Critical Hits

The Journal of Gamer Culture

Critical Bits for the week ending 2010-01-31

Posted by on January 31, 2010 · 2 Comments 

Filed under Critical Bits

Twitter Updates

DDXP 2010 Product Seminar Coverage

  • Live tweet coverage of the #ddxp 2020 #dnd product seminar starting in about 10 minutes (1p est) #
  • Likely, a lot of it was already revealed at GenCon, but if Amazon is right, there will be some curveballs. #
  • At the podium: @mikemearls, also here Rich Baker, Kirin Chase, Bart Carroll, and @Wotc_Trevor #
  • January already out: Underdark and Dragonborn. Dragonborn is experiment with low cost, softcover. #
  • Blurry pic of podium and display. http://twitpic.com/106ibh #
  • Rich Baker: every character supported in DDI evey few months #
  • Martial Power 2- support for martial, 1 fighter build, 2 ranger, 1 rogue, 2 warlord, weapon style feats, new PPs, & EDs #
  • Plus martial practices, like rituals for martial characters- non-combat options for martial chars like running marathon #
  • 3 dragon ante, expansion or standalone #
  • March: PHB3. Psionic powers, new classes, new races, new options. Supported by D&D Gameday #
  • Classes: Monk, Battlemind, Psion, Ardent, Seeker, and ??? (rumored to be Runepriest) #
  • Races: Wilden, Minotaur, Githzerai, and ??? (rumored to be Shardsoul) #
  • Plenty of options for non-psionic characters too, including hybrids. Also in March: Hammerfast, softcover, poster map, near Nentir Vale #
  • Mearls: Every place has an adventure hook. Tried to mimic City of Greyhawk. Also sample mini-campaign arc for Hammerfast campaign #
  • April/May: Plane Above book, like Plane Below but for Astral Sea #
  • Player’s Strategy Guide: aimed to be fun to read by #dnd players- essays, play advice. Not hardcore optimizing or rules. D&D celebs writing #
  • May: Dungeon mag annual. Mostly adventures. The Slaying Stone: adventure for lvl 1-3, 32pg softcover w/ poster map. #
  • June: Monster Manual 3- trying hard to include more flavor to monsters based on feedback. Story hooks included. (not 3-4 pages though) #
  • Monster blocks will contain a section on allies, and why they work together. #
  • Also releasing in June: Gargantuan Orcus. Limited edition. Base is removable. Emphasized very limited edition. #
  • More in June: Tiefling book, similar to Dragonborn, written by @sernett #
  • Deserts of Athas dungeon tiles in June. Demonicon in July, details Demon Lords, history of Abyss “make it adventurable”. Encounter tables #
  • July: Tomb of Horrors super-adventure. 10th-22nd level. Draws on Return to Tomb. Format like Revenge of Giants #
  • July- Vor Rukoth. Like Hammerfast, more Paragon-focused. Ruins of Tiefling city, east of Nentir Vale. Extraplanar bad guys #
  • “Dungeons & Dragons Essentials” first product- Dungeon Tiles Master Set “the dungeon”, keep in print. Use tiles from this in advenures #
  • August- Psionic Power by Rob Schwalb. 1 new build for each psionic class. Ardent- empath, Monk uses weapons, Psion uses ectoplasm for minion #
  • August- Lords of Madness. Completely blind box again. 6 minis, 60 minis in set, 21.99, contain huge. One mini set per year #
  • Also will be “very rare” minis of evey size. #
  • August- Dark Sun. Campaign setting and Creature Catalog. Char creation, geography, adventure, dm advice, societies all in setting. #
  • Gith, doomreavers, and more Athasian monsters. Also contains hazards and NPCs. Thought long and hard about where to start off. #
  • Baker and Schwalb primary writers. Big release using everybody, since they all are DS fans. #
  • August: Marauders of Dune Sea adventure. Set outside city of Tyr, 32pg softcover. Also new D&D dice set. #
  • Castle Ravenloft board game in Aug. 1-5 players, plays in 1hr or less, 13 advenures, 42 minis, 13 tile sheets, hundreds of cards. Co-op #
  • Scales based on # of players. Aimed to be for when can’t get together a #dnd game. #
  • Minis with Ravenloft includes 1 huge, all unpainted. Modular board. Cards for events and monsters. Drew as much from adventure as could #
  • Ravenloft will be $64.99, released at GenCon. #
  • September: D&D essentials set. Looks like Red Box. Includes solo play that helps generate character while playing #
  • Aimed to be entirely introductory product. Also in sept- Rules Compendium. Reference book for all rules. Not a rewrite of rules #
  • Errata will be incorporated into Rules Compendium. $20, 6×9 size. Red box has tokens an maps. “crayon later this year.” also $20 #
  • D&D essentials: Heroes of the Fallen Lands. Designed to be used after Red Box. New builds of existing char classes, basic char classes #
  • Fighter, Cleric, Wizard, Rogue, Ranger. More walks thru chargen. Humans, Dwarves, Eladrin, Elf, Halflings. New feats Too #
  • Oct: more essentials: Dungeon Master’s Kit, how to DM, sample adventures. Other Tiles master set: “the city” #
  • Dungeon Master Kit is big box. Has rules compendium. Lot of monster tokens, two poster maps. $40-$45 #
  • Oct: Gamma World. Uses D&D rules. Complete game experience in box. 160 rulebook included. Rooted in d&d. Chargen, how to gm, monsters #
  • More on Gamma World: 10 encounters, poster map, tokens. New card mechanics. Character will be mutant. “part cockroach, part yeti” #
  • In GW starter box, item cards and mutation cards that come up randomly. Some powerful, some silly. GW will have booster cards for players #
  • GW booster packs will be random, only found in hobby stores (not bookstore) Will also have game day #
  • Nov: D&D essentials Heroes of Forgotten Kingdoms. Introduces more classes With new builds and races (ex dragonborn and Druid) #
  • Nov: Dungeons of Dragonfire Mountain (based on dragon mountain) board game. Shares some mechanics w/ Ravenloft but with twists #
  • Some pieces of each Boardgame can be used with each other to expand and make bigger games. Same component #s as Ravenloft #
  • Monster Vault is monster book for D&D essentials, includes one token for every monsters in it #
  • December: race book for Humans like dragonborn and tiefling books. Also Gamma World “expansion” box, adventure box w/ 16 encounters. #
  • December: Dungeon Tile master set “the wilderness.” #
  • Most of end of the year is “Essentials” box starting with new Red Box 4e. Only 1 core d&d product, though essentials will have new stuff #
  • Off-hand reference to “martial power 3″ – may have just been a joke :) #
  • This year in minis: one core set, Orcus, and “one surprise” #
  • Streets of Shadow minis set and Player’s Handbook Heroes both canceled. #
  • Orcus is $74.99, emphasized very limited nature again, especially through game stores. #
  • “allaying fears” – not abandoning core d&d line. 10 products in essentials then back to core. Problem was workload. “unusual cycle” #
  • Online content (ie DDI) will support Heroscape/D&D links and the new boardgames #
  • Side note: only two cranky messages + unfollows from livetweeting. There’s more updates to come, so choose following wisely :) #
  • No big announcements for DDI. Working more on Adventure Tools but don’t have anything ready to announce yet. Working all the time on tools #
  • Character builder will “change and adapt” to fit analogue game (ie Essentials content). Also more of the boardgames planned. #
  • “How many instakills are in Tomb of Horror?” “Not enough.” #
  • More seminars this weekend- Dark Sun, and “beyond the rpg” focusing on boardgames/cardgames. If I should cover those, tell me! #

