Thoughts on the curent state of 5th edition D&D

Having looked over the recent posts on Tales from the Yawning Portal, I am less than thrilled.  I love many of the adventures and believe they should be updated and made available for every edition of the game.  That said there is something missing from the core of 5th edition that needs attention.  There just isn't enough rules to give the game enough variety.


We need more specialties, skills and options from the 5th edition of D&D and just are not getting them.  Combat bard or Spellish bard are ok for a video game but not a table top rpg.
More cultural flavors or era specific specialties would help.  Perhaps an option to trade specialty entirely for a few feats could be something, if their were more feats.


I'm sure it could be suggested that I am missing the point of the rules light style.  We could just play the character to match whatever trop or concept we wanted.  My friend once said, "I really like my samurai character, it's the first time I've had a character I want to play that can actually do something in the game."  This was a 3rd edition spirit folk samurai that wrote poetry and frequented tea houses.  It gets to the idea that often our fun roleplaying character may have sacrificed being mechanically sound for being an interesting character to play.  Players want to be able to do things, especially if they see other characters doing far more.


My hope is a wide reaching update product as the next book offered by wizards of the coast.  Less a region book like the Savage Coast Adventures, but rather something specially aimed rounding out the game.  Specialties and feats that help us recreate interesting characters from a wide range of settings.

Currently I like the minimalism of the rules but feel confined.  I think I can make characters from forgotten realms Cormyr and the savage coast but little else.  I would be at a loss for Kara Tur and completely adrift in Dark Sun. 

Skill Rolls don't let them derail your game

Role playing games can break when you have your players make a knowledge, skill or strength roll to beat a particular obsticle.  You have the theif try to pick a lock to open the only door into a building and the player rolls terrible.  This happened to me twice In the King Maker Pathfinder adventure path.  The first time was when we tried to open a closed gate in the ruins of a castle.  The second was when my cleric tried to make a religion check when analysing runes on an old tower.  Below I discuss your options as a Game Master.


Worst Option "One and Done":  If the players fail they never get a check again.  This can stop your entire adventure from going forward.  You always need to let your players try from a different angle.  Maybe not picking the lock but breaking down the door is good.  But remember there are times this is totally the best option.  If they fail a climb roll, maybe you gave them a save, but let them fall.  Think of it this way if the party is in no danger and has the option to go back to the bar and become a farmer, dont let a bad roll stop the adventure.


Badder Option "Reroll when things change": This is where you only let the players try again if something has changed.  Often Game Masters will let you check if you increase your skill, which isn't great as it halts things until you level up.  Other times you have a game master that lets you try again if you have come up with a better solution.  This seems a good solution at first, but its not.  You encourage your players to start with minimum effort and ratchet up their attempts so they are not defeated by their own dice.  We ran into this situation with a gate that would not open.  We eventually had a block and tackle and a horses helping us and we still failed the roll.  That could have been funny having the rope snap, but we would have come back with chain, then oxen. then elephants.


Bad Option "Just Reroll": we all have seen a player continue and continue to search for a secret door.  Your players will eventually say I search until I find something if you let them.  Letting them reroll can take away from the sense of accomplishment and turns the game into mechanics rather than role playing.


Ok Option "Take 20":  This is basically just reroll but it doesn't pull you out of the role playing.  Its a good option for players that don't like thinking about their characters actions much beyond the dice.


Good Option "Reroll with bonus when things change":  This is a good way to go because your players come up with better ideas from the start.  If they fail they are encouraged to think about it and try again.  It can also be the start of other scenes.  My cleric thought about going to the library with a rubbing of the runes from the tower to get an idea of their source.  It could have been another skill roll with a bonus or it could have been a little scene where my cleric talked to an archivist.


Great Option "Side adventure": This is where your attempts take you down another side quest.  Perhaps the archivist said "Yes I know those runes and brought out a man with the same cut into his back.  "He is the tomb of Tsaggqua, he has not spoken since we found him" seeing your rubbing the man starts screaming.   That is creating a new quest based off the work you did just to solve a problem.

Living Chaotic Neutral

After you have played D&D for awhile you start to hate chaotic neutral, especially if you are in the Dungeon Masters Chair. People pick this alignment to have no restrictions and still not be evil.  The effect is that the character is assumed to have no alignment, which sucks for folks really trying to play within the confines of another alignment.  Don't get me wrong dealing with lawful good can suck just as bad, though it usually is the other players complaining.  As a person who naturally falls toward the chaotic side of the spectrum I want to make the alignment become more nuanced.


The alignment descriptions of the Chaotic always include a desired for freedom and usually mention a rugged individualism.  That is nice but not much to go off of.  Chaotics' are people that have a general suspicion about groups.  The saying, "the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few" is a lawful statement.  Chaotic see groups as devolving to their lowest members or harmfully inflicting their will upon people.  They will see themselves as apart from society and will often be apart.  Think alones not wanting or accepting help from others.  They may even feel help from others comes with strings attached.  They are possibly introverts or loners walking a path outside the norm, perhaps consciously so.  They are not going to need acclaim or acknowledgement of their works, they do it for their own.

Chaotics' are going to be disorganized people.  They will go to the store without a list and wing it.  They are going to try things without the proper tools or and will trust in their own skills.  When dealing with too many instructions they may throw up their hands and proceed without them.  You will chafe at restriction on what you can do, even if not actively fighting with the rules you will have a hard time living under them.  While chaotics' may not all be introverts their view of the world radiates out from the self.  Perhaps family trumps the individual, but their commitments go from small to large.  As a chaotic person I want my daughter to succeed even at your children's failure.  I want my friends to get jobs before others.  I want my community to prosper and finally my nation.  The bigger picture comes last.  We will be people with fewer but deeper interactions with others.  Maybe fleeing from large gathering in favor of being one on one with people.


I read a post saying "Chaotic people think they are above the law", nothing could be further from the truth.  Chaotics' disagree with laws, thinking them unfair, stupid or unjust.  Chaotics' will not follow laws for their own sake.  If the law can not be enforced and gets in the way of a chaotic person it will not be followed.  The chaotic person will understand potential consequences can be applied.  As a bit on politics.  Someone on a post thought Ron Paul was lawful because he always talks about conforming to the constitution, this is absolutely incorrect.  Ron Paul is a Chaotic Poster Boy, as were the founding fathers.  Any government that states individuals have rights that exist before the government and can not be taken away by that government is chaotic in nature.  Most folks want to see their political party as good and the opposition as evil, but lets be real.  Socialism, Communalism and Fascism are Lawful forms of governance.  Anarchy, Antifederalism and Libertarianism are Chaotic forms.  Philosophies like Objectivism and Existentialism are Chaotic in nature.


Your chaotic characters are going to have weird rules that guide them.  Thinking of The Hound in A game of thrones, he is willing to hurt and kill people over chicken, but will keep young girls safe.  Sandor seems to have protecting girls and will never work for fire users as his guiding rules.  He threw away a desirable position with the Lannisters when Tyrion used fire at the blackwater. Chaotics may also make choices that are not in their best interest.  They will follow a path that feels right to them even when better paths become available as other paths may include compromises they are not willing to make or alterations that do not feel comfortable for the chaotic person to live with.

Roleplaying Guide for the Beginner

The Real Basics
Lets start with the basics of what you are going to need to actually do roleplaying.  Before you roll dice and write notes on paper, you need a game and a group of players.  There are other things you will need but we will talk about them later.

