Recent content by Cryptos

I'd suggest Eladrin or even Human rather than Half-Elf. Sure, you get one at-will power as an encounter power as a half-elf, but the "thief" part of Fighter-MU-Thief is going to be done primarily through skills like stealth, thievery, and perception. The more skills you can get, the better...

Ok. Wait. I have an Intelligence score of 18 and my skill bonuses are through the roof. I've got Craft: Computer, Knowledge: Technology, Knowledge: Bureaucracy, Sense Motive, Drive, Repair, and multiple profession skills as well as a bonus language. Why do I have to sit in this thing...

It's part of an Eladrin city... the part that stands in the world as a passage to the rest of the city in the Feywild, acts as a watchtower to those approaching the passage to the Feywild, and serves to mark the location to Eladrin as a passage to the Feywild. It's a beacon tower (like a...

If the theme revolves around a given skill, such as stealth, Eladrin are probably going to come up very often. They get an extra skill. Humans get an extra skill from their class list. Note the difference - Eladrin can pick any skill, including one not on their list. Add to that a Dex bonus...

White Wolf, for old WoD and also new, also suggests that a storyteller can do something similar in terms of rewards. You can give out generic experience that a character can spend on anything, or you can give out experience that can only be spent on specific things such as skills you've used in...

That's just bizarre. You have to design each power to have effects and modifiers that make them different. Just off the top of my head, because I haven't messed with it in a while, a fire-based power might have something like a 'contagious' advantage and a sort of damage over time advantage to...

Or the best method: 4) Don't base your plots on what the characters will find out and how, but rather on what happens when they find out. The example that springs to mind immediately, because that's what I'm reading right now, is basically any Dresden Files novel. While the main character...

The supernatural types of nWoD are considerably more balanced than in the old World. However, it should be noted that this is not balance in the same sense as a more tactical and unified game like D&D. Balance in the nWoD between types is more along the lines of, "Generally speaking, the...

Lately I've been tempted to make a halfling named Emmanuel of the Plains. I'm sure it'll pass eventually. Generally I don't play characters with joke names.

Back when I had a decently working desktop PC and a stable connection, there were MMOs that I did like, although I have a very strong dislike for WoW. I mainly liked MMOs not for the "massively multiplayer" part, but for the chance to explore a changing world that is continually updated. I...

It does seem to fly in the face of the other major advice to come out of the DMG: the "Yes, but..." principle. If one is determined to prevent a scrying effort, that would be as in "Yes, but when you view the fae prince in his domicile, it allows him to channel his power through the scrying...

Mr. theLawyer: There's a loophole there. It simply states where your client has to be, it doesn't seem to preclude him from engaging in any gaming activities at that location or from that location. Perhaps if he were to host a game for a night, she might see her way toward cutting him loose...

Elsewhere, there seems to be a lot of people giving weight to the idea that dealing out damage early and often, a strong offense, is possibly better resource management in 4e than defense and healing, a strong defense. How does that scale down in terms of party size? The reason I'm asking is...

Ok, here's a topical example: the recent revelation by Mearls that for a while, they thought that the definition of controller would mean "doing damage to multiple targets at once." Only to have them later realize that that's not what 'controller' means or should mean. More than a decade after...

I almost regret jumping in here, but the proposition here isn't simply that "wizards suck." It's that accordingly to role, they aren't all that great at controlling. And that any definition of controlling, for almost anyone outside of WotC for a certain (bizarre) period of time, did not mean...