Let's read the entire run

[(un)reason]

Dragon Issue 348: October 2006


part 2/6


First watch: Rehash kicks into high gear this month. Complete Mage? Didn't we already have this. Put it next to Complete Arcane and laugh at the contrast. Black guy with cat vs albino guy with ferret. Someone in marketing thought this through waaaay too hard. Come on, surely you can be a little more inspired.

Even more annoying than rehash is the reset button. Expedition to Castle Ravenloft throws away the years of character development, all the supplements, all the novels, all the stuff White Wolf did, and just goes right back to the start, albeit bigger (especially Strahd's stats) and more brutal than ever. And so we see some more foreshadowing of the next edition reboot.

Yet more official rehash to come. The original Dragonlance trilogy also proves more successful than everything Tracy and Margaret have done since, with yet another deluxe reissue. How many is that by now? They also do another Art of Dragon magazine book. There've been slightly less of those over the years, but still a few. And on top of that, the Monster Manual gets an errata filled, deluxe leatherbound book. Do you feel tempted, or will you wait for the complete corebook set with a special slipcase.

Also limited edition is their dragon themed chess set (not actual Dragonchess, unfortunately, which would be considerably cooler. ) See Tiamat, Bahamut, Dragotha, and a bunch of other famous dragons represented.

Their next minis set is focussed around the blood war. It's been simmering away for over a decade now, looks like it's gonna kick up a gear again. See familiar faces from the old card game, and maybe a few new ones too. Enjoy it while it lasts, before they throw this away in the reset too. Also useful is another battlemat.

On the third party side, we have new releases from some very big names. Gary Gygax's Lejendary Pantheons and Ed Greenwood's Castlemourn. Like Tracy and Margaret, they may not be able to match their 80's output in commercial success, but they're still full of ideas and have other people around them helping to make them reality. Were these any good?

If you don't want D20, then there's Anima. Anime continues to be pretty popular in geek circles, and this wants a little of that action. High action, secret conspiracies and bishis. Sounds like a good combination to me.

Also getting their art recycled is Warcraft, which is releasing a Trading Card Game. Another amusing spin-off that probably isn't going to make them much money compared to the gangbusters of their actual MMO operation, but is interesting.

Speaking of computer games, there's also stuff going the other way. Warhammer 40k becomes Dawn of War: Dark Crusade. All the diabolical and dysfunctional sides are represented. It's gonna be grim in the north quadrant.

Finally, we have a plushy Necronomicon. Just the thing to go with the plush Cthulhu. Tee Hee. Genius.


Core beliefs: Vecna. Our first three covered deities all had the distinction of having ascended mortals as their demigod sidekicks. But not all gods needed help from others to get up to that level. Vecna, for example. He's managed to cheese his way from fairly powerful lich to full-blown god in the face of archmages, gods, more than a few heroic parties, his own treacherous lieutenant, and even the Dark Powers of Ravenloft. Much of it in actual events, rather than backstory as well. (not that those were particularly pleasant modules to play through. ) As a result of this, his portfolio is a bit of a bodge job, made of what he could get at the time. The whole emphasis on secrets is largely a 3e invention, while he doesn't actually seem hugely interested in undead anymore. Becoming a lich was just a means to the ends of survival and power. There may well be a parable there about how your race and sexuality do not have to be the defining factors in your life, even if you are a minority of some sort. I also have a suspicion that he has no great respect for his new clergy either. If sacrificing them was a path to greater power still, he'd be decorating the altar and sharpening the knives as quickly as his one-handed form allows him too. So a quite different god this time, and though the formula might be the same, amusingly different results come out the other end. There's also several cool shout-outs. There is no Head of Vecna. If you find one, do not try to cut your head off and stick it on for more power. Ely Cromlich is back, with replacement parts to make up for his losses that make him all the more appropriate a servant for Vecna. And even the 2-3e switchover gets a joke at it's expense. It's actually rather impressive in the scope of it's slyness. I really enjoyed this one, and though it probably won't be that useful for PC's, it definitely will for DM's.