You need a game to play.  Probably this means 5th edition D&D, maybe Pathfinder. Most of us, say 90%, started with D&D.  If you have found another game you want to use, that's great too.  The game is important because you are going to tell your friends about it when you try to find people to play in your group. For now your job is to read the rules, at least three times cover to cover.  You need to know how the game works.


Parents: The price of gaming books has gone up over the years.  Generally the books are sold starting with a core book that includes most of the rules, setting information and everything you need to run the game.  These are usually around 50 USD, with additional books required for the Game Master who runs the game.  The three books required for running dungeons and dragons ar currently 90.05 on amazon.com, Dice may cost another 8 usd.


Next you are looking to find the people you are going to play with.  You will probably start by asking your friends.  Since everyone, including you, is new to this don't worry about who is going to be bad or good.  The one thing you really should worry about is committing to the schedule.  Playing five hours every other week is pretty standard in gaming.  You are shooting for four people at the beginning.  Three is ok, more becomes difficult and slows the game down.  Think of being the game master like juggling, three is a start then it gets harder with each ball you add.


After you have your group set up, your next job is to turn them into gamers. If you do a lot of gaming you will find gamers are very similar to each other.  We all seem to have seen certain movies and read particular books.  You and your friends don't need to go that far, but you need a basic group understanding of the genre you are playing in.  Say you are playing in a fantasy game you need to be able to say " The draw bridge lowers, the evil knight crosses with his spear and shield ready."  Everyone should understand what you are talking about.  Maybe have everyone watch a couple of movies together so you have a common language to talk about the game.  If you are the game master running the game, you really should have a picture in your head for everything you describe, so read up or watch movies.

Note:  Not all of your friends are going to like gaming or be good at it.  A funny thing about gaming is it takes a few tries until you find the right bunch of people.  Some of them you may not even like, but they are the right people to be at the game table.  Some people don't work well together, others work so well, the game becomes about just them.  Your goal is to have everyone having fun.


Resources:
Recommended movies and Series
Peter Jackson Lord of the Rings trilogy
A Game of thrones Series
Excalibur
Valhalla Rising
Hawk The Slayer
Harmonquest
Dorkness Rising
Monty Python and the Quest for the Holy Grail
Stranger Things
Original Dungeon Master's Guide Appendix N
Anderson, Poul: THREE HEARTS AND THREE LIONS; THE HIGH CRUSADE; THE BROKEN SWORD
 Bellairs, John: THE FACE IN THE FROST
 Brackett, Leigh
 Brown, Frederic
 Burroughs, Edgar Rice: "Pellucidar" series; Mars series; Venus series
 Carter, Lin: "World's End" series
 de Camp, L. Sprague: LEST DARKNESS FALL; THE FALLIBLE FIEND; et al
 de Camp & Pratt: "Harold Shea" series; THE CARNELIAN CUBE
 Derleth, August
 Dunsany, Lord
 Farmer, P. J.: "The World of the Tiers" series; et al
 Fox, Gardner: "Kothar" series; "Kyrik" series; et al
 Howard, R. E.: "Conan" series
 Lanier, Sterling: HIERO'S JOURNEY
 Leiber, Fritz: "Fafhrd & Gray Mouser" series; et al
 Lovecraft, H. P.
 Merritt, A.: CREEP, SHADOW, CREEP; MOON POOL; DWELLERS IN THE MIRAGE; et al
 Moorcock, Michael: STORMBRINGER; STEALER OF SOULS; "Hawkmoon" series (esp. the first three books)
 Norton, Andre
 Offutt, Andrew J.: editor of SWORDS AGAINST DARKNESS III
 Pratt, Fletcher: BLUE STAR; et al
 Saberhagen, Fred: CHANGELING EARTH; et al
 St. Clair, Margaret: THE SHADOW PEOPLE; SIGN OF THE LABRYS
 Tolkien, J. R. R.: THE HOBBIT; "Ring trilogy"
 Vance, Jack: THE EYES OF THE OVERWORLD; THE DYING EARTH; et al
 Weinbaum, Stanley
 Wellman, Manley Wade
 Williamson, Jack
 Zelazny, Roger: JACK OF SHADOWS; "Amber" series; et al


The Dungeon Master
If you still don't have a good idea of how the game is played, go back and re read the rules.  Don't worry it can be hard.  The best way ot learn how to be the Dungeon Master, the guy running everything, is to be a player.  Look for a game store or some place that has games.  Hang out and ask to watch or play when you see a game being run.  Think of being a player as being a student.


Parents:  If you are looking to help find a game for your child there are a few resources available.  Wizards of the coast, the publisher of D&D, maintains a site that lists stores that run games.  Meetup and other find a game sites also exist.  Gaming stores sometimes us the term Friendly local gaming store or FLGS to indicate their selling roleplaying games.  The rise of Magic the Gathering has created more of these stores, so you may have more available than expected.  Check out the store with your child to make sure it is an environment you approve of.  You can also check into the Pathfinder Society or RPGA.


Ok if you are running a game, the first thing you are going to need is a story.  This is the thing you will have your players do.  Most game companies sell books or adventure modules for you to run your players through.  These are premade stories that have been tested to be right for the game rules.  If you are going to create your own you will need to do a lot more work.  If you have a module you bought read it a few times.  You will need to know a few key points.


If you buy or create your own story, one key thing you need to know is how you will get your party to do that story.  Your friends are playing characters that are hopefully heroes and are willing to fight to help people.  Maybe monsters attacking would be enough.  Maybe they are more mercenary and to get paid to do anything.  Whatever the story is you need a clear idea why the players will risk their lives.


The easiest stories are dungeon crawls, your friends just go in, kill bad guys and take their stuff.  If you have a story that has lots of changes you need to know when the players have done this thing I need to make something happen so that the story goes here.  Each time your story changes you need to know what starts that change, what happens in the middle and where the players end up.


Those things are like the why and what in a role playing game.  The How of gaming is usually where dice are rolled and things kills.  This part is why the books have maps and people have miniatures.  When you are checking out a ruined castle and have skeletons attack your friends.  You may start needing extra things. Miniatures or some kind of tokens to represent where the monsters and players are and a battle map can be used.  My cousin just used a map inside a see through plastic sleeve and marked things with dry erase pens.  Some game masters just describe everything.  You will find certain game are meant to be played a particular way.  Dungeons and dragons plays best with the battlemat, the game Fate plays best with notes on index cards.  If the rules show a bunch of examples with miniatures its going to be best play that way, if not then don't.


Advice from GM Dirk:
Being a Game Master is the hardest job.  Players have it easy.  As Game Master, keep your ego out of the game;  you will be running every person, thing and creature in that universe except for the player-characters.  If you do this well you will LOSE all the major fights with the players--but don't worry, because that's supposed to happen.  If you do it really well, you will ALMOST kill the players, so they feel engaged and as if they've accomplished something, and they'll be entertained at the same time.  It's hard--much harder than just being a player, and if done well it can be a serious gift to your players.


Engaging in these games, it's good to know what the group wants.  Some groups may want simple hack-and-slash stories (fun, and easier to manage), while others may want to develop their characters' personalities (harder, and potentially risky emotionally.  More trust is required between Game Master and player).  A good GM will try to tailor the game to meet players' goals.


