I'm confident that HQ had shifted to PDF distribution of scenarios by this point. Living Greyhawk was PDF from the start, and never involved physical shipment of products to conventions or game days. Much later, there were printed modules sent to game stores (and the promotional "Adventurer's Guild" scenarios of the day were still printed and sent to participating stores), but in 2000, the RPGA was out of the sending physical adventures to people business.
-
NOW LIVE! Into the Woods--new character species, eerie monsters, and haunting villains to populate the woodlands of your D&D games.
Let's read the entire run
- Thread starter (un)reason
- Start date
I'm confident that HQ had shifted to PDF distribution of scenarios by this point. Living Greyhawk was PDF from the start, and never involved physical shipment of products to conventions or game days. Much later, there were printed modules sent to game stores (and the promotional "Adventurer's Guild" scenarios of the day were still printed and sent to participating stores), but in 2000, the RPGA was out of the sending physical adventures to people business.
Orius
Unrepentant DM Supremacist
What's New was mildy amusing before this, with a few good strips, but I think the new incarnation really took off at this point. Dixie wasn't all that funny or interesting before the alignment switch, but starting with this strip she does a great job of stealing the scene.
When even Piffany doesn't like you, you've probably got personality problems. Just sayin'.
I agree with the sentiment though. The art director can blather all he wants about "guidelines", but the simple fact is that those ugly-ass Replicant and Wrongfont typefaces looked ike crap. They can bash Helvetica if they want, but even though it's dull and boring as hell (and everyone just uses Arial anyways
) it's still legible, which is something these typefaces have a hard time claiming. Even the much maligned Comic Sans is easier to read, though it would probably look out of place in Dragon.I was in that crowd. The biggest thing I disliked about early 3e was the art. Eventually they managed to settle on a less over-the-top style.
Last edited:
(un)reason
Legend
Dragon Issue 277: November 2000
part 2/7
PROfILES? Ok, Now I know they're messing with us deliberately. The format gets another messing around, appearing on alternate vertical columns on each page. This is not an improvement. Anyway, Kim Mohan is our subject this month. Long-time editor of the magazine, he's now managing editor of the whole goddamn R&D department, getting to look over and help make every book that comes out clear, consistent, and high in quality. A position that suits him well, as he's never been the most exiting writer in his own right (I found the wilderness survival guide a right snoozefest) but he seems good at getting the best out of others. Another case where people feed off each other's talents to create a greater whole. Try and do everything yourself, it won't be as much fun, or as good.
Previews: Having finished rolling the D&D corebooks out, they get busy again, to capitalise on this. Forge of fury is this month's generic adventure. Looks like another back to basics dungeon crawl in an abandoned dwarf fortress full of squatters. A few months in, and the different approaches between editions are becoming very apparent.
The Realms harks back to one of their classic computer games with Pool of Radiance: Attack on Myth Drannor seems rather more plot heavy. There's room for plenty of variety in the Realms. There's also the novelisation of said game, written by Carrie A. Bebris, and Shadow's Witness by Paul Kemp, another novel.
Greyhawk moves solidly into the clutches of the RPGA. The Living Greyhawk Gazetteer helps you get even more into the setting than last month's offering, and includes lots of stuff that's been added or altered for the new edition. Whether the old fans will approve or not remains to be seen. Still, when you're going massively multiplayer, you need to make compromises for playability's sake.
Dragonlance humanizes the Draconians a little more in Draconian Measures by Margaret Weis & Don Perrin. Before you know it, they'll be no more villains than the Klingons. Oh well, as long as it makes for fun stories.
And it looks like once again, their all D&D, all the time policy gets bent a little for other d20 products. Star wars kicks off with a corebook, character record sheets, and an introductory game. Oh, and a magazine catering to Star wars gaming. I wonder how long that one'll last. In any case, it's nice to see a line start that'll actually stick around for a decent timescale for a change. See, you can have a sci-fi RPG that remains profitable, even if it is a license.
Countdown to the forgotten realms introduces a ticker. This is currently set at 7 months. Guess with the success of the last one, they wanted to get the tension up again. Before you know it, they'll be running this trick into the ground. Anyway, they have a good deal of info to impart in a single page. Once again, quite a bit of emphasis is on slicing through the vast amounts of background detail and making sure this is a good jump on point, but there's also some on how the new rules will let you build characters closer to the ones in the stories. Prestige classes certainly make more sense when they're being designed with an existing setting in mind, and guys like the Harpers and Red Wizards will have more bite now there's a definite mechanical and social path to becoming one. Plus they introduce the idea of Regional Feats here, showing they're thinking about hard-coding the mechanics into the setting on quite a few levels. The Realms has always tended towards the game rules as universe physics school of thinking, and this is plenty of fuel for the simulationists among you. This is fairly informative of where their mindset is at at the moment. Having got a generally good reception for the new system, they're confident they can push it a bit further without losing people.
Dork tower has it's enthusiasm for the game destroyed by other people's overenthusiasm.
