Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="(un)reason" data-source="post: 5105828" data-attributes="member: 27780">Dragon Magazine Issue 173: September 1991part 4/6Sage advice: How can the aztec gods live on the prime material if deities can't visit there. (One god can get told off by their peers, but when it's a whole pantheon going around engaging in blood sacrifices and ignoring the usual social conventions, it's a little harder. It's like the cops don't go up to that dirty great ranch full of inbred hillbillies who run a moonshine racket, play their music really loud and fire guns at 3 in the morning. )Similarly, how can Iuz live on the prime material (again, he's a chaotic evil half-demon who worked his way to demigodhood. He doesn't give a damn about your rules, and no-one's come along who can sort him out yet. Perhaps your adventuring team would like to give it a go. Go on, we'll be over here, watching. )Why are god's weapons so badass (because they're gods. )Why does the complete fighters handbook let paladins and rangers specialize (Power creep. They have to encourage you to buy it somehow.)How many weapons can you specialize in (Again, originally just 1, but if you buy the complete fighters handbook, you can do all sorts of forbidden things. Our splatbook writers care nothing for the fine details of the game and it's balance )I have a blatantly illegal character! Look at it! I'm so proud! ( Great. Another fine mess Skip has to tidy up. Stupid DM's not properly house-training their players. We oughta get social services in, have them taken away if they can't look after them properly.)What's the speed of a touch attack (3)Can you reflect beholders gaze attacks with a mirror (no. They're rays, not attacks based on you seeing them. )Do liches keep their racial capabilities (probably)Why do elf mages get to wear armour (special dispensation. Part of their sekrit magical training. )How many daggers can you throw per round. (not as many as you think. That's supposed to be darts, not daggers. ) What can you backstab and when. (Things with backs that aren't aware of you. Simple as that. It's an assassination tactic, not something you do in the middle of combat. That would step on fighters toes. )If you twink out you can get your chance of surprise above 100% (so it seems. But you still have a 10% chance of failure, no matter how good you are. )I really like kender! I want to play one! (Great, another player that urgently needs housetraining. Take it away before it messes up Skip's carpet.)Fiction: A little knowledge by Jerry Oliton. Dark Sun's co-ordinated rollout continues, with this little piece that illustrates the harsh realities of Athas from the ground level, and gives lots of setting details without being too expository about it. A young half-elf gets enslaved, and has to figure out how their psionic wild talents work if they want to escape. We also find out that the sorcerer kings are bastards, and that has been passed downwards pretty effectively; magic in general is outlawed, preservers have a secret organisation opposing the big bads, but good luck finding it, and there are lots of interesting animals replacing the standard earth ones. Not bad at all, even if it doesn't emulate the actual IC physics of psionics that well. (Co-operative powers should have been considerably easier to access than they were) I think this more than adequately served it's part in persuading people to buy the new shinies. Chill does ghosts too! How long before wraith comes out? Another three years. Bah. The sociology of the Flind: Spike Y Jones not only gives us another ecology under another name, but he uses the same cast of framing characters again. We get to find out another chapter in the life of Brendan Farwanderer, as told to his youthful charges. A decidedly dark one, that then comes back to haunt him in the final paragraph. Flinds may be physically pretty similar to regular gnolls, with only a few generations of selective breeding separating them, but culturally they are quite different, and rather more dangerous, for they have brains and organisation on their side to help them kill and consume the flesh of their opponents. This is a particularly epic ecology, both in size and depth, and it makes me very interested in knowing if we'll see the characters involved again. It's tricky to have proper horror unless you're emotionally invested in the characters, and introducing them, letting them hang around for a bit and then ripping them away definitely qualifies. They may not be doing ecologies as frequently lately, but the ones they have done have been of very high standard. It's good to see them not just churning them out because they're an easy way to fill a few pages every month.  Now, let's hope they do get some more really good ones sometime in the not too distant future.</blockquote>

Verification