As a follow-up to last week's post, I managed to get A0 Danger at Darkshelf Quarry to the table last night.
To recap: the intent was to try and run an AD&D module using the current D&D rules. The purpose of this was to show off the simplicity and flexibility of the current system, and to prove to myself that it could easily be done. I define "easily" as: the DM preparing the module as s/he would normally, making up the DCs on the fly (but adhering to the DC scales listed in the rulebook), and subbing out monsters as necessary, as AD&D stat blocks don't exactly transfer over. Pretty much, I wanted to show that the most work one would have to put into running an AD&D module for D&D would be finding the current rules for the monsters within.
Overall, it worked well. I was playing with my usual RPG group, which is made up of four other seasoned gamers, with more than 60 years of gaming experience between us. They'd never played the current version of D&D, and I'd say by the end of it they were impressed, which is another goal I had (the sneaky task of trying to convert my closest gaming friends to my favorite version of D&D yet). They even liked the module, though I had some complaints:
Too Long. I was under the impression that this adventure was written to fall in line with the other tournament modules, but without being a tournament module itself. Whether I was wrong in that assumption or not, it didn't fit within the four hours I wanted it to. I had to rush the ending. One member of my group suggested that I cut some rooms out of the dungeon, as tournament modules were written with the intent to see how far a party might get through the dungeon, rather than make an adventure that gives everyone the experience of an adventure from start to finish (the players also could've ended the adventure in half the time if they went to the guard house instead of into the mine). I think this works well within a tournament setting, but like I said last post, it's just not something I want to roll out for the session I'm going to be running at the games shop.
Too much hackin' 'n' slashin'. I'm not one of those gamers that turns their nose up at a good ole hack 'n' slash adventure, but there wasn't much to go on here other than sword swingin' and arrow loosin'. One of the players was playing a preacher-type cleric, who tried to convert some goblins to his faith, and that was fun to role-play, but another group (especially one made up of strangers, and therefore less-likely to go as far outside the box as my player did) might just as easily start an encounter with the goblins instead.
Not weird enough. If I'm going to run an AD&D-style adventure, I want it to be full of Appendix N nonsense, and craziness. I want eccentric wizards beseeching foul gods for power, and strange groups of monsters committing even stranger acts of terror upon small medieval towns. I guess DCC has spoiled me in that regard, by doing an amazing job of capturing the proto-D&D feel that's been bred out of the game (or recessed).
All-in-all, I've proven it can be done; you can run an AD&D module for D&D with only some monster stat blocks on hand, a tiny bit more work, and some improvisational skills (and the confidence to stand by what you change). I just now need to find a more suitable module.
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Showing posts with label RPG. Show all posts
Showing posts with label RPG. Show all posts
Tuesday, July 22, 2014
Tuesday, July 15, 2014
Slave to the Game
I'm back!
Oh. These balloons are all deflated... Ah well.
This post is about the new D&D, and a game I'm prepping, so if you wanna read about that just skip to the text under the bold, linked, title further down. If you wanna read a bunch of boring stuff about how I've been doing nothing in the last six-and-a-half months, then read on!
So what have I been up to? Well, to be perfectly frank, not writing. I've hit a bit of a phase lately where all I want to do is watch police procedurals on Netflix (if you've never watched Twin Peaks, then you definitely should, and if you don't like Twin Peaks then I really can't do anything for you. Sorry), and play Hearthstone (I can't stand World of WarCraft, but this game is so good). I'm trying to fight my way out of this slump, which is really the only way to do it. Slumps like this can't be beat with time alone. I just regret that it's taken me this long. So what's worth writing about so much that I dusted off this old blog?
Oh. These balloons are all deflated... Ah well.
This post is about the new D&D, and a game I'm prepping, so if you wanna read about that just skip to the text under the bold, linked, title further down. If you wanna read a bunch of boring stuff about how I've been doing nothing in the last six-and-a-half months, then read on!
So what have I been up to? Well, to be perfectly frank, not writing. I've hit a bit of a phase lately where all I want to do is watch police procedurals on Netflix (if you've never watched Twin Peaks, then you definitely should, and if you don't like Twin Peaks then I really can't do anything for you. Sorry), and play Hearthstone (I can't stand World of WarCraft, but this game is so good). I'm trying to fight my way out of this slump, which is really the only way to do it. Slumps like this can't be beat with time alone. I just regret that it's taken me this long. So what's worth writing about so much that I dusted off this old blog?
Dungeons & Dragons 5th Edition
I'm not going to write a whole review here (or maybe even at all), but I have to say this this is quite possibly my favorite version of D&D yet. The rules are so simple to grasp, which is really what I want these days. I just finished a two-and-a-half year long Pathfinder campaign, and I can honestly say that while I'm still willing to play Pathfinder and D&D3, my days of DMing it are over, over, over. It's just too damn complex, and too damn high-powered.
I'm sure D&D will expand the game to a point where characters can turn invisible at will, and remain so forever, or that rangers will be able to fire five different magical arrows at once, but from what I gather these will be, mercifully, optional. The core of the game is an intuitive sword-and-sorcery system, that one will be able to season to taste. I, personally, will be taking a hard look at the rules for feats, before I agree to allow their use at my table, and while I love, love, love miniatures, I'm not running out the door to include their use either.
It's also a bit biased of myself to say that I'm a big fan of DM agency (fancy-schmancy way of saying the DM is always right and can veto stuff), but this edition seems to lean more towards that than 3rd or 4th edition, without going all the way to tyranny. I mean, it's shitty when you have a terrible DM and s/he's surrounding you with nothics like you're at some sort of nothic rave (really, Carmin?), or violating the "yes, and..." rule of improv every encounter, but for the most part, I like the DM to not be constrained by the rules. Whether I was valid in feeling that Pathfinder constrained me or not, it's just how I felt, and how I don't feel now with D&D.
So what next? I'll be running an event at the shop I work at soon that will involve D&D, and I've been wondering what adventure I'll run. Seeing as how Dungeon Crawl Classics (DCC) launched me on the classic RPG kick that I've been riding high for the last little while, I thought I'd run an old AD&D module and see how well it converts to the new game. I'm betting my reputation as a world-class DM (and a handsome one at that) that it'll run like a dream.
I'd be a fool not to give it a test-run, though. To that effect I'll be hosting a game next week to give it a dry run. It'll involve four players who have yet to play the new D&D so it'll be the perfect arena to work out the kinks. The adventure will be A0 Danger at Darkshelf Quarry.
You may be grasping your computer monitor and shaking it with fury. "You simp!" you scream, spittle turning your Linux display into a corona of prismatic light. "A0 is not part of the original 'Against the Slave Lords' arc, but a mere imitator!" Well now, settle down. Sure, it's an AD&D module written in 2013 (and a prequel at that), but it's written by Skip Williams who used to work at TSR in the late '70s, and who's written many D&D modules in the past and so I have the utmost confidence that this adventure will provide the AD&D experience I desire. Besides, unlike the other A-Series modules, this one isn't designed to be a tournament module. I don't have anything against tournament modules, it's just not something I want to run at this moment. Besides, I already bought the damn re-print, and so far I've run neither Jack nor Squat of it.
So what's the battle plan? I'm going to run the adventure as it's displayed in the book, and sub in the monster stats from the new game (which can be found in the Starter Box, and the last D&D Next playtest document). That's it! If anything strange comes up during the game I will take notes, and adjust as I see fit. Great Gygax! How easy does that sound? No more templates or charts that I have to adjust to ensure game balance (a nebulous term for RPGs if I've ever heard one). I'm free, folks! I'm free.
I'll let y'all know how it goes next week.
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Wednesday, May 29, 2013
I Painted a Dwarf
See?
I've been GMing a home-brew Pathfinder campaign for about a year now, and I've run out of ideas. So I ended it, and proposed to the group that I run the Skull & Shackles Adventure Path. I've been jonesing for an epic campaign, à la The Enemy Within, for a while now, and it'll help to run something that I don't have to write. With a pre-written campaign, I can just read and interpret, which will be a breath of fresh air for these tired GM lungs.
Anyway, as a palate-cleanser, one of the guys in my gaming group decided that he'd have us playtest an adventure that he's planning on publishing in a magazine. I got so excited at the prospect of being a PC again that I painted up my dwarf cleric in a day. I haven't ever played a cleric in 3rd edition, so it took some getting used to and I don't think he was as optimized as a character should be, but it was fun to play him.
Next weekend we don't play, then the following weekend we begin Skull & Shackles. I'll let you know how it goes with regular updates here.
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Saturday, February 16, 2013
Mutant Chronicles RPG
In other news... Have you guys seen this?
Break out yer d20s!
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Monday, October 29, 2012
Print on Demand: a review whether you like it or not
As I've previously written, White Wolf/Onyx Path (one of my favorite RPG producers) has gone to a "digital first" model. This means that they will publish all their books in pdf first, then produce a print-on-demand (PoD) version of the pdf. Occasionally, they run Kickstarters for special editions of their books. So far, they've been doing this pretty successfully; their rate at getting books to the PoD stage is almost instantaneous, and I've been supporting (and enjoying) every Vampire-related Kickstarter they've done.
I'll reiterate my gripes, though: I don't like their current neglect of "brick-and-mortar" shops even though they've stated their disbelief in the traditional method of distribution. They state that they're working on finding a way to include game shops in their current model, but so far nothing's come of that. I may come across as biased, being an employee of a game shop, but you'll have to give me the benefit of the doubt when I say that I'd feel the same even if I wasn't an employee of a games shop. Games shops have always been a part of my hobby "career," both as a marketplace, and as a community center of sorts, and I work at one because I think they're great, not the other way around.
Also, pdfs are irritating. I've bought pdfs (mostly as a by-product of buying PoD products) and I've only skimmed them. I've never sat down and read a pdf gaming product. This might change if I ever bought an iPad or other tablet, but even with my brand new smartphone, I don't relish reading one. I have them to whet my appetite until my PoD arrives.
On to the meat of this article: Vampire: the Requiem Blood Sorcery.
I ordered this book on Friday, September 14th; it shipped on Thursday, September 27th; I received it on Tuesday, October 9th. All together it took 3 weeks and 4 days to get to my grubby hands from when I clicked "buy." A far cry from taking a 45min bus ride to my local game shop and grabbing it off the shelf. Now I'm not naïve; I know that it takes a long time to order things, but it took almost two weeks to print it. Still, I'd rather have them make PoD products than just pdfs so I'm not going to gripe too loudly. Plus, if my only complaint is the time it takes to get to me, then it's still a worthwhile product.
And it is.
The product is a full-color softcover. This is the first PoD product I've bought, so I've yet to experience the quality of the black and white products or the hardcovers. I hear that the black and white products don't have "full bleed" (which means that there is a small white border around every page), but the color ones do.
The paper quality isn't as great as their older "traditional" products, but it's not shitty. The printing is clear, and crisp with no pixilization of any pictures or text, it's just not glossy and looks more like the kind of paper I could walk out to an Office Depot and buy. However, it doesn't cost me the lake of ink I'd need to print it off and it's already bound.
Were it not for the type of paper and the lack of anything on the inside of the covers it would look exactly like a softcover White Wolf product of yore.
As for the content, itself, it's a fine supplement. A lot of gamers feel that every supplement should be a necessary one, but I often divide supplements into necessary (or as far as an RPG product is necessary to one's life) and optional. Necessary VtR products would be "Danse Macabre" or the "Requiem Chronicler's Guide." These are books that either update the game system through errata or revision, or add so much (or so importantly) to the game, you wonder why they weren't included in the first place. Optional refers to books like "VII" or the "Clanbooks." Were these books to be left out of a regular gaming session the game would not feel lacking, but their addition would enhance the game in certain ways.
In short, the supplement is an optional one, but does give a little bit more detail, and character to the systems of Crúac or Theban Sorcery. Having never played a character that used either of these two systems, I can't comment too strongly on the new rules, but they look like they'd be interesting, and I'm definitely going to think about playing a "spellcasting" character in my next game.
All-in-all it looks like your typical White Wolf supplement, albeit with a difference in cosmetic aspects. It's got its usual WW style, and attitude, which is a good sign considering the changes they're making to the business side of things. At least we'll always have the same content, which is the most important thing.
+++END TRANSMISSION+++
P.S. Unfortunately I may have bitten off more than I can chew in regards to my convention schedule in 2013, and so the aforementioned "Gottacon" tournament diary is cancelled due to the fact that I'm not going to Gottacon in 2013. I plan to go to GenCon and Lock and Load this coming year, and am also planning on getting closer to the black financially. As such, I can't see myself affording a trip to Victoria, BC in three months.
I'll reiterate my gripes, though: I don't like their current neglect of "brick-and-mortar" shops even though they've stated their disbelief in the traditional method of distribution. They state that they're working on finding a way to include game shops in their current model, but so far nothing's come of that. I may come across as biased, being an employee of a game shop, but you'll have to give me the benefit of the doubt when I say that I'd feel the same even if I wasn't an employee of a games shop. Games shops have always been a part of my hobby "career," both as a marketplace, and as a community center of sorts, and I work at one because I think they're great, not the other way around.
Also, pdfs are irritating. I've bought pdfs (mostly as a by-product of buying PoD products) and I've only skimmed them. I've never sat down and read a pdf gaming product. This might change if I ever bought an iPad or other tablet, but even with my brand new smartphone, I don't relish reading one. I have them to whet my appetite until my PoD arrives.
On to the meat of this article: Vampire: the Requiem Blood Sorcery.
I ordered this book on Friday, September 14th; it shipped on Thursday, September 27th; I received it on Tuesday, October 9th. All together it took 3 weeks and 4 days to get to my grubby hands from when I clicked "buy." A far cry from taking a 45min bus ride to my local game shop and grabbing it off the shelf. Now I'm not naïve; I know that it takes a long time to order things, but it took almost two weeks to print it. Still, I'd rather have them make PoD products than just pdfs so I'm not going to gripe too loudly. Plus, if my only complaint is the time it takes to get to me, then it's still a worthwhile product.
And it is.
The product is a full-color softcover. This is the first PoD product I've bought, so I've yet to experience the quality of the black and white products or the hardcovers. I hear that the black and white products don't have "full bleed" (which means that there is a small white border around every page), but the color ones do.