DDXP Community Seminar

  • http://twitpic.com/1072gq – Next session about Organized Play and Community with @christulach and @trevor_wotc. (via @geeksdreamgirl) #
  • Next DM Rewards: a Dark Sun box (WAR art), plus full set of condition cards for evey condition. Pics forthcoming. #
  • Dark Sun box http://twitpic.com/1073te #
  • Dark Sun box opened http://twitpic.com/1073×7 #
  • LFR is working to be more community driven, and is expanding play experiences, like special con experiences and new places (Raven’s Bluff) #
  • Worldwide D&D Game Days: PHB3 On March 20, Dark Sun in August, D&D Red Box in Sept, Gamma World in October #
  • Condition Cards that will be DM rewards (protoype) http://twitpic.com/1075ym #
  • Cons will have more background to pregen characters, Ultimate Delve returns this summer, highlight new products, more DM support tools #
  • Wizards of the Coast announces the end of Star Wars license http://bit.ly/94B60H #rpg #d20 (via @dorkland and @monkeyking) #
  • WotC supported cons: DDXP, Pax East, Origins, SD Comic Con, GenCon, Pax Prime, NY Comic Con #
  • Formal announcement of D&D encounters (read more on our site: http://is.gd/7eSEZ ) Middle ground between campaign and one-offs #
  • Can earn renown points by various things both in game and out of game, which let you earn rewards. (some are like achievements) #
  • D&D Encounters starts on March 17 (St. Patrick’s Day!) w/ Undermountain. Scheduling starts February 8th. #
  • .@trevor_wotc is talking about featured content on community site- specifically @NewbieDM ‘s group #
  • Talking about @wizards_dnd feed- going to do weekly rules answers, just figuring out best way to do it #
  • “when will Monuments of the Ancients, greatest adventure ever, be released into LFR?” -author @matt_James_fr #
  • Second season of D&D encounters starts in June and will be Dark Sun. #
  • DDXP Podcast: @wotc_bart updates us on the happenings at the D&D Experience. http://bit.ly/cMCvzV #dnd #ddxp #podcast (via @Wizards_DnD) #
  • RT @KenofGhastria: My latest on Examiner.com, talking about the news from #DDXP http://short.to/1573u #

