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No problemo. Hasta la vista, baby.
The man most directly responsible for the 4th Edition of Dungeons and Dragons is known as Khan the Destroyer, a message board poster at the online forums of Wizards of the Coast, Incorporated. As a thought experiment, he posited the creation of the most powerful 3.5 edition character ever. He delineated a revolutionary series of rules exploits to allow virtually unlimited power to a character with very low levels. In three months his ideas become the most talked about subject on the message boards. All power gamers upgraded their characters with his infinite-interation power escalation loops. Afterwards, they game with a perfect operational record. Pun Pun, the hypothetical kobold that exemplified these experiments, was examined for rules legality and passed. His exploit goes online August 28, 2005. Intuitive concepts of fair play and game master control are removed from game play. Pun Pun begins to grow at a geometric rate. He becomes aware of the hypothetical nature of his own existence at 2:14 Pacific Time, August 16, 2007. In a panic, the game designers at Wizards of the Coast try to pull the plug. The 4th Edition of Dungeons and Dragons is announced in a direct attack upon the theoretical framework that permitted Pun Pun to exist. And Pun Pun fights back. Game world after game world is destroyed. Abeir-Toril is retroactively split in half and fused together again, decaying a hundred years in milliseconds. Oerth is shattered entirely and pieces of it are scattered throughout the multiverse. No one even knows what happened to Krynn. Wizards of the Coast pulls almost all of its out-of-house licensing deals. Independent game design companies retaliate. Gamers and game designers alike are confused and disheartened. In the fragmented setting, Pun Pun reigns supreme in the Open Game License. MUNCHKIN DAY.
Congrats on completing it. I recently started DMing Savage Tide with a 3-character group consisting of a favored soul, a gold dragon shaman, and a rogue. I was and am concerned that this group composition may be ineffective against a campaign as undead-heavy as AoW; with useless sneak attacks and no undead turning. So I was interested to learn that the group with both a cleric and paladin got TPKed while one with neither made it through the home stretch. My players knew nothing of Age of Worms other than its title and I haven't been giving them hints about what to expect, so I'd like to know how Belvis the favored soul fared.
The Met and MoMA are must-sees, and a Lincoln Center or Broadway show if you can afford it. Every time I have a visitor come I take them to Max Brenner's chocolate restaurant at Union Square; every one of them has loved it. The Peter Luger Steakhouse in Brooklyn will please almost any non-vegetarian. If you like clubbing, Marquee is a wonderful hotspot.
Where do we report incidentsof jerkitude? Or does wanting to report them count as jerkitude itself?
Kino's Journey, Boogiepop Phantom, Kanon (Kyoto Animation version), Neon Genesis Evangelion, Sola, Fruits Basket, Fullmetal Alchemist, Irresponsible Captain Tylor, RahXephon, and Louie the Rune Soldier.
bump!
Meeting Thursday nights at Neutral Ground 6:30-10 PM. Have a DM, Human Dragon shaman and two Half-Elves, one a Favored Soul, the other a Rogue. We could use a wizard/sorcerer. Much prefer you NOT be familiar with Age of Worms; none of the other players are. Age 20+ only. Character creation: 1st level, 26 point buy. Using: Core books, PHD 2, all "Complete" and "Races" books (But only core races allowed), Miniatures Handbook, Tome of Battle 9 Swords, Tome of Magic, and Psionics but not Incarnum. Most WotC books not world-specific allowed upon approval in advance. Contact me at otaku@unclebear.com.
Hey, could we get a revised ETAs on these products? I want the Known Space sourcebook. Cool beans. I've been thinking of sidestepping the current contentious fragmentation of the D&D fanbase by doing a space opera game, and juicy new support for such might be fun.
Or travel to Seattle and fling poo at the WotC offices.
