Dragon Age Redemption to Debut on October 11th

Posted in Gaming News, Video Games with tags , , , , on September 27, 2011 by boccobsblog

Felicia Day, Queen of Kingdom Geek, announced to her loyal subjects that her long-awaited web series based on the Dragon Age world will debut on October 11th to coincide with release of Mark of the Assassin (which is new down-loadable content for Dragon Age 2).

On her Facebook page today she stated

Some articles are coming out today on Dragon Age Redemption/DLC Mark of the Assassin! […]

And the web series premieres on October 11th on Machinima’s YouTube channel! Same day as Mark of the Assassin DLC 🙂

Here is the link to the article she is referring to: LINK

Here is a link to our article about Dragon Age Redemption: LINK

This web series will be EPIC!

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Planning a Challenging Encounter

Posted in Dungeons and Dragons, Pathfinder with tags , on September 26, 2011 by boccobsblog

The following are tips on planning a challenging encounter for your D&D or Pathfinder game. Some of the ideas may seem like common sense, but you’d be surprised how many DMs (myself included) forget to work them in.

In no real order:

Wide open spaces

I no that a 20 x 20 room sounds large, but that is only sixteen squares in which to move, flank, run, tumble, fly, etc. Realistic architecture be damned, make your encounter area large enough for people to spread out and manuever.

Impede direct movement

Don’t place your archwizard bad guy in the middle of the room with a clear path for the melee characters to charge on their first round. Put that bad boy up out of reach. Make players work a few rounds before they get the satisfaction of shanking your evil caster.

Multiple Opponents

I know you want to use all your CR on the main baddie. But in most cases one enemy versus a party will end quickly and badly for your arch villain. Though some monsters can solo a party better than others, dragons, constructs, and elemental for example, but most times you will want multiple creatures. Players tend to fall back on tired out party tropes, tank, heal, stack on the spell damage. Shake things up, make the players scared.

If you use one monster it is easy for them to slip into old routines, but if you have multiple creature all hell breaks loose. The wizard is running for her life and can’t drop bombs, the cleric is unable to heal the wizard, the fighter is too busy to tank…you get my point.

Play around with an encounter calculator, you can often times add some weenies to the encounter without changing the CR. Use these minions to harass the spell casters (see below), provide flanking to your real threats, or simply impede the characters movement.

Mix combat styles

You don’t have to have all melee combats. Think of your encounter in terms of an adventuring party. Do you have ranged combat? Do you have a caster? Do you have healing? Do you have a tank?

Healing

Why is it the players have a healer and carry potion and healing devices but every bad guys in every printed module seems to be unaware that there are curative magics in the D&D multiverse? Throw a cleric in that encounter, stock your baddies with healing potions and actually use them.

Harass spellcasters

Left unthreatened a wizard with metamagic feats will nuke your best laid plans. Plan for this when you write your encounter, how can you put the fear of Orcus into those robe-wearing Nancys?

Run a simulation

Keep copies of your players’ sheets (at least the important parts, to hit, dmg, hps, AC, etc). Run your encounter ahead of time and test it out. See where you can shore up any glaring weaknesses you find. You know how your players think, what will they do and how can surprise them?

It isn’t about slaughtering your players, but it is about making sure that everyone (including yourself) has a good time. The players will feel like they earned their treasure. Shake things up. Disrupt their plans. Be unpredictable.

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An Introduction to the Sandbox

Posted in Dungeons and Dragons with tags , on September 23, 2011 by boccobsblog

The sandbox style of gaming gives your players greater agency over the world. Sometimes players feel like they are riding a train through their campaign with the DM as conductor. They feel powerless, which is sad, because we play RPG’s to feel powerful and to escape a world we feel unable to control.

I will be the first to admit that the sandbox style of gaming is more work upfront for the DM. You need have every angle covered in case your players go there, unlike a normal rail-style campaign were you know the players are going to the vampire’s castle and that is where you can focus your scheming for the week.