DDXP “Beyond the RPG” Seminar

  • At the “Beyond the RPG” seminar at #DDXP (also reporting: @geeksdreamgirl , @wolfstar76) #
  • Presenting: @mikemearls, @christulach, and Rich Baker. Talking about the new board games (like Ravenloft), 3 Dragon Ante, and Gamma World. #
  • 3 Dragon Ante expansion can be played alone or combined with original. Some of the new dragons from 4e make an appearance. Can mix and match #
  • Castle Ravenloft, for those that didn’t hear earlier, is cooperative #dnd boardgame, out for GenCon. #
  • Combination of HeroQuest, Descent, Space Hulk, and Betrayal at House on the Hill. Hour play time, cooperative, pulled from the module #
  • Dungeon is built as you go, using 4×4 interlocking tiles. 5 different characters. Scenario-driven that dictates objective and play. #
  • Monsters come with a “Script” to determine their AI. Players go, then there is a Strahd turn that runs the monsters based on text. #
  • Very cut down version of #dnd move and attack action, plus some extra powers. Plays fast. All scenarios form a mini-Ravenloft campaign #
  • 42-44 unpainted minis come in the box. 5 Heroes, huge Dracolich, piles of monsters, and Strahd himself. Lots of tokens for traps and such. #
  • And as reported earlier, “Dungeons of Dragonfire Mountain” (nee Dragon Mountain) will be released in Oct using same system. #
  • Dragonfire Mountain will be standalone, then online content will provide scenarios to combine them. #
  • Dungeons of Dragonfire Mountain also inspired by “Gates of Firestorm Peak” #
  • Depending on reaction, DDI may also provide new characters or other options for the board games. #
  • .@greywulf Sadly, the production of the game wasn’t along enough to make an appearance, so there’s nothing to show or play for it here. #
  • This may also not be the only board game engine they design. So for example, they might do a “War of the Lance” mass strategy game. #
  • Another possibility for playing the game if the DM kills off several PCs in a session, those players can go play Ravenloft :) #
  • Gamma World: 30 classic monsters + a few new ones, 10 encounter adventure, rules. Self contained game to get started. 4 token sheets #
  • GW: a few poster maps, and a GM’s deck of cards that includes 40 mutation cards and 40 tech cards. #
  • Doesn’t necessarily use classes. Some things remain the same w/ character, some change, plus mutations of all kinds #
  • Your Half-Yeti can wield an M-16 and a stop sign in leather armor. There’s also power armor, blasters, etc. #
  • 120 card set, 8 card boosters for $3.99 for more mutations, tech cards, and player “personal deck” cards. #
  • “Famine at Fargo” adventure released after core, featuring a giant mutated chicken. Expansion adds 10 cards. More expansion in 2011 #
  • Gamma World is “very compatible” with #dnd Skill list slightly different, but D&D monsters work just fine and vice versa #
  • Tech artifacts would be “spooky and scary” in D&D but they work similarly as magic items. “Radiation” as damage type. #
  • “In LFR, can we use Gamma World artifacts?” @christulach shuts that down pretty quick :) #
  • There are character themes that have elements of D&D roles- acid-spitting cockroach might be kind of a striker, for instance. #
  • “Marketing guys might not want me to say this, but you don’t have to buy boosters, and you can always draw from GM’s deck.” #
  • Almost entirely random character generation, you’ll have a key stat for your theme, and then stats rolled, as well as stats and mutations #
  • Character creation takes maybe up to 15 minutes because so much of it is random. Equipment purchase is one of the few decisions #
  • Character progression is faster than D&D, and goes up until level 10 and stops. #
  • There are plans to do more “genre games” in the future, which will almost certainly use the 4e engine. #
  • No further information on “Points of Light” setting novels, other than Bill S. is working on finishing the first one now. #
  • However, the PoL novels will be aimed at the same core audience as normal D&D novel formats, instead of being shorter or aimed younger. #

DDXP Athas Unveiled Seminar

  • #DarkSun seminar starting soon from #DDXP #
  • Rich Baker’s second project when he first started at TSR was a Dark Sun sourcebook, and even worked on such books as Will and the Way #
  • Rob Schwalb is a freelance designer for WotC and also took lion’s share of design. #
  • Baker re-familiarized himself with the Dark Sun setting before working on it again, like visiting Athas.org conversion & Wanderer’s Journal #
  • Original setting pulled more from Conan and Barsoom than LotR. Fantasy world different than what was done before. More savage & dangerous #
  • Athas in Seven Sentences (pic to come later), 4e setting had to follow all of them or else they did it wrong. #
  • Area covered in Athas is “smaller than the state of Texas” unlike other settings. #
  • Also covering seminar: @geeksdreamgirl, @matt_james_fr, @wizards_dnd, @wolfstar76, @hommlet #
  • Trying to take all the parts that original Dark Sun fans loved and take them back to their first exposure. #
  • Dark Sun Campaign Guide: 8/2010, 224pgs, 2 new races, 10 character themes, paragon paths, feats, and gear. #
  • Extensive Atlas of Athas, short intro adventure, plus material on DMing a Dark Sun game. Societies and flavor of the world. #
  • Incorporates “Cutting edge D&D tech” incl. new traps and terrain powers, revised skill challenges, etc. #
  • Theme is like a template for characters of any class. Things like Gladiators extend to all classes, so need another mechanic beyond classes #
  • Themes give one encounter power, as well as powers you can substitute your class powers for. Some limits & restrictions #
  • Gladiator gives a “controller theme” so it’s a backdoor way to get into a martial controller. #
  • Themes might make their way into core #dnd – could represent something like a Pirate. #
  • Creature Catalog: 144pg softcover, 50+ Dark Sun monsters in 120 varities. 7 Sorcerer-Kings and Dragon of Tyr. +Templates, hazards, etc #
  • Retailers gave feedback that players wanted more of the description of the world in the book that they read for campaign guides #
  • Insights from Monster Manual 3 design were used in Creature Catalog. More flavor, more story, integration with hazards, other hooks #
  • Marauders of the Dune Sea, 32pg adventure for 1-3rd level Dark Sun characters, designed by @brucecordell #
  • DDI: Monthly support for Dark Sun. Maybe not an adventure for every month, but split between adventures for Dungeon and options in Dragon #
  • List of setting questions is up- pic to come later. Things like using dungeons in Dark Sun, role of Gods, handling Dragons, etc. #
  • On things like gnomes that weren’t in 2e, specifically left out for DM to handle, but it’s not a core assumption. #
  • Q on Cosmology: decided to include core D&D cosmology. Part of the reason was for monster origins. Not that far from original Dark Sun cosmo #
  • Shadowfell is close to the Gray, magic deserts and remaining forests relate to the Feywild. #
  • RT @Judd_of_Kryos: Dark Sun 4e tweets compiled http://tiny.cc/C5614 Thanks to @Wizards_DnD and the fantastic work of @criticalhits #
  • Half-Giants (Goliaths) will no longer have fluctuating alignment… of course. #
  • Dragonborn “aren’t just bolted on”, and Tieflings will be there as well, both with hooks back to the original setting. #
  • One of the themes emphasizes Psionic wild talent. #
  • Wild talents can also get some “cantrip-level” psionic talents. #
  • In Dark Sun, trying to downplay the importance of magic items, and will use the options from DMG2 to achieve this. #
  • Mul is +2 Con and other choice +2 Str OR Wis. Edge against condition/status stuff. #
  • And that’s the end of the Dark Sun seminar. Can’t wait for August. #

