Let's read the entire run

[(un)reason]

Dragon Issue 272: June 2000


part 1/7


130(2 pages missing) They lose the magazine again at this point, having been fluctuating for a bit. What's with that. You've had it for more than half your life now. I guess it's like middle-aged people getting rid of their tattoos or something. The cover is pretty impressive again. That is one absolutely huge dragon. And it looks like they still have quite a few more dragon based articles for 2e in the time we have remaining. Let's see if these are the finely matured wine of articles, or the absolute dregs.


Scan quality: A few pages missing, slightly faded.


In this issue:


The wyrms turn: This month, Dave covers the amusing topic of people attempting to claim seniority as a gamer by saying they've been playing longer, started with an earlier edition, have had longer running characters which got to higher levels, and so forth. This is particularly funny if they claim to have started with books that are older than they are. Some people never stop jockeying for status, do they? It's a game. Can you not just concentrate on having fun, and maybe recruiting more people so it's not so hard to find a group? New players who aren't jaded, and concentrate more on playing a role than gaming the system can be more fun to play with anyway. So this is another trap for the experienced player to be aware of and avoid, for unless you're Gary, that kind of pomposity will only make you risible. What really is the value of playing the same elf for 40 years? (Well, if you're Leonard Nimoy, a good few million. ) Is it worthy of respect? Does anything really matter in the long run? Damnnit, I'm getting into existential crisis mode again. Let's embrace the illusion that what I'm doing matters on any level for a little longer, for quitting past the 3/4 mark would be a terrible waste that would nag at me for the rest of my life.


D-Mail: We start off with a letter from someone who's decidedly worried about the drastic changes it looks like 3e is making, and is rather leery about switching over. As usual, they do their best to convince him, and by extension, all the other readers that are still on the shelf, for their livelihoods depends on it.

We then have one from someone who wasn't particularly keen on their latest annual, but likes issues 267 & 268 a lot. They should try harder for their special issues, not get bogged down in messing around.

After that, Skip's rulings on paralysis get picked at. Any errors are because he's trying to hold two rulesets in his head at once, and may premptively put out some of the fixes the next edition makes. Trust his wisdom, for he knows where the problem areas are and wants to solve them even more than you do.

And finally, we have some grumbling about the guy from issue 268 who scared his players with a real tarantula when their characters encountered giant spiders. That's so not fair! Well, no, but life isn't fair. You still have to deal with it, one way or another.


Nodwick is still the smart one in the team. Maybe. If he was really smart, he'd have quit by now.


Forum: Scott Wylie Roberts gives his opinion on the 3e previews so far. Many of them are not positive. Iterative attacks in particular come under fire for looking like a hassle to remember and apply. He also wants the bloated Forgotten Realms killed and Greyhawk to get plenty of supplements next edition. I'm so sorry.

Krag Kadera (perfect dwarf name) wants energy drain made temporary. It annoys the players far less to do so. No sherlock. The big question then becomes if you want to really scare and annoy your players sometimes.

Steve Hammer thinks weapons having different damages to different size creatures is pointless and illogical. That should definitely be on the chopping block for 3e.

Keely Markham tells us about his parties draconic employer, who may also have them for dinner sometime soon. They're taking to undermountain to try and get some xp before that happens. Good luck leveling up quick enough.

 

[jonesy]

The wyrms turn: This month, Dave covers the amusing topic of people attempting to claim seniority as a gamer by saying they've been playing longer, started with an earlier edition, have had longer running characters which got to higher levels, and so forth. This is particularly funny if they claim to have started with books that are older than they are.

Is he saying people can only start with books that came out when they started? So noboby born in the nineties could possibly have started out with the red box? Sure it's more likely that people start with books from 'their generation', but it doesn't really make it a given.

 

[Daztur]

Is he saying people can only start with books that came out when they started? So noboby born in the nineties could possibly have started out with the red box? Sure it's more likely that people start with books from 'their generation', but it doesn't really make it a given.

