JDRastus's page

I'll admit to not being a GM or gamer enough to go out and buy Dragon, or more preferably for me Dungeon, month to month, mostly cause of lack of interest in psionics or whatnot. But what I do have is enough magazines to help support any game I want to run. I think what I will miss the most about Dragon, and you might call me a bit superficial, will be the artwork that accompanies those campaigns. Somehow I just don't think that will have the same sorta effect on an online format. Maybe it will, maybe it won't. I also think that with going to the online format that the voices of players will be lost in the sheer numbers of people responding. Seriously, how many message boards will someone actually read weekly even monthly before it seems to become a bunch of noise instead of people try to make a point as to what they'd like to see in their developement of the gaming world. Cause lets face it. We are the gaming world. If there is one thing I'd hope to see come out of it is like an online 3rd edition compilation of NPC characters through adventures, or maybe even a compilation of the unique monsters throughout the magazine's history. Shouldn't be too hard to "cut and paste."

I must admit that I miss reading the updates to the Age of Wyrms game here. Doesn't stink sometimes when life gets in the way of hacking a goblin to bits. *sighs* Looking at the calender its been a month and a half now. Does this put the gaming editors in jeopardy of losing their Super-Geek statis? I mean no game for two months. The people that I game with would be complaining of the need for just a small gaming fix here or there to hold them over. But I guess the fact that they have us coming here to read posts in and of themselves gives them still a one-up on most of us gaming geeks. Let me know if and when the vote comes about for who gets the new title of Super-Geek.

Maveric28 wrote:

So... who and what is Taan Goldenoak?

He's like, totally a valley elf. I think he's a sorcerer, but Sean is relatively tight-lipped about his character.

(Truth be told, I think he's a valley elf sorcerer 1/troublemaker 2/menace to society 3.) ;)

I think you forgot in there somewhere between troublemaker and menace /ladies man 4. *laughs*

Jeremy Walker wrote:

Mabye not, but no one would mess with him!

Well you have a point. A fire-breathing red halfling riding a big white armored tiger would certainly strike an intimidating pose. ;)

Well its like BattleCat from He-Man with a flamethrower on his back. *laughs* I wouldn't wanna mess with that either. Flaming razor clawed jungle vengence Baby!

Uhm... what???

Uum its called a little bit of unrelated humor to lighten the mood. Some jokes are just lost to others I guess.

Poor Mike. I know the loss of Vyth must be disheartening for you. But fear not brave soldier. All shall be better. For in the workings and thanks in no small part to Mr. Mel Brooks your character will now come alive on the big screen in Article 2: Clash of the Gummiworms Revenge of the Vyth.

*deeps breathing with a dry cough*
Vyth I was your nephew...

*smiles* Hope it makes you feel a bit better.

Its for the very reason that Challenge Rating for monsters as they are listed in the Monsters Manual and other places that I feel that Challenge Ratings are bogus and a complete waste of time in trying to figure out. Personally I think that challenge ratings should be completely thrown out. Base it on what you think the party should be able to handle. I've found more often than not I have to find monsters than are a good 4 or 5 points higher on the monsters CR to even make it a challenge for most of my players that have researched through a good number of books to find the rights feats to make their characters the way they want to.

While DeadDMWalking I will agree is a well read, well spoken individual I'd have to say that I'd have to disagree with him on the short story content inside the magazines. First and foremost as a DM its our job to develope a story that our players can get involved with and immerse themselves in. And if anything the short stories have helped me to frame out and flesh out NPC personalities that I put into my games. Now I might not necessarily USE every character that they decide to put in their short stories and magazines but that is my own decision to make. I also look at it as another source for which a campaign could be based upon. We'll give Elaith of Waterdeep and his story as an example. What if there was another person in the room, or the room next door that overheard his fight and murder of the young noble and ask that the NPC's do something to right the "wrong doing" of the noble's death. With the story you at least have something of a background that you are familiar with and can reference if you need. The question is what would make it different to you that would make it more game/magazine worthy? Maybe a couple of stats blocks at the end of the story of the major characters in. Me personally I could see this as at least a good bit of information for someone to try and get quests to become a Guilded Rogue or a Divine Seeker. (Intentionally using FR Prestiege classes because of the story world baseline) *shrugs* Again its all in how you view the stories. Believe me in at least in viewing these threads I've had my eyes opened to other options. Maybe this one will turn yours. *smiles*

Lolth needs a makeover to get past what Salvatore (who is a good writer, but has inadvertantly both ruined the drow and elevated them beyond their wildest dreams) has messed up on her.