A good player will know the rules nearly as well as the GM.  This makes play moves long better.  The players should also be flexible and allow the GM to apply the rules as needed without too much argument--the GM needs this kind of cooperation to coordinate the game and keep it going.  Player or GM, remember that the ultimate goal is to have fun.  Players should help the GM have as much fun as they do.  Try new things in-game.  If they enhance the experience, keep doing them.  If not, don't feel like you need to keep doing them, even if stopping requires a big change.


NOTE:  If you are beginning and can't buy tons of miniature figures you have a couple of options.  Pathfinder sells monster pawns which are little cardboard tokens.  Otherwise get tons of dice, different colors are best so you can say red 1 is a troll, green 2 is a goblin.  You should buy a battle mat we all have one.  Wrapping paper with the one inch squares on the back also works, they are great if you will use the map again and again.


Resources:
rpggamefind.com
https://www.findgamers.us/
https://www.meetup.com/topics/roleplaying-games-rpgs/
http://locator.wizards.com/#brand=dnd

Creating Character
Before you start playing you need to make sure everyone has a character.  The character is who they are playing.  This means both the idea and name of the character and all the rules.  Every game has something called a character sheet you can download off the internet.  It keeps all the rules for your character, print one for each player.  The game will have rules for making characters follow each step with your players.  Usually they will either roll dice to create attribute numbers or have a point system where you make your character.  Points are more fair but less fun.  Points let you make a character like you want and are good if you already have an idea, if your player does not know, dice are good.


Next your players will pick what they want their character to be and do.  Many games of classes, which are sort of like jobs, the character picks from.  Other games just have skills but either way you are making a character that does a job within the group.  A warrior class is tough; they kill monsters with a weapons.  If the character has stealth skills they are going to be scouting and spying.  Next you have a race to pick in most games.  This usually is just flavoring on top of your class. Maybe you are a dwarf or elf, there are usually special things each can do.  


NOTE: You will want to let your friends play whatever they want.  This is not always good.  If one makes a fighting thief who can't steal or pick locks they have made a fighter or even a bad fighter.  The group still may need a rogue to pick locks.  Groups need character that cover jobs like healing and tank.  The game master has it easier working with a balance group.  You the dungeon master may have to rework purchased modules to make them work well with your party; if you let everyone play what they want. You have played WarCraft I'm guessing, a raid without a healer doesnt work well right?


Filling out as much information on the character sheet as you can.  The sheet is made to make playing easier.  After playing tons people noticed certain things were needed again and again.  They put those things on the Character sheet.  I usually screw up equipment and spells.  take your time and write down everything the character needs along with weight.  Make sure they are not carrying 100 pounds of junk.  Have them explain anything weird and special they want.  Don't be too hard on them at first though.  New players may not understand ideas like spell components.  Dont kill them off because they don't have water and food.  Those are things the characters would realize and go back home for.  This is new to everyone be cool.


Playing
Before you sit down and play make sure you are really ready.  You need some place large enough for everyone to sit comfortable and get up as needed.  People often need to stand to demonstrate what their character is doing. You need a table; they keep everyone focused.  Have snacks and drinks at least the first time you play.  Going to get food can be a fun but the first time you just want to play.  Games often get loud, you need a place ok with shouting.  Example : My friends played in my parents garage when i was in high school, it was good we could cuss and do whatever, it just sucked in the winter.


Players should have a pencil, scratch paper and their character sheet at least.  Really they should have dice, a notebook, the game rulebook, pencils and their character sheet.  Diabetics should have insulin and diet soda.  Vegan's should bring their own food and all the above
.
When everyone gets there expect they are going to talk for a half hour.  This is dead time you shouldn't be to upset about losing.  When you are ready let them know.  As the game master you are telling the players everything their characters see, taste and hear. Start with a description of whatever is happening.  Even if your group has played many times describing what is happening is a good start.  Your players need to know where their characters are in the scene.  Once you have that you can start talking about action.


Once you start having events happen you are probably going to start asking the players how their characters react.  This usually requires players to start rolling dice.  I say players, you may have seen Harmonquest where the game master rolls all the dice.  With the exception of rolls to notice things have the players make their own rolls.  They like it and it puts knowing the game rules on them.  When you get down to combat the more people who understand the rules the better.  They sort of run themselves and they can help others.

Before you have your group fight something, you will probably have them wandering around the woods or a castle or something.  This part usually has character rolling their skills to notice or do something.  You the dungeon master will say "make a perception check" a bunch.  How the players do this is determined by the game.  You are asking them to see if they notice something, which is determined by their roll.  If they succeed or not you tell them something new about what is happening.  Bad guys could be sneaking up on the characters, a good role will tell the players they are there.  Most of the game, that is not fighting, it talking and rolling skill checks.  Don't be worried if your game is mainly those two things.


Fighting
Roleplaying games break into combat, most rules are devoted to fighting, so it's expected.  Most of these games are miniatures games, with a few skill rules.  Your games rules should cover everything you need.  As the game master your job is to keep the rules flowing.  You will be moving the bad guys, determining their actions or reactions and also deciding rules.  With the rule just do your best to be consistent and tend to say yes more than no, but If things are actually impossible say no.


I don't want to right much about combat.  There are lots of tools game companies have made to help you out.  There are whole books that are devoted to helping you here.  Listen up you primitive Screwheads is a good one.  My point is lots of work has been done and i don't want to get into rules, you have a book full of rules.  Online forums can help if you have any questions.  There are come general concepts used across most games.


The first gaming term you need to learn is "Round".  It is the same thing as a turn in normal board games.  If there is a difference it's that the order players go in can change from round to round.  A round ends after everyone "goes", including all the bad guys.  One of the dungeon masters job is to keep track of this and make sure players go through the round quickly.  Don't allow them to do too much as you are usually talking about 10 seconds of action.  The game will probably have lots of rules covering what you can and can't do in a round so don't worry.  Example : GM Dirk built a pretty cool wood box with blocks he uses to track who goes when on rounds.  GM Steve just writes in dry erase on a plastic binder sleeve.


How a player hits is usually not much different than any other skill roll.  Damaging bad guys is usually where things become weird.  You usually have special rules here along with different dice.  If you are playing D&D you are lucky because you are just rolling dice to get a number of damage.  That number is subtracted from a total and when you are at zero the player or bad guy are out.  Things get harder in other games. 


Your game will have lots of rules for all this, you need to know them.  You need to know character heal up from a fight.  These are the most complicated and least fun rules in games.  Sometime they will say character need to go to the hospital for a week and have a month on crutches.  Hopefully you are playing a game with healing magic that lets your players fill their health bar just like world of warcraft.  One thing you can do is not focus on that part.  Imagine sitting in Warcraft with no food to recover, I bet that is boring and slow.  It is the same in pen and paper games.  The good thing is the game master can just skip that part.


Withdrawing is another new idea. It's running away, but in a way that the rules let you not get beat up while doing it.  The idea is you are backing away from the fight weapons out and poking at the bad guy to keep them away.  This is hard because you can be totally stuck by the rules.  Example : My friends were fighting willow wisps that were killing us, we could withdraw per the rules but they were faster than us so could just advance and attack us again.  Since they floated and we were outside on an island their was no way we could escape. We had to fight to the end.