The paper quality isn't as great as their older "traditional" products, but it's not shitty. The printing is clear, and crisp with no pixilization of any pictures or text, it's just not glossy and looks more like the kind of paper I could walk out to an Office Depot and buy. However, it doesn't cost me the lake of ink I'd need to print it off and it's already bound.
Were it not for the type of paper and the lack of anything on the inside of the covers it would look exactly like a softcover White Wolf product of yore.
As for the content, itself, it's a fine supplement. A lot of gamers feel that every supplement should be a necessary one, but I often divide supplements into necessary (or as far as an RPG product is necessary to one's life) and optional. Necessary VtR products would be "Danse Macabre" or the "Requiem Chronicler's Guide." These are books that either update the game system through errata or revision, or add so much (or so importantly) to the game, you wonder why they weren't included in the first place. Optional refers to books like "VII" or the "Clanbooks." Were these books to be left out of a regular gaming session the game would not feel lacking, but their addition would enhance the game in certain ways.
In short, the supplement is an optional one, but does give a little bit more detail, and character to the systems of Crúac or Theban Sorcery. Having never played a character that used either of these two systems, I can't comment too strongly on the new rules, but they look like they'd be interesting, and I'm definitely going to think about playing a "spellcasting" character in my next game.
All-in-all it looks like your typical White Wolf supplement, albeit with a difference in cosmetic aspects. It's got its usual WW style, and attitude, which is a good sign considering the changes they're making to the business side of things. At least we'll always have the same content, which is the most important thing.
+++END TRANSMISSION+++
P.S. Unfortunately I may have bitten off more than I can chew in regards to my convention schedule in 2013, and so the aforementioned "Gottacon" tournament diary is cancelled due to the fact that I'm not going to Gottacon in 2013. I plan to go to GenCon and Lock and Load this coming year, and am also planning on getting closer to the black financially. As such, I can't see myself affording a trip to Victoria, BC in three months.
Friday, August 24, 2012
The Onyx Path
"Oh most glorious Carmin! Please will you step down from your golden throne of gaming and share your glorious opinion with the masses regarding White Wolf's change to Onyx Path?"
"HAHAHAHA! NO! You cannot begin to comprehend the wondrous sounds that I form regarding this pleasing news, for you are mere mortals, and are of the flesh! NOW GO!"
"Please, oh game master! We are aimless! We know not what to think regarding this news. Shall it usher in a new era for the World of Darkness both new and old, or is it but another sign of the end times?"
"SILENCE!"
"But oh handsome typer of game-related musings, we beg you! Tell us already."
"FINE! But I cannot be held responsible for what might result from your hubris. Now let me put on these fangs and this cape. I'm just going to... Climb down... From this... Throne... Ah, there we go! NOW HARK... I SHALL BEGIN:"
It was announced at GenCon this year (2012, in case you just woke up) that Onyx Path Publishing (OPP, but not the kind you're thinking of) will be the new publisher for White Wolf's (WW) properties. OPP is run by Rich Thomas, who has been with White Wolf since the beginning, as well as staffed by all the writers, and designers we've loved from White Wolf's heyday(s). They also own the properties to the Trinity universes (Adventure!, Aberrant, and Trinity (Æon)), and Scion. They've announced a new edition for Exalted, and are probably going to do a new edition for Scion as well. But don't take my word for it; check out their release schedule here.
A bit of background: In 2006 White Wolf merged with CCP (Crowd Control Productions. The makers of Eve: Online). At first it was great, because it injected more capital into WW and allowed them to do cool stuff. However, the cracks soon became apparent when CCP had to lay off a huge majority of WW staff because of the shortcomings of Eve. It soon became apparent that while passionate about WW's stuff, CCP was just not fit to publish pen-and-paper games. So, Rich Thomas decided to start his own company and called it Onyx Path Publishing. He's licensing the rights to make pen-and-paper products of the World of Darkness (current and classic), and Exalted (these games are still owned by White Wolf, which is a division of CCP... Try and keep up). He also bought Scion and the Trinity universes.
So where does that leave us today? With much optimism. OPP is still banking on the digital production model, which I have mixed feelings about. However, One Book Shelf has stated that they're looking into ways to include the retail channel in their model, which would be stellar. Really, I'd just like to see the core books and the storyteller screens kept in regular supply through the traditional means of distribution, at least, but I'm no businessman.
OPP is also promising a slew of new stuff! Of course, I'm most excited about any Vampire: the Requiem stuff, including the new campaign/update to the game system, but I think I'm going to fall for the new WoD stuff, and the new Mummy stuff. I don't think I'll contribute to the Mummy Kickstarter, but I'll get the books through Print on Demand (PoD, or Now in Print, as they're calling it, despite the fact that it abbreviates to NiP. What's with White Wolf and these fairly tame sexualized abbreviations?).
I'm most excited for the revisions to the WoD and VtR games. I like how they're not going to a new edition, despite the fact that I normally back new editions pretty faithfully. I'd just hate to have to do extra work to bring my old books up to speed, and I dislike the stigma that a new edition evokes amongst gamers. They're also releasing more fiction, which will be a definite buy for me. I'm reading through the Clan Saga from the Masquerade days, and really enjoying it, and I've always thought the fiction in the gaming books was fantastic.
It does seem to be an ambitious schedule, especially for a company that's going through some pretty ambitious changes. As one of my favorite gaming companies producing one of my favorite games, I wish them the best, and hope that all the huge decisions they've made in the last few years turn out to be fruitful.
+++END TRANSMISSION+++
P.S. I've had 18,000 viewers as of me typing this!
"HAHAHAHA! NO! You cannot begin to comprehend the wondrous sounds that I form regarding this pleasing news, for you are mere mortals, and are of the flesh! NOW GO!"
"Please, oh game master! We are aimless! We know not what to think regarding this news. Shall it usher in a new era for the World of Darkness both new and old, or is it but another sign of the end times?"
"SILENCE!"
"But oh handsome typer of game-related musings, we beg you! Tell us already."
"FINE! But I cannot be held responsible for what might result from your hubris. Now let me put on these fangs and this cape. I'm just going to... Climb down... From this... Throne... Ah, there we go! NOW HARK... I SHALL BEGIN:"
It was announced at GenCon this year (2012, in case you just woke up) that Onyx Path Publishing (OPP, but not the kind you're thinking of) will be the new publisher for White Wolf's (WW) properties. OPP is run by Rich Thomas, who has been with White Wolf since the beginning, as well as staffed by all the writers, and designers we've loved from White Wolf's heyday(s). They also own the properties to the Trinity universes (Adventure!, Aberrant, and Trinity (Æon)), and Scion. They've announced a new edition for Exalted, and are probably going to do a new edition for Scion as well. But don't take my word for it; check out their release schedule here.
A bit of background: In 2006 White Wolf merged with CCP (Crowd Control Productions. The makers of Eve: Online). At first it was great, because it injected more capital into WW and allowed them to do cool stuff. However, the cracks soon became apparent when CCP had to lay off a huge majority of WW staff because of the shortcomings of Eve. It soon became apparent that while passionate about WW's stuff, CCP was just not fit to publish pen-and-paper games. So, Rich Thomas decided to start his own company and called it Onyx Path Publishing. He's licensing the rights to make pen-and-paper products of the World of Darkness (current and classic), and Exalted (these games are still owned by White Wolf, which is a division of CCP... Try and keep up). He also bought Scion and the Trinity universes.
So where does that leave us today? With much optimism. OPP is still banking on the digital production model, which I have mixed feelings about. However, One Book Shelf has stated that they're looking into ways to include the retail channel in their model, which would be stellar. Really, I'd just like to see the core books and the storyteller screens kept in regular supply through the traditional means of distribution, at least, but I'm no businessman.
OPP is also promising a slew of new stuff! Of course, I'm most excited about any Vampire: the Requiem stuff, including the new campaign/update to the game system, but I think I'm going to fall for the new WoD stuff, and the new Mummy stuff. I don't think I'll contribute to the Mummy Kickstarter, but I'll get the books through Print on Demand (PoD, or Now in Print, as they're calling it, despite the fact that it abbreviates to NiP. What's with White Wolf and these fairly tame sexualized abbreviations?).
I'm most excited for the revisions to the WoD and VtR games. I like how they're not going to a new edition, despite the fact that I normally back new editions pretty faithfully. I'd just hate to have to do extra work to bring my old books up to speed, and I dislike the stigma that a new edition evokes amongst gamers. They're also releasing more fiction, which will be a definite buy for me. I'm reading through the Clan Saga from the Masquerade days, and really enjoying it, and I've always thought the fiction in the gaming books was fantastic.
It does seem to be an ambitious schedule, especially for a company that's going through some pretty ambitious changes. As one of my favorite gaming companies producing one of my favorite games, I wish them the best, and hope that all the huge decisions they've made in the last few years turn out to be fruitful.
+++END TRANSMISSION+++
P.S. I've had 18,000 viewers as of me typing this!
Friday, June 22, 2012
It's D&D!
Dungeons & Dragons Next! It's happening; you can't stop it. They put it out for a public play-test; you can't stop that, either. So what is it? What's it doing here? And why should you care?
Well, if you're not a fan of D&D, or not a role-player, that last question is pretty simple. Just stop reading this post and pop-back on Monday when I talk more about 6th edition 40K. For those of you that are D&D/RPG fans (or you just like semi-literate ramblings), keep reading.
DISCLAIMER: Even though D&D Next is an open play test, play testers still had to click on some non-disclosure thingy. I don't know what the legality of me posting stuff on here, so I'm going to try and keep it pretty vague. I guess I could wade through the EULA or NDA or whatever it was that I clicked "Agree" to, but as you know, things like those are long. I may hungrily eat-up gaming rulebooks like they're Stephen King novels, but when it comes to legalese, I blank out. Therefore, I'm not going to read it, and just be vague. If the Hasbro/WotC black helicopters land in my front yard, I'll meet them at the door, cigarette dangling from my mouth, and say: "what took ya so long?"
It's called D&D Next. Why? I dunno. I think they're like me, and are sick of the edition wars people bother everyone with on the Internet and in game shops. Perhaps they're building it so that editions, themselves, become obsolete. Perhaps they're tapping into a gaming zen that the industry has been dreaming about since Gygax and Arneson emerged from the depths of Castle Greyhawk. Perhaps they're creating a game so perfect, and representative of the geist of role-playing that any product out there is compatible with D&D! Or perhaps it's a placeholder.
So what's changed? A lot, and a little. A lot, in that it's not 4th edition anymore, not even close. It's sad really; I thought 4th edition was an extremely elegant system, and the designers of it should all win awards, but I could see how it wouldn't be the cup of tea that D&Ders pour into vials to simulate potions of clarity. Instead, one could say that little has changed, because of the similarities this game has to BD&D and AD&D. They definitely turned back the clock and made the game very simple: no attacks of opportunity (AoO), no flanking bonuses, and the saving throws are all just ability checks. In fact, abilities play a bigger role in this version than in any version since BD&D. If you want to "use rope" there's no more "use rope" skill, instead you make a Dexterity (DEX) check. If you want to search a room, make a Wisdom (WIS) check, and add any bonuses you have for Perception. Combat had a neat little trick to make up for the lack of flanking: advantage and disadvantage. If you were in a situation where you have an advantage you roll 2d20 and choose the best; if you're in a situation where you might receive a disadvantage you roll 2d20 and select the lowest... Elegant!
I actually like this system for a couple reasons, the first being its simplicity. I've been playing a lot of Basic D&D lately, and I've really come to see the appeal of simple role-playing systems. You roll dice, you add/subtract modifiers, and you compare them to target numbers to work out success/failure. Right now, D&D Next does this very elegantly, and gives you something more to do than just hack and slash, though not to the extent that D&D4 did. There are some at-will type abilities going on here, but the Vancian system is back (Magic Missile is a 0-level spell, which means you can use it as much as you want), which has a love/hate situation with me.
The idea for D&D Next is that it can be expanded upon by adding modules, so that the game gets more complex. You want combat with miniatures on a battle grid? Just add those rules on. You want skills and feats? Go ahead. It's almost as if they're taking a beefed-up BD&D (but with races being separate from classes), and letting you spice it to taste to make it AD&D. For instance there were no skills but there were some skill-like abilities that certain classes possessed. The Clerics could recall lore about religion (Knowledge (Religion)), and the Rogue could find and disarm traps (Disable Device), and that was part of its class, rather than a skill that the character invested in.
This reminds me, actually, of the article I wrote on Dungeon World, where I talked about what makes a role-playing game "old school;" a solid division of class roles. D&D3 and Pathfinder can have characters branch off in different paths, almost making them homogeneous. BD&D, D&D4, and D&D Next have very specific roles for the characters: Rogues open things, and disable them, Fighters bash, Clerics heal, and Wizards blast. Some might think of this as constricting, and it might be, but it's also what the game used to be and where it came from. It appears that it might be going this way again.
Now, of course, the play test was just that: a play test. Who knows where it will go from here, or which parts of this play test we were supposed to play test. Perhaps they're only taking criticism on the characters, or the combat system, or perhaps everything in it. I have to say, one thing I thought was pretty underwhelming was the module they supplied to play test in: The Caves of Chaos. Older gamers may remember this as the main part of B2: Keep on the Borderlands, which I find a very hack-and-slash adventure where you pretty much work your way through the Monster Manual. I do appreciate that it was pretty much B2 word-for-word but with the updated monster stats.*
Overall, I liked it, and I'd like to see where it's going. I'm really loving Pathfinder right now, but I have to admit that I'm missing the D&D brand. This play test had classic races like Hill and Mountain Dwarfs, and Pelor and Moradin, and all that good D&D IP. I think a definite defining factor on my complete fandom for this edition is if they re-do the Greyhawk setting (I'm also a huge fan of Dark Sun, but Athas had its moment in D&D4).
I should also mention (before signing off) that if you want to contribute to the D&D Next play test, you should go here and sign up!
+++END TRANSMISSION+++
* I wanted to just mention that combats are lightning-quick in D&D Next. One complaint I have with D&D4 is that the combats are really long. Pathfinder has quick combats (and thus, so did D&D3) and I like that. I just didn't know where to mention this fact in the review.
