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Message: <blockquote data-quote="(un)reason" data-source="post: 5041530" data-attributes="member: 27780">Dragon Magazine Issue 163: November 1990part 2/6Hedge wizards: Hmm. Another article specializing in the uses of the new specialist wizards, this time in relation to getting a job in the community and selling your services. Given the small number of spells you have in D&D, a specialist really has a substantial advantage here, as they get to satisfy more clients a day, and concentrate on doing a few things well, instead of being dragged all over the place by people with unrealistic expectations and trying to compete directly with everyone in the business.  Quite a bit of this seems to be Forgotten Realms focussed, with the new spells in particular being fully integrated with named owners and locations. As is often the case, the math in terms of the levels they're supposed to have and the money they earn is a bit wonky when you consider the amount of money peasants earn, and the amount of things you have to kill to get each level. Obviously you need to assume a pretty high magic world to use it. But it does have a nice flavour, and a whole bunch of low level spells useful for everyday use, so if your game meets that criteria, go right ahead. We'll get the hang of this spells for sale thing eventually. Magic gone haywire: In a similar vein to the spell misfires stuff earlier, here we have a whole bunch of quirks you could add on to magic items, make them more individual than just another sword +1 or ring of invisibility. As is usual for tables like this, some are good, some are bad, and some are decidedly mixed blessings, particularly when various magic items become sentient and start talking back to you. Several evily inventive ideas mixed in with variants on a bunch of familiar ones make this another article that could be spicing up your game for years to come if used in moderation. And so we bring to a close a themed section that's actually been pretty good, and quite forward-looking. Once again they've managed to justify repeating a topic. The role of books: Dragon's teeth by Lee Killough, Hawk and fisher by Simon Green, and Nightwatch by Robin Wayne Bailey all try and combine mystery plots with fantasy, with varying levels of success. The one that's also a D&D novel gets the best review, curiously enough. The interior life by Katherine Blake has two interconnected plotlines distinguished by the use of different typefaces throughout the book. Hmm. Wasn't Terry Pratchett's Reaper Man also published around this point using that device. This seems worth thinking about. Anyway, this review seems pretty positive as well, combining reality and fantasy subplots pretty well. Elven Star by Margaret Weis and Tracey Hickman gets a review that focusses rather heavily on the meta aspects of the book, in particular a certain anagramatically named wizard who is probably also in Dragonlance, but for legal reasons cannot use the same name in this dimension. The reviewer has doubts about their abilities to resolve the plot in a dramatic and sensible manner. Gossamer axe by Gael Baudino combines celtic harp music and heavy metal in another story putting it's own spin on combining modern day life with other worlds. While it does seem a little like the author is just writing about their own real life hobbies, at least that means the details are accurate, and there's plenty of distinctive elements springing from that. Galen Sword 1: Shifter by Judith & Garfield Reeves-Stevens looks like an attempt to start a pulp adventure franchise. The amusingly badass named eponymous hero and his various wacky sidekicks face an alien menace, with mixed success, both in terms of plot and tone. I don't think they're going to make it to 28 books. Servant of the empire by Raymond Feist and Janny Wurts gives us some fun fantasy politicking, showing that this is very much an option for building good plots on, and good inspiration for if your players are getting to that tricky name level region. Another day, another dungeon by Greg Costikyan sees the noted designer play with game conventions and use them to drive the plot of this fun story rather better than, say, Kevin Anderson managed. Well, I guess Paranoia is good practice for that, whichever way round you do it.</blockquote>

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