el-remmen
Moderator Emeritus
Hoping to run a version of this one soon. . .
TSR [Let's Read] Polyhedron/Dungeon
Hoping to run a version of this one soon. . .
Ancalagon
Dusty Dragon
Damn that is one heck of a hook!
(un)reason
Legend
Dungeon Issue 64: Sep/Oct 1997
part 5/5
The Mad Chefs of Lac Anchois: After two issues filled with short adventures, it is nice to see that even the smallest and most comedic one in here is still 10 pages long. A pair of cloud giants have kidnapped a whole load of grippli to make a giant-sized meal of frog's legs with. You have 3 days before the other giant food critics arrive at their restaurant to rescue them. Will you scope the place out as a customer and go for a heist style breakout after hours, or just go in and attack straightforwardly? (depending on party level as usual for odds of success) Or perhaps use polymorphing or three adventurers stacked in a trenchcoat to masquerade as giant health & safety inspectors and get the place shut down for regulation violations, or whatever other ludicrous idea comes to the player's minds, because this is the kind of scenario where just rolling with the cartoon ridiculousness is probably the best idea. So this is all very silly, featuring things like a spoon of transmuting Flesh to Roquefort cheese (good luck keeping your buddy from crumbling long enough to research the reverse spell and turn them back), food critics that are obvious TV chef references and the nagging ghost of the giant's great-aunt, but at least it's the kind of silliness with plenty of worldbuilding detail that doesn't railroad the players into solving it in one specific way only. If you're playing in the absurdist Orcs of Thar style it would fit right in. (although the odds of a campaign of that making it from 1st to high enough level to use this are pretty slim) The kind of comedy adventure I can see the value in even if I don't plan on using it myself, encouraging hammy roleplaying and big chaotic action scenes, it's pretty good for what it is.
A substantial improvement over the past few issues, giving us fewer adventures, each with greater depth. The emphasis on making adventures that react to the characters and have variable difficulty depending on what they do is quite pleasing, merging the roleplaying and dungeoncrawling rather than trying to ditch the dungeon parts entirely like the last few issues. On we head to see if next issue's adventures have any kind of common factor.
part 5/5
The Mad Chefs of Lac Anchois: After two issues filled with short adventures, it is nice to see that even the smallest and most comedic one in here is still 10 pages long. A pair of cloud giants have kidnapped a whole load of grippli to make a giant-sized meal of frog's legs with. You have 3 days before the other giant food critics arrive at their restaurant to rescue them. Will you scope the place out as a customer and go for a heist style breakout after hours, or just go in and attack straightforwardly? (depending on party level as usual for odds of success) Or perhaps use polymorphing or three adventurers stacked in a trenchcoat to masquerade as giant health & safety inspectors and get the place shut down for regulation violations, or whatever other ludicrous idea comes to the player's minds, because this is the kind of scenario where just rolling with the cartoon ridiculousness is probably the best idea. So this is all very silly, featuring things like a spoon of transmuting Flesh to Roquefort cheese (good luck keeping your buddy from crumbling long enough to research the reverse spell and turn them back), food critics that are obvious TV chef references and the nagging ghost of the giant's great-aunt, but at least it's the kind of silliness with plenty of worldbuilding detail that doesn't railroad the players into solving it in one specific way only. If you're playing in the absurdist Orcs of Thar style it would fit right in. (although the odds of a campaign of that making it from 1st to high enough level to use this are pretty slim) The kind of comedy adventure I can see the value in even if I don't plan on using it myself, encouraging hammy roleplaying and big chaotic action scenes, it's pretty good for what it is.
A substantial improvement over the past few issues, giving us fewer adventures, each with greater depth. The emphasis on making adventures that react to the characters and have variable difficulty depending on what they do is quite pleasing, merging the roleplaying and dungeoncrawling rather than trying to ditch the dungeon parts entirely like the last few issues. On we head to see if next issue's adventures have any kind of common factor.
(un)reason
Legend
Polyhedron Issue 126: October 1997
part 1/5
36 pages. Once again, it's the little guys that come off hardest. Dragon & Dungeon plugged onward until December and came back around July, while Polyhedron has been out for nearly a whole year. Let's find out how they've used that time, and if they'll be a little more up to date, or they'll also have a bunch of out of season promotional stuff still stuck in the pipeline long after the events have been and gone.
Notes From HQ: Dragon and Dungeon were brought back by WotC pretty much unchanged, and their first editorials presented a sanitised optimistic view of the process. In sharp contrast, Polyhedron was nearly axed altogether and subscriptions folded into Dungeon, as they tell us here. They've got a reprieve (for now), but their schedule has been cut back to bimonthly and they need to show some serious growth if they ever want to get it back. So they've already set out on a radical process of reorganisation. New office in Renton, new mission statement, new logo, new database, a much greater embrace of the internet than TSR, reaching out to RPG companies that TSR alienated so they can run a wider variety of systems, setting up a program to run tournaments specifically for game stores, it feels like they're going full out with a fire lit under their backsides. Probably most immediately significant is adding a new free tier of membership that can participate in tournaments but don't get the newszine or ability to do out of adventure stuff in their Interactives, as well as dividing your XP rankings into stuff earned in one-shots with pregens and Living stuff where you bring your own. So this makes it obvious straight away that WotC won't be as forgiving to underperforming departments as TSR, so they'd better throw as many ideas at the wall to try and improve things and see what sticks. Which will get implemented, which will be pushed back on, and which will be technically on the books but die the slow death of apathy from regular members? Well, at least slowing the issues to bimonthly means I'll probably find out the answers to these questions a little faster.