 

[(un)reason]

Dragon Issue 348: October 2006


part 3/6


Bestowed curses: In the old days, Bestow Curse and Cause Disease were some of the scariest spells around in the hands of an imaginative DM, for you could all too easily stretch your imagination to inflict effects that weren't lethal, but quite possibly worse than death for their victims. In 3e, of course, they're obsessed with balance, and so this is not an option. But there's still demand for inventive results than a generic penalty to ability scores, so here's a list of alternate effects you can inflict on someone with bestow curse, or it's higher level variant which they also add here. So this is a bit dull, but handy because it lets you know exactly what you can get away with under the current ruleset, which should help defuse any rules disputes on the subject. As Sage Advice's continued appearance every issue shows, they're never going to get everyone to agree perfectly on what the rules really mean, and if they're good or not, especially since WotC is so keen on radically reworking the rules for each edition, but by doing articles like this, at least they're trying.


Bloodlines: Vampires still haven't lost their popularity all these years later. In fact, thanks to Twilight, a whole new generation is just being introduced to the idea of vampire as forbidden romantic figure. So I'm not at all surprised to see another set of vampire variants. We've already had several extensive articles on weird blood-sucking undead from around the world. Can this contribute anything new to the pot?

Savage Vampires are your basic stalkers in de niiight, jumping on people, quite possibly in animal form, and ripping them to shreds to sate their appetites. Meh.

Shadow Vampires fade into the darkness and teleport through it, making them scary and mysterious, but thankfully even more vulnerable if you can turn the floodlights on them.

Terror Vampires aren't so interested in feeding on blood or life force, but fear itself. (reflected mechanically as wisdom damage) This means that unlike some other vampire variants, they'll never be able to overcome their monstrous natures. (although they might be able to turn them to good by playing batman and only scaring other things of darkness) However, the need to keep their victims alive and mess with their mind for quite a while is an exploitable weakness, especially if you remember not to split up the party. And at least they don't drain levels. So these are pretty obvious alternate archetypes, that don't come anywhere near the imaginativeness of previous articles on the topic, but they're done well mechanically. Scary and mysterious needs to be balanced with working well in game, and at least they've got that in their favor.

 

[delericho]

Given their more rigorous design process, it's baffling that they manage to be so much worse at making memorable adventures than TSR was. I wish I knew why, and I'm sure the writers there do as well.

I think perhaps the first half of the first sentence there may be the reason - too much focus on the 'science' of adventure design (that is, the rigorous design process), squeezing out the 'art'.

 

[(un)reason]

Dragon Issue 348: October 2006


part 4/6


Horrors of the Daelkyr: In the past we've had october issues with an undead focus, a fiendish flavour, and a sanity-imperiling lovecraftian one. Looks like they're mixing it up this time round, with both undead and Cthuloid gribleys from other universes. So let's see what unique spin Eberron puts on the idea of an invasion from another universe, and it's fallout. The Daelkyr tried to take over the world several thousand years ago. Thankfully Eberron's natives have plenty of tricks of their own, so they managed to foil this and seal the gate in the end. But the creatures left behind haven't given up, and they've created new minions by mutating and crossbreeding natives as well. This has plenty of potential to put a cool new spin on existing ideas by recombining existing ideas.

Akleu are transparent-skinned humanoid shark things from Xoriat. Excellent at stealth and climbing, they're dangerous ambush predators now they're stuck on eberron. They really ought to be doing more with their intelligence, but you know what monsters are like. Just can't seem to co-operate like humans despite their greater individual power.

Dolgrue look like bad imitations of Glabrezu. Created from bugbear stock, they spend their existence in perpetual agony, only briefly relieved by torturing others. Which means they might not be inherently chaotic evil like real demons, but only the very strongest willed of them will be able to rise above their baser natures. Polymorph them into something more pleasant, and they'll probably be eternally grateful.

Kyra look like relatives of Grell, giant brains with 8 wings replacing many of their tentacles. They're another genius, but insane creature that lives to trick and create misery for all they encounter. A shame that creatures like that can't turn over a new leaf when stuck on a less hostile plane, but have to go to so much effort to make it more like home.

