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Took me a lot longer to actually get the whole thing on paper than I thought, but mine is up now. It is really pure 4E, so if you don't like 4E, just give it a FAIL and move on.
Ha! After reading phoamslingers anti-4E rant in his judgement I almost decided to call him as a Bedridden Troll and just say screw it to the whole thing. Win or lose, it was a fun experiment for me.
Ha! After reading phoamslingers anti-4E rant in his judgement I almost decided to call him as a Bedridden Troll and just say screw it to the whole thing. Win or lose, it was a fun experiment for me.
Oh come on...would you really forefit the game just because the judge said he doesn't like 4E? That seems a bit rash. This is supposed to be about storytelling, not game editions.
BTW, I liked your submission.
The foot-removing trap was a stroke of genius, and I like the concept of a psychotic bard. I would have liked to have seen some more flavor and backstory, though, specifically on how and why the bard is so nasty.
And how the heck did you have the time to do all of this?! I barely had enough time to type my entry, let alone stat out my villain. You've even got a map in there, for crying out loud! Your time management skills are impeccable. Best of luck to you, sir!
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Last edited by CleverNickName; 19th October 2009 at 03:34 PM..
I like the tandem use of the word "troll" in there, how you use it as both a monster type and a fishing technique. This seems to be a pretty useful tactic in the Iron DM contest.
And I like the whole "murder mystery" thing you've got going on. And having the troll be bedridden by a massive case of acid reflux disease was just brilliant. Well-played.
Oh come on...would you really forefit the game just because the judge said he doesn't like 4E? That seems a bit rash. This is supposed to be about storytelling, not game editions.
BTW, I liked your submission.
The foot-removing trap was a stroke of genius, and I like the concept of a psychotic bard. I would have liked to have seen some more flavor and backstory, though, specifically on how and why the bard is so nasty.
And how the heck did you have the time to do all of this?! I barely had enough time to type my entry, let alone stat out my villain. You've even got a map in there, for crying out loud! Your time management skills are impeccable. Best of luck to you, sir!
Like I said... "almost". Considering that a full paragraph was spent trashing the only edition of the game I know well, I was pretty worried, basically figured that I was doomed regardless.
Spoiler:
You entry is good too. I felt that you made a better use of the troll ingredient than I did, and the river delta, for that matter.
As far as time management, I was able to get most of it typed up when I was watching football. The basic idea came to me as soon as I saw the ingredients (and looked up what Ioun Stones are). I figured that the wiki entry for Ioun Stones that I saw was purely 3rd Edition, and I was tempted to come up with some new kind of magic item, but I liked what I read about them. I had planned on doing more with the Troll, and expanding out the river travel, but those things had to fall by the wayside. I really feel that my whole entry is going to leveraged on the villain - which is why I took the time to make a stat block for him.
Regarding edition stuff... there is an ioun stone in the 4e PHB, several others in 4e supplements, and they've been in D&D (in basically the same form) since 1e.
Cheers, -- N
__________________
Brevity is the soul of wit, so trim your sig or look dumb.
Like I said... "almost". Considering that a full paragraph was spent trashing the only edition of the game I know well, I was pretty worried, basically figured that I was doomed regardless.
Spoiler:
You entry is good too. I felt that you made a better use of the troll ingredient than I did, and the river delta, for that matter.
As far as time management, I was able to get most of it typed up when I was watching football. The basic idea came to me as soon as I saw the ingredients (and looked up what Ioun Stones are). I figured that the wiki entry for Ioun Stones that I saw was purely 3rd Edition, and I was tempted to come up with some new kind of magic item, but I liked what I read about them. I had planned on doing more with the Troll, and expanding out the river travel, but those things had to fall by the wayside. I really feel that my whole entry is going to leveraged on the villain - which is why I took the time to make a stat block for him.
Spoiler:
I'm not very familiar with 4E; I only had the books for a month or so. But I thought I remembered something about ioun stones being in there. EDIT: Ninja'd by Nifft.
For what it's worth, I would have loved to see you create a custom magic item on the fly for 4E, using a 3E magic item as inspiration. That would demonstrate a flexibility and familiarity with the elements that not all DMs have...a very Iron DMish trait.
