Bardach's page

Still in the wrong section

Will the old GameMastery Map pack: Ships Cabins be re-released to go with this?

Thanks for listening - additional pictures are very useful. Any chance of adding additional images for some of the existing packs? There are a few I am considering purchasing as PDF's with the Holiday discount but lack enough information.

Agreed show us what the set includes

Would be nice if someone did a picture of the whole ship to match the plans. Would be nice to have that to show players along side map.

Remember a bow is held in what is normally your offhand, you do not need to drop or stow it to draw a sword. You do need to get rid of the sword before you can use the bow again though.

WotC also suported the hobbyand expanded on what TSR did with volunteers, etc. but then Hasbro appeared. MtG was not the prime reason, WoTC had got the licences for Pokemon and that is when Hasbro stepped in.
The launch of Pokemon in the UK was after the states and I was in the WoTC offices in Reading when one of the first big post launch events was being planned. The two marketing staff were briefed and then went off, I sat opposite one of them as she picked up a phone, called an outside marketing firm and got them to do everything. A month or so later the event was held and the same person went from that event, with a bonus check and got a sports car.
The volunteers, who had supported TSR and WoTC up to then, repeatedly asked for some basic sets to teach people the game. We were repeatedly refused so a large number of the kids were never even shown how to play the game and a chance to draw them into the hobby was lost - they just collected the cards.
What made this more annoying was when I saw inside a WotC warehouse their damaged goods section, I discovered cartons ful of the original sets that had been returned and replaced because "the rare card" packed with each set was reported missing. Enough written off stock was there to have given all the RPGA and MtG volunteers in the UK several sets each.
I ran the schools RPG competition for WotC/Hasbro that first year and it was when I went to set up a mail account to send out the intial packs to schools theat the then UK WotC/Hasbro staff discovered that these existed. Large mailings went to an outside company and someone went to the post office for everything else. After I intervened they had franking machines and bulk posting discounts.
Hasbro may have brought in a more effective and business like approach but they did not understand the hobby. They isolated a lot of their volunteer support - in the UK I still see a lot of the same RPGA UK people supporting the hobby but not for WotC/Hasbro. They did the same with WotC and TSR brands as with many others they took over - narrowed their focus. Now this can be good but it also places everything on one product. Out went a lot of WotC products that had had a lot of development spent on them. Roleplaying would be D&D only, Magic and Pokemon were the card games and everything else went. We have not got as bad as the Monopoly brand where all other boards games went from the company and they simply produce an endless set of variations on the game - nothing new to generate interest.
Hasbro may have a better commercial organisation but have the streamlined out any inititive to move things forward or inovate. When they brought out 4th Ed they cut all support for previous editions. Trouble was they had cut their control on D&D with the Open Games Licence which allowed others, with a better understanding of the hobby, to prosper by carrying 3.5 on into Arcanis and then hugely into Pathfinder. One of the last things I said to WotC/Hasbro manager before I stepped back from my links was "are you sure an open licence is a good idea, what happens if someone makes better use of it then WotC?".

btw I have no commercial background or training, when I showed WotC how to use mail accounts I was a school teacher!!

TSR actually promoted the hobby and diversity. The problem was those at the top at the end screwed up badly. 2 products had a lot to do with it but only because no one checked the figures.
The produced the set of spell, etc. encyclopedias which were well liked and sold quite well - problem was at a very late stage someone decided that these would look really cool if they looked leather bound and issued an order that they would be, without checking the costs so they ended up with a product which I believe made virtually no money, and if unsold stock was factored in a loss.
Dragon Dice and appalling financial control dealt the death blow. Dragon Dice was a huge success when it launched. So much so that the launch date outside the US was not going to happen because all the product was going straight into the US market. This when three fatal mistakes were made:
1. a second manufacturer was brought on line with out checking the figures properly, new manufacturer was much more expensive and the profit margin dissapeared.
2. the first expansion was released but mistakes in the packing and distribution meant that all the rare 3 point unit dice ended up in europe and the 2 point uncommon in the states making the new race unplayable.
3. and most fatal of all, a huge deal had been done to get all TSR product into book shops. Huge sums came in from this and were gleefully taken in bonuses, spent on fancy covers for books, etc. Trouble was the deal was sale and return. No one checked what was happening, kept back money or saw that the support given to the products in the traditional game store was put in place. A year later the book shops sent back their returns - which is when TSR discovered that most of the product (including enough dragon dice to have launched Europe without the expensive second factory)had not sold and had just sat on shelves. TSR had no money refund the amount required so enter WoTC.

