Vegepygmy

I’ve got my Serpents Skull campaign on a small hiatus while work demands are high. Funnily enough, it’s worked to my advantage. One of the still unexplored areas of the island is chock full of vegepygmies. Ive already worked up some reskinned monsters to replicate these in 4e, and I’m happy enough with them. Then lo and behold, without any fanfare, an article pops up on DDI with them all written up, and with an ecology to go with them.

http://www.wizards.com/dnd/Article.aspx?x=dnd/dueo/vegepygmy

They are slightly too high a level for me to use them as is, but I like the approach the author has taken. No doubt I will go back to my notes with this article at my side

The Dungeon Dozen

No apologies for just dropping a link on you, not when it takes you to so much creativity and imagination. You don’t need a d12 for this, you’ll want to use all of it in your next game. Brilliant.

http://roll1d12.blogspot.com/

Micro encounter

I’ve been asked to contribute to an Old School sandbox adventure. The brief is simple, low level, in a fairy tale forest. As it happens I was working up some stuff for a 4e adventure based around the Witchlight Fens. It’s easy enough to transpose, so with a quick rewording here’s an example of a fleshed out random encounter, the Giants Bones…

A moss covered mound turns out to be ancient skeletal remains of a stone giant. The skeleton is in remarkably good condition, being made of stone, it’s just covered in plant and fungal growth after decades lain in the woods. All the giants belongings have rotted away, or been stolen away, except for one. The giants body fell across his broadsword, which still lies beneath it untouched and waiting to be found.

The sword is nearly ten feet in length, so cannot be carried, let alone wielded, by any human sized creature. It is of plain design except for a single rune carved on the blade near the hilt. The sword is highly magical, and sapient. It can detect both law and chaos up to 3 times per day. It is +3 to hit and damage (+5 vs law/chaos). The sword can communicate with its wielder, and will happily do so. It’s goal is to strike balance, to destroy extremists of any stripe. It reserves a special loathing for the gods and their followers. It calls itself Oncelimor, and in eons past was once wielded by the queen of titans.

Now I have a machine gun

Quick question about modern firearms in your (d20) gaming. How have you seen automatic fire handled? I want an option that is reasonably balanced against single shot, or a grenade, or any other standard action. I’m guessing it should represent a decreased chance to hit (?) but increased damage. The balance could be in the ammo usage, which again I want a nice elegant mechanic for.

First thought, reskin the rangers twin strike exploit. Second thought, go with a triple strike idea but have it cost a standard and a move action? Third thought, have Auto as a keyword on equipment.

What have past d20 based games done to pull it off?

Everyone’s a designer now

My decision to write my own game has come at a time when the game I’m basing it on, 4e, is being chopped up and put into the DnDNext cooking pot. Which makes for interesting times. It means I’m having the same thoughts as every fan out there with an Internet connection and an axe to grind. I haven’t made any pronouncements on my hopes and fears for the Next project, because I haven’t entirely figured them out yet. Instead I thought it more fruitful to pour my ideas into Commando instead.

Where it gets weird is when my notes mesh so completely with some of the playtest reports coming out of the XP seminars. For instance, I decided today to strip out the skills list and go back to abilities at the core. I still want to provide bonuses, but that will be done through circumstance and discreet powers (feats for example). Seems the Next crew think exactly the same.

I’m also working at expanding combat advantage. For my game it will work in both directions, you can grant it to opponents, and you can gain it from them too. Also, I want to use it in the other pillars of the game, social encounters, infiltration, exploration, etc. I want to use the term Advantage to mean a lot, both mechanically and literally. Seems WotC are going down the same lines from the skills and abilities seminar released today.

Of course, this could just mean I’m gonna love the new edition. Happy days. Trouble is, it’s throwing me (literally) off my game as every fan posts comments in the pros and cons of very utterance. I wonder if the WotC guys will leave XP with their heads spinning like mine is? It’s hard to stay true to a vision when everyone wants to chip away at it when it’s barely started.

Haunted Temples

Without any real fanfare, there’s a nice new release from WotC just arrived through the post. It’s Haunted Temples, a map pack for playing out larger encounters. These are big double sided colour poster maps, that you’ll have seen in adventures and sourcebooks from the last few years. There’s 3 posters, of which one is completely new (that’s the temples of the title). These were showcased at the DnD site here: http://www.wizards.com/dnd/Article.aspx?x=dnd/drdd/20120111

These are genuinely useful for any game, not just DnD and not just 4e. Even the little folder is quite nice! There’s been an appetite for these, so it’s a shame they’ll probably go under the radar what with all the 5e noise.

Recommended.

Cross class

I spent a happy couple of hours transferring all the 4e Essentials martial classes into a spreadsheet. Don’t knock it til you’ve tried it. It’s amazing how many similarities they share. Maybe that’s obvious, what with them all being the same power source, but they do all have different roles. I’m not going to add in some of the newer classes like berserker and skald from Heroes of the Feywild, and see what they bring to the party. (Skald seems to be the closest we’re going to get to an essentials warlord now, shame.)

I did also get stuck into the original martial classes. I tell you what, the PHB looks really strange after 4 years. I don’t think I’ve opened it up that much in the intervening years. I was actually surprised at how cool that book still is. For the anti 4e brigade this has been an object of derision, but I think it still stands up as a great one book DnD. The fighter, ranger, rogue and warlord all have their own flavour, despite the same underlying structure. Putting them next to the Essentials classes shows up a few differences, but they still have a bunch in common. (the essentials ranger is way more magical than its classic brethren).

I’m now getting really close to a class structure for my Commando martial only game. I think the ranger will be the spine, and from there it will be free multi classing into fighter, rogue and/or warlord (tough, quick and command in Commando parlance).

There’s a bunch of reskinning to do, but not quite as much as I first thought. There’s a lot of overlap with powers, and I don’t see any mileage in that much differentiation. I’m likely to plunder the two Martial Power books for more inspiration too. There’s a lot in there to like, martial practices for one.

Now, how am I going to do grenades?