Way of the Wicked 6

This episode began with our villains continuing to search the caverns beneath the Horn of Abbadon. The first order of business was to track down where the boggards escaped to at the end of the last session. A search of mainly empty tunnels eventually lead to the discovery of the boggards main encampment. There the shaman, who was pleased that the Knot killed off the tribe's champion (and his main political opponent), issued a prophecy that the villains would return the Horn to greatness in honor of "the Father". He promised them the support of the boggard tribe as it was now firmly under his control and sent them off with a warning  that the blue wall was important. Rather than wander aimlessly, the villains requested that a froglok, err boggard take them there. Happy to see the villains go, the shaman sent two boggards to escort them to the blue wall.

It turns out the blue wall was a harmless slime mold. After some searching about a small tunnel was found in the rock. It ran deep and was too small for even the gnome to squeeze into. After a bunch of Stone Shape spells, the tunnel was widened enough for everyone save the burly guys to squeeze through. Inside the Knot found the remains of one of the cultists and the results of his clever but foiled plan. The large tome that the cultist had written contained the ritual required to resummon Vetra Kali Eats-the-Eyes as well as one of the Eyes. The ritual itself is fairly simple. It requires 3 prayers a day for 222 days - sunrise, sunset and midnight, and a sacrifice to begin, one in the middle and one to finish.

Towards the end of their search of the caverns, a secret door was found that lead up through the complex past two Ceustodaemons that allowed them to pass after being told of the villain's purpose. They searched the Sanctum and examined both the evil alter as well as the holy artifact protecting it.

A second search of the third floor revealed the treasure room and Ezra Thrice-Damned, a former cultist and now a Dreadwraith. It turned over the third eye to the villains in exchange for their promise to resummon his master.

The Knot broke their seal and Tiadora appeared a few minutes later. They gave her a status update and she almost seemed impressed. She reminded them the master has limited patience and they should begin the ritual as soon as possible. She also reminded them to work with the 7th Knot (the White Ravens), to keep the ritual from being disturbed.

Thinking they'd have some time to get things in order, they began the ritual by offering the first sacrifice - the de-petrified cultist. His heart continued to beat on the alter (Temple of Doom style) after being removed. Any plans of completing the ritual stealthily went out the window when the horn erupted in a green energy field sending a blast into sky visible for hundreds of miles in every direction as the ritual began.

Now the villains scramble to prepare the defenses against the coming onslaught of do-gooders and treasure seekers (after all it is known that the Victor never found the cult's treasure room). A quick trip into Farholde was made to procure some supplies while Purcy continued the ritual back at the Horn. The Anti-Paladin began recruiting minions, while the others worked with the Baron to get some of the things including magic they'd need to defend their new dungeon. A plan was worked out with the White Ravens to send a rider to the horn whenever their was news. Secrecy was no longer a top priority as the horn was now a giant glowing green beacon.

The trip back proved to be perilous. Jurak was an old Treant. Eighty years early he had tried to work against the cultists but had managed only small victories. When the Victor destroyed the cult, the Treant regretted not being able to have done more to stop them. The Victor charged Jurak with preventing evil from returning to the Horn and for 80 years he had been fairly successful (one of the reasons the dungeon was so empty). Now Jurak realized that an evil had slipped in under his gaze and he decided to do something about it. He watched our villains depart from the Horn and laid an ambush for their return.

The villains walked right into it. Jurak and his animated trees laid waste to the party killing 60% of their number before finally being defeated. Now the villains have to recruit some replacements because heroes are coming to stop their evil ways and won't be giving up until the ritual is complete or they are successful.

Pathfinder Bestiary 4 ramps up the hurt

Bestiary 4 for Pathfinder is now on store shelves and there are some seriously powerful monsters in it. Up to now, the mighty tarrasque (CR 25) was top of the heap as far as monsters go. However, B4 introduces no less than twelve new monsters with higher CRs. Most of these epic horrors come from three groups; demon lords, kaiju and great old ones. Some familiar names return among the ranks of the demon lords, notably Pazuzu (CR 30) and Kostchtchie (CR 26). Sadly, the kaiju do not include names like Godzilla or King Ghidorah, although Mogaru (CR 28) and Agyra (CR 27) serve as approximations of those classic Japanese monsters. Finally, the great old ones derive, of course, from the Mythos and yes, Cthulhu (CR 30) is among them, as is my personal favourite, Hastur (CR 29), the King in Yellow.

Speaking of the Mythos, they have really gone all out this time including Lovecraftian horrors in B4. Besides the great old ones, the bhole (aka dhole), colour out of space, elder thing, flying polyp, mi-go, nightgaunt, spawn of Yog-Sothoth and star-spawn of Cthulhu all make an appearance.

One notable change in B4 is the introduction of mythic rank. Though only a small number of monsters (and not any of the really powerful ones) have one, the mythic rank (MR) is included for use with the new Mythic Adventures rules. I don't own this book so I can't say much more about it other than to note its inclusion. Overall, it's worth a look, especially if you like really high-powered campaigns.

-Rognar-

Way of the Wicked 5

This session was almost completely opposite of the last one. Where as last week it was almost all fighting the entire session, this one had much more roleplaying and exploration with only 2 short battles and they only occured near the end.

Our party of villains boarded a barge with Tiadora and set off for the distance town of Farholde, Taligarde's most remote outpost. It was a three week journey and at the end they were visited by Cardinal Thorn who informed them that Sakkarot's bugbear army had fought three successful battles sacked two towns and another border keep. Eventually the great cities of the south would gather their armies and march north crushing the Sakkarot unless more was done to help.

The Seventh Knot had initially been sent to Farhold to claim a highly virulent disease that had been created by a death cult that one of the Darkarian kings had wiped out 80 years ago. The seventh knot had located the Horn of Abbadon (the death cult's hangout) but had failed to report in afterwards. Since one knot had failed to retrieve the Tears of Achlys (the nasty disease), two would be sent this time. Our villains would be in charge or retrieving the Tears, while the second team would stay in Farholde and provide cover for the operation. Unfortunately, the second team is the White Ravens, who are villains met back at the manor after escaping the prison and the two groups do not get along especially well.

The villains met with the local half-elf Baron who hates the current monarchy and is a former Asmodeous worshiper but fears being on the losing side. The gnome is quite convincing and the Baron agrees to help them. Next they track down a map of the location of the Horn which was still in the leader of the 5th knot's room at an Inn. After some school yard type taunting the next morning with the White Raven, our villains set off into the wilds to find the Horn.

They get quite lucky and find it quickly thanks to the map. They find an entry way on one of the upper levels and begin to explore. They quickly realize that when Darkarian I the Victorious slew the cult 80 years earlier he really trashed the place.Signs of battle were everywhere, murals defaced, libraries burned, very few signs were left of the original cult.

A few things were found however: some old notes written in a language they could not understand, and more importantly they were able to de-petrify one of the former death cultists. Learning that the villains wished to re-summon the cult's patron daemon Vetra Kali Eats-the-Eyes, he has agreed to help them.

Knowing that they were still missing something, everyone went down into the caverns beneath the Horn. A few Boggards were spotted and one tried to kill the villains.  His two companions escaped.

And that is where we ended for the evening. The villains know that there is an artifact which prevents Vetra Kali's return but as of yet have been unable to find it. The death cultist thinks that the entrance to the Sanctum may be found in the caves below. We shall see.

Way of the Wicked 4

Sakkarot's bugbear horde was assembled and ready to attack they just needed the signal to invade. Our villains were feeling confident that they were ready to go and so put in place one last plan to confuse the defenders. Disguising themselves as orcs, they began to burn the poor section of Aldencross. As panic and chaos set in, they raced back to the inn and set it on fire as well. Slipping out of their disguises they entered the secret tunnel hidden in the basement of the inn that connected to the old storage room in Balentyne Keep. Their first target was the wizard who was known to live in the tower. Discovering that the storage room is in the basement of a tower they proceeded to climb to the top and we disappointed to find that they had entered the rookery and not the wizard's lab. Guards were quietly dispatched and the raven keeper was dispatched before he even realized what was happening.

Looking around, the only other tall structure was the Keep's central structure. They flew over to the roof but were spotted by the guards who managed to sound an alarm before being slain. Further alerts were heard as the villains open the trap door of the roof and descended a floor. They quickly found a meeting room and a large chest. Knowing that the clock was ticking Purcy the rogue did a quick check of the chest before trying to open it. He succeeded in opening it but got zapped in the process by a trap and another alarm sounded.

30 seconds later other door in the room opened and a dour looking man in full plate opened the door. Proclaiming that he was going to end their evil once and forever he declared he was smiting the Fighter, Cleric, and Witch. Our villains started to take a pounding but a poor roll on the part of the paladin had him rolling on the floor laughing uncontrollably. Then he was crawling around in Grease unable to stand up. By the time he was back on his feet ready to continue his whooping of the PCs he was just about dead even though he was healing himself every round.

