Without naming names or giving disrespect to anyone, I can’t stand most D&D blogs lately. There are a handful of great ones, many of them I have in my links section, and definitely a few I know I’m forgetting or didn’t link to for the aesthetic purposes of my footer. However the echo chamber that is the D&D blogging community is something I just can’t fall in line with anymore. Posts full of charts and graphs about combat speed, placid vanilla content (ex: 5 new species of dire squirrels), blatant ‘sponsored by’ tweets or posts, the endless debate of the action economy or any other extremely granular diatribe about things easily fixed with a house rule or a shrug of the shoulders – are all things I could honestly care to never read again.

The community has long been influencing what I feel I should write about or how I should express myself in relation to my favorite game. I’m done with that. I don’t mind if I come off like some kind of D&D iconoclast to be perfectly honest, not that it’s what I’m aiming for. I’m not sure why the hell I’ve been trying to follow along so much with blogging, it’s not like I’m going to win some internet popularity contest and it sure as hell doesn’t put food on my table. I’ve always had trouble fitting in, even within niche gatherings and I’ve always just attributed it to thinking that perhaps I’m just a horrible person, but I know that’s not the case. I’m floundering to fall back into the right groove, and it’s a hard pill to swallow.

What I’m trying to say is that while I loved my time in the limelight from Revenge of the Iron Lich, and I’ve written my fair share of decent blog posts about the this and that’s of D&D, I’m no longer going to feel obligated to just follow the crowd. I have so many half-written blog posts in the can here that I’m either afraid to publish, or just unmotivated to do so because I’d just be chiming in on another subject that resembles a horse with 0 hit points. Do I feel some strange obligation to write about these things? Yes, and that’s exactly what I’m trying to shake off. Am I saying I won’t write about them at all? No.

Not only for these reasons do I feel its time for my writing to change, but I want this blog to have purpose, to give me a voice. I want to be more professional and less “me too”. I’m never going to tell people how they should play their game. I want to just be open and honest while refraining from abrasiveness, instead of sanitizing myself for fear of what people might think of my raw opinions on something. I don’t claim to be a genius of any sorts, my blog posts often pose more questions than answers and I’m okay with that. I hope you are too.

My Cliched Backstory, Minus Dead Parents and Heroics

I’m not a typical geek I suppose. From what I’ve gathered recently, I’ve come to the conclusion that I’m only about 50% geek, the rest of me is… whatever. Did I grow up on D&D, computers, video games, and 80′s cartoons? Hell yes! But I still don’t know (or care) what a TARDIS is, or even remotely care about whatever ubiquitous geek celebrity is whoring themselves out for this week.  Not at all. I’ve never watched any Star Trek, Monty Python, Buffy, Firefly…the list goes on. The mere sight of Anime in any form causes blood to seep from my pores in a blind rage. I could go on but you get the idea, I’m a grumpy, narrow-minded, piss poor nerd who doesn’t know every cool inside joke or secret handshake in the geek community. And I don’t care.

However for all of these things that I lack in the nerd department I fill in with other annoying yet equally passionate aspects from my life – music, movies, parenting, paintball, the horror genre, and computer nerd fixations. I could talk for hours on end about any of those topics, just not here. For these reasons sometimes I feel like an outcast in our community at times, I know it’s not a big deal but it feels like it more often than not. I’ll admit it – I want to fit in. I want to become popular and successful in some capacity in this community, who doesn’t? I just want accomplish these goals by doing my own thing now.

Our Community Has Dark Alleys Too

Speaking of popular and successful, I’m lucky to be friends with so many of you out there in our community who are both of those things. I won’t turn this post into name-drop-a-thon 2012, but you all know who you are. Some of you in particular have really turned into steadfast friends I consider among the very best a guy could have. I look forward to any time I get to hang out with people from our community, and yearn for those times again immediately after they’ve passed.

What bugs me about this community we are in though, is that these extremely talented  and successful people are at times the victims of complete and utter bullshit. I’m going to be very candid (yet tactful) from here on out and may even call people out on said shenanigans. The RPG “industry” is in fact very small. There is an extremely fine line that separates ‘fan’ or ‘gamer’ from ‘game designer’ or ‘industry pro’. Treating people like mud under your boot and then washing your hands of them like nothing ever happened, or unabashedly using them for said talents, only to speak to them when you need something is odious and deplorable. Yet I’ve seen things like this happen all too often in my 2 years here, aren’t we supposed to unite together in our common interest? Isn’t that the whole point of our community? These things can’t go unnoticed for long. I can’t stand to see talented folks have their work taken for granted because some egomaniac wants to make a few extra bucks or page hits.

Losing My Niche and Finding It Again

I can’t wholly latch on to one thing that defines my blog like others can. I can’t just write about props, or encounters, or monsters, killer adventures, or gender debates. I’d love to have some kind of defining crest placed upon my blogger head but my interests are very wide in breadth, and at times quite shallow in depth. I think variety is the spice of life, jack of all trades master of none, you get the idea. Perhaps I could call myself a master in a few areas, but not many. I suppose my niche isn’t a niche at all, maybe I have some gonzo style I can’t avoid honing in on one thing. Writers ADD? Maybe some day I’ll fall into a more focused niche. I’m not entirely sure. Though I can tell you what I’d like to be doing.

