particularly stoked about the inclusion of monster races as PCs. Complete rules for playing drow, tieflings, goblins, etc. will be a much needed addition to the game. Too bad it's ten months away.

-Rognar-

HeroLab

I am constantly building characters examining the classes trying to figure out what does and doesn't work. To speed the character building process I've found a number of spread sheets that do most of the work for me. They are never perfect and I always have make manual adjustments for things they are not equipped to handle. It would be nice if I could find a product that could do everything.

HeroLab is a pretty good product. I bought the base package for $30 and then the APG and Ultimate Combat for $10 each. It has lots of cool features but the thing I'm most impressed with so far is how well it handles archetypes. There are a bunch of features I haven't really played with yet. It could be a great GM tool if all of the encounters were preplanned in the software with all the NPCs and monsters loaded. The tactical display can monitor initiative, any status effects in play, give you a quick view of spells available, hit bonuses and damage, and even has a complicated dice roller. I mean if you fully loaded the software with everything you need, you could easily use it to run every combat. I would probably track hit points separately, and you have to look up the details for some spells but for the most part it does it all.

When I assume the DM mantle I'm strongly considering loading all the monsters and NPCs into HeroLab and see how well it works. Last time I was DM, I had a small stack of notes and character sheets that proved a bit tricky to manage. It could prove very helpful. I'd have to buy the two Bestiary add-ins first. Maybe next paycheck.

Cthulhu's ongoing war against CthulhuTech

Few games in recent memory have had to overcome more hurdles than Wildfire's CthulhuTech. Originally published by Mongoose, that relationship ended very quickly. It was soon followed up by Catalyst Game Labs, which published the bulk of the game books until an allegation of financial wrongdoing on the part of one of CGL's owners forced Wildfire to seek out yet another publisher. That new publisher is Sandstorm. It seems, however, that the ongoing financial malaise (and the obvious ire of Great Cthulhu) is about to claim another victim. There is growing speculation on the interwebs that Sandstorm and/or CthulhuTech may be coming to the end of the road. These developments have further implications for other games as well. Although it could be argued that CthulhuTech was reaching the end of its cycle anyway with all the books that had been planned already published or in the pipeline, Wildfire's new game, The Void (aka, The Game Formerly known as Chthonian Stars) is just getting started. Will it, like CthulhuTech soon find itself orphaned (again, it was also originally going to be a Mongoose release) and looking for a new publisher? And what about Posthuman Studios and their game, Eclipse Phase, which is also published by Sandstorm? It seems to be a very bad time to be in the business of publishing tabletop rpgs with high production values that are not part of the D&D legacy. It may be that the only way for small publishers to stay afloat these days is to limit themselves to pdf and POD sales.

-Rognar-

Update: Forget speculation, here is confirmation. At least it appears The Void will see the light of day.

New Comments - Old posts.

I was poking around the blog today taking a peak at our most viewed posts and I saw Derobane's post about building monks was near the top. I didn't recall what the post was about so I took a look. There were a ton of comments (ok, half a dozen) I didn't recall ever having read. At least some of them we added very much after the fact since they refer to the APG which wasn't released until 6 months later.

Is there anyway in Blogger to see what new comments are being added? It makes me wonder how many other old posts are being commented on, and I (perhaps we) have no idea.

Free RPG day!

Is June 18th this year so make sure you get down to your FLGS and check it out. I'm hoping to pick up the new Paizo goblin adventure released this year.

My apologies to the Barbarian

A few posts back I ranked the different pathfinder classes and I placed the barbarian below the fighter. I've spent some time over the last couple days messing around with barbarian builds and really looking at the powers and realized that I've made a mistake. When you try to build a barbarian like a fighter, the fighter will always be better. If you build a barbarian around some key Rage powers, you get a terrifying beast that makes a fighter quiver with fear.

If you just look at the numbers the fighter is better. He hits more often for more damage and has those nifty crit feats. But if you put your optimization hat on you can see how the ole barb can surpass his rival. Let's start with the beast totem line of rage powers. Claws are a great back up weapon, by level 16 you've got a +5 natural armor bonus making your AC better then the equivalent fighter, and at level 10 you get Pounce allowing a full attack after a charge. With the Lunge and combat reflexes feats, the Come and Get Me rage power, and Enlarged the barbarian can make Attacks of Opportunity against anyone that either moves or attacks him within 15'. Against the fighter, the barbarian would reply with 4 attacks of opportunity and then do his own full attack. With a good enough Dex, a barbarian could do over 10 attacks per round most of them AoOs at full BAB.

