The psychology of desire and attachment defines our lives in countless ways. This fact is true even in the roleplaying games. Every character you play is an extension of you and the desires you want to fulfill by playing. More elusive, though, is real attachment–emotional connection–to a game’s goings on.
Mailbag 1 – Character Contortion
Here’s the first question from the mailbag. Jon Hixson asks: “How do you deal with players new to 4e who want to run characters that the system doesn’t support?”
Exclusive Preview: Alliance 2011 Catalog
Through our sources, we’ve managed to obtain a copy of the Alliance Games distributor catalog for the coming year. This catalog is what game retailers use to decide what to order for their store to carry, and we are fortunate enough to get a peek at what the next year in games holds. Here are a few that caught our eye, along with their descriptions from the publishers.
We Are the Champions: DM Challenge at Pax East 2010
As you may have heard by now, I won the DM’s Challenge, put together by WotC on the Saturday of Pax. For weeks, since it was announced, ChattyDM and I have been trash talking and hyping each other up about the event. For a while, I was worried that the event wouldn’t run due to lack of participants. Boy, was I wrong.
Emergence & Reentry
Hello everyone! I’m Chris Sims, former Wizards of the Coast designer and editor. You might know me from my editing work on the 3e D&D game (Rules Compendium), my design work for the 4e game (Martial Power, MM, MM2, and so on), or from D&D Insider. I’m joining my friends here at Critical-Hits, because I enjoy talking, thinking, and writing about games and generally geeky stuff.
Inq. of the Week: Modifying Your Game
During the week in which that question was asked, we ran a week of homebrew rules, some advice, and even a mini-game. I hope you enjoyed it- if you’d like to see more like that, or have any other ideas for theme weeks, let us know. And to close out the homebrew week, I ask the following question in relation…
Review: “Player’s Handbook 3”
The Player’s Handbook 3 is the newest core release for 4th Edition Dungeons and Dragons that introduces a lot of new content including the psionic power source. In much the same way the PHB2 introduced primal classes with a back story, this book lays out the changes to any D&D world that might bring about psionic characters and races. If you’re a fan of psionics, miss rangers that could cast natural spells, want to play classes that are more versatile and flexible, or if you’re just looking for some new options for your 4th edition game you really should check out this book.
Monstrous Races in 4E D&D – Githyanki
In the Dragon article that previewed the githzerai race from the upcoming Player’s Handbook 3, the designers stated that the githyanki were not being developed as a PC race due to their villainous nature and they feel the drow has taken up the available real estate for a villainous race in 4th Edition.
Inq. of the Week: RPG System Showdown?
Today I’d like to touch on a subject that we’ve never directly asked before, as far as I can remember, and that subject is specifically which RPGs you are gathering around the table to play. Back in October I asked about genres and settings for RPGs, with Fantasy coming out in a massive lead with Sci-fi in second, then Modern and Horror close behind.
D&D Tips from Mass Effect 2
Today we’re going to take a look how the action RPG Mass Effect 2 can make our games better as well. I will warn that, while I don’t plan on any direct spoilers in this review (omg, I can’t believe they blew up the Citadel!) I might step into the story just a little bit. If you want to be 100% spoiler free (Woo! You sleep with Miranda) you may want to read this when you’ve finished getting most of your crew killed by giant Aardvarks.
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