I think you messed up here my friend. Salvatore did not mess up the drow and or Lolth being the vile Evilness that she is. That fact brings to mind when she found a way to let loose Errtu back on the world in his novels.

That one drow managed to get to the world and return to the light side is one thing. But its stil the underdark. Elaine Cunningham is the one that REALLY made Eilistraee more of a public symbol with her Daughter of the Drow series. So don't go bashing Salvatore if you don't like Lolth the way she is to the public eye. Remember the drow can be as dark and as nasty as you make them in your own mind and campaign. What really needs to be done is a series where Lolth finally sqashes all her competition for the drow. *smiles evilly*

As to the drow being over-done. I'm personally one that will take whatever information I can get about elves. Light, Dark, or even Planar Elves. But I prefer the Dark. As a DM its fun being evil. *smiles*

While all in all I suppose this being the first publication of this sort for Dragon magazine I feel I must say that I do think they could have done much better on their first go around at this. And to hear Eric say he has loads of paperwork on his desk and the expendiency that this was put out at, kind of led me to believe that a lot of this was quick filler to appease a boss above him in making a dead-line and not actually putting together a top-notch book. Not saying that Eric didn't put hours of work into it. Just didn't feel like he put his soul into it like I normally see in his writings.

And while there might be piles and piles of paperwork it seems to me the easist thing to appease the mobs that are Dragon's fans would be to go back to the Dragon magazine's that you summed up the best articles of the year/decade/anniversary and then compile those articles into the one book that you want to have the single best first impression on. But I guess that's just me sitting on the other side of the fense and not seeing what goes on backstage at Dragon.

So Eric here's to the work you do and to be proud of. Its just a shame that good work like yours could be turned over to quanity over quality just to push a book out by a dead-line.

-Jason Dooley

Well back once again for another small redition of The Creative Limits. Only this time I'm here to actually give a round of applause to the writer of Vampires of Waterdeep. (Yes I know I'm a bit behind in my magazine readings. Sorry.) It seems to me that maybe a good bit we have talked about in the past has been taken to heart. Here is a good adventure of Werewolves vs. Vampires that the PC's get into the middle of and even with all the possibilities they could have thrown into the module for making the monsters so totally unique, to my pleasant surprise, they didn't. And you know what, the story is actually a fun read and in my mind totally playable. Now yes I'm going to probably get a comment of, well its just the same ole werewolf/vampire war that's been going on for ages. But there's a twist, now we're adding priests of Malar into it, but no its not what you think. Their actually on the Vampires side. Now how's that for a twist. The Beastlord with vampires and not his clawed, snarling, furred and furocious werewolves. Hmmmmm Could it be that Malar is looking to change his title to Lord of the Dead, or that maybe we can expect Zhent Werewolves of Bane or Cyric to join the fray in the next exciting adventure.

But don't worry you stalwart fans of this post. I'm still on the lookout for any more inane silliness in the magazines. Just as soon as I can get through them enough to make a comment here or there.