I started on the RC when it was new but I soon switched over to using mostly 1ed stuff since it was cheap to buy used and a lot of that stuff came out before I was born...

 

[(un)reason]

Dragon Issue 272: June 2000


part 2/7


ProFiles: Andy Collins is another one of the new recruits, who would go on to be the old guard by the time of the next edition change. He actually joined WotC shortly before they took over TSR, and so got into the biggest gaming company by the back door. He doesn't seem that interested in talking about D&D at the moment, having gone straight from working on Alternity to the new Star Wars d20 game. Still, there's plenty of time for that. Like several of our newer writers, the shock from working with industry giants hasn't quite worn off yet, and he's amazed he got this far. Well, if he were actually an egotistical twat, they'd hardly say it in this magazine, would they. Another pretty solid entry that would still turn out very different if they were writing it today.


Up on a soapbox: We've already stood up for the much maligned hack and slash playstyle here. The next logical step is doing the same for Dungeon Crawling. This is somewhat easier to excise from your game than combat. Even in the most political of games, the threat of danger and the possibility of succeeding or failing at your plans is what gives your games real excitement. On the other hand, a site based challenge that you clear out and then don't return too is very much a D&D thing. But since Gary popularised the idea, of course he's going to present it as an essential part of your roleplaying experiences that you should never entirely outgrow. Yeah, once again he's being intentionally polarising largely as a way of provoking debate. I have a sudden urge to dub the trololo song over his appearance in Futurama. Still, as with Ed's perverseness, it's a lot more interesting than most of their writers, and shows that a culture does need elder statesmen who can get away with saying stuff a lot of people are thinking, but are afraid too. And since getting back to the dungeon was one of the 3e taglines, there's still plenty of ground roots support for this playstyle. You do need to recognise when a fashion has been taken as far as it can go and switch to the next wave or wipe out.


Countdown to 3rd edition: 2 months to go. Things are really heating up now, as they cover two classes this month. Barbarians have been pretty much completely rewritten for 3e. Their old nature survival themed powers have been exchanged for RAGE and the toughness and agility to survive as a frontline fighter without heavy armor. Eventually they get damage reduction, which was an exceedingly rare power before, but many monsters and a reasonable minority of characters will now be able to shrug off an infinite number of scratches. They're definitely a lot more combat focussed than they used to be. Rangers haven't changed as much on a conceptual level, but the implementation of their powers has been remixed quite a bit. Their spell selection is slightly bigger, their favored enemy power now scales nicely, and they're no longer restricted by alignment. They're just getting the general upgrade all of the classes are. This isn't as interesting as the last few, because it doesn't reveal some big aspect of the new rules, just little details. Next month's teaser, on the other hand? Brand new class ahoy. The readers have a full month to speculate about that.


Bahamut & Tiamat: The 3e teasers escalate with our first full monster statblocks. And pretty significant they are too. After all, the big bosses of the good and evil dragons took a break for an entire edition, only showing avatars in Monster Mythology. But since 3e is pushing the player empowerment in a fairly significant way, you once again have a chance of killing gods. Not that it'll be an easy fight, even at 20th level though, for their stats are in numbers you simply didn't see in earlier editions. The players may be stronger, but the monsters are beefed up too. So this gives you a pretty good warning of just how big high level statblocks get in 3e, and how they've changed the general format for monsters. The teasers may have shown us bits and pieces, but this gives you a far more complete picture. It is indeed a pretty significant step. Shame we won't see any letter responses to it before the actual books are out, given their response time.


PC Portraits: Last year we had dragonslayers in this column. This time it's dragonriders. Another of those cases where you put characters from the two groups in the same party, they will probably end up fighting. They're all pretty heavily armoured, and a couple of them are protecting their eyes as well. Well, full-grown dragons are generally more than strong enough to carry a whole party without seriously reducing their speed. And if you're fighting other dragons or similar high level threats, you need all the protection you can get. You can still adorn yourself with bright colours and precious jewelery, and do spectacular stunt flying, but without some pragmatism, you won't last many fights.