Superstition gives him an awesome will save (with a big caveat), Reckless Abandon allows him to hit as well as a fighter, and Witch Hunter give a damage bonus against anyone with spells/spell-like powers. The Invulnerable Rager archetype trades uncanny dodge and trap sense for much better DR which really helps a build like this.

This barbarian will need lots of healing available because he is going to take tons of hits but the devastation he can unleash exceeds even what an archer can do.

More on Mongoose, MRQII and Wayfarer

As I posted previously, Mongoose has not renewed its license to publish RuneQuest and the Glorantha campaign setting. It will, however, continue to publish the core rules in a new format, originally called Wayfarer. However, there is a game called Wayfarers and by a strange twist of fate, the company that produces it has approached Mongoose about a publishing arrangement. Mongoose has agreed (beware of referer spam page) and has also decided to rename its new RQ clone Legend. Since I already have MRQII and Legend is supposed to be virtually identical to MRQII with the Glorantha-specific material removed, these developments would not normally be of much interest. However, Mongoose has decided to make Legend OGL. This is awesome, or it would be, except for the little caveat that there will be no SRD. Yeah, that's right. You can freely use anything from Legends in your publications, but you have to have the book. So, to Mongoose, from the handful of gamers out there that don't publish their own work (i.e. 99.9% of us), thanks for thinking of us.

-Rognar-

All Hail the King!

The volley flew true and Nyrrissa, unable to escape, felt the arrows pierce her body. There had been no escape to heal herself this time after being anchored to this dimension.

She felt the insane rage drain from her soul as the last of her life blood leaked away. Halak the ranger lowered his bow and flexed his stiff fingers. The Archon hovering behind him was the only thing shielding him from Nyrrissa's mental control. He thought her saw the cursed Nymph smile at him as the life and magic faded from her and she began to fall into the frozen river below.

Lung the barbarian reached out and grabbed her and carried her over to the cliff, his body still riddled with Halak's arrows. Peskar, the arcane trickster, followed, shifting back to his natural form. Merissa the summoner, collapsed on the cliff edge. The insane nymph had nearly disintegrated her in the battle's dying moments. The cleric followed the pack to the cliff and began patching everyone up.

Our kingdom is safe again (for now). The evil fey who had been manipulating things behind the scenes for years had finally been brought down. It had been a rough battle. The key to defeating her was the sword Briar but its wielder, Lung, had been banished via Maze as the battle began and had only managed to return at the tail end of the fight. The rest of us had been trying to strip her of her defenses which had made her near invulnerable. Halak was the only one that had any significant chance of hurting her so we had to keep him alive (and not dominated). In the end we managed to eak out a victory.

Rippin' on LotFP

Congrats to James Edward Raggi IV and the OSR. Zack and Steve have noticed you. You have arrived.

Lamentations of the Flame Princess

-Rognar-

Role-playing vs. roll-playing in Pathfinder

As our group eagerly anticipates this weekend's finale to our long-running and highly-enjoyable Kingmaker campaign (thanks, Tayloritos!), I find my gaming style has changed dramatically from what it was perhaps 5 or 10 years ago. I don't know if it is late-onset ADD, but last week as we battled hordes of minions in our quest to lay a beatdown on the evil fey queen, I came to the conclusion that a part of me was subconsciously hoping my current character would bite it. "Why?", you may ask. "Do you not like your character?" On the contrary, Pesker, the Arcane Trickster, is actually quite awesome. Though not a heavy hitter in the party, our barbarian, our ranger and our summoner's eidolon are far more impressive at that. He is, however, supernaturally stealthy and often waltzes through combats without a scratch. He's also quite versatile, having potent spellcasting and skills to draw from.

So, what's the problem?

The new hotness has worn off....after four sessions! Yeah, this isn't even the guy I started with. My original character is Dakros the First, Priest-King of Drekmore. Once the kingdom was well-established, it became clear to me that King Dakros would not continue to wander about the hinterland, risking his neck. He needed to rule his kingdom and lead his armies. So, I retired him from adventuring and created Pesker to serve as the King's Man and deal with the dangers that threaten from beyond the temporal borders of the realm. I've learned a lot from the short time of playing Pesker. Having never played an arcane trickster (magic-user/thief in old-school parlance) in either D&D 3.5 or Pathfinder, I never had a good feeling for how to get the most synergy out of the combination. I see now that while rogues are pretty weak in Pathfinder, combining them with arcane spellcasting can make them pretty solid, especially using the Arcane Trickster PrC.

