Rant About Recent Dungeon Magazines

[billbo]

One problem with the D&D mindset -- although it's not necessarily implicit in D&D -- is the idea that unless you have a different "character class" than another dude, you don't have different roles or different characters.

And that's dumb. There can be a lot of differences in personality. And fighters, for example, have access to four different feats by fourth level. Those four different feats go a ways towards differentiating characters' abilities.

 

[Teflon Billy]

One problem with the D&D mindset -- although it's not necessarily implicit in D&D -- is the idea that unless you have a different "character class" than another dude, you don't have different roles or different characters.

And that's dumb. There can be a lot of differences in personality. And fighters, for example, have access to four different feats by fourth level. Those four different feats go a ways towards differentiating characters' abilities.

I couldn't agree more man.

The crazy overuse of Prestige Classes in published material grates on my nerves. A seperate class for everything.

The joke in my gaming group (and I hope you've read George R. R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire series, or this joke will fall flat) is that when someone creates a Game of Thrones game, there would be a one-handed sister-er Prestige Class for those who wish to play a Jaime Lannister-esque character.

It's funny because it's so true

 

[billbo]

I haven't read that, but yeah, that's the mindset.

And for all those people complaining about undue costs and such-- these prestige classes have been designed from day one as splat-book filler.

In the future, there will be a different prestige class for specializing in every single weapon. We will have Glaive Guardians and Flailists and Morningstar Avengers and such.

So much of this -- so much-- can just be handled by assigning different feats.

The V for Victory game suffered from this syndrome. All the characters -- ALL of them -- are soldiers. They are all military men. FIGHTING men. So, it's a no-brainer that they should just all be fighters, right? And then officers and intelligence officers and grunts can differentiate themselves by taking different feats, right?

Nope. Despite the fact that they all are, by definition, FIGHTERS, they all get their own stupid character class.

I'm not blaming Chris Pramas; I know there's a certain type of collect-the-set mindset out there that says "I need to have ONE BILLION different character classes! And a game or supplement without new character classes or PrC's isn't worth buying!"

But all that space wasted on the character-class tables -- sub-dividing fighters from other fighters-- could have been better spent providing background notes, scenarios, etc.

 

[howandwhy99]

With all the talk about Call of Cthulhu a question popped into my head:

Can Dungeon/Dragon magazines support Wizard's non-OGL products like Wheel of Time and CoC?

I've only subscribed to Dungeon the last year or so and do not know quite what makes a good Polyhedron article other than a original setting minigame. But if Paizo does work close enough with Wizards, maybe they have an exclusive on non-OGL adventures?

I would love some more material for CoC. When I originally picked up the book I was planning to run a Nazi-horror vs. allied spies in occupied Paris circa WWII. Imagine sneaking through the catacombs, evading Nazi troops, holing up in safe houses, and investigating a mystery that has but one insanity inducing conclusion.

This is my idea of a great minigame/adventure. And better yet, no one else (I think) is publishing material like this. Maybe you already have a captive audience for highly rated, but poorly supported books?

 

[Brown Jenkin]

Does this mean that the subscriber-only content is going to be something that's aimed to not upset non-subscribers or does that mean subscriber only content is going away?

It's time for me to renew my subscription to Dungeon & I'm going to be quite annoyed if the promised subscriber only content is not going to be included. Indeed, it's quite possibly a deal-breaker.

I've stuck through Dungeon & Dragon for quite a while. While I understand some of the financial concerns that have caused some changes in the magazine, I'm really getting sick of the "bait and switch" tactics that seem to be becoming more commonplace as Paizo decides which section of their audience they are going to ply to this week. I understood financial concerns behind eliminating the Annual, but found the attitude behind the change very questionable (it came across as "You guys complained about the d20 Special, so we decided to elminate it.")

Now announcing that there would be a subscriber-only adventure every X issues and then withdrawing it would be just another reason to bail out of a sinking ship.

Glyfair of Glamis

As a newsstand purchaser of Dungeon I have to say the subscriber only adventures was one of the worst decisions they could have made. They have now placed themselves in a self created box. They have greatly displeased those of us who buy from the newsstand who feel that we are being shortchanged on this deal. Dungeon is about adventures, and if I am paying more than a subscriber I should not be getting even less of what I am paying for. On the other hand they have now made a promise to subscribers and will greatly displease them by breaking thier word. I feel sorry for you Erik as this is not where I would want to be. Either way you risk losing readers. I hope you can pull a rabit out of the hat and somehow work out some kind of tradeoff on the subscriber thing that will allow me to get the entire magazine. I could certainly live without creature counters and CDs and Dice if you want to include these things only to subscribers, plus then I can then browse the magazine at the store rather than having it in a bag. Now all you have to do is figure out who can make the Beholder Phone to give away to new subscribers.