Elminster's Everwinking Eye: As in Dragon, Ed is too popular to cancel, and just continues with his sprawling alphabetical lists of realmslore as if nothing has happened. Now his buffer of unposted material ready to go is probably even larger. Hope you weren't right in the middle of a campaign set in the Border Kingdoms when the hiatus hit. So here we find out just how powerful the people in charge of High Emmerock are. Most of them are comfortably in the mid teens, covering a wide range of classes. As usual, they're all non-evil, but he still manages to cram enough info to make them all distinct into small word counts. The most important and powerful person isn't the temporal rulers though but the dreaded water witch. Cursed with endlessly crawling flesh, this turned out to also make her immortal and regenerative in a hideous Deadpool kinda way. Now she's the hidden protector of the place, feared by the common folk but valued by the Lords. If you drink any of the water in her domain you make yourself vulnerable to her divinations and mind control effects, which is an easy mistake to make unless you have your own magical researching abilities. So this is one where the Realms transhumanism takes notes from angsty superhero stuff, with a character who's heroic but misunderstood, which may mean she has to deal with well-meaning adventurers trying to kill her and liberate the place when she's actually the one keeping off all the major supernatural threats. That's definitely a scenario that can generate some interesting roleplaying, as every superhero movie where the heroes fight then wind up teaming up to take down the real villain demonstrates.
part 1/5
36 pages. Once again, it's the little guys that come off hardest. Dragon & Dungeon plugged onward until December and came back around July, while Polyhedron has been out for nearly a whole year. Let's find out how they've used that time, and if they'll be a little more up to date, or they'll also have a bunch of out of season promotional stuff still stuck in the pipeline long after the events have been and gone.
Notes From HQ: Dragon and Dungeon were brought back by WotC pretty much unchanged, and their first editorials presented a sanitised optimistic view of the process. In sharp contrast, Polyhedron was nearly axed altogether and subscriptions folded into Dungeon, as they tell us here. They've got a reprieve (for now), but their schedule has been cut back to bimonthly and they need to show some serious growth if they ever want to get it back. So they've already set out on a radical process of reorganisation. New office in Renton, new mission statement, new logo, new database, a much greater embrace of the internet than TSR, reaching out to RPG companies that TSR alienated so they can run a wider variety of systems, setting up a program to run tournaments specifically for game stores, it feels like they're going full out with a fire lit under their backsides. Probably most immediately significant is adding a new free tier of membership that can participate in tournaments but don't get the newszine or ability to do out of adventure stuff in their Interactives, as well as dividing your XP rankings into stuff earned in one-shots with pregens and Living stuff where you bring your own. So this makes it obvious straight away that WotC won't be as forgiving to underperforming departments as TSR, so they'd better throw as many ideas at the wall to try and improve things and see what sticks. Which will get implemented, which will be pushed back on, and which will be technically on the books but die the slow death of apathy from regular members? Well, at least slowing the issues to bimonthly means I'll probably find out the answers to these questions a little faster.
Elminster's Everwinking Eye: As in Dragon, Ed is too popular to cancel, and just continues with his sprawling alphabetical lists of realmslore as if nothing has happened. Now his buffer of unposted material ready to go is probably even larger. Hope you weren't right in the middle of a campaign set in the Border Kingdoms when the hiatus hit. So here we find out just how powerful the people in charge of High Emmerock are. Most of them are comfortably in the mid teens, covering a wide range of classes. As usual, they're all non-evil, but he still manages to cram enough info to make them all distinct into small word counts. The most important and powerful person isn't the temporal rulers though but the dreaded water witch. Cursed with endlessly crawling flesh, this turned out to also make her immortal and regenerative in a hideous Deadpool kinda way. Now she's the hidden protector of the place, feared by the common folk but valued by the Lords. If you drink any of the water in her domain you make yourself vulnerable to her divinations and mind control effects, which is an easy mistake to make unless you have your own magical researching abilities. So this is one where the Realms transhumanism takes notes from angsty superhero stuff, with a character who's heroic but misunderstood, which may mean she has to deal with well-meaning adventurers trying to kill her and liberate the place when she's actually the one keeping off all the major supernatural threats. That's definitely a scenario that can generate some interesting roleplaying, as every superhero movie where the heroes fight then wind up teaming up to take down the real villain demonstrates.