Anyway, getting back to the point of this post, it makes no sense that I should develop so little attachment to my character, that I am already looking at a replacement. I remember in my teenaged years playing the same character for years and being deeply invested emotionally in their survival. I even remember playing a dwarven fighter for months after he had hit his racial maximum and could not advance any further in levels. I can't even conceive of doing that now. Strangely, it seems my 15-year old self had a longer attention span than my 45-year old self. Or is it the nature of game today that encourages players to invest more in the "build" than the character itself? How do we get back to the "character-as-alter-ego" concept that tabletop rpgs are based on as opposed to playing a package of stats more akin to a boardgame or computer game? Would we even want to? Do any of you guys see this same trend or is it just me?

-Rognar-

All feats are not created equal

Love 'em or hate 'em, feats are probably the most prominent feature of D&D 3.x/Pathfinder as compared to previous incarnations of the beloved game. They have changed the whole concept of character generation. In the past, you chose your race and class and you were pretty much done making decisions about your character. From that point on, character development was story-driven. With the introduction of feats, the powergamers could go crazy. It's not uncommon for players like me who enjoy us some hardcore min/maxing from time to time to generate a character with 15 or 20 levels of character advancement already mapped out before we ever get to the gaming table. Heck, I've been known to spend a few hours of leisure time generating characters I have no intention of playing just to see what combination of feats I can come up with.

Spend any amount of time generating characters like this, you will soon realize some feats are way better than others. Some, like Iron Will and Toughness are just plain good, no matter what class you choose. Others like Point Blank Shot, Power Attack or Spell Penetration are indispensible for certain types of characters. Still others, like Intimidating Prowess or Catch Off-Guard are so lame, nobody would ever think of wasting a precious feat slot on them. Rarely, however, does a feat come along that is so good, it literally dictates character design decisions. In Ultimate Magic, there is such a feat. It is called Versatile Channeler. It allows neutral clerics of neutral dieties to use both positive and negative energy in their channeling. Without this feat, a player must decide at the time the character is generated which type of channeling he will use. With this feat, he can use both. He still has to choose which type will be the dominant one, but he can channel the other energy type as a cleric two levels lower (i.e. -1d6). This is huge and it means playing a good cleric has suddenly become a really bad choice. Expect to start seeing a lot more clerics of Gozreh and Pharasma showing up in your Pathfinder games.

-Rognar-

Pathfinder Character classes - Ranking.

After responding to Rognar's post (which was eaten by Blogger) I got to thinking about the rankings of character classes. I am going to do something that I am sure not everyone will agree with put them in order of greatness. I guess what I'm really ranking here is there ability to do everything(or anything) and excel at it.

1. Summoner. I have to put the summoner first because its almost 2 characters in one class. The Eidolon is basically a tripped out killing machine. It can unleash almost as much damage as the dedicated fighters while having much better AC, HP, and other abilities. The summoner himself is no slouch either. When the Eidolon is not the right tool for the job, he cast Summon Monster as a standard action and pull from the vast selection of critters available. His spell list is awesome gaining early access to lots of great spells including tons of buffs and utility spells. As Cha is the primary spell casting stat she can act as the party face or use UMD to cast just about anything. A summoner's versatility is unmatched.

2. Wizard. With foreknowledge and prep time the wizard can do it all. The wizard works best when complimenting the party and messing with the enemy.

3. Sorcerer. The Sorcerer has been improved to the point where it may now be better then the wizard especially if using the Human favored class ability to get more spells known which is the Sorcerers main drawback. With Cha as the primary casting stat, Sorc make great party faces. If only they had more skills.

4. Druid. While these guys along with clerics were kings in 3.5, the nerfs to polymorph hit them hardest. Druids still have tons of versatility but no longer can be awesome at everything. They have to choose whether they are combat kings or great spell casters. The other side suffers. They can still summon things as back-up.

5. Clerics. While clerics have lost all of the splatty 3.5 goodness and their best spells have been nerfed, clerics can still do a lot. Clerics are still really scary at high levels. The problem is that I find clerics to be boring to play until you get to high levels. At low levels they are poor fighters without rounds of prep time and most of their spells suck. They are the best healer but generally you are better off trying to kill the enemy than spending your actions doing low amounts of healing. Cleric Domains are nice and can really add some power to the class but not enough to make me want to play one.

