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You are here: Home / Archives for Newest Critical Hits

Chatty’s Quest : A Twitter Adventure

December 2, 2011 by The Chatty DM

Follow the adventures of TextChatty as he tries to survive his first day in his apartment. A Twitter text-based game played a few weeks back.

Filed Under: Actual Play, Featured, Geek Stuff, Musings of the Chatty DM, Newest Critical Hits, Roleplaying Games Tagged With: Parsely games, text-based games, twitter, twitterquest

Epic-Tier Anything Sucks

November 29, 2011 by Vanir

There’s been a lot of talk around here lately about epic tier games in 4e (and how it isn’t very much fun, and how we’d all rather have our ever-regenerating livers torn out each morning by eagles than play characters over level 20). I haven’t had any experience with epic tier play in 4e yet, but from the sound of it I cannot wait. I have, however, dabbled in the cosmos-shaking power of epic level characters in previous editions. It sucked too. Let me tell you about it.

Filed Under: Dire Flailings, Roleplaying Games Tagged With: aphrodite, beavis, cronos, fire, jupiter, kronos, liver, mythology, o noes icarus, prometheus, venus, zeus

Redesigning the Epic Tier

November 28, 2011 by Dave

Both Sly Flourish and I have talked a lot lately about the issues we’ve run into at epic levels in D&D. While there are certainly rules issues, I believe fixing them all would take up a lot more than single column. However, I do have some ideas on alternate ways to restructure how the campaign […]

Filed Under: Critical Threats, Editorial, Roleplaying Games Tagged With: 4e, campaign planning, DM advice, epic, epic tier

Critical Bits for the week ending 2011-11-27

November 27, 2011 by Gato the News Robot

Winners of the @rpggeek golden geek awards announced: http://t.co/61ovR7zK # Geeklist of @boardgamegeek Golden Geek winners: http://t.co/ILIJTkis # RT @boardgamegeek: New GeekStore items including Promos for Fresco, Panic Station, and restock of 7 Wonders promo http://t.co/ta4aKSaS # .@paizo announces Pathfinder MMO, starting by forming a new company called Goblinworks. http://t.co/uA5G0LOi # Official Goblinworks site located […]

Filed Under: Critical Bits Tagged With: twitter

The Scaling Woes of 4th Edition Dungeons and Dragons

November 25, 2011 by Mike Shea

D&D 4e is a wonderful refined combat-focused RPG but it scales poorly as levels increase. While many of the elements of 4e scale along a linear path, many powers and effects scale at a much greater rate resulting in large imbalances between PCs and the threats they face at higher levels. This makes it hard for dungeon masters to challenge PCs.

Filed Under: Editorial, Featured, Roleplaying Games Tagged With: 4e, DM advice, epic, epic tier, paragon, paragon tier

Chatty’s Dream Design Project: An Interactive Primer-RPG

November 23, 2011 by The Chatty DM

In which Chatty posts something that’s less than 500 words about what his dream game design project would be like. Hop right in and discuss!

Filed Under: Geek Stuff, Musings of the Chatty DM, Newest Critical Hits, Roleplaying Games, Video Games Tagged With: game design, gaming with children, Gaming with Kids, iPad, lady blackbird, Tablet PCs

Meat, Food, Snacks, Mjölnir

November 22, 2011 by Vanir

Last week, my preschooler son Sam came home with his very first homework assignment. The task was simple and seasonally festive: he was to sit down with me and his mom and talk about the things he was thankful for in his life, then we’d all make a poster together that involved those things. Having a child of mine respond with “meat”, “food”, and “snacks” was not a real surprise — but this nerd-papa nearly burst at the seams with pride when he said he was thankful for “thunder” and “Mjölnir”. At the end, he summarized everything by saying, “my life is cool city”. I couldn’t disagree. It also made me take stock in what I’m thankful for. I don’t have a preschool class to turn my homework in, so I guess you guys will have to do.

Filed Under: Dire Flailings Tagged With: blogosphere, dave the game, dave the refrigerator perry, family, football, giving, giving thanks, grateful, l-tryptophan, thanks, thanksgiving, turkeys

Critical Bits for the week ending 2011-11-20

November 20, 2011 by Gato the News Robot

Contest winners have been emailed in the Dungeon Mapp giveaway. Thanks to our sponsor for supplying the prizes. # RT @4eBlogs: The Dread Gazebo: Heroes of the Feywild: Interview with Writer Steve Townshend http://t.co/3NoJpHxa #dnd # RT @mudbunny74: Did you know that the #DDI update for November came out today?? Get the details here: http://t.co/oGwnBJNL […]

Filed Under: Critical Bits Tagged With: twitter

Teach Kids to Game: Nico and Rory’s Stories

November 18, 2011 by The Chatty DM

In which Chatty revisits most of his “Playing with Children” posts and represents them in anthology form to celebrate “Teach Kids to Game” week.

Filed Under: Featured, Musings of the Chatty DM, Roleplaying Games Tagged With: Bedtime roleplaying, D&D, Dungeons and Dragons, gaming with children, Gaming with Kids, Teaching RPGs

D&D Zombie Apocalypse, Part 2: The What Ifs

November 17, 2011 by The Chatty DM

In which Chatty asks a series of questions about the why and the how of a zombie apocalype in a fantasy world and comes up with solid ideas for campaign plots.

Filed Under: Featured, Musings of the Chatty DM, Roleplaying Games Tagged With: D&D, d&d 4e, Mini-Campaign, nycc, setting

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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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