Comments on: Gears of Ruin: Session 1, Revolutions per Machines, Part 1

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

Keeping up with the PCs: Part 2, What Not to Do and Quick Fixes : Critical Hits — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 17:05:31 +0000

[...] 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. [...]

By: Eric Maziade

Eric Maziade — Wed, 13 Jan 2010 21:34:12 +0000

Methinks Yan played himself some Ratchet and Clank lately

By: Andy

Andy — Wed, 13 Jan 2010 01:06:48 +0000

Cool, that makes sense. .-= Andy´s last blog ..Breakin' Down the Christmas Tree, Part 3 =-.

By: ChattyDM

ChattyDM — Tue, 12 Jan 2010 01:28:32 +0000

@Andy: The idea is that the party’s loyalty to the obvious Pro-Technology Baron has not been clearly established. And its possible that the Baron and Wrath know about each other very well and prefer to keep each other near (in the Sun Tzu way).

Heck, I forgot to mention that this adventure is actually a prequel to our campaign. More like a test bed of the concept than anything else.

@Wrath: Oh man, is that where the idea came from, I totally forgot about the Go-bots. I was more focused on Bakugans

@Sian: Yeah, I get that a lot! (Just kidding!)

By: Sian

Sian — Tue, 12 Jan 2010 01:02:57 +0000

I am totally jealous of this and want to play.

By: wrathofzombie

wrathofzombie — Mon, 11 Jan 2010 21:16:44 +0000

Gotta love the Rocklords (Go-Bots) type enemies here Great recap!
.-= wrathofzombie´s last blog ..DMing/GMing in the Abstract =-.

By: Andy

Andy — Mon, 11 Jan 2010 21:15:18 +0000

I gotta say, the boulder-into-enemy idea is awesome. I do have a question, though. How does the party deal with having a character called The Wrath of Melora? Is the player more or less going along with his companions because the alternative would be worse? It just seems like the "Eco-terrorist" character would have a hard time fitting in with his cohorts, since he'd have major reasons to be against them. .-= Andy´s last blog ..A Modest Proposal, Part I =-.

By: ChattyDM

ChattyDM — Mon, 11 Jan 2010 19:42:13 +0000

@Marc: You are free to to adapt what I post here and play with it and write about it on your blog. The Creative Commons license under which the blog works says only a few things:

You credit/link to me when you post on your Blog (like “Inspired by ChattyDM’s campaign (link) we decided to…)

You can distribute (for free) any derivative of the work you do under the creative commons license while saying where it comes from.

You can’t sell anything borrowed/adapted without reaching an agreement with me first.

So go wild and have fun!

By: Marc

Marc — Mon, 11 Jan 2010 19:30:49 +0000

Been talking with a few of my players who have also been reading about this new campaign. Would you be okay to us trying to incorporate the concept in a world?
.-= Marc´s last blog ..lawlDnD: @Diddywolf http://lawldnd.blogspot.com/2010/01/traveling-in-open-world.html Who retweeted me? =-.

By: ChattyDM

ChattyDM — Mon, 11 Jan 2010 16:44:54 +0000

Thanks for the insights on the Big/scary silent type. I’m sure Mathe will look at them.

As for technology… from the DM’s side of the screen it truly is easy… the building blocks of Monster Making allow anything from Magic to Starships

In the next posts you’ll see a few more details although I’ll say it now… I’ll keep the actual mechanics from the post becaus the turrets are going to go in a gaming article submission.

By: Arcade

Arcade — Mon, 11 Jan 2010 16:30:11 +0000

Actually, I wanted to say one more thing. I’m really interested in how you use and develop technology in your game, even if it’s magic tech. The turrets and mining camps sound great.

By: Arcade

Arcade — Mon, 11 Jan 2010 16:12:52 +0000

I’ve played the silent type before and it can be a pitfall if you’re not careful. But it is doable. I can offer a few pieces of advice: (not that you need any)
1) You need a trigger or situation that makes you not be the silent type and makes you loud, out of control and/or emotional. If you’re always silent you’re just quiet and boring. If you have times where you show a stark contrast to the silence, that gives you a personality and gives others an insight into your motivations and personality.
2) You need a partner in crime. Another character knows or has a strong interest in your past and what makes you tick. Or they may be talkative and annoying you so you need to occassionally tell them to shut up. (Donkey in Shrek) While your character may want to be silent, the other character can force you into participating or can deliberately provoke you. The silent player definitely can’t rely on the DM to provide this motivation- the DM is busy enough as it is.
3) Take intimidate and/or knowledge skills so you can still contribute during social situations. It keeps you involved and prevents you from just hiding in the back all the time. (good advice for everyone who has a non-social character)

As an example, consider Raistlin, a mostly quiet and mysterious wizard. There were triggers to make him lose his temper or become obsessive. (1) He always had Tasselhoff to annoy him, Sturm to argue with, and his brother to babysit him, which he reacted to in different ways. (2) And he was trained in arcana and history and could scare the peasants when necessary. (3)

By: ChattyDM

ChattyDM — Mon, 11 Jan 2010 15:14:55 +0000

Over the top is how we like it.

And Math emailed me saying not to worry unduly. That Stuff was going to happen with Rod.

By: Dennis

Dennis — Mon, 11 Jan 2010 10:01:02 +0000

Hehe, really cool characters, completely over the top . Will be interesting to hear how they interacted with one another!
.-= Dennis´s last blog ..Second meeting in Trudvang, part one =-.