(un)reason
Legend
Polyhedron Issue 126: October 1997
part 2/5
Perspectives - Tabletop vs LARP: One big area of roleplaying the RPGA has consistently underserved is LARPing, due to old TSR grudges against the medium. Stuff from White Wolf has also been neglected due to the strictness of their Code of Conduct. (and probably just general competitiveness as they rocketed to 2nd place in the roleplaying world so quickly) Those rules were one of the first things WotC looked at and decided was complete rubbish - it's time to embrace the future instead of fighting it. So here we have a big article from WW developers Rich Dansky, Nicky Rea & Jackie Cassada talking about the differences between LARP & tabletop. You have larger groups, events usually run a whole weekend rather than being crammed into 4 hour slots, because those costumes are a lot of expense and you want to properly wear them out. Carrying dice around to resolve conflict proves awkward, so conflict resolution uses other methods like rock paper scissors battles instead. Dungeoncrawling isn't too effective a playstyle, but modern day with hidden magic and SCA medieval stuff are pretty popular, along with murder mysteries, wild west, and other historical recreations. The big limitation is on overt powers like flying, teleportation or blowing up entire buildings, and on playing characters of the opposite gender, which unfortunately doesn't tend to get taken seriously however much people say they're staying in character. One would hope things have improved at least a little on that front in the intervening time, but I'm not overly optimistic, and of course LARPing has been hit harder by the pandemic than tabletop so there are fewer events in general to test that in. So this is a little basic, but it's an instance where it's excusable as they haven't covered this before and they have a lot of ground to make up. Another strong indicator that WotC is going to be making big changes around here, trying to open things up and work with former competitors, until they get bought out by Hasbro and become all about promoting their own products only all the time. Now it's all a matter of finding out who is willing to work with them, and how successful those collaborations will be.
Prop Talk: Continuing straight on from the last article is obviously the health & safety talk about constructing props for your LARPs. You never EVER use real weapons, and unless you're playing completely indoors in a private venue, it's a good idea not to even use convincing replicas unless you want an unexpected police appearance ruining the evening. Instead, you may want to use foam, rough shapes covered in tinfoil, basic household implements with a label on them to say what they represent in game, or even just the cards on their own to represent equipment. (although you may wind up carrying more that way than encumbrance would realistically allow, but hey, that problem turns up in tabletop too.) Once again they're showing that there are a wide variety of LARPs, which solve this fundamental problem of the format in different ways. If you want to run one, you need to think about which one to use, as it'll save you a lot of trouble in the long term.
part 2/5
Perspectives - Tabletop vs LARP: One big area of roleplaying the RPGA has consistently underserved is LARPing, due to old TSR grudges against the medium. Stuff from White Wolf has also been neglected due to the strictness of their Code of Conduct. (and probably just general competitiveness as they rocketed to 2nd place in the roleplaying world so quickly) Those rules were one of the first things WotC looked at and decided was complete rubbish - it's time to embrace the future instead of fighting it. So here we have a big article from WW developers Rich Dansky, Nicky Rea & Jackie Cassada talking about the differences between LARP & tabletop. You have larger groups, events usually run a whole weekend rather than being crammed into 4 hour slots, because those costumes are a lot of expense and you want to properly wear them out. Carrying dice around to resolve conflict proves awkward, so conflict resolution uses other methods like rock paper scissors battles instead. Dungeoncrawling isn't too effective a playstyle, but modern day with hidden magic and SCA medieval stuff are pretty popular, along with murder mysteries, wild west, and other historical recreations. The big limitation is on overt powers like flying, teleportation or blowing up entire buildings, and on playing characters of the opposite gender, which unfortunately doesn't tend to get taken seriously however much people say they're staying in character. One would hope things have improved at least a little on that front in the intervening time, but I'm not overly optimistic, and of course LARPing has been hit harder by the pandemic than tabletop so there are fewer events in general to test that in. So this is a little basic, but it's an instance where it's excusable as they haven't covered this before and they have a lot of ground to make up. Another strong indicator that WotC is going to be making big changes around here, trying to open things up and work with former competitors, until they get bought out by Hasbro and become all about promoting their own products only all the time. Now it's all a matter of finding out who is willing to work with them, and how successful those collaborations will be.
Prop Talk: Continuing straight on from the last article is obviously the health & safety talk about constructing props for your LARPs. You never EVER use real weapons, and unless you're playing completely indoors in a private venue, it's a good idea not to even use convincing replicas unless you want an unexpected police appearance ruining the evening. Instead, you may want to use foam, rough shapes covered in tinfoil, basic household implements with a label on them to say what they represent in game, or even just the cards on their own to represent equipment. (although you may wind up carrying more that way than encumbrance would realistically allow, but hey, that problem turns up in tabletop too.) Once again they're showing that there are a wide variety of LARPs, which solve this fundamental problem of the format in different ways. If you want to run one, you need to think about which one to use, as it'll save you a lot of trouble in the long term.
(un)reason
Legend
Polyhedron Issue 126: October 1997
part 3/5
Living City Interactive Guidelines: Despite not being officially called LARPs, the Living City Interactives they've been doing for several years are more than halfway there, as they involve each person playing one character wandering around a larger space even if they're not wearing costumes. So far, they've only appeared in Gen Con and a few other big conventions attended by official staff. Now they're letting anyone run one as long as they fill the right forms in at least 6 months before the convention is scheduled, just like a tournament adventure. Just decide what NPC's will be involved, what will (try to) happen, what potential XP & magic items players involved could gain (mustn't forget the certificates) and send it in to HQ and see if they force some revisions on it. Get stuck in! Another sign that they've had a lot of time to think during the time out, and are trying to throw out as many new ideas as possible at once. Let's hope some people try them out.