The age of steam: We kick off our Steampunk special with a bit of basic explanation, obviously aimed at newcomers to the idea. The hallmark of Steampunk is the combination of retro and futuristic pieces of technology, often including magic, or forms of technological development that never happened in reality (which might be physically impossible, and therefore essentially magic anyway. ) D&D magic applied frequently and in an organised and logical way to a setting can definitely qualify. And indeed, this article is pretty focussed on how you would twist D&D rules and settings to add steampunk elements, rather than general advice that would be useful for any system. (it is noted that Spelljammer is a particularly good fit, since it's physics are based on outdated victorian theories about celestial mechanics) The influences cited are a combination of novels written back then, with Jules Verne being the obvious king of steampunk ideas, and more modern ones by people like Alan Moore and William Gibson. This spends a little too long getting people up to speed to really play around with the idea, plus it has a fairly easy to spot mistake in it's references that the editors should have caught, so while interesting, it doesn't make it into the classic articles list. My best hope now is that the other articles in the section will build off it to make something better.
part 2/7
PROfILES? Ok, Now I know they're messing with us deliberately. The format gets another messing around, appearing on alternate vertical columns on each page. This is not an improvement. Anyway, Kim Mohan is our subject this month. Long-time editor of the magazine, he's now managing editor of the whole goddamn R&D department, getting to look over and help make every book that comes out clear, consistent, and high in quality. A position that suits him well, as he's never been the most exiting writer in his own right (I found the wilderness survival guide a right snoozefest) but he seems good at getting the best out of others. Another case where people feed off each other's talents to create a greater whole. Try and do everything yourself, it won't be as much fun, or as good.
Previews: Having finished rolling the D&D corebooks out, they get busy again, to capitalise on this. Forge of fury is this month's generic adventure. Looks like another back to basics dungeon crawl in an abandoned dwarf fortress full of squatters. A few months in, and the different approaches between editions are becoming very apparent.
The Realms harks back to one of their classic computer games with Pool of Radiance: Attack on Myth Drannor seems rather more plot heavy. There's room for plenty of variety in the Realms. There's also the novelisation of said game, written by Carrie A. Bebris, and Shadow's Witness by Paul Kemp, another novel.
Greyhawk moves solidly into the clutches of the RPGA. The Living Greyhawk Gazetteer helps you get even more into the setting than last month's offering, and includes lots of stuff that's been added or altered for the new edition. Whether the old fans will approve or not remains to be seen. Still, when you're going massively multiplayer, you need to make compromises for playability's sake.
Dragonlance humanizes the Draconians a little more in Draconian Measures by Margaret Weis & Don Perrin. Before you know it, they'll be no more villains than the Klingons. Oh well, as long as it makes for fun stories.
And it looks like once again, their all D&D, all the time policy gets bent a little for other d20 products. Star wars kicks off with a corebook, character record sheets, and an introductory game. Oh, and a magazine catering to Star wars gaming. I wonder how long that one'll last. In any case, it's nice to see a line start that'll actually stick around for a decent timescale for a change. See, you can have a sci-fi RPG that remains profitable, even if it is a license.
Countdown to the forgotten realms introduces a ticker. This is currently set at 7 months. Guess with the success of the last one, they wanted to get the tension up again. Before you know it, they'll be running this trick into the ground. Anyway, they have a good deal of info to impart in a single page. Once again, quite a bit of emphasis is on slicing through the vast amounts of background detail and making sure this is a good jump on point, but there's also some on how the new rules will let you build characters closer to the ones in the stories. Prestige classes certainly make more sense when they're being designed with an existing setting in mind, and guys like the Harpers and Red Wizards will have more bite now there's a definite mechanical and social path to becoming one. Plus they introduce the idea of Regional Feats here, showing they're thinking about hard-coding the mechanics into the setting on quite a few levels. The Realms has always tended towards the game rules as universe physics school of thinking, and this is plenty of fuel for the simulationists among you. This is fairly informative of where their mindset is at at the moment. Having got a generally good reception for the new system, they're confident they can push it a bit further without losing people.
Dork tower has it's enthusiasm for the game destroyed by other people's overenthusiasm.
The age of steam: We kick off our Steampunk special with a bit of basic explanation, obviously aimed at newcomers to the idea. The hallmark of Steampunk is the combination of retro and futuristic pieces of technology, often including magic, or forms of technological development that never happened in reality (which might be physically impossible, and therefore essentially magic anyway. ) D&D magic applied frequently and in an organised and logical way to a setting can definitely qualify. And indeed, this article is pretty focussed on how you would twist D&D rules and settings to add steampunk elements, rather than general advice that would be useful for any system. (it is noted that Spelljammer is a particularly good fit, since it's physics are based on outdated victorian theories about celestial mechanics) The influences cited are a combination of novels written back then, with Jules Verne being the obvious king of steampunk ideas, and more modern ones by people like Alan Moore and William Gibson. This spends a little too long getting people up to speed to really play around with the idea, plus it has a fairly easy to spot mistake in it's references that the editors should have caught, so while interesting, it doesn't make it into the classic articles list. My best hope now is that the other articles in the section will build off it to make something better.
(un)reason
Legend
Dragon Issue 277: November 2000
part 3/7
Greyhawk 2000: So what lies in the steampunk future of good ol' Greyhawk? Iuz finally got beaten, but at the cost of using weapons of mass destruction that left huge chunks of land poisoned and uninhabitable. Elves have retreated from the developed world, while Dwarves have become increasingly dominant with their mastery of industrial technology. Teleporting trains are the primary method of long distant travel, while military jets are quite capable of dogfighting with dragons. This doesn't just plop real world technology into a fantasy world, or steal all it's ideas from Shadowrun, it actually goes to some effort to sketch out a setting that's both familiar and different in it's own ways. It definitely does the job, because this is one of those articles that feels way too short, and could easily be extended out to full book form covering how the whole Flanaess went through several centuries of industrial development, with adventure hooks on how to play in any of the stages of development along the way. It's a pretty cool article that could do with a follow-up or two, and I hope it gets a good enough response to get them.