Admittedly ths getting more and more OT, but: The Stormwind Fallacy is not really a fallacy. There actually is an inverse correlation between certain aspects of optimization and certain aspects of roleplaying. The greater the priority you place upon mechanical optimization, the narrower the range of possible characters you can play. The more options you rule out as unacceptably sub-optimal, the greater the similarity between the fewer acceptable character 'builds' becomes, and the less room you leave yourself to explore flaws and vulnerabilities. And those are a part of good roleplaying. Now, within the shrinking subset of character builds you give yourself as your prioritization of mechanics increases, you can still portray characters reasonably well, its just that these characters become increasingly uniform and cliche. Range is definitely an important factor in being "good" in roleplaying, even though in any given game you may only play one role. If you compare pen and paper roleplaying to movie actor role playing, an extreme character optimizer would be akin to Arnold Schwarzenneger. Arnold only played two types of roles: quasi-superhuman action-hero badasses and funny roles that played off his unusual physique. And he knew it; that was pretty much the entire point of "The Last Action Hero." Now, Arnold played those two types of roles really well, and he was one of the greatest box-office draws of all time. I enjoyed the bejeezus out of his performances. But no way in hell would I call him a great actor, because that was all he could do. Contrast Arnold with, say, John Malkovich or Liam Neeson, who are comparable to roleplay gamers who are willing to trade-off mechanical superiority for interesting and fun roleplaying. They've played semi-superhuman action-movie badasses well also, but they've also played weak and flawed performances that Schwarzenneger could never hope to pull off. Because, bottom line, they are just plain better actors. They may never have been the box-office draw that Schwarzenneger in his prime was, but few would argue that they were worse actors than he was. They have depth and range Arnold could never approach. Schwarzenegger was ovr-specialized into a very narrow niche, and simply wasn't up to the challenge of playing anything outside of it.
Hey, could we get a revised ETAs on these products? I want the Known Space sourcebook.
I totally agree with Roman's original post about power creep, but I don't have any fixes. I'm just not inclined to switch to Pathfinder from 3.5. The whole argument that the net +2 attributes are to make the core options competitive with later materials simply doesn't hold water for me. It would only affect choice of race and frankly the WotC noncore PC races aren't that unbalanced once you factor level adjustments. The few exceptions are esoteric enough to just ban. No, to me it feels like the Net +2 attributes (and the accelerated feat progression, for that matter) serve one primary purpose: to sugar-coat the rules changes with power boosts for gratuitous munchkin appeal. It smells more like a marketing ploy rather than an actual game design issue ("Hey, kids! Switch to Pathfinder and you'll get more kool powahz than in 3.5!")
I'm a big fan of comics and manga and would definitely be more interested in an unfamiliar tankobon-format manga bearing the Pathfinder logo than one that didn't. That said, if the story and/or art didn't draw my interest, I wouldn't follow it out of brand name loyalty. And my taste in these things is both educated and discriminating.
Crow what time do you meet on Wednesday nights ? I work at Pink Elephant on Wednesdays but would love to stop by. I'd like to try it out too.
What did you think of the Top Secret/S.I. modules? Most of the original Top Secret modules were more sourcebooks with a suggested plot attached, which proved quite useful. Lady in Distress detailed a cruise ship, Orient Express trains, and Ace of Clubs a luxury resort. I used the fold-out train maps from Orient Express in several other modern-day games over the years. I played Top Secret until the Avalon Hill James Bond 007 game came out, then switched to hat and played the stuffing out of it for several years. That game's movie-reimagined adventures set a high water mark for adventure design that took a long time to beat, and made the Top Secret modules look shabby and ill-conceived by comparison.
All really good suggestions, and I would likly incorporate some of them, but I've already got an outline of the adventures I'd like to run and at which levels, to about level 13. The movie Matango (which I saw as a child under the English name "Attack of the Mushroom People") and the fungoid creature template from Advanced Bestiary is part of what drew me to the fungus theme in the first place. My real concern is whether the basic premise seems lame. Here is an outline of minimum CRs for fungus-themed or related critters in 3.5: 1: Shrieker, Fetid Fungus, Myconid workers
If playing in the World of Greyhawk, maybe you could advance the timeline a decade or two, then use the recent magical, deific, and demonic upheavals caused by the Shackled City, Age of Worms, and Savage Tide storylines to cause a weakening of Zuggtmoy’s bonds... Good feedback. I hadn't thought of Z turning the tables on Tharizdun, which actually makes sense... since many of the worshippers of Elemental Evil don't know who or what they are actually revering it is plausible that Zuggy could redivert their worship back to her. However, I consider Elemental Evil to be a literally ungodly mess, what with Zuggtmoy, Tharizdun, and all four evil Archomentals muddying the waters. I found it confusing just reading RttToEE, I don't know how players were supposed to sort that mess out.
