Richard D Bennett's page

We at Fat Goblin Games have heard tell that Intrigue is afoot over at Paizo. It must, therefore, be part of our master plan that Knowledge Check: Codes and Cyphers is available now here at Paizo.com!

Codes and Cyphers is your quick and dirty entry into the world of secret writing. The book starts with the history of secret codes in our own world, along with some notions on how to incorporate those themes into your own games. Players get spells, feats, a new archetype, and a set of easy-to-use hand codes to give a few new twists on the old brain teaser. For the GM, the Prismatic Chamber, a cabal of NPC cryptographers, stands ready to aid or vex your players as you see fit, and those hand codes work both ways, of course.

Break the code – get your copy today. It’s also available in Print over at RPGNow.com.

Can’t bite the cull now, wait for darkmans, when he’s clear.

Keep the secret speech of the streets in your back pocket! Add the clandestine tongue of thieves and swindlers to your game with the Thieves’ Cant Dictionary from Fat Goblin Games! With over 200 entries, the Thieves’ Cant Dictionary is your linguistic passport to a life of larceny and duplicity, all safely concealed in codewords and double-speak. Get yours now, before the Harman slaps the darbies on you!

The dictionary is world- and system-agnostic, the better to aid schemers and swindlers, wherever they gather.

The Iron Gods Adventure Path brought technology into the fantasy realm. Also, I've heard there's this movie trailer out the other day about a space fantasy story of some sort...

For those of you who want a little more circuit and lightning in your fantasy, Fat Goblin Games is here for you with Call to Arms: Fantastic Technology!

Call to Arms is a book line for players and gamemasters alike. Each book focuses on a different type of item, expanding rules for those items and adding everything from new mundane and magical examples of the item to new character options related to the item. Call to Arms: Fantastic Technology brings new eras of scientific advancement into your setting, including rules, setting, and plot options for researching and developing new technologies and applications. New kingdom-building rules let rulers build their fantasy nations into technological juggernauts, and new crafting rules help engineers bolt and tape technology onto their favorite mundane and magical weapons and armor. New setting concepts ease the gradual introduction of tech into fantasy worlds, gremlin-tainted crafting materials offer new ways to “curse” technological gear, and new artificially intelligent item options help get digital life out of its shell and into your sword. Capped with a new artifact, new legendary item abilities, and new feats, Call to Arms: Fantastic Technology makes it easier than ever to add super-science tech to classic swords and sorcery.

This represents the first product out of the Call to Arms line's Open Call that FGG did a few months ago. You'll get to read the work of some of the newest names in game design, along with some great old hands. Don't wait another minute! Go check it out!

My friends and I recently started playing Iron Gods. I had gotten into the semi-habit of writing campaign logs during our Shattered Star campaign, but I wanted to try something different for this go-round. Having just re-read a batch of Robert E. Howard's poetry, I decided to give it a go. At my GM's behest, I share with all of you.

Numeria, where iron flesh and languid steel
So sternly strive to see their saga soon unfurled
When wicked gods of metal sought to rule o’er man
The Seven came to light the Torch, to save the world

Hither came Bil, feral master of war and wild
The beast lord, the one called Death by his warrior band
Strength of a bull, swift as a hare, to swim, fly, fight
Technic chains will chip and shatter by his stern hand

Hither came Cathal, bright-eyed, dark-haired warrior born
Dragging all his shattered faith and his broken chains
Howling his endless rage to the vault of the stars
Bearing his sword to where the Black Sovereign still reigns

Also came Dysim – the scholar, wizard, trickster
From a fabled line of cheaters to play for all
Cunning of a survivor and a scholar’s sight
The lowly rogue silently takes the master’s hall

Gilimphiloditangle Giampalixatangle
A’chasing wonder, half a step ahead of death
The coward who could never turn his eyes away
Stealing into peril, never taking but one breath

Hither came Lantis, the dark accursed, the damned
Fine frippery veils a feral ferocity
Prophets of steel prayed to a bloody god
Came Lantis, their dire bloody reckoning to see

Came Veredel, master of metal and magic
Weaving enchanted words into the swords and spears
A shattered heart seeking solace in blood
The lives of foes will pay the price for elven tears

Came Zelaran, the thunderer of steel and fire
Roaring and striking like a raging hurricane
Chasing wisdom in the circuit, sprocket, and gear
Dealing dire vengeance with ferocious iron rain

By bonds, by blood, by hate were these men called to go
Into the murk, where evil on itself was curled
To the silver portal and to destiny’s gate
The Seven came to light the Torch, to save the world

NOTE UP FRONT: I am a player in this campaign, so please avoid spoiler-y analysis.