6. Oracle. Haven't played one so its hard to judge for sure. 9th level casting goes a long way. Most divine spells are not really the type of thing you want to spam cast. Would have to see a min-maxed one in action to really be able to judge.

7. Witch. Witches are awesome or awful depending on what you are doing. Their limited spell selection hurts but its partially made up with Hexes. Witches are near useless against anything that is immune to mind affecting effects which includes many high end monsters. In anycase, they get a bit boring since you tend to cast the same hexes in same order fight after fight.

8. Alchemist. There are several different Alchemist builds and I think most can work quite well. The class looks fun to play with a wide variety of skills and abilities. The alchemist is a class that can do lots of things reasonably well.

The next three are all very similar but with a different focus. Their ranking are almost interchangeable.

9. Magus. Not having seen one in action I am guessing a bit here. I've built a couple test PCs and they seem quite effective at all levels. Their biggest problem is that they seem to need to be in melee for their best skills to work. They can cast from range of course but then they are just a poor wizard. Getting into the thick of things means requiring decent scores in dex, con and str. Str can be dropped if you are will be to pay the massive feat costs for the Dex to Damage feat chain. Magii can do scary damage at high levels - imagine delivering a critical disintegrate one out of three casts/swings. Of course you need a high enough DC for your opponent to fail the save.

10. Inquisitor. Useful both in and out of combat. Many of its abilities are free or swift actions. I think it would a scary good archer as long as the bane ability holds out. Has great spells but has limited spells known and gets them a bit late.

11. Bard. Yes, the Bard. In the right party, the bard is a game changer. A clever bard can make combat easy for everyone else but it's hard for the bard to shine alone. Lots of skills and probably the best party face in the game.

12. Ranger. While not the damage dealer the fighter is, the ranger brings much more to the game. A few spells and lots of spells give the ranger something to do when not making the enemy a pin cushion. The rangers ability to ignore prerequisites to certain feats is very powerful.

13. Fighter. The King of Damage. No one can unload more hurt then the fighter. Sure there isn't anything he can really do but at least what he does, he excels at.

14. Paladin. In certain campaigns the paladin will really shine. BBEGs quiver in fear at the sight of a paladin charging towards them (or scarier still shooting arrows). Paladins have unmatched defenses with high Saves and likely high AC. When they are not Smiting evil they can still act as the party face and have a few spells to play with. The paladin code is a real downer.

15. Barbarian. Trades damage for a bit of versatility. Rage powers don't really make up for the loss. I'd go fighter over barbarian any day.

16. Cavalier. The biggest problem with this class is the focus on a horse. In a campaign where you could take a horse with you everywhere, this class would scoot up the list but as it is it's down near the bottom. It has some interesting flavor but I can't see myself ever playing it.

17. Rogue. The poor rogue. Terrible saves. No dependable way to inflict sneak attack damage from range. Other classes get almost as many skills and bring so much more to the table.

18. Monk. While I am still digesting the magical oriented monk in UM, the only decent build of monk currently existing is the Zen Archer. Any other monk is likely going to be underpowered. The base monk is highly mobile and can annoy spell casters, but that's all. The monk has some neat tricks but that's all they are and the monk is quickly out shined by other party members.

Keep in mind just because I ranked something lower doesn't mean I would not play it. I really like rangers but they lack the versatility of other classes and one of their big powers hinges on the whims of the DM (Favored Enemy).

I've updated this post here.

I miss power creep

One of the most common criticisms leveled at D&D 3.5 was power creep. Every new splatbook upped the ante with more powergaming options. I had my own misgivings about power creep at the time, but now I think what I disliked was not power creep, but the related problem of rules bloat. I have come to this conclusion as a result of my experience with Pathfinder. The good folks at Paizo have made controlling both power creep and rules bloat a top design priority. As a result, their release schedule for rulebooks has been far more modest than that of WotC. Since the Pathfinder Core Rulebook was published in August 2009, Paizo has only released the Gamemastery Guide, the Advanced Player's Guide the Pathfinder Bestiary, the Pathfinder Bestiary 2 and now, Ultimate Magic. Now, I appreciate the wisdom of releasing only about three rulebooks per year, but I wish the books that did come out had more awesomeness in them. The Advanced Player's Guide, for example, introduced six new base classes. I have played one, the Alchemist, while my co-blogger, Obiri has test-driven the Witch (ok, that sounded dirty) and the Summoner. I did like the Alchemist and Obiri's Summoner has proven pretty effective, but the Witch did not impress me much and the other classes, the Cavalier, the Oracle and the Inquisitor are so lame, no one has even bothered to give them an audition. Furthermore, despite a mountain of new feats, spells and alternative class features, I have found very little in the book that appeals to me unless I'm actually playing one of the new classes.

