I began to wonder how many people have bought these books. This led me back to a thought I had when 4E first came out, with the shift of magic items to the Player’s Handbook it became much less important for players that aren’t DMs to buy the Dungeon Master’s Guide and the Monster Manual, and back then I wondered how many people bought all three anyway. These curiosities have now combined into this poll!
Pain of Campaigning VIII: What About the Bad Guys?
Looking at the Campaigning Inquisition, I saw that the vast majority of people favor heroic or at least characters that have the potential to be heroes. Considering the nature of the D&D beast, this makes sense, but I worry that people may be hesitant to try one of the most enjoyable modes of D&D: playing as one of the bad guys.
Mages Gone Wild
Let us take a short trip back in time, to an earlier era of D&D. It was the age of AD&D 2nd Edition, the edition that my group and I really cut our teeth on. The first character I brought to the table was an Elven Psionicist named Spock (The Complete Psionics Handbook being the […]
Four Concepts Adrift in D&D
With the impending release of the PHB2, and the general notion of what will be included, it occurred to me that even with these classes there seem to be some fairly reasonable character concepts that just don’t seem to mesh well with D&D. This article will identify those concepts, identify where I perceive the shortcoming in bringing the concept to fruition, and take a stab at how to solve this problem.
Inq. of the Week: PHB2 Classes?
Our previous Inquisition focused on a topic near and dear to many RPG players, and can even make or break a person’s whole opinion of a system depending on how it works, systems for magic. I have to say that I’m not surprised to see my personal favorite system, Free Form Magic, come in first place with 27% of the votes.
The Rule of C4
The trigger happy attitude displayed by many characters and parties in D&D is notorious, prone to looting everyone/thing within groping range; a typical group of adventurers in a fantasy tabletop setting isn’t exactly known for leaving places intact when they blow into town. This player/party attitude is brought to the forefront when explosives enter play, but the other thing it does for many players is opens up their tactical and strategic ability. This is why I believe the Rule of C4 should not be quickly or idly dismissed as more of the “Michael Bay” syndrome that many fear happening to their precious D&D campaigns.
A Comparison of Content
You’ve all heard the argument, and indeed many of you have probably even said it a couple of times, that “4th Edition has less content in the core books than previous editions of D&D.” But I’ve wondered if this was accurate. My instinct and a hunch were telling me one answer, but I set out to find out the truth!
4th Edition Encounter Planner
Earlier this week I was talking to Asmor and idly mentioned to him how I was trying to make an Encounter Planner for 4th Edition that used the DMG encounter templates. I was hoping to have something where I input a level, choose a difficulty, and it outputs a list of the monsters that will […]
Pain of Campaigning VII: The Finale (Part I: What You Want the Adventure to be)
Well, if you’re reading this with a finale on the horizon, first, let me say: Congratulations! I can honestly say that amongst the best DMs I know that the prospect of actually having a campaign reaching a conclusion, rather than dying out, is no greater than 50%… and that’s a generous estimate. Personally, my latest […]
Inq. of the Week: D&D Insider?
Rumors are going around that this week D&D Insider will be switching over to paid only accounts, which means that we will no longer be getting a decent amount of free content in the online Dragon and Dungeon magazines. What this does mean is that hopefully Wizards is getting a few steps closer to launching […]
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