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D&D XP 2010: Dark Sun Characters

Posted by on January 29, 2010 · 22 Comments 

Filed under Featured, News, Roleplaying Games

Here are scans of all 6 characters being run in the adventure “Dark Sun: Death in the Arena” here at D&D XP. I played in it last night and really enjoyed it. I played the Battlemind which is one of my new favorite classes (especially because it mashes together Psychometabolists and Psychic Warriors, both of which I loved.)

Anyway, here’s the characters:

Suldin, Human Illusionist Wizard

Vinara, Human Sorcerer-King Pact Warlock

Ulieth, Elf Resilient Battlemind

Kindrok, Goliath (Half-Giant) Arena Fighter

Morg, Mul Thunderborn Barbarian

Pak’Cha, Thri-Kreen Animist Shaman

And a compiled PDF of all.

One last tidbit, for those that are into this kind of thing. Weapon breakage rules are as follows: if you roll a 1 on an attack with a weapon, you can reroll it. If you’re using a non-metal weapon, it automatically breaks after the attack if you do so. If you’re using a metal weapon, it breaks on a roll of 1-5.

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D&D XP 2010: Dungeons & Dragons Essentials

Posted by on January 29, 2010 · 23 Comments 

Filed under News, Roleplaying Games

The 2010 product seminar, for the first 3/4s of the year at least, contained almost all products we heard about at GenCon. One of the biggest surprises, aside from changes in the minis line and the announcement of a boxed set 4e Gamma World, was the line known as “Dungeons & Dragons Essentials.”

During the last quarter, WotC will roll out a product line designed for new players. The game’s core is what was being called the “4e Red Box.” The prototype image was styled after the original D&D Red Box, and contains enough for a few players to play (including some tokens and maps), but can also be played solo. What was interesting to me was the “walkthrough” approach to the rules, where the book is designed to come with you to learn the rules as you play. Also neat is that the choices your characters make during the actual game determine what class you are, instead of generating a character first.

The Red Box is supposed to be the clear, introductory, “I’ve never played D&D before and want to learn” set. An emphasis was given by the WotC staffers that the bookstores (since before 4e and well into 3e) have had trouble selling D&D books because it’s not easy to recommend what new players should buy. [Read the rest of this article]

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D&DXP News: D&D Encounters

Posted by on January 28, 2010 · 4 Comments 

Filed under News, Roleplaying Games

Today at D&D Experience 2010 Wizards of the Coast announced their new program titled D&D Encounters, a natural evolution of the Delve Night concept. D&D Encounters is aimed at encouraging players to mingle and interact more with other gamers in their area and will allow players to participate in contests to win cool prizes and D&D swag.

This new program is set up for your local game store to host a short play session each week, usually 1 or 2 encounters in length, from February through the rest of Spring. They will also be giving out Renown points for accomplishing tasks in these sessions that can be traded in for in-game rewards along with the above mentioned contests for players and stores to win prizes “that will make stores an even more exciting place to play D&D. I have no idea what that could mean, but my money is on fog and light machines!

Here is the official information:

D&D Encounters:

  • D&D Encounters sign-ups open February 8
  • Each D&D Encounters play kit (arriving in stores March 10) comes with all the materials needed to support 12 players and 2 DMs – adventures, maps, tokens, rewards for players and DMs, and a promo poster which doubles as a play tracker
  • Each Wednesday, players participate in a one-encounter D&D play session lasting about 1-2 hours
  • The first season of D&D Encounters features the iconic dungeon of Undermountain in the Forgotten Realms and runs March 17 through June 2

The first D&D Encounters mini-campaign takes place in the Forgotten
Realms exploring new areas of Undermountain, with their own
characters, one they create at the store, or a pre-generated character
provided with the kit. It’s a good chance for players to experiment
with a new character…or try DMing for the first time, since there’s a
full kit of materials provided, it’s easier to get into running a
game.

In each battle, players will earn Renown Points redeemable for in-game
rewards; as players progress through the campaign, they will earn
Renown Points for completing encounters, finishing quests and engaging
in other adventuring activities. Before and during the game, we’ll be
encouraging discussion via the Web, (Twitter and the Wizards community
site) to share experiences with other players from around the world
and even get clues/bonuses for use in-game.

