halfling...no...death-ling's page

I own Oriental Adventures (3e book for Asian themed campaigns) and it has the shugenja (and the samurai) and I personally think that the classes in the OA book are far better than their 3.5 counterparts. Theres far more customization than the 3.5 ones because they have 8 clans and 2 spell sets from each clan (I think).

On a completely unrelated topic the samurai is actually exactly like the kensai (Complete Warrior) but it has 20 levels to it and you start out with a masterwork weapon.

my 2 cents

Aberzombie wrote:

DMR wrote:

I don't get it...

I don't think you're supposed to, unless you're around 15 or so.

Nope.

I'm 15. I don't get it and I think it's the stupidest thing ever.

Apparently Wizards has once again made a mistake in figuring out how to reach out and please their target audience. Cuz you know that all us 15-year olds like glowing green brains.

All those people at my school were totally bringing glowing green brains with us to school. We were totally showing them off. We were like giving them names and trading them and s~@!.

(Sheesh.)

TOTALLY MAN!!!!

Mine is named Fred the Jar.

I'm 15 also and personally I hate MySpace...I didn't really like this either...

The green suxx...

From that junk the DI is going to be spawned from....

Whats DI??

So they gain DR 15/magic for only 1 round? Seems kind of a waste to me.

Full attacks.

for the last 3 attacks they get 15 less dmg on each of them.

However, the bugbear in a group will NEVER be the hottest spellcaster, may it be divine or acane...

Funny thing, though he may never be the HOTTEST spell caster (arcane-wise), he could be a decent one.

They don't get an intelligence decrease.

Thats what my friend likes about them so much....They can play almost any class.

And apparently Bugbear Monks are beasts.

Y'know, I actually saw a book called "D&D for Dummies".

DMing for Dummies too (I don't know if its actually called that tho...).

halfling...no...death-ling wrote:

I don't understand how spontaneous casting is any better than preping spells in the morning.

Really? It's quite simple. When you prepare spells, you have to guess which spells you're going to need to cast that day. When you can cast spontaneously, you can wait until you know for certain before committing that spell slot.

Spontaneous casting is a huge advantage. Huge. And as Dragonchess Player notes, sorcerers pay for it with their limited spell selection and lack of bonus feats.

Touuuucheeeeeee.....

Truename magic rules K.O.!!!!

HOLY GOD YES!

I've been looking through the Tome of Magic and yea they do pwn both wiz and sorc...

Sorcerers have one huge advantage over wizards: spontaneous casting. They pay for it with a fixed spell selection and lack of bonus feats.

I don't understand how spontaneous casting is any better than preping spells in the morning. Yes, a DM could be a terrible person (lol) and throw a big encounter at the PCs right in the morning instead of coffee to wake them up. But how often does that happen??

A disadvantage I see with a sorcerer is that they have to have longer casting times to cast a metamagic spell (personally I don't like metamagic spells because the longer casting time of the sorcerer and the higher level of the wizard always dissuade me...).

To state my position: I would rather play a wizard.

In any case, I don't see the big advantage.

Hey everybody thanks for the suggestions!!

I'm probably going to use them some time soon...

<insert evil DM laugh here>........

...BBEGs...

Incidentally, do any of you guys have the Savage Species book? It is a necessary source if you want to play outlandish monsters instead of standard races.

1st: Whaaaaa???

2nd: Actually we play with level adjustments and just deal with them.... I know it's not ideal, but if we want to play something like a drow or a deep gnome then we just suck it up and take the 2-3 level hit...

But thanks for the suggestion! I may look into the savage species book. I actually got my first taste of monster levels with Libris Mortis and it's undead monster classes.

So I'm running a campaign. I have a party of 3 adventurers that I'm pitting against the world.

The line up is as follows:
*Smoke Element Dwarf Rogue-Archer-Type-Thing
*Half-Vamp Elf Necromancer Fighter
*Armadillo (I forgot the race, its in MM3, its got crazy high dexterity) Ninja

Everything is overpowered in the party (except for the Necro-Fighter because of poor class decision) because they have way too good dexterity. The smoke element has about 26, and so does the ninja.

BTW, the characters are way unbalanced, they can dodge like none other, but when they do get hit, they will die, and wizards are a problem for them too.

Yes I know I can just throw only wizards at them, but eventually they will get mad at me for trying to kill them and we don't want that to happen.