 

[kristov]

Dungeon

I really loved Dungeon magazine, and have been a subscriber for about 3 years now and I purchase old issues regularly at Gaming Stores.

Unfortunately, they ruined Dungeon magazine with the cancer that is Polyhedron. Slowly it is devouring pages and content from the ass of the magazine.

When my subscription runs out, that will be the end of it for me. Sorry to see it go, but it doesnt belong there.

Poly was a free crap magazine sent to the RPGA members right? How did it end up using space on my paid-subscription. Make it a junked out PDF or something for download.

Kristov

 

[Christian Walker]

I don't think Scrollworks sucks. The issue I read didn't have a lot of mechanical use to me, but it was damn funny

Ha! That was a strange little issue, one that I "retired" out of embarassment. It was cute, but crude. Fortunately, things have gotten much better.

Those little cubes were a lot of fun to make, though. I used the die machine at my school for a few hours one day. Co-workers would walk by, see me hard at work, and would say "Hard at work, eh?" "A project for your students?"

Um, yeah. That's it, a project for the students. Yeah...

Take it easy,
C.

 

[ColonelHardisson]

I love Polyhedron's minigames. Every one of 'em. The problem with them is, as many have pointed out, that they receive no support. So, I have a suggestion...

Make 'em OGC. Let companies and fans play with 'em. See what ones garner the most interest, then publish some support for those that are the most popular.

The reason I love the minigames is because of how they cover so many genres that haven't been covered yet. I mean, Thunderball Rally (Or whatever it was called; I don't feel like dragging the mag out right now) covered a genre that isn't often covered (other than by Car Wars), and seems fun, to boot. The same is true of the rest of the minigames - WWII, Scooby-Doo-type cartoon mysteries, John Carter-esque adventures - that stuff can't be beat. Iron Lords of Jupiter is a good case in point - man, I'd love to see a more thorough treatment of this setting. And it's not the only one I feel that way about.

The minigames help show that d20 can be used for a wide variety of genres. Trouble is, being closed content makes them a creative cul-de-sac. No real support for them is planned by the parent company, and nobody else can use them, so a lot of good ideas fall by the wayside.

Regarding the comments above about genres becoming scarce or too narrowly-defined - I have to disagree. In fact, I think that's why the minigames shine - they cover very narrow genres, or genres that often seem wacky or simply bizarre. Why not a King Arthur minigame? An 80s slasher-movie minigame? Or minigames based on classic literature? Doc Smith space opera? Time travel? Soap operas? Sitcoms? Storm chasers? The point being, experiment with d20 in genres it hasn't covered, or with genres that haven't been touched by RPGs before, even if they seem, well, stupid. So far, many of those that people decry on the internet are the ones I think are the best.

As for other suggestions for the magazine - I'd say lose the glossy paper. Simple white paper is best for adventures, because many would like to write notes or revisions on the adventure. Glossy paper with colorful backgrounds makes that tough to do.

 

[Ranger REG]

Once again, I have to put my vote for Poly. If it weren't for its new format introduced back in January 2002, I'd never picked up Dungeon. No offense to the Dungeon magazine staff. I'm at a point where I don't need pregenerated adventure scenario to run my D&D game. I'm doing fine creating my own, which is why I prefer Dragon for game and reference material.

What I like about Poly is the fact it caters to my current interest in d20 gaming as a whole, and not just D&D. I like to see more d20 games using the familiar ruleset. I still play PULP HEROES and MECHA CRUSADE still.

The new Poly format brings additional support to Wizards' non-D&D RPGs, from d20 Modern to Star Wars. They deserve as much periodical support as D&D, which is still Wizards' hot-seller RPG.

 

[kristov]

Genres

You mean to say genres which no large group of people care to play, support or deal with.

I think that is the faulty logic here - RPG's are about playing, not about reading some flakey concept on how to have a Soap Opera RPG that will not recieve any kind of mass appeal.

Dungeon magazine was a raved-about magazine for a long time - it should have been left alone. I want to play D&D, not read about Teenage Kangaroos in Space.

Kristov