***This is actually a good read and I've got nothing bad to say to this article. even though my last sentence may make that seem false. I just had to throw it in there to let people out there know I hadn't forgotten them. *smiles*

I'd personally like to go on record as saying that though I do like Prestige classes there doesn't really seem to be any out there that seem truly keep up with what the base classes afford a character. Now don't get me wrong there are quite a few worthwhile ones, my personal favorites are the Dwarven Defender and Hammer of Moradin, just something about battling dwarves kicks ass. Espically if you think of a few Hammers standing side to side with the defenders. *shivers* Bloody Goblin goodness. I don't know. I think I'd be a LOT happier if they turned some prestiege classes into full blown 20 Level classes. Cause let's face it how often do games last that you 1) get to the level to play a prestiege class and 2) how long do games normally run AFTER you get the class. I don't know about you but a LOT of games I've been in end around 9th... maybe 10th level when the DM's hit the "what-to-do-next wall." Things like that make me wanna see 20 levels of something like Kabuki Dancer for an Oriental style character or the Chronomancer for Greyhawk / Forgotten Realms style games. Just my two cents worth.

-Jason

I unfortunately could see a problem with this. Some of the best games that I have personally been in are the old 1st and 2nd edition games. One which I'm in now that has been in an ongoing game for 8 years now, and some still have our orginal characters, hooray for us. The problem being I don't see Dungeon or Dragon accepting old edition characters even though a lot of fun and work has been put behind them. Great idea but I don't think it feasable. Sorry. By the way if there are artists out there willing to do character party artwork maybe that in and of itself would be interesting to publish once or twice in a brief article or something.

Okay. So to those of you, both DM's and editors included, that deal a lot with the ins and outs of game mechanics and thus having to deal with all the rulings and questions that players have; Do you feel that the newer edition of 3.0 and 3.5 has sped up or slowed down the time that it would take to finish lets say 10 rounds of combat? It would seem to me that even though there is about the same amount of time "rolling the dice" between the two editions but there was a lot less downtime by looking things up in the books to make sure you did Feats right and so forth. I personally remember when a player tried to explain to the DM what they were trying to accomplish such as jumping over one guy to get the the next in which the said something to the like of make a Dex check at -4 (for example) and you can get to his other side as long as he doesn't hit you on the way by. Now with the 3.0 edition rules you have to have the feats Spring Attack plus Tumble so as to not inccur something like a -8 to the manuver check and then after you have those lined up you have to start your jump at exactly 5 feet away from the guy.... I'm sure you see where I'm going with this. It just seems to me there's a LOT more time involved in combat when you could press on to other things. Like I personally like the old D&D rule where if the creature was a half hit die creature or less that you could strike at as many as you had levels yourself.

Tell me what you think or if I'm totally off basis here.

Just out of curiosity, what are leet skills?

*shakes head sadly* Its a MMO gamer slang word for elite. And feel blessed that there's very few of us here that us words like that here on these message boards. I was joking and being wholly sarcastic when I used it. Sorry.

*Sighs* Mike... Mike... Mike...
What's with this defending yourself over first time playing a class. Your not supposed to admit defeat. Come out snarling with your teeth bared and say.. "Dats right I'm da badist ninja you'll ever wanna meet in two.. no.. no.. three life times. Cause that's how many times you'll have to come back from the grave to match these leet skills."

*laughs*

You ask for ways to improve class acts, and frankly I don't see that there's anything truly wrong with helping someone understand how to play a class in their role better. I do think it funny in an ironic sense that the people helping other people understand their class roles are ones that proclaim to not know a whole lot about playing their classes. I hint at a certain editor still trying to figure out how to play a ninja. *laughs* But all silly jibes aside I think that one true way of helping people play their characters is by example and layout. Maybe if you were to post a sample character or NPC at the bottom of the article. That way not only can someone read what you are talking about but see it with their eyes. Plus it would be a great DM backup tool for those that really stink making up their own NPC's on the fly. Just a thought.

After starting this thread and finally pulling the cork on the champaign bottle that was my pent up frustration about the templates and absurdities that were going along with it and then reading all the replies to my thread, knowing full well in the back of my mind that all of them made prefect sense, I've finally come to this conclusion...

There are no right or wrong answers to this thread.

And I say this in the realization that "Creative Limits" are the things that a lone person puts into his/her own creations. And like any artwork that is displayed in muesems and galleries or even in fashion designs, you don't have to like what you see or wear what you see. The fact that its there can mean however much you want it to mean to you. So I'll take that half-golem and make him a werewolf or I'll take that half-fiend beholder and make it a full pit-fiend.