Well, if you're not a fan of D&D, or not a role-player, that last question is pretty simple. Just stop reading this post and pop-back on Monday when I talk more about 6th edition 40K. For those of you that are D&D/RPG fans (or you just like semi-literate ramblings), keep reading.
DISCLAIMER: Even though D&D Next is an open play test, play testers still had to click on some non-disclosure thingy. I don't know what the legality of me posting stuff on here, so I'm going to try and keep it pretty vague. I guess I could wade through the EULA or NDA or whatever it was that I clicked "Agree" to, but as you know, things like those are long. I may hungrily eat-up gaming rulebooks like they're Stephen King novels, but when it comes to legalese, I blank out. Therefore, I'm not going to read it, and just be vague. If the Hasbro/WotC black helicopters land in my front yard, I'll meet them at the door, cigarette dangling from my mouth, and say: "what took ya so long?"
 |
| If you can look closely, you can see a top-secret watermark. |
So what's changed? A lot, and a little. A lot, in that it's not 4th edition anymore, not even close. It's sad really; I thought 4th edition was an extremely elegant system, and the designers of it should all win awards, but I could see how it wouldn't be the cup of tea that D&Ders pour into vials to simulate potions of clarity. Instead, one could say that little has changed, because of the similarities this game has to BD&D and AD&D. They definitely turned back the clock and made the game very simple: no attacks of opportunity (AoO), no flanking bonuses, and the saving throws are all just ability checks. In fact, abilities play a bigger role in this version than in any version since BD&D. If you want to "use rope" there's no more "use rope" skill, instead you make a Dexterity (DEX) check. If you want to search a room, make a Wisdom (WIS) check, and add any bonuses you have for Perception. Combat had a neat little trick to make up for the lack of flanking: advantage and disadvantage. If you were in a situation where you have an advantage you roll 2d20 and choose the best; if you're in a situation where you might receive a disadvantage you roll 2d20 and select the lowest... Elegant!
I actually like this system for a couple reasons, the first being its simplicity. I've been playing a lot of Basic D&D lately, and I've really come to see the appeal of simple role-playing systems. You roll dice, you add/subtract modifiers, and you compare them to target numbers to work out success/failure. Right now, D&D Next does this very elegantly, and gives you something more to do than just hack and slash, though not to the extent that D&D4 did. There are some at-will type abilities going on here, but the Vancian system is back (Magic Missile is a 0-level spell, which means you can use it as much as you want), which has a love/hate situation with me.
The idea for D&D Next is that it can be expanded upon by adding modules, so that the game gets more complex. You want combat with miniatures on a battle grid? Just add those rules on. You want skills and feats? Go ahead. It's almost as if they're taking a beefed-up BD&D (but with races being separate from classes), and letting you spice it to taste to make it AD&D. For instance there were no skills but there were some skill-like abilities that certain classes possessed. The Clerics could recall lore about religion (Knowledge (Religion)), and the Rogue could find and disarm traps (Disable Device), and that was part of its class, rather than a skill that the character invested in.
This reminds me, actually, of the article I wrote on Dungeon World, where I talked about what makes a role-playing game "old school;" a solid division of class roles. D&D3 and Pathfinder can have characters branch off in different paths, almost making them homogeneous. BD&D, D&D4, and D&D Next have very specific roles for the characters: Rogues open things, and disable them, Fighters bash, Clerics heal, and Wizards blast. Some might think of this as constricting, and it might be, but it's also what the game used to be and where it came from. It appears that it might be going this way again.
Now, of course, the play test was just that: a play test. Who knows where it will go from here, or which parts of this play test we were supposed to play test. Perhaps they're only taking criticism on the characters, or the combat system, or perhaps everything in it. I have to say, one thing I thought was pretty underwhelming was the module they supplied to play test in: The Caves of Chaos. Older gamers may remember this as the main part of B2: Keep on the Borderlands, which I find a very hack-and-slash adventure where you pretty much work your way through the Monster Manual. I do appreciate that it was pretty much B2 word-for-word but with the updated monster stats.*
 |
| The aforementioned B2. |
I should also mention (before signing off) that if you want to contribute to the D&D Next play test, you should go here and sign up!
+++END TRANSMISSION+++
* I wanted to just mention that combats are lightning-quick in D&D Next. One complaint I have with D&D4 is that the combats are really long. Pathfinder has quick combats (and thus, so did D&D3) and I like that. I just didn't know where to mention this fact in the review.
Monday, June 18, 2012
Dungeons, Dungeons, everywhere...
The Wargamer is back, everyone, and with it comes a review of a yet-to-be-released game called Dungeon World. Dungeon World is a role-playing game that boasts "old-school style and modern rules." Really, it's a game that captures the essence of the original Dungeons & Dragons while incorporating a new mechanical aesthetic I see popping-up here and there within the "indie" gaming scene. Now, that's a hell of a paragraph, touching on various things I just spouted out without any explanation, so let's just sit and digest it before I explain more.
Here, look at their Kickstarter.
Now, I'm too young to have digested the zeitgeist of role-playing games during the late-'70s/early-'80s, but I am playing in a Basic D&D campaign right now, and I have been playing role-playing games quite regularly for over a decade-and-a-half so I can speak on the matter of "old-school style" without looking like a total rube. Primarily, what I gather, is that every character had a role, back in the day. Rogues opened things, fighters bashed things, and wizards threw spells and died. Combats were deadly, the fantasy of the world seemed like it was left on the low setting, but was really ever-present, and Larry Elmore, and Keith Parkinson, painted sweeping vistas that fostered the imaginations of DMs, and GMs.
So, what's meant by "new mechanical aesthetic?" Crack open a copy of Burning Wheel, or the Committee for the Exploration of Mysteries, or even the Mouse Guard RPG (based off the Burning Wheel system), and you'll see that, while all the usual trappings of a pen-and-paper role-playing game are there (dice, character sheets, attributes and skills), the way these things are used is different. For instance, in The Committee for the Exploration of Mysteries (TCFTEM) all the players are characters remembering instances in the past that had already happened, but for the purposes of the game are happening just now. There's also no Game Master (GM). Instead, the other players are your adversaries, but, like a traditional GM, they're also there to help you tell a story, rather than see your carefully-crafted character dead. You roll the dice to give you attributes, and to indicate success (or failure) on given tasks, but the dice need to be interpreted subjectively, rather than objectively.
I guess that's the real difference between a traditional RPG and the modern games that are termed "indie:" the "democratizing" of the GM, making her less of a benevolent tyrant, and the use of dice in more abstract terms (a departure from gems like Rolemaster, where the dice are law). Now, of course these are generalizations, and don't deign to encompass all of the newer RPGs invading our game shops.
So what about Dungeon World? Well, I had a a chance to play this game on Free RPG Day, with one of the creators of the game as GM. I played the Ranger, while those around me played the Wizard, Rogue, Fighter, Bard, and Cleric. Much like an old-school RPG, the classes were well-defined (Cleric healed and repelled undead, Wizard blasted stuff and cast light, the Bard buffed, etc.), and the game even includes an interesting rule stating that you cannot double-up on classes within a party. Before you think of this as restrictive (I guess it is), it does create for some balanced parties and allows each gamer to shine in their own way.
We went through character creation, which consisted of your typical fare, except that you start with the choice of class before you do things like stats, race, etc. The character creation was also part of the character sheet, which contained all of our options for that character, which we checked, circled, or highlighted in some way to show that we chose that certain ability. For instance, I had a choice with the Ranger between going with a human, or an elf. I went with human, and checked off the box next to it. Assigning ability scores is as simple as putting them (along with their modifier) into the relevant statistics (which are the same as in D&D: Strength, Dexterity, Constitution, Intelligence, Wisdom, and Charisma). I don't know if these were pre-rolled, or if you always start level 1 with the same six numbers. Other than the choice of race, or stats, I got to choose my animal companion, and my equipment all by checking boxes, and circling choices.
The most innovative thing about character creation was the rule for Bonds. Bonds are personal connections between you and the other players. Few are adversarial (you are a party, after all), and most of them are pledges such as fealty, or mentor ship, or something like that. They come into play when you wish to aid or confront another player, in which case the modifier to the die roll would be equivalent to the number of times that player is mentioned in your Bond statement. The statement, itself, is a list of Bonds between players with a blank space where the character's name should go. These are all done through agreement with the players, making it so that you can't just mess with some one's background by saying that they hate nature, when really they love it (a couple of my Ranger Bonds had to do with nature, and the bonded companion's feelings towards it). As you play, you may resolve these bonds. Perhaps your lukewarm feelings towards another player is cooled or warmed, or perhaps you've been assigned to mentor another player, and you've taught them all you know by the end of the adventure. In this case, you erase the bond, receive experience points, and write a new bond beneath.
Experience points are gained for failing rolls! Let that sit in. This definitely gels with the old adage that you learn more from your mistakes than your successes. One xp/failed roll, and when you get 8xp you've levelled! Ding!
Now how do you hit things? All dice rolls to succeed or fail, are determined by rolling 2d6 and adding in your relevant stat bonus (STR for combat, DEX for shooting, etc.). 10+ unequivocally succeed, while 7-9 succeeds but with something bad happening to you, and anything less than a 7 is a failure. Since the GM doesn't roll any dice, the failure usually means that the target of the attack gets to deal damage (having hit the PC by virtue of not being hit by the PC), or the player slips and falls in the case of a skill check requiring a rope, for instance. 7s, 8s, and 9s still consider the action a success, but perhaps the enemy has snuck in a blow, or some other misfortune befalls the player, just not as bad as if a total failure were to occur. What I thought was super-keen was that on a 7-9 sometimes the GM offered me a choice, such as with my missile attacks where I could attack with -1d6 damage, or attack at regular damage, but mark off an ammunition point from my quiver (ammunition points are an abstract way of tracking arrows, or bolts). This "choice" mechanic is repeated with other actions as well, leading to what was a detailed role-playing experience. Rather than the GM declaring on a failed roll that, "your arrow flies wide, and strikes the cavern wall," I was put in as part of the action, and not just the sad recipient of a failed roll.
The actions one can take in Dungeon World are known as Moves and they are things like Volley (missile fire), Hack-and-Slash (melee), Spout Lore (used as a knowledge-based skill), and Discern Realities (perception, prettymuch), to name just a few. Each of these Moves works similarly to the method I described above, and replace the Move, Minor, Standar, one would find in D&D, for instance.
So how do I like it? Enough to back it on Kickstarter (here it is again). What do I like about it? Its mechanics. As you all know, I'm a sucker for how games work. If I had any interest in mathematics, I'd have become an engineer, so instead of figuring out how machines work, I like to take apart games and look at them in that fashion, and I like what I see here. It's interesting enough to grab my attention, but familiar enough to keep me playing. In fact, one of the things I like about this game is that I can imagine myself playing in a protracted campaign using this system. Many of the smaller "indie" RPGs (I must admit) I
can't imagine playing beyond a one-off, but Dungeon World seems like it has enough to keep my attention for much longer.
I can't just fawn over it, though. Some things I'm hung up on are from my "mainstream" (I'll have to write an essay on the dubious usage of terms like "indie" and "mainstream" in reference to gaming) gaming likes: I would like to see an increase in HP from level to level. In Dungeon World there is no HP increase, so I imagine I'd have to rely on my new powers to keep me from dying against larger, and more powerful monsters in later levels. I do like the basics of the levelling system, but more HP would be nice. Also, I'm not sure if a game like this would put more work or less work on the GMs shoulders. My GM seamlessly demonstrated the shared storytelling and die-deciphering that the game showcases, but I wonder how a system like this would fare if I GM'd it, or a more inexperienced player. At least they wouldn't have to roll dice.
Overall, I really, really, like this game. But don't take it from me; go here and download the quickstart, and see for yourself. I can't wait for the hardcover to show up on my doorstep so I can plan my first adventure. Man, I hope the bestiary includes an Owlbear.
+++END TRANSMISSION+++
Here, look at their Kickstarter.
Now, I'm too young to have digested the zeitgeist of role-playing games during the late-'70s/early-'80s, but I am playing in a Basic D&D campaign right now, and I have been playing role-playing games quite regularly for over a decade-and-a-half so I can speak on the matter of "old-school style" without looking like a total rube. Primarily, what I gather, is that every character had a role, back in the day. Rogues opened things, fighters bashed things, and wizards threw spells and died. Combats were deadly, the fantasy of the world seemed like it was left on the low setting, but was really ever-present, and Larry Elmore, and Keith Parkinson, painted sweeping vistas that fostered the imaginations of DMs, and GMs.
So, what's meant by "new mechanical aesthetic?" Crack open a copy of Burning Wheel, or the Committee for the Exploration of Mysteries, or even the Mouse Guard RPG (based off the Burning Wheel system), and you'll see that, while all the usual trappings of a pen-and-paper role-playing game are there (dice, character sheets, attributes and skills), the way these things are used is different. For instance, in The Committee for the Exploration of Mysteries (TCFTEM) all the players are characters remembering instances in the past that had already happened, but for the purposes of the game are happening just now. There's also no Game Master (GM). Instead, the other players are your adversaries, but, like a traditional GM, they're also there to help you tell a story, rather than see your carefully-crafted character dead. You roll the dice to give you attributes, and to indicate success (or failure) on given tasks, but the dice need to be interpreted subjectively, rather than objectively.
I guess that's the real difference between a traditional RPG and the modern games that are termed "indie:" the "democratizing" of the GM, making her less of a benevolent tyrant, and the use of dice in more abstract terms (a departure from gems like Rolemaster, where the dice are law). Now, of course these are generalizations, and don't deign to encompass all of the newer RPGs invading our game shops.
So what about Dungeon World? Well, I had a a chance to play this game on Free RPG Day, with one of the creators of the game as GM. I played the Ranger, while those around me played the Wizard, Rogue, Fighter, Bard, and Cleric. Much like an old-school RPG, the classes were well-defined (Cleric healed and repelled undead, Wizard blasted stuff and cast light, the Bard buffed, etc.), and the game even includes an interesting rule stating that you cannot double-up on classes within a party. Before you think of this as restrictive (I guess it is), it does create for some balanced parties and allows each gamer to shine in their own way.
