If I wanted to I could probably engrave all of my maps directly to wood
Cost effective? No
In any way reasonable? No
Awesome? YES
dude, buy some vellum. i bet you could find some.
alternatively, shoot you a fuckin rabbit and get someone to paint a map on that fucker's skin once you get it cured and shit. then you have a rad soft furry-backed map.
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RankenphilePassersby were amazedby the unusually large amounts of blood.Registered User, Moderatormod
edited January 2010
alright, so I just finished running what may have been the best goddamn game of D&D I've ever played
I had set up the whole thing for six level one players
four showed up, due to sickness
we decided, "You know what? Fuck it, let's do it anyway. If we go down, we'll go down swinging".
And there were a lot of moments when it came very, very close to that, but they managed to pull it off by the skin of their teeth. No healing surges left, cleric down to four hp, tank down to twelve, fighting a custom-made level five minor devil and his summoners, and they fucking started pulling crits out of their goddamn asses left and fucking right. Mowing down motherfuckers. Group tactics like bitch ain't shit. Incredible. The guys were absolutely standing up and cheering with every successful hit.
Two of the guys had never played D&D before in their lives. Absolutely stunning way to introduce them. They're all friends from school, so there's a solid chance we'll be able to turn this into an ongoing campaign, and I could not possibly be happier about it.
Also, the Critical Fail Result Cards that Fishman wrote up were a miracle in practice. Added so much excitement and fun to the natural ones.
God, I love that afterglow high of a really good game going well. I hadn't played since PAX, so this was definitely an itch that needed scratching, too.
RankenphilePassersby were amazedby the unusually large amounts of blood.Registered User, Moderatormod
edited January 2010
I'll email you over the cards. I only used the set as a 2d40 rolling table, as I didn't get a chance to create physical cards yet, so the results skewed heavily toward the middle of the pack, but if you send me a PDF of the design you make of them, I'll happily send you the text.
I'd love to make it a collaborative design, time allowing, if you'd be up for it, but if you wanna throw together a prototype of it, that'd be amazing.
That's unbelievably cool. Your new name is cool guy. Let's have sex.
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RankenphilePassersby were amazedby the unusually large amounts of blood.Registered User, Moderatormod
edited January 2010
so what do we know about the whole Scales of War adventure set?
I can't sleep, and having a good base adventure setup to draw from would help a ton. I wanna do some research, see what's available, and I seem to remember hearing good things.
I was playing some DnD with a group at the local comic shop for awhile. It was kind of annoying because we used all premade dungeons that we would buy from the store, but the DM skipped all the RP parts and it was all about combat, which was also annoying because with all of us and the DM's 2 characters he insisted he play there was like 8 people in the party so combat rounds took about 40 minuets.
UtsanomikoBros before DoesRollin' in the thlayRegistered Userregular
edited January 2010
My 3-player D&D group has spent all of level 2 with an NPC or two in the party, but the first time they came up with traveling with a caravan as their own idea, and then they later asked the wizard to accompany them to their destination. I play them as very back-row supporting cast who either take orders or tag along.
The DM should never have an NPC in the party with more than 4 players, out of simple practicality if not respect.
Throw the DM's character minis on the floor and tell the dude to go play heroclix. Don't do it in anger, just grab them slowly and stare him down the whole time.
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FishmanPut your goddamned hand in the goddamned Box of Pain.Registered Userregular
edited January 2010
Meh, there are times where DM-run NPCs can be beneficial, either for future story development or because the players are inept (through stupidity or inexperience).
Doesn't sound like this was one of those, though.
I've run successful multi-NPC encounters; as rivals ("So sorry we can't stay and help you finish these Ogres, but there's only one Idol of Adelon!", as a co-operative team ("you hold them off, we'll open the gates!"), as objectives themselves (the prisoners you've released begin to arm themselves and assist you in fighting back the horde!).
Again, these are specific story-based examples which are presented as the exceptions to the rule. In general the DM shouldn't have ongoing PC's placed in the party as DMPC's.
Ah fuck, found it. Epic tier to do it with bows. Eurgh.
Alright, how do I do the sniper idea well? I'm currently thinking of blowing a ton of feats into a rogue multiclass, so I have sneak attack shit to pile on top of my ranger stuff.
Also, does anyone know of any sort of trapmaking feats one can pick up? I don't think there are any, but I would love for this character to be tossing out beartraps and shit to lure his enemies into.
