Let's read the entire run

[(un)reason]

Dragon Magazine Issue 262: August 1999


part 3/7


Half-pint heroes: Well, it seems that this issue's theme is not just being shared amongst Gnomes and Halflings, but a whole bunch of other races as well. I guess you really can fit more of them in the same space and people won't mind. Still, making more races available as PC's seems to be perennially popular, which is why they hard-code it into the next edition. In the meantime, there's certainly plenty of races left to treat in this fashion.

Buckawn, like other fae races, can only become fighters and thieves, cost extra xp to advance, and only get their more powerful spell-like abilities at higher levels. These nerfs probably don't prevent them from being rather useful to a team though, and less irritating than many of the more pranksterish fae that might attach themselves to a party. As long as you don't mind a little eco-preaching, let them stick around.

Chitine also make rather good rogues, due to their wall climbing and web spinning abilities. Plus they can fight four-handed with minimal penalties, making them engines of death compared to a normal fighter at low level. While not as flexible as thri-kreen, they could well be picked for the twinking potential. But they do have light-sensitivity issues to keep them from being over dominant, and no spellcasting abilities at all, so they can't fill every role.

Grippli also get superhuman climbing abilities in their amusing sticky froggy way, plus camouflage in their natural terrain. Their class selections are fairly typical for humanoids; despite their above average inteligence, they don't seem to have the knack for wizardry or technology. Good social skills are just as important for building a large-scale civilisation as brains.

Ravenkin are even smarter, but wings and prehensile feet don't allow for as complicated tool-using as a decent pair of hands. Plus they're originally from Ravenloft, where you're too busy trying to keep things that go bump in the night from turning whole cities into ghost towns to grow and advance as much as you'd like. Still, they do have the best class options of this lot, including lots of multiclass wizard ones. And flight. Funny that small things are actually more mobile on average.

Tasloi are another one that have exceedingly high potential as rogues, and not too much at other classes. A dexterity bonus and strength penalty'll focus the mind towards indirect solutions. Once again, climbing is a real strength of theirs, but they're not fond of bright light. Still their pack instinct means if they've ben kicked out of their home, they'll probably be loyal to a group that takes them in. And although some of these races could be a little inconvenient socially, none of them are completely game-breaking. Yet more to add to the list of useful crunch then.


Elmshire - A halfling heaven: Time for Roger Moore to give us one of his periodic returns to a topic he pioneered in the first place. Halflings in D&D worlds aren't quite the same as the hobbits in middle-earth, as many of your young becoming an adventurer is almost expected in trouble heavy places Oerth or Toril. And without powerful wizards like Gandalf looking out for them, they have to do their own hard work to make sure their homes remain places of bucolic serenity. This is of course important for actual play, because it means there can be some conflict within and around them to keep things from getting boring, and the players from leaving for good. This is certainly the case in Elmshire, which has seen a nasty plague, and had to deal with the Greyhawk wars just a few years ago. This leaves a definite undercurrent of suspicion and emotional trauma in their makeup, and more than a few problems to solve. Perfect adventure fodder, in other words. So Roger provides an example of a homebase rather faster than Ray did, and with more distinct flavour as well. Save your own shire. It'll make you feel like a big damn hero! I think this definitely qualifies as both a useful and distinctive article. How is it that the long-term writers often wind up producing the most unusual stuff?


By any other Name: No surprise that this is tackling the naming conventions of halflings & gnomes. Along with the usual syllable soup, they have a tendency to pick up nicknames based on things they've done, which you'll probably want to do in play, rather than roll on the table. Once again, this isn't very interesting, although you can get a few silly results on the nickname table if you're so inclined, so I don't have much to say here. I think this series is already running out of steam.


PC Portraits is in theme as well, with a whole bunch of short folks. Since all we see is faces here, this is represented by giving them generally rounded, child-like features, even when they also have beards and wrinkles. I think that works, but watch out for the perverts. You don't want to play with someone who seems a little too into playing up the child aspects, especially when also combined with sexualising. Nuff said.