I’d like to be blogging about some form of D&D that I’m actually playing, which I can’t right now. That will change soon enough though. I’d like to be blogging about the latest Legends & Lore article with honesty and candid thoughts on whatever it is without fear of being ostracized by other bloggers or worry about stepping on someone’s toes. I’d like to be regularly publishing content like adventures, a book of monsters or traps, or even a campaign world. I’d like to get into doing full publications – I feel that the time frame on projects like those really allow me to hone my work into something more focused and conclusive, instead of feeling obligated to blog X amount of times per week. I’d really like to becoming part of a 3rd party press setup that puts out quality gaming materials. My one page dungeon is a good example, it was hard for me to truncate myself but it really opened my eyes to something I truly love. I hope you enjoyed it too.

A Bloodstained  Map and Apologies

I hope to accomplish all of these goals. And while I’m not sure if this post does anything for anyone but me, I felt the extreme need to write it. I realize there is some juxtaposition in what I’m trying to say here but, just know that I’m trying to change and focus my efforts toward bigger and better things. I yearn for rational D&D discussion and common ground once again, I could go back to writing about 4e but I’d really prefer not to. I hope that doesn’t upset my readers but I can’t find fun in things I can no longer put my heart into. And we should all be writing to enjoy it, right? I don’t mean to step on toes either, if you write blog posts full of graphs or ‘topic of the week’ matters, etc –  I have nothing against you, and I truly hope you are enjoying your writing. It’s just not something that really appeals to me right now, I didn’t write this post to discredit anyone’s hard work or passion by any means.

To wrap up I just want to say that I hope this post makes some semblance of sense, and thanks for reading if you’ve made it this far. Obviously I could use some input here so if you have any questions, comments, or thoughts please leave them below. If they are of a more personal nature you can always email me. Thanks again, and stay tuned.

Recently on Haste I got up on a soapbox about healing surges after the onslaught of discussion last week. Skip to 9:10 of this exquisite podcast so we can start this blog post off on the same page. Go ahead, I’ll wait. Back now? Okay good, let me clarify a few things here:

• My game of thrones reference was of course, an extreme exception to the norm. I”m very aware that people can die from sneezing within the lands of Westeros.
• I’m not for or against healing surges at this point,  and I do think they definitely change the way the entire game feels on a very fundamental level.
• As Micah said, both ends of the spectrum sound like fun games, although very different ones.
• I believe the abstraction of healing surges is a blessing and a curse, as with most abstraction in D&D. But the word “healing” has many implications across gamer spectrum.
• I won’t be touching on if it is the Cleric’s job to heal, or anyone elses for that matter. I won’t jump into that bloodbath today.

Let’s Just Call Them Surges

What if it were implied that surges just in fact gave a surge of something not to be named. We’re sticking to abstraction here, right? A surge of courage, energy, bravado, luck, knowledge…you get the picture. Why not use surges identically as previously but imply that they could be many things, that they can be traded in for a burst of HP, but perhaps not always. Or perhaps these things have different options depending on your race, or class? What about race / class combos? For instance if you’re a dwarf, and a martial class you can spend a ‘surge’ to do a one-two punch of extra damage on your next swing, or shake off a condition?

I think there’s a lot that can be done with surges to extrapolate on their ‘healing’ capabilities while still allowing for a bit of simulationism that is more varied, not to mention it may drive that ‘magical healing’ visual from the heads of some very grumpy grognards.

The Beauty of Modularity

I’m sure that there are in fact far more than two options for healing when it comes to D&D Next. What I’m examining here are the two obvious choices: Healing Surges, or more traditional healing as done throughout the history of the game. Both have their strong points, both have their quirks.

The real question for me here is, can both of these things fit into the same game? I can see different modules working wonders for combat situations, xp, and a ton of other stuff. Though healing is perhaps a mechanic buried so deeply within the plinth of the game that there can be only one option without mucking everything else up entirely? I think maybe it is, and I also don’t think it’s going to be one of those things where one character has them and another doesn’t, to me this seems like an issue that will need to be determined by the DM for their game prior to character creation.

Call Me Stupid

Maybe I’m dead wrong, I’m no game designer that’s for sure. I mean,  I could see actually see the above situation being possible, but not with much ease of use in an at-the-table situation. People want streamlining, they want their games to run fast without consulting charts or busting out calculators during play. That’s one thing I think most modern game designers can agree on, is that things just aren’t what they used to be. The world itself has changed immensely from the 70′s and 80′s when D&D was in its heyday. As much as we don’t think our everyday lives full of surfing the internet and GPS’s on our phones may affect our outlook on how we spend our free time playing elf games – it does. We’ve been socially re-wired. What used to work then, doesn’t always work now.

There is much to be said for old school mentalities on D&D, and much to be appreciated. I’m not knocking it, so don’t get me wrong. You can call me a dullard if you want but I’m not too fond of the thought of remembering 2 or 3 sets of healing rules and how to adjust it all on the fly during combat for different players. Bumbling through 2d12 charts or conversion tables to properly simulate a fart in the wind isn’t my idea of fun. I don’t think I’m alone here.