 

[(un)reason]

Dragon Issue 272: June 2000


part 3/7


Dragon Psionics: Ed Bonny does another intriguingly specific article for a niche setting. How does Gem Dragons having access to a source of power the other two families can't learn or really understand affect politics? Since Psionics aren't subject to magic resistance in 2e, and have lots of mind affecting powers, you can see how some dragons would get paranoid. But while there are some adventure hooks here, most of this is devoted to 8 new psionic powers, most of which are proprietary secrets of various races, and in some cases specific clans. Most of them are quite dragon specific, and wouldn't be of much use to a race without flight, breath weapons, and so forth even if they did manage to somehow steal the secret. This means that while this is pretty fun reading, it's not going to be useful to a huge number of people. Still, given their current stance of making the material they release more generic, that means I shall treasure it. If there's any campaign that really needed a few good supplements to keep you from running out of material before you even got past 1st level, it's Council of Wyrms.


How to talk with a dragon: Speak softly, and bring lots of friends with big sticks. Unless you're dealing with a dragon that's still small and young enough that they can't squash you with one claw like a bug, you need to be both obsequious and constantly on your guard. Unlike Devils, which want your soul, and will normally keep to the letter of their bargains, dragons don't consider you important enough to negotiate with seriously unless specifically proven otherwise, plus you look so very appetising, so evil or neutral ones may well eat you as soon as you're no longer useful or amusing, and even good ones will be more than a little patronising. This article takes an extreme stance, (you certainly couldn't say this about all the dragons in Ed's Wyrms of the North series) but does so with style, and more than a little humour, making it stand out from the crowd. It once again shows how interesting a writer Robin Laws is, and how taking a strong stance for an article gets more notable results than filling up your statements with conditionals and compromises. He fully deserves to be a popular and polarising writer who gets forum threads about what he does with this showing.


Sleeping dragon Inn: We finally get to see the winner of this competition from issue 251, nearly 2 years later. I do have to wonder what took them so long. And since the inn is small and rectangular, and doesn't have any huge surprises in layout, I'm not sure why they picked this one over all the other submissions they got. What do you consider good building design in a fantasy campaign anyway? I think I'd really have to see some of the competition so I could get an idea of what the bad ideas looked like, (and if they were actually more gonzo and awesome anyway) so I could judge it better.


The secret library of Vecna: Ah yes, Bahamut and Tiamat may be getting an upgrade in the edition change, but it's Vecna who's really getting a promotion, from an occasional adversary to a core god who'll appear in most campaigns which don't make up their own whole new set. Part of that is because he just has an iconic look. Anyone can draw a corpse missing a hand and an eye, and however the details differ (did they ever say if it's the right or left eye? ) anyone with a modicum of D&D lore'll be able to say "yup, that's Vecna alright" But anyway, since he's temporarily trapped in Ravenloft at the moment, this is a collection of typically double-edged magical items that he's collected recently. You'd have a hell of a time getting hold of them, and if you did, the odds of you turning into an undead creature, being possessed by a ghost, or just dying horribly when he catches you are pretty high. Basically, you're screwed, because he's the writer's darling, and trying to fight him will just send you on a railroad ride of frustration. I think i speak for many in the audience when I say that noise.


Fiction: The skin witch by J Gregory Keyes. Fool Wolf continues to try and get rid of his savage bonded spirit, only to find that the only people who might be able to accomplish that have agendas of their own, and are not to be trusted in the slightest. I don't think it'll surprise you to hear he fails, the author not wanting to change the major framing device for the stories. (plus he'd have to find a sidekick or someone else to talk too to make the adventures relatable) However, he doesn't keep the world static, with the river god that was shooting to become a monotheistic overlord having been overthrown recently, leaving a big power vacuum. But that hasn't made things any nicer, and the magic-users are still getting up to some pretty ed-up stuff in the name of power and security. He might not want to be a hero, but compared to the people he meets, he's not a bad guy at all. Like Gary's column, this is one of the few things in the magazine pushing at what the censors might allow, and is more interesting for it. Magic is probably more interesting, and definitely more balanced when it has a price, and so using it or not is a real choice. Perhaps that would be a better way of balancing D&D magic. Instead of nerfing the powers, just add a few more strange costs for them.