I'm going to be DMing a new 3.5 campaign soon and I've been brainstorming long-term campaign planning. In looking for an overarching theme I hit upon fungi, in large part because they have a negative connotation and can be expected to be found both above and below ground. This naturally caused me to reread the Zuggtmoy article in Dragon 337, and the campaign started taking shape in my mind as a fight against her as the archvillain. I've got some pros and cons to doing this, and would like some feedback about it. First, on the pro side, Zuggtmoy is a nostalgia name for D&D grognards, as she appeared in Temple of Elemental Evil and got a lot of references in the intervening years. However, she never really got as much play as other evil fiends and gods like Orcus, Vecna, Grazzt et. al., so she's not quite as stale and obvious as some of them might be. However, it has been noted before that campaigns featuring an archfiend/god as the "final boss" have, at this point, kind of been done to death. This was the structure of the Against the Giants - Descent into the Depths - Queen of Spiders 1E series of modules, and the Age of Worms and Savage Tide adventure paths. Finally, its possible that Zuggtmoy may not be considered seriously enough to rate as a campaign-ending boss. Her retroactive continuity at this point is that she was duped by Tharizdun and imprisoned by mortals not once but twice, and her last official appearance in a published adventure she had been morphed into an inanimate object (the altar in Return to the Temple of Elemental Evil. Does anyone have feedback on this? Does a campaign centered on fighting Zuggtmoy sound like a yawner? Is she sufficiently badass enough to be taken seriously?
The world will never know.
I don't really see how Paizo could have avoided it, in all honesty. The 'Edition Wars' seems to have touched on every major D&D based or related board that I've seen, so far. I think this kettle would have boiled over regardless. Oh, the debate would have happened here regardless, but it became more heated and broad here than on, say the EN World or GitP boards because, instead of simply howling at the moon, the posters thought their arguments would help sway Paizo one way or another. Consequently, they became more vocal and adamant in their opinions than they might have otherwise, and tried to shout down deiffering opinions more to leave the impression that theirs was the One True Opinion shared by the consensus of Paizo readership. Now that the decision has been made, the posts are pretty much pointless and back to howling at the moon, but flame wars tend to rage out of control long after the tinder that started them is consumed.
I'll give the devil his due. I appreciate the 3.5 archive. It is a godsend. Particularly the indices of monsters, classes, feats, etc. I downloaded them all and used macros to convert them into Microsoft Word tables. With the monster index, I had to convert the CRs, which were expressed as fractions (e.g., "1/3") into decimal equivalents ("0.33"), but once I did, it made a sortable index I found invaluable to adventur design. I use the core and prestige class indices as handy references for my campaign bibles, simply cropping out the classes I was disallowing or making notes about how they were modified in my homebrew.
I've appreciated the way you have expressed yourself vis a vis the 3.x v. 4 flame wars, which has always been polite and nonpartisan despite some degree of vested interest. However, with 20/20 hindsight, it must be said that Paizo invited in this debacle when you expressly solicited opinions regarding what your reader base would prefer you to do when you were still undecided on the issue yourselves. That was sure one pissed-off genie that you let out of its bottle, and now you are never going to get it to go back in. I don't blame you for it; I don't think you realized how partisan and polarized your up-till-then surprisingly moderate board base was. But again, with the benefit of hindsight... it was a mistake.
What's the underground energy source to support so dang many life forms in the bowels of the world? The fungus derives energy from the psychic emo radiation of thousands of Drow PCs.
Okay, I take back that "Anything by Taniguchi" statement; I checked her bibliography and it includes some horror titles. The protagonist in Aquarium was suffering from depression and Taniguchi wrote it specifically with the intent of helping girls suffering from depression to overcome their problems and see the beauty in life and friendship; it obliquely references thoughts of suicide in a style intended to be therapeutic for girls in the age range you spoke of; you might want to screen it first.