Our party has just completed The Varnhold Vanishing and I am left with a moral conundrum: a good chunk of the treasure of this book is bound up in the items that belong to the Varnlings we just went to hell and back to rescue. On the one hand, I get moral complexity. On the other hand, future AP writers are using a CR system that builds in presumptions about our level of equipment. Kingmaker has had its share of treasure designed to make the PCs' lives onerous (I'm looking at you, statues in the Dancing Lady's Tower), but this may be the first time that I cannot envision a way for a good-aligned party to take recompense out of what they have found.

What sort of reactions have other parties drawn to the way in which treasure is handed out, or not handed out, over the course of the adventure?

It has been almost a year since my Rise of the Runelords campaign came to a bloody conclusion in the depths of Runeforge. I took some time off to run some other games, try out some Pathfinder Society, and let my batteries recharge. When I saw the advertisements for Way of the Wicked, I was intrigued, but only a little bit – I’ve played in two “evil” campaigns in my gaming career (Begun in 1980). One of them was amazing: we were agents of the Zhentarim and I was playing a cleric of Bane. We worked together to enslave the Moonsea and beat the unholy hell out of Semmemon. The other was…well, it was bad. PvP combat was practically the rule and we never really got anywhere or accomplished anything. So I approached WotW with some hesitation. Gary McBride responded by not only dispelling my fears, but making me hungry to run a game once more.

Now, as much as I like Talingarde and the church of Mithra, my players want world they are familiar with. I considered setting the game in Golarion, but it felt like Golarion had enough troubles and the potent and righteous kingdoms waiting to be demolished were few and far between. However, I had been a Forgotten Realms player from way way back. My wife’s very first D&D campaign (1999) was in the Realms. One of my biggest complaints about Faerun was that villains seemed to have a pretty hard time of it. If you didn’t live in the Moonsea, there were Chosen of Mystra, Harpers, and a whole armada of good churches waiting to fall on your poor evil head. One the questions a Realms DM always has to answer is, “Why hasn’t (Insert mighty NPC name here, usually Elminster) solved this problem yet?” Bad guys get a raw deal in Faerun. It’s time for some payback.

So my Way of the Wicked campaign will see the PCs lay waste to the Forest Kingdom of Cormyr. They’ll do battle with Purple Dragon Knights and the Church of Torm (any god that refers to himself as the “True” God in a pantheon should be held suspect). In the coming months, I’ll make some posts about the conversions I’ve made to Cormyr and to the Church of Torm in order to bring so much of what I loved about Gary’s writing into the campaign. The campaign will not actually kick off until the New Year, but I've got a lot of work to do in the meantime!

It’s time for the champions of truth and justice to bend the knee.

This is something I put together for our local Kingmaker game. We have a number of folks playing gambling types and I wanted to add some real-world card games alongside Towers or the occasional round of Three-Dragon Ante.

Thus, I offer up for general consumption Golden Eagles Poker.

Enjoy!

My beloved bride is running Kingmaker (the set and an offer to run were last year's Christmas gift - I am a lucky man!). We're chronicling the game over at Obsidian Portal

Within the adventure logs, you'll also find some "behind the scenes" material from our mighty DM, as she breaks down her own experiences with putting the campaign together. The forums also include a semi-lengthy debate of letters on the shape of the new government.

Come for the political debates, stay for the Bearowl!

My players have currently planted themselves in the heart of Jorgenfist and are trying to figure out how to deal with Mokmurian. On my 2nd reading of books five and six, I've hit upon an idea for a somewhat radical change for ol' Karzoug.

The second half of this campaign involves a tremendous number of spellcasters in the role of BBEG. Barl Breakbones, then Mokmurian, then the many and varied wizards of Runeforge, finishing up with the the big Transmuter-of-Doom at the end. While themes can be good, it feels like two big problems could erupt:

1) The players develop a sense of tedium: One more spellcaster, one more battle with loads of annoying spells combined with the occasional explosion that ruins everyone's day.

2) As the players develop anti-spellcaster tactics, the possibility of them giving the arch-villain of the campaign a righteous pasting becomes more and more likely. The couple of threads I've seen noting games in which he was wiped from the field in a big hurry have reinforced this concern.

So I did some thinking about Karzoug's nature: As the Runelord of Greed, he's incredibly old, fantastically greedy, and highly intelligent. While a ten thousand-year-old wizard certainly fits the bill, I think there's something else that might fit as well, if not better.

I'm thinking of making him a Dragon.