We went through character creation, which consisted of your typical fare, except that you start with the choice of class before you do things like stats, race, etc. The character creation was also part of the character sheet, which contained all of our options for that character, which we checked, circled, or highlighted in some way to show that we chose that certain ability. For instance, I had a choice with the Ranger between going with a human, or an elf. I went with human, and checked off the box next to it. Assigning ability scores is as simple as putting them (along with their modifier) into the relevant statistics (which are the same as in D&D: Strength, Dexterity, Constitution, Intelligence, Wisdom, and Charisma). I don't know if these were pre-rolled, or if you always start level 1 with the same six numbers. Other than the choice of race, or stats, I got to choose my animal companion, and my equipment all by checking boxes, and circling choices.
The most innovative thing about character creation was the rule for Bonds. Bonds are personal connections between you and the other players. Few are adversarial (you are a party, after all), and most of them are pledges such as fealty, or mentor ship, or something like that. They come into play when you wish to aid or confront another player, in which case the modifier to the die roll would be equivalent to the number of times that player is mentioned in your Bond statement. The statement, itself, is a list of Bonds between players with a blank space where the character's name should go. These are all done through agreement with the players, making it so that you can't just mess with some one's background by saying that they hate nature, when really they love it (a couple of my Ranger Bonds had to do with nature, and the bonded companion's feelings towards it). As you play, you may resolve these bonds. Perhaps your lukewarm feelings towards another player is cooled or warmed, or perhaps you've been assigned to mentor another player, and you've taught them all you know by the end of the adventure. In this case, you erase the bond, receive experience points, and write a new bond beneath.
Experience points are gained for failing rolls! Let that sit in. This definitely gels with the old adage that you learn more from your mistakes than your successes. One xp/failed roll, and when you get 8xp you've levelled! Ding!
Now how do you hit things? All dice rolls to succeed or fail, are determined by rolling 2d6 and adding in your relevant stat bonus (STR for combat, DEX for shooting, etc.). 10+ unequivocally succeed, while 7-9 succeeds but with something bad happening to you, and anything less than a 7 is a failure. Since the GM doesn't roll any dice, the failure usually means that the target of the attack gets to deal damage (having hit the PC by virtue of not being hit by the PC), or the player slips and falls in the case of a skill check requiring a rope, for instance. 7s, 8s, and 9s still consider the action a success, but perhaps the enemy has snuck in a blow, or some other misfortune befalls the player, just not as bad as if a total failure were to occur. What I thought was super-keen was that on a 7-9 sometimes the GM offered me a choice, such as with my missile attacks where I could attack with -1d6 damage, or attack at regular damage, but mark off an ammunition point from my quiver (ammunition points are an abstract way of tracking arrows, or bolts). This "choice" mechanic is repeated with other actions as well, leading to what was a detailed role-playing experience. Rather than the GM declaring on a failed roll that, "your arrow flies wide, and strikes the cavern wall," I was put in as part of the action, and not just the sad recipient of a failed roll.
The actions one can take in Dungeon World are known as Moves and they are things like Volley (missile fire), Hack-and-Slash (melee), Spout Lore (used as a knowledge-based skill), and Discern Realities (perception, prettymuch), to name just a few. Each of these Moves works similarly to the method I described above, and replace the Move, Minor, Standar, one would find in D&D, for instance.
So how do I like it? Enough to back it on Kickstarter (here it is again). What do I like about it? Its mechanics. As you all know, I'm a sucker for how games work. If I had any interest in mathematics, I'd have become an engineer, so instead of figuring out how machines work, I like to take apart games and look at them in that fashion, and I like what I see here. It's interesting enough to grab my attention, but familiar enough to keep me playing. In fact, one of the things I like about this game is that I can imagine myself playing in a protracted campaign using this system. Many of the smaller "indie" RPGs (I must admit) I
can't imagine playing beyond a one-off, but Dungeon World seems like it has enough to keep my attention for much longer.
I can't just fawn over it, though. Some things I'm hung up on are from my "mainstream" (I'll have to write an essay on the dubious usage of terms like "indie" and "mainstream" in reference to gaming) gaming likes: I would like to see an increase in HP from level to level. In Dungeon World there is no HP increase, so I imagine I'd have to rely on my new powers to keep me from dying against larger, and more powerful monsters in later levels. I do like the basics of the levelling system, but more HP would be nice. Also, I'm not sure if a game like this would put more work or less work on the GMs shoulders. My GM seamlessly demonstrated the shared storytelling and die-deciphering that the game showcases, but I wonder how a system like this would fare if I GM'd it, or a more inexperienced player. At least they wouldn't have to roll dice.
Overall, I really, really, like this game. But don't take it from me; go here and download the quickstart, and see for yourself. I can't wait for the hardcover to show up on my doorstep so I can plan my first adventure. Man, I hope the bestiary includes an Owlbear.
+++END TRANSMISSION+++
Friday, February 17, 2012
I Cast Sleep
You wanna come up to me and make fun of 4th edition D&D? Well, if your thesis is that D&D3.x was the pinnacle of role-playing games design, then I can one-up you without setting down my coffee...
I play Basic D&D, motherfimir!
Thaaat's right! Now, of course I wasn't alive when the original Red Box came out (I believe my parents were married though, so that's something), but I am alive now, and I'm enjoying the heck out of it.
Now, in terms of games design, it's pretty inelegant. Say what you want about 4th edition, it's one hell of an elegant ride. It's the Mercedes-Benz of role-playing games. Everything works. Now, of course Benz' aren't for everyone (I don't mean that patronizingly) so I understand why some would prefer to play older systems. Besides, there's nothing saying that one's game has to be elegant or that even elegance has a place in role-playing games. You have to agree, though, that in terms of playability D&D4 is pretty darn neat.
Basic D&D (we're playing the third/fourth edition of it) is just that; Basic. I stand there, and I swing at a goblin. If I miss, then I wait until our initiative comes up again and I swing at it, hoping beyond hope that the goblin didn't hit me last turn. You see, most starting Hit Points (HP) levels are anywhere from 1d4-1d8 and most weapons do 1d6 damage. Our Dungeon Master (DM) was a kind soul and let us begin 1st level with max HP (so my wizard - er, "magic-user," sorry - has 4 HP instead of a random number from 1-4), he also let us roll our stats with 4d6 and drop the lowest die).
Hilariously, my magic-user has only three spells (the kindly DM also let all magic-users start with "Read Magic" for free... Makes sense), which were chosen not by myself, but by the DM. So Malegaunt the chaotic magic-user has Sleep, Read Magic, and Light. For those of you that remember the old "Vancian" magic system, you'll know that I can only memorize one of those spells at a time, and once I've cast it, that's it until I go to sleep and memorize another one (or re-memorize the spell I cast).
So, in terms of a role-playing experience, it seems legit. I mean, if I was actually a magic-user in Mystara, I could imagine myself being afraid of goblin arrows, and conserving my magical energy. As a game that was borne out of Jack Vance, Robert E. Howard, Michael Moorcock, and Fritz Lieber-type sword & sorcery, it's a great simulation. In terms of "gameyness" nothing so far can beat 4th edition.
As I might've stated in a previous post, I'm mostly done with the "edition war" bulljunk that can be overheard in the back corners of many fine hobby gaming shops, I'm merely pointing out differences in philosophy (a topic every opinionated gamer should at least have a passing knowledge in, otherwise don't talk to me) of game design that is important to keep in mind when comparing these games.
Anyway, the point is: I'm enjoying the hell out of Basic D&D, and I'm playing again this Sunday. I'm thinking I'll find a miniature and paint 'em up to stick in front of me. Basic D&D does not use miniature combat the way that D&D3.x, Pathfinder, or 4th edition does, but it'd be cool to say "See? I have a red cloak."
+++END TRANSMISSION+++
I play Basic D&D, motherfimir!
Thaaat's right! Now, of course I wasn't alive when the original Red Box came out (I believe my parents were married though, so that's something), but I am alive now, and I'm enjoying the heck out of it.
 |
| Basic D&D's third edition (that's right, it's the third Red Box since 1977) This one came out in 1983. |
Basic D&D (we're playing the third/fourth edition of it) is just that; Basic. I stand there, and I swing at a goblin. If I miss, then I wait until our initiative comes up again and I swing at it, hoping beyond hope that the goblin didn't hit me last turn. You see, most starting Hit Points (HP) levels are anywhere from 1d4-1d8 and most weapons do 1d6 damage. Our Dungeon Master (DM) was a kind soul and let us begin 1st level with max HP (so my wizard - er, "magic-user," sorry - has 4 HP instead of a random number from 1-4), he also let us roll our stats with 4d6 and drop the lowest die).
 |
| Basic D&D 4th Edition. Not a box, but a hardcover book. |
So, in terms of a role-playing experience, it seems legit. I mean, if I was actually a magic-user in Mystara, I could imagine myself being afraid of goblin arrows, and conserving my magical energy. As a game that was borne out of Jack Vance, Robert E. Howard, Michael Moorcock, and Fritz Lieber-type sword & sorcery, it's a great simulation. In terms of "gameyness" nothing so far can beat 4th edition.
As I might've stated in a previous post, I'm mostly done with the "edition war" bulljunk that can be overheard in the back corners of many fine hobby gaming shops, I'm merely pointing out differences in philosophy (a topic every opinionated gamer should at least have a passing knowledge in, otherwise don't talk to me) of game design that is important to keep in mind when comparing these games.
Anyway, the point is: I'm enjoying the hell out of Basic D&D, and I'm playing again this Sunday. I'm thinking I'll find a miniature and paint 'em up to stick in front of me. Basic D&D does not use miniature combat the way that D&D3.x, Pathfinder, or 4th edition does, but it'd be cool to say "See? I have a red cloak."
+++END TRANSMISSION+++
Thursday, November 17, 2011
V20
Vampire: the Masquerade burst onto the scene in 1991. I was 5 years old, and much too young to appreciate it.
When I first began gaming in '95, I had toyed around with Advanced Dungeons & Dragons 2nd Edition but never "met" Vampire until D&D3 came out and I started going to game shops instead of Games Workshops or the library for my gaming. That's when I first saw White Wolf's games, and I was not impressed.
You see, at the time I was a little different than I am today. I was still a nice, and smart kid, but things that were outside the box were strange to me, and I was also the type of kid who jumped to conclusions before looking, and Vampire was "weird and gothy." I'm sure 14-year-old Carmin and 25-year-old Carmin would have some laughs if they met now.
Suffice it to say, I've never played Vampire: the Masquerade.
Fast forward to 2008, and I had already been working in an independent games shop for two years. After two years of seeing Vampire: the Requiem sitting on the role play shelf, I finally decided to take the plunge and I bought the World of Darkness (WoD or nWoD (new World of Darkness)) rulebook and the Vampire: the Requiem (VtR) add-on. I was hooked from the first chapter.
What I love about Vampire is the overwrought grimness of the whole setting, and the unapologetic intelligence with which the staff at White Wolf write. Every book they produce opens with a story, or set of stories before the credits and printing information are even displayed. VtR was also the first time I've seen (in writing) a games designer suggest a rule as opposed to offer an official ruling. Sure AD&D2 had optional rules in the blue boxes, but they were always add-ons or replacements for the basic mechanics, never was an entire mechanic merely a suggestion. To the mind of a role player who came to his formative years during the late-'90s/early-new millennium this was revolutionary.
During the beginning of 2011 I hadn't paid much attention to the White Wolf website, so one day in May I decided to pop-by the new re-vamped (har-de-har-har) website and take a look at what was new (especially because I had heard that they were moving to a digital-first model of distribution. More on that in a later post). I saw an ad for the 20th anniversary of Vampire: the Masquerade (VtM, which is part of the classic World of Darkness (cWoD)). I was curious; here was the father to VtR, and though the two games share only superficial details, I wanted to see where my favorite RPG had come from. Though it was $100. I wavered for a month, but finally decided to buy it. I just received it today. Let's take a look shall we?
Now, before you express shock at the fact that a book I ordered in June finally arrived, take note that White Wolf only printed these books in September/October, and they were taking order for the whole summer as a "print on demand" sort of deal.
When I first began gaming in '95, I had toyed around with Advanced Dungeons & Dragons 2nd Edition but never "met" Vampire until D&D3 came out and I started going to game shops instead of Games Workshops or the library for my gaming. That's when I first saw White Wolf's games, and I was not impressed.
You see, at the time I was a little different than I am today. I was still a nice, and smart kid, but things that were outside the box were strange to me, and I was also the type of kid who jumped to conclusions before looking, and Vampire was "weird and gothy." I'm sure 14-year-old Carmin and 25-year-old Carmin would have some laughs if they met now.
Suffice it to say, I've never played Vampire: the Masquerade.
Fast forward to 2008, and I had already been working in an independent games shop for two years. After two years of seeing Vampire: the Requiem sitting on the role play shelf, I finally decided to take the plunge and I bought the World of Darkness (WoD or nWoD (new World of Darkness)) rulebook and the Vampire: the Requiem (VtR) add-on. I was hooked from the first chapter.
What I love about Vampire is the overwrought grimness of the whole setting, and the unapologetic intelligence with which the staff at White Wolf write. Every book they produce opens with a story, or set of stories before the credits and printing information are even displayed. VtR was also the first time I've seen (in writing) a games designer suggest a rule as opposed to offer an official ruling. Sure AD&D2 had optional rules in the blue boxes, but they were always add-ons or replacements for the basic mechanics, never was an entire mechanic merely a suggestion. To the mind of a role player who came to his formative years during the late-'90s/early-new millennium this was revolutionary.
During the beginning of 2011 I hadn't paid much attention to the White Wolf website, so one day in May I decided to pop-by the new re-vamped (har-de-har-har) website and take a look at what was new (especially because I had heard that they were moving to a digital-first model of distribution. More on that in a later post). I saw an ad for the 20th anniversary of Vampire: the Masquerade (VtM, which is part of the classic World of Darkness (cWoD)). I was curious; here was the father to VtR, and though the two games share only superficial details, I wanted to see where my favorite RPG had come from. Though it was $100. I wavered for a month, but finally decided to buy it. I just received it today. Let's take a look shall we?