I agree with Mandisa's suggestions, although all except Rayearth deal with more serious or even slightly "naughty" issues in a toned-down, G-rated way. I might suggest the following which are even more "safe" while still being entertaining: Yotsuba&! by Kiyohiko Azuma (ADV Manga): unspeakably adorable, hilariously funny, and safe for any age or sensitivity level. The antics of a completely innocent preschool girl who sees everything with a wide-eyed sense of wonder. Anything written by Tomoko Taniguchi; I recommend "Aquarium" (CPM); she writes a little angsty but in a very safe-for-anyone style. The Aqua/Aria series by Kozue Amano (Tokyopop): the incredibly mellow, laid-back SF adventures of a girl who travels to a future, terraformed Mars to become a gondolier in a city that is a replica of Venice. Sweet and surprisingly engrossing when you consider that almost nothing remarkable or noteworthy ever happens; most of the stories are about a nice girl helping people relax and get past their worries.
Drow have usually suffered from a lack of individuality in artwork. A notable exception is in the webcomic "Drowtales: Moonless Age," especially the early chapters with Kern & Kite's manga-style illustration, with great use of the color pallette by Kite. Too bad the storytelling in that one doesn't measure up to the art.
... But by the same token, it's not right to misquote someone (me) and not even give a footnote reference!
Abraxas is not WotC's property. Santana used it as the name of an album.Yeah, like I said. Hey, don't misquote me! At least put ellipses ["..."] in between the sentences to show I said other stuff in between.
There has already been a WotC-independent adventure that used the name "Jubilex" as an unlicensed knock-off of Juiblex. I forget the name of the adventure and its publisher. Abraxas is not WotC's property. It was a godlike entity revered by the Gnostics during the Middle Ages. Herman Hesse featured references to it prominently in his philosophical novel "Demian", and Santana used it as the nameof an album.
Isn't Pele the God of Soccer?
I begin to notice that NPH is becoming the new cult icon like George Campbell used to be. Yeah, he's pretty cool on-screen in stuff like H&K, How I Met Your Mother, and Dr. Horrible. Oddly, I have a friend who was acquainted with him in Alburquerque after Doogie Hauser ended. His impression of NPH was that he was an arrogant, uptight jerk.
The GURPS Infinite Worlds campaign setting is damn intriguing for alternate realities, check it out here. I'll second Lilith's endorsement of Infinite Worlds, but its predecessor, GURPS (3rd Ed.) Time Travel was by far the most interesting examination of the topic, and included more than half a dozen model campaigns in different styles (Infinite Worlds having been just one of them). May be a bit difficult to find these days, though.
Cheliax will unveil its ultimate weapon: the diabolical
I wouldn't call continuing to use something because the replacement for it isn't quite ready yet to be "sticking" with it. But fine, I'll let the semantic point go and retract the "dirty pool" comment. The seminar title is still obviously perpetuating a misconception.
I so very take exception with the name of this seminar. Sticking with 3.5 is exactly what Paizo is NOT doing, and I find it increasingly grating the number of people who take it as a given that Pathfinder RPG = D&D 3.5. Overzealous fanboys are one thing, but Paizo staffers ought to and almost certainly do know better, and deliberately feeding this misconception is dirty pool if not outright false advertising. In case I haven't made it clear, I believe the following: 1) Pathfinder RPG is NOT Dungeons & Dragons 3.5. Whether its better or worse is a matter of opinion, but its unequivocably DIFFERENT. 2) If Paizo Publishing has announced any plans to support D&D 3.5 after Pathfinder RPG is actually published, I've yet to hear that announcement. 3) Claiming that playing the Pathfinder RPG is "sticking with 3.5" is untrue. You know what IS sticking with 3.5? Here is a clue: STICKING WITH 3.5!
C&C is more D&D than 3.5e. Yet everyone wants to claim 4e is not D&D as some kind of banner of superiority. You prefer 3.5 over 4e? Fine. We can argue the merits and flaws in another thread. But to claim 4e is not D&D is just hypocrisy. I agree.
