(un)reason
Legend
Dragon Issue 58: February 1982
part 1/2
88 pages
In this issue:
Dragon Rumbles: Oh dear oh dear. We have our second RPG controversy making the news. Someone LARPing was shot by the police, who believed their fake gun was real. This is why you should use cards if playing around non-participants who don't know what's going on. And once again Jake seems more concerned with the damage by association that this could do to tabletop gaming than extending any sympathy to the LARP community. There is a definite air of "I told you so" to this entry, which I find a bit disturbing. This would be a very different editorial if Tim was still in charge. It is a shame that the TT and LARP communities got so separated, and I wonder how much of that is the fault of the people in charge of TSR in these early days. White wolf might have done quite a bit to bring them back together, but the damage was already done. It's silly to over fragment in an already niche market.
Out on a limb: A letter spotting the editing errors in Mad Merc 2 issues ago, which they admit too, and add further corrections of their own.
A letter telling them that they are too scathing in their rebuttals to many of the letters they get. They reply that they aren't half as scathing as some of the ones they get in. And at least they don't swear or use bad spelling and grammar.
A letter asking them how the hell to handle premonitions of death when you don't know what's going to happen in game. They tell him just to fudge it and use your own guesswork. Sigh.
Another letter weighing in on the high level character debate, in support, and wishing they'd post more support for high level games. Which gets a strangely scathing reply in response. Kim obviously isn't a fan of high level games.
A letter asking for more house-rules and clarifications to the official rules, as for all its claims of mechanical rigour, there are still substantial amounts of vagueness and incompleteness. Next thing you know, people'll be asking for a new edition
Leomund's tiny hut: Len gives us a bunch of new cleric spells, as he and gary felt they were still a little lacking in some respects. As this is done by official sanction, most of these made it into future books, such as water walking, dust devil, meld into stone and negative energy protection (at last, we have a counter to energy drainers). Yeah, this is a needed add-on. And it's nice enough to add a bunch of spells that are primarily useful for non-adventuring clerics, and an early synergistic metamagic spell, Combine. This is a definite step forward in terms of spell technology. Of course, that means wizards are likely to get a load of extra spells too soon. (Actually, I'm surprised they haven't thought of publishing those as regular articles before. It's certainly the kind of thing there's always demand for.) How are they going to keep fighters and thieves up? (oh, yeah, they aren't )
Dragon's bestiary: Sull are another floating jellyfish creature. A surprisingly popular D&D ecological niche, really. These ones are psionic, and fight by ramming rather than stinging. Interesting.
Beguilers are kyoot little magical mammals. Which I guess is the point. They're also pretty magically powerful, and their parts are useful in making magical items. But how could you be so cruel as to hunt something this adorable down. You'd get far more benefit keeping one as a familiar.
Magenta's cats are another wizard creation. Yay. Intelligent psionic cats. Now there's a rare and original idea You can have one as a familiar too. It'd probably be more useful than another party member at low level as well.
Blood of medusa: Nice. One of the more intricate pieces of greek mythology gets another look at. When the original medusa was killed, pegasus and chrysaor sprang from her blood. And descended from them in various ways are the hydra, chimera, sphinx, and quite a few monsters that don't have D&D versions such as echidna and cerberus. This gives stats for quite a few of them, and is in general a good sparker of imagination on how to create your own set of unique monsters for your own campaign. Which is a pretty good thing, as it makes monsters more mythic, and not just another faceless challenge to kill for XP and loot. Bringing family into it always makes things more interesting, as Grazzt, Igggwilv and Iuz demonstrate. I very much approve.
Four myths from greece: The greek theme continues, and they give us stats for Atalanta, Daedalus, Deiphobe the sybil, and Chiron the centaur. Despite not being under any of the regular columns devoted to this kind of thing, they are all as disgustingly high in every stat as ever, even the ones not connected to their legendary accomplishments.
The dwarven point of view: Looks like it's that time again. They've been doing themed issues for the classes recently. Now they're starting on the various races as well. This is an official article by Roger Moore, and goes quite a way towards filling in D&D's implied setting. Yes, dwarven females do have beards. But there's a whole lot more to them as a race than just that. Why do dwarves become thieves? Why are they so obsessed with craftmanship? Why can't they become wizards? All these and more answered here.
Bazaar of the Bizarre continues the dwarven theme. The high anvil of the dwarves is a general craftmanship booster, as if they needed it. Still, you've gotta have dwarven made magical items, and they need help for that. The helm of subterranean sagacity does the same for their mining abilities. Pretty dull pair really. Don't you have anything more inventive?
Sage advice also gets in on the act with the short bearded folk.
Why don't ettins suffer a penalty to hit dwarves (they have two heads)
Can an ioun stone increase your stats above 18. Would this allow a demihuman to exceed their maximum level. (no and no)
Do dwarves have alignment restrictions (no, just tendencies)
What are the chances of my character being a sub-race. (If your DM allows it, you can be. Your race is one thing you don't have to roll to determine.