I have defeated procrastination and placed his dreary head onto a trident! That’s right! I’ve had one hell of a time editing my words down into 3 columns of 9pt font, and refused to partake in the lure of Tribes Vengeance long enough to have finally succeeded in creating a one page dungeon for this year’s contest!

It’s been really hard to push myself to get through this because I’m in the midst of buying my first home, not to mention the real world seems to have the chaos pedal pushed to the floor this month. Another pitfall has been that I’m normally quite verbose when it comes to writing, so paring down the word count here was one hell of an exercise. It was a good one though, I’ll be sure to write more about that actual process soon on my personal blog.

System Neutral and Railroad Free

I’ve made the entire delve completely system neutral, as a matter of fact there is no mention of DC’s, CR’s, levels, action economy, etc. I did this in order to not only fit all of my vision onto one page, but to ensure that this could be played with as many systems as possible. But wait, that’s not all I’ve left out on purpose! I really wanted DM’s to get a good feel at what I’m trying to accomplish here without railroading them, assuming that most DM’s will take this and run with it.

I think there’s just enough clue and implication here to give a clear picture, and simultaneously open enough to make it your own. There are many choices entirely left to be governed by whomever runs this module that will make it interesting for each group of players, and perhaps multiple playthroughs. For some ideas on what I’m talking about, be sure to grab the full 3 page version complete with treasure descriptions, monster index, a large map, space for notes, and some points on running the adventure.

Under the Microscope

If you liked this and you’d like to see more, please keep your eyes peeled right here. If you don’t like it tell me why as I’d greatly appreciate it and any feedback you might give me. I did put a lot of work into this, but perhaps not as much as I’d have liked to. Anyway, this is just a sliver of the campaign world I am currently working on, this map here keys into a much larger area map that I have a lot of plans for. The absurdly talented d20Monkey will be doing illustrations and cartography for me in these endeavors so at least if you hate my design, you can still love his artwork.

I’ll be working mainly on system neutral material should until 5e’s release. Aside from the obvious beauty of being able to material in multiple systems in the meantime, it should make converting over to 5e relatively easy once its available. That is unless we’re allowed to publish 5e material once the public playtest starts, in which case I’ll hop right on that!

Progress Report

As you might recall, a while back I did a review of the base Thunderstone game. If you haven’t given it a read I suggest you do, it covers a lot that I won’t be regurgitating here. The short summary is that the game was fun although I did have a few quips with it, Thunderstone advance was on the horizon and my hopes were that it would iron out some of the game’s clunkier bits. Well Thunderstone Advance has arrived and I’m here to report back on the changes and improvements to the game.

Delve Deeper, Faster

Perhaps the biggest change to the game on a large scale, is that getting into the dungeon takes a lot less time and preparation than previously. At least according to Jeff Quick, Alderac’s lead guy on Thunderstone, during an interview I had with him just last week. This was (in my opinion) done primarily by increasing the overall effectiveness of your “milita” cards to a new type called “regulars” who are a bit more useful. Not only that, but you do have more useful starting resources for your deck in general, the game can also be set up so that low level monsters come out of the dungeon first. This stops the really big bad guys from coming out in the beginning of the game and completely destroying you or slowing the game to a crawl.

Improvements and Efficiencies

Monsters all now have levels as which adds to the overall balance of the game and serve as a good indicator as to whether you can tackle them or not. There are a multitude of rules clarifications and codification for many of mechanics, which greatly reduces the verbose nature of some of the cards and smooths out gameplay quite a bit. The contents of the box also comes with a ton of dividers just as the first game did, but these are all meticulously labeled and color coded! The card layout itself has been changed immensely to allow for much better at-a-glance use, with more distinct icons and colors making for a lot less “wait, what does this symbol mean again?”. Speaking of cards, which Thunderstone has an abundance of, XP is now in the form of small plastic thunderstone shaped tokens. This is a really nice touch and helps detract from the confusion of keeping track of so many different piles of cards during the course of the game.

Fresh Ideas

Aside from smoothing out so many bumpy aspects of the game’s flow and design, Thunderstone Advance really brings some fresh ideas to the table that simultaneously reinforce the overall narrative flavor of the game as well as adding fun without additional complexity.

