Don DM's page

This year's Gencon Iron Player Tournament is the final part of the three part trilogy with the heroes trying to reclaim Golarion from the clutches of Cthullhu.

Tons of goodies in this update The first Iron Player Tournament Journal is posted and talks a lot about Cthullu and how we incorporated the traditional horror and mystery into a role-playing game that still focuses on action and adventure. We also give a quick run down of the last 3 parts.

The first Gauntlet Journal which explains the format we're using this year for the gauntlet. We have a shorter, fiercer tournament to test your DM merit.

Bart's Journal is something special we are doing this year online. We are taking one lone commoner in the army, and telling his story. He has finally found where the army is gathering. However, he's losing everything else. For all updates go to
www.ironplayer.com

Hi Iron players,

We're reaching the finale of our design and playtest phase and I wanted to share with everyone how amazing this adventure is this year for the Iron Player Championship( RPG1007948). We've taken the theme of Ninjas and Pirates, which often comes off as campy, and wretched up the serious factor to make it the kind of adventure you will want to invest emotion into.

But that's not the news I want to share. The big news is, is that we're also providing the Iron Tournament into more bite sized chunks. We aren't taking anything away from our full tournament players. Instead, we have added 3 additional events of 2 to 4 hours for teams and players that want the epic adventure and nonlinear gameplay of an Iron Player event, but do not want to devote the entire 8 hours. The prizes are obviously smaller, but the adventure is just as fun.

Though Those who do the challenge instead of the tournament will be playing in one of the three adventure acts that tournament players are running. However, we have altered these adventures so that they are complete adventures with a beginning middle and an end and an option to proceed into challenge if you have generics.

This isn't just for the Iron Player Tournament. We have had a few dungeon masters who have wanted to test their merit against decorated Iron Dungeon Masters but not run the full gauntlet (RPG1007959). The Dungeon Master Challenge calls out these dms with shorter blocks where they compete against 1 dm to see who can entertain a party the best.

These new events will be posted by the end of the week. We thank everyone new for signing up and hope to see everyone again this week.

Game ID Title Start date/time Duration Event Cost
RPG1016482 Iron Team Challenge: Shipwr... 8/5/2010 12:00:00 3.5 hrs $ 6.00
History
RPG1016483 Iron Team Challenge: Terrorist 8/5/2010 14:00:00 3.5 hrs $ 6.00
History
RPG1016484 Iron Team Challenge: Destru... 8/5/2010 17:00:00 2 hrs $ 4.00
History
RPG1016485 Dungeon Master Challenge 8/5/2010 12:00:00 3.5 hrs $ 4.00
History
RPG1016486 Dungeon Master Challenge 8/5/2010 14:00:00 3.5 hrs $ 4.00
History
RPG1016487 Dungeon Master Challenge 8/5/2010 17:00:00 2.5 hrs $ 4.00

Now that other old campaign has ended, I'm starting a new epic campaign that will take the party from 0 level commoners to 20th level, substituting death with gruesome injuries.

The campaign is based off of the Obsidian Twilight line of Pathfinder Campaign products. Gone are humans. Instead the remaining races have survived by changing and there are a half dozen new races consisiting of various outsider, undead and shapeshifter races.

We're looking for a new player (or two) to join us within the next month as we start off the campaign.

If you've never played pathfinder, this will be a great jumping off point to learn.

There are four players in our campaign, (My wife and three guys between the ages of 25 to 35). We run through the entire game in session, using signals to speak out of character. This really drives a good level of submersions.

We use pewter minis for epic combats (and a projector) and imaginative tactical combats for more mundane combats.

This campaign, in addition to traditional rpging will also feature massive combat rules as the PCs are attempting to build up an army to fight the undead hordes in the post apocalyptic fantasy world.

We're looking for player(s) who are consistent and can make it out for a majority of our Sunday game sessions and who can keep a good character background updated on the website (10 minutes maximum of your time a game week).

We play 2 - 4 sundays a month from 4 p.m. until 10 or so in dearborn michigan.

If you're interested, respond or send me an email at dm at darkpaths .

You can find the pathfinder srd at
http://www.d20pfsrd.com/

You can explore the campaign website at
http://www.darkpaths.com

Hi, Could you replace the mentions of Iron Dungeon Master with Iron Player in the title and first two references in the thread. Wrong tourney on the brain. Thank you.

http://paizo.com/paizo/messageboards/paizoPublishing/pathfinder/pathfinderR PG/general/2009IronDungeonMasterPathfinderTournamentNeedsDMs

The first Iron Dungeon Master Tournament was a huge success, and we are planning an even more successful event this time around. The Iron Player Tournament is a single game./day tournament. We are in need for 4 to 5 more Iron Dungeon caliber Dungeon Masters to help us run an event. We need Dungeon Masters that wow their normal gaming table every other week. That do more than just run a module out of a book every week. We need dungeon masters that have a unique style and thoroughly enjoy dungeon mastering. If you are interested, private message me or respond in this thread with an email address to contact u.

