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Yep. But I also remember a software company that I contacted about a problem with their program. They mailed me a new disk with the most up-to-date patched version - at no charge. This was a $40 game from a smaller company (Breach 2). If I tried that today, I'd be lucky to even get a response...

I noticed this attitude from the very beginning of TSR - I don't know if Gygax started it, but he made a number of public statements against companies for "stealing" concepts such as Armor Class, Level, and Hit Points (never mind where he got them in the first place). TSR always had a bit of...

Two points off the top of my head: 1. Concerning area effect spells, one possibility is to charge one extra mana per 5' square affected. 5' radius would be 4 squares, 10' radius would be 12 squares, 15' cone would be 6 or 7 (depending on facing), and so on. A 40' radius would be 172 squares...

Just my two cents', but I think if you try to balance this with point buy, it won't work very well. Players can be very good at getting the most out of their stats, if allowed to pick and choose. One possibility is to have all characters use the same point buy up front (say 28 points), then...

YMMV, but I thought he did an excellent job in The Greatest Game Ever Played. Admittedly, the british (both golfers, the journalist, the aristocrat) really made the movie, but if you haven't seen it, give it a shot.

Similar. When prepping an adventure, I like to have everything handy, in a format that I like to use. I hate paging through several different books for one bit of info, or one stat block. The SRD helps enormously here, with cut and paste, but the other stuff can be very time-consuming to enter...

Oops, my bad. This is a much more difficult problem. I don't know if this will work for you, but here's what I started doing when my group started a new campaign. I create item cards for every item the characters get, with a brief description. What I do not put on the card is a cost. If the...

I agree wholeheartedly with the first sentence. The second, OTOH, works only for specific stereotypes, such as a Knight of the Round Table. I would argue that Harry Dresden (of the Dresden Files) is an outstanding example of a paladin (tho a very imperfect one). Yet, he's no fighter. No armor...

Boy, I hope I misunderstood this. It sounds like you're saying the GM(s) limit characters in how much wealth they can have. Why? The wealth guidelines aren't intended to be a straitjacket, limiting what an individual character can have - they're just general guidelines for a particular style of...

Agree 100%. This is like the arguments about "hack-n-slash" style games, or "powergamers" - the spirit of the game is having fun, not conforming to someone else's preferences.

I like it. One nit pick: I believe the tail attack should be at +3, as it's a secondary attack.

Since I only find RP notes on about 5-10% of the entries, for me, it's not much use. However, for GM's who primarily need stat blocks, especially for some unusual class/race combos, it's a great resource.

I use NPC's from books constantly, but usually not for the stat blocks. I need evocative names, interesting RP traits, hooks, background, etc. I can do the mechanics in my sleep, but coming up characters who aren't just a variation of the same character...not if my life depended on it. I've...

The key is to give the pc's something they can affect, and have anything they can't affect occur off-stage or as a cutscene. That pretty much sums up the problem with the modules, as written. The writers didn't focus on ensuring that the players had fun, regardless of how the story progressed.

Our group gave up on the adventure after the first module because of the final encounter. YMMV, but I would strongly recommend eliminating that encounter (where the PC's are encouraged to participate, but virtually everything they can do has been nerfed by the module writer). If you must keep...

Your argument is getting stronger, but I still don't like it... :p Fortunately my current group isn't using the Hexblade, so we don't have to worry about this.

Hyp, I follow your reasoning and it makes perfect sense if one assumes that (partial) saves are used in a consistent manner, which given WOTC's track record, I don't. I'll bring up glitterdust yet again. Per your interpretation, it has a main effect and a lesser effect. The main effect is...

Prismatic Wall also has Fortitude partial listed for its fourth effect - if a hexblade saves against it (poison), does that negate all the remaining layers of the wall? Or only that particular layer? If only a specific layer, then a reasonable interpretation of the orb spell is that there are...

Good point - I missed the fact that it doesn't apply to reflex saves, which excludes quite a lot of common spells.

Alignment