Here are a few tips for creating your first sandbox:

Don’t Scale Encounters

The idea of the sandbox is that players may get in over their head and be forced to run for their lives. I’m not saying but a dragon in the area next to the starting town, but don’t be afraid to place higher CR encounters in your area than you normally would. There should be a real sense of danger in the sandbox, the players should know that they run a real risk of death if they’re not careful.

Don’t Scale Treasure

This goes along with the last rule, if your players decide to take a big risk and attempt a challenge that is over their head, they should be rewarded with great treasure. Also, the sandbox is about going out into the wilds and the ruins and the dungeons, there won’t (shouldn’t be a lot of places to spend coin, so increase the items and decrease the coinage when rolling up your treasure)

Don’t Plan Every Hex

There shouldn’t be a monster every step of the way in your sand box, reason being, that isn’t a believable ecosystem and it will make travel sluggish and tedious. Try making encounter tables or use the existing ones in the DMG.

Not Too Small, Not Too Big

If you make your sandbox too small your players will explore it in no time, but if you make it too big you as the DM will have to plan for a million years to plot it all out.

I think every DM should try to run at least one sandbox. It stills allows you to flex your creative muscle but it also has a different feel to a standard game. In a rail style game the DM is seen as an adversary that the players must work against, while in the sandbox the DM takes on a new role entirely. The players choose their own path and this allows the DM to shrug some of the responsibility and just enjoy the ride. I find myself cheering for the players as they fight and I don’t feel like I have to win a battle. I have no investment in the npcs and monsters that I might feel in a rail-style campaign (I have read article by other DM that feel the same way, so I know I’m not alone on this).

Below are two links to other sand boxes, the first being the blog, ars ludi, where the author walks you through his sandbox campaign. The second link leads to Gabe’s (from Penny Arcade) sandbox game inspired by the West March campaign.

West Marches

Gabe’s Sandbox

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Wizard’s to Resume Miniature Sales

Posted in Dungeons and Dragons with tags , on September 22, 2011 by boccobsblog

Wizard’s of the Coast announced at this year’s Gen COn that they would resume the production of miniature for a new skirmish board game. Rodney Thompson from Wizard’s said, “we are planning to release themed sets of miniatures in the future; accompanying these minis will be new skirmish rules that we are pleased to offer now for playtesting.”

If you want to learn more, visit this link to visit the article on Wizards.com.

I only hope that “themed sets” means, orcs, drow, goblins, etc., and not factions. Themed sets would sell like crazy. No more having to buy thirty packs in the hopes of getting enough orc miniatures to run an encounter.

 

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Mordenkainen’s Magnificent Emporium

Posted in D&D 4e Content, Dungeons and Dragons with tags , , on September 20, 2011 by boccobsblog

pic via Wizard's.com

Mordenkainen’s Magnificent Emporium drops today from Wizard’s of the Coast. According to their website:

Welcome to Mordenkainen’s Magnificent Emporium, a wondrous collection of magic items—each one with a story to tell. This tome provides Dungeon Masters with a ready assortment of treasures to tempt greedy players, along with historical nuggets and alluring adventure hooks that set these items apart from your run-of-the-mill flaming sword or bag of holding. This book adds rich flavor to the treasures and trinkets presented within, and a dash of inspiration for Dungeon Masters looking to liven up a monster’s trove. Hold on to your magic hats—everything must go!

This 160 page D&D 4e product sells for 29.95

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Madness at Gardmore Abbey Boxed Set

Posted in D&D 4e Content, Dungeons and Dragons, Gaming News, Product Review with tags , on September 19, 2011 by boccobsblog

pic via Wizards.com

Tomorrow Wizards will release Madness at Gardmore Abbey. According to the Wizards website:

This deluxe adventure takes heroes into the ruins of Gardmore Abbey, a monastery that was once the base of a militant order of paladins devoted to Bahamut. According to legend, the paladins brought a dark artifact back from a far crusade and stored it in their abbey for safekeeping, and evil forces gathered to assault the abbey and take it back. What the legends don’t tell is that this artifact was actually the Deck of Many Things, a force of pure Chaos.