What can I do to tone them down a bit, not change their characters, but more so change monsters.

Thanks!

First D&D module that I ever played was when I was about 10 or 11 (2002 or 2003...lol....I'm a young'un:)

Anyways, we played The Secret of Bone Hill (the first one in the low level section).

I then went through a 1 year rut and then I got back into 3.5E. I'm DMing my own campaign and on of my friends is DMing Red Hand of Doom.

Uh...67? I tend to just read and lurk on these forums, so I've got a good excuse.

I'm like a ninja!

Sneak in and sneak out, only carry what I need: 65 posts with this one!

Huzzah!!

w00t thanks much!!

My Dragon issue never arrived and I've waited about 5 days after the time it arrived on newsstands. I don't know if I'm just impatient or it never actually got sent.

Did anybody else have this problem??

Thanks

For the record, though, the basic mount is pretty useless.

What about the "Sword of Cilestia" variant in Dragon a while back.

imo that seemed ok to me.

my 2 cents

W00T!

Thanks everybody for your responses!

I think that they are so good that I'm going to print them off right now and start making my army...with some help from the Complete Warrior of cours. ;)

Thanks everybody! :)

If you just have 800 orc 1st level scouts and 3000 hobgoblin warriors and 500 crossbowmen and whatever, it's boring.

Well thats good that you think it would be boring, it would be to me also...

Hopefully, it won't boil down to me pitching 3 over-powered PCs against 4500 lvl 1 grunts of an army just to kill them. ;)

How would they compare to the numbers of the actual army??

And how wouldthe army aquire them (would they just run thru a village and convince all the people that their army is the best and that they should follow them?)

I usually do this by percents.

What number of people do you use in an army normally (or at least one thats going to span a few nations) and how would you organize them (use units=10 individuals, battalion=40 individuals etc.)??

It sounds like you want a more covert army.

Yes thats right, but not only that. We need some heavy fire power there...lol.

If its anything like a medival army then don't forget the camp followers.

Camp followers being...clean up crew??

...as well as 25%-75% of the main force in followers. ...most of the followers a day or two behind the main force, so that they aren't too far away in case they are needed.

Define "followers" please and how would they be used??

Thanks

The sad thing is I can't tell if you're kidding or being factual.

LOL same...sadly...

Hokay! So...

I'm going to start a Red-Hand-Of-Doom-Style-Campaign-Thing soon and obviously there is a huge army involved (Imix's material plane army to be specific) and I need help with the biggest part-THE ARMY!

I'm having lots of trouble starting it and after I think of all the things that it involves I have lots of trouble sorting everything.

The Army itself consists of what most armies consist of (scouts, skirmishers, gurrilla fighters, assassins, clerics, commanders, high commanders, infantry etc. etc.). The army also spans several nations and is as much a political army as it is a martial army (i.e. lots of inteligince and informants everywhere).

One simple question: Where would you start building it and where to go from there?

Thanks much!

I always thought of them as ranger-druid types, so I would probably go with leather, studded, hide, or a really light metal (chain shirt for example).

My $.02

Do you run DMtools?

If so I have a possible extension for your web site, if your interested, that is.

I enrolled for a Web Page Design class in my high school and we got the opportunity to make a personal web page, and I have always wanted to make a Dungeons and Dragons Community Database.

It's where people would post ideas for anything and everything in DnD.

I would need coaching on how to get posts into a web site system but I could probably get that from my mom, and then I would need to make the actual site in FrontPage. But I didn't want to do all the work without your go-ahead.

I can send you the idea map that I have made if you could give me your email, look at that and then you can decide.

Thanks
The Halfling

My 2 cents......I let my players roll almost everything. ...I just don't tell them the DC they are rolling against. So for example if they are moving silently or disguised and they roll a 14, they may feel safe and secure behind it. Little do they know the guards can see right through their attempts.

Same here, never tell the PCs the DCs for anything, be it monsters' saving throws or checks. Never do it, don't think I ever will.

All four Athiests

Or just make the animal companion undead as well. The vampire was obviously in such a state before being staked, so there's no reason you can't pull some DM mojo and say that he had an undead animal companion to boot. If you feel compelled to do so, burn a feat slot or give him a magic item to justify it, at your option.