Now, before you express shock at the fact that a book I ordered in June finally arrived, take note that White Wolf only printed these books in September/October, and they were taking order for the whole summer as a "print on demand" sort of deal.
Here's the book:
That's a leatherette cover with the ankh of the Camarilla on the front.
Here's a shot of the inside:
The book is full-color, and 520 pages long. It's got silver gilded edges that are mirror-like, and it's got two (that's right, TWO) cloth bookmarks.
Now here's what the book isn't: It's not a re-do of the game. It still has the old clans, the old mechanics, and the old storyline. The wonky die-rolling system of a combination of a die-pool and a variable target number is still there, and all the clan weaknesses and benefits are there as well. However, it's meta-plot neutral, which means that it doesn't further the meta-plot from VtM Revised (3rd edition), and is, therefore, compatible with wherever you decided to situate your campaign. There's still the Camarilla and the Sabbat, and the Anarchs, but it doesn't force the plot down your throat.
The folks at White Wolf describe it (in their typical style, that I love) almost as a love letter to the old game that everyone loved. Their target audience was those those that played and loved the old edition, and this book is a celebration of that game. In fact, it's all you ever need to play VtM.
So why do I have it? Well, like I said, I love Vampire, and want to take part in all aspects of Vampire. I want to use the book for ideas, or perhaps even to play the old game. I also mentioned that it's all one would need to play VtM, therefore it seems like a good place to go from for a person like myself who is interested in the old Vampire system, but doesn't want to collect the hundreds of old books, or pdfs.
What started out as a "love letter" is becoming a saga, as White Wolf is releasing a bunch of products set in the classic World of Darkness (cWoD) under the "Onyx Path" line. These books will be new productions of the old systems (Vampire: the Masquerade, Werewolf: the Apocalypse, Mage: the Ascension, Changeling: the Lost, etc.) along with new supplements. They just released a 50-something-page adventure that's a loose continuation of the old book "Ashes to Ashes," called "Dust to Dust." The next book to be released for the Onyx Path is the V20 Companion (a book of "hacks" for V20). Similar things will be in development for all the cWoD games.
So, what do I think of this book? I love it! It's fascinating to look at where my favorite game came from, and satisfying knowing that what I bought was not a shard of a larger work, but almost like an omnibus. If I really wanted, I could go back and collect all the old books, but I don't have to. My enjoyment of this work of art can stand alone. And a work of art it is. Some art is re-hashed from the old supplements and core books, but because it's an homage to the old system this isn't a problem. New art by Tim Bradstreet are very impressive.
My complaints with the book, stem with some faults in the printing. There's a magenta line running horizontally in the Clan Giovanni section. It's not enough to ruin the book, but it shouldn't be there. Also, the book is bowing:
I'm going to try and put some heavier books on top of it for a couple of days, but I don't think that will actually do anything.
Was it worth the $100 I paid for it? Yes. Barely. Would it be worth the $100 if one was a fan of VtM from the beginning, and got huge play out of it in the '90s? Very much so. However, this thing was a limited run, and if you didn't order it before the end of the summer, you're shit outta luck. White Wolf is going to put the thing on print on demand through One Book Shelf soon, but right now you can purchase the pdf. From what I hear the book will either be in one volume in black and white, or two volumes in full color. I suggest you pick it up.
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P.S. As a bit of a housekeeping note, you'll notice that I tagged this as both "Vampire the Masquerade," and "V20." From now on, things that do not pertain to the V20 or Onyx Path will be labelled as "Vampire the Masquerade," while things that pertain mostly to V20 will be labelled as such. Expect to see much more "V20" labels than "Vampire the Masquerade" labels, as I'll be collecting just the V20 books.
Tuesday, November 15, 2011
Monster Vault Review
I'd like to write a full review of the Dungeons & Dragons 4th edition Essentials line of products soon, but my cup already runneth over. Suffice it to say, for now, that Essentials gets two thumbs up from myself. More glowing would be to say that not only do I love it, but it's my preferred way to play D&D4. Now that's a loaded statement.
However, today we'll concern ourselves with the D&D Essentials Monster Vault by Wizards of the Coast (or as I like to call it: "The best value for your gaming dollar on the RPG shelf").
Let's start off by showing you how many tokens you get in it:
Yes! That is a lot of tokens. And it's just the small ones.
Here are the big ones:
It may not look like a lot, but that's a 21.6cm X 28.6cm X 4.75cm box!
To give you a better idea, here are the frames that the tokens came from:
That's 2cm! (or ¾" for those of you that insist on using the Imperial system)
Now I know what you're thinking: "Pfft! I scoff! Miniature figurines are better than tokens, my good man!" While you are correct, beggars can't be choosers, and I like my non-randomized tokens very much, thank you! Besides, Reaper's Asylum imprint is doing a heck of a job in that department. Double besides, there's 320 tokens in the Monster Vault.
Now on to the material itself: As you'll read in my (glowing) Essentials review later on, the monsters presented in this book (10cm less wide than C5 format; 320 pages; softcover; full-color) are fully-compatible with your hardcover books. In fact, it's worth getting for someone who already has all the Monster Manuals (3 at the time of writing) because most of the monsters in here are new. Of course some are repeated, but you must remember that this is also meant to double as a player's first monster book. Some monsters are too iconic to not be reprinted.
Let's use a few examples: The oft-used Kobold (we get it, WotC, you like the kobold. D&D players the world over must've exterminated this species by now). In the Monster Manual we have a level 1 minion (Kobold Minion), a level 1 skirmisher (Kobold Skirmisher), a level 1 Artillery (Kobold Slinger), a level 2 soldier (Kobold Dragonshield), and a level 3 artillery (leader) (Kobold Wyrmpriest). In the Monster Vault out of the four Kobold entries there, only the Slinger and Dragonshield are repeated. The book adds two new Kobolds: the Tunneler (level 1 minion skirmisher), and the Quickblade (level 1 skirmisher). Orc-wise we get 7 new orcs that aren't in the Monster Manual!
Finally, one thing that I think Wizards of the Coast also has right is the amount of modules they're producing again (I just wish they kept up the "letter-number" trend). This one comes with a level-4 adventure entitled Cairn of the Winter King™ along with a double-sided, color, poster map of two of the large encounters in the adventure. I haven't had a chance to look over the adventure (because my DM ran a couple of elements from it, so I was told explicitly not to look at it), but I've played in a couple of the encounters and I can say that they're good. They didn't feel unbalanced, or too easy.
Overall, a good product, and well worth the $34 (Canadian) I paid for it. Like I said earlier, you'd be hard-pressed to find an item on your shop's RPG shelf that's as good a value as this. Outside of the other Essentials stuff, my next pick for value would have to go to any White Wolf product ($30 hardcover books? Yes please!), or Green Ronin's Dragon Age RPG.
+++END TRANSMISSION+++
Friday, February 11, 2011
Top 5 Roleplaying Games: The (new) World of Darkness
An unlikely contender, I have to admit. For years, the World of Darkness, and Vampire: the Masquerade specifically, have been the butt of many of my gamer jokes. It has always had a reputation of being pretentious and overwrought, and maybe a little creepy. After all, shouldn't gaming be fun? Why should I sit at a table with four people I used to be comfortable imagining we're elves with? I say used to because there's something that dies in the fragile eco-system that is role-play when you're confronted with a morally grey encounter with a vampiric prostitute and a drunken changeling logger...
How, fucking, wrong I was.
Now, in the title I delineated that this is the new World of Darkness; this is because there was an old one before it. The Internet has distinguished these two by calling the current offering from White Wolf Publishing the NWoD, and the older one the OWoD. What's the difference? I don't really know. I never played the OWoD. But here's what I do know, thanks to the Internet:
The OWoD contained the following games: Vampire: the Masquerade; Werewolf: the Apocalypse; Mage: the Ascension; Wraith: the Oblivion; Changeling: the Dreaming; Kindred of the East (a V:tM spin-off); Hunter: the Reckoning; Mummy: the Resurrection; Demon: the Fallen; and Orpheus. Many of the games had some spin-offs like a Vampire game that took place in the same universe but in the Dark Ages, or a Werewolf game that took place in the Victorian era, etc.
Characteristics of these older games and settings were that they all had, what was called a, meta-plot. The meta-plots of the various games were all story lines that ran through the various games. in Mage: the Ascension (M:tA) for instance there was a technocratic group of people who were trying to take over the world, or in Vampire: the Masquerade (V:tM) there were two organizations: one called the Sabbat, and the other known as the Camarilla. They fought a bunch. One common thread in all their meta-plots was that the universe was going to end. In fact, one of the last products released for all the games was a book that dealt with how to bring your games to an end. For good.
The NWoD did away with these meta-plots and these apocalypses, and instead presented the worlds as a toolbox (or sandbox as they call it). This means that they present you with the way things are in this world and let you have it. They don't tell you about key organizations or players, just that there are these types of creatures and there are those types of creatures, now have at it. I think this is the reason I fell in love with this game in the first place. It's so freeing as a GM (or Storyteller as they call it), to be able to create my own affairs within the framework of the world. Like someone who heard rock and roll for the first time in the '50s my world was shaken when I saw the phrase "you might want to do this" in the rulebook. They might as well have said "or whatever" after a key part of a mechanic. I never had more fun crafting a campaign.
There, of course, were some rules differences but I can't rightly explain them, as I've never even cracked an OWoD book beyond the opening chapters of the V:tM rulebook. What I want to get at with the meat of this article is the NWoD currently supported by White Wolf Publishing.
The system is intuitive and fantastic. You have a characteristic, or a power, or a skill that is measured by a number of dots (•) that go from • to •••••. In order to succeed at an action you find the characteristic and the skill/power/trait that go together with the action you want to attempt. Then you roll your number of •s in d10s. You need 8s, 9s, or 0s to succeed with 0s giving you additional rolls. If you roll at least one of these numbers, you've succeeded. If you roll more, then you succeed harder. If you roll none, then you fail. Easy.
Combat is simplified as well. A couple of the gamers in my group who have played the OWoD have had some complaints about the combat system but I really like it. Let's say you want to shoot a guy. You'd roll your Dexterity characteristic and your Firearms skill together in d10s. Let's say my Dex is ••• and my firearms is ••. I now have five dice. If I were throwing something at him, or punching him the guy would subtract his Defence characteristic from my dice pool, but I'm shooting him so he doesn't (it's hard to dodge bullets). Instead he's got a Kevlar vest which takes 2 away from any firearms dice pool. I now roll 3d10 and look for 8s, 9s, and 0s. I roll an 8 and a 0. I pick up the 0 and re-roll it giving me a 3. I still hit twice with the 8 and the original 0 so I do two points of lethal (as opposed to bashing or aggravated) damage, and we see if the guy dies.
Beyond that each of the settings has their own special rules on how to use powers, or create supernatural characters, but I'm not going to focus much more on the rules because the game itself likes to put story before rules anyway, so let's move on.
Mage, whatever. This leads to a nicer cohesion between the various supernatural beings in the setting and can even allow for your group to contain a Vampire, a Werewolf, a Mage, and a Changeling, though this isn't very common, and all those groups have very good reasons for never wanting to hang out with each other at all.
So what is the World of Darkness? Well, it's our world, but darker. Despair runs thicker through the streets, over which loom gargoyles and other forms of Gothic architecture. Cities are more corrupt, crime and violence is everywhere, and law enforcement and heroes are few. This world is inhabited by dangerous things that lurk at the edge of light: Vampires, Werewolves, Spirits, demons, ghosts; and these dangerous things are the people you play.
Of course the game is as depressing, or as evil as you want. In my last (and first) Vampire: the Requiem (V:tR) campaign there was a creepy Nosferatu Vampire, striding the alleyways next to an amoral Kindred (Vampire) who seeks only knowledge, a lone wolf criminal, and a wealthy eccentric who was on a mission to find the killers of his father and a missing girl from his past. They actually banded together and chose the lesser of two evils threatening Vancouver.
After I really got into these games I began to see past what some people would consider pretension and overwrought drama of these games and see a very well-constructed platform from which to launch adventures taking place in the modern age (or in the past, as the Requiem for Rome book allows you to do). Not only was I intrigued by being allowed to play "serious" games in modern times, but I really liked the story emphasis that seems to seep from even the character sheets. I've played through Vampire: the Requiem, but next up a friend of mine will be running a Changeling: the Lost (C:tL) game also set in Vancouver, and just after the events of the Vampire campaign. It's a brilliant sense of continuity, and I relish the thought of being able to play on the other side of the Storyteller's screen. This is definitely one of my favorites and I can't wait to revisit the dark streets of the World of Darkness again, and hopefully regularly.
+++END TRANSMISSION+++
How, fucking, wrong I was.
Now, in the title I delineated that this is the new World of Darkness; this is because there was an old one before it. The Internet has distinguished these two by calling the current offering from White Wolf Publishing the NWoD, and the older one the OWoD. What's the difference? I don't really know. I never played the OWoD. But here's what I do know, thanks to the Internet:
The OWoD contained the following games: Vampire: the Masquerade; Werewolf: the Apocalypse; Mage: the Ascension; Wraith: the Oblivion; Changeling: the Dreaming; Kindred of the East (a V:tM spin-off); Hunter: the Reckoning; Mummy: the Resurrection; Demon: the Fallen; and Orpheus. Many of the games had some spin-offs like a Vampire game that took place in the same universe but in the Dark Ages, or a Werewolf game that took place in the Victorian era, etc.
Characteristics of these older games and settings were that they all had, what was called a, meta-plot. The meta-plots of the various games were all story lines that ran through the various games. in Mage: the Ascension (M:tA) for instance there was a technocratic group of people who were trying to take over the world, or in Vampire: the Masquerade (V:tM) there were two organizations: one called the Sabbat, and the other known as the Camarilla. They fought a bunch. One common thread in all their meta-plots was that the universe was going to end. In fact, one of the last products released for all the games was a book that dealt with how to bring your games to an end. For good.