• Avatars are a nice touch that just hit the Thundestone scene, what they basically do is allow you to embody a certain RPG archetype (Fighter, Rogue, etc.) for the duration of your Thunderstone game. Each gives you a thematic bonus that you can choose to spend XP to level up as you delve through the dungeon. I did a short video on them which you can check out and decide for yourself if they are worth the 10$ price tag.
• Familiars are another new element in Thunderstone Advance, normally when you’d be able to choose treasure from the village you can instead choose to draw a random familiar. Brownies, pseudodragons, dire wolves, and imps are some of the familars you may wind up with, they remain in play and do not get shuffled back into your deck until you use one of their abilities. Their abilities also grow in power depending on the amount of XP you currently hold, but you mustn’t spend your XP to actually use them. Once again, a very nice touch and addition to the game that adds another layer of flavor without adding complexity.
• Horde Monsters are a new monster type that have been introduced which increase in power each time you fight them, this makes for a nice touch both thematically and in the progress of monsters getting stronger the deeper you delve.
• Curse Deck, formerly the Disease deck that gave out giant piles of static -1 bonuses, the new and improved curse deck promises to truly hamper your efforts. The curses still all give you a -1 to your attack but now they place you with a decision to make because they can be discarded if you fulfill some requirement instead of just using your turn to rest and destroying one. Discard two cards, lose xp, gold, etc are all bargains you can make in order to rid yourself of the curses.
• Preparing is a new option for how to spend your turn, in addition to resting, going to town, this 4th option allows you to ready yourself for battle on your next turn. When you prepare you discard any number of cards from your hand that you like, and place the rest back onto the draw pile from your deck, ensuring you’ll draw them on your next go round. It acts as a filtration process that can really put you in a good position for slaying bad guys down in the dungeon.
• The game board is a new addition, which provides you a nicely illustrated backdrop complete with labeled ‘slots’ for placement of all of your during the game. Not only does the board add a nice organizational touch, but it also adds a second level of complexity as it is double sided, one side being the dungeon and the other side being the forest. The forest is a sort of light or beginner friendly alternative to the dungeon, as it has light penalties that are far less harsh.
• Thunderstone bearers now replace the Thunderstone card, it adds quite a bit of challenge to the finale of the game and also keeps you from feeling like “we delved through dozens of evil monsters to come pick up this rock?”. You’ve got to fight for it, and boy do these bearers bring the pain!

Deckbuilding Dungeon Crawl 2.0

Thunderstone Advance really nails what a deck building game should be, and it does so with flourish and the trappings of an awesome dungeon crawl. Rife with amazing artwork and quick gameplay, if you’re into deck building games and you’ve yet to check this one out you’re seriously missing out. The difference between Thunderstone and Thunderstone Advance is like night and day, definitely a great game to jump into the series with. I can’t speak for Thunderstone vets but I’d assume they welcome these changes to the game with open arms, as the refinements made here really bring the game to top notch status in my opinion.

If I had only one thing to say that hasn’t changed from my original Thunderstone experience it would be that the game still seems to lack many elements of interactivity. I’m sure there is a conscious game design reason behind this, but I still can’t help but feel at times that I feel like I’m playing multiplayer D&D themed solitare. There are rules for solo play too, I might add, which I’ve yet to try. It’s just that I could honestly care less about what my opponents do with their turn, and it kind of bums me out. Occassionally someone will have a rogue hero that causes me to lose a few gold or something, but nothing that ever generates any sort of rivalry or tension between players. I just wish there was more of this in the game, or at least the option for more of this. Maybe some Thunderstone junkies out there can advise me on how to do this?

All personal preferences aside, Thunderstone is a great game. If your’e into deck building games or if you’ve never even played one I’d say that this game is a great place to start. The number of approaches you can take going into the game seem to expand every time I play it, and if you want to check it out before taking the plunge, you can always download the rulebook and give it a look over or check out the facebook game. Until next time everyone, delve boldly!

Madness? This. Is. Mt. Skullfire!

What is Epic Spell Wars of the Battle Wizards you might ask? Well it’s a game that involves some cards, life counters, some dice, and a bunch of wiz biz. What’s the big deal about all that you might ask? You might say “Jerry, but I already have games with all of those elements in them!” The difference is this, to put plainly: this game is probably more fun. Also Epic Spell Wars most certainly contains 300% more crazy shit than other leading games. Do other games involve gore-nado’s or testikills? Yeah that’s right, you’ll probably get squashed by a giant testicle in this game, and earn magical loot like Lady Luck’s Brassiere. Interested? Read on!

What The Fluff?!

Death Fairy’s Maggoty Lightning Bolt? Sounds interesting. Beard O’ Blasty’s Infernotastic Cone of Acid? Devastating! Walker Time Ranger’s Disco Mirrored Brain Suck? Wait, what the hell is going on here? Yes these are but the tip of the iceberg when it comes to all spells you can construct within ESWotBW. The gameplay is really basic – construct spells to obliterate your foes with, and hope to be the last wizard standing. Become the last wizard standing twice, and you win the game!

Spells in the game have 3 components: a source, quality, and delivery which are used to build your spell each round. Everyone takes their turn simultaneously and lays out a spell they’ve constructed from their hand of 8 cards while pronouncing it in their best wizard voice! It is up to your group to make up a penalty for players not speaking in wizardly tones. Each player picks one of the 8 wizard personas to take on during gameplay, which are illustrated on a card along side a counter to keep track of your life total. The wizard players pick is purely cosmetic and has no effect other than the amount of laughter that takes place when announcing oneself.

Millions of Spell Combinations! Okay, Maybe Just Thousands…

Each of the three components add to the mechanics and resolution of  the spells you cast. The source of a spell is basically the name of the wizard casting it (which is specified by the  card itself, or whichever of the 8 wizards you happen to be playing) and usually adds mild or random effects, while the quality is a wacky adjective that describes the spell and adds damage or other benefits such as spiky, mysterious, or ballsy. Finally, the delivery of a spell is the big whizz-bang chaotic ending that usually does the most damage and involves rolling a few dice. Deliveries are usually something brutal like vorpal trap or exorcism but also delve into heinously strange territory with cards like meatier swarm or phantasmagoons.