 

[(un)reason]

Dragon Issue 272: June 2000


part 4/7


Arcane Lore: Another helping of overpowered dragon-exclusive spells for our birthday. Truly yawnaramic. This column held out for a bit, but has now well and truly fallen into the same repetitive malaise that got the bestiary and bazaar a few years ago.

Breath Control makes your breath weapon more reliable in terms of damage inflicted. Not really a great gain, overall.

Claw Aura, on the other hand, is a pretty nasty buff. Double your damage, using the energy type of your breath weapon. This'll be more useful to some dragons than others, particularly the one with interesting multiple options.

Magnify Breath Weapon gets pretty brutal at higher age categories. Fry the ers trying to steal your treasure with great prejudice. Woo.

Hoard Cache is another way of storing your treasure extradimensionality for security and transport reasons. Seen you before.

Breathmantle surrounds your whole body in your breath weapon. Another way to discourage the enemy getting close. Which is a good idea for dragons, for being surrounded means you can't toast them all in one breath. And that's bad tactics.

Dimension Trap lets a dragon store a breath weapon like a far more devastating fire trap, to set around their lair, or wherever. Brutal, but not too surprising.

Wing Razors are't too surprising in effect, only in degree. 12d4 points of damage? That's near vorpal in intensity. You could have a whole low-level party sliced in two without blinking. I suppose their breath weapons are usually even nastier. So yeah, yet more draconic scariness, as if you really needed it by now.


Bazaar of the Bizarre: A substantially more useful bazaar this month. A few months ago, we had planar armours. This time, we have planar weapons. Not quite a big or unique as the previous time, this is still full of useful stuff for your players and their opponents. The planes retain their popularity among the writers, even if the line has been cancelled.

Arcadian Dwarven Hammers work best for dwarves, and disappear if not used regularly. You need to be proactive in your attempts to kick the butt of evil, otherwise what's the point.

Bytopian flintspears burst into flame whenever they strike a metal weapon. This does focus your optimal combat choices a bit, but hey, you can cheat by powering up with your buds just before battle. It's a neat flavour touch as much as anything.

Celestial Swords put you in contact with a celestial, and you get to make a deal with them for power, at the cost of doing good and having your soul go to them when you die. | think that's a price I'm willing to pay.

Fiendblades are also a means by which you can strike a deal with a powerful extraplanar being and get power at the cost of your soul. Course, the destination is going to be a good deal less pleasant than it would with a celestial as your boss.

The Flail of Apomps has a tryptich of nasty special effects, and a whole bunch of yugoloth true names inscribed on it. That has definite uses, but of course, summoning fiends has it's dangers. I suppose either way, someone suffers, which pleases the Gehreleths.

Modron Heartspears are made for the express purpose of fighting tanar'ri. You'd think they at least affect slaadi as well, but apparently they're not as much bother. Or maybe they have a different tool against them. Guess that's in your hands.


Dragon's bestiary: More adorable little dragonets? Well, we've had plenty of them before, but still not as many as we have full dragon types. Still, our last bestiary for this edition is once again treading very very familiar terrain. Guess they're trying to make us eager for the changeover by feeding us to bloating with stuff we don't really need.

Crows-nest dragons are draconic gull equivalents that'll follow ships and scavenge from ports. Killing them is bad luck.

Geyser dragons are adorable little amphibians with the ego of full size dragons. You'll need to be a pretty dominant personality to get one of these as a familiar. Sounds like the plucky animal sidekick from certain novels I'm familiar with.