Fantasy futures: Stephen Kenson rounds out the steampunk stuff with a second article. Actually, it feels rather like this and the first one were one big article split up by the editors, given that they're written and structured almost identically. This is more general than the previous one, touching on levels of technology from renaissance to postapocalyptic and giving lots of examples of books that cover each of them. Between the two of them, I can see the seeds of a great article, if they'd been edited differently, had the pacing kicked up a notch, and some decent illustrations were there to break up the text. As it is, this is just frustrating. So much wasted potential of such an awesome concept.
Elements of a hero: Now for a complete change of gears. This is essentially a Giants in the Earth article, with a novelist coming in to write a bit about their books, and then the regular staff doing D&D conversions of some of the characters. T. A. Barron has spent the past 5 years writing a series of books about the adventures of young merlin, as he grew from a boy with unexplained but powerful magic abilities to a proper hero. This very much follows the traditional hero's journey, where they have to not only overcome external obstacles, but their own limitations and personality quirks if they are to truly become legendary. As he's developing powers without tuition, they choose to represent Merlin as a Sorcerer in this incarnation, with an increased chance of random stuff happening that would probably indicate a Wild Mage if they'd bothered to put them in the new edition. So this shows that they still need to break a few rules to fit many literary characters into D&D's rules, but not quite as much as they used to, and has some useful storytelling advice mixed with the self promotion. So overall, this one's ok, and makes sure the issue isn't useless to people who want some more conventional fantasy from the magazine.
Unusual suspects: After the high requirement subclasses, Arcane spellcasters are the ones that were formerly the most restricted by race. Here's another stereotype busting article to get people trying out those halfling wizards (which rock) and half-orc bards. (which suck) Even the races that could be spellcasters anyway, like elves, now have a vastly expanded selection of specialist options, which can also be used to break stereotypes you never even realised you were bound by. You could have Urdlen worshipping gnome necromancers, elf racial isolationist abjurers, or dwarven item making specialist enchanters, all concepts that make sense in light of setting, that weren't legal before. This is pretty cool, made cooler by the fact that it includes bits and pieces of new crunch to go with the ideas, including substitute racial abilities and stats for groundhog familiars.
That also keeps it from being useless on rereading, so it's another pretty well handled bit of agenda pushing. They want people to push the game as far as it'll go, because their playtesters didn't really, and they still think it can take anything you can throw at it. Have fun getting your wish granted. 
How you play the game: Oh, Tracy Hickman. You have produced quite a few things that get on our nerves over the years. This is not a fluke at all, as he describes some of the irritating things he's done in actual play, and gives us advice on how to play like him. Leap into action, don't let the other players bog down play with lengthy preparation and paranoia. If a problem stumps you, metagame the DM into providing more clues by pretending to give up. Make sure you always have your fair share of the spotlight or more. Be dramatic, push the DM for more details on creatures and the environment, and then use those cleverly. It's a good reminder that he was one of the first people pushing us to get out of the dungeon, and into storygaming mode. On the other hand, he was also partially responsible for Kender, Tinker gnomes and Gully Dwarves. And these aspects of his personality are not in conflict, but two sides of the same coin. So if you follow this advice, you can certainly expect your game to be interesting. On the other hand, if your DM isn't the grand narrative type, you may well die as a result of it, or at the hands of the other players if that's not the case. Oh well, it's easy enough to roll up a new, even more "interesting" character, and make them wish they'd stuck with the old one, isn't it.
part 3/7
Greyhawk 2000: So what lies in the steampunk future of good ol' Greyhawk? Iuz finally got beaten, but at the cost of using weapons of mass destruction that left huge chunks of land poisoned and uninhabitable. Elves have retreated from the developed world, while Dwarves have become increasingly dominant with their mastery of industrial technology. Teleporting trains are the primary method of long distant travel, while military jets are quite capable of dogfighting with dragons. This doesn't just plop real world technology into a fantasy world, or steal all it's ideas from Shadowrun, it actually goes to some effort to sketch out a setting that's both familiar and different in it's own ways. It definitely does the job, because this is one of those articles that feels way too short, and could easily be extended out to full book form covering how the whole Flanaess went through several centuries of industrial development, with adventure hooks on how to play in any of the stages of development along the way. It's a pretty cool article that could do with a follow-up or two, and I hope it gets a good enough response to get them.
Fantasy futures: Stephen Kenson rounds out the steampunk stuff with a second article. Actually, it feels rather like this and the first one were one big article split up by the editors, given that they're written and structured almost identically. This is more general than the previous one, touching on levels of technology from renaissance to postapocalyptic and giving lots of examples of books that cover each of them. Between the two of them, I can see the seeds of a great article, if they'd been edited differently, had the pacing kicked up a notch, and some decent illustrations were there to break up the text. As it is, this is just frustrating. So much wasted potential of such an awesome concept.
