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Message: <blockquote data-quote="(un)reason" data-source="post: 9001337" data-attributes="member: 27780">Dungeon Issue 75: Jul/Aug 1999part 1/592 pages. We've already seen them make a big deal about the return of Monks & Assassins recently in the Scarlet brotherhood book. Now they're trumpeting the return of the anti-paladin on the cover of this issue, which is another pretty strong sign of the direction they're planning to take the next edition in. Shades of grey and winning by talking to your opponents? Not this time. Let's see if going back to the dungeon is fun this time around, or merely formulaic regurgitation of nostalgia.Editorial: The cover was all about the villain. In sharp contrast, the editorial is all about letting the heroes be awesome. Hero Points have been a part of the Living Jungle & Death campaigns for years now. Monte Cook also likes the idea, but his implementation in his home campaign is much more dramatic, letting you cheat death or perform normally impossible stunts. It all makes for a much more cinematic game style and Chris is all in favour of that. (especially when it's his character that gets to be even more awesome than usual.) Another reminder that many of the upcoming changes have been years in the brewing and what will get to appear in the corebooks next edition and what will be cut and only appear years later in 3rd party books like Arcana Evolved & Ptolus is currently the subject of heated debate in the WotC offices. Slightly more conservative heads will win this time around, sticking to the tactical dungeoncrawling as default playstyle, but there will be plenty of opportunities to experiment and customise once the dust settles. A pretty decent bit of foreshadowing that mentions these things earlier than they did in Dragon, this definitely has more historical significance than the average editorial.Letters: First letter double nitpicks the one in last issue about druids turning banshees. Apparently, they specifically can do that in celtic campaigns for some reason. The joys of trying to keep track of tons of sourcebooks with different exception-based designs.Second wants the next adventure series to be set in the Great Glacier. There's a lot of unexplored ground there that you could put all kinds of weird dungeons in. Maybe two per issue as well so it all goes a bit quicker?Third really doesn't want multiple adventures in a series in the same issue, as that'd destroy it's general utility, but going monthly would be nice, whatever kinds of adventures you prefer.Fourth also wants them to keep the variety up in each individual issue, and would also like a better idea of just how stiff the competition is for each slot in the magazine. Maybe some league tables or something like Polyhedron has? Chris is happy to give his own acceptance & rejection stats, but spares the blushes of the other freelancers. Maybe some more info will appear next time around.Fifth wants to see more Spelljammer stuff, but worries about it alienating other groups. Would writing it so it's easily converted to a terrestrial nautical campaign help? A little, but you still need to make it a good adventure either way to get accepted.Sixth is very happy to see more Greyhawk material, and also wants them to keep adventures easily customised, like those old school adventures. That's the way to ensure they remain useful and encourage DM's to hone their own design skills.Seventh wants more complex plots, particularly if they do another series. The adventures in the Mere of Dead Men series might have been good individually, but they were pretty episodic and formulaic. Something that forces the PC's to grow and develop both statistically and as characters as the adventures go on would be superior next time.Finally, someone who wants more adventures that revolve around a particular area rather than a specific ongoing plot. You'll want the Living City for that, although pick your adventures carefully, as the average standard is pretty weak compared to Dungeon's high competition contents.</blockquote>

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