Opabina are a prehistoric creature we've seen grown to giant size several times before in the magazine. (issues 176 and 204) They actually move at a decent speed this time around, and have reach, which makes them slightly scarier. They're still annoying aquatic grapplers though. A fairly faithful conversion.

Xenostelid are another attempt by the daelkyr to make themselves feel more at home by crossbreeding lots of different insects until they're gigantic freakish monstrosities, all legs and pincers and mandibles. With webbing, poison, and a deadly screech, they're pretty versatile, and make quite scary shock troops if put in a team.

Xorbeasts are the most alien-looking of these, slimy creatures that exist to trap things in their folds, and take them back to their masters for gruesome experiments. I'd certainly be scared seeing one of these sliming around trying to grab me, so I think this article is a success in twisting things to give them a new, but still scary flavour. Can't neglect your body horror as well as the more psychological sort if you want to keep players on their toes.


The ecology of the wight: Another halloween appropriate article here. Wights don't have as many literary antecedents as ghouls, and their name is a bit suspect, but if you asked parties of adventurers which they're more scared off, 9 out of 10 would say the one that drains your levels. Trying to differentiate them from the other low level undead, this sets out to tie them a bit more closely to their celtic barrow origins (making them the northern counterpart to mummies, amusingly) while still giving them some extra versatility. They already have several variants, including the terrifying epic level ones. They're also differentiated by being more warrior focussed than most undead. Mummies are usually priests, incorporeal ones pretty much have to be spellcasters, vampires do everything, zombies have no finesse at all. Seems to work. So I guess this is another decent but not exceptional ecology.

 

[(un)reason]

Dragon Issue 348: October 2006


part 5/6


Savage tidings: So here we are, at the third adventure path, and the second one to be extensively supplemented in Dragon. We've already faced down Kyuss and his exceedingly icky servitors. What will this one entail. I already know it involves demons, Demogorgon, people being transformed by savagery, the sea, and the isle of dread. But it's the specifics that are important. Will I enjoy them? No time like the present to find out. Note that once again, I have not read the corresponding adventures.

Our first instalment gives us more detail on the city of Sasserine. The 7 districts get a few lines each, and then we get 6 full page writeups for various affiliations that the players will either want to join, or oppose. This isn't really quite enough to play there, but I assume that more information is presented in the corresponding Dungeon issues. I do get the feeling that they're setting up a status quo, but it'll be knocked down relatively quickly into the adventure, Orpheus style. So far, it's not particularly gripping, but as we know, there's no point destroying something the players aren't attached too. Lets see how long it'll take to kick into high gear this time round.


Spellcraft is once again tied in with recent releases, with a bit of ravenlofty goodness. Now unlike Dr Dominiani in issue 339, Strahd is well established as a wizard both capable and willing to develop his own spells. If he were a little more motivated in this area, he could probably overtake Azalin given a few more decades practice. But at the moment, he's still not the most powerful darklord in Ravenloft, just the oldest and most famous. So the only real continuity error will be if this has 9th level spells in it, or stuff from his forbidden schools.

Bloodstone's Frightful Joining is from the old Tome of magic, and ironically was one spell that didn't work too great in Ravenloft, due to close exposure to undead thoughts being extra maddening around here. Strahd also developed a reverse version of this, although curiously, that isn't mentioned here. It's actually a lot safer than it used to be, with both the chances of damage and insanity eliminated. Guess someone's been doing some refining work in the intervening years.

Curse of the Gypsies doesn't seem to be from a specific source, but isn't too surprising, given the role the Vistani have in Ravenloft. It's actually less impressive than the regular bestow curse spell, so this won't be doing the epic stuff the tales have done in the past.

Rain of Terror was from the 2e box set. It has a typically reduced 3.5 style range and duration, and more defined mechanical effects, but the visuals are the same. Gross stuff keeps falling on your head. This may be a bit unnerving.

Strahd's Baneful Attractor was also introduced in the 2e box set. it gets a bit of a nerfing too, being restricted to damage dealing spells rather than messing up all the targeting in the area. They really are cutting down on the amusing unintended consequences these days.