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Last edited by CleverNickName; 19th October 2009 at 05:04 PM..
Took me a lot longer to actually get the whole thing on paper than I thought, but mine is up now. It is really pure 4E, so if you don't like 4E, just give it a FAIL and move on.
It seems to me that participlants should refrain from thinking this way and even more from commenting this way. Now if you lose you're going to wonder whether it was the edition, or the fact you made the judge irritated at you. If you win its not a problem for you but you're going to make the other guy wonder whether it was because the judge tried too hard not to show favoritism. On the whole it seems a bad idea to drag any aspect of the edition war into this contest. Just assumet he judges will do the best they can in their own way.
Regarding edition stuff... there is an ioun stone in the 4e PHB, several others in 4e supplements, and they've been in D&D (in basically the same form) since 1e.
Cheers, -- N
That's hilarious that I didn't even notice them in the PHB - thanks for pointing them out. I haven't hit anything near Epic tier, and so haven't looked at such high level items. I prefer the items I used anyway - even if they are a little overpowered for the level they are being used at.
Quote:
It seems to me that participants should refrain from thinking this way and even more from commenting this way. Now if you lose you're going to wonder whether it was the edition, or the fact you made the judge irritated at you. If you win its not a problem for you but you're going to make the other guy wonder whether it was because the judge tried too hard not to show favoritism. On the whole it seems a bad idea to drag any aspect of the edition war into this contest. Just assume the judges will do the best they can in their own way.
Yeah, I really can't disagree with any of this. Despite my fear with phoamslinger's bias blurb, I felt that he did a good job judging the round in which his edition-slam appeared. I just expressed my concern about edition in reference to his (per your bolded line) and put up what I came up with per the line following it. I have no doubt that, win or lose, phoamslinger will describe why the winner and loser are chosen. I just feel bad about kicking up all of this noise with a poor attempt at being self-deprecatory.
judgement for Rechan vs Atras is done (and has a longer word count than either).
Thank you for the judgment, and for forgiving my use of 4E , I'm glad to know that it didn't disqualify me. I felt that I really mis-used the River Delta, and when I re-read my adventure I noticed that I left out a few of the details that I had in mind that would have gone a long way to explaining some of the connections.
I saw the Bard as a Pied Piper archetype, so I wanted him to demand a harsh payment for his service. As soon as I went down that path, I forgot to leave the hints that he was the one to plant the Troll in the first place. Keeping the foot handy would let him drop it off in another town and collect more victims. Keeping the Troll handy would let him send the Troll back or re-seed if some pesky heroes came along and took care of the situation without him. I mostly focused on the singing part of a Bardic repertoire to tie in with the Pied Piper, but I gave him some story telling attack powers, and should have put something in about him using acrobatics to avoid his traps when fighting.
I had hoped to make the Skill Challenge a more important part of the adventure, but I just didn't have the time to do much more with it than I did. This is something that I will work on if I make this into a Living Forgotten Realms adventure for my local players.
It was fun, round 2, I'm sure, will be much harder. Thanks for the competition, Rechan.
Regarding edition stuff... there is an ioun stone in the 4e PHB, several others in 4e supplements, and they've been in D&D (in basically the same form) since 1e.
actually, I've been house ruling them almost all the way back to 1e. when you find or buy them, they are gemstones, but when you put them in orbit they become little sparks of colored light, orbiting your head. they become gems again and fall to the ground when you die. or the wearer can voluntarily take them off.
otherwise it would logically be too easy a sleight of hand check or Dex/ Reflex check to do a disarm against them. or so I've always figured.
plus having colored magical lights orbiting your head and granting bonuses is a cool visual.
It seems to me that participlants should refrain from thinking this way and even more from commenting this way.
Definitely want to avoid getting entangled in this kind of argument. Even if you just want to bark at the judges, this sort of criticism has a way of taking root and before you know it, you're way off in the weeds. Take Wicht's advice and just leaf it alone.
and now, ... I'm really curious what you all think...