With the keep's paladin commander dead, the villains tried to make it down to the main floor, no longer so concerned about the wizard. They were assaulted twice a choke points by the remaining guard captains and their men but each time our villains triumphed. By the time they exited to the keep's ground only a handful of the keep's defenders remained. Outside an aerial battle took place as the wizard finally showed himself as he rained down Fireballs and IceStorms. Not expecting the skinny witch to be a melee threat, the wizard let her get close and she wrapped him up in her hair and squeezed him until he died.

From here the villains sabotaged the gate house defenses and opened the portcullis. Lastly they fought off the dwarven engineers that had heard the calls and come to help defend the Keep. Alas, for them it was too late and they suffered the fate of the soldiers before them.

Satisfied that their work was complete, they broke the seal that notified Cardinal thorn of their success and sat back and watched the carnage and the bugbears poured through and began to loot and pillage. Tiadora arrived with their reward and instructed to board a boat that will soon arrive that will take them to their next adventure.

Smartest Orc in the World

I love fiddling around with character builds. Sometimes I come up with a concept and then try and find the most optimal way of achieving the concept and other times I start with a class and look at different ways it can be great.

Most of my current favorite builds are pretty conventional. The human Invulnerable Rager Beast Totem Superstitious barbarian that has an insane amount of HP, and uses Come and Get Me to counter attack enemies into bloody pulps. I tried this one but he died at level 4 when I rolled a 1 on a will save. Its a rather one dimensional character so I haven't had a lot of incentive to try him again

The Inquisitor is a class that I've been tweaking lately. I have two builds I like here. The Intimidator is a melee specialist that uses large weapons and Cornugan Smash to Intimidate his foes. I played this build at level 6 on a one shot adventure and it was quite fun. Lots of combat and non combat options but the build is a bit MAD and having only a moderate AC is a problem. With all of the Inquisitors set damage bonuses a Two Weapon build should be viable but they just don't get enough feats for it to be really effective.

The archer build works a bit better mechanically. Con is not quite so critical if you are not in the thick of things. Pathfinder archer builds tend to be ridiculously strong anyway and this build starts a little slow but will eventually outperform Ranger archers once high level inquisitor spells come into play. A round of buffing is required for the Inquisitor to be at its best. Multiclass in one level of rogue and you have a great rogue replacement with trapfinding.

The alchemist is an interesting class. It has rather diverse class features that don't really synergize but still complement each other. I've played around with strong melee builds, bomber builds, but then I started looking at  a buffer/controller alchemist build. The idea here is to get you Int as high as possible and use the modified bombs to do knockdowns, stagger, or entangle. The DCs can get crazy high especially if you are using a Cognatogen (Mutagen variant). Because you can target different saves most of the time you can find the right tool for the job. Play a half orc for the extra bomb damage. You would have many more skills than a wizard, and good AE damage when you need it (with touch attacks so not likely to miss). The best part is the ability to hand out buffs using Infusions. You fighter buddy will love you when you hand him a Giant Form 1 Infusion he can drink just before a big battle.

I picture this character rather Beast like (the character from X-Men). He adventures in a lab coat, wears spectacles and he's a half-orc. He knows the answer to any knowledge question, buffs up his pals, and uses his bombs to entangle flying dragons, stagger opponents with multiple attacks, and knockdown enemy casters. Not a dominating character but useful in many different situations.

I tried to talk one of my players into playing something like this but they went rogue instead so that means that they now get to face him as an opponent. That is one advantage of being the DM, I get to throw of all my favorite character builds at the PCs and see how well they perform in combat. I think my 20th level archer Inquisitor will wipe the party but that encounter is still far far into the future. I expect the PCs to meet my first customized adventuring party sometime around Christmas. They need more time to mature as Dreadlords before I start throwing my optimized enemies at them.

Way of the Wicked 3

Our band of Villains have arrived in Aldencross. They set out to scout out the watch tower. The keep is about half a mile from town and defends an old dwarven bridge spanning the river. 100m around the keep was cleared of forest but otherwise the area was lightly forested.

They spent the first few days relaxing, replacing gear, and trying to get a feel for the town and its occupants. The local inn, The Lord's Dalliance, is the place to be with many of the off duty soldiers coming here to drink as well as some of the watch captains. The party dwarf made friends with the engineers working on the keep and gained some intelligence that led the catfolk rogue to steal a copy of the blue prints. The others schmoozed with the soldiers getting a feel for the garrison's strength.

The villains began a campaign of assassinating the military leadership.  The scouts were ambushed at a farm and the captain and a couple of the scouts were killed. Another captain was killed while meeting with his lover in the town. The keep's head priest was ambushed in town before he could conduct the service one morning.

The remaining leadership in the keep are aware something is not right. Nothing is entering or leaving the keep without being closely scrutinized. The villains are keeping their heads low and have come to realize there will be no more ambushes. However, they have one remaining ace up their sleeves. While slinking around the inn late at night the rogue witnessed a secret door being opened. A bit of investigation indicated that it lead into the storage room of the keep.

The time has come. The bugbear horde should now be in position. The villains have 2 weeks to throw open the gates of the keep to the horde and weaken the defenders sufficiently so that the bugbears can win. Why wait longer than necessary? Everyone is ready to go all they need now is one last plan.

Way of the Wicked 2

So last time saw our band venture into the dungeon beneath Cardinal Thorn's manor in search of a silver and sapphire pendant "you'll know it when you see it". Each room offered a lesson on Asmodean theology and were filled with traps, or nasty critters. The PCs struggled through each room wondering what each lesson really meant. Eventually they made it to the final room and found an imprisoned Knight of Alerion. It was a tough battle but our villains managed to triumph over the lone knight and take his silver sapphire pendent - his order's holy symbol.

Pleased with their success, Cardinal Thorn inducted the group as his Ninth Knot during a ritual with devil blood and a sacrifice. We then queued up a training montage while everyone leveled up to 3.

The next mission involved a trip to the north smuggling weapons to a bugbear chieftain on a pirate vessel. The weapons were delivered and the group learned that the bugbear leader Sakkarot was also involved with Cardinal Thorn. The bugbear informed them that they had it would take him another 2 weeks to get his horde assembled and ready to move and he could hold them together for 2 weeks - another longer and they would begin to desert. A huge feast was thrown and the next morning the villains were to depart. Their orders were to kill the pirate captain and all of his crew after being dropped off on the south side of sea, but fearing a double cross the villains attacked the captain before they even set sail. The captain went down quickly but not before a critical hit would explode the goblin into a dozen pieces. The rest of the crew surrendered and the journey across the lake was quiet. As they reached the shore, the rest of the crew was mercilessly slaughtered and the ship set afire and sunk.

As the sun rose, our band of villains entered the town of Aldencross disguised. They would have up to 4 weeks to throw open the gates of the fortress of Balentyne to the horde and set Talingarde aflame!

*this update is a bit late as we played 2 weeks ago.

The measure of a man

The running joke is that the internet is all porn and cat pictures and it's true that fake breasts and cute felines with a craving for cheezburgers certainly consume a disproportionate amount of the world's bandwidth. However, I think there is a third pillar of the internet that is growing in strength everyday, that is, manliness. Massive bacon consumption, a killer porn 'stache and hero-worship of Ron Swanson are apparently the true measures of a man these days. Well balderdash, I say! (Crap, my monocle fell out...hold on). Let me tell you young whippersnappers what you require in order to be a man. Oh, and by the way, these guidelines are not limited to men, they will serve women well too.

1. Have a working knowledge of history: Now put down that smartphone and don't even think of consulting Wikipedia. No one says you need to know what year the Second Punic War started, but understanding many of the problems we face today requires knowing the history of those problems. How can you understand the conflict between the Israelis and the Palestinians if you've never heard of the Balfour Declaration? As George Santayana, a famous Spanish-American philosopher said "Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it".

2. Have a working knowledge of politics: Every adult should know the orientations of major political parties in his or her country. You should know what socialism and capitalism actually are, beyond the slogans you see on bumper stickers and T-shirts. If a politician is described as progressive or conservative, liberal or centrist, you should be able to guess what said politician's opinion will be on most major issues of the day. You should have opinions of your own and you should be able to defend them. You should vote. It matters.

3. Know how to do things: Change a tire or a light fixture, make your own beer or grow your own tomatoes, go hunting or fishing, own some tools and know how to use them. Be as self-sufficient as you can be, you never know when it may save your life.