Atarlost, I agree with you in principle.

There were a host of products, including a cardboard spinny-wheel in DRAGON, that attempted to make that data easier to use.

But yes, there should sensibly be space restrictions for big swinging weapons. When you're exploring a tight sewer tunnel, you should be able to fight with a spear but not a sweeping greatsword.

They also produced a plastic version for fighters (originally there was to be a fighting wheel for each class) combining all the tables - trouble was it took at least as long to use as just checking the tables. They sold so well that years later they gave a bunch of them away at a con - no one wanted them for the game but tried using them as frisbees. Trouble was they were so thin that when they came towards you it was difficult to see them ... and the edge was surprisingly sharp.

I wrote a RPG tournament - in round 1 kids from the caravan they are guarding are kidnapped, and returned in exchange for the wagons, at the first campsite. The mission is to see the kids safely returned and then track down the bandits and their base (which they were told was the main reason they had been sent as extra guards), deal with them and if possible recover the wagons they had been guarding.

They were issued with details of the border area where the bandits were operating, a map of the caravan route and maps of the three main wilderness campsites on the route.

One group found the kids (released by the bandits in return for wagons) and spent a day escorting them (and the others from the caravan) back to the nearest town before heading to campsite 3. They then waited there for the main adventure which had to happen there because "why else would they have bothered giving us the map".

One DM wanting to run a new Cthulhu campaign had us generate characters without being allowed to discuss this with each other as we would not know each other until we met.

Week 1: all the characters were independently at a function in a hotel. We were supposed to meet each other (and would then learn about each other as the campaign progressed). After 3 hours the DM had never managed to get two characters together at one time.

Week 2: DM: you have all been summoned to this meeting to do a job for ####. Describe your characters and abilities and then I'll read the intro...

Bardach wrote:

Playing in a 2nd ed. mod we came across a statue near the entrance.

Statue was actually a stone golem with instructions to attack any one who damaged it or attempted to pass through a door.
Being suspicious we put a bag over its head without damaging it.

Thing was it was max. size bag of holding which we then took up a nearby hill to a 300ft cliff and then shook the bag out.

The DM's face was a picture....

Yeah - just because it can hold as much material as the golem doesn't mean that it can fit the golem through the bag opening.

2nd ed TSR module, not a bestiary golem. It was specifically described as life sized statue of a attractive slim female. Not that you would normally want to pull a 2ft wide sack over an attractive slim female - but you could.

We had ended up on the wrong largely uninhabited continent, searching for a way back. While on watch one night DM informed the character that he saw a falling star. Character remembered a legend that you could wish on seeing a falling star:

DM: You see a falling star, what do you do?

Bogey: I wish for a pie and a pint.

Bogey enjoyed his pie and pint, and we spent several weeks exploring before taking the DM's next plot hook to get home.

Playing in a 2nd ed. mod we came across a statue near the entrance.
Statue was actually a stone golem with instructions to attack any one who damaged it or attempted to pass through a door.
Being suspicious we put a bag over its head without damaging it.

Thing was it was max. size bag of holding which we then took up a nearby hill to a 300ft cliff and then shook the bag out.

The DM's face was a picture....