We will be using the pathfinder 3.5 system for this tourney. If you have only DM'd 3.5, don't fret, we'll have a cheat sheet on the differences between them, which are pretty minor from a DM perspective. Plus we allow every DM to run the table and adventure how they wish. The event will be THursday bertween 12 to 7:30

THE IRON PLAYER TOURNAMENT 2009 - WHAT WE DO DIFFERENT.

We break the mold of traditional tournaments by offering a full experience for the player. The idea was to combine all the good stuff about the tournaments that we liked, and diminish all of the negative stuff.

* The tournament judges the entire array of player skills Players will be judged by no less than 3 DMs as well, testing their ability to adapt to change in styles.
* Players play through the entire adventure, not just 1 or 2 encounters and then are eliminated.
* Our scoring system is not based on small objects that must be made, but on global comprehensive objectives. This gives players a real role playing experience as they have only their full toolset of creativity to accomplish things. More than just objectives, players are also judged on how they play the game. We have created a mixture of objective and subjective scoring for this event.
* Playing through a normal tournament is a minimum of 12 to 14 hours. Our tournament wraps up in 7 hours with everyone making it to the end and impacting the story in the same world.
* Players design their own character. No one gets screwed because they had the "bad" character sheet. Part of being a great role playing game player is building great and useful characters that transcends the stat sheets. Players also have time to write a brief background, which may/may not come into play. Because these are Iron caliber DMs, the adventure will be tweaked depending on your origin and team background.
* Encounters provide a balance of tactical challenging combat, brainteasing puzzles and multifaceted traps.
* The adventure is designed so that the PCs decisions impacts their experience in a non-linear fashion. Where as there is an "end goal" how you reach that goal will impact what that goal is and what happens during it. Every team also gets some type of closure on their adventure, so even the team that decided to wander around the grove all day, fighting Fey Devils would experience the end results of their actions.
* 3 different DMs judge the action. So their is a great minimization of being screwed by a bad DMs. You also get a different experience for each DM.
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2009 Iron Player Tournament Needs DMs/Designers
We're starting the creative process for the next Iron Player Tournament for next year's gencon. Last year, the tournament was a huge success, so much so that we had to turn away a few people because we ran out of two DMs (two guys quit on us at the last minute).This year, we decided to switch to teh Pathfinder campaign setting and ruleset. The tournament adventure will be based off of Golarion and follow one of the major mysteries about the world.

We're hoping to start early and change our creative process a bit. We are looking for strong DMs to help us make another successful Iron Player Tournament. This year we're not only inviting DMs into the process earlier, but we're listening to some of the DMs advice from last year and incorporating a method for them to run an adventure they have more familiarity with "their own" within our the tournament's story structure.

Last year was an ambitious yet successful project and we're looking to grow this year. This year we are taking even more chances to make the best player tournament at gencon. In order to more cater to each participating DMs strengths, we are changing the adventures structure. Last year, the organizers designed the entire adventure, and we realized the multiple paths structure was too much for a DM whom was not familiar with the process from the beginning. We also realized that we had paths that were not necessary. Though the players had a great time, the DMs had a lot of material they never used. This time, we're doing something different.

We're still doing the popular three DM system but changing it to both
a. still provide a non-linear structures that put the pcs in charge of their adventures
b. still make it easy for a DM to run and enjoy within their style.

THis time, DMs will have the option of designing their table's first part of the adventure based on guidelines, and instead of DMs receiving all of the subsequent paths, certain paths will only be handled by certain DMs, making a lot less material for the DM to be prepared for.

For those DMs who do not wish to create their own adventure or sign on to late to get in on the creative process, we will have a generic that could be run at any table.

If you plan on going to gencon next year and would like to get on board, shoot us an email at needdms@ ironplayer dot com

TOURNAMENT INFO
The Iron Player Tournament is a single day Role playing tournament. This year, we will be switching to the pathfinder role playing system (a slight upscale of 3.5). The tournament is designed to be a lot different than other tournaments. We have our tournament in a single day and create a process where no one judge determines your fate. Players will get to experience three DMs over the time period. Players make their own character at the event. We understand that it is still agame, and the event is designed so every player plays through the whole adventure. We designed this tournament to be the anti format of every other tournament at Gencon. Something fun yet competitive.

Players design their own character, a brief background and each table comes together to decide on the origin of their team. Because these are Iron caliber DMs. Players are judged by the DM on how they perform during certain tasks as well as how they contribute to the team overall. Each team will delve into three DMs' views of the world over their adventure.
The adventure is designed so that the PCs decisions impacts their experience in a non-linear fashion. Whereas there is an "end goal" how you reach that goal will impact what that goal is and what happens during it. Last year, we designed an adventure that could be tackled in a variant of ways and still stay within a structure where the player's rpg skills could be judged.
__________________
Iron Dungeon Master Dreads
www.ironplayer.com
Dark Paths

The Iron DM is looking for 1 player for his signature campaign world, Christaria Lives: Secrets of Mana. We play on Sundays from 4 to 10 in the Dearborn area.

