I spend most of the week working out the story elements and building an exciting and dangerous, yet balanced, encounter or two. By the time I get to treasure allocation, I’ve spent my creative energy and it’s usually less than an hour to game time. What the heck do I give them? Enter wish lists.
Archives for October 2010
Critical Hits Podcast #24: Tomb of Horrors Actual Play (Part 3)
In part 1, our party ventured into the Tomb. In part 2, the party came across three chests and fought the denizens of those chests. Part 3 picks up after the combat when the cleric had dropped and was starting to bleed out. The party explores a bit more and comes across a hallway filled with glyphs of varying descriptions… and comes across another mysterious portal.
Critical Bits for the week ending 2010-10-24
RT @gmskarka: DriveThruRPG Doctors Without Borders Flood Relief for Pakistan — $25 for $700+ in RPGs http://bit.ly/d2kyxD # Preview of the Druid Leader build from Heroes of the Forgotten Kingdoms, uses animal companion rules: http://bit.ly/aYRWT9 # RT @JaredvonHindman: GWPSA: Hey Gamma World Freaks! Have you seen the Gama World Card Set List? http://tinyurl.com/35qln29 # The […]
Booty Talk
One of the problems with the usual take on magic items is that most of them provide simple mechanical benefits without doing anything truly interesting. This isn’t a fault in and of itself, since magical trinkets need to affect the game in some way. The essence of the problem is when the game renders such mechanical bonuses mundane by assuming the characters have them. The developers increase the challenges in the game based on such assumptions, rendering the potentially fantastic merely necessary.
Great RPG PDFs, Another Great Cause
Remember when DriveThruRPG put together that great bundle to benefit Haiti, and ended up donating $178,900 for humanitarian aid? Well, they’re doing it again, but this time, they’ve put together another great collection of RPG PDFs for a low price in order to raise money for flood victims in Pakistan.
The Architect DM: Give It Some Structure
Today I’m going to focus on what could be considered the biggest and most important architectural element that anyone could use. As things go, this element may also be one of the most overlooked when it comes to dungeon design for home games or even in published adventures. I’m talking about structure, and not the kind that makes sure your adventure has a beginning, middle, and end (though it can help with that with surprising ways) but the kind that if it were simplified to its most common element: you could just call it columns and walls.
The Lion, The Witch, and the Progressive Enhancement: CRAZY DELICIOUS
When I am not being angry at BioWare or working feverishly into the night coming up with Star Wars-themed sexual innuendo, I sometimes show up to my day job as a web developer. One concept that we frequently use at work to make websites usable and friendly to everyone is called progressive enhancement. Put simply, […]
Inquisition: Your Mutant Origins
Explore your mutant origins in this Inquisition. Are you a telekinetic android? A speedster plant? A yeti rat swarm? Let us know just what you are in this poll.
Essentials, Choices, and Jams
At a certain level, probably high Heroic and certainly in Paragon and Epic tiers players might have twenty four possible choices on their turn including at-wills, encounter powers, daily powers, utilities, and items. This high number of choices mixed in with the already tactical nature of combat in 4e often leads to analysis paralysis. Players simply can’t figure out what the right move might be.
The Dungeon Master Guys, Episode 6
What NOT to do with your campaign wiki, using horror in your D&D games, and we answer your DM questions.
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