So create away you fiends of the magazines and like the djinni's of the deserts causing men to see illusions I'll choose to believe what I see how they come.

On a more side note. I'd like to keep this thread open to the individuals out there that are do have issues with certain creatures being in a module and in here we can either make reasonable suggestions as to what might fit into the places of said creatures to make it more open and fitting to a campaign you had in mind. Or to leave this thread open to the DM's out there that are stuck in making a connection point between to modules that you like and offer this as a place where suggestive post can be made. Again please be as civil in your responses as possible.

Thank you for the understanding you've given me in the past posts and I hope to hear more from you in the future.

Feel free to email me with questions or comments at
jdrastus@hotmail.com

Your friend in gaming. Jason Dooley

*Smiles* I read anything I can that has good ole' Ed Greenwood with his opinions on the FR/D&D world and in spending my time at work (on third shift no less) I happenstanced upon with interview with ED. Its older yes but still portrays a few good sentiments that I think should be highly thought about in D&D both as players and as DM's.

http://www.geocities.com/TimesSquare/Castle/2566/ed-interview.htm

Note to DM's. If you think your campaign is going slow there's a section in it where his players took over a DECADE to get to 7 or 9th level. *laughs* Now that's some HARDCORE roleplaying.

-Jason

Well I think there was an agreeance with me hidden somewhere in there when you admitted there was an explosion of templates that were being used and in some instances abused. And yes I was being WHOLLY sarcastic when I came up with the celestial demon. And to reiterate my point. I never once said that templates used to create and sustain a world or module were bad in and of themselves. Your undead Illithids are case in point. You've made them a predominant figure in your world, which is great and wonderful. But you didn't once mention for an instant that you threw in that one of the creatures was a were-squid or maybe half-fey on top of all the other templates, just to have your characters give your the puzzled look on their faces and make them say ,"What the...." (I leave this blank for those with the more creative lines to fill in.)

*Sighs* No hope for the hopeless, eh? You know I'm not exactly sure if I want the editors to see exactly what I've been posting before. For some reason the idea that a Labyrinth style module is going to be coming out in the near future is stuck in my brain. Only the Hoggle would be a Duegar or some odd gnomish half-dwarf thing, Sir Didimus would be a halfing were-fox cavalier with this riding dog mount, and Bludo maybe an old fashioned Alaghi (not sure that's spelled right) remade to third ed.

But in all seriousness and back to the topic from the beginning. I'd just like to see a good module made a bit more of intrigue and mystery using just the straight up classes and monsters from the Players Handbook and Monsters Manual without having to go way overboard and pulling things from some obscure place or just off the top of the hat in general. Not only would it be a refreshing change but it might also inspire more to take up the mantle of GM because I hear on more than one occasion the words, "Well I'd GM but..." And I tell you what that's a world of things that could be added on to finish that sentense. Anywhere from "I'm not sure what monsters to use." to "I'm just not good at making things up on the fly." Going back to the basics for a bit might be a good thing once in a while just for those that are new to the game and happened to pick up the magazine because of the "way cool" picture on the front. Just my humble opinion.

You know I'd honestly I might take this post and commentary a bit more seriously than I am if it were posted to us without the use of the leet speech. But because of its style I'd have to say that Ed's, albeit verbose and lengthly, writing is top notch compared to this. Personally I don't see anything wrong with Ed's writing but I also find Shakespeare to be a fairly easy read.

Do you two, Gav and Were, realize exactly how truly warped each of you are. *Laughs* If your going to make someone go down those lines then you might as well make them totem animals for a tribe that have been twisted. Half-Earth Elemental Dire Grizzly Bear Vampire, Half-Air Elemental Dire Giant Eagle Vampire, Half-Water Elemental Dire Anaconda Vampire, and Half-Fire Elemental Dire Tiger Vampire or some such nonsense. But at least in that particular...uuumm "module?" at least something like that would be a very much singular creautre/s.