4. Fulfil your obligations: Everyone has obligations, to your society, to your employer and most importantly, to your loved ones. Be the man everyone needs you to be. Get your lazy butt out of bed and do what needs doing. Be engaged. There are probably people who depend on you. There are certainly people who care about you. Put down the game controller and go help your wife with the housework or your kid with her homework. Invite your parents over and cook them a meal. Go shovel the driveway for your elderly neighbour. Pay your debts.

5. Be respectful: A real man does not insult or belittle others. He doesn't misuse other people's property or use threats of violence (but see below). When a woman says no, a real man accepts it. Oh, and if you disrespect my daughters I will crush you like a bug!

-Rognar-

Way of the Wicked: 1

I think this is going to be a very deadly campaign judging by the carnage present in session 1. First level characters are not known for their durability and I initially underestimated the added difficulty that would arise from being unarmed and unarmored. At least there were no pugwumpies. Session one started with 6 of the nastiest known criminals in the kingdom being sentenced to death in an inescapable prison.

Fortunately for the players the prison no longer lives up to its famous reputation. The present warden is uninterested in running the prison and basically spends all of his time staying in his tower doing magical research and leaves the daily running of the prison the the corrupt guard sergeant. The sergeant has let go a number of guards and just pockets their earnings now, he also runs a nightly rigged poker game that keeps half the guards away from their regular posts and a number of the guards drunk.

The second factor is a mysterious visitor who claims to know the Anti-paladin (he's never seen her before), she manages to get him alone and smuggles a magic object to him. Using that item (similar to a cloak of many things), the PCs manage to escape their bindings, and open their cell. After a short debate, they decide to spring the imprisoned Ogre after the Gnome sorcerer gets the Ogre's agreement to help them escape. Unfortunately the Ogre was drugged and seriously injured and with a lack of party healing capabilities the Ogre would go untreated.

The first part of the escape went fairly smoothly. The first few guards were quickly disabled and the prison seemed unusually empty as the criminals focused on escape rather than exploring, stopping only long enough to loot the guards of their weapons and armor as they made their way to freedom. The goblin rogue slipped out the doors and scouted around the main prison building noting the high walls. After spotting and being spotted by the dogs, the goblin slipped back inside where his companions were waiting. What followed what a mad dash for the gatehouse and what they hoped was freedom on the other side. Half of the party stopped to fight the guards that went to investigate while the rest  headed for the door. The guards got initiative and things began to go downhill fast. The signal horn was blown and within a few rounds reinforcements began to arrive.

A hole was made in the door and parts of the party climbed through into the gatehouse. The guards here were again disabled by the sorcerer but their companions in the connecting rooms used the arrow slits to poke holes in our anti-heroes. Back in the courtyard, the wizard  was unconscious and bleeding profusely from 2 lucky arrows, and the dwarven fighter opened the gatehouse door so the Ogre could escape as well.
The wizard would expire in the ogre's arms but was none the less carried through the gatehouse down the road and across the bridge that led to freedom.

This was not the end however as the bridge itself was fortified and the gate on the land side was blocked and defended. Several of the villains had an "every man for himself'" attitude and there was no real strategy on how to pass the gate. In the end the wizard died, the fighter and paladin were knocked unconscious and recaptured and the Ogre, who was never in good health to begin with, was killed as he attempted to scale the gate.

The heroes made it to the manor house of the mysterious benefactor, and were united with heroes that strongly resembled those that had just died or been recaptured. Everyone got 200gp to buy some equipment and three days to relax and recover from their escape. They learned they were not the only adventurers in the manor and did a bit of recon on the "White Ravens". Next their training was to begin but first they had to go into the dungeon under the manor and retrieve a silver and emerald amulet and return it to the Cardinal to prove they were worthy.

Things were not off to a good start but hopefully level 2 and two weeks to get a feel for their new PCs will have things running smoother when we play again in two weeks. I think everyone is still used to being level 17, reality bending super heroes from the end of the last campaign.

Rise of the Runelords - The End

After just over a year of playing, Rise of the Runelords has come to a close. I think Rognar's wizard was the only original PC to make it through the campaign. My bardadin managed to survive from about level 5 on without dying at all (a feat no other PC can claim). There were definitely parts of this campaign that were a bit of a meat grinder. C seemed to come with a new PC every second week.

We were all experiencing high level campaign fatigue towards the end so the DM chopped off 90% of the final book and we just fought 3 ridiculously tough battles to end things off. J's cleric came to the party rescue many times pulling people back from the brink of death and some times even after they'd passed over.

Karzoug is no push over and in the surprise round downed 60% of the party before we even had a chance to act. We threw everything we had at him and in the end it was C's latest archer PC that finished him off.

RotRL was a fun campaign but started to drag a bit as you get into Runeforge. The place is a huge dungeon and it just seemed to drag on a bit as most of the fights are against wizards and its not until near the end that you figure out what you are even there to do.

Next up I get to assume the mantle of DM, and kick off the new campaign - Way of the Wicked. Yes, its an evil campaign and will hopefully be a lot of fun.

A day at the range

My buddy J and I have a minor obsession for all things WWII. We used to be hardcore Axis & Allies Miniatures players until circumstances prevented our lunch hour skirmishes. Just as well I suppose, he usually seemed to find a way to win. Anyway, we also like guns, especially WWII-era combat rifles. This weekend, we took our rifles out to the range and fired off a few boxes of cartridges. We brought along another buddy, E, who had almost no previous firearms experience. However, years of first-person shooters have served him well as he handled himself admirably. Here are some pics:

My two Lee-Enfields, a No.4 and a No.5 "jungle carbine"

Here is J firing the carbine

J has a M-1 Garand bored for 7.62mm. Here is E firing it. Notice the ejected shell casing near the top of the picture

Finally, here is yours truly having a go with the M-1

Good times.

-Rognar-

Pathfinder - Mythic Adventures

I'm still digging through this book so this is more of a first impression than a detailed review.

This looks like Pathfinder turned up to 11. The first thing that strikes me is how much offense has been ramped up. With only a couple mythic tiers damage is easily going to increase by 50% for non casters and will probably double or triple as you get into the higher tiers. Archers take on a new level of scariness as the  get even more arrows per round and the damage bonus from deadly aim goes up by 50%. It is easy to push spell DCs up through the roof as well. I'm still trying to figure out how Mythic Vital Strike works. Depending on how you would calculate the new damage I can see this doing a lot of one hit kills. Why bother with iterative attacks if you can hit once and do as much damage as swinging 4 times?

In terms of defense there doesn't seem to be as much unless you are taking one of the mythic defensive paths. There are a few ways to boost saves (but quite a few rays to get re-rolls), and I saw what looked like quite a few AC boosters. Still lit seems to me that the scales have tiled towards offense even more so with mythic. It's Rocket Tag taken to the new levels.

The first half of the book is all of the PC mythic stuff which has not changed to significantly from the beta test. There is a short section on magic items and artifacts, a section on monsters and then a sample mythic adventure taking up a good chunk of the end of the book.

Over all, this looks like a fun system which allows the PCs to do some wild and crazy stuff. As long as you like your Pathinfer big and bold this is the place to be.

Anyone know of a Skylanders RPG?

If you're the parent of kids in the 5-10 year age cohort, chances are you have heard of Skylanders. If you have kids like mine, every conversation you have with them quickly turns to Skylanders. Before they will tell me if they want cereal or waffles for breakfast, I have to decide if I prefer Drobot or Flashwing (Drobot, of course). For the uninitiated, Skylanders is a toy line and a video game all in one. It includes a line of collectible figures, not surprisingly known as the Skylanders, divided up into eight elements: Earth, Air, Water, Fire, Life, Undead, Magic and Tech. Within each element are several characters, some are elementals, some are robots, there are also elves, dragons, undead creatures and anthropomorphic animals, and a few that simply defy easy description. The really clever part is that each figure has a radio frequency identification chip embedded in the base. When the figure is placed on a device called a portal, which is available for both Sony Playstation and Xbox, it becomes the character in the game.

The game setting is a world called the Skylands (what can I say, it's a kid's game), where towns and villages float in the air high above some unknown land below. Airships fly from one skyland to another, which are populated by a race of anthropomorphic animals known as the Mabu. There is also a wide variety of bad guys including the lowly (but annoying) Chompies, Drow (rhymes with snow), various troll-like things and Arkeyan robots. The Arkeyans were a race of evil robots than conquered and enslaved the Mabu 10,000 years ago. Although the giant Arkeyan robots were defeated (by the original Skylanders) and locked away in the Lost City of Arkus, many of the lesser Arkeyan robots remained scattered throughout the Skylands. There's a lot of potentially good stuff in there for a role-playing game, but it doesn't get developed much in the third-person shooter game. As my kids are getting close to the age at which they could handle a tabletop game, I'm curious if anyone is aware of any attempt to design a Skylanders tabletop rpg. Given the wide range of abilities displayed by the various characters, I would guess the best system would be some sort of superheroes game. Anyone know of an supers system that elementary school kids could handle?

