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Message: <blockquote data-quote="(un)reason" data-source="post: 5219367" data-attributes="member: 27780">Dragon Magazine Issue 188: December 1992part 2/6The wizards three: And then there were three, and another classic series truly begins. Toril, Oerth, Krynn and our own world are all represented now. How Ed's avoided being killed or turned into a small furry animal with all these superpowerful wizards visiting regularly I'm not sure. But his gain is also our gain, as we get to read the stories of him stuck in a suit of armour while three archmages bicker and exchange stories. Well, two and a half, as El and Mord would say about Dalamar. It's a hard life, stuck on a tiny little world where the gods don't let you go above 18th level, and there's hardly any CR appropriate encounters for you to try anyway. Everyone hears about the cool toys months before you do, and when people get famous, they move away and never come back.Even more than last time, this also becomes commentary on recent metaplot events, with Ed setting this instalment after Vecna Lives, where Mordenkainen got killed in the intro. (Remember folks, always back up your memories regularly and keep plenty of clones in storage. <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f600.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":D" title="Big grin    :D"  data-smilie="8"data-shortname=":D" /> Guess D&D and Paranoia have more in common than you'd think. ) He also refers to several other creatures he's invented, and other articles from this magazine, making this extra entertaining now I've read all those. And the new spells and magic items are incredibly mean, once again cementing Ed's ability to create tactically intelligent effects that screw over the standard countermeasures and further humiliate those attempting them. Since these are advanced techniques, you should be wary about using them regularly, and make the players really work to add them to their spellbooks, but it's still highly entertaining. He's not only lasted longer than most writers, but continues to go from strength to strength, just like his insanely high level NPC's. Forum: Steve De Young thinks fighters are still a valuable member of the party, particularly at low levels. Yes, but rangers and paladins are still even better, and can get most fighter kits and a whole bunch of exclusive ones each. Reliable damage output and toughness is rather a one-trick pony business. M. J. Simpson, on the other hand, supports the complaint that specialisation just isn't enough as a nice protection. Hardly anyone in his game plays straight fighters any more. Even adding extra incentives aren't doing the job. Selman Halabi also thinks more needs to be done to make fighters interesting. Unfortunately, his solution involves removing more stuff from other classes, rather than adding it to fighters, which isn't going to make them more interesting now, is it.  William De Pretre, on the other hand is on the side that thinks they're a valuable, nay, essential part of the team. I can see this one running for quite a bit. John Duffin thinks having a bog-standard class which is easy to master is good for the game. Plus, this means you can role-play them in pretty much any way that you like. He does have a point. Accesability is important, and doing one thing well can prove a lot more profitable than doing many things ok, as many real world businesses can attest. Andre Costatini also thinks that the fighter classes openness is what makes them exiting. Remember, most real world famous people would be fighters, and they certainly weren't all alike. You can certainly follow in the footsteps of Conan or Robin Hood. Rick Tazzle deals with the Swashbuckler problem in some detail, including a few new optional uses for weapon proficiency slots. You know, maybe that is part of the solution to the boring fighter problem. After all, they do get more slots, although probably not in quite sufficient quantity to make up for their lack of other stuff. Michael Satran extends the debate by pointing out how much better paladins are than rangers. Since they use the same XP table, this isn't entirely fair. With extensive bullet-pointing, it's hard to argue with him. Still, I hope someone will take up the debate. I certainly think that when you factor in their respective kits and other splatbook stuff, rangers get more customisability than paladins, catching them up a bit. The voyage of the princess ark: The team split up again in the final installment of the adventure. Haldemar takes a planar trip to get back to Alphatia quickly, leaving the Ark behind. This does not go quite as planned, but the diversion proves useful, as now he has solid evidence with his own eyes that the Glantrians are planning to somehow drain magic from the world. Not good. He tells the Empress, but she of course has to deal with politics. Here we run into the problem that their future is now predetermined, with Alphatia's destruction in the Wrath of the Immortals metaplot. It just hasn't happened to them yet. Bruce drops a number of rather obvious hints in here, in another case of the big setting reveal being spoiled where it probably shouldn't. Meanwhile, back at the Ark, the rest of the crew run across the Phanatons. Despite being cute little gliding things, they still prove more than capable of capturing the crew. Proving that they are friendly turns out to be a rather testing experience, involving lots of spiders used in a rather witch-hunt-esque manner. Charming. Still, all's well that ends well. Having covered a new race in here, Bruce of course elaborates on their history and culture, and makes them available as PC's. Since being uplifted by the immortal Ui, the Phanatons have been a persistent thorn in the side of the Herathians, given their tendency to hunt and eat giant spiders. They aren't the scariest race, but in a forest environment, they can be very effective, shooting things from above and gliding from tree to tree. Like Kobolds, they can take down much tougher creatures by use of hit and run tactics, poison and traps. They get the usual shamanic option, and here we see an AD&Dism creep in, as they get different powers depending on the specific immortal they follow. Are dwarves and halflings the only races that don't have spellcasting as a standard option? And that's the end of the series. It really could have gone on longer, after all, there's the entire arm of the immortals and most of the southern continent still left uncovered. And up to a few months ago, Bruce certainly seemed to think it would continue. But I get the impression that the management didn't want the series continuing in the past when the timeline in general has been moved on, and Bruce didn't want to send them into the future again, to see the aftermath of their nation's destruction. After all, Haldemar doesn't seem the sort to take that lightly, and if allowed to continue as a protagonist, he might mess up the metaplot. And we can't have that, can we. Another case where a good series is hampered by overall management. Such a downer of an ending.</blockquote>

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