The NWoD did away with these meta-plots and these apocalypses, and instead presented the worlds as a toolbox (or sandbox as they call it). This means that they present you with the way things are in this world and let you have it. They don't tell you about key organizations or players, just that there are these types of creatures and there are those types of creatures, now have at it. I think this is the reason I fell in love with this game in the first place. It's so freeing as a GM (or Storyteller as they call it), to be able to create my own affairs within the framework of the world. Like someone who heard rock and roll for the first time in the '50s my world was shaken when I saw the phrase "you might want to do this" in the rulebook. They might as well have said "or whatever" after a key part of a mechanic. I never had more fun crafting a campaign.
There, of course, were some rules differences but I can't rightly explain them, as I've never even cracked an OWoD book beyond the opening chapters of the V:tM rulebook. What I want to get at with the meat of this article is the NWoD currently supported by White Wolf Publishing.
The system is intuitive and fantastic. You have a characteristic, or a power, or a skill that is measured by a number of dots (•) that go from • to •••••. In order to succeed at an action you find the characteristic and the skill/power/trait that go together with the action you want to attempt. Then you roll your number of •s in d10s. You need 8s, 9s, or 0s to succeed with 0s giving you additional rolls. If you roll at least one of these numbers, you've succeeded. If you roll more, then you succeed harder. If you roll none, then you fail. Easy.
Combat is simplified as well. A couple of the gamers in my group who have played the OWoD have had some complaints about the combat system but I really like it. Let's say you want to shoot a guy. You'd roll your Dexterity characteristic and your Firearms skill together in d10s. Let's say my Dex is ••• and my firearms is ••. I now have five dice. If I were throwing something at him, or punching him the guy would subtract his Defence characteristic from my dice pool, but I'm shooting him so he doesn't (it's hard to dodge bullets). Instead he's got a Kevlar vest which takes 2 away from any firearms dice pool. I now roll 3d10 and look for 8s, 9s, and 0s. I roll an 8 and a 0. I pick up the 0 and re-roll it giving me a 3. I still hit twice with the 8 and the original 0 so I do two points of lethal (as opposed to bashing or aggravated) damage, and we see if the guy dies.
Beyond that each of the settings has their own special rules on how to use powers, or create supernatural characters, but I'm not going to focus much more on the rules because the game itself likes to put story before rules anyway, so let's move on.
Mage, whatever. This leads to a nicer cohesion between the various supernatural beings in the setting and can even allow for your group to contain a Vampire, a Werewolf, a Mage, and a Changeling, though this isn't very common, and all those groups have very good reasons for never wanting to hang out with each other at all.
So what is the World of Darkness? Well, it's our world, but darker. Despair runs thicker through the streets, over which loom gargoyles and other forms of Gothic architecture. Cities are more corrupt, crime and violence is everywhere, and law enforcement and heroes are few. This world is inhabited by dangerous things that lurk at the edge of light: Vampires, Werewolves, Spirits, demons, ghosts; and these dangerous things are the people you play.
Of course the game is as depressing, or as evil as you want. In my last (and first) Vampire: the Requiem (V:tR) campaign there was a creepy Nosferatu Vampire, striding the alleyways next to an amoral Kindred (Vampire) who seeks only knowledge, a lone wolf criminal, and a wealthy eccentric who was on a mission to find the killers of his father and a missing girl from his past. They actually banded together and chose the lesser of two evils threatening Vancouver.
After I really got into these games I began to see past what some people would consider pretension and overwrought drama of these games and see a very well-constructed platform from which to launch adventures taking place in the modern age (or in the past, as the Requiem for Rome book allows you to do). Not only was I intrigued by being allowed to play "serious" games in modern times, but I really liked the story emphasis that seems to seep from even the character sheets. I've played through Vampire: the Requiem, but next up a friend of mine will be running a Changeling: the Lost (C:tL) game also set in Vancouver, and just after the events of the Vampire campaign. It's a brilliant sense of continuity, and I relish the thought of being able to play on the other side of the Storyteller's screen. This is definitely one of my favorites and I can't wait to revisit the dark streets of the World of Darkness again, and hopefully regularly.
+++END TRANSMISSION+++
Wednesday, February 2, 2011
Top 5 Role-playing Games: Dungeons & Dragons
Note: The quality of this article is not up to my usual standard. While I don't like churning out schlock, I did on this occasion for the sake of beginning a regular schedule of posting I've been meaning to do for a long time. Paradoxically, I decided to publish a sub-par article for my own good. At the very least I'll get back on a regimen.
The reason for this sloppy posting is the heaviness in my heart for a friend who passed away February 1st, 2011. Not at all to turn this tragedy towards myself, but I just couldn't muster up the energy to give 100% on this article. Though we weren't terribly close, I've had nothing but great interactions with this man, and I'll miss his presence in the gaming community.
Adrian Nelson was not only a fellow Vancouver gamer, but a kind and fun person who succumbed to health problems too soon. A gamer, actor, and Viking enthusiast, he will be missed by everyone in the Lower Mainland who pushes 10mm fantasy and historical soldiers around on the tabletop. My condolences go out to those who knew him better, and to his family.
Adrian Nelson was not only a fellow Vancouver gamer, but a kind and fun person who succumbed to health problems too soon. A gamer, actor, and Viking enthusiast, he will be missed by everyone in the Lower Mainland who pushes 10mm fantasy and historical soldiers around on the tabletop. My condolences go out to those who knew him better, and to his family.
Now here’s a classic. If you’ve never played Dungeons & Dragons (D&D) before, then you’ve definitely heard of it. It was the first role-playing game and it’s still as great today as it was 35 years ago. Currently the game is in its 4th edition, and while it’s drawn a lot of controversy I do believe that it’s the best game to bear the D&D logo.
I began my foray into D&D during the mid-90s during its 2nd edition. Back then it was called Advanced Dungeons & Dragons 2nd Edition (AD&D2E) and it was done by a man named David “Zeb” Cook, who, as far as I know, isn’t doing any games design these days. The game represented mystery to me. I had always heard of this game, but I had never played it, and wanted to see if it was as dangerous and Satanic as the public made it out to be. It wasn’t, of course, but it was very mysterious, and seemed endless in its possibilities.
You see, the D&D books presented no particular world; it was all just generic fantasy art, and concepts. Sure they had settings like Greyhawk, the Forgotten Realms, and Dark Sun, but the idea behind D&D is that the game is a toolkit that you can use to create your own fantasy world.
Without getting too much into the mechanics of the various editions (they’re all similar in many regards, and I’m not familiar with the earliest editions of D&D), I’ll explain how the game works: It uses all of the basic polyhedral dice (d4, d6, d8, d10, d12, and the ubiquitous d20). One would roll a d20 to resolve most actions, trying their best to roll as high as you could (though low rolls were sometimes desirable in the earlier editions). In D&D4 you roll a d20 and add any modifiers based on your skills, then compare to a certain defensive number of your target, or to a number set by your Dungeon Master (DM) in the case of skill checks. Then on a successful attack, you’d roll your damage dice (each weapon or attack possessed a different die).
After AD&D2E Tactical Studies Rules (TSR), the owning company of D&D went bankrupt. The reason cited for this is that they overextended their novel publishing arm and during a year of very bad sales, were forced to refund the book chains the money paid for the books. Wizards of the Coast (WotC), the makers of Magic: the Gathering, bought TSR’s stuff for $1,000,000 (all of this info is courtesy of the D&D coffee table book). WotC had the foresight to keep D&D alive, despite dwindling sales of RPGs at this time (mid-to-late-90s), and in doing so save an industry.
In this gamer’s humble opinion, the d20 license saved role-playing. Many have claimed that it created a homogenous industry, but I think that’s ascribing the d20 system to the natural decline of many role-playing games at the time. In 2000, WotC re-did D&D for the 3rd edition. They dropped the “Advanced” off the title, and made the rules free for any developer to use and create their own games (called the Open Gaming License (OGL). This was the shot in the arm that created many games companies that are around today, gave us some great titles, and gave some older titles a second life. Games like Deadlands, and Cyberpunk saw reprints in d20 form, while games like WarCraft, or Conan: the Barbarian saw pen-and-paper versions for the first time. Now many games companies have sprung back from the days when everything used the D&D3 rules, and the license is not as common as it was ten years ago, but the industry is healthier because of it, and now many other companies aren’t afraid of opening their doors to other publishers to use their mechanics (Savage Worlds, FATE, etc).
In 2008 the D&D3 system had grown too big and unwieldy. What was once a clear and concise game had its boundaries blurred, so that wizards and fighters were little different than each other. What the industry needed was a shot in the arm again, and in order to break away from the homogeneity that it helped create, D&D4 was established. D&D4 is a more dynamic and cinematic game system. It definitely takes some cues from the video gaming industry, which is reaching Hollywood-ish proportions. In a form of true reciprocity, D&D borrowed from the very industry that borrowed from it. As a result D&D4 just has more for you to do! There are more options during character creation, and combats are more dynamic, with more movement, and more description. No longer do you sit there and stab the Gnoll with your sword; instead you’re taunting that Gnoll so that its attacks are directed away from your friends, whose attacks are bolstered by your other companions, all so the rogue in your party can slash at the Gnolls legs, not only causing damage, but hamstringing the poor creature as well.
Now, of course this game is critiqued as being too much like a Massively-Multiplayer Online RPG (MMORPG, or just MMO). But as I stated before, it’s only borrowing from something that it helped create. D&D is growing, and it needs to. Sure RPGs are not in the danger they were in ’97, but that’s not to say that the industry is invincible. Companies like Fantasy Flight Games are creating RPGs that are hybrids with other forms of gaming (Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay 3rd edition), while the “Indie” role-playing market (which celebrates more esoteric game mechanics) is rather big and desired by many role-players. And if I may be so bold, I believe that D&D4 is more faithful to the original D&D than the previous two editions, which tended to bleed the various player classes into one another. In this edition, a rogue is a rogue, and a wizard is a wizard, and there’s no mistaking a cleric for a druid, or a barbarian for a fighter. Each has their own roles that they play within the party, and help to create these great synergies, which make playing this classic game all the more exciting.
In short, D&D is one of my favorite role-playing games of all time. While the newest edition is my favorite, the previous games each had their charm, and I had fun playing the previous two editions that I had. After all, I wouldn’t have played them for the twelve years before D&D4 that I had if I didn’t like them.
+++END TRANSMISSION+++
Monday, January 3, 2011
Top 5 Role-playing Games: Savage Worlds
For the third entry in this series (again, this goes in no particular order), we have Savage Worlds: a game I was, at first, hesitant to play.
Savage Worlds is an open-source Role-playing game (which means that it's a set of rules you can use with any setting) produced by Pinnacle Entertainment Group and Studio 2. When this was first brought up as a game idea, our group had just finished playing Dark Heresy. This would've been when Dark Heresy was first released, and Savage Worlds (SW) would've been a huge departure from our safe haven of gaming that included only Dungeons & Dragons and the Warhammer/40K gaming system(s). I was hesitant not only because it was different (my gaming pioneer spirit was somewhat limited then), but because it seemed too simple. Now I know that's where its beauty lies.
We're three sessions into our SW gaming right now, and this game easily squeezes into my top 5 gaming list. Its simplicity does nothing to limit its entertainment or depth, and is indeed the only way that SW can integrate so many different genres and worlds under its banner.
Savage Worlds is a role-playing system that mixes roleplaying with miniatures gaming. If I'm permitted to blow your minds, I'll suggest that SW makes as entertaining a miniatures game as it does a role-playing game. The system uses all of the standard polyhedral dice save the d20 (we've seen enough of that one!), and uses them in conjunction with the French deck playing cards (something I generally hate) to resolve all uncertainties in the game.
All your vital statistics and skills are represented not by numbers but by dice. For instance my current character (a Duwamish marksman who went AWOL during the First World War) has the following attributes: agility (d8); smarts (d6); strength (d4); spirit (d6); and vigor (d8), while for skills he has a d10 in shooting, but only a d4 in fighting, and so on.
When rolling to do something you roll the die that the skill uses (or if you're rolling a straight attribute roll, you would roll the die associated with the attribute), plus a d6. The extra d6 is something that player characters (PCs) get as well as some non-player characters (NPCs). If you get this extra d6 you're considered a Wild Card (even NPCs can be wild cards). Anyway, roll your skill/attribute die plus the d6 and choose the highest roll. If you roll the maximum allowed on a die (the number next to the "d") you get to roll again and add the value to that die roll so long as you keep rolling maxes. If the highest roll is greater than 4 (the Target Number (TN)), you succeed. If you beat the TN by another 4 you get a "raise" (get the poker terminology yet?) which is like a level of success in the Warhammer 40,000 RPG.
Damage is as simple as rolling the damage value of your weapon and applying it to the target's toughness and armor combination. If it beats it, he/she/it's stunned, if it beats it again he/she/it's wounded once. You get three wounds before you're incapacitated, and it's game over, rover. Each wound level (-1, -2, and -3) reduced every roll by that number. Oh! Before I forget, it's also important to know that most modifiers to rolls come in the -/+2 value. This will reduce or increase your roll not the TN, which remains always at 4.
That easy. Now the poker terminology comes from the fact that this game is a modified version of the old Deadlands RPG which was done by this very same game company during the '90s. Deadlands is still around and is the flagship setting for SW (which is, itself, open-source and can be used for any setting you can dream of). Deadlands is the wild west gone mad: undead, native magic-users, crazy Victorian inventions, and a never-ending civil war that turns the western genre on its head. I'd love to run this game sometime.
Currently we're playing in a "pulp" setting: 1936 America. One character is a more hard-boiled Indiana Jones, another is a 1930s Iron Man, and the third just got back from a gaming break for the holidays and will be "rolling-up" a character tonight. We're playing adventures from the first Daring Tales of Adventure compendium, and having a blast. So far, there have been no rules disputes, and if there's any rules questions, the answers are easily found in the book.
Savage Worlds is meant to be used with miniatures (a standard in RPGing these days if you ask me), and breaks from the standard grid-mat trend and introduces inches and terrain (something that convinces me this would be great to play a miniatures game with). You can use a grid mat if you like (I prefer hexes), and we use an abstract tabletop (we use miniatures, and terrain but don't measure anything and just use the figures for visual aids), but the rules take into account tabletop features.
