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Per encounter abilities are only a problem if players or GMs attempt the game the system by artificially lengthening an encounter to extend a power's duration. I have to say that I have very sympathy with this "problem." Each gaming group can put a stop to such behavior on their own. My group...

I have to let my inner whovian out. The episode was Curse of Fenric, and it starred the 7th doctor. One of the coolest things about it IMO was that the village priest was able to turn the vampires at first, but they subverted his faith by talking to him. Once it faltered, they were fell on him...

It seems that I am forever agreeing with John Snow. :) I would hope that they have fixed the problem with multiclassing as cherry picking in 4e. The SWSE rules for multiclassing are much better IMO than anything we've seen in D&D so far.

I'm going to admit that I have my problems with the spiked chain. If such weapon had existed in history, and it was half as good as the spiked is in D&D, no fighter anywhere would have wielded anything else. That said, I know that some people really like them, so I wouldn't argue for them not...

I'm a historian as well, with a focus in Late Antique/Dark Ages. There is nothing in the campaign hook that wouldn't make sense in such a setting. Coming of Age rituals are pretty iconic in tribal/village cultures. The presence of actual monsters in this setting makes it a bit more problematic...

QTF. No Warlord (or any other character class) who acted like this would be welcome at any table in my group. Being abused by the NPCs is bad enough. Abusing fellow PCs is a good way to lose a friendship.

I believe that Shelly is writing what her audience wants. She is a pretty successful author, and there are a lot of us who like her articles just the way they are.

Sorry. I was at work and didn't have my FF with me. In any event, I still think the monster was way cooler than its name. But I guess it would have to be.

One person's lame is another person's cool. Personally, I like tindertwigs and sunrods. I may not be too fond of the concept of waybread/journeybread/whatever, but there are a lot of GMs and players who do like it. BTW, the armor you mentioned above seems way more lame to me than alchemical...

I've been lurking for a while on the threads dealing with this subject because I'm not sure how I feel about the new rule. We're going to give it a try this weekend in our two games, to see how it works out. But I do have a few thoughts: Fire Squares vs. Pixilated Circles I don't particularly...

I have to say that all of the features look pretty cool to me, especially Ari's. I have always had a soft spot for Orcus. I've used him in just about every game (including Champions) that I've run over the years. :D I am less happy that we will see fewer articles over the next few weeks. I...

I would suggest that anyone looking for a serious article not read Shelly's column. My wife loves her, she makes me laugh and I think she's a welcome addition to the line-up. As for her dislike of the dead, not everyone can be perfect - but this made her one step closer for me. :p

I started with OD&D (white box) in 1978, then moved to AD&D in 1980. I played (and ran) 2e intermittently, but flirted with HERO, Runequest and GURPS for most of the 1990s. I even spent some time on the convention circuit running demos of GURPS (it's how I got anout 1/4 of my collection). 3e...

I started with OD&D (white box) in 1978, then moved to AD&D in 1980. I played (and ran) 2e intermittently, but flirted with HERO, Runequest and GURPS for most of the 1990s. I even spent some time on the convention circuit running demos of GURPS (it's how I got anout 1/4 of my collection). 3e...

Bear with me on this. The CIFAL was actually an interesting monster, reminiscent of Frank Herbert's The Green Brain http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Green_Brain. Like many original Fiend Folio monsters, it suffered from poor naming conventions. No one would want to use a monster called a...

I don't want to be snarky here, but 4e can't possibly do away with any of these elements. We may see fewer published scenarios that deal with them, but most adventures are homebrewed. On this point, I would agree 100%. Not every room must have a challenge in order to be interesting. I would...

Funny thing is that I had always assumed that this was the way D&D scenarios were meant to be designed. The earliest published modules were replete with such encounter areas. In the G1-3 series, several encounter areas said things like (paraphrase): if combat breaks out in room 20, then the...

My group will have multiple 4e games starting up within 6 months of the release date. The characters I've been working on: Human wizard (PoL campaign based loosely on Keep on the Borderlands): He's kind of a nerdy and booksmart wizard, running out to the frontier because of an accident that...

Along with the Froghemoth, the web bird and the vegepygmy.

They were written up extensively in module D3, Vault of the Drow.