Saga Interactive Rules: I can feel pretty certain some people took advantage of the last offer to run their own D&D interactives at conventions. I'm much less confident that anyone ever cared enough to run a Dragonlance 5th age one. Nevertheless, they're giving us rules on how to make the system work better in a large group situation where you generate your character in advance and there's a much greater possibility of PvP conflicts. No idea how well they work, but it still shows that they want to continue to support the system for now rather than cut it straight away. I guess they did do several years of dual stat stuff before completely giving up on the concept so it must have had a few strong fans doing their best to keep it going.
Vignette: Apparently, there are even Star Wars LARPs now. Well, it does have much more name recognition than Dragonlance, particularly 5th age. It's definitely an easier sell to casuals at a convention. Not sure what system they're using though, as there's no mention of system here, just some advice that can be easily transferred to other genres. Rather than having GM's who play multiple characters, it makes sense to have one person play a particular NPC and their related subplot. It's a little more responsibility, but does mean you don't have to generate your own character, and often means you get to play a greater variety of characters over the course of multiple events. People who are willing to do things like that are the glue that holds a game together, particularly in a scenario which is more about the mission (as Star Wars should be) than PvP drama. Another article that's simple enough on it's own, but works well as part of the larger picture, showing how LARPs work over all sorts of genres and how you run them. If you have lots of examples to choose from you're more likely to like at least one and take advantage of it.
Dispel Confusion: Yet more tweaks to their Living campaigns that we need to be brought up to date on. Procampur is now open for you to create characters, locations and adventures in the same way as Raven's Bluff. Enjoy that mountainous commute between them and watch out for bandits. Living Death's timeline advances a year, although in light of events, they'll keep the '97 tournaments available until halfway through '98 so people can catch them. They also adjust the wealth rules so you always start off with a little spending money even if you don't get any in adventure, depending on your wisdom & charisma scores. Finally, they let everyone have the same amount of unspent hero points in the Living Jungle. And so the physics of the universe get a minor increment less racist. No objections to any of these changes.
part 3/5
Living City Interactive Guidelines: Despite not being officially called LARPs, the Living City Interactives they've been doing for several years are more than halfway there, as they involve each person playing one character wandering around a larger space even if they're not wearing costumes. So far, they've only appeared in Gen Con and a few other big conventions attended by official staff. Now they're letting anyone run one as long as they fill the right forms in at least 6 months before the convention is scheduled, just like a tournament adventure. Just decide what NPC's will be involved, what will (try to) happen, what potential XP & magic items players involved could gain (mustn't forget the certificates) and send it in to HQ and see if they force some revisions on it. Get stuck in! Another sign that they've had a lot of time to think during the time out, and are trying to throw out as many new ideas as possible at once. Let's hope some people try them out.
Saga Interactive Rules: I can feel pretty certain some people took advantage of the last offer to run their own D&D interactives at conventions. I'm much less confident that anyone ever cared enough to run a Dragonlance 5th age one. Nevertheless, they're giving us rules on how to make the system work better in a large group situation where you generate your character in advance and there's a much greater possibility of PvP conflicts. No idea how well they work, but it still shows that they want to continue to support the system for now rather than cut it straight away. I guess they did do several years of dual stat stuff before completely giving up on the concept so it must have had a few strong fans doing their best to keep it going.
Vignette: Apparently, there are even Star Wars LARPs now. Well, it does have much more name recognition than Dragonlance, particularly 5th age. It's definitely an easier sell to casuals at a convention. Not sure what system they're using though, as there's no mention of system here, just some advice that can be easily transferred to other genres. Rather than having GM's who play multiple characters, it makes sense to have one person play a particular NPC and their related subplot. It's a little more responsibility, but does mean you don't have to generate your own character, and often means you get to play a greater variety of characters over the course of multiple events. People who are willing to do things like that are the glue that holds a game together, particularly in a scenario which is more about the mission (as Star Wars should be) than PvP drama. Another article that's simple enough on it's own, but works well as part of the larger picture, showing how LARPs work over all sorts of genres and how you run them. If you have lots of examples to choose from you're more likely to like at least one and take advantage of it.
Dispel Confusion: Yet more tweaks to their Living campaigns that we need to be brought up to date on. Procampur is now open for you to create characters, locations and adventures in the same way as Raven's Bluff. Enjoy that mountainous commute between them and watch out for bandits. Living Death's timeline advances a year, although in light of events, they'll keep the '97 tournaments available until halfway through '98 so people can catch them. They also adjust the wealth rules so you always start off with a little spending money even if you don't get any in adventure, depending on your wisdom & charisma scores. Finally, they let everyone have the same amount of unspent hero points in the Living Jungle. And so the physics of the universe get a minor increment less racist. No objections to any of these changes.
(un)reason
Legend
Polyhedron Issue 126: October 1997
part 4/5
Living City Campaign Character Creation Guidelines: Once again WotC is willing to make the hard changes TSR wouldn't, as they finally drop Comeliness from living city characters. (although many of the NPC's in articles & adventures didn't have it on their sheet and the world didn't end anyway) The number of points you have to divide between stats remains the same though, which will please everyone except those who used it as a dump stat and minmaxed the rest. That's the only big change from last time, although there are a few more bits and pieces from supplements added to the allowed list. Maybe next time they'll be brave enough to examine a few more sacred cows before the 3e changeover pushes the big rules changes out to everybody. It would be interesting if they used the RPGA to test ideas before settling on the ones we know and love(?).