Elements of a hero: Now for a complete change of gears. This is essentially a Giants in the Earth article, with a novelist coming in to write a bit about their books, and then the regular staff doing D&D conversions of some of the characters. T. A. Barron has spent the past 5 years writing a series of books about the adventures of young merlin, as he grew from a boy with unexplained but powerful magic abilities to a proper hero. This very much follows the traditional hero's journey, where they have to not only overcome external obstacles, but their own limitations and personality quirks if they are to truly become legendary. As he's developing powers without tuition, they choose to represent Merlin as a Sorcerer in this incarnation, with an increased chance of random stuff happening that would probably indicate a Wild Mage if they'd bothered to put them in the new edition. So this shows that they still need to break a few rules to fit many literary characters into D&D's rules, but not quite as much as they used to, and has some useful storytelling advice mixed with the self promotion. So overall, this one's ok, and makes sure the issue isn't useless to people who want some more conventional fantasy from the magazine.
Unusual suspects: After the high requirement subclasses, Arcane spellcasters are the ones that were formerly the most restricted by race. Here's another stereotype busting article to get people trying out those halfling wizards (which rock) and half-orc bards. (which suck) Even the races that could be spellcasters anyway, like elves, now have a vastly expanded selection of specialist options, which can also be used to break stereotypes you never even realised you were bound by. You could have Urdlen worshipping gnome necromancers, elf racial isolationist abjurers, or dwarven item making specialist enchanters, all concepts that make sense in light of setting, that weren't legal before. This is pretty cool, made cooler by the fact that it includes bits and pieces of new crunch to go with the ideas, including substitute racial abilities and stats for groundhog familiars.
That also keeps it from being useless on rereading, so it's another pretty well handled bit of agenda pushing. They want people to push the game as far as it'll go, because their playtesters didn't really, and they still think it can take anything you can throw at it. Have fun getting your wish granted. How you play the game: Oh, Tracy Hickman. You have produced quite a few things that get on our nerves over the years. This is not a fluke at all, as he describes some of the irritating things he's done in actual play, and gives us advice on how to play like him. Leap into action, don't let the other players bog down play with lengthy preparation and paranoia. If a problem stumps you, metagame the DM into providing more clues by pretending to give up. Make sure you always have your fair share of the spotlight or more. Be dramatic, push the DM for more details on creatures and the environment, and then use those cleverly. It's a good reminder that he was one of the first people pushing us to get out of the dungeon, and into storygaming mode. On the other hand, he was also partially responsible for Kender, Tinker gnomes and Gully Dwarves. And these aspects of his personality are not in conflict, but two sides of the same coin. So if you follow this advice, you can certainly expect your game to be interesting. On the other hand, if your DM isn't the grand narrative type, you may well die as a result of it, or at the hands of the other players if that's not the case. Oh well, it's easy enough to roll up a new, even more "interesting" character, and make them wish they'd stuck with the old one, isn't it.
Sanglorian
Adventurer
Kender, Gully Dwarves and Gnomes was my favourite Dragonlance book! Which is interesting, since back in those days I insisted (unsuccessfully) on serious role-playing as high art.
The idea that Dragonlance Ruined Everything has some popularity in the OSR. I can't really comment, since I was born well after everything got ruined.
Ed_Laprade
Adventurer
TH sounds like a player I'd toss. Which is something I've never done! 
Orius
Unrepentant DM Supremacist
This was an interesting article and it had some good ideas, but there's something about it that feels off to me for some reason, like something's missing. I'm not exactly sure what it is. It could be my unfamiliarity with the setting, I don't know.
Yeah I agree. This article felt like it was a bunch of quick bullet points on post-medieval settings which did nothing to cover any of them in a way that did them justtice. Plus his future setting only covers a post-apocalyptic game, while ignoring potential for settings like cyberpunk or space opera, which is kind of limiting.
(un)reason
Legend
Dragon Issue 277: November 2000
part 4/7
Fiction: Another name for dawn by Paul Kemp: Time for another prequel to their novels to appear in the magazine. How did Erevis Cale get his name? He made it up as a portmanteau of someone who's life he spared, and his new status after being exiled, translated into an obscure language. Makes sense to me. As this is both self-contained and full of interesting and subtle little details, it's one of the more pleasant examples of this behaviour, but it is still a reflection of an aspect of company policy I find a bit irritating. The Forgotten Realms already has enough fans that it doesn't need constant promotion, nor does it need more origin stories when the established heroes are pretty interesting. I feel oversaturated and want to go on a purge.
Dragonmirth brings back some familiar faces, and misses the point again.
VS Orcs: Orcs are another well known monster that you don't need particularly complex tactics to beat. They aren't great at anything other than frontal assaults, so you can mow through them if you have a decent amount of artillery. They might be a challenge at 1st level, but even that can be fixed if you exploit flaming oil, taunting and traps. Really, they're another monster that doesn't need an article like this on them. Stop picking the easy targets! You're wasting your page count and our time by doing so. I know we're still new to the edition, but we learn fast. Some people are already quite a few levels up and don't need hand-holding. Give us a more interesting monster. Kthnxbye.
Bazaar of the Bizarre: An old but still cool subject gets a third airing for the new edition. Named magical swords of the Forgotten Realms have been responsible for two pretty kickass articles in the past. Hopefully they'll be able to make it a hat trick, even if they're not giving a full 7 this time.
Ashram is inhabited by a spirit, which gives it a whole bunch of useful powers. Initiative bonus, extra fire damage, stunning, energy resistance, it's nicely set up to be in the hands of some bad guy you might meet.