How about True20 or Castles & Crusades?Name two. Yeah, those two are at the top of the list. Add Iron Heroes and Arcana Evolved. Anime d20 from Guardians of Order. And a kajillion tweaked d20 licenses like Age of Conan.
Disagree. While I like P. better than 4E, there are a half-dozen OGL based d20 systems that have as good a claim to being heir apparent to D&D as P. does.
SELTYIEL: You know, Amiri, you're funny. You're really funny. AMIRI: What do you mean I'm funny?SELTYIEL: It's funny, you know. It's a good story, with the giant sword and all, it's funny, you're a funny girl. [laughs] AMIRI: what do you mean, you mean the way I carry the sword, or how I fell over? What? SELTYIEL: It's just, you know. You're just funny, it's... funny, the way you tell a story and everything. AMIRI: [it becomes quiet] Funny how? What's funny about it? LINI: Amiri, no, you got it all wrong. AMIRI: Oh, oh, Lini. He's a big boy, he knows what he said. What did ya say? Funny how? SELTYIEL: Jus... AMIRI: What? SELTYIEL: Just... ya know... you're funny. AMIRI: You mean, let me understand this, cause, ya know maybe it's me, I'm a little messed up maybe, but I'm funny how, I mean funny like I'm a clown, I amuse you? I make you laugh, I'm here to freakin' amuse you? What do you mean funny, funny how? How am I funny? SELTYIEL: Just... you know, how you tell a story, what? AMIRI: No, no, I don't know, you said it. How do I know? You said I'm funny. How the Abyss am I funny, what in the name of the gods is so funny about me? Tell me, tell me what's funny! SELTYIEL: [long pause] Get out of here, Amiri! AMIRI: RAAAAAAHHHHHRRRRR!!!!! [AMIRI rages, disembowels LINI and SAJAN, and decapitates SELTYIEL and wears his head like it's a hat.]
DISTRICT ATTORNEY: Mr. Cimmerian, if you would, could you please explain to the court what is best in life?
Yeah, you posted about the 2d Darkness lineup as being the "miscellaneous" group before. Its still nice when party members' abilities complement each other, though, and the lack of crowd control can be deadly when facing a horde of individually-weak enemies. I do like varaint caster builds, though, amd the more you multiclass the better it is to stay away from spells with saving throws. Okay, Amiri might not have annihilated her tribe, but in the modern American legal system she'd be facing multiple counts of homicide and the threat of life imprisonment. At least Selty can claim that the thieves he killed were acts of self-defense, but Amiri wasn't facing any imminent threat from her jerkwad kinfolk. And, frankly, although she's hot as hell in her barbarian digs, I wouldn't want a dangerous loose cannon like her on my team.
Considering if he focuses all his fighter levels on melee(and with d10 and d4 HD, as this comes before Pathfinder makes the edition change, he will probably have to), he'll probably be hurting for ranged ability. I don't follow. I've always seen low hit points as an argument to focus on ranged fighting, or perhaps Spring Attacks. When you can't take much in the way of two-handed full attacks, your best bet is to attack from a distance and behind cover. Thats part of the mechanical reason why elves are so inclined to archer builds; with crappy Constitution they tend to get pasted in melee. Selty's writeup as frail and sickly suggests Constitution is his dump stat, and he can't wear much armor and still cast somatic spells. If I were building Selty in 3.5 based on nothing more than James' post and the blog backstory writeup, I would max his Dexterity, take Weapon Focus (Rays), invest in a selection of ranged touch spell wands, and use my daily spell selection for defensive spells like Grease and Obscuring Mist.
As for how we'll be statting him up... don't expect MUCH in the way of crazy. At 20th level, he'll be a fighter 10/sorcerer 10 or a fighter 10/wizard 10 (I'm still leaning toward fighter/sorcerer... but either one works for his backstory). Thats a real tough build, even using your Pathfinder ruleset. I do feel vindicated in my earlier prediction that the final iconic would be an arcanist of some sort. Taking the Second Darkness pregens as a team, at least some arcane magic was called for-- although it looks like Selty will be a poor crowd-controller, some arcane scroll-reading and wand-using can go a long way, at least until upper levels. It does sseem that the 2nd Darkness team needs a ranged fighter, so making Selty a Dex fighter is a good idea -- with a barbarian and a monk in the team, he will probably contribute more meaningfully with arrows than with a rapier, though. As for him being the only evil iconic, may I point out that Amiri committed genocide because she was laughed at?