Forces To Reckon With: Like Ed, Eric continues onwards providing the very belated second part of Tulrun's description. We actually get full stats for him, putting him at 25th level, not quite Elminster challenging, but not easy prey for any regular party, particularly since he can still bust out his weretiger form if he's out of spells. If not trapped, he's more likely to just teleport away than fight fair, quite possibly teleporting in something else in exchange to keep opponents busy. If the enemy isn't a threat, he'll use polymorphing to beat them in an unorthodox form, quite possibly a harmless seeming one like a rabbit (run away, run away, get the holy hand grenade!) to add to the humiliation. As with Eric's stats for elder evils, this probably isn't a battle most groups will want to fight, but it shows his mastery of the D&D system at a level way above where most groups retire and how fights get weirder and more rocket taggy rather than just adding on ever larger numbers to attack & damage. If you want to play at this level you need to get similarly creative. So this is the kind of thing I'd enjoy using, but can easily see how other groups would struggle with incorporating it and the way the rules in general handle at that level. It's a shame that this didn't wind up becoming an ongoing series, as if they did more high level stuff in it'd be easier to keep a game running long term in general.
A World of Your Own: Roger is also in a secure enough position to keep his regular series going as if nothing has happened. Small islands vary widely in inhabitants even if they're not that far apart, and that would apply even more in space. Both unusually large and unusually small variants of existing species show up, although on the very small islands it's going to be the small ones that maintain a viable breeding population. This means you're entirely justified in giving each one a different quirky random encounter table. Only one example this time, as he fleshes out Long Block, a chunky rectangular asteroid dominated by rastipedes and denzelians, with an interesting selection of smaller animals & fungi. That means this is unusually easy to just pick out and use as is for him, rather than giving you a list of references and expecting you to finish off the setting yourself. (although the list of monster books he's drawing from is still extensive) Picking a small selection of obscure creatures and then figuring out what kind of ecology they'd make seems a good way to make a setting unique. This gets my approval.
part 4/5
Living City Campaign Character Creation Guidelines: Once again WotC is willing to make the hard changes TSR wouldn't, as they finally drop Comeliness from living city characters. (although many of the NPC's in articles & adventures didn't have it on their sheet and the world didn't end anyway) The number of points you have to divide between stats remains the same though, which will please everyone except those who used it as a dump stat and minmaxed the rest. That's the only big change from last time, although there are a few more bits and pieces from supplements added to the allowed list. Maybe next time they'll be brave enough to examine a few more sacred cows before the 3e changeover pushes the big rules changes out to everybody. It would be interesting if they used the RPGA to test ideas before settling on the ones we know and love(?).
Forces To Reckon With: Like Ed, Eric continues onwards providing the very belated second part of Tulrun's description. We actually get full stats for him, putting him at 25th level, not quite Elminster challenging, but not easy prey for any regular party, particularly since he can still bust out his weretiger form if he's out of spells. If not trapped, he's more likely to just teleport away than fight fair, quite possibly teleporting in something else in exchange to keep opponents busy. If the enemy isn't a threat, he'll use polymorphing to beat them in an unorthodox form, quite possibly a harmless seeming one like a rabbit (run away, run away, get the holy hand grenade!) to add to the humiliation. As with Eric's stats for elder evils, this probably isn't a battle most groups will want to fight, but it shows his mastery of the D&D system at a level way above where most groups retire and how fights get weirder and more rocket taggy rather than just adding on ever larger numbers to attack & damage. If you want to play at this level you need to get similarly creative. So this is the kind of thing I'd enjoy using, but can easily see how other groups would struggle with incorporating it and the way the rules in general handle at that level. It's a shame that this didn't wind up becoming an ongoing series, as if they did more high level stuff in it'd be easier to keep a game running long term in general.
A World of Your Own: Roger is also in a secure enough position to keep his regular series going as if nothing has happened. Small islands vary widely in inhabitants even if they're not that far apart, and that would apply even more in space. Both unusually large and unusually small variants of existing species show up, although on the very small islands it's going to be the small ones that maintain a viable breeding population. This means you're entirely justified in giving each one a different quirky random encounter table. Only one example this time, as he fleshes out Long Block, a chunky rectangular asteroid dominated by rastipedes and denzelians, with an interesting selection of smaller animals & fungi. That means this is unusually easy to just pick out and use as is for him, rather than giving you a list of references and expecting you to finish off the setting yourself. (although the list of monster books he's drawing from is still extensive) Picking a small selection of obscure creatures and then figuring out what kind of ecology they'd make seems a good way to make a setting unique. This gets my approval.
(un)reason
Legend
Polyhedron Issue 126: October 1997
part 5/5
Tournament Characters - How to Write 'Em: After making a whole load of changes both little & large, here's an article that could have been written at any point in their history. Remember that you're writing for lots of different players & DM's, who have to wrap the whole story up in a 4 hour slot, so you need to paint in broad strokes, giving details that are useful in portraying how they interact with each other rather than spending pages on backstory. If the same character is appearing in multiple rounds, they might have changed in a few specific ways due to events, but they need to be consistent in both statistics and personality traits. Think carefully about their proficiences and equipment lists, both the obvious things like making sure they can use the weapons they own and in putting more esoteric bits of equipment in that could be used cleverly to solve puzzles. Don't put overly powerful magic items in, particularly in Living games where they could break future adventures. Always get someone else to doublecheck all your math to make sure everything is mechanically legit. All pretty familiar and basic, but they are putting more emphasis on mechanical solidity than they used to. As with Eric's ultrapowerful creatures, this is another reminder that the big changes of 3e were built up to gradually behind the scenes, even if they might have seemed dramatic to people who'd lost touch with the gaming scene for several years before picking up the new edition. If you're willing to get forensic there's a fair number of clues who was responsible for what.