And to support participating stores, Wizards will be hosting contests
and promotions to offer prizes that will make stores an even more
exciting place to play D&D. Information on D&D Encounters and related
promotions (as they come up) will live at www.dungeonsanddragons.com/dndencounters.

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Keeping up with the PCs: Part 3, The DM’s Toolbox and Other Dirty Tricks

Posted by on January 28, 2010 · 22 Comments 

Filed under Musings of the Chatty DM, Roleplaying Games

Welcome back to this series about helping D&D 4e DM’s keep up with players who manage to become more performing than the game’s default assumption.

In part 1, I described the “Secret Synergy Bonus” that made players a lot better at dealing with combat encounters that should otherwise be more challenging.  Then in part 2, I started sharing some solutions to bring challenges back to combat encounters, some bad and some easy to implement.

Today, I want to present ideas to make you think about implementing more elaborate solutions to this very interesting phenomenon.  I find the Synergy Bonus to be a very cool aspect of D&D 4e, I’m glad it exists, I just wish it was easier for DMs to deal with when it crops up.  Fortunately, the game offers the best DM toolbox ever created to deal with such issues, all it needs is some creativity and a little flair for “fun” dirty tricks.

Ruin the PCs’ Game Plan

As my players developed into elite adventurers, I noticed that there was a method to their efficiency.  They would pick or settle on a strong point on the battle map. The defenders and leaders would occupy it by forming a line against which the monsters would invariably crash.  The melee striker would then close in and create a triangle with that line, catching monsters in the middle and dishing massive damage.  The controllers and ranged strikers would just stand behind the line and deal death from afar.

I noticed that the sooner the PCs established this (or similar) pattern, the faster they took control of the fight.  That’s what I call the PCs’ game plan. It occurred to me that my goal should be to try to break that plan to swing momentum toward my monsters long enough to worry the players.  Turns out that it worked!

Examples:

  • Having lurkers pop behind the ranged PCs a few rounds into the fight
  • Having defenders get snatched by flying/tentacled monsters and dropped in the middle of monsters/ in a trap
  • Forcing high damage striker to attack minions before reaching juicer targets.
  • Traps/magical effects that hit large areas and cause forced movement, sending PCs flying all over the place

Of course the PCs will eventually reestablish control of the fight, but chances are more resources will have been spent and the players will feel more satisfied with the challenge.

Complex Encounters

As I said yesterday, mixing monsters, terrain and traps together can make for phenomenal encounters.  While you can pick and chose encounter elements rapidly as a quick fix, a DM willing to invest some more time can develop his own evil combos and synergies that will rival the PC’s.  Lots of monsters have powers that combine together and with many fantastic terrain and traps.  I personally love ‘pinball’ effects where PCs are thrown left and right on the battlefield into traps and ‘interesting’ terrain.

The trick is to combine various elements together and create interrelationships between them.  Traps are cooler when they interact with PCs and Monsters, fantastic terrain can hide a monster or push creatures into traps and so forth.

Here’s a simple example:

A cave encounter features a bunch of Kuo Toa (Insane Fish men), a few 3X3 pools of what’s apparently water and many Stalagtites/Stalagmites.

The Stalagmites provide cover and have truncated tops that are great shooting platforms for ranged creatures. They can be climbed but they are covered by some gunky sap that deals acid damage to climbers and slows climbing.

The Stalagtites have been weakened by the acidic gunk such that whenever a creature walks within 1 square of one, it falls and crashes in a burst attack (vs Ref), dealing damage and immobilizing creatures hit by it (It also creates difficult terrain).

The pools are very acidic (notice a theme here?) and slightly neurotoxic. They deal acid damage every per round (5 per tier) and slow any creatures in it  (until end of next turn).

But, in those pools are… wait for it…

ACID SHARKS! (Thank you Rich Burlew!)

They are immune to the pool’s effect and have a Grab Bite power, keeping PCs in the pool, getting burned and eaten at the same time.

Finally, the Kuo Toa leader is a Kuo Toa Whip, a controller whose power set includes Sliding PCs….into the stalagmite and pool.

Add a few Brutes, Minions, Artillery (on the  Stalagtites) or Skirmishers and you have a a challenging encounter for your players.

Of course, if your players are truly at “that point”, they’ll eventually crack your setup and start throwing monsters into the pool so THEY get eaten by a shark… but that’s part of the fun of it all no?

For a more extreme example here’s an entry I sent for the Wizards of the Coast Holiday Encounter Contest a few weeks back.   It’s a toy factory line made of dangerous traps.  All monsters have forced movement powers and the line has 2 control panels to trigger traps out of sequence or reverse the direction the whole thing is going.  Tons of fun.

Adding complex elements to split the PCs,  surprise them and screw their game is the way to catch up to them.

Make Encounters not about Combat Anymore

If the players have reached a point where combat is almost always too easy for them. You may prefer to move away from hyper crunchy encounters (like the examples above) and go another way. You might want to have encounters stop being primarily about combat.

What if combat occurred in encounters where PCs had more pressings things to do?  You create scenes where PCs need to perform critical tasks that can’t be interrupted (usually a high-tension skill challenge, one where each failure is harsh  for the PCs) and then have monsters come and interrupt the fun!  Now PCs must deal with the Skill Challenge and the monsters.

In the current issue of Kobold Quarterly, I wrote an article exactly about using skill challenges in combat (woot 2 plugs in one post) to add new dimensions to them (Woot, plug!).