In the Libris Mortis there is a feat called "Stitched-Flesh Familiar". It makes a familiar undead, but u could use the almighty power of the the DM and just change it a bit to make it an animal companion, maybe raise the prereqs for it a bit and take away all the familiar-ish things with in the feat.

Thought it help.

...just remember that the gaurd has to be paid regularily so let me know any changes in income.

Speaking of income...what would the income be of all the people and soldiers woking for you? The topic came up and i thought it would be interesting to know..

I'm about to start a huge battle similar to the Red Hand of Doom campaign, and I don't really know how to handle them.

If anybody has any input or ideas that I could use, please share them with me as I need them badly.

The battle will involve 4 "Flame-lords" of 10th to 15th level, each of them has several platoons of about 20 goblins, undead, and various fire outsiders and elementals with one commander for each, and various siege engines below them that they can command at their whim.

Thanks

Spider poles...

???Spider poles??? What are they and in what book

Re: Fourth: Again, not sure what you mean exactly. First, the symbols you used didn't show up in the text on the messageboard, and the only way I saw them was by replying to you. I believe you are refering to monsters with class levels? Level adjustments are constant for a race, regardless of how many levels and individual does or doesn't have. If the LA is +6, then the ECL will always be HD + class levels + LA.

An Example:

Say in the ogre de4scription for the character race it would say "Ogres start out with x ammount of levels in giant which gives them...etc. etc."

While the drow description doesn't say that they start out with any levels of humanoid.

Why is this???

Hope that clears up the question, it doesn't realy have to do with gmae mechanics but it's just a question that came up a session.

Thanks

All 4 have to do with character level.

First: Is ECL HD plus class levels or is it level adjustment plus class levels?

Second: Is a level adjustment any different from class levels as far as ECL concerned, gaining levels and chalenge rating for encounters

Third: What is the difference between ELC and HD?

Fourth: Why do some creatures in the MM have levels of <insert type here> and a level adjustment while some only have a level adjustment?

Thanks, these have been bothering me for a while.

I kicked off a campaign for level 10 PCs (which are over powered just a little bit because of races). The meet up where all the PCs meet each other was kinda weak, but I didn't really think that out.

The PCs would have to make listen and/or spot checks during the night at about 12:00 they would see the divine flashes of lightning and fire being cast by priests in the slums.

If they went to investigate then people called the "Divine Eyes" or sumthin like that would see them unless they went at night and succeeded at some ungodly high move silently and hide checks to get into the slums then they had to get passed the guards on the outside (They weren't actually supposed to get in).

Then they would go and investigate in the church of "Pelor" in the city. Which was actually a church to Imix. So then they found a huge underground complex under the church.

Thats how the campaign was kicked off. The it goes into a Red Hand of Doom type thing where they can either stop or help a war with intricate plot twists. I have a lot of it planed out but I have a hard time getting encounter, making treasure, and just all the mechanics in general but I have fun with it. I have this wierd habit of changing small things at random times when im working on it and I think it makes it really fun.

No, I don't have a date, It's more of an informal dance. But yea, you're right, I probably should have planned for weeks before, but I tend to procrastinate...lol....

Yea...

I have a Halloween dance (in high school) on Friday and we have the option to dress up as sumthin...I might, might not, but I owuld need ideas if I was to dress up...

Needs to be sumthin pretty hardcore, no weapons, and I will actually be dancing so no beholder costumes (Excelent idea for Trick or Treating though, you can keep warm and also exchange padding for candy space...lol)

MY Half Price Books (Minnetonka-Eden Prarie Area, Minnesota) has only 2e and 3e stuff...which I think is kinda interesting just to look at the classes and such, but has no game content.

It DOES, though, carry a Dark Sun Campaign setting box set which i am thinking on buying...

...just like mercury and steel have never been added to the "official" metallics.

Mercury would be really intense as a metallic dragon color/type, so would steel but not as intense as murcury.

Hardcore-like
The DH

We will be playing our 5th or 6th session of Red hand of Doom. We have four PCs:

Human Werewolf Druid
Lizardfolk Ranger
Elf Rouge/Wizard
Half-Elf Cleric of Herinous

AND I will be kicking off my own homebrew campaign arc with 3 PCs:

Smoke Element Dwarf Desert Knife Fighter (my own class)
Half-Vampire Fighter/Necromancer
Armant (or Armand, I can't remember) Ninja/Assassin

All the PCs are about 10th level.

