I just wanted to throw this out here, rather than other places because this is the community I enjoy above others.
A couple of weeks ago my FLGS got a package with my name on it. When I got to the shop, the owner gave it to and I opened it up to find a thank you note from Wizards of the Coast because I ran the D&D Encounters at the local shop for a number of months.
With that they included a large calender with a lot of neat art, a pair of packs of fortune cards (along with a promo card), and the bulk of a set of Gale Force Nine's Dungeon Master's Tokens.
I was quite surprised and happy to get a gift, I felt at least I could at least do is talk about this neat stuff I got.
The tokens are nice. Obviously focused on 4th edition, but I probably will be using them in all my games. They are a lot better quality than I would have imagine from the pictures. They are not awe inspiring, but they don't feel cheap to me and seem as though that they will last quite a while.
The fortune cards look nice. Most cards though get repeated images of symbols based upon the type of fortune it is (shield for defense, sword for attack, etc.), it would seem only rare cards get unique art, which I understand. Don't like the rarities on the cards though, don't think it fits for how they seem to be used.
Not too sure about the rules for them, my games seem to operate slowly without the cards and I just imagine some players wanting to spend some extra time rereading the card and analyzing their situation before moving on with their turn. I can't imagine it would add too much time, but my thoughts generally are focused on speeding up turns.
I am not sure how much of an advantage a player with the cards would be compared to a character without. Many of the cards are usable in a certain situation, others have some restriction on how you can use the boon, others require a sacrifice, and others include a risk. I would say that the deck certainly boosts the power a bit and that a thoughtfully built deck can be significantly better than that. Just not sure how big the difference in power is.
Overall I like the "gamble" cards more than the others though there are a couple that I really enjoy thematically. I want to try and use the cards in a game, but with modified rules because I don't have enough cards for all my players to play by the suggested rules.
If one wanted, I think that they can be used between d20 systems in a fashion. The closer the game is to D&D the easier it is to use them. You would have to reinterpret what somethings mean on the fly though.
There is another thing that I enjoyed about the packs. Along with the fortune cards in the pack, there is the standard card with advertising on the back, but on the flip side there is a card that you can use for tracking things in your games. For example, the two that I got are an initiative tracker (a PC/NPC/Monster card that has spaces for writing down the Initiative, perception, AC, Fortitude, Reflex, Will, and Name/Description/HP) and a condition tracker (a generic card with space for condition's description, duration, and other information about it). I wouldn't buy the packs specifically for them, but they are a nice extra inside the packs.
That went a lot longer than I had originally intended, but I am avoiding the temptation to avoid culling it. Again I really enjoyed the gift package I got, it really did feel nice to get an unexpected reward for running the Encounters games.
As far as fortune cards go, I doubt I'd want to use them as they are written (basically as small mini-powers PCs can use throughout combat) - but I could see handing them out as extra treasure, or finding other ways to distribute them. A player might have them option of taking one, but when he does, the DM gets one too. Etc. Stuff that keeps them from just being pure power creep, but lets you use them in interesting ways.
I would like to figure out a way to use these cards and any I might buy later, what do you think about these ideas (not all together at the same time)?
1. I build the communal deck at the start of the session or encounter and have players draw cards at the start of each encounters. This way everyone can draw cards even if they haven't bought a pack and I can adjust the packs to the encounters, remove cards that wouldn't activate or emphasize a particular theme of the encounter.
2. Have drawing from the deck not be an automatic boon for each turn. Let characters spend a move action to discard and draw from the deck. Maybe add a feat to reduce the necessary action to a minor action.
3. In Gamma World style, when they roll a natural 1 on an attack, have them discard any cards they might have and draw one.
4. Add them as treasure, when the party finds a magic artifact they all get to draw a card.
5. Have decks be tied to certain magic items (example, on a crit a lucky dagger lets you draw a random card from a deck with Gambler's Eye, Gambler's Dodge, and Lucky Fall.)
6. When the battle gets tough the party rises to the challenge. Enemies' critical hits deal an extra d6 of damage, but the person who got crit gets to draw from the deck.
Good on WotC for rewarding DMs.
As for the fortune cards -- the lack of color art on every card is a little surprising given the cost ($.50 a card).
Good on WotC for rewarding DMs.
As for the fortune cards -- the lack of color art on every card is a little surprising given the cost ($.50 a card).
I'm a bit disappointed by it because I am especially attracted to pretty pictures, but the art they have is at least better than the Gamma World cards with no art (except for the layout background portion of the card). I would have rather seen art reused from other products on the more common cards rather than have the default icon image on each of the non-rare cards.
While I am not a very big fan of WotC I have to give them credit here this is pretty cool of them.
You were not a DDXP. Those tokens and calendar are to stay at the store and to be used for Encounters.
That concerned me for a bit, I didn't want to take anything from the store that belonged to them. So I quickly dug through my piles of papers that I loathe to sort of clean up to find the letter that came with it. The letter says:
Please accept these tokens of our appreciation. We hope that some of them will help you run even better games.
- And exclusive 2011 DUNGEONS & DRAGONS calendar
- A token packet courtesy of Gale Force Nine, made especially for our D&D Encounters DMs
- A special D&D Fortune Card™, gambler's eye
I recall there being a letter for the store in there as well, I read a bit of it before I realized it was for the store and not myself. I do recall it saying something along the lines of, "This package is for the GM. Please make sure they get it. Don't keep it for yourself or sell it."
If the package was intended for the store, I apologize for taking it.
i will use the cards as a role playing award.
example: player 1 does something really cool, funny, great idea, great use of powers, skills, criticle hits, etc. player 2 says: player 1 deserves a card. and i issue a card, the player gets to use it whenever he/she wants to.
so, they are an award for fun.