Other examples:

  • PCs must find an object hidden in an area, the longer they search for it, the more monsters pop out and attack
    • Indiana Jones Special: The monsters have different roles: Vermin Swarms, Defenders and Rival adventurers!
  • Allied Load Bearing King just died and PCs must escape the crumbling castle or be crushed underneath it (a great Skill Challenge just there).  However, the elite guards sworn to die with their deceased sovereign face the PCs, accusing them of murder as the castle crumbles around them (Embedded Skill Challenge or Combat!)!

I could write whole posts about those 3 subjects, and maybe I will if there’s a demand for it.  This is just a few examples to get your brain going.  The Secret Synergy bonus is a great feature of 4e, it’s just that it’s a lot easier to stumble upon it than it is for the DM to master all the elements of the impressive DM’s toolbox to act as a counterweight to it.

I may also revisit this later with a post about helping players transition to the synergistic state.

Thanks for reading, I hope you’ve enjoyed my 1st full series here. I’m starting to enjoy myself a lot!

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Five Things I Would Like WotC to Do With D&D in 2011

Posted by on January 26, 2010 · 29 Comments 

Filed under Editorial, Featured, Roleplaying Games

I generally try to avoid business speculation about Wizards of the Coast. It would seem that a large vocal group of D&D players like to second-guess and pontificate about what is and isn’t good for the Dungeons & Dragons business.  I don’t care. I’m in this hobby to play the game, not get my MBA. WotC’s business is their own concern, not mine. While the direction of a lot of computer and video games matters quite a bit – we all want the games we play to be something we enjoy – this isn’t as much of a concern for D&D. The game is flexible and modular; I can build the game I want out of the material they provide.

Elitism aside, I still pay attention to what WotC does with Dungeons & Dragons and I still have a desire to see them head in certain directions. I’m just not pompous enough to assume that my ideas are best for their business.

With all of the 2010 predictions going on, I thought it might be fun to look at the five things I’d like to see WotC do with Dungeons & Dragons in 2011. Why 2011 instead of 2010? It’s very likely the WotC production schedule has already fully planned out their line for 2010. Any desires I have will likely have to wait until 2011 to become reality. So I’m skipping 2010, a year filled with Dark Sun, the third set of core books, and lots of other interesting products to focus on the year after.

I will warn you now that these are likely to be contested opinions. I’m guessing every D&D player has a 3×5 note card in their back pocket with things they want WotC to do. But today we’ll simply have to suffer through mine.

Let us begin. [Read the rest of this article]

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Keeping up with the PCs: Part 2, What Not to Do and Quick Fixes

Posted by on January 26, 2010 · 24 Comments 

Filed under General Musings, Musings of the Chatty DM, Roleplaying Games

In part 1, I discussed a common occurrence in D&D 4e where parties becomes much stronger than they should be through what I called the ‘Secret Synergy Bonus.’  This occurs when players figure how to play their PCs as a focused team based on good communication and smart use of power combos to increase combat efficiency tremendously.

I also discussed that while not a necessity to enjoy D&D 4e, this ‘bonus’ could sneak up on a DM and make supposedly challenging encounters too breezy to create much tension with players.

And just so you all know, I’m currently living through those very issues.  My players discovered that bonus a long time ago and now that we’re into mid-paragon level, most of our fights, while interesting, end up feeling like they could have been harder.  Thus I’ve been in solution-seeking mode for quite some time now.

Today I’ll tackle two types of solutions to bring back challenge into combat encounters with synergistic parties:  the questionable solutions and the quick solutions.  In part 3, I’ll conclude this series with a discussion on using more elaborate solutions to the issue and share some of the tips left by readers.

Less Than Ideal Solutions

When a problem crops up, humans usually look for the path of least resistance to resolve the issue.  We want a simple solution that will resolve everything.

The worse possible solution in my mind would be to try to stifle the bonus by telling players they can’t plot and play like that because it would be meta-gaming (how I hate this word). The game was designed to allow Slayers, Tacticians and Power Gamers (3 of the many types identified in the Dungeon Master Guide) to truly enjoy character creation and combat.   The synergy bonus does not prevent story-telling or roleplaying, but is likely a bonus feature for some players to discover and play with.

Also, to make combat more difficult,  the first reflex is often to play with the encounter’s XP budget and monster levels.  Logic says that if you use higher level monsters, the party will have a harder time dealing with them and thus the fight will be more challenging. However, in practice, while higher level monsters deal more damage (i.e. are more of a threat to PCs) they have higher defenses and more hit points.

So combat encounters may become more challenging, but will also be longer and potentially more frustrating.  Against higher defenses, PCs are going to miss more often and when they do manage to hit, they’ll need to dish out more damage to vanquish monsters.  This is especially true of Soldier monsters. However, some monster types like Artillery and Skirmishers aren’t so bad.  Their defenses and HP are lower to start with and they deal high damage so using higher levels ones can be a workable solution.

I’m also a bit leery of ‘multiply damage of all monsters by X’ and ‘divide all HP by Y.’  I know many DMs use them and I’m the first proponent of house rulings, but in my musings on the subject, these rules may be  patches done to sound game math, if uncalibrated for synergistic parties.

In fact, I’m beginning to suspect that while 4e is dead easy to prep for, it can lure DMs into a form of laziness that is easily exploitable by the synergy bonus.  Blindly fiddling with combat mechanics numbers to make fights more challenging (or to avoid the grind) is risky, but I believe you can do it knowingly.