Now the party will face two dragons en route - Freezemaw and Ghlorofaex, but there has been a surprising dearth of dragons in this particular campaign. It's also worth noting that I have a very simple reason I would like to make this change - that Colossal Red Dragon "miniature" sitting on my bookshelf. Making Karzoug into a Great Wyrm Red Dragon changes up a couple of things about the final encounter:

1) It makes combat a lot more visceral - the Burning Glaive notwithstanding, Karzoug as written will spend most of his time slinging high-powered magic at the party. While this presents interesting tactical challenges, the melee folks are at the mercy of necessary fly-items to get them to grips with the Wizard. While a dragon of such age and power would hardly need to engage in hand-to-hand, a mighty Red is the kind of dude to get his talons bloody.

2) It's a surprise for the players - Presuming that Karzoug dealt with his minions and fellow Runelords in a shapeshifted-human form, the players are expecting a mighty wizard. When said wizard transforms into a Colossal Dragon...well, I get a little evil giggle from imagining the looks on their faces.

I might have to redesign the Eye of Avarice a bit, though it's certainly a large enough space. It makes changes it altitude a bit trickier, as his flying ability will lack the precision of the spell. There's also the fact that his spellcasting will diminish significantly (though I may adjust that to make his spellcasting sufficient to the task of being a Runelord, even if it's not 20th-level Transmuter kind of power).

Is it a good idea? Will I end up TPK-ing the party? Am I letting my love of one big mini overwhelm good sense? Are there other changes I should be looking at? What do ya'll think?

So, did your wife get you all 6 episodes of Kingmaker for your birthday?

Did she then offer to run it for you?

I am a blessed and lucky man. That is all.

Thanks to my new job, I am confident that I will not have time to take part in National Novel Writing Month this year. This makes the second year I will not be participating; however, this year I am responding not with surrender, but with a different plan.

I am going to write an adventure.

I’ve been out of the adventure-writing business for about six years and it’s time to challenge myself again. According to the phenomenal Pathfinder podcast by d20 radio, your average Pathfinder 32-page adventure is somewhere from 25,000-30,000 words. So I’m going to give it my best shot.

Inspired by my time-sink-of-the-moment, Dragon Age, I want to write an adventure that provides players with choices that bear consequences. Not bad consequences, necessarily, but ones that are pretty much irrevocable. I also wanted to get away, at least in the larger story, from a very clear-cut bad guy. The story has one, to be sure, but he (or it might be “she” by Thanksgiving) doesn’t show up until the very end.

As befits a NaNoWriMo-esque project, I invented the plot on my hour commute home. I need it to be self-contained, but to hold parallel storylines depending on how the party makes its decisions. What I came up with is this:

A human outpost is the site of a negotiation in the process of breaking down. An Elven and a Dwarven settlement have already spilt blood and are simply finalizing the excuses they will use before erupting into a real fight. It’s a fight no one wants and that no one can really win but honor will not allow them to back away. Then the party arrives. Suddenly, both sides see a way to convince the other side that attacking would carry too high a price. Negotiations ensue, bribes are offered, threats are made – in the end the party must choose a side (and they will have to choose – to stand aside invites disaster). Once their choice is made, a series of events erupt: battles with scouts, prisoner rescues, dealing with mercenaries brought in by the other side. Eventually, the side that did not win the party’s support invokes a terrible weapon to try and snatch victory from the jaws of defeat. Should the PCs stop this last, desperate maneuver, they force a return to negotiations, though now with one side in a clear position of strength. The new honesty reveals a third party has been manipulating events. The party must deal with this manipulator and prevent doom from falling on this frontier region.

That’s the essence of it and it could very well change as the month progresses. Because NaNoWriMo is all about artificial deadlines to create impetus, the following deadlines have been imposed:
Week 1 (1-7 November): Plot Outline & Town
Week 2 (8-14 November): Siding with the Dwarves
Week 3 (15-21 November): Siding with the Elves
Week 4 (22-30 November): Dealing with the BBEG and wrap-up

It is my intention to post regular updates as I progress on this adventure. I want to create 3-5 encounters for each “Week”, along with the plot to thread all the events together.

It’s a ridiculous notion, which is why I’m sharing it with anyone who cares to hear: One is more likely to indulge in the ridiculous if one has proclaimed it to the world. Avanti!

What? That old saw? Yep. Sandpoint, having fallen through a Star Trekkian wormhole must be saved all over again the way everyone else already did...everyone but you.

I need 2-3 more players to round out our party. We're likely to play on Saturdays, also likely to play monthly. 18+ only, please.

I've started a campaign hub over at Obsidian Portal: RotR VA. It's small but it's mine and I love it. As we get closer to a full crew, there will be more data to share.

Cheers!