I may start an adventure with some new players that said they wanted to play D&D and I wanted a good adventure for their first times playing.

1. It can't be any adventure paths from Dragon, seeing as I don't recieve that mag.

2. It can be from anywhere else, Wizards, other web-sites, and even home brews that you happen to have on your computer.

3. We all start out at level one and there will be three of us.

Thanks all!!!

I think that instead of getting rid of class skills entirely, make it so that all classes get all the skills except for a couple.

perform: a barbarian wouldn't need
UMD: a sorcerer or a wizard wouldnt need
disable device and pick lock: barbarian wouldn't use

There are other various crafts and such that certain classes wouldn't get (a druid with craft: armorsmithing, its just redundant).

But yea...thats my 2 cents

EDIT: Not redundant but...something i can't think of it right now but you all know what i mean

One word: ninja'd

I am so confused right now.

What is all this talk about polymorph being revised. I need help, I didn't see anything wrong with it when i read through it a while ago, but I guess that says something about me as a D&D player.

Could someone please shed some light on this for me, or at least just tell me what is wrong with the rules that are outlined in the PH.

Thanks
The DH

This is kinda one dimensional as far as how deep disscussion on alignments can go...but personally I hate all the alignment based spells and the paladin.

1) The spells are too specific, if you prepare the wrong spell then your fatched. And there is generally a 50% chance that you will prepare the wrong spell, which really is not that good..

2) The paladin is too goody-goody two shoes for me...and also he is far too specific...but on the other hand I do like the fact that they give you some wiggle room by giving you the option to change into a fallen paladin with the blackguard prestige.

But over all I hate the alignment spells but I love alignments because you can do so much iwth them and they can decide so much about the game, it also makes the DM think more if it goes wrong for him. And they tell so much about your character.

The DH

d13 wrote:

Tambryn wrote:

I am thinking I will toss a tanglefoot bag at them and then summon an arrow demon to wail on them. I will have purchased adamantine arrows ahead of time to give the demon. What do you think?

Tam

Of course you would have to summon them first, before you came into contact with the anti-magic field, but this raises a question for me. If you summon a creature and then after it has been summoned it comes into contact with an anti-magic field, is the creature then sent back to the planes? Does an anti-magic field dispel a summoned creature? These spells do have a duration after all, so isn't all of their time spent in the material plane a result of a magic spell?

Cast spell - monster appears - X rounds later the spell ends and monster disappears.

Perhaps this is common knowledge but I have never really thought about it before.

When you summon a monster it actual brings them to the material plane...thats why its a conjuration spell, not an illusion spell.

An illusion spell on the other hand WOULD dispel when it came into contact with the anti-magic field...

The DH

Oops sorry...don't listen to the above post.

Sorry...I guess thats what these message boards are for...lol

Tambryn wrote:

I am thinking I will toss a tanglefoot bag at them and then summon an arrow demon to wail on them. I will have purchased adamantine arrows ahead of time to give the demon. What do you think?

Tam

Of course you would have to summon them first, before you came into contact with the anti-magic field, but this raises a question for me. If you summon a creature and then after it has been summoned it comes into contact with an anti-magic field, is the creature then sent back to the planes? Does an anti-magic field dispel a summoned creature? These spells do have a duration after all, so isn't all of their time spent in the material plane a result of a magic spell?

Cast spell - monster appears - X rounds later the spell ends and monster disappears.

Perhaps this is common knowledge but I have never really thought about it before.

When you summon a monster it actual brings them to the material plane...thats why its a conjuration spell, not an illusion spell.

An illusion spell on the other hand WOULD dispel when it came into contact with the anti-magic field...

The DH

I posted something in the Chaotic Neutral thread. If you could look there I asked for a sort of key or something for graphing alignments.

Look at the CN thread for more details but yea...

DH

I may try graphing an alignment...I'm going to start DMing soon (in a week or two) and I think that is very interesting because we have an assassin in our party but the whole campaign/adventure is extremely good based (as in the characters have to be good to get the full effect...or at least not evil).

Do you have any sort of system or key that you could give me, Valegrim. It seems like a lot of experimentation (lol) for that too work and this will be my first time DMing...so if you could post it then that owuld be great.

Thanks
The DH

One group

Average age: ~20
Ages: 13, 14(me), 15, and about 40

Wow I feel young...geez...