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Message: <blockquote data-quote="(un)reason" data-source="post: 8625632" data-attributes="member: 27780">Dungeon Issue 50: Nov/Dec 1994part 1/566 pages. Dungeon continues to not do racial diversity even when they have a good opportunity too, as apparently the cover is supposed to be Von Kharkov, but doesn't look even remotely black. It's bad enough when you greywash the Drow. I know it's hard to make darker skin tones work in an image when they're also supposed to be lurking in the darkness, but you could at least have the right type of nose and hair for the ethnicity. I somehow doubt hair relaxers are available anywhere in the demiplane but Dementlieu's snootiest salons. Well, that's a somewhat irritating start to the issue, and also means they'll be including a Ravenloft adventure, which have above average odds of being a railroad. Oh well, on we go to see if I can find some positives in the contents. Editorial: Unlike Polyhedron's big anniversary, the editorial here winds up pointing out how little Dungeon has changed since it began. The average page count is mildly larger, but it still appears at the same frequency, uses exactly the same format, has much of the same staff, and even the trade dress remains the same as issue 1. The new art director wants to switch things up a little, but Barbara is wary about tinkering too much with what has been a winning formula so far. Looks like they're not going to make any changes until the general crisis in TSR catches up with everyone and they start flailing around trying to fix things. That's not actually too far away now, is it. We shall see if it results in the quality of their layout going downhill for several years the way it did in Dragon. In the meantime, keep sending those adventures in! They're still powered mostly by freelance work, and definitely don't want to change that part. Letters: First letter complains they don't list both the recommended character levels and total party levels in the contents page. Easy enough to fix. They're still not going to put full stats or references for every spell & monster they include in here though. Second is in favor of them writing adventures in such a way that they still work when converted to another system. It's the ones with good stories that'll really be remembered, not ones that just throw a series of monsters at you who attack on sight and never communicate. Third wonders how they go about choosing art for their adventures. This is something they do in house more than the actual adventures, but they still won't say no to submissions, as a good pool to choose from increases the odds of getting artwork that fits with the intended tone of the adventures.Fourth has lots of nitpicks to make about recent adventures. Why is a Drider referred to as he or she in an adventure? Just because they had their reproductive organs forcibly removed by Lolth, doesn't mean they don't retain their previous gender identity. How they express and cope with that is of course up to them. Finally, someone complaining about the use of wishes to railroad the players in To Bite the Moon. That's not even how they work under most interpretations of the rules, as well as being game breaking if the players could do the same thing. That's not good for the integrity of your campaign world. Any system or adventure that doesn't work without breaking internal consistency is unfairly designed and not the kind of adventure I'm looking for.</blockquote>

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