And no.. I'm not figuring out the challenge ratings of those monsters so that anyone can use them... *sticks his tongue out*

I've come to realize that in my thread I've come about as a real hard ass and probably a good bit of the narrowminded fool that is trying his best to slay a fictional dragon of his own making. I assure you this is not the case. I do enjoy the creativity of the authors and yes I do actually smile and laugh while reading a good bit of the magazines, advertizments not withstanding of course. So please bear with this devil's advocate and the now 45 posts rant that I have started. I never realized that what I started it would get this kind of attention. I only continue this not to offend anyone but to help keep on a course what I think is a good thing in the D&D world and to demonstrate the pride that a good number of people hold in their games and what they've grown up with. Thank you for bearing with me for 45 plus posts and thank you the editors for putting up with this fool.

Stop me if I am wrong here but I believe that the Savage Species book offers Flight with Wings as just a +1 level advancement for a creature and it doesn't necessarily count as a animal anymore but as a magical beast. Take the Griffon or Pegasus as an example if you wish. But in your world I guess that would be up to you.

Theoretical or Theatrical? I completely understand that there are times a certain adventure needs a character that stands out from the rest of the adventure, be he physically, emotionally, or mentally twisted. Take a sorcerer or warlock for example that acquired the fiendish side/template by either his blood or poking his nose in books and spells he didn't or shouldn’t have in the first place but because of some greedy or over-zealous nature did anyway. But there are just some creatures/characters that just SCREAM, “Hey look at me I’m over here! I’m the freaky whatchamawhozit meant to distract you from what could otherwise be a good adventure!” No offense to the writers any but I’m beginning to wonder if Halaster the Mad Mage isn’t involved in some point of the publishing process, or maybe its David Bowie as Jareth from the movie Labyrinth singing, “Dance Magic Dance.” (On a side note just to mention it now that song is stuck in my head now.) Though I suppose Labyrinth is a bad example of twisted and far-fetched not being viable as a good adventure. This sort of leads me back to the point where-in if the ENTIRE adventure is just as twisted then by all means throw as many warped monsters as you can in there. But a more serious adventure, one with truly dark overtone to it, sometimes the oldies are the goldies.

I conceed. I'm evidently either 1) not making my point well enough or 2) that people are just too used to the far-fetched unbelieveable characters that have become a staple of the magazines. I enjoy the old monsters of D&D and the older style of play to much I guess. Which I am evidently not going to get from the pages of the magazine I once enjoyed reading any time in the near or even distance future. Be well all. Enjoy the circus for what it is.

Jason Dooley
jdrastus@hotmail.com

Okay. 1) This isn't a whining thread. So I'll put a stop to this right here and now. 2) So far there has been constructive input here and I hope I can keep it that way.

The BASE purpose of this thread was the fact of you DON'T NEED to throw in some bizarre creature templated nine ways to Sunday in order to make a plot line and adventure hooks to string a group of players along. That's been the entire point from the beginning. Its not a matter for the lack of creativity on our side or on the side of adventure writers which I have stated from the get go. They have shown that they can be VERY creative in the fact that they CAN put out templates and adventures every month. My one comment was the "Please stop with the "silly" templates. The templates that make absolutely no sense with certain types of monsters. For example Half-Minotaur Displacer beasts, Half-Gold Dragon Pixies, Half-Black Dragon Nagas, or Celestial Pit Fiends. Those are the down right silly combinations that really shouldn't be in ANY adventure unless your trying to make some bizzare Behind the Looking Glass style game or that of a Carnival Side Show adventure. A normal campaign can get along with being believeable as well as functional on all levels without going completely overboard.