Ellenderin is known as the weeping blade because it constantly drips holy water. This obviously makes it unpleasant to undead, but could also save your life by giving you something to drink in a pinch. And it makes for interesting visuals. I think this one counts as a success.
Galathos has a royal history, and is able to reflect spells on their casters. If you find this one, you'll have plenty of competition for it.
Malagar transforms your blood to flame on a crit. This obviously inflicts lots of extra damage. It too has an interesting history, being turned against the country of it's creation.
Sarghathuld kicks the butts of orcs, hurting and blinding them. Meh. Not too impressive. So one really cool idea and 4 so-so ones. This isn't quite up to issue 74's standards.
The adventures of Volo: Food! Given the number of jokes Elminster has made about Ed's weight over the years, and his love of worldbuilding, it's no surprise that he's thought about what kind of stuff people in the Realms eat. We've seen quite a few examples of that in books, some amusingly close attention to the specifics of snacks in The Wizards Three, and here's another 3 pages of nomables from all over the Realms. As with his work on plants, animals, musical instruments, languages, et al, there's a good mix of real world stuff, real stuff with funny names, and invented dishes using ingredients not found on earth. (which crosses over nicely with said imaginary ecosystem info. ) Elminster takes plenty of interest in this subject as well, with his usual clarifications and corrections. And we get to find out what dragon meat tastes like in the Realms, which I find very amusing. It's all a bit excessive, but since I know this kind of info is about to take a sharp nosedive in the magazine, I'm enjoying it for all it's worth. And the ornate spork just tops the whole thing off.
PC Portraits: This column helps out with the steampunk stuff as usual. The artist uses an unusually light touch with their pencil work and shading, giving everything a semitransparent feel. Most of the characters are pretty well dressed and refined looking, and slightly over half of them have some obvious technological gadget that they're wearing or doing something with. I definitely like this one, as it has plenty of room for you to take the pictures, colour them in, and scribble over them to make them your own. Plus there's a half orc with muttonchops and dwarf cabbie. How can you not love that? Dress with style. It marks you as a cut above the norm, even if you don't have much money.
part 4/7
Fiction: Another name for dawn by Paul Kemp: Time for another prequel to their novels to appear in the magazine. How did Erevis Cale get his name? He made it up as a portmanteau of someone who's life he spared, and his new status after being exiled, translated into an obscure language. Makes sense to me. As this is both self-contained and full of interesting and subtle little details, it's one of the more pleasant examples of this behaviour, but it is still a reflection of an aspect of company policy I find a bit irritating. The Forgotten Realms already has enough fans that it doesn't need constant promotion, nor does it need more origin stories when the established heroes are pretty interesting. I feel oversaturated and want to go on a purge.
Dragonmirth brings back some familiar faces, and misses the point again.
VS Orcs: Orcs are another well known monster that you don't need particularly complex tactics to beat. They aren't great at anything other than frontal assaults, so you can mow through them if you have a decent amount of artillery. They might be a challenge at 1st level, but even that can be fixed if you exploit flaming oil, taunting and traps. Really, they're another monster that doesn't need an article like this on them. Stop picking the easy targets! You're wasting your page count and our time by doing so. I know we're still new to the edition, but we learn fast. Some people are already quite a few levels up and don't need hand-holding. Give us a more interesting monster. Kthnxbye.
Bazaar of the Bizarre: An old but still cool subject gets a third airing for the new edition. Named magical swords of the Forgotten Realms have been responsible for two pretty kickass articles in the past. Hopefully they'll be able to make it a hat trick, even if they're not giving a full 7 this time.
Ashram is inhabited by a spirit, which gives it a whole bunch of useful powers. Initiative bonus, extra fire damage, stunning, energy resistance, it's nicely set up to be in the hands of some bad guy you might meet.
Ellenderin is known as the weeping blade because it constantly drips holy water. This obviously makes it unpleasant to undead, but could also save your life by giving you something to drink in a pinch. And it makes for interesting visuals. I think this one counts as a success.
Galathos has a royal history, and is able to reflect spells on their casters. If you find this one, you'll have plenty of competition for it.
Malagar transforms your blood to flame on a crit. This obviously inflicts lots of extra damage. It too has an interesting history, being turned against the country of it's creation.
Sarghathuld kicks the butts of orcs, hurting and blinding them. Meh. Not too impressive. So one really cool idea and 4 so-so ones. This isn't quite up to issue 74's standards.
The adventures of Volo: Food! Given the number of jokes Elminster has made about Ed's weight over the years, and his love of worldbuilding, it's no surprise that he's thought about what kind of stuff people in the Realms eat. We've seen quite a few examples of that in books, some amusingly close attention to the specifics of snacks in The Wizards Three, and here's another 3 pages of nomables from all over the Realms. As with his work on plants, animals, musical instruments, languages, et al, there's a good mix of real world stuff, real stuff with funny names, and invented dishes using ingredients not found on earth. (which crosses over nicely with said imaginary ecosystem info. ) Elminster takes plenty of interest in this subject as well, with his usual clarifications and corrections. And we get to find out what dragon meat tastes like in the Realms, which I find very amusing. It's all a bit excessive, but since I know this kind of info is about to take a sharp nosedive in the magazine, I'm enjoying it for all it's worth. And the ornate spork just tops the whole thing off.
