hellacious huni's page

I wish it was my multiple personalities, Ultra, then maybe my players would behave for once and not slap around all my precious NPCs. What bullies.

Here is an episode of "Shop Time for Gram" the 5th level fighter of the party:

"I'll give you 700gp for that +2 Longsword..." Gram says.

"Um, that's a +2 Longsword, finely crafted in the-"

*jumps up on counter and kicks shop keeper in the face* (says my player, Lucy)

I break the fourth wall for a moment: What are you doing Lucy?

Lucy: Negotiating.

Me: Mmm...alright, roll a diplomacy check with a -15 modifier for kicking Gruber the poor shop owner in the face.

24, male, writer and investment banker (can you guess which one is my passion?). I started as a player around 1991, Cyberpunk 2020. I stopped for about 10 years due to not having any friends who were interested in roleplaying, but I always had a desire to play.

Then around 2001, I noticed 3rd edition and said to myself, "Self, do you think you could DM?"

And then I said, "Well, thank you for asking, but that seems like a lot of work, me."

So I was like, "Self, I don't like your tone...just kidding, I love it! Shut up! We're DMing, end of story!"

So now I run two games but still hold a dirty secret desire to be a player (but everyone else is too chicken to DM, it's a frightening, frightening job you know).

Sorry Boz,

You didn't deserve that.

Dear Mr Mona,

Trip not my good man. Boz merely did not read your post carefully enough. You never asked anyone to give the magazine 5 stars. You just told people to go to amazon and give a fair and up to date rating of what Dungeon and Dragon magazines are currently offering. I understood your intent.

It actually kind of pissed me off that the reviewer on Amazon would completely jake all our steam by leaving the one star rating and discrediting our review in the process. I'd be willing to say that reviewer never read Dungeon Magazine or else it might have been a four to five star rating.

I mean, hey, I understand where Boz and that reviewer are coming from, it looks like senseless pandering by using an almost cultish group of followers to do your bidding. Yeah, that would be wrong. But, when you get close to both magazines and the editors (like yourself) you realize they are cuddly, warm, pliant, not evil overlord masters at all.

And this is to Boz: tell you what Boz, if you play Daryl and Duhan (code for D&D) give Dungeon magazine one read and tell me it is not the most useful thing you've ever gotten your hands on as a DM, then you will see Erik was not forcing anyone to go give a five star rating, he was only telling us there is another place for us to gush about one of the best magazines that have ever existed (besides Quilting Quarterly, but that magazine is like ambrosia for the eyes).

Anywho, stay in school, winners don't do drugs and all that.

Love,

Hellacious Huni

Wouldn't it be neato if there were a series of articles each seperately based around one full level of the abyss, detailing each aspect and attribute of that level? Man-o-man, I have been itching for that ever since I read the hollow Planar Handbook (I say hollow because it was missing any semblance of crunch relating to any of the planes it mentioned).

Does anybody have any ideas which levels would make great articles?

What issue had the different arrow types?

And can anyone clue me in on just what exactly a +2 arrow would do. I mean, I know what a +2 bow would do, but a +2 arrow?

Thanks.

My favorite cha was "Todrick J Andersburgenstein the 3rd" a human 5lvl Fighter/ 5lvl Belmont Acolyte. The Belmont Acolyte was a prestige class of my DM's making (nicked from the Castlevania whip wielding Belmonts). I had a Vorpal Whip and the power to create 3 bottles of holy water per day. I was a holy water machine! I would pour it on my cereal in the morning and splash it into every NPC's face that we met (just to be sure, vampires are tricksy!). Needless to say, a wet NPC is not a happy NPC (especially shop keepers).

Todrick's crowning moment was when the rest of the PCs had laid about a metric ton of dynamite in the catacombs of the Vampire Ultanrian's Castle...with me still in the upper halls (the Dwarf of the party didn't much ken to waitin for "some fairy with a whip" to shag ass out of there). So it's just me and a very angry vampire and a castle falling down around us. My Hide checks were helped by the incredible amount of noise caused by a 500 year old castle giving up the ghost and by Ultanrian's penchant for narcolepsy (a sleep curse from a well placed enchanted crossbow shot that affected him every couple rounds). All I could do was jump out from behind corners trying to behead Ultanrian with a vorpal critical but the vampire wasn't having it. At the last moment, just as the castle was crumbling to dust, Todrick unhitched his belt (with about twenty bottles of holy water attached) and used it as an improvised whip on the sleeping vampire, and then it was off a nearby balcony for about a thirty story fall into the moat. My group was kind enough to drag my body out of the water and jam a cure moderate wounds potion down my throat.