Rewards
When you friends finally kill a monster or even complete the story you created you are going to be rewarding them.  This usually means loot and experience points.  There are other things like titles or story rewards like land.  But, Loot and Experience are the real things players care about.  Giving out money is easy.  Magic items are a bit harder as they often alter the game rules.  Giving out experience is tricky.

If there are premade magic items in the adventure module stick with those for a bit.  Altering what you give can cause problems at the beginning.  You don't always know what is right and will give too much or too little.  Monty Hall is what we call those that give too much, new Game Masters usually give out far too much.  You give Excalibur to a new player they kill everything and fly through levels.  Its sort of like being a twinked out character in an MMORPG.  Minny Hall it less bad until you hit the point where players basic needs are not covered.  If your party can't get a room or eat the players start to complain.  There is also a resurrection spiral, you need to avoid.  Its where players lost a fight and someone dies, they sell off gear to get them resurrected, then they attempt the fight again because it is part of the story.  They loses because they are less without their gear, more die..etc...repeat..until total party kill!


Experience is hard.  You want to reward them but not too much.  I would say good play should be rewarded with a tangible award every 3 ot 4 sessions and bad play every 6 to 7.  What this means depends on the game, a skill award is a pretty small thing so could be less a full level in D&D is big.  Also as you continue to play these rewards will eventually increase in cost.  Your WOW character levels were easy in the beginning and took most as you leveled right?  You need to award enough that players are engaged but not some much that they find it undeserved.  Example : My friend Anthony hated WOW because levels came so fast compared to Everquest.  In the beginning with new players its sort of fine to over award, but long time players will start to desire a challenge.  GM Joseph is all about players scrimping for each resource, even a horse and cart, that is his fun zone. 

Macrocosm: Attributes part 2

After you decide what, if any, attribute subsets you would like to use you have your characters start by defining their Base attributes.  These will define how the subsets will be used.  When players are establishing the four attributes they start at 0; the level of the average human.  Players can trade up to a +2 in an attribute for a -2 in another.  Players are then given two extra points to distribute into their attributes.  Below are some restrictions.

• You can not put more than -2 into any given attribute
• You can not put more than +3 into a given attribute unless allowed by the specific setting.

Once your base attributes have been set you next move on the attribute subsets you will be using.  Your base attribute serves as the number of points you have to distribute into the attribute subsets.  This allows you to set a particular sub set equal to your base attribute and zero out the others should you like or set the points as you like.  This applies for both positive and negative values.  Finally characters are given a single point per attribute subset, that must be placed in that set.  It is up to the game master if this can be added to take an attribute beyond +3.  I recommend yes for fantasy, supers and tranhuman settings and no for modern or historical settings.

Example: A Character with a base Observation attribute of 3 has to distribute points between social, physical and mental subsets.  The player has resided to be a paranormal investigator that functional poorly in society.  Our Social attribute could be set to 0 but perhaps we should go with a -1 instead; Aspergers' perhaps.  Our player wants a solid skill to observe the physical and spiritual.  For Physical we place the 1 point we got for the -1 decrease to social; giving us +1.  Our final 3 points go to mental observation.  We now have to look over the physical, mental and social sets to decide if we wish to place our 1 point bonus for each subset into observation.  Probably not for social, but yes for physical and mental.  Physical is no problem as it sums to only +2 and is legal.  We would need to ask Game Master approval for the +4 in mental observation.

Adding a new attribute subset can also happen when the Game Master so chooses.  The addition of an Insanity or force subsets into a game that previously did not include such rules could be an example of this. 

The player always has the option of moving a stat from an existing subset to the new subset.  This allows the character to say this is what I was really meaning when I assigned the value before.  Perhaps you only had a mental subset and later add a magic subset.  The original subset is placed to zero, but is assumed to have a deficit that must be be paid off through experience awards.  Please note consider attribute subset bonus values when applying these numbers; they must remain in their original subset.  You are free to apply your bonus from the new subset to the value you carried over.  Again the Game Master must approve values of +4 and above.

Should the player not carry over attribute values, they can apply negative and positives values as was described when creating base attributes.  Again applying the subset bonus when they are finished.

Macrocosm: Attributes

Macrocosm uses four attributes to describe characters, in its most basic form. These attributes are used to modify skill roles and can be applied as the Game Master Desires.  This allows for the GM to apply unusual attribute and skill combinations as situations arise.  The basic attributes follow.

• Strength: This relates to the power and results of checks.  Raw Strength when chopping with an axe and the emotional effect of a piece of art both fall under strength. 
• Resistance: This accounts for resisting (or perhaps saving from) the some effect.  Willpower and Constitution are both represented here. 
• Manipulation: Should be used in cases of change and modification.  This could be manual dexterity or even charismatic manipulation. 
• Observation: It is simplest to point to the senses, but this represents more.  Noting a key of music or the subtext of a story also fall under observation.

Attributes range between -2 on the low end and +5 on the high end. These are modifiers that are applied to the roll.  Lower than -2 assumes a character so deficient in the particular area it would impede the heroic stories present in most game worlds.  An Attribute rated at 0 is actually the average person on the street.  Attributes of +5 are truly superhuman.

Design Note: For those of us coming through Dungeons and Dragons, only four attributes feels petty limited.  In initial design I had assumed these attributes duplicated in physical and mental subsets.  This maps more closely with the role playing games I played throughout my life. The following was my solution.

While one is more than welcome to play with the four basic attributes game masters are free to establish subsets that better capture their world or gaming philosophy.  Should your game function in a highly social world such as a song of Ice and Fire; by all meaning include a social subset of the four attributes.  Perhaps someone playing in the Star Wars universe may wish to include a Force subset.  Spiritual, Creative or even Sanity attribute subsets could be used depending on your game world.  Game Masters are of course free to use the attributes they feel best reflects their own play style / philosophy.

Value	Base Attribute	Physical Subset	Mental Subset
+2	Strength	+2	-1
0	Resistance	+1	-1
+1	Manipulation	+1	0
-1	Observation	0	-2

Look for part 2 which will include assigning starting values and adding an additional subset during game play.

Rickel's guide to Lock Picking for Role Playing Games part 1

I have been putting off doing something on lock picking until I had a better handle on the subject.  I think I have enough of the basics to cover the subject with some depth.  It is important to know I am a novice who has read a bit and watch quit a few videos.  I have picked a practice see through lock, but nothing real. There is a guy named Solomon whom authored a great booklet on the art of picking. It fills out the information better than I could, and in colorful language.

Lock picking in role playing games is a bit weird as they are often presented as a technology in advance of real world locking tech.  In fantasy gaming there has always been this vision of clock work locks that contain self resetting traps.  This is not the case in the real world.  You could imagine the legal repercussions of someone getting hurt by a trap in the modern world.  There is also a terrible secret you will learn if you being picking locks yourself.  Many modern locks offer little to no security.

There are all sorts of locks in the world; historical and modern.  For gaming purposes Lets treat all pre modern locks as of two types; pin and tumbler and other.  Pin and tumbler type locks are defeated by the art of picking.  Locks that fall into the "Other" category are defeated by exploiting known design flaws.  When we talk about picking locks in fantasy gaming are talking about pin and tumbler type locks generally.  Opening handcuffs or cracking a safe in a pulp game would fall into the exploiting "Other" category.

