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Message: <blockquote data-quote="(un)reason" data-source="post: 5265474" data-attributes="member: 27780">Dragon Magazine Issue 194: June 1993part 4/6Gamma Terra Revisited: Along with the Dragon Project articles, here we have a gamma world article. Only the 2nd one since 4e's release though, (and once again by an official writer) which once again goes to show how much they're struggling to get people to write in with this stuff. It's not a particularly surprising topic either. More Mutations? That's like saying more monsters or spells for D&D. The main question then becomes are they any good. Browsing through them, I can definitely say that these are more superhero powers than remotely realistic body alterations. Some even have the rather artificial limitation of 1/day, which further affects that feeling. Guess they're still playing on the gonzo side in the TSR offices. Pretty standard collection though. Extended lifespan, darkness generation, phasing through objects, flight, blasty energy balls. The main thing to recommend it is the well above average artwork. Otherwise, tis somewhat yawnsome. You won't be inspiring the freelancers with stuff like this. Campaign journal: As with the dragon projects, we have our second wave of campaign boosters from the official writers this month. This time, it's Dark Sun's turn. Rich Baker sets about integrating kits into there, with a short bit of advice on good existing ones, and then launching into a whole range of new ones, 2 for each class group. That won't catch them up with Al Qadim, but it won't hurt, and shouldn't be too hard to retroactively integrate into your game. Slave warriors have fairly substantial bonuses, but of course are slaves, which does limit their freedom quite a lot. And if they do escape or get set free, they'll lose the benefits and get a different set of penalties. Unless the owner is another PC (Which isn't impossible since there's a noble kit) this'll be rather a nuisance. Maybe an all-slave campaign would be fun for a bit. Raiders are your typical bandity types. They get a substantial bonus to ambushes, but are obviously not very popular in most social situations. Better leave that to the other PC's while you lurk menacingly in the background then. Veiled ones are preservers strongly on the in in the veiled alliance. This means they have other wizards to help them out and get half-decent spell choices, but need to spend quite a bit of time maintaining a cover identity and helping out other preservers. This'll create adventure options as well as restrict them, and the other players may well have to help out in your plot lines. Better hope they don't also have kits that demand a ton of their time. Arcanamach's are their opposite halves, sorcerer-king's attack dogs. Which means they can operate openly, have extensive spell selections, and order around virtually anyone apart from templars, but they're feared, hated and regularly sent on missions by their boss. It's a stressful life, and not that great for PC's. Chroniclers are priests who do historical research, a pretty rare commodity on Athas. They get Read Languages, rogue style, and an eidetic memory, at the cost of always having to try and recover ancient lore, which isn't really a drawback at all, although it may lead them into unwise situations. Ahh, the old swashbuckler setup. Tribal Priests are another one with mainly social benefits and hindrances. Gotta take care of your congregation, no matter how it may get in the way of your adventuring. But much respect if you do. Caravaneers get lots of bonus proficiencies and will never be short of a job, but like many travellers, will face scorn and distrust from people in any other situation. Gypsies and sailors get a bad rap but you can't really live without trade. Since their hindrance will mainly come into effect if they leave their job, this'll keep them adventuring. Sycophants steal via charm and freeloading rather than blatant thievery, soon becoming able to juggle one friend off another and live virtually for free without anyone noticing. Course, this requires people not seeing them as a threat. They may have some mechanical backup, but they can still blow it by strapping on armor and looking like a professional adventurer. Noble psionicists are pretty much the same as the kit for other classes. Extra money at the start, but they then have to maintain themselves in the style they're accustomed too, or lose the social clout their family connections grant them. Probably ought to be a non class specific kit. Untutored ones break the normal psionicist rules and get a wild talent on top of their usual powers. They then pay for this over the course of their career by not getting free defence modes and being unpopular with regular trained psychics. This is obviously one rather dependent on luck, but in general, this will start out a fairly decent advantage and gradually become more and more of a disadvantage, so it's a good one to tempt players with. So here we see an unusually high number of bonus proficiencies in many of the kits, and lots of purely social hindrances, some very strict. Ironically, this discourages everyone from taking a kit, for if they all did, their competing social requirements would tear the group apart when properly enforced. This is a definite design flaw that needs addressing. It's fine for NPC's to have issues like that, but PC's need to be able to keep the team together to survive and prosper. I am once again reminded of my own musical experiences, where one of the biggest obstacles to a band's success is the various life events of the members constantly getting in the way of actually producing anything. You really do need to be able to just say <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" /><img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" /><img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" /><img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" /> 'em all and set off into the unknown if you want to make a huge life change. Integrating into the community can be a trap for the unwary that wastes your entire life in petty details. And I really don't want that incorporated into my gaming when it's precisely what I play to escape.</blockquote>

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