Wraithform was originally from the 2e PHB. Not sure why it never got converted to 3e. It's surprisingly little changed, with only a bit of math conversion needed. The whole thing's a bit boring really. You're just trying to feed of nostalgia.

 

[(un)reason]

Dragon Issue 348: October 2006


part 6/6


Sage advice: Does a dwarf barbarian wearing heavy armor retain fast movement (no)

Can a bard use bardic knowledge to substitute for any knowledge score (no)

Can a dragon shaman choose dragons not on the base list as totems (if you sstat them out, yess. Remember to keep them balanced, collins collins)

Can you use touch of vitality to restore a lost level (Only before it becomes permanent)

How does a druids animal companion advance at epic levels (It sslowly falls behind, collins collins. Ssoon it will be useless in battle.)

Can you clarify how mettle works (If it would have a partial result, it doess absolutely nothing. Very annoying, collins collins)

Do monks live forever when they reach 20th level (No. The book ssays that clearly)

Does a paladin with a special mount need to train it (not if itss intelligent, collins collins. )

How does ghost step work. Does it end when you attack (No. Ninjas are nassty killerss, yess. )

Can a soulknife create an alternate form soul blade right away (No, they have to make it, then resshape it. Ssorry.)

Does a soulknifes psychic strike apply to both blades if they're dual wielding (Yess)

When a soulknife uses bladewind, how many targets does it affect (Jusst one)

Can a warmage benefit from the extraspell feat (No. They already know all the ssplellses on their list, preciouss.

Can a wilder use wild surge while affected by timeless body (no. Both the benefits and penalties are negated )

Does practiced spellcaster help you get into prestige classes (No. Jusst like skill focuss won't help you meet skill requirements. Itss sso unfair.)

What can an assassin do while studying for death attack (anything, ass long as they keep the target in view. A good assassin sstays inconspicous)

Do children of the night become able to cast higher tier mysteries (yess. Nice shadowcassting. Andy liksess. )


Class acts: Adventurers get Mountain Ghosts. Dwarf ninjas may sound silly, but even as far back as 1st ed, Assassin was the class dwarves could gain highest level in apart from thieves (which were unlimited for nearly everyone) Don't underestimate their ability to be sneaky bastards when there's large quantities of money at stake. Exploding crossbow bolts, Repeating crossbows, Silk armor for stealth, comfort, protection and style. Noise dampening oil to apply to your equipment. More fun stuff for you to spend lots of money on.

Arcane casters gain Unfamiliar Territory. Of all their class features, familiar is the one that most often doesn't fit a particular concept and gets ignored, so here's 9 more things you can exchange that class feature for. Will you save your power and learn how to reabsorb it in the face of adversity, or put in an inanimate object instead like psions. Both seem like pretty decent options, the first particularly if you plan to go for a prestige class which doesn't advance your familiar.

Divine gets wild shape guide. A compilation of animals druids can become, and another pathetic attempt to get people to adopt the mid-edition nerf to their powers and shapeshifting in general. Ha. Good luck with that one. NOT!

Warriors get Marshall of Battle. An update for Marshals, including a bit of errata, and a whole bunch of new auras. Command large numbers of troops, and use them to whup enemy ass. More obscure class wuv for those of you that crave that kind of thing.


Nodwick finds undead pirates. After the past couple of issues, that seems more like a vacation. Dork tower try the healthy snacks again. This time even Carson is horrified. Honestly, have you no memory at all. He likes that stuff. Zogonia find out just how much they missed in the last dungeon. OotS suffer from too much inaction as they fight a large battle.


This one would be above average if it were any other month, but is fairly middling for an october issue, as it does have a fair amount of rehash. While they do have a few cool new ideas, there's also quite a bit of regurgitating old ones too, and blatant self-promotion for their new products. Still, it's not as if I can't look back, and as long as they're adding at least a little cool new stuff each time, the journey has not been in vain. That remains the case here.

 

[(un)reason]

Dragon Issue 349: November 2006


part 1/6


74 (100) pages. Someones been playing too much Zelda recently :cough:/ripoff/:cough: Time for another elf on the cover, and another issue without a theme. We've had plenty of both of those, so it's once again time to judge individual articles on their own merits, rather than as part of a larger plan, and see if we can come up with our own schemes to combine them in cool ways.


