"Classic" Dragon Articles

[Derulbaskul]

My vote for a classic article is Fedifensor from issue number 67. It was the search for a holy avenger on a githyanki citadel on the Astral Plane.

My vote for the useful articles are those that deal with names for the various races.

My recommendation for the editors is that it is high time a proper index was compiled and hosted on the website. I have all the Dragon issues (OK, I cheated by buying the CD ROM) but sometimes it's hard to find the one you need. Now, if we had an index that would be a whole lot easier.

 

[Knightfall]

The Wizards Three
Campaign Classics
Anything Greyhawk related

 

[Psion]

• I'll second (or whatever number we are up to) Dungeoncraft
• And Toxins of Cerillon. Permanently broke me of poisons that sounded like blood types.
• The article on mysteries in Dragon #240. It was a rockin' selection of intriguing elements you could drop in as plot hooks, clues, etc. It rocked so much, I wrote some of my own (see here and here.)
• Ed Bonny's Skills & Powers planescape article. Yes some of it was over the top, but it brought planescape in line with S&P.
• The articles on gem dragons and ferrous dragons.
• Don't remember the exact title of the article, but there was a naming article that provided alternate cultural names for various creatures, like calling hobgoblins "bwgan."
• A plethora of paladins. This is the paladins of different alignment article that lots of people were referring to, and it is in the early 100s (105 or 106 IIRC).
• What's New, with Phil & Dixie!
• The three part psionics article that included the psionicist and Deryni. (Looking back through the CD archive, it was funny seeing how they warned you to use the psionicist at your own risk "because Gary didn't write it any only he knows what's balanced." As if the existing Psionics system in 1e was balanced... BID.)
• The creature catalogs. It chapped my hide that the third one got left out of the dragon CD archive... I had to go dig up my hardcopy.
• The enchanted armors article illustrated by rk post, that had things like bug armor and force armor. I need to update that to 3e.
• The article on new ioun stones in 179. It also talked about the original ioun stones as conceived by Vance, and made a sort of parallel where you could harvest them on a part of the plane of minerals that borders on the positive energy plane.
• The humorous article with the wandering damage table (with interesting entries like "cut self shaving, consult limb loss table...")
• The humorous article by Roger Moore in which he states that a date with a succubus can take you from archmage to prestidigitator in a single night...
• As long as people are mentioning monthly columns they like, let me throw in my pitch for the somewhat newer (but still pre-3e) Dungeon Mastery. The content of the articles varied a lot, but there were a lot of intriguing articles in there, such as the article on generations (based on a real book that posits there is a generational cycle that defines the values of successive generations, and takes this theory and puts it into practice by applying it to the NPC trait tables.)

 

[Gallo22]

I'll go with all of the above, but..

The thing that makes some articles more memorable than others to me is how they are written.

I like it best whe the article is written from within the game. It's not Ed Greenwood and Monte Cook discusing magic spells, it's Elminster chating with Malhavoc at an inn about their favorite gnomish illusions spells.

One recent article that was very memorable was the Ecology of the Sheet Phantom. It took a very silly monster and made it feel like it was an undead creature to be feared by showing it to us through the eyes of it's victims.

Imagine if in the last issue of Dragon, the Spies in the pictures were describing their own chosen "Professions". What if the Gadgets and Gizmos article was presented as the Aurora's Whole Realms Catalog was, as items for sale, but by a D&D version of Q?

This is a VERY GOOD idea!! Hope Erik goes with it!!

Gallo22

 

[Klaus]

"The Green Dweomer", from Dragon #273 (the last 2e issue)...


... 'cause it was my first professional RPG gig!

Also, "Bard on the Run" that featured the Companion's Rhapsody (with apologies to Queen):

"Oh Kitiara, Kitiara/Kitiara let me go!"

 

[DocSER]

I have an odd favorite (favorite except for some that have already been mentioned here many times, at least).

I think it was in the last year or so before issue 200. There was an article on "bonded weapons". These were weapons that were composed of elemental or energy-based materials (defined broadly). A magical sword actually made of sound or pure magic, for example.

The execution was not spectacular but the concept brought in a different class of magic weapons. There was a lot of flexibility for customization and these were easy to drop in to a campaign.

It sure beats the prestige class (or dozen PrCs) that have become depressingly common. PrCs take a lot of work to integrate in to campaigns for characters (they have to devote an entire level to these things just to start). We are talking about months of game time to work through a short one. While I like the idea, the marginal value has diminished substantially.

The bonded weapons, on the other hand, could be worked in to a campaign in a variety of ways. One could simply find one of these weapons (maybe in the hands of an opponent). One could have to create one to overcome a damage resistant monster. One could have to quest to find an epic or near epic level bonded weapon. There were simply lots of options. If you wanted to make this the center of campaign, you could. You could also just use one for flavor.

I like these sorts of campaign options that can be integrated in to campaigns with little disruption if one wants.

 

[d20Dwarf]

Sheldon Price's ridiculous ninja class articles, with the land mines and rockets and stuff. The way we talk about them, though, you probably won't want to include them in your project.

Bring back the jester core class, though. That would make me happy.

 

[Calico_Jack73]

Gotta go with the Paladin variants for all alignments other than Lawful Good.

 

[nikolai]

I remember enjoying Elminster's Notebook, shame it slowly died...

 

[grodog]

As a living example of how ENWorld is bad for your wallet, I went onto EBay and bought the Dragon Archive CD-Rom this morning.

Curse all of you!!!

Olive, that's the single best $30 gaming investment you'll ever make. Relish it!