PC Portraits: This column helps out with the steampunk stuff as usual. The artist uses an unusually light touch with their pencil work and shading, giving everything a semitransparent feel. Most of the characters are pretty well dressed and refined looking, and slightly over half of them have some obvious technological gadget that they're wearing or doing something with. I definitely like this one, as it has plenty of room for you to take the pictures, colour them in, and scribble over them to make them your own. Plus there's a half orc with muttonchops and dwarf cabbie. How can you not love that? Dress with style. It marks you as a cut above the norm, even if you don't have much money.
(un)reason
Legend
Dragon Issue 277: November 2000
part 5/7
Class acts: The rage mage. :giggles: Legendary. Now there's a good example of a prestige class made to make a suboptimal character build more viable. As with the undead hunter, this works best if your original class is a fighty one, particularly a barbarian, as it has it's own spell list rather than adding to your existing class. This is also a good example of how certain prestige classes can become massively more twinked when playing well selected unorthodox races, as they can bypass the usual dipping needed to meet all the criteria for the class. Also notable is that it has a skill list of 4, which can be a definite problem. I guess they don't expect a rage mage to be smart as well. Still, it's an interesting idea, and a reasonable implementation. If you're playing for flavour rather than optimisation, this could be a pretty fun one to try.
Rogues Gallery is still heavily forgotten realms focussed, despite the edition change. The character illustrations go back to being in black and white, and now we have the full rules out, the statblocks are larger than in issue 273, fully detailing all their skills, feats and spells. As with last time though, they're giving lots of attention to Sembia, showing that their light touch policy with this nation is well and truly ended. So it's time for them to face world-threatening troubles and play host to heroes that foil them in the novels.
Jak Fleet is a halfling rogue/cleric harper. He started off more roguish, but has gradually acquired responsibility as he levelled up. He still sometimes bucks the rules, as a charming rogue should, and gets in trouble with his superiors, but they've forgiven him so far. Very Captain Kirk, really.
Drasek Riven is a hard man who's had a hard life. Born into slavery, he was left for dead, lost an eye, rescued by a slaver, and eventually found a place in the Zhentarim. He's a nasty piece of work who goes out of his way to look for a fight, and has rather a deficiency of subtlety. I can't really pity him that much, given the number of abused orphans that do grow up to be heroes. He'd probably have been just as nasty a a spoiled noble child.
The Righteous Man is the lead cleric of Mask in the area. He hates the Zhentarim, and is trying to take them down, in a typical case of evil being it's own worst enemy. He's a big fan of using summoned monsters to do his bidding, and has suffered quite a bit of premature ageing as a result of this. Whether he can avoid dying and make the leap into the real big leagues of villainy will have to be seen, but I somehow doubt it.
Yrsillar is a mid-upper level demon of a new race called greater dreads (they were obviously running short on imagination in the name department. ) He's perpetually hungry, eats souls, can unleash blasts of negative energy, and rules over a blasted wasteland in The Abyss. Cliche city, in other words. The only interesting touch is that if you kill him quick, all the wounds he inflicted on you heal up, which I'm sure will be a plot point in the book. Kinda the opposite of a loadbearing boss. Seems like the kind of reward you get in a video game, especially if you have yet to face the real final boss after you beat them.
Nodwick goes mac. Very cool of him.
Forum: Daniel Gosz reminds us that all the old books are still here, and you can still play 1e or 2e if you like. As ever, the canon police are purely a joke, and will not break down your door and confiscate your books now a new edition is out. And let's face it, it's a lot easier to convert 2e stuff to 3e, with it's greater flexibility, than the other way round.
Lance R. Goetz is annoyed that PC's aren't given any advice on how to use, or not use poison. It's like they want to whitewash it out. He's also bemused that paladins are a full class, while blackguards are a prestige class. The new edition is supposed to be more consistent. What gives?
Bryan Penney isn't pleased that the new clerics get such a wide range of spells, although domains are pretty cool. No pleasing some people.
Nicholas Gregorio rubbishes the idea that the ancients were inherently more awesome or honourable than us. Look what we can do, and look what they did. Look at the modern treaties between governments and codes of war. (Ok, so we honour them in the breach as much as ancient knights did their codes. ) Why do people romanticise the past?
Philip Mitchell prefers playing evil characters, and wants some modules catering to people who do. Sorry, we're still a family friendly company.
David Jenkins tells the complainers that if they think they're so great, why aren't they working for the company? Thee could be millions of reasons for that. It does not mean they're not talented people.
John Cunningham is pleased that the new edition has really brought back the sense of wonder it used to have. It's like a whole new world. How long before the shine starts wearing off though? You know people can get used to anything.
Bryan Cooper praises prestige classes and their creator Monte. They look like a great way to liven up a party, especially if not everyone has one. Let the games begin!
part 5/7
Class acts: The rage mage. :giggles: Legendary. Now there's a good example of a prestige class made to make a suboptimal character build more viable. As with the undead hunter, this works best if your original class is a fighty one, particularly a barbarian, as it has it's own spell list rather than adding to your existing class. This is also a good example of how certain prestige classes can become massively more twinked when playing well selected unorthodox races, as they can bypass the usual dipping needed to meet all the criteria for the class. Also notable is that it has a skill list of 4, which can be a definite problem. I guess they don't expect a rage mage to be smart as well. Still, it's an interesting idea, and a reasonable implementation. If you're playing for flavour rather than optimisation, this could be a pretty fun one to try.