When you chain 3 spell elements together, all of the artwork on the cards connects and you wind up with something awesome like this:

 You don’t always have to play all 3 parts of a spell though, and you might not always be able to. When you announce your spell you fill in the gaps with your wizard name, made up adjectives and delivery names. Players who play smaller spells act first than those who’ve channeled up longer ones, players who tie either go by initiative order (indicated on the card) or a good old-fashioned roll off to determine who goes first. This has both its advantages and disadvantages which adds a good dose of strategy to the pure chaos of the game.

Death Is Awesome

If you’re gonna die, better to die first! The sooner you’re out of the game, the sooner you’ll be scoring Dead Wizard cards to help you out in the next match when you come back for another harrowing round of ridiculous spells and cartoony carnage. Most of all the dead wizard cards give you benefits like returning with treasure, increased health, and bonus die rolls. A few of the dead wizard cards do actually say “You’re dead. Live with it.” which is a nice touch.

Bizarre Baubles

Sometimes you get loot, all of the time that loot is absurd and awesome. Sometimes other wizards will steal your treasure, sometimes you’ll blast them into a pink mist and get it back! Sometimes the Phister Cannon or the Wand of “Let’s Get This Shit Over With” really come in handy. Treasure is earned when a card tells you that you’ve earned it and you draw from the pile of treasure cards, they provide all sorts of bonuses and situational effects, along with a few gambles. The only downside to treasure is that if you acquire a ton of it, you may have a hard time keeping track of all its awesomeness!

The Game, The Goods

Epic Spell Wars of the Battle Wizards is insanely fun to play, and extremely easy to jump into. Once you play a single hand the whole rest of the game should immediately click for most people, for those who don’t grasp it by that first round…well you’ll have one extra turn of blowing them to smithereens before they return the favor.

Games can last anywhere from half an hour to a couple of hours, depending on the size, luck, strategy, and experience levels of everyone playing. Not saying that the game has a steep learning curve, but if you’ve played a few games you’ll have a better idea as how to eliminate the other wizards with a bit more efficiency. The randomness of the game keeps things really interesting at all times though.

The artwork for this game was done by the amazing Nick Edwards who’s art style for these was so similar to Pendleton Ward’s I thought that the Adventure Time creator was involved. I was mistaken but not disappointed by any means. The packaging, printing, and cards themselves are all very high production value, I’ve played about 5 full games now with zero wear & tear on the cards. The game even comes with a cardboard standup of Mt. Skullfyre for flavor!

Now Go Melt Some Faces!

How many times have I used the word awesome in this review? Probably one too many. In case you haven’t picked up on this yet – I highly recommend this game. It’s great for just about anyone, devoted gamers and casuals alike – even people who don’t normally play tabletop games will have a blast with ESWotBW. Much laughter is sure to ensue, many body parts are sure to fly, and only the greatest battle wizard shall survive!

As many of you may have guessed by now, my reason for straying from 4e D&D is because I’m already playing the next edition of the game. I’m not talking about the play test either, I am playing a mostly finished 5e D&D. The playtest is all a facade – the designers are going full steam ahead with the direction they want to take the game, any and all feedback they are calling for right now are basically things already chiseled into the stone of the game’s rules. My guess is they are only running these polls to feign interactivity with the community, and to gauge how much ire they are going to raise in people when the rules are finally released.

I’ve had it up to here with these shenanigans, not to mention the NDA that I signed is basically nothing more than a gag order. The game is near completion but they wouldn’t let you all know that, in a few weeks the final edits will have been run and the art orders completed. Monte, Rob, and Bruce will be sailing around in their expensive yachts drinking  scotch and being fed grapes by cosplay girls. While you and I sit here and wait for these supposed ‘feedback cycles’ to end, which is bullshit. My complete and total dissent for all of this has finally come to a head and I can no longer keep my mouth shut. So since this post has most likely already blacklisted me for everything I’ve said here, I may as well go off the deep end and reveal some more tidbits about the game.

Classes

You may have heard some bits and pieces about classes through polls, or talk from conventions, or even read those bogus leaked playtest rules. Truth is, what you really need to know about classes in the game is that they are all boiling down to an amalgamation of sameness. All the talk about giving everyone backstab? About the 30 different flavors if fighter? About vancian magic and non vancian magic? It’s basically all the same, they have effectively design themselves into a world of mediocrity with the modular mentality, classes have become no exception to this approach.

I’ll also tell you that they really need to get Rob Schwalb some extra vacation time because all of the ‘classes’ (I now use this term very loosely) are shaping up to look like Assassins. A new 6th level cleric ability “Rosary Garrote”? A 10th level spell called “Bigby’s Heinous Hitmen”? Any character with an INT score of 10 or more can brew poison and gains a +2 bonus to throwing daggers? Things are just getting out of hand. I partially blame Bilsland for this too, he’s got an unhealthy Assassins Creed obsession.