Pin and Tumbler locks are those in padlocks or your door.  You can imagine nearly everything in the fantasy realm is going to be pin and tumbler.  Solomon does a great job of explaining these locks in his article, you should read it.  Generally locks have two part pins that prevent them from turning.  When the key is inserted the pins are raised to the exact magic height where turning splits the two parts of the pin.  When you are picking you are manually raising the pins to this magic height.  Normally they would spring down but because of the voodoo of tension and imperfections in the locks manufacturing tolerances picking becomes possible.  Its fine if you just take this as black magic but understand the operation involves to processes.  The application of tension through a tension wrench typically executed through the non dominate hand, is the first part.  The second step is manipulation of the pins with a pick held in your most dexterous hand.  This is not to say this cant be done one handed, it would be difficult or require a weighted tension wrench but would be possible.

For gaming obviously one roll can cover the entire lock picking experience, but you are here for  depth.  Rickel goes deep on shit like Phoenix Command, that's right Barry Nakazono I love you too! So here is a general series of steps to flesh out picking.

1. (Optional) External Identification - Identifying the lock type and external search for traps.  here we are looking to see if this is a known lock type that may have a known exploit.  The rules for picking in most games are stacked against newbie rogues.  Living in a small town with few locksmiths they are probably going to have a fair bit of understanding of the local locks and their faults.  I would give 15 to 30 Percent bonus in situations like this.  Visual checks for traps are going to have poor results but are also completely safe.  When you roll this make sure its is Skill plus Intelligence.
2. Internal Identification - Here we are identifying the number and type of pins we are playing with and looking for traps.  There are things called security pins which increase the difficulty of the picking process.  I would not allow taking 20 on a lock without doing an internal identification.  Traps are another concern and performing an internal identification successfully will alert the rogue to their presence.  On the other hand a fumble ( Or failure if your a nasty DM, are you nasty?) will trigger the trap.  This is both a mental and physical process as you are probing the lock and creating a mental picture of its mechanism.
3. (Optional) Disabling Traps - Here you are disabling any traps that are present.  This can be both mechanical disabling and simply activating the trap in a safe fashion.  Here I am going to deffer to the game master, if you think your player has a good idea of how to accomplish the task give them a bonus.  You can have activating the trap require a fumble or just a failed check.  I would give some sort of saving throw.  You may be wondering about how this step is optional.  The player may be in a hurry and just attempt open the lock.  Its a mistake but give your players the rope so they can make their own noose..
4. Actually picking the lock - Here you are manipulating pins and applying tension.  You are welcome to apply a 5% penalty per security pin in the lock if you like, but in reality these things increase time to pick more than they do difficulty.  In game terms that can be pretty much the same I understand, but there is a subtle difference.  In D20 I would do something like increasing the time to take 20 rather than not allowing it. You can do a similar Bonus or Penalty  if you have more or less pins. 

    Lock Quality         Number of Pins        Bonus/Penalty

Crap            Less than four        +15%

Poor            4                              +5%

Average       5                             None

Good          6                           -05%

Great         7                          -15%

 Exceptional   More than 7           -25%   

Going back to those that skipped disabling traps.  If they fail or succeed they are getting hit by the trap.  I guess give a save maybe.  If they fumble don't even give that.  If you are playing in a system that allows for superior success you can think about having that be the requirement to not activate traps.

For those picking the exact same lock again and again its worth noting that I gets easier.  This is due to something called binding order.  A particular lock binds up in the same fashion because of its imperfections.  If you open and lock again and again you are going to become accustomed to it.  Game Masters please consider this when assigning difficulty.

Environment is another factor when dealing with locks of all sort.  Locks in the outdoors have a tendency to wear heavily and be difficult to use.  Anything submerged will be in even worse repair, perhaps rusting parts together.  The other side of environment is the general affluence of the area. Wealth buys better locks.  And also there is the consideration of what it guards.

I also wanted to call out another lock that is functionally similar to the pin and tumbler called the Lever or Mortise.  These are locks that have a series of levers that lift up like a railroad crossing sign.  When all are in the stop position they prevent the lock from opening.  Picking these locks requires a different tension wrench and picking wire.  You are pushing the levers up like an open railroad crossing sign and opening the bolt.  Rather than a pushing of pins its a turn of the wrist and working through the lever stack again and again.  I would not change the rules outlined for pin and tumblers as both can be modeled with the same rules presented above.

Other locks are going to be less common in your fantasy game but shackles would certainly fall into this category.  These are easier to defeat and will almost always have some sort of flaw in design. If the player can identify the lock they can take 20 to defeat these sort of locks, excepting a combination safe lock.  I would give the player a roll should they want to attempt these tasks quickly. 

Combination style locks can be cracked with feel and mathematical processes.  A Combination padlock is going to be easy enough but a safe is exponentially harder.  The padlock may be more easily shimmed in truth though.  This is a process of using a disposable piece of metal to depress the locking mechanism. 

Rickel's guide to Pick Pocketing for Role Playing Games

Pickpocketing is a much overlooked aspect of thieves bag of tricks.  Players may find the risk of being detected does not out weigh the rewards.  Game Masters would generally be unwise to hinge completion of an adventure on the party thief succeeding on a single die roll.  In first edition Dungeons and Dragons the best possible chance for a first level thief picking pockets was so low players would not consider an attempt until several levels higher.  The thieves guild game did a great job of expanding pickpocketing rules but that material can be difficult to find and is intrinsic to rules of the era.  I want to express my debt to the Gamelords material in writing this post.  My goal is to look at pickpocketing in depth with a eye toward modern games. 

Any time a pickpocket check is made there is potential for a great deal of drama is introduced to the gaming session.  Players, even of low level, should be able to create situations where odds are in their favor.  The game master should feel new avenues of role playing are opened up to them.  A ball or social evening could becomes a goldmine of thievery.

Many games have presented pickpocketing as a skill check that measures the ability of the rogue attempting the theft.  There was the the assumption that failure would be bad, but little was concrete.  I would advise before any roll is made four quests need to be answered.

1. What is being stolen?
2. What is the disposition of the target?
3. What are the environmental conditions?
4. Who else might see?

What is being stolen?  Cutting a coin purse or lifting a wallet are easy tasks for professional thieves.  Taking a watch or jewelry that is being worn if far more difficult.  Removing a dagger from under a belt is going to be easier than removing it from a sheath at least without detection. 

• Bag        +2    +10%
• Rings,necklace    -1    -5%
• Earrings    -2    -10%
• Small weapon    -3    -15%
• Large weapon    -5    -25%

What is the disposition of the target? Stilling from someone in a drunk stupor is far easier than someone on the alert.  I wear my wallet in my front pocket and will often check to assure it is in the correct location.  Assume items in hand as not being able to be pick pocketed.  Rogues or anyone whom professionally steals has and additional state that can be applied on top of their disposition.

• Drunk        +10    +50%
• Distracted    +3    +15%
• Apprehensive    -2    -10%
• Alert        -4    -20%
• Rogue        -1    -5%

What are the environmental conditions?  Darkness and crowds aid the rogue in their attempt.  Also a particularly engrossing activity can help make the job easier. Apply all conditions that are present.

• Daylight    -2    -10%
• Dusk        +2    +10%
• Night        +3    +15%
• Crowded street    +6    +30%
• Alone        -1    -5%

   
Who else might see?  People generally will alert the target if they witness theft.  The problem is most folks are not often looking.  As we see above crowds actually make theft harder to detect.  If the target is part of a host apply -1 or -5% to account for the added difficulty of being an outsider.  If a bodyguard is present at the time of a theft; the rogue makes a single skill roll that is first used to determine success and then used as part of a contested skill roll against the guards alertness.

