NOW LIVE! Today's the day you meet your new best friend. You don’t have to leave Wolfy behind... In 'Pets & Sidekicks' your companions level up with you!

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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Elder-Basilisk" data-source="post: 2775375" data-attributes="member: 3146">Hmm. At the moment, I'm mostly running the RPGA's living campaigns--in my home game it probably won't be my turn to DM my campaign for a good six months or so. I do, however, do my best to use as many environmental factors as possible. While some DMs will simply say "you're in a forest; no charging" and put down a blank battlemap, I try to draw trees and undergrowth on the map and, if appropriate to put in elevation. If the PCs are travelling across the frozen trollfens, they'll be making balance checks to move more than half speed and when the flamestrike a troll, the troll might fall throught the weakened ice afterward.I suppose it is tactical, but my main take on it is that it also tends to be more cinematic. In one fight, for instance, the party's dwarf cleric was tanking a pair or trolls while everyone else ran for cover. Since his armor made him pretty much unhittable, I had one troll grapple him, move him to a cliff, and make a third grapple check to throw him over. He then made a reflex save and caught onto a branch about fifteen feet down the slope. On his turn, he slung his shield, cast air walk, cast freedom of movement, pulled out another axe and walked back up to the fight. That's a lot more interesting and memorable than "I hit, you miss, etc." In one other battle, I had laid out a spiked pit in the middle of an arena so the dwarf bull-rushed one of my warmages into it. More memorable than using the heedless charge shock trooper ability, I'd say. In another one, I had a fight in the inn and the bard's player took a look at the setup and said: "OK, I move to here, jump onto those barrels, hop up onto the bannister, slide down and attack into the flank from higher ground." He had the skills to pull it off and it once again made for an interesting combat.If I write another module, I think I'm going to take it as a personal challenge to include at least one hazard that makes bull rush useful and at least one opportunity for jump or balance to open up new options. It's just more interesting to fight group of monsters A in an interactive environment that affects the combat than to fight group of monsters A on a flat featureless plain.I don't know if it effects everyone equally, but I think it makes things more fun in general.</blockquote>

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