What's the maximum level dwarf clerics can be? (8th with wis 18, 7th with less)
How come dwarves can be psionic when their god isn't. (Good question. Perhaps the psionic ones have some human blood)
What does Moradin's worhipper alignment entry Lawful good (dwarves) mean? ( he might prefer his worshippers good, but he's a magnaminous deity who will tolerate dwarves of other alignments. )
Can dwarves use long or bastard swords one-handed? ( That's your DM's decision. I'm not going to give a ruling on this (how odd))
part 1/2
88 pages
In this issue:
Dragon Rumbles: Oh dear oh dear. We have our second RPG controversy making the news. Someone LARPing was shot by the police, who believed their fake gun was real. This is why you should use cards if playing around non-participants who don't know what's going on. And once again Jake seems more concerned with the damage by association that this could do to tabletop gaming than extending any sympathy to the LARP community. There is a definite air of "I told you so" to this entry, which I find a bit disturbing. This would be a very different editorial if Tim was still in charge. It is a shame that the TT and LARP communities got so separated, and I wonder how much of that is the fault of the people in charge of TSR in these early days. White wolf might have done quite a bit to bring them back together, but the damage was already done. It's silly to over fragment in an already niche market.
Out on a limb: A letter spotting the editing errors in Mad Merc 2 issues ago, which they admit too, and add further corrections of their own.
A letter telling them that they are too scathing in their rebuttals to many of the letters they get. They reply that they aren't half as scathing as some of the ones they get in. And at least they don't swear or use bad spelling and grammar.
A letter asking them how the hell to handle premonitions of death when you don't know what's going to happen in game. They tell him just to fudge it and use your own guesswork. Sigh.
Another letter weighing in on the high level character debate, in support, and wishing they'd post more support for high level games. Which gets a strangely scathing reply in response. Kim obviously isn't a fan of high level games.
A letter asking for more house-rules and clarifications to the official rules, as for all its claims of mechanical rigour, there are still substantial amounts of vagueness and incompleteness. Next thing you know, people'll be asking for a new edition
Leomund's tiny hut: Len gives us a bunch of new cleric spells, as he and gary felt they were still a little lacking in some respects. As this is done by official sanction, most of these made it into future books, such as water walking, dust devil, meld into stone and negative energy protection (at last, we have a counter to energy drainers). Yeah, this is a needed add-on. And it's nice enough to add a bunch of spells that are primarily useful for non-adventuring clerics, and an early synergistic metamagic spell, Combine. This is a definite step forward in terms of spell technology. Of course, that means wizards are likely to get a load of extra spells too soon. (Actually, I'm surprised they haven't thought of publishing those as regular articles before. It's certainly the kind of thing there's always demand for.) How are they going to keep fighters and thieves up? (oh, yeah, they aren't
) Dragon's bestiary: Sull are another floating jellyfish creature. A surprisingly popular D&D ecological niche, really. These ones are psionic, and fight by ramming rather than stinging. Interesting.
Beguilers are kyoot little magical mammals. Which I guess is the point. They're also pretty magically powerful, and their parts are useful in making magical items. But how could you be so cruel as to hunt something this adorable down. You'd get far more benefit keeping one as a familiar.
Magenta's cats are another wizard creation. Yay. Intelligent psionic cats. Now there's a rare and original idea
You can have one as a familiar too. It'd probably be more useful than another party member at low level as well. Blood of medusa: Nice. One of the more intricate pieces of greek mythology gets another look at. When the original medusa was killed, pegasus and chrysaor sprang from her blood. And descended from them in various ways are the hydra, chimera, sphinx, and quite a few monsters that don't have D&D versions such as echidna and cerberus. This gives stats for quite a few of them, and is in general a good sparker of imagination on how to create your own set of unique monsters for your own campaign. Which is a pretty good thing, as it makes monsters more mythic, and not just another faceless challenge to kill for XP and loot. Bringing family into it always makes things more interesting, as Grazzt, Igggwilv and Iuz demonstrate. I very much approve.
Four myths from greece: The greek theme continues, and they give us stats for Atalanta, Daedalus, Deiphobe the sybil, and Chiron the centaur. Despite not being under any of the regular columns devoted to this kind of thing, they are all as disgustingly high in every stat as ever, even the ones not connected to their legendary accomplishments.
The dwarven point of view: Looks like it's that time again. They've been doing themed issues for the classes recently. Now they're starting on the various races as well. This is an official article by Roger Moore, and goes quite a way towards filling in D&D's implied setting. Yes, dwarven females do have beards. But there's a whole lot more to them as a race than just that. Why do dwarves become thieves? Why are they so obsessed with craftmanship? Why can't they become wizards? All these and more answered here.
Bazaar of the Bizarre continues the dwarven theme. The high anvil of the dwarves is a general craftmanship booster, as if they needed it. Still, you've gotta have dwarven made magical items, and they need help for that. The helm of subterranean sagacity does the same for their mining abilities. Pretty dull pair really. Don't you have anything more inventive?
Sage advice also gets in on the act with the short bearded folk.
Why don't ettins suffer a penalty to hit dwarves (they have two heads)
Can an ioun stone increase your stats above 18. Would this allow a demihuman to exceed their maximum level. (no and no)
Do dwarves have alignment restrictions (no, just tendencies)
What are the chances of my character being a sub-race. (If your DM allows it, you can be. Your race is one thing you don't have to roll to determine.
What's the maximum level dwarf clerics can be? (8th with wis 18, 7th with less)
How come dwarves can be psionic when their god isn't. (Good question. Perhaps the psionic ones have some human blood)
What does Moradin's worhipper alignment entry Lawful good (dwarves) mean? ( he might prefer his worshippers good, but he's a magnaminous deity who will tolerate dwarves of other alignments. )
Can dwarves use long or bastard swords one-handed? ( That's your DM's decision. I'm not going to give a ruling on this (how odd))