Mole dragons have a face a dwarf would find cute, and gemlike scales. They're one of the smartest and most malevolent varieties of dragonet, with decent magical abilities. Give a Dao one as a pet.

Pavilion dragons live in rainforests and have psionics. They're tricky to win as a familiar, but quite good if you can manage it. Is that enough choice for you now?! Please please say it is!

 

[(un)reason]

Dragon Issue 272: June 2000


part 5/7


Oh, this is a terrible advert for die, vecna, die! You really are not selling us on it by trashing the old edition, even before the new one is out.


The ecology of the hydra: Looks like the ecologies are eager to make the changeover, with this one dual-statting all it's crunchy bits. Other than that, it's business as usual, with the association of monster hunters being their impetuous and arrogant selves, and suffering rather for it. High intelligence, looooooow wisdom. And terrible at dealing with women. With social skills like this, who needs vows of celibacy? As usual, plenty of research on the creatures mythical antecedents is done, as well as extrapolation on it's capabilities as a multiheaded creature. Thankfully, like ettins, brains are not among the things it's many heads grants it, so it can be defeated more easily than say, a dragon. A fairly average ecology, this pretty much sticks to the usual formulas for this group, although it does introduce what looks like a new recurring character. Gotta keep the dynamics from getting stale somehow.


Shop keep does the pedant thing.


The new adventures of Volo: Another chance here for Ed to demonstrate his ability to whip up cool stuff in such quantity that there's no way it could all fit into a conventional book format. All those little quotes he's come up with from various characters that never got incorporated into novels, or put at the beginning of chapters of sourcebooks get offloaded here, lightening his pile of unpublished stuff a bit more. Like Oscar Wilde, it seems he has quite the supply of pithiness, and has invented a ridiculous number of fictional books written within the setting. We know by now the Realms has basic printing press technology, and a long history, so that's not too credibility stretching. A more interesting question is how many of these authors actually have histories, stats, and mentions elsewhere, and how many were just names made up on the spot. Lots of geeky fun combing other books and articles to be had here then. Not only an amusing reading, but one that looks like it'll get extra value with a bit more hindsight.


Gamma Squirrels & Mutant Moose: They're referencing the old Rocky & Bullwinkle RPG TSR did in the late 80's? They never mention that! Even more than Buck Rogers, (but not as much as the All my children RPG, which was never even mentioned in the magazine ) this is something that gets left out of a lot of histories. But they're not actually converting any setting material from the cartoon, just using it as a secondary reference while they give us gamma world material, which is a slight disappointment. Of course, rules for creating mutated anthropomorphic animals can be applied to many settings, so it's easy enough to genericise this material. This certainly looks like another article that'll help you play Alternity for a while longer, and do different things with it. My main issue is with the sudden mood whiplash between the gonzo artwork and intro, and the dry and serious contents. Methinks whimsy is not Andy Collins forte, and he was forcing the tie-in a little.


The wisdom of (Corey) Solomon: Oh dear. The guy in charge of the D&D movie is a first time director who's been trying to get it off the ground for nearly 10 years. And they're apologising for the low budget. However you spin that, and they're trying hard to be positive, it doesn't make this look like a promising prospect. Also, casting Tom Baker as an elf? That didn't really work, did it. Richard O' Brien as a master thief who sends the heroes into a maze though, that was just obvious in an amusing fashion. They're also making it obvious that there'll be a fair bit of cheese involved (which really, you should have figured out last month when they said a Wayans brother is involved. ) Already, our hopes of getting a serious treatment of the subject matter is fading. You think this will sell us on the movie? Even without the knowledge of hindsight, this would make me skeptical. This is going to be even more of a struggle for them than I thought.


Wizards live: Virtually every day apart from thursdays is packed this month, although once again, more than half of it is TCG material, which shows how much of their market share that makes up. Skip does Sage Advice live again, which must be a fairly popular one, and Monte Cook explains the new barbarians in a bit more detail. Nothing particularly surprising here, so I have nothing more to say. Just another promotional article.