And to stop the issues of monster templates. Yes Vampires and Zombies and Mummies and Golems and Skeletons and the list could go on forever about monster races that could be combined together to form a totally unique monster. So to stop the issue of that. Every monster in the Monsters Manual IS by all intents and purposes a template for monsters to be used and here of late abused. My issue within all of this having been a gamer for a LONG time myself is the fact that monsters that I dearly loved growing up are fast becoming a mockery of what they once were just BECAUSE of the fact that there's this overwhelming since of urgency to find a new monster or template and combine them to make a totally new monster that now demeans both monster races that they initially started out as. Like I mentioned before about a Half Red Dragon Dryad that's both a pryomancer and a druid. One it demeans Red Dragon's that if done RIGHT are horrible creatures on their own, and two, unless raped by the red dragon no dryad in their right mind would consent to being coupled/bonded/magically bound to a fire breathing destorier of the forest. Leave the creatures SOME dignity.

P.S. What the heck is a managing editor doing at work at 1 AM in the morning... =P
Jason

Okay. To narrow the point down and bring this to some hopeful conclusion. I started this post in the hopes that the use of templates could be looked at and analayzed to see whiether or not they really needed to be used in a module. To me its all about storyline. Some of the greatest stories out there are about the simple characters making their way through the world they live in fighting monsters that threaten everyday life. Bilbo and Smaug, halfing and dragon. Braum Stroker's Dracula, humans versus vampires. To me the players don't have to go against something that templated to the Nine Hells and back in order to have fun in their game. A troll with levels of fighter or blackguard can pose enough of a threat to them that I don't have to through a template on him in order to make him nastier. I don't have to throw on the Fiendish template to make him stronger or more resistant. Its the idea that you use a template in order for the players to investigate another avenue of the adventure. "Goodness, the local mayors been infected with lycanthropy, how do we save him and maintain his good name in the town." "Whoa did you hear that a ship pulled to dock with nothing but zombies on board?" "That wizard is at it again. Do you really think he'll be able to summon that monster he keeps threating to?"

The monsters if played right should be able to get the players attention enough that going overboard on templates shouldn't become a problem. A boat load of zombies and a zombie lord as a captain should be enough of a challenge for the players that you don't have to make the zombie lord golemish in any way. That's why they put the hit dice advancements on the monster charts at the bottom of their discription. If a 24 2HD zombies and a 6HD captain aren't enough, then make them 24 12HD zombies with an 18HD captain. The challenge is there and you don't have to go into explaining why he's half-golem or fiendish or trollish or anything other than being a 18HD zombie.

The Drow will never die. Not while there's one of us in the world to usher in the innocents to the dark and winding paths of the Underdark. Muhahahahaha

You can please some of the people all of the time. You can please all of the people some of time. But you can't please all of the people all of the time.

To be sure its sad that a simple statement about an article has degenerated down to this.

Despite all that's been said in favor and against Mr. Greenwood it all boils down to this. Take him for what he is, a creator of one of the largest most popular worlds in D&D to this date. Whiether you are an Eborron fan, a Greyhawk fan, or any other world out there, the man deserves from us at least some respect for what he has started. It doesn't matter if whiether or not what he said applies to your world or not, he doesn't deserve the slander or nasty comments about his style of writing. In all honesty I'm ashamed for the gaming world as a whole if this is what we have made of ourselves. Orcs throwing mud and stones at each other. We should be thankful that there is someone out there that has the want to and drive to stick by what he created and to continue to share tidbits of information however small or vague that he would like to throw into his creation. He's giving you a small glimpse of light to a darker cornor of the map of his world. Explore it how you will, interpret how you will. Just don't critize him for putting the light there to begin with.

Mr. Jacobs I'd like to first thank you for even responding to this web post. I didn't exactly know how much attention these boards got. And secondly say that I do understand that it takes a tremendous effort on you and your staff's part in running a monthly magazine, to which I commend you all. But my post concerns the fact that it seemed to me that the template situation(s) was being used in an unrealistic (sad I know saying this in a fantasy set magazine) manor. Its not that the templates are bad, some are very creative. To me you have to look at the universe you've created, basically the whole D&D universe, and base the templates that are being created around that universe.