Rogues Gallery is still heavily forgotten realms focussed, despite the edition change. The character illustrations go back to being in black and white, and now we have the full rules out, the statblocks are larger than in issue 273, fully detailing all their skills, feats and spells. As with last time though, they're giving lots of attention to Sembia, showing that their light touch policy with this nation is well and truly ended. So it's time for them to face world-threatening troubles and play host to heroes that foil them in the novels.
Jak Fleet is a halfling rogue/cleric harper. He started off more roguish, but has gradually acquired responsibility as he levelled up. He still sometimes bucks the rules, as a charming rogue should, and gets in trouble with his superiors, but they've forgiven him so far. Very Captain Kirk, really.
Drasek Riven is a hard man who's had a hard life. Born into slavery, he was left for dead, lost an eye, rescued by a slaver, and eventually found a place in the Zhentarim. He's a nasty piece of work who goes out of his way to look for a fight, and has rather a deficiency of subtlety. I can't really pity him that much, given the number of abused orphans that do grow up to be heroes. He'd probably have been just as nasty a a spoiled noble child.
The Righteous Man is the lead cleric of Mask in the area. He hates the Zhentarim, and is trying to take them down, in a typical case of evil being it's own worst enemy. He's a big fan of using summoned monsters to do his bidding, and has suffered quite a bit of premature ageing as a result of this. Whether he can avoid dying and make the leap into the real big leagues of villainy will have to be seen, but I somehow doubt it.
Yrsillar is a mid-upper level demon of a new race called greater dreads (they were obviously running short on imagination in the name department. ) He's perpetually hungry, eats souls, can unleash blasts of negative energy, and rules over a blasted wasteland in The Abyss. Cliche city, in other words. The only interesting touch is that if you kill him quick, all the wounds he inflicted on you heal up, which I'm sure will be a plot point in the book. Kinda the opposite of a loadbearing boss. Seems like the kind of reward you get in a video game, especially if you have yet to face the real final boss after you beat them.
Nodwick goes mac. Very cool of him.
Forum: Daniel Gosz reminds us that all the old books are still here, and you can still play 1e or 2e if you like. As ever, the canon police are purely a joke, and will not break down your door and confiscate your books now a new edition is out. And let's face it, it's a lot easier to convert 2e stuff to 3e, with it's greater flexibility, than the other way round.
Lance R. Goetz is annoyed that PC's aren't given any advice on how to use, or not use poison. It's like they want to whitewash it out. He's also bemused that paladins are a full class, while blackguards are a prestige class. The new edition is supposed to be more consistent. What gives?
Bryan Penney isn't pleased that the new clerics get such a wide range of spells, although domains are pretty cool. No pleasing some people.
Nicholas Gregorio rubbishes the idea that the ancients were inherently more awesome or honourable than us. Look what we can do, and look what they did. Look at the modern treaties between governments and codes of war. (Ok, so we honour them in the breach as much as ancient knights did their codes. ) Why do people romanticise the past?
Philip Mitchell prefers playing evil characters, and wants some modules catering to people who do. Sorry, we're still a family friendly company.
David Jenkins tells the complainers that if they think they're so great, why aren't they working for the company? Thee could be millions of reasons for that. It does not mean they're not talented people.
John Cunningham is pleased that the new edition has really brought back the sense of wonder it used to have. It's like a whole new world. How long before the shine starts wearing off though? You know people can get used to anything.
Bryan Cooper praises prestige classes and their creator Monte. They look like a great way to liven up a party, especially if not everyone has one. Let the games begin!
(un)reason
Legend
Dragon Issue 277: November 2000
part 6/7
Role models: This column switches writers and formats again, getting a fairly substantial repurposing. Jonathan Tweet boots out Chris Pramas, and turns this into an extended Sage Advice supplement on Attacks of Opportunity. They're not wrong in thinking that quite a few people won't get the rules, and need a good set of examples clearly listing what does and doesn't provoke AoO's. Which means we scrap the photographed minis for isometric line drawings (which I think are computer generated, given how identical the pieces look. ) and the central block of writing with pictures around the edge for paragraph/visual example pairs. It's still pretty light on content, and very much self promotion, but there's a new purposefulness to this column that makes it both better to read and more useful than the last few months. It gives me hope that there is more that can be done with it after all.
Sage advice: Do you need to attack to get the benefit from expertise (no, but it'd be a waste not too, cause you still need to make an attack action. Making an attack action without attacking? That's just silly. )
Does Expertise apply the whole round, or just while you're attacking. (until your next action. You obviously have not grasped the concept of cyclical initiative yet. )
Do you have to wield a weapon of defending to get it's effects (yes)
Can you use weapon finesse while fighting two-weapon (Oh yes)
Can multiclass sorcerer/wizards trade spells between their classes (No. Each has to be tracked separately.)
Do rings of wizardry double all your arcane classes spells (Only the base, not any bonus ones for specialization and high stats. )
Why can't the ring of regeneration bring you back from the dead (Because it only works on living creatures. Once again, basic failure of logic here.)
When you're raised, can you choose which class you lose your level from. (No. Highest one. Tree too high, attract axe, ha ha.)