 

[(un)reason]

Dragon Issue 272: June 2000


part 6/7


Dungeoncraft: Ray's advice this month is stuff that even he admits is likely to be particularly subjective. What physical objects do you really need to run a session? DM Screen, Notes, Rulebooks, Character sheets, Dice, Minis, Maps, Notepads AND Props? Yeah, that's a fairly extensive list. These days, I'd condense all of them apart from the dice, minis and props down to my laptop, and possibly even use an electronic dice roller as well. And since I'm not a great user of minis and props, i'd probably skip those as well. Once again, for someone who wants to do the minimum of effort needed, he sure does put a lot of work into it. I suppose that's the thing isn't it. If you put in a bit more effort at the outset, you can get everything else done more efficiently. And then the temptation can be to keep working harder because you're getting more done, making a positive reinforcement loop. And aren't those just so much nicer than the negative ones? And if the result is the difference between retiring at 55 and buggering off to the spanish riviera to live comfortably, and having to keep doing a part time job at 70 to supplement your crappy pension, then I think you can say the result was worth it. But anyway, this is all YMMV. And reminds me just how much computers have taken over in the last decade, by the improvements in their form factor more than their processing power increases. I don't feel I've gained anything from this article, but I'm still interested in seeing what he has to say about making the first session of a campaign good. Onto next month then.


Sage advice: Do undead characters get the AC of their monster type ( Recycled question. No.)

Will a naga crown and rings of wizardry used together quadruple your spell slots. (Hell no. At best, they'd triple it (remember you add multipliers, not multiply them out. ) At worst, they'd go boom, and permanently disjoin your spellcasting ability for trying to be such an egregious twink.)

How long does the mantle of baravar last (One hour per level. You can split that, within limits.)

Does blocking use your base or adjusted THAC0 ( adjusted)

Does the axe of the dwarven lords transform deep dwarves into normal dwarves (Yes. If they aren't a hill dwarf, they undergo an embarrassing race change. Prepare to be treated like Michael Jackson)

How does a ring of regeneration interact with the deaths door rules (Recycled question. )

Can really big weapons nullify the automiss from a cloak of displacement (no, even if that makes no sense)

Do you get strength bonuses on bows or not (you do. Just not on crossbows, who's firing has little to do with your strength. )

Is using a ring of vampiric regeneration an evil act. (No. You're already hurting them. What does it matter that you're getting some hp back from it)

How does Antipathy/Sympathy work (flexibly. It's a high level spell. It can affect most creatures)

If you cast wall of fire on large creatures does the damage for different range categories stack (no. Use only the highest applicable)

Do bariaur get natural armour (No. The monster description is assumed to be wearing hide armour)

Does rope trick accommodate 8 characters full stop, or 7 plus the caster (you choose. )

What protects you from dragon turtle breath (fire resistance, as counterintuitive as it may seem)

How long does it take to prepare a free magick (same as a normal spell slot)

Can you use a dust devil to disperse dust of sneezing and choking (Yes. This means it doesn't work at all, not that it can affect multiple creatures.)

Stop messing me around! How do you really pronounce Flind! ( Doughnuts down your pants. Maybe that'll cheer you up. Tone poetry? JFK's death? Skip gives up. No pleasing some people. )

Maybe a bit of alternity stuff'll cheer them up.

How much does a gravity negater cost. (not much, in all contradiction of reality.)

Are there rules for repairing cyberware (Go to a surgeon. This stuff's too complicated for you to fix it in the field. We have to force you to spend money somehow.)

What good does a computer gauntlet do you (it makes you better at using computers in general. Is that so complicated?)

 

[(un)reason]

Dragon Issue 272: June 2000


part 7/7


Role models: The people in the staff room continue to show off their deals with various minis companies, allowing them to afford better stuff than you™. Sure the idea that you should prepare for your sessions, and buy cool new props and minis to whip out for each new setpiece is a good idea, but all this costs money and uses up storage space which is increasingly at a premium, especially in the current sucky economy. And unlike last year's material that was rather good at showing you how to use what you have creatively and making it go further, this just leaves you too it. So so disappointing, with a side order of smug. Get a dedicated writer in again!


