Playing Bashfully
I’m not sure why, but sometimes I’ve had players who downright just play like wimps. It is a stereotype (or perhaps assumption) that spans far and wide regarding player characters in RPG’s that label them as heroes or extraordinary in some way. You would think these people who weave elemental and divine powers from their fingertips, transform into beasts, leap chasms and wear plate armor brimming with weapons would charge headfirst into danger.
Apparently not always, as my most recent homebrew campaign first started I’d never seen so many players take the “safe route” so often. By safe route I don’t mean “Let’s see if we can convince the baron of X before we try Y” I mean when encountered with a graveyard that may have a few zombies lurking around they opted to sleep until daylight before investigating, even though an urgent matter was at hand. Unfortunately I didn’t punish properly for taking a casual approach to dispatching evil.
I had a cinematic encounter laid out before them, the moon was full and the graveyard thick with mist where an ominous winged silhouette appeared each night perched atop an abandoned tower. A barmaid offers them a key left by a stranger who said it would unlock the towers mysteries also offering gold to vanquish whatever sinister thing that resides in the tower. “You say the shadow appears there every night, and it’s yet to attack?” “Well then it’s probably not going to do anything tonight either, let’s get some rest and investigate when the sun rises, it will be safer this way.”
Review: Gale Force 9 Dungeon Master Tokens
Humor amidst the tension
Personally I didn’t know what to think of these new D&D rule announcements earlier today, and in regards to the essentials products I’ll just have to wait and see if they’re for me I suppose. I’m always for improving, balancing and making games more fun for everyone and after spending almost the entire day looking into these things, and reading angry posts on ENworld to enlightened twitter posts I think I fall into the “I’m totally stoked about this” crowd. I also happen to belong to the “Magic Missle changes are rad” (also – Dispel Magic) crowd – just to put that out there.
I still think it would be nice to see a digital version of some of the sourcebooks be made available to DDI subscribers but that’s a whole other post. (Yes I know the compendium prettymuch does it, but as always- I want more)
Anyway in an efforts to move away from the heavy hearted version debate going on I’d like to share something I made for fun over the weekend.
Dark Sun Goodies!
D&D Encounters buff recap
For those of you lucky enough to have participated in D&D Encounters, or followed the unfolding news and stories via your preferred source of news consumption you know exactly what these are. For those of you who don’t D&D Encounters was a weekly 1 shot (1-2 hrs tops) encounter played out at your FLGS or other participating venue that’s gone on for the past 12 weeks. Each Wednesday while these were going on @Wizards_DnD sent out random buffs hourly that had an effect on those games. I’m posting an archive of all those buffs here for use in your own game – perhaps make cards, create a table and roll for random effects, or do whatever you will with these little gems. Wizards and D&D players all over are currently gearing up for season 2 which will be set in the Dark Sun campaign setting – which I’m hoping to actually get in on this season.
So without further ado I give you the list, special thanks to @WolfSamurai and his nice little blog over at @matt_james_rpg’s loremaster.org for archiving these too. (I “borrowed” the last 6 weeks or so after advanced google searches got tiring) (Plaintext download HERE if you dislike formatting)