Well, now we have Ultimate Magic. I will leave it to Obiri to review UM, but I will make a few observations. It introduces one new base class, the Magus, which mirrors the Eldritch Knight prestige class (and even uses the same iconic art). I like the concept of a fighter/mage and so I may try the Magus at some point, but most of the rest of the book follows the same recipe as the APG, an occasional morsel of meat floating in a thin, bland broth. The problem is power creep, or more precisely, the lack of power creep. It's a delicate balance to produce new options for character generation that are just as cool as the old stuff, but not more powerful. It is a balance that neither WotC nor Paizo seems able to manage. WotC chose to throw caution to the wind and just kept ramping it up. However, they were able to keep most of the core classes relevent by giving them lots of new hotness in parallel with the new classes they introduced. Paizo has chosen the opposite approach, introducing less new stuff, most of which is less appealing than what was already released in the core rules. I'm sure many will disagree with me, but I'm starting to look back fondly on the WotC way of doing things.

Let the flaming begin!

-Rognar-

Mongoose and RuneQuest/Glorantha part ways

Mongoose has announced it will discontinue its licensing agreement with Issaries to publish RuneQuest II and any related Glorantha-specific material. It will, however, retain its core MRQII rules, which it intends to repackage as a new fantasy rpg called Wayfarer. It will port its other IPs that use the MRQII rules (Deus Vult, Wraith Recon, Eternal Champion) to the Wayfarer system.

I really like the core rules and don't care much for the eccentricities of Glorantha, so this looks like it might be good news. However, my general opinion of Mongoose is that they have a tendency to bite off more than they can chew. In the case of MRQII, the core rulebook and Monster Coliseum were both quite well-done, but some of the later supplements, notably Necromantic Arts and Arms & Equipment were seriously flawed. Also, Mongoose doesn't have a reputation for timely releases of errata. So, I'm, at best, ambivalent about this development. If Mongoose gives Wayfarer the attention it deserves, it has the potential to be a truly first-rate game. I sincerely hope they get this project right.

-Rognar-

Rippin' on...BattleTech

80s retro art from BattleTech classics, courtesy of Steve and Zack

BattleTech

-Rognar-

Chthonian Stars at long last

Chthonian Stars has finally been released to much fanfare...ok, no fanfare. Still, it was the best-selling pdf on DriveThruRPG for a couple of days, so I can't be the only one who bought a copy. To recap, Chthonian Stars is a mashup of Alien, The Fifth Element and Call of Cthulhu. A rogue celestial body is approaching our solar system emitting some strange form of radiation which is causing all manner of apparently supernatural phenomena. Weird cults are popping up all over the solar system, ships are disappearing, atrocities are being committed by otherwise normal people and rumours of monster sightings circulate. The publisher, Wildfire, originally intended to release the game through Mongoose, using the Traveller ruleset. Something changed their minds and the game is undergoing a reboot. The new game will be called The Void and will use a new ruleset. However, there was much hype and excitement about the original idea and Chthonian Stars was pretty much complete when they decided to pull the plug, so they released it in pdf format.

The look of Chthonian Stars is very reminiscent of Wildfire's other rpg, CthulhuTech. It has the same artistic style and the same interspersed pieces of short fiction, although in general, I found the quality of the writing to be a bit inferior to CthulhuTech. It seemed to lack the same ability to inspire dread in the reader. Choosing to name one of the characters in one of the stories "Capt. Zack Bradigan" didn't help.

The setting of Chthonian Stars is a veritable cornucopia of future history tropes; a global economic crisis, a bushfire conflict in the Middle East leading to WWIII, a terrorist nuke and then everyone coming to their senses just in time, a golden age of cooperation and a return to space, colonization of the solar system and then, inevitably, an end to the glory days as the colonies grow restless. It is certainly a script we've all seen before, but it serves the campaign setting well enough. The "present" is the latter half of the 22nd century as the Chthonian Star approaches the solar system and end of the age of humanity looms.