Combat

Ah yes, a return to “classic” D&D ideals right? Wrong. The D&DNext playtest documents default combat ‘module’ is for a new line of miniatures yet to be announced (will also be compatible with Dungeon Command minis) that have  slotted conical bases. You’ll be able to purchased “rippers” that rip your miniatures into a lightning fast spin, where combat will take place in a Dungeon Rumble Pit© especially made for the game, there will be several Rumble Pits with different themes and campaign setting backdrops to spice up your games. The last miniature left spinning is resolved as the winner of the combat.

Spellcasters will need to purchase small hand operated NERF style Magic Misslers© and attempt to shoot at their enemies in the Rumble Pit to simulate the chaos of magic and bring about opportunities for friendly fire, which is being touted as “old school”. So now you know that this is their idea of “quick” and “easy”, this is awful. It seems like Hasbro is really reaching their arm pretty far up WotC’s ass on this one, I can’t see any of the designers actually going for this. But hey, money talks and other stuff walks, right?

Feats

Full disclosure here: since feats were such a big issue in previous editions, and personally I think there were far too many anyway I kind of welcome this change. We all know about being overwhelmed by having too many choices when it comes to making a character, which is why WotC has decided to go with cards. Yep, you heard me. More cards, in random booster packs none the less, similar to Fortune cards, these packs will hold 8 randomly selected feats which you can use when building your characters. They will be set up similar to the classes in the game: Common, Uncommon, and Rare feats. You’ll need to actually posses the cards in order to use the feat, new organized play rules will not be allowing players to use feats without proof of ownership. This means each card will also contain a serial number near the art credits at the bottom of the card, which will require registration through the RPGA. For home games this probably isn’t too big of a deal though, I’m sure someone will pirate them and spread them around the internet in no time. This definitely brings new meaning to the words feat tax.

And Then Some

Of course these are probably the three biggest offenders when it comes to D&DNext completely destroying our beloved game, but there are others. From the new licensed D&D health snack foods meant to be the only form of sustenance at organized play events, to the LARP rules, this is not our D&D. This game went from sounding like a promising avenue to be everyone’s game, to no one’s game.

If none of my words here are enough for you, please view this video I snuck out from one of the exclusive D&D Next playtests at DDXP this year. I’m not the only one who’s speaking out on this either, be sure to find more snippets of info over at Critical Hits where Dave Chalker is spilling some beans too. Until next time, whenever that may be.

 Note: In case you haven’t figured this out yet, everything in this article is false. April Fools!

I’ve been using a lot of accessories for writing and adventure design lately, among my many tools, a few of my favorites have been the Fourthcore Alphabet and the Deck of Many Things from Madness at Gardmore Abbey. I’ve also been using some miscellaneous bits on things like cryptography, numerology, and puzzles from online sources. Using stuff like this makes for a really interesting mix of dungeon scenarios, plot hooks, fun challenges, and lots of other stuff.

Story Cubes

But what about simple tools, things that aren’t specifically geared towards gamers nescessarily? Well I’ve got those too and I want to talk about two of them today – Writer’s Dice and Rory’s Story Cubes. These are both really great tools not only for writers block, or quick ideas but they are also great for designing an entire mini-adventure or getting your kids imaginations to run wild. Here’s an example of what I’m talking about, I’m just grabbing ideas from some of the dice seen in this photo:

Writer’s Dice

Writer’s Dice seem to compliment the story cubes perfectly, created by Daniel Solis as a kickstarter project – these little things can surprisingly spark away cases of pretty bad writer’s block. Use them when you’re at a loss for words, when you’re not sure what should come next, or various other situations which I’m sure I’m not even thinking of right now. There’s also a mobile app for Writer’s Dice for those of you who who prefer to virtually roll dice (heretics) for Android, iOS, and Windows mobile that you can pick up for $1.

I did a short video on the cubes and the writer’s dice if you’d like to check them out in a more intimate manner. I really enjoy using both of these tools when playing with my kids, dreaming up adventures, writing stories, or even designing dungeons. So that’s it for today, in the meantime keep those ideas flowing, and happy gaming!

There is beauty in the amount of abstraction that goes into playing 4e D&D. On one hand you have these great things like “combat advantage” that sum up a huge variety of situations with a simple set of words, also things like “sneak attack” and “ongoing damage” work wonders for the imagination and mechanics simultaneously. All these things work, and they work well. At-Will and Daily powers make sense, and they imply instantly recognizeable mechanics to even the newest of players (“Encounter” is another story, and a blog post for another day).

This condensed, streamlined, codified version of D&D that is 4e has truly been its blessing and its curse, I believe it would have been much less of a curse had the original core books did a better job explaining the ins and outs of the game instead of simply implying them. This goes back to something Sersa V and I talked about ton the Haste podcast and how these big companies like WotC need their “What is an RPG” sections and they need to do them damn well. But I’m not talking just this section alone, those books could have done a lot to speak to the reader like a person and lay things out in layman’s terms when it came to running their games. The DMG did a good job of this, the DMG2 did an even better job, the PHB’s…not so much. Problem is, those DMG’s fell into the hands of probably only one fifth of the D&D player base, which is another problem entirely for our hobby. Steve Winter explains it a lot better than I can though, so go have a read.