There are a few special situations I wanted to address.  Pickpocketing can also be used to plant an item on a person.  This is usually just popping an item into a pocket.  You can apply penalties for larger items as you feel is best.  Spells also can mimic the above effects.  While others will not see some sort of alertness check should be allowed by the target to feel a shift of the weight on their person.  You also have a few groups or individuals I call amenable observers.  These can be anyone from a culture that does not have solid ownership of individual property like kinder, tricksters and other thieves.  These observers often represent even more role playing opportunity.  Thieves will not rat you out but may demand a cut.  A guild may take even stronger steps to assure no one poaches from their patch.  A spy network would perhaps coerce the players co operation .

Wonderous Stories

Well being a gamer I have finally realized I need to find a game.  Think we have started to be all set up in the house.  Now something feels like it is missing in various places in my families lives.  I have been intentionally staying away from online gaming as it takes too much time for the reward it gives me. I even deleted Svegrund on Khyber server for D&D Online. But a table top game sounds great.

I am been trying to reach out the through http://www.rpggamefind.com/ but have yet to hear anything.   The funny thing for me is you almost have to be looking for a relationship when hunting a gaming group.  I often say i am looking for something Fun but Serious.  Which sort of means i want to role-play but a few jokes are great.  What I am actually trying to get at is I want to play with folks who are not drunk or on drugs.

So with everyone shocked and outraged I should probably explain.  I am a black and white sort of person and endeavor to be so.  I was raised up in the 80's with the just say no to drugs thing going on. For me drugs are out of the question and even being around pot smoke makes me very uncomfortable.  If pot was a pill I may not feel so weird but I don't even want to smell it.  I would say whatever for other folks partaking but not in a game.  I want to be playing with people active and contributing to the whole.  I'm a game snob i guess.

Well it makes hunting for a game a bit of a challenge.  It this point I am even considering games I actively dislike.  If you are in Vancouver Washington and have an extra seat at the table, maybe give me a comment or email at jameslrickel@gmail.com

Bethorm first impressions

Howdy friend.  I recently received my copy of Bethrom from the kick starter Jeff Dee ran some months ago.  There was trouble with my address after moving from San Jose to Vancouver.  I have been going through the book and looking over rules for the past couple of weeks.   I wanted to give you not a real review but a few general thoughts.

I have always been a person who favored rules over fluff in roleplaying games, until recently.  I think with Bethorm I was actually hoping for more of the Tekumel back ground than I got.  I was wanting to get into MAR Barkers works, but this is book is not a great resource for those not already familiar with The Empire of the Petal throne.  You almost need to dredge up some old books to get the source material to drive stories in Bethorm. 

That this book tackles is a rules system with an extensive set of magic and creature rules that are setting specific.  I say that not as a bad thing, especially for Tekumel, which has seemed to have more system free sources.  This gives a crunchier setting for adventures in that world.

My general impressions are the book is very content heavy per page.  The material is packed on to each page.  This has come with at the expense of organization and layout.  If anything this book reminds me of the original The Mechanoids book from Palladium, in its lay out.  It can bee a bit of a challenge looking for certain information.

All in all I see this as a good book but a very niche one.  The empire of the petal throne is just weird and any buyer needs to know this going into it.  Folks familiar with Tekumel will enjoy it and those of us wishing to get to know Tekumel will understand its a set on a larger undertaking.

Collecting Shadowfist in 2015

I recently started collecting the Shadowfist collectable card game again.  It was sort of a strange lark that got me going on this but I have already bundled up a better collection than my original.  This may not be for everyone but here are a few thoughts if you are wanting to give it a try.

Why Shadowfist?  Well I really liked it in the past.  But there are other reasons as well.  First off there are few games with very many expansion sets.  Really only Shadowfist, Legend of the five rings, and Vampire the eternal struggle (Jyhad) have enough for me to consider.  I understand there are loads of new games games produced by Fantasy Flight but I am looking for things i can grab cheaply.  Of these Shadowfist and Legend of the five rings are actually still being produced.  As for Shadowfist there are actually a couple of planned tournaments at Kublacon which sort of locked up my choice.

I have found the two biggest keys to buying up these cards are patience and knowledge. As for patience I am really getting at waiting on solid deals.  There are loads of folks on ebay right now trying to sell off unopened Shadowfist cards.  They for the most part are asking retail for their cards which seems crazy.  If you wait you can find people offer an old collection of cards every month or two, these are usually around 20 bucks or so dependent on size.

Knowledge really wasn't the best term to use.  There are really just a couple of things I realized that I had not thought about.  First is a concept we use in Atari cartridge collecting.  Some cartridges have no value, you just will get them in the process of collecting.  Common and uncommon Cards from the Limited and Standard sets are like this in shadowfist.  You are going to get them so don't pay for them.  Work at getting cards from any other set Dark Future, Flashpoint, whatever.  The second weird thing I found was ebay is not always the best price you can get.  That sounds obvious but I mean the seller on ebay may offer an item cheaper on their own website.  I have found this to be the case for unopened packs on multiple occasions.

SO where do I look for cards?  Ebay.com and shopgoodwill.com have been my primary sources.  Moving from The Bay I have no idea where to look for cards here in Portland/Vantucky. If I was back home I would look at places like the comic collectors shop in sunnyvale.  Old shops that have been around through the card craziness in the 90's.  I scored a box of Vtes cards off those folks for ten bucks. Also check your toad and troll or other online game source.  Keep in mind you may want to get more cards than you need and pass them around to folks to give yourself to play against.  I have some unopened packs I will think about giving out at to drum up interest.

Update:  I sort of forgot to mention the new stuff that is being released.  Buy that stuff from FLGS and the kickstarters they release.  I would recommend supporting the company as directly as you can.   Funding the source of new cards is a great way to support the Shadowfist community.

Observations of rereading the Dungeon Masters Guide 30 years later, part 2

As I continue reading through the players handbook and dungeon masters guide books I am shocked at how poorly the information is arranged.  There are many occasions where the information is split across the rear section of the player handbook and several spots in the Dungeon Masters guide.  Its sort of crazy doing things this way.  I guess this was before the notion that players understanding the rules made things easier for the guy behind the screen.  Actually it seems that all rolling was intended to be behind the screen!

I wanted to make note of a few surprises that have come to mind in reading.  Information is just not clear at all at times.  With regard do the class and sub classes they did a poor job explaining.  Many times you read rules that address a class, but seem to not include the sub classes.  Later in reading on you have similar text that logically must be applied to subclasses, like the int table for magic users and illusionists, Later this class / sub class is directly explained.  Why wasn't this done in the beginning and if you get the Unearthed Arcana, forget what I just said.

Gygax was working on the Mini Haul school of game mastery from the start.  Look at his advice to have people bring first level characters into an existing campaign.  Even more telling are his statements on being stingy followed by his 100gp a level, monthly gold tax.  What the hell dude we are still trying to pay for our in and you want to tax my party 100gp a head at first level?  We are averaging an encounter a day in our first level AD&D game, we are going to be broke forever!  We are just trying to get to the point where we have all the equipment we need to be start, let alone plate armor.