I like Rechan's better. I though Atras's adventure was a fairly straightforward monster hunt without much to differentiate it from other "kidnapped maiden" stories. I don't do 4e but I am left wondering how a bard becomes a powerful necromancer in order to have undead attacking on his behalf. The troll seemed very tacked on to me and hardly integral to the adventure.
Rechans had some weaknesses. I'm used to trolls being semi-animilistic monsters so their agreement with the village is a bit contrived for me and I do wonder why the cleric couldn't heal the third troll. I didn't know who Ioun was but assumed it was some sort of saint or diety. I thought the Ioun stone was really Rechan's weakest ingredient.
But if I ran both of these, I am pretty sure the adventure that would be remember 6 months later by the players would be Rechans, not Atras'.
More criticism than I would normally volunteer but the judge did ask for it.
Definitely want to avoid getting entangled in this kind of argument. Even if you just want to bark at the judges, this sort of criticism has a way of taking root and before you know it, you're way off in the weeds. Take Wicht's advice and just leaf it alone.
Sorry for not having posted anything about the matches so far, but I hadn't had enough time to read them all thoroughly.
I have a question, when is my round supposed to begin? According to a calendar that I can't find now, I was supposed to receive my ingredients today Oct. 19, but it seems that we're still on the previous match.
Best regards,
Felipe.
__________________ "'Farewell, elfmaid,' he said softly. 'Your light will shine in this world. It is time for mine to darken. Don't grieve, dear one. Don't cry.' He held her close. 'The Forestmaster said to us, in Darken Wood, that we should not mourn those who have fulfilled their destiny. Mine is fulfilled.'"
I've been maintaining an unofficial schedule over on Page 4 of this thread (link.) There was some scheduling difficulties last week, but I think we got them all Iron'd (ahem) out.
Looks like you are up for tomorrow's match. But like I said, this is an unofficial schedule. Nifft is the event coordinator.
I like Rechan's better. I though Atras's adventure was a fairly straightforward monster hunt without much to differentiate it from other "kidnapped maiden" stories. I don't do 4e but I am left wondering how a bard becomes a powerful necromancer in order to have undead attacking on his behalf. The troll seemed very tacked on to me and hardly integral to the adventure.
Rechans had some weaknesses. I'm used to trolls being semi-animilistic monsters so their agreement with the village is a bit contrived for me and I do wonder why the cleric couldn't heal the third troll. I didn't know who Ioun was but assumed it was some sort of saint or diety. I thought the Ioun stone was really Rechan's weakest ingredient.
But if I ran both of these, I am pretty sure the adventure that would be remember 6 months later by the players would be Rechans, not Atras'.
More criticism than I would normally volunteer but the judge did ask for it.
I felt that with both entries:
Spoiler:
the River Deltas were just there.
both Bedridden Trolls were weak or very replacable, once the acid add-on keeping them in bed was eliminated.
Rechan had a stronger Bard, but Atras evoked a more Monstrous response; but still a slight edge went to Rechan there.
but Rechan's Slayings, while frightening in the 21st century today, wouldn't be that impressive in a D&D world as opposed to the idea of one irritated high level adventurer massacring an entire town.
and Atras' Feet (regardless of how or where they came from; I wouldn't double tap a negative into Severed Feet from a bad use of Bard - maybe a cross class Necro feat would have been appropriate?) were much more integral to the entire story as were his Stones.
Rechan's Stone was the weakest of all in either entrly and hit his adventure almost as negative points since it could have been completely eliminated and the story would have remained totally unchanged (with the Abbot simply recommending the players' course of action). so just counting on a item by item basis, as well as my overall feelings at the end, I felt Atras did the better job...
...but there was room for lots of improvement on both of them. I would recommend in the future that you NOT skimp on word count if it's necessary to fully convey the story you're trying to tell. single spaced typed, Rechan's was three pages, Atras' was four. my judgement of the two ran five pages, plus.
I barely had enough time to type my entry, let alone stat out my villain. You've even got a map in there, for crying out loud! Your time management skills are impeccable. Best of luck to you, sir!
, I'm glad to know that it didn't disqualify me. I felt that I really mis-used the River Delta, and when I re-read my adventure I noticed that I left out a few of the details that I had in mind that would have gone a long way to explaining some of the connections.
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