Chapters on character generation and rule adaptations follow the setting description and they are fine. The default character concept is the Warden, basically a government agent mandated to investigate and, if possible, eliminate supernatural threats throughout the solar system. While other classes are certainly possible, only the Wardens have the authority to go anywhere from the mines of Mercury to the lonely outposts of the Kuiper Belt, thus making them the best choice for a party of investigators and they have a wide range of backgrounds so no two Wardens need be alike.

Technology seems to be a bit of an eclectic mix. Firearms are the default ranged weapon type. There are no lasers or particle beams, yet, oddly, there are some very high-tech melee weapon options including monofilaments and vibroblades. There is a surprisingly large number of space ship designs included in the game, warships, freighters, transports, shuttles, rescue vessels and the special "Knight's Errant Class" corvette used by the Wardens. There is no FTL capability and no artificial gravity, so setting aside the cosmic horror aspects, the game is quite hard sci-fi.

Following the chapters on equipment and ships, there is a chapter detailing the planets in the solar system as well as major extraplanetary bases and colonies. There is also a fairly extensive bestiary, which may be my favourite chapter in the book. My understanding is that a more detailed bestiary entitled Horrors of the Void is due to be released this summer as a pdf. If it is as good as the one in the core book, it should be excellent.

The last two chapters in the book are intended primarily for gamemasters. One deals with gamemastering in general. It includes advice on how to run a game, as well as a list of plot hooks and rumours GMs can use to get things moving. The other provides a lot of secret information on the setting as well as a few short adventures. I was a bit surprised by how much of the background on the Chthonian Star was actually revealed in this section. It's common for rpg designers to leave a lot of those details up to the GM to decide, but not in this case. It is well-advised that players keep away from the last chapter.

All in all, Chthonian Stars is a decent offering and given that Horrors of the Void will be the only supplement released for the game in this form, it should make for a nice complete game requiring only the core Traveller book to play. The setting is, perhaps, a bit less compelling than that of CthulhuTech, but it avoids the clunky Framewerk game mechanics, making it, in my opinion, a better and more playable Cthulhu space horror game.

-Rognar-

Cross-posted at Rognar's Space Horror RPG Blog

Rippin' on Magic the Gathering...again

Zack and Steve take another shot at MtG.

Magic the Gathering

-Rognar-

Ultimate Magic

As subscribers start to get their PDFs, the spoilers are going up on the Paizo message board just as they did with the APG. It will be at least a week before our FLGS gets a copy so I have to get by on spoilers until then.

I am eagerly looking forward to this book for a couple reasons. My summoner character in our current Kingmaker game is level 16 and probably will only a gain another level maybe 2 before its over. My eidolon has pretty much maxed out its awesomeness and each level there is only a small list of evolutions worth considering adding. I'm hoping to see one or two that I can slap on before the big boss fight art the end of the campaign (although the last few sessions seem to be mainly big boss fights and we kill off the greater henchmen and minions).

The biggest reason I'm looking forward to this book is to redeem clerics and druids. In 3.5 these were two of the strongest classes but each has been hit rather hard with the nerf bat in Pathfinder. The druid now has to focus on either casting of shape shifting both of which are now weaker then they were in 3.5 when the druid could do both.

The cleric has great high level spells but the low level ones that are not buffs largely suck. Even some of the best cleric buffs have been nerfed. The default way to play a cleric is as a support character. I find support characters boring. To me the most fun part of the game is rolling the dice and support characters don't have to do that. Your fellow PCs are not going to try to dodge or save against your buffs or blocks your heals with Spell Resistance. The problem is with the current spell list its hard to play any other way until late in the game. Low level debuffs are terrible compared to a wizard, and clerics lack any other meaningful offensive spells. You can try to play as a battle cleric but to be offensive you need to buff yourself for a couple rounds since all of your good buffs have a really short duration. By the time the battle cleric is ready to party, the ranger has kissed all the women and the barbarian drunk all of the booze. The options a battle cleric had to buff in 3.5 are not available in Pathfinder. The only option is Quicken Spell and its not until level 15 or 17 that you can quicken the best buffs like Divine Power and Righteous Might. What I'm hoping to see is an expanded spell list for clerics that give them options to be anything other then healer/buffer.

The druid doesn't have it quite so bad (ie boring) but its spell list could use some jazzing up as well.

I'm looking forward to seeing the Magus. This sort of character which is a blend of sword and sorcery seems right up my alley but we'll have to see how it is implemented. The version in the Beta was ok but needed a stronger spell list for me to want to play it.