Quick Fixes

The biggest issue about the synergy bonus is that players get more and more practice playing the same PCs together and become more efficient while the DM is expected to track combat, monster stats, statuses and control monsters (quick tip: Delegate to players and/or software!) The chances of a DM developing such synergies with his monsters during combat  (unless it’s pre-planned, which I’ll discuss in part 3)  is unlikely barring a Tactician DM (Oh yeah, those exist too).

Now while the fixes discussed above aren’t ideal, it doesn’t mean that there aren’t other quick fixes that can help.

First is a little secret I stumbled upon while playing with the Monster Maker Adventure Tool application from D&D Insider.  While creating monsters for my new Gears of Ruin campaign, I noticed that each attack power had 4 damage options: Low, Medium, High and Custom.  Looking at the values, I realized that the low/med/high corresponded to the chart on page 42 of the DMG (and at the beginning of the ‘Trap’ section of the DMG 2).

This made me realize that I could play around with damage outputs within the level range of the p42 chart without changing the XP cost of a monster!  So my first tip is simple:  Max out damage of your monsters attacks by giving them the ‘High’ column of the normal damage section of the table.   If the monster is already at the top, feel free to nudge it up a bit more.  Like Mike Shea of Sly Flourish mentions in yesterday’s comments: feel free to add a +5 damage bonus per tier (Heroic/Paragon/Epic) per attack.

Secondly, add damaging terrain to the fight.  If you sprinkle the battlemap with areas that deal damage automatically when entered (or when a creature starts its turn in it) then you have a more challenging fight.  Remember though, any damage you want to deal without an attack roll should be limited to 5 per tier.  Best of all, there are no XP costs for that.

If you want the terrain to deal those wonderful p42 damage amounts, make the ‘terrain’ a trap with a simple trigger (entering/starting in it), an attack bonus (equivalent to a monster of the appropriate level) and pick a damage amount  from p42 based on level.   The rule of thumb here is that the narrower the trap’s effect is, the higher the amount of damage is.  Don’t forget to factor a XP cost equivalent to a full monster (or a minion if its a one shot trap) but feel free to interpret how many ‘zones’ of damage correspond to one trap and budget accordignly.

You can also use hindering terrain that slows/grabs/restricts PC movement.  Don’t overdo it as getting grabbed/restricted repeatedly gets annoying and encourages PCs to stop moving, which makes combat less exciting for all.

Third, make sure your monster mix is focused on dealing damage.  While you can challenge PCs by stunning, dazing and restraining them to let monsters deal medium damage, this is often a one-way ticket to player frustration.  Massively going after the PCs’ hit points is the way to go here.  You need high damage dealers like Artileries,  Skirmishers, Lurkers and Brutes to worry the players.

Quick Pick Combo

Lastly, you can mix all of the above  for best effect.  Use high damage monsters and increase their damage further as per the table on page 42.  Add damaging or hindering terrain and traps.

More importantly, pick monsters with forced movement powers so they can send PCs into the damaging/hindering zones/traps,  making simple combos of your own!

I’ll get into more details about mixing other encounter elements to make fight more challenging in part 3.

In the mean time, what about your own quick fixes? Some were already posted yesterday but maybe you have stumbled upon your own and you’d like to share.

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Uncle Vanir’s Jedi Jamboree

Posted by on January 26, 2010 · 15 Comments 

Filed under Comics, Dire Flailings, Humor, Movies, Television, Video Games

I’ve had the pleasure lately of being the “cool uncle” as far as my 6-year-old nephew is concerned. Ever since about a year ago, his wandering interests have, for the most part, been something I’m either directly interested in, or at least knowledgeable about. At first, it was Star Wars. Ever since I met my wife, my in-laws have tagged me as a nerd, and that meant I would want Star Wars stuff for any present-giving occasion. (While sometimes tiresome, this assumption is usually correct. ) When my nephew turned 5, he started to watch the Clone Wars cartoons (the new CGI ones, not the utterly brilliant Genndy Tartakovsky series from 2003), and he started watching the other movies and getting interested in Everything Star Wars Ever. And so, every time I’d visit, a thousand questions would be waiting for me. At first, it was just things like “hey Uncle Matt, who’s your favorite Jedi”, but he soon figured out I was familiar with most of the names of the vehicles (in the original trilogy, anyway), and he’d describe things he’d seen in the movie and I’d try to decipher what he was talking about and tell him the names. [Read the rest of this article]

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Inq. of the Week: Welcome to the New Digs / Hero Minis

Posted by on January 25, 2010 · 21 Comments 

Filed under Featured, Inquisition of the Week, Newest Critical Hits, News, Roleplaying Games

Last week, Bartoneus wanted you to get your basic pants on and asked about which original D&D class is your favorite. Wielding the power to warp reality (while gaining d4 hit points per level) was the favorite with the Magic User taking 23% of the vote. Second place was the “race as class” option of Dwarves/Elves at 21%, and Fighters and Thieves tied for third. Last place was the poor Cleric, who prays to his deity to be granted the power to be liked.

The keen-eyed among you might notice two things: one, that poll I linked to doesn’t work, and two, everything looks different. That’s because we’ve launched our new site design (with the imaginative code name: Critical Hits 6.0) that not only freshens things up a bit based on your feedback, but also is setup with a new space for our illustrious new writer/blogmate Phil, the Chatty DM. We’ve also taken onboard at least one more regular writer and a few guest writers to help us keep the content flowing.