-Rognar-

Think positive

As my family can attest, I am not exactly the life of the party a lot of the time. Being something of an introvert with, as Melville would describe it, a bit of "damp, drizzly November in my soul", I tend to steer clear of internet negativity whenever I can. There's enough ugliness in the real world, without having to crawl around in the fetid swamp of trolling and nerd rage that occupies so much of the internet. Longtime readers might notice, for example, that I never give anything a bad review, be it a book, game or movie. That's not because I like everything I see, it's just because if I don't like something, I don't bother to write about it. I don't feel as though I have anything to say. I used to have a political blog which I eventually purged from the internet because I was finding it so hard to find anything positive to say. Politicians, even ones I admire or agree with on many issues, always seem to find a way to disappoint me. Being a father, I want to be optimistic about the future. I want to believe things will be better (or at least just as good) for my kids as they were for me. I've talked about this a bit in my "bright future" blog posts. Happily, I'm not alone in my desire to see more optimism and positivity in the world of geekdom. Two personal initiatives in particular have come to my attention from prominent members of sci-fi/fantasy/gamer community, Sarah Hoyt's "human wave" movement and Monte Cook's "A+ campaign". I'd also give honourable mention to Wheaton's law, but I prefer not to scold (an assertion my kids might contest). I'm not really going anywhere with this other than to bring attention to these laudable efforts from two talented writers. Now I just have to find the time to read Darkship Renegades.

Oh, and Numenera looks awesome.

-Rognar-

Red Aegis looks awesome

What do you get when you combine the tabletop rpg aspects of D&D with the empire-building of Sid Meier's Civilization? Red Aegis by Vorpal Games. There have been games in the past, notably Pendragon, originally published by Chaosium, that have allowed for dynastic play. Players could play a character throughout his or her life, then go on to play a scion of the original character. It was an interesting concept and pretty well-executed, but the game itself had limited appeal. Red Aegis, which is currently in the process of a successful Kickstarter campaign, is much more ambitious, Rather than playing several generations of a single family, the players take on bloodlines which rule empires for millennia. I cannot express how stoked I am for this project. My two favourite types of games, tabletop rpgs and turn-based computer strategy games fused into one...

Read more at io9.

-Rognar-

Oh, one more thing...it will be compatible with Pathfinder.

Book of Quests for RQ6

I recently picked up Book of Quests, a set of adventures published by The Design Mechanism, for RuneQuest 6. The book is softcover, 224 pgs. in length. It contains seven scenarios, including the introductory adventure, "The Caravan" which is available for free download from their website. Although designed for use with the RQ6 ruleset, Book of Quests is not set in Glorantha (although no doubt, it could be with minor adjustments). The genre is strongly sword-and-sorcery, which is also a clear departure from the Gloranthan norm. Magic is rare and sorcery, in particular, is almost unheard of by most people and greatly feared by those who do know of it. Hence, the common thread in the seven scenarios involves the rise of an evil sorcerer named Jedakiah. Acting behind the scenes, the sorcererous villain directs his barbarian allies to cause considerable problems for a civilized land known simply as The Realm. Throughout the series, the PCs slowly learn of Jedakiah's schemes and of dark secrets long forgotten.

In the end, of course, only they can thwart his evil machinations. The book seems to be well-written, with an excellent index (unusual for a book of adventures) and a decent amount of cultural background info, such that the setting can be fleshed out for further use. Of course, the final word can only be written through gameplay.

-Rognar-

Runelords update

Rise of the Runelords is coming to a close. We finished off Book 5, gained 2 levels and jumped to near the ending of Book 6. Most of the session consisted of 2 fights. The first against 2 golems and the next was against a bunch of super storm giants and a high level fighter. Both were very tough.

As a party we tend to approach combat the same way just about every time. Unleash massive amounts of damage and kill them before they kill us. There isn't usually much battlefield control. When facing opponents that out gun you, there are going to be problems. And we had a lot.

Our biggest problem with the first battle is that we were largely unbuffed to start. There was lots of scurrying around trying to get the basic buffs to start. Things were further complicated by one of the golems grappling a party member. The other one pretty much would always auto-hit and inflict 50+ damage so no one really wanted to stand near it. It was a mad, chaotic fight but we managed to win with no casualties although the cleric had some work to do at the end of the fight.

The second fight was much harder. We quickly discovered that the squishier party members would probably die if they got hit with a full round attack so this battle was largely about positioning. The wizard flew around dodging statues being throw at him by a giant before getting grappled in mid-air by the fighter. The archer ran around trying to snipe the giants and not get killed. The palabard was running around invisible trying to kill the giants and not get smooshed. The rogue got caught in a bad spot and got pounded by 2 giants. He died not once but three times as the cleric kept using reach spells to heal him and bring him back. The last hit pushed the rogue so far into the negative that he was beyond clerical healing. The archer was also caught by one of the giants and did not survive the battle. If this is a sign of things to come, I think we are in trouble.

Snap Shot

I was looking at feats last night and I took a closer look at this one. Snap Shot basically allows an archer to make attacks of opportunity with a bow. That sounds pretty good until you look at the the Improved Snap Shot feat. This adds 10' onto the 5' that you threaten with Snap Shot giving you a total threat range of 15'. That's huge!  One more feat line that makes archers very, very scary.

Pity me, for I am weak

I have never read any of The Song of Ice and Fire series, nor do I watch A Game of Thrones. I have great respect for what George R.R. Martin is doing and I have no doubt the books are the modern classics his fans believe them to be. However, I have always been a little intimidated by the series with its bewildering number of characters and off-balancing attrition of protagonists. Still, I always thought I would eventually get around to reading them, perhaps when my kids were a little older. I'm not so sure about that anymore. I've never been much for excessive violence. The cartoonish violence of Friday the 13th or Conan the Barbarian is fine. The sanitized violence of the old war movies is fine. But the visceral, hateful violence we often call torture porn these days, I just have no stomach for it. The response I have seen on the internet lately over the so-called "red wedding" scene in A Game of Thrones leads me to believe that I probably wouldn't enjoy it. It all sounds a bit too nihilistic for my tastes. From what I can determine, the most honourable characters in the series are all destined to suffer a horrific fate, while the schemers and betrayers are rewarded for their treachery. This may be reflective of reality, but it doesn't make for a particularly satisfying reading experience. Am I missing something or am I just out-of-touch with today's fashion?

-Rognar-

Anatomy of a PC: The Battle Bard

I am a power gamer. I do not like my characters to die so I do not like to have any critical weaknesses in my character builds. I like them to excel in at least one area and be competent in a few others. He struggled a bit in the early levels but has matured nicely and it now a corner stone of the party. So here is my current PC:

Aasif
Male Human (Keleshite) Bard (Dawnflower Dervish) 12 Paladin 2
LG Medium Humanoid (human)
Init +11; Senses Perception +16
--------------------
Defense
--------------------
AC 28, touch 19, flat-footed 20 (+9 armor, +7 Dex, +1 deflection, +1 dodge)
hp 148 (2d10+12d8+73)
Fort +18, Ref +22, Will +17; +4 vs. bardic performance, sonic, and language-dependant effects
--------------------
Offense
--------------------
Speed 30 ft.
Melee +3 Scimitar +21/+16/+11 (1d6+10/15-20/x2)
Ranged Shortbow, Comp. (Str +1) +18/+13/+8 (1d6+1/x3)
Special Attacks bardic performance (move action) (31 rounds/day), bardic performance: countersong, bardic performance: distraction, bardic performance: fascinate (4 targets) (dc 21), bardic performance: inspire competence +4, bardic performance: inspire courage +3, bardic performance: inspire greatness (2 allies), bardic performance: soothing performance, bardic performance: suggestion (dc 21), battle dance: inspire courage +6, battle dance: inspire greatness, smite evil (1/day)
Spell-Like Abilities Detect Evil (At will)
Bard (Dawnflower Dervish) Spells Known (CL 14):
4 (4/day) Invisibility, Greater, Dimension Door, Freedom of Movement, Echolocation
3 (5/day) Haste, Glibness, Slow (DC 18), Displacement, Dispel Magic, Good Hope, Terrible Remorse (DC 19)
2 (6/day) Delay Poison, Glitterdust, Tongues, Heroism, Mirror Image, Silence (DC 17), Bladed Dash, Versatile Weapon (DC 17)
1 (7/day) Silent Image (DC 16), Grease (DC 16), Disguise Self, Cure Light Wounds, Feather Fall (DC 16), Saving Finale (DC 16), Vanish, Vocal Alteration (DC 16), Windy Escape
0 (at will) Mage Hand, Know Direction, Read Magic, Prestidigitation (DC 15), Detect Magic, Light
Paladin Spells Prepared (CL 0):
--------------------
Statistics
--------------------
Str 13, Dex 25, Con 18, Int 10, Wis 8, Cha 20
Base Atk +11; CMB +12; CMD 31
Feats Arcane Strike, Dervish Dance, Dodge, Improved Critical (Scimitar), Improved Initiative, Power Attack -3/+6, Skill Focus (Perform [oratory]), Toughness +14, Weapon Finesse
Traits Eager Performer (Perform [oratory], Terrible Remorse), Magical Knack (Bard [Dawnflower Dervish])
Skills Acrobatics +25, Bluff +25, Climb -1, Diplomacy +32, Disable Device +3, Disguise +25, Escape Artist +5, Fly +25, Handle Animal +8, Intimidate +8, Knowledge (local) +7, Linguistics +6, Perception +16, Perform (act) +25, Perform (dance) +25, Perform (oratory) +32, Ride +5, Sense Motive +32, Sleight of Hand +5, Stealth +5, Swim -1, Use Magic Device +24
Languages Common, Giant, Kelish, Orc, Thassilonian
SQ aura of good, battle dance (swift action), jack of all trades: trained skills, lay on hands (1d6) (6/day), mediative whirl (3/day), spinning spellcaster, versatile performance abilities (acting, dance, oratory), well versed
Combat Gear Potion of cure light wounds, Potion of gaseous form, Potion of protection from evil, Potion of remove blindness/deafness, Potion of remove paralysis, Potion of restoration, lesser, Wand of Barkskin (CL 12), Wand of Cure Light Wounds; Other Gear Celestial armor, +3 Scimitar, Shortbow, Comp. (Str +1), Bag of holding II (empty), Belt of physical might (Dex & Con +4), Circlet of persuasion, Cloak of resistance +2, Golembane scarab, Headband of alluring charisma +4, Ring of protection +1, Backpack (empty), Belt pouch (empty), Mirror, Sack (empty), 379 GP, 3 SP, 9 CP
--------------------
Special Abilities
--------------------
Arcane Strike As a swift action, add +1 damage, +1 per 5 caster levels and your weapons are treated as magic for the purpose of overcoming damage reduction.
Aura of Good (Ex) The paladin has an Aura of Good with power equal to her class level.
Bardic Performance (move action) (31 rounds/day) Your performances can create magical effects.
Bardic Performance: Countersong (Su) Counter magical effects that depend on sound.
Bardic Performance: Distraction (Su) Counter magical effects that depend on sight.
Bardic Performance: Fascinate (4 targets) (DC 21) (Su) One or more creatures becomes fascinated with you.
Bardic Performance: Inspire Competence +4 (Su) +2 competence bonus for one ally on a skill check.
Bardic Performance: Inspire Courage +3 (Su) Morale bonus on some saving throws, attack and damage rolls.
Bardic Performance: Inspire Greatness (2 allies) (Su) Grants allies 2 bonus hit dice, +2 to attacks and +1 to fort saves.
Bardic Performance: Soothing Performance (Su) Allies are healed and some conditions are removed.
Bardic Performance: Suggestion (DC 21) (Sp) Make a Suggestion to one Fascinated creature.
Battle Dance (swift action) A Dawnflower dervish is trained in the use of the Perform skill, especially dance, to create magical effects on himself. This works like bardic performance, except that the Dawnflower dervish’s performances grant double their normal bonuses, but thes
Battle Dance: Inspire Courage +6 (Su) Morale bonus on some saving throws, attack and damage rolls.
Battle Dance: Inspire Greatness (Su) Grants self 4 bonus hit dice, +4 to attacks and +2 to Fort saves.
Circlet of persuasion +3 competence bonus to CHA-based checks (skills already included).
Dervish Dance Use Dex modifier instead of Str modifier with scimitar
Detect Evil (At will) (Sp) You can use detect evil at will (as the spell).
Golembane scarab Can combat golems with weapons, unarmed attacks, or natural weapons as if those golems had no damage reduction.
Jack of All Trades: Trained skills (Ex) You may use all skills untrained.
Lay on Hands (1d6) (6/day) (Su) You can heal 1d6 damage, 6/day
Magical Knack (Bard [Dawnflower Dervish]) +2 CL for a specific class, to a max of your HD.
Mediative Whirl (3/day) (Ex) Quicken a cure spell as a move action.
Power Attack -3/+6 You can subtract from your attack roll to add to your damage.
Smite Evil (1/day) (Su) +5 to hit, +2 to damage, +5 deflection bonus to AC when used.
Spinning Spellcaster (Ex) +4 bonus on concentration checks to cast spells defensively.
Versatile Performance (Acting) +25 (Ex) You may substitute the final value of your Perform: Act skill for Bluff or Disguise checks
Versatile Performance (Dance) +25 (Ex) You may substitute the final value of your Perform: Dance skill for Acrobatics or Fly checks
Versatile Performance (Oratory) +32 (Ex) You may substitute the final value of your Perform: Oratory skill for Diplomacy or Sense Motive checks
Wand of Barkskin (CL 12) Add this item to create a wand of a chosen spell.
Well Versed (Ex) +4 save vs. bardic performance, sonic, and language-dependent effects.

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So the last time someone played a bard in a campaign they were a very stereotypical bard. Great buffer, great party face, but otherwise not very useful in combat situations. I was playing around with the idea of a good gish build and I found the bard to be the best base. The Dervish Dancer archetype is very helpful since it grants the Dervish Dance, and Combat Casting feats and changes Inspire Courage into a self only battle dance that grants double the bonuses. The 2 levels of Paladin are mainly for Cha to Saves, but a once a day Smite Evil is pretty tasty too.

A couple house rules made this character bloom a little easier. Everyone is granted Weapon Finesse and when you get an attribute at levels 4,8,12, etc, you get 4 points to add to your point build or you can take the single attribute point. This allowed my to push Str up to 13 at level 4 enabling Power Attack on a scimitar. Otherwise, focus all of the attribute point increases on Dex when is the primary stat for this character. The secondary stat is Cha and tertiary is Con.

So I am the party "Tank". I get up close and personal and encourage the bad guys to hit me and not the squishy casters, archer, or rogue (although he's not that squishy). To be successful in this role I deploy two lines of defense. Since very early on in my career I've cast a lot of Mirror Images; so many in fact that my party has begun to refer to them as "The Dance Crew" (since I'm always Dervish Dancing). They have taken many hits for me and I'm very grateful for them. As I've been able to fill some problem areas in my gear I'm much less dependent on the dance crew to keep me safe. Against a single opponent who hits once or twice a round very hard, its the my go to spell, but as I like using second levels spells for Heroism, I am more and more using Displacement as my standard magical defense.

I am also now able to sport a decent armor class. It seems like I was forever AC 21 which was great in the first few levels but I was getting clobbered as we passed level 10. Now I have very stylish Celestial armor which not only allows me to use my entire Dex Bonus to AC but also grants me Fly once a day increasing my mobility. I also have a Wand of Barkskin (CL12) which last for 2 hours and pumps my AC up to 33. If we have time to buff before a tough battle I can usually beg a Shield of Faith from the Cleric putting my AC up to 36 or if I use Smite 38. My standard AC33 doesn't quite meet my target of AC=Level+20, but its close enough for now. Most mooks are not going to hit and I can use my spells on the tough opponents.

OK that covers tanking. But can I actually hurt the things I'm fighting or do they just ignore me and chase after the sort targets nearby? Well, unprepared, things look pretty grave. My damage is a mere 1d6+10. 7 from Dex to Damage and 3 from the weapon enchantment. Luckily I have access to some fairly long term buffs so as long as trouble is expected I am usually covered. Heroism grants +2 to hit and lasts 2 hours. Battle Dance is activated as a swift action and adds +6 to attack and damage. Power attack adds another +6 to damage and lastly we have Arcane Strike which consumes a swift action but after the first round of combat that's not usually a problem. Add those up and the first attacks hit bonus is +26, does 1d6+25 and has a crit range of 15-20. On a full attack I usually do 50-75 a round, more with Haste and some lucky rolls.

His big weakness on the combat side of things is no real range option and no decent Area of Effect damage. Luckily other party members are highly effective at these roles.

In terms of Saving Throws I'm in good shape. My general rule here is to keep them all at character level or higher - higher is always better. I will make an exception for Reflex but only if the character has tons of HP, and has some special movement options (Fly, Dimension Door). Reflex saves tend to be AE damage or drop you in a pit or stick you in a cage.The two level of paladin help a great deal here with the high numbers, so much so that until recently I only had a +1 cloak of resistance.