This adventure brings characters into the extensive dungeons beneath the ruins—dungeons that are warped and twisted with the raw forces of Chaos surrounding the cards of the deck.

I am glad to see that boxed sets are making a comeback. While I personally prefer 3.5e. I do miss the box sets from second edition. You really felt like you were getting your money’s worth because along with the books, you got poster maps, handouts, code wheels, 3d cardboard terrain, etc.

Another awesome aspect of this adventure is that it comes with a deck of many things. While this artifact has ended or destroyed more campaigns than it’s helped, it is still an icon of D&D.

This boxed set comes with a bunch of cool stuff:

  • Four 32-page books that present the adventure location of Gardmore Abbey, new monsters, enemies and allies, quests, and encounters.
  • Two double-sided battle maps depicting dramatic locations in the adventure.
  • A die-cut card stock sheet of monster tokens.
  • A die-cut card stock sheet of dungeon tiles.
  • A deck of 24 cards — 22 cards presenting the Deck of Many Things plus 2 Treasure Cards.

 

The adventure begins tomorrow and will retail for 39.99USD

Example of the DoMT artwork:

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A Good Back Story Should Create Options, Not Extra Work

Posted in Dungeons and Dragons with tags , on September 16, 2011 by boccobsblog

A good back story is an amazing thing. It helps a player feel a greater connection to his/her character and make writing adventures easier for the DM. A bad back story on the other hand, creates work for the Dm and infringes on his/her story arc. Keep your character’s past in the past, and don’t let it affect the present; leave that option to the DM.

I remember a game I played in a few years back. One of the other characters had a very detailed back story for his character, and it was clear that he’d worked really hard on it. The only problem was that it detailed a kingdom and massive political group that didn’t exist in the DM’s game world. The player had created a powerful story that had nothing to do with the campaign we were about to embark on.

So how does a player create a back story that is detailed and exciting and fits with the campaign? Here are some tips:

Learn about your GM’s game world.

GM’s spend a lot of time detailing the world that you play in and often times that level of detail seems to get overlooked by some players. See if there are new or different twists that your GM uses in his/her system and write your background to include some of those unique elements.

Mention interesting characters or family members

If you mention a run in you had with a crime boss, or that your character has a planes-traveling uncle with a penchant for mischief, for example that gives your GM great fodder for side quests.

Lost family treasure

Maybe the character’s family treasure was taken by a marauding band of barbarians or a dragon. The ideas create possible places to take your character without infringing on the present.

Inheritance

Maybe they character inherited a broken sword, or a mysterious arcane object. These may not be more than family gossip and worthless, but they may give your DM a place to go if his idea well runs low.

 


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GURPS Wizard 3: Versatility with Only Small Headaches

Posted in GURPS with tags , on September 14, 2011 by boccobsblog

The Green Lantern pays only 20% cost for his abilities, because they are limited to a unique ring and he has to wear that stupid-ass costume.

If anyone in your group is a comic book fan, they’ll probably attempt to sway your GURPS group to some sort of superhero campaign. Let me just make one thing perfectly clear: I am not a fan of this genre. To me, the Marvel and DC universes are like some giant game of 4th edition DnD with 6,000 DM’s all fighting for control.

Humbuggery aside, GURPS is a system that can struggle with this kind of game. Supers tend to have a dizzying array of powers all based around a theme, and often come up with creative uses on the fly to cope with specific situations. GURPS, with its heavy emphasis on buying specific effects, can be frustrating. Remember when Superman flew around the Earth so fast he reversed time? Well you better have paid for “Jumper: Time” since the beginning, bucko. Green Lantern? Better sharpen a few pencils.

GURPS: Powers attempts to fix this with a few new advantages aimed at versatility, namely Create and Control. They are unusable. Let’s say I want to make a guy that can make fire. I can buy Create: Fire at 10 pts a level. Ok, how MUCH fire does that let me create? According to the rules, energy “appears in a quantity sufficient to do 1,000 x (level squared) kJ of useful work.” It also stipulates that “The GM should limit power output to 15 kW or so.”

What?