Personalities of Note: Following straight on from last page, they have a couple of Living City NPC's that they'd like to see turn up in multiple adventures, hint hint to all the tournament writers. Reusing the same characters saves effort and makes the setting feel more consistent. Captain Dominic Cutler, a tough mercenary currently protecting Raven's Bluff, and Noah, a half-elven graffiti artist painting anti-war political slogans anywhere there's a bit of blank brickwork, which does not endear him to the Watch. There are plenty of ways you could wind up interacting with them, both friendly and hostile. This is the only article here that really feels out of date, as both character's backstories heavily reference the war, which is now pretty much over. Probably intended for the december issue last year and been sitting ready to go since then. Not completely useless then, as I'm sure they're still living around there doing something, but less so than they would have been if they were on time.
Classifieds is a big conspicuously blank page due to the hiatus, as obviously no-one's been sending any in for quite some time. Will it be filled again next issue, or will it struggle and wind up being cancelled?
On the other hand, the preregistration form for Winter Fantasy looks as packed as ever, with 11 AD&D tournaments and 7 for other systems. They've changed the schedule so there's only 3 timeslots for tournaments per day, with several hour gaps between them for food and seminars, so you no longer have to rush straight from one to the next trying to cram everything in. Make sure you set an alarm if you schedule one that ends at 1 in the morning, then another that starts at 8am the same day though, as oversleeping and missing that would be embarrassing.
A much more interesting issue than the first Dragon or Dungeon ones back, with less sloppy out of date stuff and already showing clear signs of how the new management will change things around to shift them back towards profitability. I guess that's a benefit of taking your time instead of rushing to the presses at the first opportunity. Now to see how the return to bimonthly schedule agrees with them long-term, and how much faster it'll make the next few years go by for me.
part 5/5
Tournament Characters - How to Write 'Em: After making a whole load of changes both little & large, here's an article that could have been written at any point in their history. Remember that you're writing for lots of different players & DM's, who have to wrap the whole story up in a 4 hour slot, so you need to paint in broad strokes, giving details that are useful in portraying how they interact with each other rather than spending pages on backstory. If the same character is appearing in multiple rounds, they might have changed in a few specific ways due to events, but they need to be consistent in both statistics and personality traits. Think carefully about their proficiences and equipment lists, both the obvious things like making sure they can use the weapons they own and in putting more esoteric bits of equipment in that could be used cleverly to solve puzzles. Don't put overly powerful magic items in, particularly in Living games where they could break future adventures. Always get someone else to doublecheck all your math to make sure everything is mechanically legit. All pretty familiar and basic, but they are putting more emphasis on mechanical solidity than they used to. As with Eric's ultrapowerful creatures, this is another reminder that the big changes of 3e were built up to gradually behind the scenes, even if they might have seemed dramatic to people who'd lost touch with the gaming scene for several years before picking up the new edition. If you're willing to get forensic there's a fair number of clues who was responsible for what.
Personalities of Note: Following straight on from last page, they have a couple of Living City NPC's that they'd like to see turn up in multiple adventures, hint hint to all the tournament writers. Reusing the same characters saves effort and makes the setting feel more consistent. Captain Dominic Cutler, a tough mercenary currently protecting Raven's Bluff, and Noah, a half-elven graffiti artist painting anti-war political slogans anywhere there's a bit of blank brickwork, which does not endear him to the Watch. There are plenty of ways you could wind up interacting with them, both friendly and hostile. This is the only article here that really feels out of date, as both character's backstories heavily reference the war, which is now pretty much over. Probably intended for the december issue last year and been sitting ready to go since then. Not completely useless then, as I'm sure they're still living around there doing something, but less so than they would have been if they were on time.
Classifieds is a big conspicuously blank page due to the hiatus, as obviously no-one's been sending any in for quite some time. Will it be filled again next issue, or will it struggle and wind up being cancelled?
On the other hand, the preregistration form for Winter Fantasy looks as packed as ever, with 11 AD&D tournaments and 7 for other systems. They've changed the schedule so there's only 3 timeslots for tournaments per day, with several hour gaps between them for food and seminars, so you no longer have to rush straight from one to the next trying to cram everything in. Make sure you set an alarm if you schedule one that ends at 1 in the morning, then another that starts at 8am the same day though, as oversleeping and missing that would be embarrassing.
A much more interesting issue than the first Dragon or Dungeon ones back, with less sloppy out of date stuff and already showing clear signs of how the new management will change things around to shift them back towards profitability. I guess that's a benefit of taking your time instead of rushing to the presses at the first opportunity. Now to see how the return to bimonthly schedule agrees with them long-term, and how much faster it'll make the next few years go by for me.
