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You are here: Home / Archives for 2009

Archives for 2009

New Grand Contest: The One-Page Dungeon!

April 14, 2009 by The Chatty DM

A few weeks ago while mulling the jumble of ideas that was to become my new Primal/Within D&D campaign, I made the discovery of the One Page Dungeon template.  I was blown away at the sheer brilliance and simplicity of the concept and I’ve already used it a few times, including for my next game […]

Filed Under: Musings of the Chatty DM, Roleplaying Games Tagged With: contest, Theme week: Dungeons

Inq. of the Week: Roleplaying with Minis?

April 13, 2009 by Bartoneus

As I mulled over some topics on boardgames, my mind was still wandering back to the D&D game I ran on Saturday, so today we have a topic that spans between D&D and boardgames!

Filed Under: Featured, Inquisition of the Week, Roleplaying Games Tagged With: 4th Edition, D&D, Inquisition of the Week, miniatures, roleplaying, Roleplaying Games

Primal/Within Chronicles: The Crypt of the Thief-Prince, Part 3

April 13, 2009 by The Chatty DM

See part 1 and 2. Fast-talking the Cursed Prince! The Royal Crypt featured 2 levels of mezzanine overlooking a central ‘court’.  The Court had a Huge stone throne sporting a sculpted effigy of the Dwarven Exiled prince.  Support columns dotted the whole chamber. On the throne stood a dark, spectral form screaming ‘Lies, all LIES! […]

Filed Under: Musings of the Chatty DM, Roleplaying Games Tagged With: 4e, Chatty's 2008-2009 campaign, Megadungeon, Primal/Within, Theme week: Dungeons

Primal/Within Chronicles: The Crypt of the Thief-Prince, Part 2

April 13, 2009 by The Chatty DM

See part 1 here. Mines of Shadows. The PCs took the Teleportal and found themselves on a Magic Circle in what was obviously a Mine (I used D&D’s Fantastic Location Mithril Mines map). As soon as they arrived, they knew something wasn’t right. Broken bodies of workers and guards were lying everywhere.  The magical light […]

Filed Under: Campaign Logs, Musings of the Chatty DM, Roleplaying Games Tagged With: 4e, Chatty's 2008-2009 campaign, Megadungeon, Theme week: Dungeons

Primal/Within Chronicles: The Crypt of the Thief-Prince, Part 1

April 12, 2009 by The Chatty DM

This is a recounting of my new homebrewed D&D 4e campaign called Primal/Within.  I describe what my players did and I pepper it with some DM/Designer insights.  The PCs are level 7.  They are usually multi-parters as I try to keep each post under 1500 words. Enjoy! Yesterday, three of my friends from my usual play […]

Filed Under: Campaign Logs, Musings of the Chatty DM, Roleplaying Games Tagged With: 4e, Chatty's 2008-2009 campaign, Primal/Within, Theme week: Dungeons

Critical Bits for the week ending 2009-04-11

April 11, 2009 by Gato the News Robot

Dual classing is back (DDI sub required). More like Gestalt characters than anything else You must read Order of the Stick’s tribute to Dave Arneson ENWorld’s interview with WotC President Greg Leeds

Filed Under: Critical Bits Tagged With: twitter

Dungeon Week at Musings!

April 11, 2009 by The Chatty DM

I love me a dungeon!  I really do! Starting with the  gaming reports of the first session of my Primal/Within campaign, all posts of this week will relate to Dungeons and the goodness that comes from them! Regardless of the version of D&D we favour, most of us share a love for this archetypal adventure […]

Filed Under: Musings of the Chatty DM, Roleplaying Games Tagged With: contest, Megadungeon, Theme week: Dungeons

Chatty’s Review: Monte Cook’s Dungeon a Day

April 10, 2009 by The Chatty DM

The Capsule Review Monte Cook’s Dungeon-a-Day subscription-based website presents a fully playable OGL 3.5 Megadungeon being progressively built by publishing a new encounter area each day. The concept of the adventure module is brought to a whole new level through the power of Hyper-linking, high quality art and pictures of gorgeous 3D models of dungeon […]

Filed Under: Musings of the Chatty DM, Roleplaying Games Tagged With: d20 3.5, Megadungeon, monte cook

Krod Mandoon: Comedy Central caters to the RPG crowd?

April 9, 2009 by Bartoneus

What better to occupy my 10-11pm hour on the Thursday before a Friday off from work then the potentially horrible but still quite intriguing Comedy Central premiere of a fantasy-comedy series? Not much! The full title for the show is Krod Mandoon and the Flaming Sword of Fire, and it will be showing for at least a few half-hour episodes on Thursday nights at 10pm.

Filed Under: Featured, Reviews, Roleplaying Games, Television Tagged With: comedy central, flaming sword of fire, krod mandoon, Reviews, Television, tv show

My Tribute to Mr.Arneson

April 9, 2009 by The Chatty DM

I didn’t know much about Dave Arneson, only that he was the co-creator of D&D and that there was some big issue about giving him the credit he was due.  I’m not much of an history buff about D&D so I never got the full story. Most of what I do know about Mr. Arneson […]

Filed Under: Musings of the Chatty DM, Roleplaying Games

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About the Author

  • The Chatty DM

    The Chatty DM is the "nom de plume" of gamer geek Philippe-Antoine Menard. He has been a GM for over 40 years. An award-winning RPG blogger, game designer, and scriptwriter at Ubisoft. He squats a corner of Critical Hits he affectionately calls "Musings of the Chatty DM." (Email Phil or follow him on Twitter.)

    Email: chattydm@critical-hits.comWeb: https://critical-hits.com//category/chattydm/

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