 

[David Howery]

By any other Name: No surprise that this is tackling the naming conventions of halflings & gnomes. Along with the usual syllable soup, they have a tendency to pick up nicknames based on things they've done, which you'll probably want to do in play, rather than roll on the table. Once again, this isn't very interesting, although you can get a few silly results on the nickname table if you're so inclined, so I don't have much to say here. I think this series is already running out of steam.

I still think the best 'naming' article of all time was the April Fool one which had a table where you used dice to come up with random consonants and vowels to produce long convoluted unpronounceable names... usually. The first time I used it, I came up with 'Yb'. The second time, I got one with all consonants, no vowels, and 8 letters long (don't remember just what it was)...

 

[(un)reason]

Dragon Magazine Issue 262: August 1999


part 4/7


Fiction: To dam it where it trickles by Pete D Manison. The issue of magic being just another field of science and used accordingly is one of those issues that writers have struggled with quite a bit over the years, with various results. If it has consistent rules, they can be learned and exploited like anything else. If it doesn't, then what keeps it from being pure deus ex machina, robbing a story of tension? Well, here's one of the cleverer solutions to that. The idea of magic as fuelled by belief and force of will, and therefore impervious to scientific exploitation because the more you actually know, and the more rationally and logically you think, the less power you have. Of course, this leads to a situation where the head wizards could easily be outclassed by their pupils, and have to not only keep this a secret, but actively discourage critical thought in their students, and never let them know why, because that in itself will ruin their magical development. It's a setup filled with inherent tragedy, really. Might as well just become a scientist, as science doesn't care what you believe. So this is memorable, and more than a little sad. As speculative fiction, this definitely gets high marks.


The ecology of the jermalaine: They've had an osquip around for quite a while, and he's played a big part in some of their stories. So it's not surprise that the association of monster hunters decides to investigate the Jermalaine. So they take the shrinky pills, and it's down into the tunnels. Now, if only wizards got Bluff as a class skill. Unsurprisingly for this lot, they get found out, captured, seriously humiliated, and only get out by sheer luck. That shtick is starting to get a bit tiresome. This is what happens when you play to the crowd. Flanderisation sets in, and before you know it, you're slipping on a banana skin while a clown plays a whistle. And then the series gets cancelled. How much longer can he keep this up?


Bazaar of the Bizarre: Gnomes and halflings once again get lumped into the same section, forced to share features. Still, this does look like quite a long article, so I shouldn't complain. Otherwise next time I might have to plough my way through 10 pages of items. And that would be incredibly tedious. Looks like this one'll be long enough as it is.

Amulets of the Steinneblin let you speak with badgers and detect details of stonework like Gnomes. One of those honorary member items that also makes them tend to like you, just as elves have got recently.

Armor of melding lets you hide in the rock. In the underdark, this may well be a lifesaver. Who knows when a deep dragon is going to come slithering around the corner.

Badges of the Svirfneblin are another honorary member item that grants you a whole bunch of racial abilities. Course, since Svirfneblin have rather more impressive powers than Rock Gnomes, these are correspondingly more awesome to have.

Badgervests let you shapeshift into a badger. Gee, what a surprise. How many limited shapeshifting items do we have in the vault now?

Boots o' the Giant let a normal gnome imitate a spriggan and suddenly grow to huge size and back. Now all you need is a foul temper and lack of hygiene to match and you're ready to play infiltrator. Have fun.

Boots o' the Hills obviously let you go hiking through the roughest terrain without any danger of slipping. I'm pretty sure we've seen something like this before too. Next!

Bracers of Striking boost your strength. Unusually for these kinds of items, they're designed so they remain useful no matter how strong you are. Another sign of the edition change, where plusses will become standard, rather than boosts to a certain level.

Cloaks o' the hills are the gnomish equivalent of cloaks of elvenkind. Unsurprisingly, they work best in the environments gnomes prefer. Another one you could make variants of for all sorts of races.

Cocoon Crystals put you in stasis if there's a rockfall around you. This will save your life, but may involve waking up centuries later in a strange land if there's no-one to free you. Sounds pretty neat to me.