(un)reason
Legend
The Raven's Buff Trumpeter 1-8: October 1997
7 pages. The peace was too good to last. Myrkyssa Jelan's armies have now set their sights on Tantras. Where are all these reinforcements coming from? Our manpower is still thoroughly depleted from the last fight! Lady Amber advises adventurers not to get involved, leave any intervention to the professionals. Will they heed that, or will disobeying authority be a crucial part of upcoming big adventures? You can bet if they did it'd be applied inconsistently, with any lawbreaking that's not expected for the current plot still resulting in your character being taken away without rolling. Also suspicious is that all PC Watch members have been assigned away from the merchant district. What's going on in there that the people in charge don't want you to see? Plus a whole new bunch of people have been given landed Lordships to rebalance things away from the merchants. Not all the news is driven from the top though. There have been protests outside the wizards guild, mainly caused by bards annoyed that they aren't allowed in despite being able to cast arcane magic. The kind of thing that'll be even more significant next edition as all kinds of variant spellcasting classes proliferate. Plus the predictable racism about the construction of a shrine to Eilistraee in the city. Some people just aren't willing to accept that not all Drow are bad, no matter how many epic stories Drizzt appears in. Others of course aren't willing to accept that fiends are evil by definition, and associating with them only leads to trouble, as apparently a recent adventure has resulted in a whole bunch of adventurers marrying alu-fiends, while another upcoming one is recruiting people to head to the lower planes and participate in the Blood War. Will the payment be worth the risks if you survive, or will your employers prove to be not only evil, but treacherous as well? Definitely a wide variety of pot hooks being thrown out this time, giving adventurers plenty of choice what kind of adventure they want to go on.
Living City Q&A is way larger this time. Obviously the online traffic is starting to pick up now people know they're back.
Why didn't the DM let me use magic items from Barney's Bazaar? (They specifically don't stack AC bonusses if you have other magic armor)
Do exceptional strength bows need a certificate? (no)
What happens if the XP cost for joining a guild would drop me a level? (you can't join yet. Do another adventure and come back when you've got enough to spare)
Am I allowed to donate unwanted magical items to charity auctions? (very yes)
Are pets allowed? (If they have a GP price in the corebooks and you have room for them.)
Can I be a multiclass specialist in multiple things? (no)
Can I use the new stuff from Powers & Pantheons? (we're trialling it now. Email me, get a special certificate and don't abuse it, or we'll take it away and won't let anyone have it.)
Can I recharge a ring of spell storing with different spells once used up? (no)
Do I get illusion immunity for superhuman intelligence? (no)
If I recharge a ring of spell storing at a temple of Mystra, are the spells maximised? (no)
What are the knighthoods of Raven's Bluff? (There are currently 9 of them, organised into 4 tiers, plus a couple of lesser tiers for unofficial ones devoted to particular nobles and independent groups, ie, any you make up yourself)
Are the Knights of the Lady an official order? (no, they're just another unsanctioned tier 5 one beholden to her, not the city. )
Do you need 2 letters of recommendation to join a knighthood? (yes for all except the Golden Rosters)
Can Golden Roosters write letters of recommendation? (only if you're trying to join them, not a higher order. They don't get no respect.)
What do I do if I don't know anyone to write recommendations? (go to more conventions and network. We may make an exception if you're in some far-flung place where that would be prohibitively hard & expensive.)
What do I do if a knight deserves a chivalry point but there's no certificates in the module? (more emailing admins!)
What do I do if I get a negative chivalry point? (straighten up and behave in future adventures)
How can I move between knightly orders? (Up or out baby, no going back to lower ones)
How do I join the Keepers of the Mystic Flame (talk to the boss personally)
Does it cost the same number of chivalry points to move to another order in the same tier as going up? (yes)
What happens if I change my mind while I'm a squire? (you can quit, but you can't come back if you change your mind again. No flip-floppers wanted. )
Do your old chivalry points still count when you change order? (yes)
Can you receive the same honor twice? (yes)
Can non-knights have chivalry points (only if you're squiring and working towards it. Otherwise it's simply not a concern.)
How long do I need to stay in an order before moving up? (1 year for secular orders, 2 for religious ones. If you start now, you might barely be able to make it before the edition changes.)
How long do I need to be in an order before joining the one of the sub-groups? (6 months)
Do you lose the benefits of previous orders? (only if you're kicked out, not if you move up)
Can I keep using old titles? (yes)
What are the benefits of chivalry points? (reaction adjustments)
Does being a knight affect my fame points? (yes, quite positively)
What does the Knights Council do? (all that tedious admin stuff)
Where can I find out about the knighthoods? (some of the lower ones have articles in Polyhedron, but all the most up to date info is online now!)
7 pages. The peace was too good to last. Myrkyssa Jelan's armies have now set their sights on Tantras. Where are all these reinforcements coming from? Our manpower is still thoroughly depleted from the last fight! Lady Amber advises adventurers not to get involved, leave any intervention to the professionals. Will they heed that, or will disobeying authority be a crucial part of upcoming big adventures? You can bet if they did it'd be applied inconsistently, with any lawbreaking that's not expected for the current plot still resulting in your character being taken away without rolling. Also suspicious is that all PC Watch members have been assigned away from the merchant district. What's going on in there that the people in charge don't want you to see? Plus a whole new bunch of people have been given landed Lordships to rebalance things away from the merchants. Not all the news is driven from the top though. There have been protests outside the wizards guild, mainly caused by bards annoyed that they aren't allowed in despite being able to cast arcane magic. The kind of thing that'll be even more significant next edition as all kinds of variant spellcasting classes proliferate. Plus the predictable racism about the construction of a shrine to Eilistraee in the city. Some people just aren't willing to accept that not all Drow are bad, no matter how many epic stories Drizzt appears in. Others of course aren't willing to accept that fiends are evil by definition, and associating with them only leads to trouble, as apparently a recent adventure has resulted in a whole bunch of adventurers marrying alu-fiends, while another upcoming one is recruiting people to head to the lower planes and participate in the Blood War. Will the payment be worth the risks if you survive, or will your employers prove to be not only evil, but treacherous as well? Definitely a wide variety of pot hooks being thrown out this time, giving adventurers plenty of choice what kind of adventure they want to go on.
