One last comment. the quote is good, but you have Robilar's name musspelled therein
Dear Gary,
LOL, Robillard (a rouge with a few fighter levels) is one of my character's from the old school (whom I named after a local plumbing company in the Twin Cities area, sounded like a good name in spite of the profession for which it came, shh, don't tell my players he is named after people who deal with raw sewage
).
It wasn't until the Epic level handbook can out that I learned of Robilar (Minus one L and the D) and that he was a fighter of great power, I picked up a used copy of Return to the Tomb of Horrors a few weeks later, I think that also mentions Robilar in the forward written by you.
My own Robillard ran through the Tomb of Horrors with 32 henchmen and four other party members. By the time we got to the Demi-Lich at the end, we were down to 7 henchmen (14 died, 11 failed their morale checks and fled when the body count started, in spite of my high charisma) and 3 other party members. We pulled the scoop and run technique when souls started to disappear (once the Paladin bit the dust, no pun intended, we knew we were in trouble).
Not to demean your Robilar, but I had this one, Robillard, since back when you wrote your first Greyhawk book staring Gord the Rouge, a huge inspiration for my character. I'm sure that Robilar has been around for longer, but until recently, when I started to do research to take my character's through the Vecna Lives module, I have not heard of Robilar. Kind of funny I think that we have two different characters with simular names.
I did swipe a character name from Greyhawk, Kronn, my 16th level barbarian under the old unearth arcana rules, which was not very fair for XP, was named after the Kron Hills, sorry, but I love him and won't change the name
Hey, when you do come to town, tell me a head of time and I will prepare something worthy of Mordenkainen to use his power in, and I promise I won't reveal his power to others, otherwise a nice simple high level 15-20 level adventure to get the blood pumping (my current party is level 15). Of course I am running a henchmen campaign right now too. That is to say, the henchmen of the higher level players, who are 4th level now, go on quests too for their masters. I thought this was a fun thing to do rather than just say, "Hey, your henchman just gained a level," I make the players earn it for their henchmen. It is more fun that way, it keeps the game fresh and you would be welcome anytime to play in any one you like.
Also, there is a D&D game variant called Grim and Gritty. The rules are a bit more extreme and combat much more deadlier as you only get HP equal to your CON Plus up to one HP a level and instead of AC you roll a defense roll against there attack roll and armor doesn't give AC bonus but rather damagae reduction equal to the AC bonus for the armor, so a chain shirt would give 4 damage reduction to all wounds. Other than that, everything is the same, including the damage from weapons and magic (although in this style of play magic is low to none existent, much to my sadness since I enjoy play mages, otherwise a fireball could kill everyone because of the low HP of most of the characters). I don't run that one, it is the only one I get a chance to play in now, but I am sure they would not mind if you would like to throw your hat into the arena. Just let me know, anytime.
Scott, thanks for the info, I am trying to track down copies of the Living Grewhawk issue #0 because I hear they have 3.0 stats for the circle of eight. I am expanding the beginning of the Vecna lives module, in which the players get to play the circle of eight mages, so the players can use the high level mages for a bit of fun before they die to Vecna and would like to get better stats then are listed in the current 2nd edition module. Your background information is helpful though, thanks for the help, and if you happen to know where I can score a copy of the Living Greyhawk issues, please cough up the info.
"Hey, you there, fetch me that gem encrusted skull from amongst that pile of bone and ash." - Robillard to his Half-Ogre henchmen.
"Duh, OK." - Last words from Grogg, son of Grogg, as he reached for the Demi-lich's skull. - The Tomb of Horrors