Scan Quality: Blurry, low-res, indexed, ad-free scan.


In this issue:


Editorial: This month's editorial is another reminder that in the real world, adventuring is HARD. Dealing with rough terrain, darkness and lugging around 50 pound backpacks is not glamorous, and will have pampered modern folk whinging after less than an hour of trekking. Hell, even a bit of LARPing serves as a good reminder of the realities the magazine's writers work with every day. Balanced encounters? They had trouble just keeping track of their stuff in the dark. In conclusion, they'd rather keep their fantasies fantastical, not try and make the game too gritty or go off and try to become adventurers in real life. Buncha wusses. Not impressed at all. At least Roger had his army experience to draw upon when writing. Go out, experience harsh conditions and come back. Then you might be able to write adventures that genuinely resonate with us.


Scale Mail: Our first letter is from someone who liked the Impiltur article, but found it woefully incomplete. Given how much Realmslore there is by now, they could fill a whole issue on a single country and still miss something. The same will definitely apply to the Horde one this month, since that was originally a full boxed set, plus novel and adventure trilogies.

Next, we have a letter from an eagle scout trying to earn a merit badge. This is cute and unusual enough amongst their normal selection of letters that they just can't resist helping out. Next thing they'll be printing complaints from people's mums again.

A second letter also praises the Implitur article. With demand like this, they really are thinking about bringing back a regular monthly column of realmslore. It's good that the readers made that very clear to the staff.

And once again, we finish off on some historical nitpicking. The 5th element (according to the greeks) was Cosmos, connected to the 12-sided platonic shape. Milla Jovovich and Ma-Ti can go each other. ( which I can't find fanfic or art of on the internet, in blatant violation of rule 34)

 

[(un)reason]

Dragon Issue 349: November 2006


part 2/6


First watch: Our environment books go back to where adventures often start with Cityscape. Once again they show us that you don't even need to go anywhere, with lots of stuff useful for both players and DM's. Selective AoE spells? That's always incredibly handy anyway, given dumb players. But what races will they focus on?

Eberron gets Dragonmarked. The spotlight goes on one of the biggest sources of cool new crunch and setting associations. If you want to focus on this side of your character a little more, then now you can. Prestige classes. Getchore prestige classes here! Join the queue mate.

Following up on the new basic set, we have Scourge of the Howling Horde. An introductory adventure for 1st level characters, designed to hold a new DM's hands through the experience. Jump on board, the water's lovely.

Out in D20 land, Goodman games are going for a major nostalgia hit with Gazetteer of the Known Realms. See the adventures that came before put into context, in classic fashion harking back to old mystara and oerth. Yay for that and yay for boxed sets.

Also quite possibly nostalgia inducing is the complete D&D cartoon boxed set. Seems like they've mentioned it here recently more than they ever did back when it was actually on. Another one of those slightly baffling turnups for the book, especially as time has not been kind to it.

The Blood War minis set gets unleashed upon the public. Not just fiends, but all sorts of other planar creatures as well for you to fight. On the third party side, Magnificent Egos release a Kraken upon us. Other worlds vs the watery deeps. Pretty decent fight actually. There's also a whole range of wooden environments from Laser Crafts, including a rather nice ship to facilitate water battles. All ties together surprisingly neatly.

Our game aid this month is another easily erasable initiative board. Seen them before, may well see them again.

If you're interested in card games, there's Rise of the Shogun. Like the warmachine/beasts, this is a selfcontained game, but can combine with other games in the series to make something bigger. No great surprises here either.

Our book is slightly more interesting. The art of the Cthulhu Mythos draws from tons of products from the last few decades, including the RPG. If you're a collector, then this'll give you something to display, and quite possibly an idea of what else is still out there to track down.

Order of the stick gets The Dungeon of Dorukan. A fun little game starring all our treacherous, unstable and incompetent friends we've come to know and love over the years. Who will win this battle and get the bragging rights?