Diamond Badgers are Wondrous Figurines designed for digging. With big savage claws, they're not at all bad in combat either. What is it with Gnomes and Badgers? How do such an amiable race have an affinity for what is basically a giant chunky cranky weasel?

Gloves of Digging let you bypass the badger bit, and use your bare hands instead. Dig speeds are incredibly handy in giving you tactical options. Let's see what tricks you can come up with.

Stone Knives cut through stone like butter. You won't go as fast as the last two, but you get more precision, and can really mess up rock based monsters, as well as becoming a famed sculptor. Retire and become an artist. It's safer than adventuring.

A Pick of Piercing halves armor based AC bonuses and has a wide crit range. Another one that seems to have been made by making a sneaky peek at the upcoming system changes.

Pit Bags are a really nasty bit of trickery. Bags of holding that conceal their entrances and only allow living material in, leaving you naked and your stuff outside for the looting? Now that'll REALLY piss players off. A trick worthy of Garl Glittergold himself.

Barrier Shields provide better cover than normal when used in formation. This obviously means mass production is needed to get full benefits, which is always a bit tricky for permanent magical items.

Goblinslayer Swords let you go berserk attacking goblins. Seems more a dwarf idea than a gnome one. Meh.

Talismans of the Forstneblin are the third of our racial power granting honorary member items, this time focussed around forest gnomes. One wonder what abilities the tinker gnome version would grant. Hopefully speaking and listening at the same time would be among them.

Grandfather's Keys are a trio of useful little devices that help keep a halfling's home safe and sound without having to resort to nasty violence that might damage the furniture.

Hammock Cloaks are another device that allow you to have both comfortable daywear and a sleeping place. Comfort is a halfling specialty, so no surprise they'd recycle and customise this idea for their needs.

Restless Pillows are yet another bit of rehash. You sleep on it, you get prophetic dreams. How very obvious and recycled.

Bracers of Honesty are technically cursed, but they're very useful in dealing with criminals, so a halfling community may well have a few of them around for more humane punishment.

A Horn of Hiding can only be heard by halflings, while it also makes the blower invisible to a specific race. Interesting combination, but effective in defending the homelands. Probably not quite so useful to an adventuring group though.

A Pouch of Forgetfulness makes the original owner forget anything stolen and put in it. This may cause weird memory gaps if it's an important item.

Wish Brushes grant you a wish based on whatever you paint. Steer well clear if you're not an artist, for poor composition will produce equally twisted results. I'm sure a sadistic DM can have great fun with this one.

Flutes of Transportation take you to wherever the song played was composed. This may get a bit embarrasing, since songs are frequently written indoors. But it does make for exceedingly good plot hooks and fun hunting down of lost lore. Very neat.

Hob's Footbath lets you whizz along, but you'll need to soak your feet before and after or suffer horribly. Respect your magical items, don't just treat them like a tool.

Oil of Fake Footsteps show that once a problem's been highlighted, variants on the solution'll be along in no time. Again we fix the problem of being tracked, this time via disguise rather than misdirection.

Bully Coins are a more anvilicious variant on an idea explored over a decade ago by Gully Dwarves. Give up your treasure freely to a threatening big person and they'll soon be cut down to size, very literally. Never thought I'd be preferring the Dragonlance version to the generic one.

Buttons of Climbing are a bit of detachable clothing that are in theory reusable, but retrieving them from a clifface may be a problem. Maybe you can pull them up with your toes, since you are a halfling, and they generally go barefoot even in horrible conditions.

A pipe of answers helps you get in some productive serene contemplation time. Wizardly gifts can be nice, sometimes, when they don't backfire by revealing depressing information.

Chimes of the Dragon create the illusion that a Dragon is lurking in the room. Hopefully this will scare off timid intruders. Like certain famous halfings, for instance. All this time, and they're still inextricably bound to Tolkien.

Daisy Chainmail is one of those ludicrous puns that they just can't resist slipping in. It's rather fragile stuff too, needing constant infusions of fresh daisys to keep full effectiveness. I think I'll skip this one.

The Helm of the Halflings is another one that combines uses for great practicality and reduced encumbrance. Take it off, turn it upside down and use it as a bowl. It even cooks the stuff inside it. Very handy.