I’m An Ugly D&D Duckling

I dont know what demographic I fit into for things like this to be honest, because when it comes to games I don’t care about dungeon ecologies or every motivation and biological process that goes into what makes a creature or NPC tick. I don’t care about the lack of logic as to why everyone hides their valuables in underground labyrinths, or the why or how magic plays its part in the world. I certainly could, and would sit around and theorize these things with people, and often do when coming up with campaign settings and such – but when it really comes down to it I could give a shit less about the where, how, and why of all of these questions, and I think my players feel the same.

I play games to have fun, I really do. For me, fun isn’t writing a thesis paper on the logic or reasoning behind how and why a tribe of goblins have thrived for X years and managed to build kingdoms or create trapped pits of spikes 40′ deep and covered them up with a rug. Do your players ever ask “well gee, why would the king guard his precious amulet of undead curbstomping with a meticulous chess puzzle, was chess even part of this world?” My answer is why do we care if we are knowingly just playing a game? Chess is a part of our world, now try solve the puzzle! While this is more of a debate on realism/meta-game, what I’m getting at is – while I don’t normally care about these things, sometimes the amount of abstraction breaks the game down for me when I know I should care less.

Abstraction Distractions

As much as I’m for assuming “combat advantage” could mean a multitude of things, or how much enjoyment I could obtain from a room with a giant chainsaw wielding demon full of traps inspired by Mario Brothers logic – some of these abstractions still bug me. The game starts to break down for me when this happens, and while I’m no stickler for realism in my games I just can’t see justifying certain aspects of 4e’s design. Couldn’t we just have had a section in the DMG explaining how to emulate monster behavior if you really want the “tanking” feel from MMO’s? Wasn’t the “aggro” or “hate” a mechanic invented to do exactly this anyway? Marking targets in D&D was always something that puzzled me, my group has always completely ignored the mechanic and we’ve got along just fine.

How does CHA help a rogue fight? How does CON power a warlock’s pact with otherworldly entities? How does INT affect the religion skill? Why does everything conveniently end on my next turn or when the encounter is over?

Some of these things never quite added up for me, and while I could make an entire blog post about the how and why of my feelings that 4e made ability scores seem like the most trivial aspect of your character sheet, I’ll spare you all and save that too for another post, another day. But the question that remains for me is while some abstractions don’t seem to bother me at all, why do other (possibly less abstract) elements really seem to pull me out of the game? Perhaps I’m immersed in the game, more than the game world?

I’m not asking for or suggesting more simulation, or trying to argue for or against abstraction here. I’m just trying to gauge how much is too much, and I’d like to know other people’s opinions on these things. When (if ever) does the game break down for you? How can we fix things like this possibly heading in to D&DNext? I welcome your thoughts!

Lords of Waterdeep is the newest offering from WotC as far as D&D board games go. This game, unlike it’s predecessors is not about dungeon crawls, heroics, or world domination. Lords of Waterdeep puts you in the drivers seat of one of the powerful lords that secretly control the city of splendors through trade, espionage, the clergy, magic, and all out warfare.

Gameplay revolves around completing quests, out witting and out maneuvering your opponents with the occasional dash of stabbing them right in the back (or front). The basic idea of the game is to complete quests and objectives that best fit whichever randomly determined lord of Waterdeep you selected at the beginning of the game, none of your opponents know which lord you are, and neither do you know which one they are. The game ends after a solid 8 rounds of play (which go by rather quickly) and whoever ends with the most victory points is the winner.

The game has layer upon layer of D&D flavor, which is as thin or thick as you’d like it to be. Play it as a game and nothing more, or really put your imagination to work when picking up quests from the tavern or hiring thieves to do your dirty work. The flavor in Lords of Waterdeep goes a long way, but it is far from a requirement to enjoy the game.

How Do I Play, What’s Inside?

Rather than listening to me devolve into the specific mechanics of how the game is played here, why not leave that to Mr. Rodney Thompson, co-designer of the game who has created a lovely video that will teach you everything you need to know to play, in only 8 minutes! Want to know all the bits and pieces before you spend your hard earned $50, check my short unboxing video below for all the colorful wooden goodness:

Board Setup

Setup is a breeze, all the cards and markers have their own spot on the board and each player’s tavern card has a place for everything they need to keep track of – active quests, completed quests, plot quests, their agents and other resources are all at a glance and easily within reach. Everything is nicely color coded and the box itself provides a nice go-to grabbing spot for the players coins and resources when needed. I’ve found that if you merely start explaining each element as you lay it onto the board there is very little left to explain before jumping into someone’s first game. Setting up, tearing down, and learning the rules of this game is a breeze – if only D&D itself could be this easy!

Gameplay

Lords plays pretty quickly, and you’ll hardly ever notice the time is passing because the game is so much fun. Lords of Waterdeep is so simple, yet so complex that you’ll need to play through a few times before you start to truly realize all the possibilities and strategy you can employ while playing it. The experience always seems to speed up as the rounds go by and you can’t help but get sucked in trying to pull off awesome synergies with plot quest combos and seeing if you intrigue card your opponents into a stupor.

Not only do most players seem to grasp the game by the end of the first round or two, but you’ll see that the layers of gameplay really mesh nicely as the game progresses – quests, intrigue cards, foiling your opponents plans, and doing some really crafty stuff with some of the unique abilities the purchasable buildings provide.

