Dragon #295 in Today!


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I want elves so skilled they can capture the divine light of holy trees in gems and fight wars against evil gods over their possesion.

I'm especially looking forward to the ELH so I can truly run a 1st Age Middle Earth game in D20. That will be FUN! :D
 

drowdude said:

quote:
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Originally posted by Vuron
"My Wizard summons the energy of the multiverse into a golden ball of energy chanting Ka me ha me ha!"
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"Special Beam Cannon!!!" :D

"FINAL FLASH!!!!!!!!!!"
 

>>>
So no artifacts then from this issue? Huh I was hoping to see that list of artifacts that 294 said they would do.
>>>

It's looking like that's going to appear in 297. I meant to slip it into 296, but another index was so long I had to bump it.

--Erik
 


Kamehamehahaha?

Aaron L said:
I want monks who can throw a kamehameha and release all their ki at once in a blast so devestating that it turns them to stone.

:confused: Aaron, what is this from? I got all the others...
 


Arcane Runes Press said:
Yup,

"OZ"ball and "Boots of Monk Replacement". Can't wait to add THAT to my game.

I WILL buy the ELH and I hope to be surprised by what's inside, but I am swiftly losing hope.

I want "epic" as in Gilgamesh, Thor vs Jormungand, or the Monkey King. At this point it looks like WoTC equates "Epic" with Final Fantasy's Limit Break spells.

To be fair, Mjolnir is at its core just a magic warhammer with a metric boatload of abilities layered on - and I mean the mythological Mjolnir, not the writeup in D&Dg.

Heck, where do you think they got most of the weapon abilities and magic items in the DMG? Gauntlets of ogre power, girdle of giant strength, hammer of thunderbolts...you think the way they interact is an accident? It's all from epic myths, folks. Gygax knew what he was doing - he stole from the best.

I have a feeling that myth and legend are where they are getting their ideas for what is possible with super-high levels of skill as well. Want to duplicate Cuchulain's spear feat? You need a grossly high bonus on your Jump and Balance checks so you can leap from spear to spear as they fly through the air - and of course 4 attacks. :D

Any set of rules cannot hope to give you the epic of Gilgamesh or the Kalevala. At best it can give you the tools to make your own - and as far as I've seen, the ELH does that. The players need to apply the imagination and turn that DC80 swim check into Beowulf in full mail, holding a sword as he swims through a storm. The players need to apply the inspiration to turn a +5 magic spear with a laundry list of abilities into Gungnir or Gae Bolga. No book can do that for you.

J
 


drnuncheon said:


Any set of rules cannot hope to give you the epic of Gilgamesh or the Kalevala. At best it can give you the tools to make your own - and as far as I've seen, the ELH does that. The players need to apply the imagination and turn that DC80 swim check into Beowulf in full mail, holding a sword as he swims through a storm. The players need to apply the inspiration to turn a +5 magic spear with a laundry list of abilities into Gungnir or Gae Bolga. No book can do that for you.

J

SHRUG. Maybe. But a book that purports to give "Epic" level gaming can and should include long sections on how to develop a campaign that incorporates weapons like Gungnir without that campaign descending into a farce of well muscled ego machines hurling nuclear bombs at one another. That kind of guidance is as much of a "tool" as a laundry list of new abilities is. So far, the teaser releases I've seen have all revolved around "look how mighty this new item or power is!" After a while, that sort of thing just makes me shrug. I want to see a teaser that describes a playtest adventure or campaign. I want to see concrete examples of how the playtesters took all the tools from the ELH and turned them into at least a reasonable approximation of heroic myth or, at the least, a cohesive, internally logical campaign.
 

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