In terms of Spells, I focus on buffs, utility, and defense. There are a couple of offensive spells on the list. I well timed Slow can trivialize certain fights, and Glitterdust and Grease have a multitude of uses. I have Terrible Remorse but I've never been able to bring myself to cast it. Its just too cheesy.

Like most all bards, I make an excellent party Face. My beef here is that its only been the last few levels when that side of things has really come together and since then we've met people that shoot first and ask quesitons later. I've had to spend a few skill points of Linguistics, because your diplomacy of 35 doesn't count for as much when they have no idea what you are saying.

And that is Aasif, my Dervish Dancer. Slayer of Goblins, Giants, and just about anything else that messes with the forces good.

Way of the Wicked

Wow, posts 2 days in a row! This trend isn't going to continue.

Another great Adventure Path that I've read through over the last 6 months is Fire Mountain Games' Way of the Wicked. Yes, this is an evil adventure path. It removes some of the problems of an evil AP by making the default alignment Lawful Evil and giving the PCs a powerful patron to help keep them in line early on. It comes with lots of great options like a LE version of an Anti-paladin (although I hate that class descriptor), and an archetype for clerics that want to channel positive energy.

The first part starts with a jail break and assuming it is successful, the PCs soon meet their new patron and things take off from there. Part 2 has the PCs running their own dungeon and trying to keep out or kill off the damn heroes that keep invading.Parts 3 and 4 have the PCs gathering allies (there is a great henchman system - and the Leadership feat could be used in a way that does not break the game) and raising an army. Parts 5 and 6 are quite epic as the PCs reach 20 level making it quite a journey that takes place over a couple years.

The 6th book strongly reminds me of the sixth part of Kingmaker - lots of set pieces or 1 or 2 encounters - often against nearly epic opponents. Aside from the fact that this AP is sooo long (after the PCs hit level 12 or so we rarely get more then a couple encounters done per game night) it would be perfect for our group. We all love playing evil, there's a fairly straightforward plot (with only a handful of important on-going NPCs), lots of interesting fights, and just enough role--playing that we can ham it up between battles where we try to demonstrate our evil awesomeness. The trick would be too seriously trim down and combine the last 3 or 4 books books into something fun that makes sense.

Razor Coast

Our blog has been pretty slow lately. Its hard to say exactly what's behind it. I have lots of good ideas for posts but they never seem to get finished,or in many cases started.

This post (and several others if I get to them) are about adventures. I am always trying to get my hands on all of the cool new adventures come out for Pathfinder. Unfortunately I am not made of money so although I prefer the hard copies I'm often stuck with the pdf version. I love reading through them, looking at the cool art, looking for awesome ideas, trying to figure out how they would play out and if my group would enjoy them.

We've been playing Pathfinder Adventure paths for a while and we are used to fairly linear adventures with lots of fighting, a bit of roleplaying, and a few puzzles. We don't do well with complicated plots since after two weeks no one remembers what was going on, and too many NPCs just get confusing. The problem with this is that the adventures that are often the most enjoyable to read would probably play poorly with our group. I love the Curse of the Crimson Throne AP. The first three parts focus heavily on a home city, come with a wealth of interesting NPCs and there are a couple plots and subplots running. I can see how some groups could love this adventure. It is full of roleplaying opportunities and if you didn't want to rush through things you could expand on Korvosa a great deal and really make the environment come alive.

The first part of the Kingmaker AP was almost the opposite. It was largely a hex crawl. If was fun at first but  I think everyone was starting to get a bit bored with the concept by about the third book. My group seems to have a short attention span.

Last summer I sank some money into a couple Kickstarters. First was Slumbering Tsar and then Rappan Athuk. ST starts as a hex crawl, becomes an urban dungeon and finally turns into a not quite mega dungeon. RA is a pure Mega-dungeon. Both are well designed and have lots of cool encounters but next to nothing in terms of plot (ST has a minor plot but it comes up so infrequently, I can't seen any players every following it). I'm not really sure if anyone in my group would be interested in playing something that's so open ended. Something to think about.

Anyway, with all of that out of the way I'm finally coming to the heart of this post. After blowing my money on ST and RA I didn't have any left for Razor Coast. Now for people that have been following this product since it first came about, it has a long and complicated history. The brain child of Nick Logue who is responsible for some of the better (and gruesome) early Adventure Path parts. It was supposed to have a Hawaiian/Caribbean feel to it and have lots of pirates, undead pygmyies, and were-sharks. Lots of people thought it looked great and many people pre-ordered it. And then Nick Logue disappeared.

Actually he was teaching in England but he stopped visiting his website, answering email or posting on the Paizo message board so he might as well have vanished. People wanted updates and what they got in return was silence. This went on for a couple years before Lou Agresta contacted Nick, and started to work with him to get the product finished. Full details of what went on and the aftermath cane be found on the Paizo message boards but the short version is that the final work was done by a number of very talented writers and last year Frog God Games put up another Kickstarter, this time to get Razor Coast finally published in all of its full color splendor. The curse was finally lifted.

I have to say that this thing is a master piece. It is full of great ideas, interesting PCs, tons of plots and subplots, heroes, villains. Its got it all. It is also very daunting. This is not a work for beginner DMs. With most APs you could just pick up the book and muddle through (although this is obviously not the ideal way to run them), but not with this. You would have to have read it from cover to cover, understand the different plots, and have a good idea how it all comes together. There is an entire section of this massive book dedicated to helping the DM track everything that's going on. Which factions the PCs have fallen in with, their motivations, the attitude of a number of NPCs towards the PCs, which set piece encounters should be used next and why, important plot pieces to share with the PCs (rumors). You really do actually have to plot out the adventure while you are playing it so that you know which way the PCs might go and keep everything prepared. Razor coast would never be played the same way twice because there are so many options available to the PCs. They've also released a few extra Razor Coast books that include a few more options set piece adventures, player options, and naval warfare rules.

Would this be something I'd be willing to take on as DM? I don't really think so. I can see this as as being one of the best adventures out there but my group just loses too much momentum between sessions. This would play best with a group that plays at least on a weekly basis and a DM with lots of preparation time.

Final verdict: Very ambitious adventure for players level starting at level 7 and going until level 13. If it was done right it would be the stuff of legends - that campaign that gets talked about years or even decades after the fact. Done wrong and it would muddled confusing Paizo Adventure Path wannabe.

Review of Magic World

So I picked up Magic World by Chaosium, the latest iteration of fantasy role-playing for the d100 system. Though broadly similar to the other contenders, RuneQuest 6 by The Design Mechanism and Legend by Mongoose, Magic World, not surprisingly, more closely adheres to the Basic RolePlaying game system. Interestingly, it doesn't use the expanded magic system presented in The Magic Book, released in 2011, which updated the magic rules from older editions of Chaosium's RuneQuest for use with BRP. Rather, Magic World expands the sorcery rules from the basic BRP game. In other words, all magic in Magic World is sorcery. If The Magic Book is derived from RuneQuest, Magic World seems more influenced by another old Chaosium game, Stormbringer. Though the darker aspects of Stormbringer and its later edition Elric! have been toned down in Magic World, the rules for summoning demons and elementals are there. If you can get your hands on the excellent Elric! supplement, The Bronze Grimoire, to incorporate its more detailed summoning and necromancy rules, Magic World would make an excellent ruleset to run a dark fantasy campaign.

-Rognar-

Highlights of the Calgary gun show

It was a real marathon, seeing everything at the show. Here are a few of the highlights.

A Winchester Model 1876 rifle:

An awesome collection of 19th century Mauser rifles:

A Bren gun:

A Boys anti-tank rifle and a Browning M-2 machine gun:

-Rognar-

Calgary gun show

So, my buddy J and I went to the Calgary gun show today sponsored by the Alberta Arms and Cartridge Collectors Association. It was the first time for both of us and we were pretty blown away by the size of the show. The selection of firearms, militaria, knives, hunting equipment and general guy stuff was amazing. Being something of a WWII buff, I was particularly keen to pick up a Lee-Enfield rifle, and I lucked out. I got a sweet deal on a 1943 Lee-Enfield No.4 Mk.1 rifle. J was sorely tempted by a mint-condition Garand M-1, but the price tag was pretty steep. He walked away, but I could see the sadness in his eyes. I'll have more pics to show later, but for now, here's a shot of me rocking the Saxon warrior look.