Control is just as baffling. Before the physics student can figure out how many kilojoules are necessary for  your Magneto-clone PC to throw a Buick Skylark, he chucks his purple helmet in the trash and goes home.

The solution our group came up with involved Modular Abilities, an advantage described in the basic set and expanded upon in Powers. Basically, modular abilities allow you to put points into a floating pool, allocating them as you see fit when the need arises. This, combined with some thematic limitations, creates something your PC’s can work with without the need for a graphing calculator. Now, the Fire guy can sink his modular points into various forms of Innate Attack (burning) when he needs to lay down the pain in some specific  fashion, but he can still come up with bizarre uses  at his whim.

This also helps with handling small abilities that you can’t really find a fit for. Maybe the guy who controls water wants to use a little jet to push a key out of a keyhole. He says “I have 50 points in modular abilities. Mind Control is 50 points. Surely “Push Key” is worth somewhere below that.”

The system is not perfect. It still requires the player to do a lot of paperwork, and buying modular abilities at high levels (particularly when the player abuses limitations to reduce the cost), can get downright cheesy. But at least you don’t have to look up what a kilowatt is.

-Dave (the GURPS Wizards)

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Puzzles in Place of Skills Checks

Posted in Dungeons and Dragons, The Crafty DM with tags , , , , , , on September 12, 2011 by boccobsblog

Here are a few ideas to use in your game to replace standard dexterity and intelligence challenges. Those are really the only skills that can be taken into the real world. Handing your player a steel bar and telling them to bend it will be amusing, but result in certain failure for your player, unless you game with the Hulk. Likewise injecting your players with Anthrax as a means of switching up boring old Constitution checks will result in a decrease in players in your area.

Jenga

This wooden puzzle would work great as a dexterity challenge. In place of rolling a dex check or using a dex-based skill (like open lock, balance, etc) you could have your player(s) pull blocks and set the difficulty in number of blocks removed as opposed to a simple DC/roll. The problem with this method is that Glinfor the elvish ranger has a 17 dex while, Joe the gamer does not. But it could be fun and present a new challenge at the table.

Tilt Puzzles

Remember those little plastic tilt games with silver balls inside them? They would also serve as an excellent replacement for a dexterity challenge. The tech-savor GM could use a tilt game on his/her smart phone also.

Sudoku

A Sudoku puzzle makes a perfect mental challenge. In a past game I used a Sudoku puzzle on a pc that wanted to read the mind of a person trained to resist mental probing. Rather than adding a couple of points to the DC of the roll, I gave the player a Sudoku puzzle to simulate the mental struggle and shifted the focus to another player to allow the mentalist time to work. It was a neat trick, but again you run into the problem of player skill vs. character skill, though with mental challenges you always draw on player knowledge so it isn’t as glaring. (For example, your wizard has a 24 int, that isn’t helping you solve that riddle). Sudoku comes in varying difficulties so they require little adaptation.

Mazes

A printable maze serves as another physical representation of a mental challenge. They also work great as an alternate to rolling an int check when under the effects of a Maze spell. They can be found easily on the web in varying levels of difficulty. A maze may also work in place of a saving throw for mind-affecting spells or after a player has failed a spell and that die roll will prevent him/her from finishing the encounter.

Hopefully this gives you some ideas for changing things up at the game table and giving your visual and tactile players something to do. Using them all the time will get tedious and lose effect, but trying it once a campaign will be sure to impress your players. Remember, as the DM you’re the entertainer and you have to keep your act fresh to ensure your audience is having a good time and keeps coming back to drink your Dew and eat your Doritos.

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Thundercats D&D

Posted in D&D 3.5, Dungeons and Dragons, Pathfinder with tags , , , , , , , , on September 9, 2011 by boccobsblog

Those of us that lived through the 80’s, the Thundercats were an inescapable pop culture phenomena. That said, the Cartoon Network is having success with the show’s latest incarnation that runs on Friday evenings. I have watched a few episodes and it is pretty good. The new version is a retelling with a younger Lion-O, but the essence of the old show is preserved.

That said I thought it would be fun write a post that would give you ideas for running your own Thundercats D&D, d20, or Pathfinder campaign.