If I recall correctly, Alchemist and Master Mixer from artificer are the only things that have trap like things one can make.
Man I am so excited about getting these miniatures made.
Plan as it stands now (might adjust as test models are produced)
For normal small to medium sized characters and creatures:
1" wide x (small)" deep x 2.25" tall (to allow for stands) with art engraved on both sides (pre production models will probably have the same art on both sides, production models will have front and back views)
Changeable stands to designate status (white for OK, red for bloodied, black for unconscious/dead). This might not happen, we don't really have a way to mold plastic, so unless I find something pre-made the stands might be simple 1"x1" squares glued to the bottom of the figures.
Maybe a plexiglass board engraved with 1x1 squares? Allowing for paper maps to be placed underneath.
This is awesome.
also t rank-- That sounds like a sweet session. I hope our Rogue Trader game has a session as fun and rewarding as that.
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HachfaceNot the Minister Farrakhan you're thinking ofDammit, Shepard!Registered Userregular
edited January 2010
Fact: DMs who don't allow DDI-exclusive classes are tards.
Fact: DMs who don't allow DDI-exclusive classes are tards.
tards I say.
There was a time when I excluded all Dragon/Dungeon magazine content from my games (as well as any 3rd party books) because I was of the viewpoint that none of it was internally checked and balanced against official content.
Which was, in fact, the case with much of it.
However, then I realized Wizards of the Coast doesn't even bother to internally check and balance official content against itself. At least, in the 3.5 days anyway.
So, it doesn't really matter, anyway. As a DM you can't really inherently trust anything for D&D to be properly balanced unless you've given it your own eyeball. What book it comes out of is basically meaningless because of how WotC does things.
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HachfaceNot the Minister Farrakhan you're thinking ofDammit, Shepard!Registered Userregular
edited January 2010
I totally understand not instantly approving stuff that was published in Dragon pre-4e, but with 4e came an entirely new publishing model. Dragon is no longer the place where amateur fans write in with their cool ideas or whatever. It's all done by the same people who put the published books together.
4e is not perfect but in terms of balance and playtesting it puts 3.5 and earlier editions to shame.
The stuff in dungeon and Dragon are both checked by the same guy who does the physically published books. So on that level they are all roughly balanced.
So if something retarded is printed in Dragon it stood just as much chance getting published in Player handbook 3
Also they are releasing errata for Dragon articles the same as all the physical books so you can always check the monthly update to see if they changed something questionable.
Right, so really the only excuses i can see and agree to is "I haven't read it, and until i do, you can't use it." or "It doesn't work in this campaign, please use something else."
or something similar to them.
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StraightziHere we may reign secure, and in my choice,To reign is worth ambition though in HellRegistered Userregular
edited January 2010
My DM doesn't read dragon. He doesn't have a subscription. So yes, I can show him, but I mean, I also completely don't blame him if he doesn't want to include stuff from it just for me.
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RankenphilePassersby were amazedby the unusually large amounts of blood.Registered User, Moderatormod
edited January 2010
As a DM, there's a lot of times I'm not comfortable adding in any god damned thing all willy-nilly
especially if it is an internet-exclusive class or from a Dragon magazine or some shit
I don't know anything about it, hard to plan encounters for shit you're not experienced in dealing with, and man, I'm the DM, I got plenty to keep track of already without all that shit
if you ain't got the book with you, you ain't likely to be able to talk me into letting you playing it
The DDI stuff has some neat feats and stuff in it you should check it out sometime Rank.
Though the play tests tend to be hit or miss but they're play tests for that reason.
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StraightziHere we may reign secure, and in my choice,To reign is worth ambition though in HellRegistered Userregular
edited January 2010
Yeah, I'm the same way Rank
I mean I've usually got my laptop with me at games anyways, but I would sympathise
I've DMed enough ridiculous bullshit to understand that nobody else wants to do that
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RankenphilePassersby were amazedby the unusually large amounts of blood.Registered User, Moderatormod
edited January 2010
I know it does
and I allow some of that stuff
but some of it is pretty sketchy - how do I write encounters for the seventy fucking billion things they keep adding all the time
I like to keep stuff simple and manageable. Okay, PHB2 is printed, go for it, you can use that stuff. PHB3 isn't, so no, you can't. I love the DM tools and character creator, and to be honest I allow a lot of shit I don't actually have physical documentation for, but in terms of general classes and shit I really prefer printed materials for them.