-Rognar-

The aliens of TSR

Back in the good old days of TSR, Inc., much like it is today, Dungeons & Dragons was king. However, they did produce some other tabletop rpgs in different genres, including their popular post-apocalyptic game, Gamma World (1st ed. 1978), and their less-popular space opera game, Star Frontiers (1st ed. 1982). Personally, I quite liked Star Frontiers (much more than Gamma World, which just seemed weird and unbalanced to me). Star Frontiers includes three alien PC races, in addition to Humans, the Dralasites, the Vrusk and the Yazirians. The Dralasites are a race of amorphous blobs who can grow limbs as needed and have a fondness for philosophical discourse and lame jokes. They breathe through their skin, giving them an acute sense of smell, but their vision is limited. Because of their cultural affinity for debating, they have some ability to detect lies. The Vrusk is an insectoid race with a highly-complex society. Most Vrusk work for some mercantile entity and their loyalty to their company is absolute. Due to the extreme complexity of their laws and customs, Vrusk are highly-adept at social interaction. They have a racial ability to comprehend hidden motives and intentions. The Yazirians are tall, slender simians with large, wing-like membranes between their arms and legs that allow them some limited ability to glide. They are an aggressive, warlike race with night vision and the ability to enter into a berserker state in combat. A later effort at introducing a second edition of the game, entitled Zebulon's Guide to Frontier Space (1985), introduced several new races, but no supplements beyond the first book were ever published and the new edition was left abandoned and incomplete.

TSR flirted briefly with the space opera genre in 1993 as part of its Amazing Engine generic game system and the supplement, The Galactos Barrier. However, that experiment was very short-lived and they didn't really get serious until 1998 with the release of Alternity. A whole new suite of PC aliens are introduced in Alternity. These include the Fraal, a race of highly-advanced and peaceful nomads who bear a strong resemblance to the stereotypical aliens of UFO folklore. There is also the Mechalus, a cybernetic race trying hard to make amends for a dark past, the Sesheyans, a non-technological race of stealthy, bat-like humanoids, the T'sa, a technologically-advanced and constantly active reptilian race, and the Weren, a race of huge, lumbering, furry humanoids with a warrior culture and a preference for black-powder weapons. Like Star Frontiers and Amazing Engine, Alternity was a short-lived product line, although a significant number of supplements were published. These include several game settings. The Star Drive campaign setting might be described as the default space opera setting, but a modern sci-fi conspiracy setting called Dark Matter was also released, as were settings based on Gamma World and StarCraft.

Finally, in 2002, Wizards of the Coast released d20 Modern (and d20 Future two years later) and they did something quite interesting. They took all the alien races from Star Frontiers and Alternity and combined them into the new game. It was awesome to see Werens and Dralasites, Sesheyans and Yazirians available together and it was a laudible gesture from WotC to fans of these out-of-print games.

-Rognar-

Centauri ship enters Solar System

NASA has published a photo of an asteroid called P/2010 a2. The asteroid is notable for its unusual comet-like tail which NASA scientists suggest is the result of a high-speed collision. However, looking at the structure of the debris field, I am reminded of something else.

Just think, our first contact may involve a race of decadent, 18th-century European aristocrats with a penchant for orbital bombardment.

-Rognar-

Inspiration Mars

I watched the Inspiration Mars press conference yesterday. Dennis Tito, aerospace engineer, entrepreneur and most famously, world's first space tourist, is spearheading the effort to launch a private manned flyby mission to Mars in 2018. The goal is to take advantage of a favourable planetary alignment to send two humans, one man and one woman, within 100 miles of the Martian surface, then slingshot them back to Earth. The entire mission would take 501 days. The risks involved in this mission cannot be overstated. There will be no abort option. The crew will be subject to cosmic radiation for a prolonged period of time and the re-entry will be, by far, the fastest ever for a manned spacecraft. All of this will be done on a shoestring budget from private donors. Only the Americans would have a hope in Hades of pulling this thing off. I wish them well.

-Rognar-

Skill enhancement feats...do you use them?

In the Pathfinder core rulebook, there are ten feats specifically designed to enhance skills. Of course, the main one is Skill Focus which allows you to pick any one skill and add a +3 bonus (+6 at 10 ranks). Beyond that though, there are nine others which define two semi-related skills and provide a +2 bonus (+4 at 10 ranks) for each. In my experience, the popularity of these feats ranges from lukewarm to "wouldn't-touch-it-with-a-ten-foot-pole". Personally, I find for many of these feats, there is only one of the two skills that I wish to enhance, making Skill Focus the better choice. Below is my hierarchy of these feats:

Feats I might consider taking for most characters: Alertness

Feats I might consider taking if I was playing a rogue or ranger: Deceitful, Deft Hands, Self-Sufficient, Stealthy

Feats I might consider taking if I was playing a sorcerer: Magical Aptitude

Feats I would never consider taking: Acrobatic, Animal Affinity, Athletic

Of these, only Magical Aptitude is really useful enough to be considered a "no-brainer"and only for sorcerers (and maybe bards). The absolute worst one has to be Acrobatic. It enhances the Acrobatics and Fly skills, which are pretty good skills, but has anyone ever played a character that uses both? If you can fly proficiently, why would you ever invest skill points in Acrobatics? Feel free to comment on my rankings. Any skill enhancement feats that you simply can't live without?

-Rognar-

Rippin' on...old school D&D art

The more touchy members of the OSR might get offended, but Zack and Steve are at it again, this time directing their cynical gaze at the early D&D artists like Erol Otus and Jeff Dee. Duck and cover, guys.

D&D art

-Rognar-

Too much fantasy for d100?

Chaosium has just jumped in with both feet in the d100 fantasy battle royale with the pdf release of Magic World (hard copy expected in March). Alongside RuneQuest 6 from The Design Mechanism and Legend from Mongoose (not to mention OpenQuest, which is a nice, little rules-light variant from a nano-publisher called D101 Games), we now have three major versions of the venerable d100 game engine for fantasy role-playing. This is shaping up to be an interesting, if ultimately, self-destructive competition involving a young upstart, a disinterested, second-tier publisher and a creaky old-timer that doesn't know when to hang 'em up. My money is on RQ6, largely because both Mongoose and Chaosium have other priorities (miniatures and Call of Cthulhu, respectively) that drive their release schedules. Still, given the glacial pace at which all three companies release supplements for their respective games, I should have little trouble supporting all of them. Anyway, the three games are so similar, any material published for one can easily be converted to use with another. An embarassment of riches, to be sure.

-Rognar-

The Magic Book (Basic RolePlaying)

Basic RolePlaying is a generic game system. As such, it has a variety of different kinds of supernatural powers, magic, sorcery, mutations, super powers and psychic abilities. They are designed with the idea that multiple types will be used together. For example, a futuristic sci-fi campaign might include both mutations and psychic abilities, while a "kitchen-sink" style campaign might throw everything in there. For a pure fantasy or sword-and-sorcery campaign, however, the magic system is a bit sparse and bland. Fortunately, Chaosium has access to the rich history of RuneQuest and has released The Magic Book, a revised and updated version of the RuneQuest 3rd Ed. magic system for BRP.

The Magic Book contains four integrated magic systems, Spirit Magic, Divine Magic, Wizardry (formerly called Sorcery) and Ritual Magic. Anyone familiar with any version of RuneQuest will be recognize with the first three. Spirit Magic, as the name implies, deals with the Spirit World. Its practitioners are typically called shamans and they communicate with and bind into service various types of spirits including demons, elementals, ghosts, beast spirits and even spirits contained within inanimate objects such as weapons and armour. Not surprisingly, Divine Magic is derived from the power of the gods and includes a lot of spells involving healing, illusions and natural forces. Wizardry derives its power from scholarly study of the universe. It demands greater commitment from its practitioners than other forms of magic, but can become the most powerful. There are a wide variety of spells in Wizardry including many that resemble those of the other types of magic and is the tradition of choice for anyone dedicated to serious sorcerous power.

The last type of magic is Ritual Magic. Rather than being derived from a different source of power, it represents a different way of spell casting that can be practiced by any sort magic-using character. Powerful summoning, enchantment and divination spells typically involve time-consuming magical procedures, called rituals, to cast.

The Magic Book is an excellent supplement to the BRP core rules. Although it could be used along with the magic system already included in the game, The Magic Book provides a self-contained set of rules that are far superior. I suspect most gamemasters will prefer to simply use them in place of those provided in the BGB.

-Rognar-

Book Review: The Prince of Nothing (Series)

I'm not going to go into to much details here other than some of my opinion on the series as the wiki entry for this series is very accurate and quite helpful and I don't really see any reason to repeat it.

The series of three books is all about character development. The central plot is fairly straight forward and most of the book follow a fairly plodding pace. The plot is important but really this book comes down to its characters. The book series has a fairly strong philosophical bent and tons of words are devoted to laying out the various lines of philosophical thought, the nature of the various magics, and probing the nature of human perception. It's some pretty heavy stuff.

What did I think of it? Well, I finished it. I finished it even though I had a copy of the last book of the Wheel of Time series. The Prince of Nothing is not an addictive page turner. With most books I read, I burn through them as fast as I can. I read this series at a very relaxed pace, in one case taking over a week off before I started reading it again. It is pretty easy to put down because the pace is very slow and there is always lots to absorb. The series does lay out a few mysteries that I was very curious about and I had to get to the end to discover the answer.