Now while this game is fantastic, if you're looking for something deeper you might want to try Rolemaster, or its sci-fi sister Spacemaster. Savage Worlds is a light game, but my opinion on RPGs is that all rulesets are combat systems, and the role-playing and the depth are left to the Game Master and the group. If you want to figure out how much damage was done to an NPCs arm, and what kind of diabolical poison comes from crushed Ghan'ka root, you should probably find a translated version of Das Schwarze Auge (or learn German). Unless you want to reduce that detail to a -2 roll.
Overall, Savage Worlds is a fantastic game system, and my brain is filled with ideas for using it to run everything from a RPG set in the Vor: the Maelstrom universe, a Deadlands game, or even using it instead of Mutant Chronicles. Yes, this game is firmly entrenched in my top 5 role-playing games.
+++END TRANSMISSION+++
Friday, November 5, 2010
Top 5 Roleplaying Games: Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay
To continue the series on what I believe the top 5 role-playing games of all time are, I hereby give you: Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay.
Much like the Warhammer 40,000 Roleplay system (of which I wrote in the first installment), this is a dangerous game, where one cannot simply walk into a room of orcs and begin swinging safely, nor can you discount the effects of madness, or disease. Very few healing potions will save you from Nurgle's Rot, or the sight of watching your friend's leg get hewen from her body.
Remember what I said in the preamble to this series: These games are arranged in no particular order, otherwise this would be last in the series taking it's rightful place as what I believe to be the best roleplaying game I've ever played. Also remember what I said about editions. When I mention a game I take into account all of the editions I have played, in this case it's all of them.
I began my first foray into Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay (WFRP) during the years when Hogshead took over production of the game. This was in the early 2000s, and during that time the Games Workshop in Metrotown Centre (which was my game shop of choice) actually carried the books. Apparently they didn't sell exceptionally well, but I bought every, damned, book they had over time. i had dabbled in Advanced Dungeons & Dragons 2nd Edition previous to WFRP, but never had I dove into a game with such enthusiasm as WFRP 1st edition. Perhaps it was my already well-grounded love for the Warhammer World through the fantastic miniatures game, or perhaps it was the fact that while AD&D 2E was fun, WFRP promised to be a dangerous and brutal game that would tax my decision-making skills in ways that dungeon crawling never had.
+ENEMY WITHIN CAMPAIGN SPOILER ALERT+
I began Game Mastering (GMing) the Enemy Within Campaign (even today hailed as an amazing campaign by critics, and the most fun I've ever had playing an RPG). The Enemy Within took the players on a quest from Bögenhafen near Altdorf, all the way to Kislev and back to confront a Greater Daemon of Tzeentch and save the Empire. Though the time in Kislev was a bit tedious and strayed from what is now believed to be absolute canon of the Warhammer World, the dark humor of the stories and the recurring characters made you feel totally immersed. If you're looking for a sentence to sum up the greatness that this campaign and game possessed: WFRP 1st edition and the Enemy Within Campaign kept a group of four 9th graders playing every week for the entire 5-volume set.
+END OF SPOILERS+
Then in 2005 during my time working as a redshirt at the very Games Workshop where I first experienced WFRP, Black Industries was founded. This subdivision of Games Workshop was to deal with Games Workshop's board and role-playing games, though the rules were developed by the ever-creative Chris Pramas and the folks at Green Ronin Publishing in Seattle. Green Ronin created the 2nd edition of WFRP; tidying up some of the loose ends and clarifying bits here and there, but overall not changing much. To a gamer like myself (who hadn't sojourned across the Old World in over four years) this was perfect. Now more people could experience what I and my three friends did back in high school. The big campaign was called Paths of the Damned, and was a three-part series that advanced the WFRP timeline to the current events of the Warhammer World: The Storm of Chaos.
In 2008/2009 the reigns of board and role-playing game publishing went to another American outfit called Fantasy Flight Games (FFG), a company who had made other forays into role-playing but was most famous for its boardgames. Fantasy Flight soon announced another edition of WFRP, and this time it would be different again from other role-playing systems. This time it was to have board game components. This news shocked the role-play community (gamers are a fairly conservative group), and I must admit even shocked myself.
As a clerk at a games shop I got a complimentary copy from FFG and I ran the intro adventure in it for a group of gamers. While skeptical at first, it quickly grew on me. I realized that what I loved about WFRP wasn't the percentile dice, or the critical hit charts, or the miniatures (though all those things were great), but that I loved the grittiness, the danger, and the insanity. The third edition (though adding cards, symboled instead of numbered dice, and counters) was exactly what the other editions were, but more innovative.
So how do the games work then? Well, the first two editions are similar, but the third isn't really, so I'll do them in two groups.
1st/2nd Editions
To begin you'd roll d10s and add a modifier for each statistic, which were similar to the Warhammer Fantasy Battle statistics: Weapon Skill, Ballistic Skill, Strength, Toughness, Wounds, Leadership, Intelligence, Willpower, and Dexterity. Then you'd choose a race and a class (Elf, Human, Dwarf, or Halfling; Warrior, Academic, Priest, Rogue (classes were gotten rid of in 2nd edition)). Then you'd roll a d100 on a career chart (or a specific career chart as determined by your class in 1st edition), and cross-reference your roll with your race and get your career. This would describe what you did before you became an adventurer.
The game was d100 based with low-rolls being better than higher ones. You'd want to roll under your characteristic to succeed, then for damage you'd roll a d6 (in 1st edition) or a d10 (in 2nd) and add the first digit of your strength (or the Strength Bonus in 2nd edition, which was the same thing as in 1st, it just got its own entry on the stat line), subtract the Toughness and armor of the opponent and that's how many wounds you'd do. If your opponent's wounds got to below 0, you'd roll a d100 on a chart, cross-reference the amount that the damage brought the opponent below 0 by, and get a result which you'd look up on a chart. Also, the game was location-based, so you could hit someone in the arm, head, whatever.
The magic systems were the most different in the two editions: In 1st it was more like Warhammer Fantasy Battle 3rd edition where your character would have a certain number of magic points that would decrease with spell use and increase with rest. Almost like a currency. In 2nd edition, you had a magic number which would be the number of d10s you had to roll. If any of them turned up a 9 (Tzeentch's favorite number) you'd roll on a specific chart depending on how many 9s you rolled and see what your penalty is. Magic in 2nd edition was more in line with Warhammer Fantasy Battle 6th edition, and was, thus, more dangerous. I liked the 2nd edition way of magic better.
3rd Edition
3rd Edition still has the careers, still has the critical hits, and still has the insanity, but they all work a little differently. The characteristics are point-buy instead of rolling (because in this edition there are no numbered dice, only ones with symbols). Then you'd choose your career card, and choose your talent, and action cards. Talent cards fit into your career sheet like slots, with each sheet having space for a certain number of talent cards, and the action cards are ones you're trained in, or have the requirements for. The dice mechanic is much better than in the first two editions, and it goes like this.
Take the number of blue d8s based on your characteristic, and add any white d6s if you have a bonus to your characteristics. Then add a number of purple d8s equal to the difficulty. Then you must convert a number of blue d8s into either red d10s if you're reckless, or green d10s if you're conservative (as determined by choice, and career). If you have any pertinent skills, add a yellow d6, and then add white d6s for favorable environments/situations and/or black d6s for unfavorable ones.
Then roll. Certain symbols cancel out others, and others just stay there. You're able to succeed, and still have bad things happen, as well as fail, and have good things come out of it. Personally, I believe this mechanic helps role-playing as opposed to hindering it. In games with numbers, it's easy to just say "I hit" and move on. This way, you're forced to describe the scene to make sense out of why you can succeed but still have bad luck. "As you stab into the beastman, he slips on the blood of his comrades, wrenching the sword out from your hand and falling to the ground just as the minotaur bounds towards you."
The game also takes miniatures and battle mats out of the equation. Weird, especially with the fantastic range of figures Citadel Miniatures has. However, this makes the role-playing the center of the action and the exact placement and fiddly details of maps gets pushed aside. Criticize the game all you want, but you can't say that role-playing is limited in favor of a 'board game aesthetic.'
Overall, I love the new edition (possibly the best). It definitely adds more to the game table (which isn't always good), but the to-hit ratio is greater, and it still retains all the bits of the last editions that I loved. That being said, I wouldn't have played the last editions for nine years if they weren't brilliant either, and so I shouldn't say that the new edition blows the others out of the water, but that it adds to them to help make WFRP the best roleplaying series I've ever played.
+++END TRANSMISSION+++
Much like the Warhammer 40,000 Roleplay system (of which I wrote in the first installment), this is a dangerous game, where one cannot simply walk into a room of orcs and begin swinging safely, nor can you discount the effects of madness, or disease. Very few healing potions will save you from Nurgle's Rot, or the sight of watching your friend's leg get hewen from her body.
Remember what I said in the preamble to this series: These games are arranged in no particular order, otherwise this would be last in the series taking it's rightful place as what I believe to be the best roleplaying game I've ever played. Also remember what I said about editions. When I mention a game I take into account all of the editions I have played, in this case it's all of them.
I began my first foray into Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay (WFRP) during the years when Hogshead took over production of the game. This was in the early 2000s, and during that time the Games Workshop in Metrotown Centre (which was my game shop of choice) actually carried the books. Apparently they didn't sell exceptionally well, but I bought every, damned, book they had over time. i had dabbled in Advanced Dungeons & Dragons 2nd Edition previous to WFRP, but never had I dove into a game with such enthusiasm as WFRP 1st edition. Perhaps it was my already well-grounded love for the Warhammer World through the fantastic miniatures game, or perhaps it was the fact that while AD&D 2E was fun, WFRP promised to be a dangerous and brutal game that would tax my decision-making skills in ways that dungeon crawling never had.
+ENEMY WITHIN CAMPAIGN SPOILER ALERT+
I began Game Mastering (GMing) the Enemy Within Campaign (even today hailed as an amazing campaign by critics, and the most fun I've ever had playing an RPG). The Enemy Within took the players on a quest from Bögenhafen near Altdorf, all the way to Kislev and back to confront a Greater Daemon of Tzeentch and save the Empire. Though the time in Kislev was a bit tedious and strayed from what is now believed to be absolute canon of the Warhammer World, the dark humor of the stories and the recurring characters made you feel totally immersed. If you're looking for a sentence to sum up the greatness that this campaign and game possessed: WFRP 1st edition and the Enemy Within Campaign kept a group of four 9th graders playing every week for the entire 5-volume set.
+END OF SPOILERS+
Then in 2005 during my time working as a redshirt at the very Games Workshop where I first experienced WFRP, Black Industries was founded. This subdivision of Games Workshop was to deal with Games Workshop's board and role-playing games, though the rules were developed by the ever-creative Chris Pramas and the folks at Green Ronin Publishing in Seattle. Green Ronin created the 2nd edition of WFRP; tidying up some of the loose ends and clarifying bits here and there, but overall not changing much. To a gamer like myself (who hadn't sojourned across the Old World in over four years) this was perfect. Now more people could experience what I and my three friends did back in high school. The big campaign was called Paths of the Damned, and was a three-part series that advanced the WFRP timeline to the current events of the Warhammer World: The Storm of Chaos.
In 2008/2009 the reigns of board and role-playing game publishing went to another American outfit called Fantasy Flight Games (FFG), a company who had made other forays into role-playing but was most famous for its boardgames. Fantasy Flight soon announced another edition of WFRP, and this time it would be different again from other role-playing systems. This time it was to have board game components. This news shocked the role-play community (gamers are a fairly conservative group), and I must admit even shocked myself.
As a clerk at a games shop I got a complimentary copy from FFG and I ran the intro adventure in it for a group of gamers. While skeptical at first, it quickly grew on me. I realized that what I loved about WFRP wasn't the percentile dice, or the critical hit charts, or the miniatures (though all those things were great), but that I loved the grittiness, the danger, and the insanity. The third edition (though adding cards, symboled instead of numbered dice, and counters) was exactly what the other editions were, but more innovative.
So how do the games work then? Well, the first two editions are similar, but the third isn't really, so I'll do them in two groups.
1st/2nd Editions
To begin you'd roll d10s and add a modifier for each statistic, which were similar to the Warhammer Fantasy Battle statistics: Weapon Skill, Ballistic Skill, Strength, Toughness, Wounds, Leadership, Intelligence, Willpower, and Dexterity. Then you'd choose a race and a class (Elf, Human, Dwarf, or Halfling; Warrior, Academic, Priest, Rogue (classes were gotten rid of in 2nd edition)). Then you'd roll a d100 on a career chart (or a specific career chart as determined by your class in 1st edition), and cross-reference your roll with your race and get your career. This would describe what you did before you became an adventurer.
The game was d100 based with low-rolls being better than higher ones. You'd want to roll under your characteristic to succeed, then for damage you'd roll a d6 (in 1st edition) or a d10 (in 2nd) and add the first digit of your strength (or the Strength Bonus in 2nd edition, which was the same thing as in 1st, it just got its own entry on the stat line), subtract the Toughness and armor of the opponent and that's how many wounds you'd do. If your opponent's wounds got to below 0, you'd roll a d100 on a chart, cross-reference the amount that the damage brought the opponent below 0 by, and get a result which you'd look up on a chart. Also, the game was location-based, so you could hit someone in the arm, head, whatever.
The magic systems were the most different in the two editions: In 1st it was more like Warhammer Fantasy Battle 3rd edition where your character would have a certain number of magic points that would decrease with spell use and increase with rest. Almost like a currency. In 2nd edition, you had a magic number which would be the number of d10s you had to roll. If any of them turned up a 9 (Tzeentch's favorite number) you'd roll on a specific chart depending on how many 9s you rolled and see what your penalty is. Magic in 2nd edition was more in line with Warhammer Fantasy Battle 6th edition, and was, thus, more dangerous. I liked the 2nd edition way of magic better.
3rd Edition
3rd Edition still has the careers, still has the critical hits, and still has the insanity, but they all work a little differently. The characteristics are point-buy instead of rolling (because in this edition there are no numbered dice, only ones with symbols). Then you'd choose your career card, and choose your talent, and action cards. Talent cards fit into your career sheet like slots, with each sheet having space for a certain number of talent cards, and the action cards are ones you're trained in, or have the requirements for. The dice mechanic is much better than in the first two editions, and it goes like this.
