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You are here: Home / Archives for Newest Critical Hits

Chatty Plays: “Last Night on Earth”

November 9, 2010 by The Chatty DM

In which Chatty shambles with the recently dead and delivers a putrid review of the best Zombies board game around… but be ready to lose to those zombies, often!

Filed Under: Board, Card, and Miniature Games, Musings of the Chatty DM, Reviews Tagged With: Last Night on Earth, Tropes, Zombie Apocalypse, zombies

D&D Essentials and the 4.5 Edition Issue

November 8, 2010 by Bartoneus

It’s Monday and as of last week the Wizards Premiere stores have been selling Heroes of the Forgotten Kingdoms and Monster Vault, which means for most intents and purposes the entirety of the D&D Essentials line is now out there for people to play and read. As people absorb and utilize the material we should be able to gain a general sense of exactly what Essentials really is and what it means for the 4th Edition of Dungeons & Dragons. That said, one of the biggest concerns/complaints/or whatever you choose to call it that I’ve heard raised about D&D Essentials is whether or not it is D&D Edition 4.5.

Filed Under: Editorial, Featured, Roleplaying Games Tagged With: 4e, essentials

Critical Bits for the week ending 2010-11-07

November 7, 2010 by Gato the News Robot

RT @newbiedm: New Post: "Play rpgKids and give to St. Jude's Children's Hospital" http://wp.me/pkce6-FZ # Award-winning interactive fiction designer @zarfeblong has launched a kickstarter for his ambitious IF iPhone app: http://bit.ly/bAgNJJ # RPG Golden Geek finalist shortlist has been posted, winners to be announced November 17th. http://bit.ly/c4SkB6 # From the Archives:: Comic's most enduring character […]

Filed Under: Critical Bits Tagged With: twitter

Transmute Veteran Gamer to Newbie

November 5, 2010 by guest

I took introducing my players to this new system as a personal challenge. How would I introduce the system? How would I avoid overwhelming them with the intricacies of the game system, but still get the game up and running quickly? How would I make this new game experience easy for the players while still satisfying my personal urges to immerse them in the world and the story I was developing?

Filed Under: Editorial, Featured, Roleplaying Games Tagged With: deadlands, gm advice, teaching

Review: “Resident Evil Deck Building Game”

November 4, 2010 by darkyoung

Bandai Collectible Games is soon releasing their foray into the “deck building” genre. Don’t know what a deck building game is? In this type of game there are a variety of different cards on the play field that you “purchase” to place into your deck. Each turn you draw some cards from your deck to make up your hand to do things like buy higher cost items, draw more cards, or perform special actions. When your deck runs out of cards, you shuffle your discard pile and start all over again, making your deck grow more powerful with each passing turn.

Filed Under: Board, Card, and Miniature Games, Reviews, Video Games Tagged With: deck building game, resident evil

Support the Bagram Air Force Base Gaming Community

November 3, 2010 by Dave

Jason over at The Action Point blog has been deployed over in Afghanistan at the Bagram Air Force Base. He’s setting up gaming for the troops, but he’s run into a problem: they don’t have enough stuff. While they’re getting official support in the form of Encounters, they can still use the essentials: dice, books, minis, maps, etc.

Filed Under: Critical Bits, News, Roleplaying Games

Character Builder: The Next Generation

November 2, 2010 by Dave

Wizards of the Coast announced today that the new version of Character Builder will be released on 11/16. As has been previously rumored, the new version is web-based, and will support Essentials and Dark Sun characters, which the previous version was not updated to do. The old, downloadable version will still work, but will not receive any further updates. Monster Builder (and other web-based tools) are to follow later. The FAQ on the character builder goes over some of the issues as well, and below is some of my take on the whole thing.

Filed Under: Editorial, News, Roleplaying Games Tagged With: 4e, character builder

Orgrimmar Politics As Usual

November 2, 2010 by Vanir

It’s the end of a brutal election season, and the race for key positions in the Horde have never been closer. No one could have expected Thrall to step down from his position as Warchief, but it was no surprise to anyone just how heated the battle to ensue would become. Hit the jump for expanded election coverage!

Filed Under: Dire Flailings, Featured, Humor, Science Fiction & Fantasy Genre, Video Games Tagged With: biden, bush, cheney, clinton, faith based initiatives, garrosh hellscream, gore, grom hellscream, healthcare, high overlord saurfang, Humor, kerry, mary o'donnell, masturbation, mccain, no child left behind, obama, saurfang the elder, saurfang the younger, shamans, shamans rule, tax cuts, thrall, universal healthcare, varok saurfang, warcraft, world of warcraft, WoW

Ghoulish Mailbag: Handling PC Death

October 31, 2010 by The Chatty DM

Fighting Ghouls and Goblins, Chatty picks a letter from his mailbox and tackles the classic “but what’s a GM to do when a PC dies?”

Filed Under: Musings of the Chatty DM, Newest Critical Hits, Player Psychology, Roleplaying Games Tagged With: Character Death, D&D, d&d 4e, halloween

Critical Bits for the week ending 2010-10-31

October 31, 2010 by Gato the News Robot

From the Archives:: Behind the Wave http://bit.ly/cSXIIm #charchive # DDXP 2011 Information: http://bit.ly/dB8RJd Plus check out the event section for something interesting… http://bit.ly/aAMumq # RT @fredhicks: #gammaworld as a gateway for finding Birthright or Supers ? My Deadly Fredly graphic post awaits: http://j.mp/b9520r # Thanks for including us with such great company! RT @Morrus: Interactive […]

Filed Under: Critical Bits Tagged With: twitter

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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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