 

[Nellisir]

Bazaar of the Bizarre: Gnomes and halflings once again get lumped into the same section, forced to share features. Still, this does look like quite a long article, so I shouldn't complain. Otherwise next time I might have to plough my way through 10 pages of items. And that would be incredibly tedious. Looks like this one'll be long enough as it is.

I was a little surprised to get my issue and find out my article had doubled in size. Gnomish magical items...now with halflings!

Amulets of the Steinneblin let you speak with badgers and detect details of stonework like Gnomes. One of those honorary member items that also makes them tend to like you, just as elves have got recently.
Badges of the Svirfneblin are another honorary member item that grants you a whole bunch of racial abilities. Course, since Svirfneblin have rather more impressive powers than Rock Gnomes, these are correspondingly more awesome to have.
Talismans of the Forstneblin are the third of our racial power granting honorary member items, this time focussed around forest gnomes. One wonder what abilities the tinker gnome version would grant. Hopefully speaking and listening at the same time would be among them.

Obviously based off of the ring of faerie, from Unearthed Arcana (pg 93). I make no claims of originality. I just thought (think) they are nice, sort of basic/utility magic items.

Armor of melding lets you hide in the rock. In the underdark, this may well be a lifesaver. Who knows when a deep dragon is going to come slithering around the corner.

I remember creating it for a campaign I ran, but not how often it got used.

Badgervests let you shapeshift into a badger. Gee, what a surprise. How many limited shapeshifting items do we have in the vault now?

A lot. Not as many as there are limited shape-shifting spells in PF and later 3e and 4e (I think), but a lot.

Boots o' the Giant let a normal gnome imitate a spriggan and suddenly grow to huge size and back. Now all you need is a foul temper and lack of hygiene to match and you're ready to play infiltrator. Have fun.

You could do horribly broken things with polymorphing and size changing in 2e. It was beautiful. I loved it. And lets face it, what gnome doesn't dream of growing ten feet tall and stomping goblins?

Boots o' the Hills obviously let you go hiking through the roughest terrain without any danger of slipping. I'm pretty sure we've seen something like this before too. Next!

Utilitarian. Why should elves have all the fun? I like my gnomes magical.

Bracers of Striking boost your strength. Unusually for these kinds of items, they're designed so they remain useful no matter how strong you are. Another sign of the edition change, where plusses will become standard, rather than boosts to a certain level.

Didn't have a thing to do with the edition change. Just seemed logical, that strength-boosting items should do -something- no matter how strong you were.

Cloaks o' the hills are the gnomish equivalent of cloaks of elvenkind. Unsurprisingly, they work best in the environments gnomes prefer. Another one you could make variants of for all sorts of races.

Elves and dwarves get the vast majority of "racial" items. I didn't want to do a collection of one-off, wacky, marginally useful items. I wanted to make a sort of solid core of gnomish magic, stuff that would actually be useful to gnomes and player characters.

Cocoon Crystals put you in stasis if there's a rockfall around you. This will save your life, but may involve waking up centuries later in a strange land if there's no-one to free you. Sounds pretty neat to me.

Yeah...I think I had a bugger of a time pricing it. It's more of a story item than anything.

Diamond Badgers are Wondrous Figurines designed for digging. With big savage claws, they're not at all bad in combat either. What is it with Gnomes and Badgers? How do such an amiable race have an affinity for what is basically a giant chunky cranky weasel?

A) they can talk to them, B) similar habitats, C) badgers are (represented as) more attractive than weasels, and no one takes ground squirrels seriously. I could have used foxes, now that I think of it. Foxes would be cool.

Gloves of Digging let you bypass the badger bit, and use your bare hands instead. Dig speeds are incredibly handy in giving you tactical options. Let's see what tricks you can come up with.

Not sure if this one ever got use in my campaign.

Stone Knives cut through stone like butter. You won't go as fast as the last two, but you get more precision, and can really mess up rock based monsters, as well as becoming a famed sculptor. Retire and become an artist. It's safer than adventuring.