Living City Q&A is way larger this time. Obviously the online traffic is starting to pick up now people know they're back.
Why didn't the DM let me use magic items from Barney's Bazaar? (They specifically don't stack AC bonusses if you have other magic armor)
Do exceptional strength bows need a certificate? (no)
What happens if the XP cost for joining a guild would drop me a level? (you can't join yet. Do another adventure and come back when you've got enough to spare)
Am I allowed to donate unwanted magical items to charity auctions? (very yes)
Are pets allowed? (If they have a GP price in the corebooks and you have room for them.)
Can I be a multiclass specialist in multiple things? (no)
Can I use the new stuff from Powers & Pantheons? (we're trialling it now. Email me, get a special certificate and don't abuse it, or we'll take it away and won't let anyone have it.)
Can I recharge a ring of spell storing with different spells once used up? (no)
Do I get illusion immunity for superhuman intelligence? (no)
If I recharge a ring of spell storing at a temple of Mystra, are the spells maximised? (no)
What are the knighthoods of Raven's Bluff? (There are currently 9 of them, organised into 4 tiers, plus a couple of lesser tiers for unofficial ones devoted to particular nobles and independent groups, ie, any you make up yourself)
Are the Knights of the Lady an official order? (no, they're just another unsanctioned tier 5 one beholden to her, not the city. )
Do you need 2 letters of recommendation to join a knighthood? (yes for all except the Golden Rosters)
Can Golden Roosters write letters of recommendation? (only if you're trying to join them, not a higher order. They don't get no respect.)
What do I do if I don't know anyone to write recommendations? (go to more conventions and network. We may make an exception if you're in some far-flung place where that would be prohibitively hard & expensive.)
What do I do if a knight deserves a chivalry point but there's no certificates in the module? (more emailing admins!)
What do I do if I get a negative chivalry point? (straighten up and behave in future adventures)
How can I move between knightly orders? (Up or out baby, no going back to lower ones)
How do I join the Keepers of the Mystic Flame (talk to the boss personally)
Does it cost the same number of chivalry points to move to another order in the same tier as going up? (yes)
What happens if I change my mind while I'm a squire? (you can quit, but you can't come back if you change your mind again. No flip-floppers wanted. )
Do your old chivalry points still count when you change order? (yes)
Can you receive the same honor twice? (yes)
Can non-knights have chivalry points (only if you're squiring and working towards it. Otherwise it's simply not a concern.)
How long do I need to stay in an order before moving up? (1 year for secular orders, 2 for religious ones. If you start now, you might barely be able to make it before the edition changes.)
How long do I need to be in an order before joining the one of the sub-groups? (6 months)
Do you lose the benefits of previous orders? (only if you're kicked out, not if you move up)
Can I keep using old titles? (yes)
What are the benefits of chivalry points? (reaction adjustments)
Does being a knight affect my fame points? (yes, quite positively)
What does the Knights Council do? (all that tedious admin stuff)
Where can I find out about the knighthoods? (some of the lower ones have articles in Polyhedron, but all the most up to date info is online now!)
Last edited:
(un)reason
Legend
The Raven's Buff Trumpeter 1-8s: October 1997
1 page. Extra, extra, read all about it! A second short edition in quick succession as emergency hits. The city's hall of records burns down mysteriously, resulting in lots of stuff being lost. Everyone who's part of an official order or guild needs to help rebuild the lost information. A perfect opportunity for people to sneak into knightly orders by falsifying records and pretending they were there all along. Whether that's the OOC intent or not, and whether the loss of information is OOC as well as IC I'm uncertain, (and if so, how it happened) but this definitely has plenty of future plot potential, both in hunting down the culprits and the long term things that could be set in motion due to the loss of solid information. This is one i'd definitely like to know more about from the people who were actually there at the time, to know how much of this was caused by OOC events and if people took advantage of it or played things fairly.
1 page. Extra, extra, read all about it! A second short edition in quick succession as emergency hits. The city's hall of records burns down mysteriously, resulting in lots of stuff being lost. Everyone who's part of an official order or guild needs to help rebuild the lost information. A perfect opportunity for people to sneak into knightly orders by falsifying records and pretending they were there all along. Whether that's the OOC intent or not, and whether the loss of information is OOC as well as IC I'm uncertain, (and if so, how it happened) but this definitely has plenty of future plot potential, both in hunting down the culprits and the long term things that could be set in motion due to the loss of solid information. This is one i'd definitely like to know more about from the people who were actually there at the time, to know how much of this was caused by OOC events and if people took advantage of it or played things fairly.
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