My final observation was something I have been looking for, specifically.  This would be rules for head shots.  In a campaign with my cousins we had this rule of intelligent creatures making 1 in 2 attacks to the head, with non intelligent doing 1 in 6.  The effect was double damage for the head shot.  This was something I never have been able to find, until today, and always wondered about its source.  It seems to come out of the Helmet rules in the DMG, which state this about players not wearing a helmet.  Basically they are saying if you have no helmet you are ac 10 but with the helmet ac 1.  I have no idea about double damage for head shots though.  I wonder if it was read somewhere else then strapped on to form a sort of critical attack rule?

Observations of rereading the Dungeon Masters Guide 30 years later, part 1

I have started a new project related to my gaming groups, starting an old school AD&D game.  I am going through the players and dungeon masters to reread all the rules, with the goal of fishing out the weird house rules we always used.  The rules of the game are sort of imparted through osmosis more than actual study for most players of the original game.  Sure we look into the books and find some thing we can latch onto and know, but often we think we know the rules of AD&D more than we know them.  I am specifically trying to take not of things I thought were in the rules and are not. There are rules that are like ghosts, you read them and then can never find again.

Here are couple of points I never really knew, or knew but not as specific elements of the rule books.  Starting with the dungeon masters' guide, I didn't know how much Gary Gygax wanted to kill off my character.  Aside for elements like monsters and wizards having no hit points, Gygax was a butcher.  Those Disease and Parasitic infection rules were basically setting a timer on characters lives.  You apparently adventured solely in the northern climates or awaited renewal in carousel.  Seriously Just hanging out in a tropical city allowed for the chance of infection every week.  Let alone going through sewers like you might in Gygax's A series.  Yes I survived and conquered but I croaked due to scabies.

Another point I had ignored was how much TSR was trying to sell to me.  They sure mention all their little figures and how useful they would be.  Dungeon Geomorphs shit you better have em, son!  I sort of remember TSR going a bit apeshit about their license back in the late 80's with the whole Role-aids thing.  I had no idea they had started it with The Judges Guild license.  Accept no substitutions!  I can understand that in some respect, quality control is handy.  Our Dungeon Master Brian had all sorts of extra stuff hidden in binders that took the original game and blew it out of the water.  But flipping out over a module, whatever.

Back to the players handbook, thieves should never exist anywhere.  A first level thief with the best chance to pick pockets is only going to have a 35-40% chance of ripping you off.  How do they get better starting off that low.  I mean you do it once and retire I guess.

There are a few rules I seem to have materialized from out of my head.  I would swear I have read that you can only receive so much experience from an adventure.  That number was specifically enough to level you and then you could reach the next level minus a single experience point.  I can tell you that rule has been followed from gold box games to Dungeons and Dragons online.  But I have no idea where it is in the Dungeon Masters guide.

De Profundis: Dinner in the Shanty

My Fellow Gentlemen

The structure which meet my arrival was as fantastic as farcical.  My mind raced until I murmurs "A Ship" incredulously.  The establishment was once a tall sailed ship now a fixed resident of murky fens upon one face and the paved city cobblestones upon the other.  A stone approach was laid upon the murk to provide egress and entrance.  This itself was no petty task as it appeared the muck swallowed up the stones again and again, forming successive strata until satiated finally allowed for this walk.

I will deem the inward establishment quaint though it was at best rustic and less kindly a shanty.  The walls all reclaimed wood and nautical ornament, recalled the age of sail.  The seaside suspiciously absent from the locale, I avoided the creole lobster stew and contented myself with a phosphate whilst I awaited my hosts.

My detention was short as I was greeted by Crowley's approach.  He descended a stair draped in some fantastically appointed robe.  Its collar radiated the arcs of the sun and lowly glass beads were stitched into the bodice.  He wore a turban upon his head like some wild sultans' crown.  It was all too much for my composure and I regretfully let out a chuckle! This drew an anger of nonesuch fury, I even recoiled within my chair fearing violence to my person.  The many words were sharp and acid tongued oft falling into verses and languages I dreamed only desert insects may understand.

The man calmed some after many minutes of attack, perhaps remembering he had some purpose for me.  The words then were soft almost sibilant and always pushing.  He desired my help in attending one of his many congregants.  I am to attend a society function as a paramore, or some such foolishness.  I agreed if only to escape.  Even now I prepare for the eve with his dame. 

Yours very truly
J.L. Reich

Game Review: Star Wars Edge of the Empire Beginners Game

I was run through the Star Wars: Edge of the Empire Beginners Game of the last month.  While some of the rules ended up being a bit nebulous at times It was a fun game and an awfully good intro to gaming product.  I am going to say without qualification if you are a gamer parent with kids say 10 to 15 this is a fantastic introductory product.

So this is Star Wars minus Jedi, just to let you know right now. The setting seems to be the fridge of the empire with the setting taking place sometime post episode VI.  The only Jedi are Yoda and Luke in this setting with Vader and the emperor as the only sith.  There is supposed to be a new book coming out that introduces force sensitivity.  This will flavor your class but not make you a Jedi, is the thought.

Some of the big cool points were all the fiddly prop bits that came with the basic game.  The character sheets are huge multi-page affairs, sort of like the old twilight 2K character creations worksheets. they guide you through experience gains and help you understand your characters abilities.  Also they each have a nice write up that connects you to your fellow players.  I am being nice the writing is shatneresq at times and laughable.  That aside you also have loads of maps along with character and enemy tokens for combat.  It really was cool for a intro product as it gave you everything you needed in one box.  Even the Dice!

I put that at the end because dice are weird, in Star Wars.  I have never seen anything like them.  They work in opposing pairs that have a cancelling effect between themselves.  So you basically have green 8 sided and yellow 12 sided dice as skills for your characters actions.  If you roll something opposed by another character they give you anti success dice that are purple 8 sided and red 12 sided.  These dice return six values successes, advantages, triumphs, failures, defeats and despair.  These work out to cancel each other Successes for failures, Advantages for defeats and finally triumph for despair.  Once you have canceled you have the results.  This ends up being weird as you sometimes have failed and have a bunch of advantages or succeeded and many defeats or a despair.  These are more for the GM to add flavor i guess.  Its interesting as you can use the trump and successes if you succeed to do extra things.

There are extra characters you can find online at the fantasy flight games site.  This was handy as we had an extra large group.  I played Tray'essek a trandoshan which was cool but didn't

This along with the tons of Star Wars resources out there make for a very good introductory experience.  You can have pictures up for all the races in a few seconds along with music.  Our GM even created a scroll for us.  This really would create a special experience for newcomers.
have the full character booklet.  It was a little odd as some of the stuff the other characters had written out we had to figure out for my character.

A Look at the Bones 2 Kickstarter

This is going to be one of those no skin in the game reviews.  I actually backed a kickstarter a few weeks ago and didn't mention it here because it seems shifty.  I don't want to be telling you about stuff for my own gain.  That said I am really thinking about this bones 2 miniatures kickstarter.  Please go check it out here:

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1513061270/reaper-miniatures-bones-ii-the-return-of-mr-bones?ref=live

They are dishing out a barrel of minis for 100 bucks.  It seems like they are getting near 1 mini for 1 dollar at this point which is incredibly cheap.  Yes they are plastic but I was paying 3 bucks for a blind shot at a goblin miniatures. I think their scheme is to get an extra 50 here and there for add on sales.  That said they are giving like 24 minis for that 50 USD. 