Based on a magic item from one of Joel Rosenberg's "Guardians of the Flame" novels.

A Pick of Piercing halves armor based AC bonuses and has a wide crit range. Another one that seems to have been made by making a sneaky peek at the upcoming system changes.

Serendipity. I vaguely recall this being a sort of "fill in the gap" item, that there was some kind of "slashing" special weapon, and a "bludgeoning" special weapon, and this was the "piercing" special weapon, but I can't find anything to support this. That sort of thing all became standardized and templated, essentially, with 3e.

Pit Bags are a really nasty bit of trickery. Bags of holding that conceal their entrances and only allow living material in, leaving you naked and your stuff outside for the looting? Now that'll REALLY piss players off. A trick worthy of Garl Glittergold himself.

I don't think I ever gave my PCs one of these; too afraid of what they'd do with it. I think of it as a bit of DM's cheat, myself.

Barrier Shields provide better cover than normal when used in formation. This obviously means mass production is needed to get full benefits, which is always a bit tricky for permanent magical items.

I love the image of a wall of these rooting into the ground, though. I don't know if I thought about mass production. It's not like there was a serious dearth of magical items in the world. And given that this was towards the tail-end of 2e, there were lots of ways to make magic items (though they did all required high-level casters). Also, 2e magic item creation actually got you xp, I think.

Goblinslayer Swords let you go berserk attacking goblins. Seems more a dwarf idea than a gnome one. Meh.

It was an easy gimme. Dragon did cut one or two -really- boring weapons (I think they did, at least...I can't find them in my article submission. Maybe I revised it?)

This came out in August, and was the issue on display at Gen Con 1999, which was a) the only year I went, and b) the announcement of 3e. Big fun.

 

[(un)reason]

I was a little surprised to get my issue and find out my article had doubled in size. Gnomish magical items...now with halflings!

How very cheeky of them.

A lot. Not as many as there are limited shape-shifting spells in PF and later 3e and 4e (I think), but a lot.

That was tiresome, wasn't it.

Didn't have a thing to do with the edition change. Just seemed logical, that strength-boosting items should do -something- no matter how strong you were.

Since so many of the 3e changes were things people had been doing as house rules for years, that's an interesting matter. I wonder how many people wrote in saying that method was preferable to the previous one.

I love the image of a wall of these rooting into the ground, though. I don't know if I thought about mass production. It's not like there was a serious dearth of magical items in the world. And given that this was towards the tail-end of 2e, there were lots of ways to make magic items (though they did all required high-level casters). Also, 2e magic item creation actually got you xp, I think.

Oh yes. You could actually retire and make a full time job of it under those rules. How things change.

 

[(un)reason]

Dragon Magazine Issue 262: August 1999


part 5/7


Rogues Gallery: Ah yes, Baldur's Gate. There's an interesting game. So it seems that while this month's gallery is a Realms one yet again, this time it's converting the characters from one of their computer games instead of their novels. Another way in which they can keep the variety up, at least for a little while, since they don't release nearly as many games as novels. Come on, isn't Greyhawk supposed to be having a revival? Give us the characters from their new novels as well.

Abdel Adrian's portrait is obviously modelled upon Billy Ray Cyrus, complete with mullet. Way to make us hate him dude. And given he has a lot of bloodlust to deal with, courtesy of being the son of the god of murder, plus not much of a sense of humour, spending time around him doesn't seem a very safe proposition. Well, most computer game protagonists do rack up insane death counts. Why not lampshade it in setting?

Jaheira is a half-elf fighter/druid harper with a fairly interesting past, but not a particularly interesting personality. By being a whole bunch of things at once, she never really stands out as one. Well, at least it means she doesn't have any obvious weaknesses.

Tamoko is a ninja from the east. Once again, nice to see people still want to keep Kara-tur alive. She has the typical ninja trait of never fighting a fair fight if at all possible, and a heavy accent because she's not from around here. And the usual concern with honor. Yawn. Give me a bit more depth. Still, at least they're using a class from a splatbook.