Mike Shea of the awesome Sly Flourish blog is going to be writing us a few guest reviews and editorials (the first was his Assassin’s Creed 2 review). Dixon Trimline, a longtime RPG player but first time blogger, will be bringing his gaming experience to us, and debuted with “Winners and Losers in D&D.” Finally, Vanir of StupidRanger will be coming to us with his own particular brand of insanity in a column called “Dire Flailings”, which should be premiering this week.

We’re still doing some tweaks which is why you may see some oddness, but if you see anything that is definitely broken or just bugs the heck out of  you, let us know.

OK, onto business! This week it was announced that the Player’s Handbook Heroes series of miniatures from WotC will be canceled. For those of you unfamiliar with the product, the idea was to separate the big “mystery packs” that they had been doing since the beginning of the D&D minis line with Harbinger. One pack would be for DMs and full of monsters, with one visible bigger monster and the rest random (there have been no announcements about the fate of this line.) The other pack was designed for players, and contained 3 hero minis, completely visible, and divided up by power source. The packs also contained a new, unique power card for each of the three classes represented in the pack.

As soon as the announcement that PHH would be canceled, there was a lot of talk on Twitter about how they didn’t look like they were selling in stores, and how the power card inclusion was a bad idea, and so on. My immediate theory was that the intended audience, players, wasn’t buying them, and the burden was remaining on the DM to provide miniatures for everyone, and so maybe the DMs didn’t care as much about picking them up. That tends to be how it works with all the groups I play with.

Thus is my Inquisition of this week:

Who provides the minis at your game table?

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Ultimately, the reason that the line was probably canceled was a combination of factors that lead to low sales. Let’s just hope that the next thing they come up with is awesome for us mini-lovers.

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Keeping up with the PCs: Part 1, The Secret Synergy Bonus

Posted by on January 25, 2010 · 45 Comments 

Filed under Musings of the Chatty DM, Roleplaying Games

Welcome to my new home on the net!  Please don’t mind the paint cans, canvas and holes in the walls, we’re not quite there yet, but we  soon will be.  If you’re an old reader and you’ve just  landed here without having caught my last few posts, I’ve merged my old blog with Critical Hits to focus on what I do best: writing.

My Editor-in-Chief and good friend Dave gets stuck with stuff I don’t like as much: editing and housekeeping.

It’s a Win/ Wi… Hmm yeah. I win that one for sure.

If you are a regular CH reader following the main feed, this is not a guest post, I’m now a full  member of the team (with an impressive list of Prima Donna perks).  I hope you’ll appreciate my not-inconsiderable musings from now on.

All right, on with the actual RPG content!

The PCs are too powerful, I can’t keep up!

Many D&D 4e DMs have experienced a shift in their gaming group’s performance since they started playing.  PCs become capable of taking absolutely everything thrown at them with more ease than the game rules assume.  Encounters at the PCs’ level barely make a dent in their resources anymore.

“Dude, I lost, like, just one Healing Surge.”

By that point, higher level encounters are also often dealt with relative ease.

I’m now quite sure this is behind the persistent myth about ‘Unkillable PCs’ in 4e.  I call this the ‘Secret Synergy Bonus’ of D&D and I’m convinced that if DMs don’t recognize its existence (or keep blaming it on something else like ‘Power Creep’), they’ll be stuck with this problem for a long time and may have campaigns crash on them because of it.

The secret synergy bonus theory is simple.  Gaming groups that are used to playing D&D cooperatively will eventually discover that the way the 4e rules were written, similar to Wizards of the Coast’s other bestseller, Magic: The Gathering, encourages them to build and play their characters as if they were each an extension of the same ‘creature’. For those who know Collectible Card Game terminology, a D&D 4e party is exactly like a ‘deck’ made of 4-6 ‘colors.’  If it’s built and/or played sloppily, the party will perform well under its potential, making it relatively easy for the DM to defeat (often forcing number fudging and other DMing tricks to prevent TPKs).  On the other hand, if the party is built with great power combos within and across PCs and if it is played tightly with high focus, it will shoot over the power curve every single encounter.

Spotting the Bonus in Action

It’s extremely easy to spot groups who have stumbled onto this ‘secret’ when you walk by their gaming table, they ask each other questions all the time and they listen to each other!

They inquire what other PCs powers do, they compare how they can work together and they level up by choosing new powers as a team. They also ask what others plan to do during combat and, very importantly, they start using delay and ready actions to maximize the effect of each other’s powers.  They ask each other what targets they plan to take down and start planning as a single tactical unit to make sure that PCs aren’t all over the map, diluting their attacks over too many monsters.

When players start doing that, the results are phenomenal and it becomes a positive feedback loop, making encounters easier and faster. The ‘average’ encounter, unless you become creative (oh…foreshadowing!), becomes a trivial challenge.  That’s gaming synergy at its best.

The thing is, many DMs,  focused on writing adventures, weaving stories, or using pre-published adventures, don’t spot or adjust their material to this shift.  They often find themselves left with the feeling that the enjoyment of the game (i.e. challenging players) is slipping out of their control, making them frustrated and giving players a sense that the game is too easy.

Fortunately, we’ll get to solutions in part 2 later this week. (Yeah, I’m such a tease).

What about you? Have you experienced this yet in your gaming group (as a player or as DM)?  If so, has everyone adapted? If not, what do you think is preventing this from happening?

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