Take the number of blue d8s based on your characteristic, and add any white d6s if you have a bonus to your characteristics. Then add a number of purple d8s equal to the difficulty. Then you must convert a number of blue d8s into either red d10s if you're reckless, or green d10s if you're conservative (as determined by choice, and career). If you have any pertinent skills, add a yellow d6, and then add white d6s for favorable environments/situations and/or black d6s for unfavorable ones.
Then roll. Certain symbols cancel out others, and others just stay there. You're able to succeed, and still have bad things happen, as well as fail, and have good things come out of it. Personally, I believe this mechanic helps role-playing as opposed to hindering it. In games with numbers, it's easy to just say "I hit" and move on. This way, you're forced to describe the scene to make sense out of why you can succeed but still have bad luck. "As you stab into the beastman, he slips on the blood of his comrades, wrenching the sword out from your hand and falling to the ground just as the minotaur bounds towards you."
The game also takes miniatures and battle mats out of the equation. Weird, especially with the fantastic range of figures Citadel Miniatures has. However, this makes the role-playing the center of the action and the exact placement and fiddly details of maps gets pushed aside. Criticize the game all you want, but you can't say that role-playing is limited in favor of a 'board game aesthetic.'
Overall, I love the new edition (possibly the best). It definitely adds more to the game table (which isn't always good), but the to-hit ratio is greater, and it still retains all the bits of the last editions that I loved. That being said, I wouldn't have played the last editions for nine years if they weren't brilliant either, and so I shouldn't say that the new edition blows the others out of the water, but that it adds to them to help make WFRP the best roleplaying series I've ever played.
+++END TRANSMISSION+++
Friday, October 1, 2010
Top 5 Roleplaying Games: Warhammer 40,000 Roleplay
Beginning the list off is the trilogy of roleplaying games that take place in the 41st millennium: Dark Heresy, Rogue Trader, and Deathwatch by Games Workshop and Fantasy Flight Games.
To say that Dark Heresy was one of the most anticipated roleplaying games is putting it lightly. The collector's edition sold out within minutes, and I'm happy to say that one sits atop my gaming shelf like a terrible, black, monolith, lording over the other roleplaying games as if to dare them to match the deadliness and grit that this book eats for breakfast. Utilizing the Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay 1st/2nd edition system, this game allows you to take on the role of an Inquisitor's acolyte, a member of the bridge crew on a Rogue Trader's vessel, or even one of the superhuman space-knights known as Space Marines as you explore a brutal, and horrifying future 38,000 years from now.
The system uses a d100 mechanic where you roll under a given statistic in order to succeed at various tasks. When it comes time to dish out damage, a damage is rolled (1 or more d10s with additional valued depending on the strength of the user or the viciousness of the weapon), and from it is subtracted a toughness value and an armor value, the sum of which determines the wounds inflicted. When your wound limit is reduced to below 0 you begin to take critical damage as determined by how below 0 you are as well as the type of weapon just used upon you. No critical hit is good, but many are better than others. These are truly vicious, however, resulting in loss of limb, organ failure, or death. The game is also location-based, allowing you to target arms, legs, bodies, or heads. Far from slowing down the game, this system allows for a detail often absent from many RPGs.
The universe, itself, is possibly one of the most characterful elements of the game. It's the 41st millennium, and 10,000 years ago a living God referred to only as The Emperor fell victim to the betrayal of his "son" Horus. While Horus succumbed to his injuries in the final battle, The Emperor was left in a death-like state. To preserve him, humanity stuck him in The Golden Throne: a city-sized life support system, that sustains his deathlike state. The Emperor is revered as a god by most of humanity, yet he does not interact physically with anyone. His will creates a psychic barrier that exists between reality and an alternate dimension known as The Warp. The Warp is filled with echos of every living thing, thought and emotion. It's also filled with hellish creatures known as Daemons and their foul gods (Slaanesh, Nurgle, Khorne, and Tzeentch) who try to destroy humanity.
Humanity, itself, is a medieval hierarchy of bureaucrats, governors, and aristocracy. At times it mimics the middle ages, while at others it appears to be an enlightenment-type society, though with none of the enlightenment's optimism or mistrust of religion. To add to the mix, a plethora of aliens exist to torment humanity. The majority of humanity mistrusts aliens and the government of the Imperium treats them with a genocidal rage and xenophobia that rivals any such feelings in our present era history. The most common aliens are the barbaric Space Orks, the enigmatic Eldar, their psychopathic cousins the Dark Eldar, the imperialistic Tau, and the infinite hordes of the Tyranids.
In Dark Heresy, you take on the role of a servant of an Inquisitor (the Imperiums' equivalent of both the FBI and the CIA), investigating rumors of dissent, heresy, or contact with aliens. You are little more than a citizen, who has shown some prowess in one aspect of law enforcement, or bureaucratic life, which presents a challenge as you are not powerful, but you show some heroic aptitude, and you have the backing of a powerful patron whose credentials strike fear into the hearts of your average citizen or even royalty. Combat in this game is not favorable, and is highly dangerous. Unlike in many sci-fi/fantasy RPGs, you can't always shrug off a gunshot, and if you don't possess the Dodge skill, you'd better wear armor, or stay out of trouble.
I like this game because you are an average citizen of the Imperium (or a cop, or grunt soldier) who has been drafted to serve the Emperor, and it can be dangerous, and creepy, often leading to the madness of your character as you assail the lairs of cultists, heretics, or (Emperor help you) go up against daemons.
Rogue Trader takes the power level of the 40K roleplaying games up a notch, putting you in command of your own starship (and also letting you take on the roles of more powerful characters), as you explore the unknown parts of our galaxy. Unlike Dark Heresy, you don't have much authority, except that you're a Rogue Trader, who is a type of nobility. Granted you command your own starship and you have a warrant of trade (a license allowing you to trade with worlds within the Imperium), but you operate between the laws, often trading with aliens and heretics, just so that you can make a buck. This is probably my favorite of the three games, as it gives you more powerful equipment and characters as in Dark Heresy (though not as powerful as in Deathwatch), and still pits you up against some of the most terrible things that come from outside the boundaries of Imperial rule. I'm also an explorer at heart, and the ability to explore the fringes of the galaxy (albeit in a fictional world) is too much to resist.
Deathwatch is the latest in the 40K roleplay series and allows you to take on the role of a Space Marine, a knight and favored warrior of the Emperor. In fact, each Space Marine carries a bit of the Emperor's blood and genes within their DNA. Millennia ago, the Emperor created these warriors and crafted his "sons" known as the primarchs. To each primarch he gave a legion of marines encoded with their (and by extension, the Emperor's) DNA. Each space marine reflects the emotions of their primarch (most primarchs are now long dead), and is a genetically-enhanced human warrior. This is the ultimate power level in the 41st millennium. In Deathwatch you are a space marine who has been taken from his chapter (the designation for a space marine legion), and recruited into the Deathwatch, an alien-hunting organization who operates (as in Dark Heresy) under the command of an Inquisitor.
In this game you and your fellow players go on military missions that require surgical strikes as opposed to full on attacks. You're not running in guns blazing, but figuring out tactical ways to complete your missions. While this game doesn't lend itself to the roleplaying situations that many RPGs do (I can't see a space marine bartering for a gun at a market, or trying to impress a planetary governor), you have to work with your squad (who are taken from different chapters that are sometimes at odds with each other), and interact with other characters in the game (space marines can't shoot their way through every problem). It uses the same system as the previous two versions of the game, but takes you from the alleyways and shadows of Imperial society and into the battlefield and war rooms of the Imperial war machine.
That's all for today. Tomorrow you'll get another one. If you want me to elaborate on any aspect of any of the games I describe, just say so in the comments section and I'll do my best to edit, and/or respond to your query. These posts are often unplanned and emulate myself chatting, ad lib, with you about my favorite games.
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P.S. My spellcheck is wonky right now, and my ferry ride is almost over. While I pride myself on my writing skills and grammatical accuracy, I do tend to think and type quickly. I'll try again later, but please excuse any problems your eyes encounter.
To say that Dark Heresy was one of the most anticipated roleplaying games is putting it lightly. The collector's edition sold out within minutes, and I'm happy to say that one sits atop my gaming shelf like a terrible, black, monolith, lording over the other roleplaying games as if to dare them to match the deadliness and grit that this book eats for breakfast. Utilizing the Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay 1st/2nd edition system, this game allows you to take on the role of an Inquisitor's acolyte, a member of the bridge crew on a Rogue Trader's vessel, or even one of the superhuman space-knights known as Space Marines as you explore a brutal, and horrifying future 38,000 years from now.
The system uses a d100 mechanic where you roll under a given statistic in order to succeed at various tasks. When it comes time to dish out damage, a damage is rolled (1 or more d10s with additional valued depending on the strength of the user or the viciousness of the weapon), and from it is subtracted a toughness value and an armor value, the sum of which determines the wounds inflicted. When your wound limit is reduced to below 0 you begin to take critical damage as determined by how below 0 you are as well as the type of weapon just used upon you. No critical hit is good, but many are better than others. These are truly vicious, however, resulting in loss of limb, organ failure, or death. The game is also location-based, allowing you to target arms, legs, bodies, or heads. Far from slowing down the game, this system allows for a detail often absent from many RPGs.
The universe, itself, is possibly one of the most characterful elements of the game. It's the 41st millennium, and 10,000 years ago a living God referred to only as The Emperor fell victim to the betrayal of his "son" Horus. While Horus succumbed to his injuries in the final battle, The Emperor was left in a death-like state. To preserve him, humanity stuck him in The Golden Throne: a city-sized life support system, that sustains his deathlike state. The Emperor is revered as a god by most of humanity, yet he does not interact physically with anyone. His will creates a psychic barrier that exists between reality and an alternate dimension known as The Warp. The Warp is filled with echos of every living thing, thought and emotion. It's also filled with hellish creatures known as Daemons and their foul gods (Slaanesh, Nurgle, Khorne, and Tzeentch) who try to destroy humanity.
Humanity, itself, is a medieval hierarchy of bureaucrats, governors, and aristocracy. At times it mimics the middle ages, while at others it appears to be an enlightenment-type society, though with none of the enlightenment's optimism or mistrust of religion. To add to the mix, a plethora of aliens exist to torment humanity. The majority of humanity mistrusts aliens and the government of the Imperium treats them with a genocidal rage and xenophobia that rivals any such feelings in our present era history. The most common aliens are the barbaric Space Orks, the enigmatic Eldar, their psychopathic cousins the Dark Eldar, the imperialistic Tau, and the infinite hordes of the Tyranids.
In Dark Heresy, you take on the role of a servant of an Inquisitor (the Imperiums' equivalent of both the FBI and the CIA), investigating rumors of dissent, heresy, or contact with aliens. You are little more than a citizen, who has shown some prowess in one aspect of law enforcement, or bureaucratic life, which presents a challenge as you are not powerful, but you show some heroic aptitude, and you have the backing of a powerful patron whose credentials strike fear into the hearts of your average citizen or even royalty. Combat in this game is not favorable, and is highly dangerous. Unlike in many sci-fi/fantasy RPGs, you can't always shrug off a gunshot, and if you don't possess the Dodge skill, you'd better wear armor, or stay out of trouble.
I like this game because you are an average citizen of the Imperium (or a cop, or grunt soldier) who has been drafted to serve the Emperor, and it can be dangerous, and creepy, often leading to the madness of your character as you assail the lairs of cultists, heretics, or (Emperor help you) go up against daemons.
Rogue Trader takes the power level of the 40K roleplaying games up a notch, putting you in command of your own starship (and also letting you take on the roles of more powerful characters), as you explore the unknown parts of our galaxy. Unlike Dark Heresy, you don't have much authority, except that you're a Rogue Trader, who is a type of nobility. Granted you command your own starship and you have a warrant of trade (a license allowing you to trade with worlds within the Imperium), but you operate between the laws, often trading with aliens and heretics, just so that you can make a buck. This is probably my favorite of the three games, as it gives you more powerful equipment and characters as in Dark Heresy (though not as powerful as in Deathwatch), and still pits you up against some of the most terrible things that come from outside the boundaries of Imperial rule. I'm also an explorer at heart, and the ability to explore the fringes of the galaxy (albeit in a fictional world) is too much to resist.
Deathwatch is the latest in the 40K roleplay series and allows you to take on the role of a Space Marine, a knight and favored warrior of the Emperor. In fact, each Space Marine carries a bit of the Emperor's blood and genes within their DNA. Millennia ago, the Emperor created these warriors and crafted his "sons" known as the primarchs. To each primarch he gave a legion of marines encoded with their (and by extension, the Emperor's) DNA. Each space marine reflects the emotions of their primarch (most primarchs are now long dead), and is a genetically-enhanced human warrior. This is the ultimate power level in the 41st millennium. In Deathwatch you are a space marine who has been taken from his chapter (the designation for a space marine legion), and recruited into the Deathwatch, an alien-hunting organization who operates (as in Dark Heresy) under the command of an Inquisitor.
In this game you and your fellow players go on military missions that require surgical strikes as opposed to full on attacks. You're not running in guns blazing, but figuring out tactical ways to complete your missions. While this game doesn't lend itself to the roleplaying situations that many RPGs do (I can't see a space marine bartering for a gun at a market, or trying to impress a planetary governor), you have to work with your squad (who are taken from different chapters that are sometimes at odds with each other), and interact with other characters in the game (space marines can't shoot their way through every problem). It uses the same system as the previous two versions of the game, but takes you from the alleyways and shadows of Imperial society and into the battlefield and war rooms of the Imperial war machine.
That's all for today. Tomorrow you'll get another one. If you want me to elaborate on any aspect of any of the games I describe, just say so in the comments section and I'll do my best to edit, and/or respond to your query. These posts are often unplanned and emulate myself chatting, ad lib, with you about my favorite games.
+++END TRANSMISSION+++
P.S. My spellcheck is wonky right now, and my ferry ride is almost over. While I pride myself on my writing skills and grammatical accuracy, I do tend to think and type quickly. I'll try again later, but please excuse any problems your eyes encounter.
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