The first book was VERY hard to get into. Through out the series I found myself not really liking any of the characters. They were interesting but I really didn't give a hoot about whether they lived or died. The two most interesting characters don't show up until the second half of book one making the first half a real pain to get through. It is all world building and character development.

Don't get me wrong, there is lots of interesting stuff here. The world has a very 12th century Mediteranean  feel to it. A Crusade is being called and the Byzantine Emperor is both scheming with and against his European associates. There is lots of political jockeying and it isn't until the arrival of the "Prince" that the story really gets underway. A Jesus Christ like prophet figure even gets thrown into the mix. The battles are great and well written but the real conflicts here are all interpersonal.

The series doesn't have a full end. Like real world events, the story never stops and this tale is no different. At the Climax of the series, the Prince of Nothing reveals his true motivation, makes an important decision and a large battle is fought.  There are hints about what events are likely to follow but the book simply ends without tying up many issues. I wasn't surprised to learn that the author is writing a second series that takes place 20 years in the future. The Second Apocalypse is coming after all.

The Spider God's Bride (for Legend)

Morten Braten's The Spider God's Bride is a compilation of sword-and-sorcery mini-adventures for the Mongoose Legend role-playing game. Originally released as The Spider God's Bride and Other Tales of Sword and Sorcery for the d20 system, the new edition is available as a pdf (and presumably POD). It starts out with an explanation of the tropes associated with the sword-and-sorcery genre, noting in particular, how it differs from the high fantasy genre more typically associated with fantasy role-playing games. Next there are sections on player races (all various humans), magic and cults. There is only one type of magic in The Spider God's Bride (sorcery, of course) and in keeping with the style of sword-and-sorcery, the use of magic is subtle, sinister and self-destructive. Although players are allowed to employ sorcery, they must always be on guard to avoid becoming too tainted by it. Also, many spells we associate with fantasy rpgs are not permitted, although this restriction is probably more noticeable in the d20 version since sorcery in MRQII/Legend/RuneQuest 6 tends to be similar to sword-and-sorcery type magic anyway.

The adventures themselves are quite good, though some appear very challenging and potentially quite lethal if the players aren't extremely clever and at least a little bit lucky. All the tropes you would expect from a work inspired by Robert E. Howard and Clark Ashton Smith are present in abundance, palace intrigue, snake-worshipping cultists, ancient tombs and steaming jungles. There are muscle-bound barbarians and seductive sorceresses, and naked steel awaits in every alleyway. All of this takes place against the backdrop of the world of Xoth, the author's own campaign world. Additional information, including a map (unfortunately not provided in The Spider God's Bride) may be found on xoth.net. This additional online content greatly enhances the published material, allowing for more sandbox play.  I hope two later d20 Xoth products, Song of the Beast-Gods and The Citadel Beyond the North Wind will also be released in the future as Legend publications.

-Rognar-

Rippin' on....adventure hooks

Something different from the guys this week, Steve's Adventure Toolkit: Wicked Encounter Generator. I'd really describe it as a random generator of encounters and adventure hooks and it's awesome. My favourite so far:

A mother is afraid her son has been eaten by a giant toad, but the giant toad is actually protecting the child from his emotionally abusive stepfather.

-Rognar-

Dragon Age on TableTop

I've always wanted to watch a group of top tier players run a tabletop rpg, to see how a game goes when it's not being played by a bunch of average nerds like us. So I anxiously watched last night's episode of TableTop on geekandsundry.com because instead of playing a card or board game as they usually do, Wil Wheaton and his friends were playing Dragon Age by Green Ronin. A group of professional actors and the DM was the game designer, himself. I was expecting flourishes of Shakespeare-inspired role-playing and a rapier-sharp repartee between the players and DM. Imagine my dismay when instead I got to watch a bunch of dudes playing a game pretty much just like we do. The DM was just another doughy, bearded geek trying to keep a group of jackasses focused on the game. One guy created a wizard who was modelled on "The Fonz" from the 70s sitcom, Happy Days, while another one created an elvish rogue who spent most of the game smelling things. Obviously, they were playing it up for laughs and there were a few moments of humour, but I guess if I'm ever going to see the superstars play, I'm going to have get myself to GenCon.

-Rognar-

Rippin' on...Nightbane

After wasting everyone's time with another look at Street Fighter (what is it with that obscure game that fascinates them so much?), Zack and Steve are back with the funny. No company is a more inviting target for ridicule than Palladium, hence:

Nightbane

-Rognar-

Gygax Magazine - Holy Shipping Costs, Batman!

I have a few rules I live by, I don't vote for any candidate just because he or she seems like someone who would be fun to have a drink with, I don't eat invertebrates and I don't buy anything which costs less than the shipping. With this in mind, I was quite excited about the release of Gygax Magazine this month. With some pretty high profile contributors like Cory Doctorow, James Ward, Rich Burlew and Lenard Lakofka, it looks to bring back the glory of the old Dragon Magazine. I dutifully started my online order for the first year of the new magazine...$35 for four issues, ok!...shipping to Canada, $49.40, yikes! It would be cheaper to get a PO Box in Great Falls, MT and take a drive down every three months. Sorry folks, that works out to over $21 per issue, too steep for me.

-Rognar-

Update: There may be hope yet for international customers. Gygax Magazine is offering to hold, free of charge, a copy of the first issue for each international customer while they explore other options for shipping. If they can find a way to get the per issue shipping cost down to about $5 or less, I'm subscribing.

Movie Review: Hansel & Gretel: Witch Hunters

So a bit of a warning first: I don't get out much. It was our seventh wedding anniversary  We had the baby sitter lined up and everything was a go. My wife wanted to do dinner and a movie since we had a hard remembering the last time we went out and did both. We looked at what's available and we both met up with a list of movies that we wanted to see.

My wife looked at my list (containing such films as the Hobbit and Skyfall) and said : NO. So I looked at hers. She's got the hots for Jason Statham so we considered going to Parker until my wife learned that Jennifer Lopez was in the movie and since she hates Jennifer Lopez so that was out.

Next on the list was Hansel & Gretel. It had almost universally terrible reviews but it was R rated which suggested there might be nudity to go along with the violence and there wasn't anything else we could agree upon. So with that background in mind we went to the theatre with very low expectations.

We saw it in the new UltraAVX theatre which is a fancy trick to get you to part with an extra 2 dollars on top of the already $3 3D fee. The screen is big, the sound loud and you get to pre pick your seats which I guess is a nice perk. Oh, and the seats were leather, recline, and the aisles were wider then a normal theatre (so you can recline without being in the person behind you's lap). Actually maybe it was worth the $2 after all.

The movie itself was dumb but fun. Aside from the obviously prochronistic weapons, the movie was pretty internally consistent. Sure it was also predictible in many spots but at least the movie winks at the cliches and just keeps going. The action is pretty good. The sets were probably the best thing about this movie. This film really nailed the whole Grim fairy tale feeling. They make use of the 3D a few times but it wasn't anything awesome. I'm still not sold on 3D in most movies. The film tries to have a sense of humor and most of its jokes hit home although there wasn't anything that had me ROFL.

There is lots of violence and gore, much of it over the top graphic although it could have been worse. The troll scene is played for laughs and worked quite well. My wife seemed to think it was among the funniest in the movie. There wasn't much in terms of sex. For the guys, you get a very brief boob shot and Gemma Arterton can really rock a pair of leather pants. For the ladies, Jeremy Renner strips down but my wife thought he needed to spend more time in the gym (bare chest).

So overall it was a fun movie with a nice D&D vibe to it.  You will enjoy the movie if you go in with low expectations and can turn your brain off for the 110 minute run time. We don't get out much so just about any night out is automatically really good.

Final mea culpa from Wizards of the Coast

It is hard to miss the news that Wizards of the Coast is once again allowing the sale of pdfs for older editions of D&D. Good for them. It never made much sense to remove the older editions from circulation. The move certainly didn't help D&D 4e, it generated a lot of ill will towards the company and cost them a modest, but still significant revenue stream. This represents the culmination of the Great Wizards of the Coast Apology tour that began with the reprint of the original AD&D core books. I can't say any of this really matters to me. I am probably never going back to old-school D&D unless age catches up with me and, in my dotage, I am rendered intellectually incapable of handling rules-heavy games like Pathfinder or RuneQuest. Nonetheless, I applaud WotC for coming to its senses.

Oh, and if you don't mind, how about a reprint of the Rules Cyclopedia, you know, just in case.

-Rognar-

Update: DrivethruRPG is overloaded right now. I wonder why.