Search results

Almost like they're drawn from (or at least inspired by) real-world mythologies. ;) Seriously, you're absolutely right. The problem is shallowness and two-dimensionality. And it can afflict races based on any source--it certainly seems to have afflicted the D&D3E races moreso than most of the...

And, BTW, why have a couple people in this thread referred to dralisites as "rock people"? There's nothing rocky about them--they're soft and amoeba-like or maybe gelatin-like, and they're not silicon-based, so where'd that idea even come from? It never would've occurred to me to liken them in...

My problem is with 2-D races that are (1) unoriginal, (2) shallow, and (3) bland. So, while the litorians and sibeccai of Arcana Unearthed disappointed me on the 1st point (the lion-people are nomadic individualistic warriors; the dog-people are doting servitors and highly urban/social), they...

Well, the more i hear about the B5 D20 books, the more i want them--i only have the core book. I at least want all the race/gov't books, all the season guides, the rangers and psi-corp books, the galactic guide, and the crusade spin-off book. We'll wait and see about the campaigns and the zocalo...

It depends on how much influence you want the luck points to have on the game. With so few of them (only one per level), if you want them to have a significant influence, you should definitely let the players decide after the roll. Heck, if it were my game, i'd let them decide after the results...

My last group ranged in age from mid-20s to mid-30s. We gamed whenever our schedules allowed. For at least a solid year, there, that meant Sat/Sun mornings [varying from week to week], sometimes as early as 8:30AM. We'd rotate locations, and the host fixed breakfast. It worked great. One of my...

I've used the different lifespans in two different ways. In After the Overrunning, the elves, as near-fey, were charged by the faeries with keeping the other races in check. Then the faeries got pissed off and took over the whole place. Now it's a couple elven generations later, so many of the...

pshaw! Ideas can't be copyrighted, and neither can game rules. And, even if the game stats qualify as copyrightable (doubtful), such a small excerpt, in the context of telling someone about the content of a book, is almost definitely well within the realm of fair use. Or, to put it another way...

Even "well-written" is partly a matter of taste or preference. I figured out AD&D1 simply by reading the AD&D1 PH and DMG--i'd played exactly one session of Basic D&D before that, and was completely clueless (as is normal, IME, for one's first RPG session). And had no problem doing so. I was 10...

I missed your point--in response to a claim that one is flavorful, if idiosyncratic, and the other is dry and to-the-point, you post a passage from the first that is idiosyncratic, though perhaps not terribly flavorful, and a passage from the second that is dry and to-the-point. I just kept the...

I'm pretty sure that the rule officially says that, in the case of a tie, the person with the higher bonus to the roll wins, and if those also tie, teh person with the higher ability modifier wins, and if that's also a tie, flip a coin--i'm pretty sure it never mentions the ability score itself.

Earthdawn is very cool in a number of ways. The goal of the design of the game was to provide for high-fantasy dungeon crawling, with ecologically-impossible monsters around every turn, magic items just lying around, and heroes who totally overshadowed mundanes--IOW, all the D&D tropes. So, they...

It worked like this, roughly: some sort of skill/ability check if you want to change your engagement status with a foe, and if that foe doesn't want to let you, it's an opposed check. So, if you want to retreat, and your foe wants to keep bashing you, you both make a check. If you succeed...

Well, Elements of Magic is a, what, $10 PDF? I don't know what "BoHM" is, but we'll assume a $30 hardcover. DanMcS's proficiency rules are free. The D20SRD is free. So, grand total: <$40.

Well, heck, if we're gonna go just on monetary value vs. price paid, i think my friend has you beat: an entire bankers' box full of AD&D1/2 stuff for free, including two copies of Dieties & Demigods, one with Cthulhu & Melnibonean, the other with just one of those (i forget which one was in the...

Just a point of order here: scenarios aren't "splatbooks". A splatbook is a book about a group within the game, and is a player's book moreso than a GM's book. The group could have in-world meaningfulness (Clanbook: Tzimisce), or be purely mechanical in theme (The Complete Warrior). But the...

You're just bringing your own prejudices to the table. After all, if either of them is superior in any sort of vaguely-objective way, it's clearly the PB&J. PB&J can be kept at room temperature for several days; a hamburger will go bad in just a few hours. PB&J is perfectly edible after being...

Um, maybe he likes PB&J more than hamburgers? Seriously, though, i'm pretty certain the point of his comparison was not that D&D3E is better or worse than AD&D1, just that they're hugely different. That's it. BTW, i'm assuming you didn't intend to analogize D&D3E to an Apple II, vs. AD&D1 as...

Well, if by revolutionary you mean "a big change", then, yes, it definitely is. That's simple observation. Whether it's a big improvement, and whether the changes are novel/original, is where we get into more subjective territory.

Has no resemblance to any of my experiences, or those of people i knew. One group of about 4 college-age guys didn't switch. But 3 of the four of them were playing in my 2nd ed game at the same time. Every other group i knew switched, and happily. Most grandfathered existing characters; a few...