Search results

In D&D, they absolutely do. D&D does not make any pretense of realism about training time. The difference between level 1 and level 20 is enormous to the point of absurdity, but you can develop those skills in a few months of adventuring. So why assume that your 1st-level abilities took years...

In my last campaign, I restrained myself in the early stages. In the later stages, I went wild and things got nuts; but I didn't have to deal with it for long, because the campaign was approaching its end. Also, this coincided with a sharp increase in plane-hopping and general weirdness, and was...

I think we've already seen it: Pathfinder. Some other company with a connection to D&D picks up the torch and makes a 5E clone under a different name.

Survival is a goal. Why does the AI care about that? Humans care about survival because natural selection weeds out organisms that don't, and we're the end product of 4 billion years of that. But an AI only cares about whatever functions it has been trained to maximize. It doesn't have a...

My take: I like the fantastical to be rare within the setting as a whole. But it also should not be evenly distributed. There are pockets where the fantastical ramps way up, and that's right where the PCs tend to find themselves.

Agreed on "Heroes." I can't think of other examples of "one-season shows" offhand, but I will say that "Supernatural" was a five-season show. "Swan Song" needs only a few tweaks to be a perfect conclusion to the story. As far as I'm concerned, everything after that is fanfic with unusually high...

My take: Stop fighting human psychology and put it to work for you. If you present an indication of danger, the players will zero in on it. This is perfectly logical and entirely in character. It is also a valuable tool to the writer/DM: You can be confident that you have the players' attention...

At that point you don't need box text. Just put on "Monty Python and the Holy Grail." It's all you'll hear that session anyway.

I can see the point that box text is a good support for novice DMs, but if that is its primary function, then it should be modeling evocative, immersive narration. And that means keeping it short. No, shorter than that. Really short. The more adjectives and sentences you pile on, the more the...

Depends on a lot of things. How common are magic items in this setting? What other adventure options are available? What kind of monsters are we facing? Also, what edition is this? Some editions you're badly screwed without magic weapons. Others, it's not such a big deal.

Eh, this isn't really in "boycott" territory IMO. More like "Your periodic reminder not to assume WotC always has the community's interests at heart, and check that money you're spending on them is still giving you value." (Of course, if you do that check and the answer is no, then you should...

Before anyone says it: WotC is NOT required to do this to keep the IP. "Defend it or lose it" is for trademarks, not copyrights.

I think it's safe to say Sigil's hit point total compares unfavorably to that of a doornail. This is no doubt stuff that was already in the pipeline. If they are still putting out content three months from now, then I might start to consider "not dead yet."

Moreover, concentration requirement is a killer for damage spells. The powerhouse combat spells tend to be debuff, battlefield control, and action denial. And most of the good ones -- Fear, Hypnotic Pattern, Hold Person/Monster, Wall of Force, etc. -- are concentration spells. That's generally...

Just a reminder that you have the power to edit Wikipedia articles if you feel so inclined. :)

You can make enormous changes while preserving backwards compatibility. D&D rules consist of "elements" (spells, feats, equipment, classes, species, etc.) and "systems" (movement rules, resting rules, combat rules, etc.). There are well-defined interfaces through which each system interacts with...

The changes are on par with what we saw in the 3E -> 3.5E transition. It is certainly not 6E. But it absolutely is 5.5E. Substantial changes were made to the existing rules; they did not simply consolidate options from the material already in print.

If it were my campaign, the answer would be yes; there is a genuine eclipse that serves the archmage's requirements. Of course, there will be some... side effects. For example: The archmage did not specify which moon was to produce an eclipse, so rather than moving the existing moon, the...