The players need to grow up. Roleplaying and other gaming ability is not about age.
I have run games for school groups for over 30 years introducing hundreds to the hobby. I see the same mix of distracted, good and poor players in yound groups, adult groups and mixed groups.
I ran a convention for just over 20 years until we lost our venue. In the days before the ongoing campaigns took over we ran a three round elimination open tournament. We had children playing in that and often progessing to the second round in front of adult players. The last year we ran that format the whole event was won by a 13 year old playing in his second final.
During the years of living Greyhawk we ran monthly games days where the players ranged in age from 12 to 40's and the DM's from 14 to 40's.
We need new players to keep the hobby going (and even a home campaign from time to time will lose a player and want someone new). The only way we can see if a new player of ANY age will cope and fit in is to give them a try out. If you are uncertain is a player will fit into a longstanding group run someone off games, rather than your normal campaign. If the group then finds they don't fit then don't invite them into the regular campaign - but GIVE THEM A CHANCE.
My son was playing role games by the time he was 6, playing a regular campaign with players since he was 9 and in adult/mixed groups occaisionaly from 10 and regularly from 13. As a youth he also ran and taught other games to all ages at official demo days run by TSR and Hobby games. Not all young players are going to be that good and confident but then neither are a lot of adults.

Anyone know where to find a copy of Jason's two - links do not work anymore

Unless the deeper darkness is being specifically targeted at the item with the continual flame on it heighten will have no effect.
If you have two items seperately in the area, one with light and another with darkness, you are not countering or dispelling the spells.

To use a counterspell, you must select an opponent as the target of the counterspell. You do this by choosing to ready an action. In doing so, you elect to wait to complete your action until your opponent tries to cast a spell. To complete the action, you must then cast an appropriate spell.

To dispell you have to target, in this case touch, the item with the effect you want to remove.

Instead their effects are combined in the area of overlap.
In the case of continual flame it is producing normal light for 20ft so when an object with deeper darkness comes into the area this still becomes darkness with anything further than 20ft in the supernatural darkness. So unless the person wearing the shoulder pad can see in normal darkness he is still going to be blind even in the 20ft around him.

An object with Daylight on it would cancel the darkness spells effect allowing "otherwise prevailing light conditions exist in the overlapping areas of effect" but it is not permanent.

Note that these spells are not AoE spells, they are touch, the item touched produces an effect in the area.

Way back a parent wrote to the headmaster of the school where I was running a very popular RPG club enclosing newspaper and magazine cuttings quoting Pat and the other moral mob.
This could have caused me a lot of problems as I was not exactly flavour of the month with him anyway - if they had not started with "You may not know what is happening in your school...."

SKR's final word in that thread was

So, short answer: if something gives you a natural attack, it gives you a natural attack (whether that's primary or secondary is built into the attack, just as a claw or bite is always primary and a tentacle or hoof is always secondary), and your chosen attack sequence may change whether you use your full BAB or use the –5 for it being in addition to manufactured weapons or other primary attacks.

Note the section in bold - prehensile hair is specified as Secondary.

The part you should be paying attention to is "Universal" not "Monster." They're the universal rules for those kinds of attacks.

If they were Universal Rules that would be the title - universal in this context is an adjective applied to the word Monster i.e. the rules apply to all monsters.

A later part of the section makes it clear that the rule applies to monsters not characters - "Some creatures do not have natural attacks. These creatures can make unarmed strikes just like humans do."

Lets look at what the complete rules being quoted in support of the argument actually say.

A - the quotes are taken from a section entitled "Universal Monster Rules" not character.

B - they are referring to the types of natural attacks listed in the referred table and the rule is an over-ride to that - so that for example a creature with wings, but no other attack, could use them as their primary weapon although normally wing is defined as a secondary attack.

C - as others have already pointed out the next sentence says "This increase does not apply if the creature has multiple attacks but only takes one."

D - they go on to say "Creatures with natural attacks and attacks made with weapons can use both as part of a full attack action .... Such creatures attack with their weapons normally but treat all of their available natural attacks as secondary attacks during that attack, regardless of the attack's original type."

I would therefore rule against a Witch using her hair as a primary weapon on the grounds that
- the quote used to support this is from general rules specifically referring to Monsters not Characters (A).
- the quote is referring to and varying the listed monster attack types which the Witches Hair does not come under (B).
- even if the first two facts are ignored (C) makes it clear you cannot choose to forego other attacks to change the type of your remaining one.
- the fact (D) that the section goes on to talk about both natural and weapon attacks would tend to discredit those that argue the the word "natural" was accidently missed out of (C).

If the designers do wish this particular bit of cheese to happen they need to issue a ruling that says so in an errata or FAQ ruling - until then the rules as written should apply and they state that this is available only as a Secondary Attack.