Sarevok is the bad guy spawn of Bhaal, who has embraced his murderous urges and would rather like to become a god himself. His stats are predictably obscene, and he has some interesting magical items. He seems like a suitable challenge for a boss.


Arcane Lore: Ha. Now this is a long-needed solution. Spellbooks do keep on getting stolen or wet or burned. Many many wizards will sympathise with this one. You'd think more would work on solutions. Maybe they're just not sharing. Thankfully, this one wizard is, even if he chose to hide behind a pseudonym. What does he have to hide? Maybe Elminster and the cosmic balance mafia are out to get him. Well, I'll certainly assist in the dissemination of this.

Animate Drawing is one of those little flavour spells that wizards can use to impress the rubes. Animate their houses instead, that'll really get their attention.

Organize Spellbook lets you refile your spellbook so all the 1st level spells are at the beginning, or put all the elemental ones together. A lot easier than rewriting them all when you've picked them up as a grab-bag over the years.

Protection from Bookworms seems pretty obvious. Yup. Keep this one up and you'll reduce your odds of nasty crap happening quite considerably.

Ink Transfer is another way of allowing your spellbook to undergo a revamp and reorganization at considerably reduced cost. Getting a bit ratty? Pop the ink out and put it in a new one. Awesome.

Ink Luminescence lets you make your spellbook glow-in-the-dark. If you're thrown in a dungeon, and managed to hide your spellbooks, you can rememorize and get the hell out. Maybe some of the later spells will assist further with this.

Protection from Liquids another one that should be obvious in it's spellbook protecting utility, but plenty of other items could also benefit. Weapons don't want to rust, bro.

Damage Link lets you do the Dorian Grey thing, protecting one item at the expense of another. Use cheap stuff to protect the expensive things you really value. All purpose and dead useful.

Spielbuk's Pocket Spellbook lets you shrink it into a tiny replica and back with a word. This'll make it safer, but it'll still be easy to lose. Inscribe it with your personal sigil, then you'll always be able to trace it. Ahh, the joys of article synergy

Temporal Corridor is a nice little xanatos gambit one. Send an item into the future, to keep safe, or pop out just when you need it. One of those spells that gives you second perfect temporal sense would synergize well with that.

 

[(un)reason]

Dragon Magazine Issue 262: August 1999


part 6/7


Dragon's bestiary: A second computer game derived bestiary in a row? This is a bit worrying. I know I said quite a few times last year that you needed a change, but if you do too much of this instead it'll soon feel just as tedious and creatively moribund. Variety is important. How many ways do I have to say it?

Anyway, this month is another backconversion, even more direct than last time. For whatever reason, Planescape: Torment included quite a few monsters that weren't actually found in D&D. Since my appetite for planar creatures still isn't really sated, even after all these years, far be it from me to to complain about this one.

Gronk are big hopping rocky things that smash anything they see. Definitely a monster purely for the fighting and killing, as with so many of these computer game conversions.

Grillig have the interesting distinction of being born from 2D, and being immune to edged weapons. They use quite interesting tactics, and have a cool backstory too. These would definitely be allowed citizenship as a canon immigrant if I was in charge.

Sohmien are decidedly creepy looking horse variants. Like Bebiliths, they are evil creatures dedicated to hunting other evil creatures, in particular Nightmares. One way or another they'll end the cycle of destructiveness, quite possibly by taking out both sides. Once again, sounds pretty neat to me. The writers on Torment knew what they were doing.

Trelon also venture well into the uncanny valley thanks to their modelling. Tony DiTerlizzi would be proud. They attack wizards in large quantities, particularly illusionists, and have quite a few immunities. They're another quite interesting creature that again, I wouldn't mind using.


Role models: In some ways, minis are a tremendous boon to mass combat. They allow you to easily tell who is where and think in a tactical fashion. But as has been made very clear before, they're also a substantial expense. You can reduce this by having a single mini represent a whole troop, but that can lead to it's own issues if you want the heroes to split off and do things individually (which they might well be more effective at, given D&D scaling. Once again, this column does three things in two pages. Rules ideas, a mini scenario, and a bit of painting advice. Putting scars on your minis when they came close to death, showing the gradual development of your characters in a solid way is a pretty neat idea too. This column is becoming quite the little smorgasbord of useful tricks. Gotta love it when the writers surprise me like that.