What happens when you lose levels in an abandoned class (You ain't getting them back, sonny jim. This may actually be an advantage, for ex paladins. )
What are the modifiers for scores above 18 (+1 per 2. This scales indefinitely, unlike AD&D's rubbish caps)
Surely if continual flame is an evocation, dancing lights should be as well (You may be right, but who's the private sage around here? Remember to show Skip a little deference. )
Isn't taking undead as your favored enemy suboptimal (yes, along with oozes, constructs and elementals. Feature, not bug. Rangers should stick to fighting natural creatures like god intended. )
When a spell gives you +X per Y levels, do you round up or down. (Down down deeper and down)
Do two weapon fighting & ambidexterity apply to fighting with double weapons (Yes)
Does combining a draw with a move let you attack after this (Yes.)
How do you make a partial charge (Look in the footnotes)
Does stacking metamagic feats increase the delay (No, thankfully.)
Do whips provoke attacks of opportunity (Yes. That's why you use them at range.)
Do characters with strength penalties only suffer half the penalty attacking off-hand (No. That's not how it works. A bonus is a bonus and a penalty is a penalty, and the two are governed by different rules. )
Can a paladin without a charisma bonus lay on hands (No. Like any spellcaster, if they don't have the stats, they can't do the magic.)
Why don't you plummet when fly is dispelled (Because we're really nice people)
Is dropping your magic resistance a free action (No. A standard one. This may cause problems in a pitched battle. Still, since it's mostly monsters that get magic resistance, see this as an opportunity.)
How do rays interact with critical hits (The damage is doubled. Nothing else. Bit of a token gesture, really. At least until you start adding feats, at least. )
What happens if you cast identify more than once ( Same result. You can't beat a good look at the books. )
Do you have to save against poison again if you succeeded first time (yes. You can never tell if it's going to bite you in the ass later.)
Are all cones as wide as they are long (They are now. Simplification for convenience strikes again! )
Can you stack cleave and whirlwind attack (Yes. It doesn't get really scary until you have great cleave though. )
part 6/7
Role models: This column switches writers and formats again, getting a fairly substantial repurposing. Jonathan Tweet boots out Chris Pramas, and turns this into an extended Sage Advice supplement on Attacks of Opportunity. They're not wrong in thinking that quite a few people won't get the rules, and need a good set of examples clearly listing what does and doesn't provoke AoO's. Which means we scrap the photographed minis for isometric line drawings (which I think are computer generated, given how identical the pieces look. ) and the central block of writing with pictures around the edge for paragraph/visual example pairs. It's still pretty light on content, and very much self promotion, but there's a new purposefulness to this column that makes it both better to read and more useful than the last few months. It gives me hope that there is more that can be done with it after all.
Sage advice: Do you need to attack to get the benefit from expertise (no, but it'd be a waste not too, cause you still need to make an attack action. Making an attack action without attacking? That's just silly. )
Does Expertise apply the whole round, or just while you're attacking. (until your next action. You obviously have not grasped the concept of cyclical initiative yet. )
Do you have to wield a weapon of defending to get it's effects (yes)
Can you use weapon finesse while fighting two-weapon (Oh yes)
Can multiclass sorcerer/wizards trade spells between their classes (No. Each has to be tracked separately.)
Do rings of wizardry double all your arcane classes spells (Only the base, not any bonus ones for specialization and high stats. )
Why can't the ring of regeneration bring you back from the dead (Because it only works on living creatures. Once again, basic failure of logic here.)
When you're raised, can you choose which class you lose your level from. (No. Highest one. Tree too high, attract axe, ha ha.)
What happens when you lose levels in an abandoned class (You ain't getting them back, sonny jim. This may actually be an advantage, for ex paladins. )
What are the modifiers for scores above 18 (+1 per 2. This scales indefinitely, unlike AD&D's rubbish caps)
Surely if continual flame is an evocation, dancing lights should be as well (You may be right, but who's the private sage around here? Remember to show Skip a little deference. )
Isn't taking undead as your favored enemy suboptimal (yes, along with oozes, constructs and elementals. Feature, not bug. Rangers should stick to fighting natural creatures like god intended. )
When a spell gives you +X per Y levels, do you round up or down. (Down down deeper and down)
Do two weapon fighting & ambidexterity apply to fighting with double weapons (Yes)
Does combining a draw with a move let you attack after this (Yes.)
How do you make a partial charge (Look in the footnotes)
Does stacking metamagic feats increase the delay (No, thankfully.)
Do whips provoke attacks of opportunity (Yes. That's why you use them at range.)
Do characters with strength penalties only suffer half the penalty attacking off-hand (No. That's not how it works. A bonus is a bonus and a penalty is a penalty, and the two are governed by different rules. )
Can a paladin without a charisma bonus lay on hands (No. Like any spellcaster, if they don't have the stats, they can't do the magic.)
Why don't you plummet when fly is dispelled (Because we're really nice people)
Is dropping your magic resistance a free action (No. A standard one. This may cause problems in a pitched battle. Still, since it's mostly monsters that get magic resistance, see this as an opportunity.)
How do rays interact with critical hits (The damage is doubled. Nothing else. Bit of a token gesture, really. At least until you start adding feats, at least. )
What happens if you cast identify more than once ( Same result. You can't beat a good look at the books. )
Do you have to save against poison again if you succeeded first time (yes. You can never tell if it's going to bite you in the ass later.)
Are all cones as wide as they are long (They are now. Simplification for convenience strikes again! )
Can you stack cleave and whirlwind attack (Yes. It doesn't get really scary until you have great cleave though. )
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