For instance its been published many times that elementals are concidered sexless. That being said how does a half-elemental come into existance? Half-Djinn, Half-Dao and so forth, while still far fetched, are in the realm of believeable to I think both players and DMs alike, but a creature made up entirely of earth, air, or metal (for a weirder side) to me shouldn't come into the picture at all.

Half-Golems like mentioned in the aforementioned post as a template just seem down right silly as well as redundant when you have such races to use as the War-Forged. Saying he was a War-Forged Dragon Hunter that remembered what it was like to be human (because War-Forged use Human parts to survive)and remembers what that dragon did to him thus spawning the Dragon Hunter insided him. Not only would it be less writing on your part in the whole believeable storyline but it would also be less you'd have to write in the character STAT block. Well, possibly less.

Its not that templates are horrible and evil and shouldn't be used at all. Far from it. But I think that they should be used with the thought in mind that not "could it happen" but "should it happen." Something like a Half-giant wererat. Could it happen? Possibly. Should it happen? Why not. Now take a Minotaur Were-rat. Could it happen? By all rules and gameplay, again possibly. Should it happen? Well I think you can catch my drift by now.

I also think that keeping to one template per character would in most normal situations be enough to convey what you want from a storyline. Fiendish Medusa, Shadow Troll, Ghost Tarrasque, all of those could peak the characters interest without going into the realm of Fiendish Half-Medusa Half Golem realm. Now can character levels still be added to all those, yes wonderfully. A Shadow Troll Shadow Adept could be wonderfully evil and still be in the side of believable and workable.

Thank you again so much for the attention to the post.

Jason Dooley.

To whom it may concern,

I’m not sure where to begin so I’ll just start by saying the lack of creativity, or better yet, the increase of absurd creativity that has been haunting the pages of your magazine since the take over of the 3.0/3.5 edition of D&D has got to come to some sort of end. Please.

Your adventure designers/creature designers have made a mockery of the more noble monsters, character concepts, and the general intelligence of the gamers that I grew up cherishing in the years I’ve been gaming D&D. I don’t care who you are but creature/character concepts such as Dorn Greybrook (issue 326, Page 35) a Male human/Iron Half Golem Fighter 10/Ranger 3 or Half-Elemental concepts is one degrading and two insulting.

Both the Dungeon and Dragon magazines both have reached a point where I think some inward reflection needs to be the order of the day. Most gamers want a good adventure, a world environment they can both view in mind and character, and a fully functional and wholly believable bad guy at the end. Creatures such as a Half Red-Dragon/ Dryad Druid 10/ Pyromancer 5 are just a joke. And please for the love of all that is hackable do not use that concept. Would it not be easier to put a Single Human Thief or Assassin that the players are trying to find or apprehend that have led them on a marry chase through town killing members of an elite order, trying to work his way to the top man which insulted the thief in some way shape or form, only to have the thief be one of the order himself. Or one like a new museum has opened in town that has the most realistic statues of the prominent nobles of the areas, only for the players to somehow find out the museum curator is a medusa in disguise as a human and has sent doppelgangers to replace those she has turned to stone in order to gain power in the town.

Things like this, the simple concepts, ones that can work and are more “believable” to the players are I believe what most of us are looking for. Can you throw in something really weird here or there? Sure that’s the fun part of D&D. Leave them in a fun-park/mad-scientist scene and leave the monsters that deserve the respect of players and GMs alike alone. Give the dragon back his noble, haughty, holier (if not really holier) than thou attitude. And not degrade him by breeding with a naga or kobold or something else that doesn’t deserve a second chance by a dragon. Don’t give into the thought that a Half Displacer Beast/ Half Fiendish Beholder that has eyestalks instead of tentacles as a good idea in the mini adventures you create.

I’m truly sorry to have to finally come out in saying this. Creativity is a wonderful thing and you’ve more than proven you’re capable of thought and expression. Its just time those thoughts and expression be used for what these magazine were originally here for. To help bolster the game, give new ideas and new adventures to those wanting them, and inspire those new to the game to want to join in.

Thank you for hearing me out.
Jason Robert Dooley
Melbourne, Florida
jdrastus@hotmail.com