Nodwick and co take their shot at another classic module. Many giants are humiliated.


From dungeons to drivespace: Alternity gets a conversion of Ilithids and beholders this month. Two of AD&D's most powerful, distinctive, and mechanically tricky creatures, they have an array of powers that takes a reasonable amount of work to represent elsewhere. Indeed, just these two monsters take them a full 11 pages, more than many an ecology. They also have some general talk about converting other AD&D monsters, and some thoughts about how to integrate these two terrors into the Star Drive setting. I don't think it's a co-incidence that both appeared quite a bit in Spelljammer as well, and had interesting social structures that differed substantially from their earthbound colonies. I think this was a clever choice of creatures, as it presents a challenge, and then solves it, showing you that you can get ambitious with the Alternity system and it'll hold up. That seems like it might get them a few more purchases. So this article gets a fairly positive result.

 

[(un)reason]

Dragon Magazine Issue 262: August 1999


part 7/7


Marvel Superheroes: This game decides to do Spiderman's symbiote again. Now this is one character that's definitely changed in the meantime. When we last saw it in issue 94, it hadn't even bonded with Eddie Brock yet. Now it has a well established rivalry, an kid, and a grandchild on the way. Ahh, continuity. Gotta love the way it gradually adds up, despite the efforts of some writers to keep the world static. It's stats are considerably simpler under this ruleset, partly because it's been established that some of it's quirks are specific to it, while others vary depending on it's current host and their subconscious, which wasn't clear before, and partly because the new system is generally simpler. So this is fairly interesting because it not only lets me draw direct comparison, but also take a good look at what's been happening outside the magazine. But they do use exactly the same image, curiously enough. And it is only a single page long, leaving me with not a huge amount to work with. So it goes in the entertaining, but not substantial enough to be filling category.


Dragonmirth finds a new spin on the Rapunzel jokes. KotDT engage in equal opportunity ruining of adventures.


TSR Previews: As I said last issue, there does seem to be some formatting switcharound, with several of last month's new releases also here. This leaves just three actual new things for me to cover.

First up is the Silver anniversary collectors edition. A whole load of reprinted classic modules, a previously unreleased cut from that era (L3: Deep Dwarven Delve by Len Lakofka) and the usual fripperies of author commentary and pretty posters. Just the thing for both curious new players, and grognards who's old copies are getting rather ratty from regular use now.

The Realms gets Silverfall: Stories of the Seven Sisters. Ed Greenwood does some fiction featuring all of them together for the first time, to face an epic threat. I love that they can foreshadow things like this for so long before actually doing them.

Dragonlance gets Brothers in Arms: The Raistlin chronicles volume 2. Back in time we go, to milk the biggest names they have a little longer. They might be dead at some point in the timeline, but as long as there's a few days that haven't been covered in exhaustive detail, someone'll find adventures to slot in there.


Profiles looses it's dumb capitalisation again. I suspect the editors are fighting over this. Anyway, this month's subject is Steven Schend. He's worked on the original FASERIP Marvel game, the Forgotten Realms, and now Alternity. His modus operandi is a combination of taking care of the little details, which is very important in a setting like the Realms, and looking to make things that really make you go wow. Sounds like he's one of the people who keeps Ed enthusiastic by allowing his world to surprise even him. And as we know, keeping things surprising is the hardest thing for any creative type, because as soon as it becomes a formula, it ceases to be surprising. And this profile does stick very firmly to the established formula for them. And in response, my writeup sticks closely to the formula for that. Yawn. Tell us something controversial.


Another issue full of articles that are either good or dull, but with a distinct lack of actively bad ones. Once again, it's business as usual. Which I'm sure is the way the Halflings would want it. Can't be having with surprises around here. Nice quiet life, that's what we want. Maybe a few monsters to keep the young'un's throwing arms in shape, but nothing they can't handle. Let's keep playing it safe for the time being. Let's move the count up one more number, no more, no less, save in the case of annuals, where you're essentially moving up an intermediate imaginary number. Two is too many, zero too few. Three is right out!