And finally, they promote a company that makes replica swords of the ones you see in movies. That's entertainment. Nothing you can't sell or buy, if you know the right people and pay the right PRIIIIIIIIIIICE!!

 

[(un)reason]

Dragon Issue 349: November 2006


part 3/6


Final fantasy XII: Immediately after First Watch ends, we have another article that's just pure promotion with absolutely no usable material. I know the final fantasy series is a big deal, but you at least managed interesting conversions of stuff before in the Silicon Sorcery column, and those were usually only 2-3 pages long. Instead, this is just a basic description of the game with a bunch of artwork, with neither game material or critical reviewing involved. So this is an area in which they have definitely continued to get worse after Erik took over. A shame.


Hitting the bullseye: As they did with polearms in issue 331, here's a comprehensive guide to various ranged weapons in D&D, with their specific benefits, weaknesses, and costs detailed and a few new ones added. The kind of thing that doesn't have the same kind of glamour as new spells and magical items, but is actually less common, and oddly enough easier to use in everyday play, as the things it details are more affordable. As much attention is put on the ammo as the things firing it, with a fairly unsurprising set of trick arrows for those of you who want to play hawkeye or green arrow. The only thing missing is new feats that enhance your shooting skills, since we have plenty of those in our two rounds of splatbooks by this point. It's just a shame they don't cover slings too, because they're seriously underrepresented in the magazine, with not a single bazaar devoted to them in any edition. That seriously needs fixing. So this is decent, but not great.


Demonomicon of Iggwilv: Dagon. Another iconic demonic name gets a fairly substantial update this month. Their simultaneously new and shiny, and older and more primordial epic demon type continues to get love, as they retcon him into an obyrith. Which does actually make sense, considering the mythology that surrounds him. His statblock has some particularly nasty special powers that mean anyone without access to a powerful cleric will likely be permanently ed up even if they do defeat him. His thralls also have some interesting benefits and penalties, with the expected innsmouth look stuff being supplemented with some musical tricks, and lots of nicely backed up flavour. It's back to these being tremendously fun reads, filled with all kinds of neat bits and pieces that you can use individually, or weave into an epic plot culminating in a confrontation with the demon lord himself. How very pleasing.

 

[(un)reason]

Dragon Issue 349: November 2006


part 4/6


The horde: Well, this is pleasing too. They're actually updating the timeline properly in this return to a long-neglected area of the Realms. That's a positive development indeed. The Horde may have been defeated a generation ago when they tried to attack the western Realms, and been mostly forgotten, but they certainly haven't forgotten in turn. Like the gap between WW1 & WW2, there's now a new generation of angry young men who want to try their luck, while the old are still healthy enough to take part and eager to avoid the mistakes they made last time. Of course, not everything has changed, and there's a fair bit of regurgitating basic info about the geography and culture, but the big players have been updated, so this is still useful to someone who has the boxed set, and vice versa. They also update the dzalmus dragon, which curiously enough wasn't in the boxed set, but the bonus material in Dragon 163. It does seem more than enough to work with if you want to bring back a bit of that exotic flavour. Now if only they'd do a big feature on australian, south american or polynesian adventuring and myth, all of which are sadly lacking because no-one could be bothered to do the research, or the people at WotC don't think they'd have a wide enough audience appeal. (which ironically results in them having less racial and sexual diversity in their articles than the 90's) You've managed quite a few themes they missed in the old days. Don't let the magazine die without leaving out these obvious ones.


The ecology of the ogre mage: What, when you haven't done regular ogres here yet? :shrug: If you say so. I suppose they do make more interesting characters, being intelligent, magical, having a proper society and all that. Like rakshasas, they originally derive from eastern myth, and like them, they have a definite fiendish flavour without actually being extraplanar, making this extra appropriate following on from the last article. This lampshades that, by providing a creation myth that has them descending from the children of gods, and creating two new variant subspecies that make that option extra appealing. It also makes them seem more likely than most races to add to their power by taking class levels. With fairly solid ties to both D&D and real history, this is another quite decent ecology, adding quite a bit of stuff that should be useful in actual play. No objections here.