The game world revolves around the pCs trying to rebuild a world after a catastrophic event that produced an ice age. Civilization has moved below ground as evil necromancers rule the surface in the midst of a dark ice age. The PCs have began building a magical dome city called Overland, and despite restoring the ice, they still find that through the evolution of Overland, so restores the hope of the world that the surface is not so dangerous. The players embark on short and campaign altering quests to help restore their city.

We use Paizo's amazing Pathfinder system with a few races not in the book. I have been DMing for 9 years, and enjoy running a game that combines excitement and good role playing. Our group consists of 5 players several have been playing for a couple years and the rest are life timers. We will accept both experienced and ready to learn gamers.

I and several other Iron DM allstars have put together a grand player event in the spirit of the Iron DUngeon Master Event. The Iron DM allstars are all top five finishers in the tournament. By far these are the best darn collection of DMs this side of Monte Cook's table.

Called the Iron Player Championships, the event is designed to be an RPG tournament that breaks the mold of other RPG tournaments. The idea was to combine all the good stuff about the tournaments that we liked, and try to deminish all of the negative stuff. The tournament judges the entire array of player skills and not just one or the other. Players will be judged by no less than 3 DMs as well, testing their ability to adapt to change in styles.

We also wanted to deminish the time required and yet give everyone a feel that they completed an adventure in the end, not just 1/3 of one. A little bit longer than a normal game (7 hours which includes some timely breaks), players will venture into an ancient grove to prevent an dioablical hell cult's grand scheme. The adventure contains a good balanced amount of tactically challanging combat, brainteasing puzzles and multifaceted traps.

Players design their own character, a brief background and each table comes together to decide on the origin of their team. Because these are Iron calibar DMs, the adventure will be tweaked depending on your origin and team background. Players are judged by the DM on how they perform during certain tasks as well as how they contribute to the team overall. Each team will delve into three DMs' views of the world over their adventure.

The adventure is designed so that the PCs decisions impacts their experience in a non-linear fashion. Where as there is an "end goal" how you reach that goal will impact what that goal is and what happens during it. Every team also gets some type of closure on their adventure, so even the team that decided to wander around the grove all day, fighting Fey Devils would experience the end results of their actions.

The event has took off, selling out in the first week and we're in need of extraordinary DMs who are eager to be apart of an amazing event. The event is Thursday, April 14th, from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. Because of the unconventional module, we need DMs who can perform off the cuff and bring their own flavor, charisma and style to the event. Each table incorporates the personal DMs own flavor, giving the event a more natural non formualic feel.

If you're interested leave some contact info and we'll bring you into the process.

Nathan
"dreads"

I like them, but I don't feel that they do enough to incorporate the skills of the opposing character. ON the surface, there is trip, sunder, grapple, bullrush, disarm and overrun.

What I did was add an opposing skill that can be added to the cmb of the opponent to determine the DC of the attack.

For instance, grapple has an opposing skill of escape artist. escape artist is added to the CMB score to determine the DC. The other abilities use athletics as an opposing skill.

Also for grapple, I took a note from the other combat maneuvers and determinded degrees of grapple depending on how well the dc is beat.

None of these abilities receive an "attack of opportunity" instead dependong how awful a player loses he receives negative reactionary results.

For example this is the reactionary result for a failed grapple.
Reactionary Results: 0 = 1/2 standard attack damage to opponent
-10 = full damage

AGain, the idea is to reduce the number of rolls in combat and always keep the focus of rolling on the players turn .

Attacks of Opportunity have often been the plague of many of game. What gets them, how many do you get and why? Does it make a heck of a lot of sense for a person who is fighting enemy b to automatically land one amazing hit on enemy a because he went into his pouch,. Mechanically it can bog down the game. Of course I am a fan that the fewer rolls the better.

I like to think of attacks of opportunity as reactionary hits, things you do on an inpulse against opponents who have let their guard down.
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When a character provokes an attack of opportunity, treat the person as if they were flatfooted. Deal half the damage to the character. If your opponent succeeded an acrobatic check, ignore executing damage. There is no limit on the number of attacks. However, your initiative is lowered by 2 each time you take an attack of opportunity. You can not lower your initiative below 1.
Any player reduced to 0 or below by an attack of opportunity is instead knocked unconscious.

If this is the second consecutive attack made against this opponent, deal full damage.
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When I came up with this rule the idea was to satisfy everyone.
1. PUnish npcs and pcs who perform risky maneuvers in combat
2. Try to figure out what a reactionary action would differ from a deliberate action
3. reward players who perform reactionary attacks on opponents they were already fighting.
4. Try to reduce the book keeping of keeping up on what npc performed an attack of opportunity.
5. Limit attacks of opportunity in combat and strengthen the importance of initiative