Silicon sorcery: Colon overload this month, as we cover a game which uses two of them in it's title. Total Annihilation: Kingdoms: The Iron Plague? That's one clunky title. The result is fairly clunky too, as it involves transplanting some rather steampunk looking technology into your fantasy game. Mechanical scorpions, submarines, zombies, and bomb launchers are reasonably fun devices, and examining how a society supplies and powers it's technological advancement can lead to adventure hooks in itself. So this is a bit clunky in it's implementation, but there are some good ideas here. Well, I guess you don't want your technology too glossy, or it's harder for players to take it apart and tinker with it.


Nodwick is still battling the slave lords. Well, there are an awful lot of them around to battle.


Coming attractions: The Realms, as always, is busy busy busy this month, with 4 connected products. R A Salvadore is responsible for 2 of them. Book 4 of the cleric quintet gets it's turn this month. At this rate they'll finish them off by the time the next edition hits. Meanwhile, on the new front, he gives us The Spine of the World. Wulfgar has a crappy time for some reason, including having to induct some n00bs into playing D&D. Being a hero is a hard life. There's also a hint book for Baldur's gate II, and Cloak and Dagger, wherin they reveal some of the few remaining big secrets of the world in an attempt to beat the edition change sales slump. Amazed they still have any at all after the volume of supplements it has now.

Dragonlance mixes fiction and gaming material in More Leaves from the Inn of the Last Home. It might have more grimness, but the 5th age still has it's share of whimsy as well. The more things change, eh.

Greyhawk Decends into the depths of the Earth. Paul Kidd novelises D1-3 & Q1, with a bit of T1-4 thrown in as well. See the whacky group of weirdos who did the giants and white plume mountain romp their way through the oldest adventure path AD&D has to offer.

Vaguely connected to Greyhawk as well, but also to Ravenloft and Planescape, is Die, Vecna, Die! Another horrible railroad where canonically, the PC's fail, as Vecna not only survives, but becomes a god next edition. Way to end 11 years of 2nd edition on a sour note. Sure, it hasn't all been good, but it never deserved this.

Alternity gets a Gamma World conversion. Metamorphosis Alpha got converted to the Amazing Engine. Now this gets a short lived revival. (since they've already decided that they're killing this line) Dark apocalyptic?! Methinks the writers missed the point as well. No wonder no-one talks about this version much.

Another bit of cross-promotion from their other department as well with a M:tG book getting space here. Prophecy by Vance Moore is book 3 of the Masquerade cycle. So not only are you stealing WW's colons, you're also nicking their buzzwords. How lame is that?


What's new grapples with the issue of keeping very big pets. And the snail makes it a little further across the page. Oh, the continuity! :fans face: Where will it end?


They seem particularly keen to get to the next edition this month, with the two extra articles using the new mechanics standing out nicely. This is understandable, because this is a pretty filler heavy issue otherwise. There's some interestingly obscure articles, and some just plain boring ones, and not much that's really going to be generally useful. Let's see if any decent ones can duck and roll to get under that door before it closes for good in 2 months time.

 

[M.L. Martin]

Vaguely connected to Greyhawk as well, but also to Ravenloft and Planescape, is Die, Vecna, Die! Another horrible railroad where canonically, the PC's fail, as Vecna not only survives, but becomes a god next edition. Way to end 11 years of 2nd edition on a sour note. Sure, it hasn't all been good, but it never deserved this.

On the bright side, we got some brief hints at interesting parallel planes and a decent Citadel Cavitius sourcebook out of it, and some killer Kevin McGann art.

From what I've heard, the product may have suffered from managerial interference--the

Spoiler

whole theme of PC-useable Vecna relics

came from on high, as I understand.