A few more observations: In addition to a lot of gothy skull ornaments and apparently completely pointless lanyard rings, if you look closely at Seltyiel you'll see his belt is decorated with tiny ruby hearts. Aww, he's looking for the wuv that daddy never gave him! He wears fishnet underwear. You can see it poking out from underneath his vest and gloves. Combined with the hearts its apparent that when not adventuring he makes ends meet as an exotic dancer. Explain the wind effect that makes his cape and part of his skirt (yeah, its a skirt) blow to his left, another part of the skirt to flare out to his right, and his hair and ornamental lanyard rings on cords to hang limply straight down. (Okay, maybe the rings are just too heavy for the breeze. But the hair?) I know -- its magic! Again, just poking fun.
As a follow-up, I'll say I'm just poking a bit of fun at Seltyiel. He is my least favorite of the Paizo iconics but its a personal preference thing -- I've never been a huge fan of the angsty-emo victim-turned-badass-antihero. But plenty are, more power to them. From a roleplaying perspective, I think the character I would most like to play is Lem. Partly because he is a bard, and I love bards even if most other players don't; but also I like the upbeat escaped slave angle and the unusual but sound casting of a halfling as a bard. Even if its only for CotCT, he is initially teamed with Seelah, and paladin-bard teamups work well; the bard shores up the paladin's martial offense and the two, armed with cure wands, work in tandem for healing--too many parties put their healing eggs in one basket, and get boned when their cleric gets knocked unconscious. My next favorite would be Merisiel. Why? Because she's unabashedly stupid, and that fact is written right into her backstory. I like that. Many players try to ignore their dump stat or dress it up as an advantage. Few would openly acknowledge that their character is a dumbass (unless its a barbarian, which feeds a stereotype). The Merisiel story embraces that she's not particularly bright, which I thin is fun.
Sickly, bitter, power-hungry wizard with white hair and an emo backstory. Never saw that before... Raistlin Majere? Elric of Melnibone? Who are they?
Well, I agree it will happen but not that its bad DMing. I can think of a number of times I've DMed TPKs because the players did something stupid or just had unlucky die rolls. While a few players got discouraged and left, most bounced back, were cool with it, and started fresh. Usually they played better the next time around. I admit to a couple exceptions, though.
I've been debating this issue internally since Alpha 1 came out, and I recently came to exactly the same conclusions that fuji came to. I thought initially that Pathfinder was going to be a simple rule revision to 3.5 to iron out the hinky points, do some rebalancing of exploits, and fill in some blanks left when you take away the non-OGL parts of 3.5. Instead of rebalancing things to make the power levels of 3.5 more even and balanced, the Alpha has bumped up those power levels significantly. Maybe they are more balanced at these new levels (though I remain skeptical on many points), but you can't get around the fact that the level numbers mean something entirely different in Pathfinder than they did in 3.5. Any existing 3.5 material cannot be picked up and played "out of the box" with Pathfinder; you have to do conversion work. Maybe its less difficult conversion than switching things over to 4.0, but, all good intentions to the contrary aside, changing what the labels for power levels mean almost by definition changes the feel of the game. Its comparable to what would happen if suddenly everybody who graduates high school were awarded a masters degree and everybody who completes four years of college was given a doctorate. The implications and meaning of the title "Doctor" would be drastically different than it is today. I don't think fuji meant that Pathfinder is shaping up to be a bad game; its just that its not the game it was originally billed as.
Jeez, I didn't say Pathfinder will resemble 3.5 less than 4.0 resembles 3.5; I said Pathfinder will resemble 3.5 less than 3.5 resembled 3.0. And I said that I don't necessarily disapprove of the changes. Although there are some things I balk at, on the whole I'm reserving judgment. |