In no special order:

No Human/Demihuman Races

The fun of the Thundercats is that there were no humans and that image of a world populated by anthropomorphic animals was something different and alien. (To my knowledge, Mumm-Ra was the only Human on Third Earth) Use only anthro-animal races like Gnolls, Lizardmen, catfolk, etc.

Medium Magic

Remove classes that prepare spells in advance, such as wizard and cleric, and allow only spontaneous casters like sorcerers and favored souls. This is slightly lower the magic level of the world by limiting the number of spells your players will have access to, but most importantly it will better fit the theme of primal forces and innate power.

Dealing with Tech

The new series sets up technology as something that the Thundercats don’t use or really understand. This approach will help to highlight the nature/tech dichotomy of the show, and make your life easier as a DM. Tech should be as obscure to your characters as ancient artifacts are to your players.

If you get too liberal with the Tech, you wont be playing a fantasy game any more. If you add too much, it will cease to be powerful and mystical. Besides tech is the weapon of Mumm-Ra and his forces, if you give your players too much tech, it will blur the lines between the nature/tech struggle at the heart of the series.

I would use the futuristic weapons listed in the DMG page 146 to outfit Mumm-Ra’s goons. A Thundrillium shortage could explain away every single soldier doesn’t carry a rifle.

Thundercats

You can simply use the catfolk from the Races of the Wild book, or use the following subspecies to give your world more definition. These variations follow the catfolk entry, expect as noted. I made each of these the same size, even though wild cats vary greatly in size : Cheetah 140 lbs., tigers 675 lbs., lions 550 lbs. (thanks Wikipedia!)

Lion- +2 Str, +2 Dex, +2 Chr, Size: medium, Favored Class: Fighter

Noble and strong, the lionfolk are the rulers of Thundera.

Tiger- +4 Str, +2 Dex, Size Medium, Favored Class, Ranger

Solitary and brooding, tigerfolk are stronger than lions, but do not work well in a groups, preferring to work alone.

Cheetah- +4 Dex, Size medium, Favored Class: Scout, Bonus Feats: Improved Initiative,  Dash[1]

The fastest of the Thundercats, the cheetahfolk aren’t as strong as their brothers.

Sabertooth- +6 Str, -2 Chr, Size medium, Favored Class: Barbarian, Bonus Feat: Toughness

Savage and feral, the Sabertoothfolk are the strongest of the Thundercats, but the hardest to lead.

These are just a few of the possibilities. I thought of doing other types, Panthers for example, but it is hard to make them mechanically different from tigers.

Sword of Omens (minor artifact)

This version is based on the new series. The original sword had about 126 powers and would be impossible to duplicate.

The Sword of Omens is a +5 thundering bastard sword. The sword has the following abilities:

Size Variation- As a standard action the wielder may change the size of the sword to any one of the following: dagger, short sword, longsword, bastard sword. Regardless of the weapon’s size it retains all its properties.

Call of the Pride- As a standard action the wielder can produce the symbol of his clan in the air. The symbol is visible to clan members regardless of distance of visibility.

Sight Beyond Sight- Once per day, as a standard action the wielder may use Clairaudience/Clairvoyance as per the spell. Caster level 20th.

Claw Shield

The claw shield is a leather glove reinforced with steel strips. It acts as a buckler, and thanks to its steel claws, can act as a slashing weapon as well. Because of its strange nature, the claw shield is an exotic weapon. (DM’s could consider giving Thundercats this proficiency as a bonus racial feat)

Claw Shield   30gp   1d6 dmg   x2 crit   2lbs.   slashing   armor bonus 1   armor check penalty -2   10% arcane spell failure

The shield claw cannot be used to perform a shield bash, and the user cannot wield a weapon in their claw hand as the claws are fixed. The shield claw is considered a light weapon. Claw shields can be adapted to sheath small blades.

Hopefully this will give you a starting point to work from. If you enjoyed this post and would like to see more like it, let me know. Next time I could stat out Mumm-Ra and create a Thundertank.

[1] Complete Warrior

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