2 Player vs. Multiplayer

The 2 player experience is very different than when playing with 3 or more people, namely because you’ll find yourself fighting over resources much less often and it really comes down to who can churn out quests faster than the other, perhaps with a bit of strategic flourish but mostly the 2 player game feels a bit less adversarial and punchy as when playing with more. Not nescessarily a bad thing, you’ll just find that playing with two provides a bit more relaxed game experience.

With 3 or more players the race to claiming the best resources and buildings is a lot more dynamic, the possibility to raise up alliances with other players and then break them down at just the right knife-in-the-back moment is a blast. I’ve yet to play with a full 5 players but I have played with 4 and it was a good time. Without going too far into the mechanics of each building, quest, and intrigue card I can say that the replayability in Lords of Waterdeep is high, and the game is very addictive. This is my favorite D&D board game yet.

In A Nutshell

Lords of Waterdeep is a great game, and I can’t recommend it enough for D&D fans and folks who just like board games alike. I’m sure realms junkies will love it too, as they’ve done a great job at dressing up a fantastic board game with full D&D garb. That perhaps is my biggest takeaway from this game, is that it’s a really solid game and perhaps designed as a game first, and a D&D product second – not that the “D&D-ness” of the game is lacking or stilted in any way.

Replay value on this one is high, the bar for entry is low ($31 on Amazon and if you use one of my links to purchase the game you gain a permanent +1 to awesome!) and you might even find yourself role playing a bit while you’re trying to outwit your fellow waterdhavian lords!

I’ll still be talking about D&D here non stop, and I’ll still be reviewing other D&D products like Lords of Waterdeep and other cool things coming down the pipe. However since I’m no longer actively playing 4e, I don’t want to wind up feeling like a tool writing product reviews or content for a game I no longer play.

What can I say, I’m done playing 4e mostly, and I’m definitely done designing for it. This is not some fatalistic attitude or dissent-laden stance on the game, I am merely focusing on the future. I’ve been spending a lot of my time playing another game with my group. When the time comes for me to start discussing that game, I’ll let you guys know, trust me. Anyway, right now all of my creative energy is being poured into the future of D&D, in hopes that third party content may once again hold weight in the next edition. Regardless of that outcome, I’m still looking forward to the next age of the game moreso than trying to cling onto what is left of its present.

This is a strange transitional period for me, and I hope you’ll see me through it and help me knock the cobwebs off of this blog in the meantime. I’ll be posting some system neutral stuff, reviews of cool board games that are helping me pass the time, and of course editorials, as always. Now let’s talk about Heroes of the Elemental Whateversauce.

Earth! Fire! Wind! Whatever…

Heroes of the Elemental WhoCaresWhenIsThePlaytest (nickname courtesy of SkylandGames) is a book full of standard 4e fare, not much more I can say about it. There’s a bunch of kick ass artwork, some interesting story about primordials and a lots and lots of info on earth-fire-wind-watery shenanigans, but the book lacks heart. Yeah, that was a Captain Planet joke, so what? It is also filled with page upon page of 4e powers that look like every other power out there but with a new shuffle of elemental flavor keywords.

There is nothing interesting about this:

Which is basically every 4e power ever, the novelty has wore out its welcome for this guy. I’m done. I refuse to spend time pretending to care any more. If you’re still playing 4e and are running an elemental themed game or want to run one, this is probably a solid book to pick up.

Keep in mind that this “review” is directly proportional to how compelled I felt to peruse its pages. With every 4e release I’m not sure if it is my own perception, the writers who wrote these books knowing they’d launch into D&D limbo, or a combination of both among many other factors, but each one has been progressively underwhelming for me. This is not a jab at either of the writers of this book, or any recent D&D titles and their respective authors in any way either, just an attempt to be candid. I’m not invested in the lore of D&D like some are, so all of the wonderful fluff written regarding the primordials and such falls on deaf ears for me, I know this review is harsh and perhaps a bit unfair, I’m just trying to be honest and frank here.

I don’t think that Heroes of the Elemental Chaos is a bad book, and I don’t think it will turn people off like it did me, I don’t think you should pass it up if you are even still slightly invested in 4e. I’m just stating that for me, at this moment in time there are undisclosed reasons for my falling out with the game. Hopefully I can blog more about them later. That’s about all I can and will say for now, so let’s move on.

Onward, To Waterdeep!

Next week I’ll have an in-depth review of a product that actually interests me – the D&D board game Lords of Waterdeep! I cannot stop playing it or gushing about it to everyone I know, even the non-gamer friends I have love this game. It is so compelling in fact, that my gamer (yet not net-addicted) best friend has decided he wants to help write a review AND got himself a twitter account. Now that says something!

I’ll also have a post on some ideas about running a campaign full of PC’s that are near identical and how to keep things fresh. I’ll also be covering some really old modules in the near future too (since that’s what I’ve been running lately – Sinister Secret of Saltmarsh anyone?) Anyway, in my strange state of gaming limbo if you guys have any suggestions or ideas for things you’d like me to write about please let me know also. I’d love to hear what you guys would like to hear from me. See ya’ next week!