For gamers wanting to start a miniatures collection this is a great way to get going.  Its very cost effective and gives you a large amount of basics.  You have heroes and villains.  Large minis and small ones.  Undead and monstrous vermin.  This really will take you a long way.  It would be great if they tried to cover specific modules and say hey the tomb of horrors is completely covered with our minis.  It may well be now. 

Money is flowing into this at a crazy rate.  I don't think you want to skip this one, its going to go down as legendary kickstarter campaign

First Thoughts on Monty Cook's Numenera

Howdy folks

I have been reading through The Players Guide for Monty Cook's Numenera game.  I wanted to pass along a couple of thought for people considering buying it and those who may not know about it but should buy it.  I will start off by saying I am not done reading it, I have reached the part talking about "class" powers which mostly wraps up the book.

So Numenera is as close as you are going to get to Digest Publishing Groups failed AI project as you are going to get.  I have chatted with Joe Fugate through email and have a decent understanding of what AI was intending and Numenera is it.  They both used even used the Asimov quote about sufficiently advanced technology being indistinguishable from magic as a design philosophy.  Magicians work out to be humans who can manipulate nano swarms existing in an area in AI, where Nano's are the wizards of Numenera.  The reason I supported the kickstarter was immediate fear this would be very similar to the game I have been working on for years.  The art work in Numenera immediately conjures elements of my own setting.

The rules for doing things in the game are light but elegant.  I am quite a fan of the idea of melee range, which is a nebulous distance where the fight is occurring.  You just can attack people in melee range, you don't worry about speed or attacks of opportunity.  Combat is fluid and moving.  It really makes maps and miniatures completely not needed.

Skills are also simple yet elegant.  You just roll a d20 verse a target number/target number step.  A target number step of 1 may require a roll of 3+ and 2 may require 6+.  The Game Master Sets the difficulty number and the players must roll it.  The player uses their skills not to add or subtract to the roll but to decrease the skill target number step.  So having a skill in jump will make that 2 step become a 1 step and drop the target number to 3+.

I have yet to get my hands on the Core Book so we will see if my impressions continue to ring true.  I have a feeling The old Dark Space setting may also be influencing the game as well.

Follow up:  I guess i should talk about the Adjective Class who Does Stuff mechanic.  This is something that comes in at the end of the book. It allows for mixing of ideas and developing your character into a thematic concept.  You have adjectives like Rugged and Mystical which allow for extra skills and stat pool points.  These can work to expand your character into new areas or specialize your skills, a rugged nano being more well rounded and a mystical nano being specialized.  These work in theory but i am not sure if there shouldn't be a few more. 

The Does Stuff mechanic needs more options.  From a crunch perspective this is very similar in that it just adds to your class.  This can be things like controls beasts or Wields two weapons, basically creating the what type of class you are.  I am going to come right out and say they need more, what they have is ok as it works to create a feel for the setting. But in looking to create the more iconic characters from my own setting, I see no way the game handles necromancy.  I guess the nearest you get is telekinesis if you are moving a corpse like a puppet.

Game Review: Bang!

We tried the Bang! game last night with the group, minus one.  This is a fun game!  But I think I was most happy just to have another 7 player option that I didn't have to buy regardless if the game sucked or not.  But this is a fun one so double bonus.

Everyone is playing a role from the sheriff, deputy, outlaw and finally the renegade.  Each of the roles change what is required for a win and only the sheriff is known.  The rest play with their roll down and are hidden and require you to figure out who is playing each role.

You are then playing various actions that function as attacks.  These can be shooting someone with a "Bang" card or other weird things that force discarding a card or getting rid of an object in play.  The other players usually have defense cards that allow them to be missed or get out of the way.

So it sort of works that you are trying to figure out who is playing each roll then move on with killing folks.  When the Sherif is killed the game ends which is good for the outlaws.  The sheriff wants to kill all those dry outlaws as does the debuty.  The renegade wants to kill all the outlaws then the deputy and finally the sheriff for a win.

It was pretty fun for our group not one complained and I would say everyone had a good time.  I liked it.  It would be pretty fun with a few more cards was my only complaint.  Just to have more variety in the character cards.  This can easily be fixed by buying the Bullet edition instead of the basic edition.  The bullet seems to be pretty cheap on ebay if you get the right deal.

Campaign Seeds: Torg morning in America

Torg was an interesting game that I really never got a chance to check out.  There was just so much to it that you would go broke trying to collect it all.  The idea was to react a multi-genre system, very popular at the time, were all the different areas of earth were transformed by a Reality War.  Each section was under control by a particular Dark Lord and was reworked to fit their vision of a perfect world.  That is a bit of a stretch but there was a fantasy setting in England and a cyber setting in France, in any event. 

Through a series of plot line advancing modules they resolved the game with the characters winning the Reality War and earth being returned to it original state.  Which is all cool and wrapped up but it  doesn't allow for a lot of further role play.

What would excite me and provide for some further role playing, is taking the idea and warping it a bit.  Perhaps the players did win but not for themselves, rather they just put another dark lord in power.  This one with a vision of the present Earth as his domain.  The thing being that our history post 1994 or 95 has all been on hold, as the dark lord maintains his grip.

This give the character a new dark lord to fight with people who have no idea about the Reality Wars.  They assume the heroes are dangerous insane folks that should be locked up.  The Soviet union could be still in place with a lingering cold war.  It would allow for turning the 80's cold war US into a setting of its own.  Which creates for some rather nostalgic gaming.  

I am unsure of whom I would suggest as the Dark Lord, perhaps Bush the elder or some figure behind the scenes wanting the status quo to remain.  I am sure the next question is why the time frame?  Mainly because that is when Torg was all washed up.

The players would have no internet or a most a very difficult to access one.  Bulletin Board Systems would be all the rage along with party lines.   Guns and equipment would be limited to those in the basic boxed setting for the non effected earth.  If you really wanted to get weird let the history advance to modern 2013 tech and then have this 80's revision of the world start intruding that is cool too.  Things that are happening in the news could be modified to be ushering the change.  PRISM and the conflict in Afghanistan could be working their way back to the 80's.  A massive cyber attack could bring down the internet such that though it is up it is constantly being hit by a global denial of service attack.

Characters for campaigns

The jester is a character inspired by A Game of Thrones on tv.  He serves as a sort of an inverse to a character like Tyrion  In fantasy games he would be a large brutish race, half orc, but could be a large brutish human in more historic low fantasy games.  He has been captured and as a survivor moved into the service of a noble as a humiliated court jester, something like Dontas.  He is meant to be a character with a hidden skill set that can function as an operative for hire.

His training is as a ranger and has developed his skills to fit the city.  His fighting style is skirmish fighting using improvised weapons and ambush attacks.   He is often ignored in the city or mocked but he uses this to track his targets.  Ambushing from cover and dealing with them in a secluded spot.

This is a good character to harass a party with even if he does not serve as a combatant.  He could be tracking an spying on the party for some noble, only to alert guards later on.  If discovered he could turn the pursuit into an elaborate game.  Continuing the jest while he batters the party with jugs or wine bottles for comedic effect.

The jester can also serve as a good bridge between the underbelly of crime and the upper echelons of society.  Making him a Mr. Johnson stand in for the fantasy setting.