The Barbarian Backgrounds was a perfect example of what I would like to see more of, variation. I don't know if that is one of the class acts you wrote, Medesha, but that was quite nice, even if some feel it was broken.
I look at rules this way, they're only broken if you let them break you. You have to be a DM, stand up to the rules, don't let them push you around! The rules are all, "Hey, kid! Where's my lunch money." And you're like, "Back up rules! I'm a big girl (or boy) now! No longer will I let you decapitate all my player characters or what not!"

Thanks for asking Zherog,

I think that what would be great to see is some articles on alterior ways to play classes. For instance, I would like to see an article on the many ways to play a sorcerer (shunned wanderer, mop boy at a prestigious magic school, wilder, magician), the same could be done for any class. I know it's fluff but sometimes fluff goes down easier than crunch and it really helps my players find themself in their character, rather than just being a "sorcerer". I keep bringing up this point because I think it is the very lifeblood of what makes Class Acts necessary: a character class is only what you make it. A fighter is only as interesting and compelling as his look, history, attitude, fighting style, equipment, etc.

As for crunch, I think one of the greatest Class Acts of all time was the Knowstones article for the sorcerer, it did what all great crunch should do, it found one of the established rules of D&D (sorcerers don't get very many spells) and turned the rule on its head letting you do something that almost makes you feel like you are cheating.

Well, that's it for now, I see another thread in General Discussion called "What would make Class Acts Better", they're probably saying the exact same things right now.

I guess great minds think alike Scylla. Sorry, I think you and me were writing at the same time.

I definitely think that class acts has its place in Dragon, but I feel that sometimes we are pulling a Charles Dickens and writing just because the editors will pay for it, not because we actually have anything to say. I have seen really good Class Acts and really bad Class Acts (when I say bad I mean not very useful).

I think what would solve the problem is if Class Acts was a little shorter each month, maybe only hitting a couple random classes each month and making room for a more or longer articles. This solution would do two things, create an environment ripe for exploring some of the other core classes (favored soul, swashbuckler) and create more quality articles due to the time to really compile and single out the quality submissions (rather than having to have a sorcerer or fighter article that month for example).

Also, one last thing and this goes out to the editors of Dragon: one major thing that I have been dying to see in class acts (and I know this might increase cost) is artist portrayals of the different classes. There is nothing I love more than to see a decked out character and say, "What the hell class is that?" and the owner of the art replies, "Oh that? That's a level one fighter." It always astounds me the diversity that D&D allows even with characters in the exact same character class (one of the reasons I am such a big fan of the Eberron source book art is that it gave me a completely new perspective on the way some of the races and character classes could look). A great example of this is the marvelous art on the cover of issue #288 of Dragon. Is that a fighter? Maybe. Probably a fighter, but you can't be sure because that woman doesn't look like a caricature of a "fighter class", she looks like an individual.

I am beginning an adventure that starts with "A Box of Flumph" and will run through the City of Istivin arc. I am making "the Grackle" from "A Box of Flumph" a little more sinister and mysterious but running with the idea of a shady character who has made enemies everywhere and burnt every bridge he has ever crossed.

The whole campaign is based around chasing Jonas through a mish-mash of Dungeon adventures (Fiendish Footprints will show its face) that I am implanting in a homebrew world. I am asking all my PC's to invent a terrible thing that Jonas has either done to them or taken from them to give proper motivation for revenge. In the end I am going to let the PCs either sate their lust for revenge in a battle to death in the midst of the world being torn apart by a rift in time or I am going to let them join Jonas and travel to the past to help rectify all the wrongs he has done.

All the adventures can be easily linked by following the Grackle's rabbit trail straight into and out of each module.