 

[(un)reason]

Dragon Magazine Issue 263: September 1999


part 1/7


116 pages. BING! After a couple of years of being a bit up in the air, just got real at Wizards of the Coast. 3rd edition is now officially announced to the world, and the countdown starts now. You can bet the volume of letters and forum posts will skyrocket in the next few months. And it already looks like they're going to make a bigger deal of this than they did the 2e update. Still, there are other things being announced on the cover as well, so it doesn't look like the magazine will be nothing but promotion. I can definitely say I'm interested in seeing how fast they dole out the teasers, and in what order, so this is not one issue where I'm going to hang around the contents page for long.


Scan Quality: Generally good, whitespace around pages, no index.


In this issue:


The wyrms turn doubles in size, to do some serious elaboration on the cover announcement. Just a year from now, your system will be completely renovated. And we'll do our best to incorporate your suggestions into it, to make it better. We've already been watching the forums with great interest, taking note of your suggestions. Obviously they're not revealing everything, and may still change things around, but they do slip more than enough details to get everyone talking. There's going to be a unified mechanic, the average character gets a fairly substantial power upgrade, there's more focus on action and high level stuff, and exceptional strength is scrapped like the speedbump it is, letting you get to superhuman prowess far more easily. They're practically baiting people to erupt in a fury about how 3e is going to be for powergamers and munchkins. This should be fun to watch. So this is quite a playful beginning, showing they're going to make some serious changes, but are fairly confident about them, having already done a whole lot of arguing and playtesting in-house. Let the flamewars commence.


D-Mail: No edition wars yet here, as they're still 2-3 months behind the new releases. Patience, my dears. In the meantime, we have the usual rollplaying vs roleplaying argument subverted. They're independent axes that you can be better or worse at, like chaos and evil. Master them both and you can WIN THE GAME!!!!!

Our second one is someone complaining about the probability of producing intelligent dragons under Greg Detwilers model. You know, many mythical dragons weren't that smart. That didn't stop them from being legends. D&D has if anything, inflated their overall competency.

A request for more specific setting based articles. Unlike in the old days, where they said they'd publish more if people sent them in, they now say screw that, we're going to concentrate on generic stuff. Well, that and the forgotten realms, which is practically generic anyway. You want more specific flavour, you need to put it in your own campaign yourself. Another big sea change that comes with the next edition, already being put into implementation.

Some serious naming niggles. Unfortunately, this is one area where reality is often weirder than fiction, partly because some parents are just plain cruel to their children, and partly because what sounds perfectly natural in one language can be rather silly when directly translated. Plus there's the problem with famous names that would actually be common, but also break immersion in game. Jesus christ that can become a headache.

And finally, we have someone wondering what's happened to the mini line. Ral Partha's licence has expired, and they going to do it in house from now on! Which also means they're already making minis based on the classes and races that'll be core next edition. So this response shows how much they already have finalised and moving ahead. If they'd stayed with another company, that'd add extra weak links where info could get out early. Very interesting indeed. Where else will we be able to get extra teasers that aren't simply handed out.


Nodwick is used as cover. Oh woe. Just kill him and stick him back together like you usually do.

 

[LordVyreth]

And finally, we have someone wondering what's happened to the mini line. Ral Partha's licence has expired, and they going to do it in house from now on! Which also means they're already making minis based on the classes and races that'll be core next edition. So this response shows how much they already have finalised and moving ahead. If they'd stayed with another company, that'd add extra weak links where info could get out early. Very interesting indeed. Where else will we be able to get extra teasers that aren't simply handed out. .

And let me tell you these things have been a huge money pit for me, but one I don't regret. As someone who never cared about painting minis, or the lead wars, or whatnot, these little colored bits of plastic sealed the deal for me. Nothing like tossing a chain golem or something on the board for all the characters to see. Hell, I once dug out my Carrion Crawler as a player when I recognized the DM's description. Sadly, because I homebrew like half the monsters I toss at the party, I have to use approximations most of the time. Hurry up with the holoboard already, reality!