And yeah, the Assassin looks shit hot, but I'm not ready to allow someone to play it in a game I'm running, especially one that looks like it might be long term, unless I know they really understand it and can help me understand how it works in play, and that I know they're capable of playing something as different as that.
I'm not saying disallowing the stuff is bad, not knowing what what the people are capable of is a huge deal, but to just outright disallow something cause it was only printed on them there internets is a poor reason to do it.
If i was trying to play something from DDI i would present all relevant stuff to the DM and discuss it until an understanding was met.
Do agree about not allowing phb3 stuff yet, though more because it's only a half of class and not very well supported yet, might make the player feel under powered. Not so much because it's not in print yet.
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RankenphilePassersby were amazedby the unusually large amounts of blood.Registered User, Moderatormod
edited January 2010
well when you grow up and get pubes and get your own little party to dm you can allow any magical goddamn thing you want
Well, just finished our third fight in a play-by-post I'm playing in Critical Failures.
I'm playing a Pacifist Cleric, which means if I hurt something that's bloodied I get stunned until the end of my next turn, but all my healing powers are insanely good.
It's pretty damn fun, I thought that because my damage output was practically nil I'd be getting bored but I'm having to coordinate all my attacks so that the right monster gets the right debuff so the right ally hits him and gets my healing. It's really awesome to have to plan stuff out a lot more tactically then I usually do with a defender or striker. The last battle I was able to completely shut down the enemies with a single daily power, saving my group a crapload of resources they would've otherwise been forced to spend to win the fight.
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HachfaceNot the Minister Farrakhan you're thinking ofDammit, Shepard!Registered Userregular
I'm not saying disallowing the stuff is bad, not knowing what what the people are capable of is a huge deal, but to just outright disallow something cause it was only printed on them there internets is a poor reason to do it.
If i was trying to play something from DDI i would present all relevant stuff to the DM and discuss it until an understanding was met.
Yeah. Unless you have learned every power and ability of every core class by heart, adding DDI-exclusive stuff won't exactly be revelatory or groundbreaking. Hell, some of the published classes have stranger new mechanics than the DDI-exclusive stuff (looking at you, shaman's spirit companion). The assassin class in particular is easy to understand and is essentially a variant rogue. And it's not like it's hard to print out the relevant pages of a Dragon article and show it to the DM.
I am a pretty good DM and I don't fucking know what any of my players' powers are. I rely on them to keep track of stuff. So far, no problems.
With my maptools game I usually make the macros for all the characters, so I typically know the player's powers just as well as they do (in theory anyway).
I have a bad habit of interrupting during their turn and saying "Oh why don't you use such-and-such power on this monster so your buddy here can shift to this square and get combat advantage for his daily power."
Also sitting there waiting for a player to announce an immediate interrupt I just triggered when they either don't want to use it just yet or have forgotten they even have it.
Seriously I almost killed half the party in the first encounter of Keep on the shaodwdarkevilbadplace.
sure two of them where new to DnD but the other's knew what was up. They where afraid to leave the town ever again.
Shortest adventure ever.
did it ever occur to you that you may have completely ruined dnd for two newcomers? Being the best is NOT what DMing is about.
Gee, maybe the part where i am saying i'm a bad dm puts some insight on this.
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RankenphilePassersby were amazedby the unusually large amounts of blood.Registered User, Moderatormod
edited January 2010
I came so close to wiping the entire party on Sunday. They knew it was a possibility, as I had prepared the adventure for six players and only four showed, and they were all "you know what, fuck it, these are brand new characters, if we die, we die", but when it came down to the wire and they were really neck deep in shit, they were fucking scared. Like, seriously stressed about it. They'd never seen a party wipe, and I've never completely killed a character yet. But they were on the very verge of death.
They decided to press on and try their luck, and the gamble paid off. They were on the edge of their goddamned seats and were absolutely floored when they managed to survive, and the two new players were fuckign hooked.
I can't wait until tomorrow, I'm working the Chaos Scar short adventures into the game, as they're pretty well designed short adventures (like three to four encounters max) and they all work together into a cohesive storyline with a little imagination, so it saves me a lot of time. I've got three different ones printed out that they could discover, so leaving it open like that gives them a bit more sandbox-y room to discover things on their own.
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IpseDixitTreat me like a pirateAnd give me that bootyRegistered Userregular
edited January 2010
I was at Borders today
Very tempted to waste some of my xmas gift card on some 4e books
And some of the "legends" monsters or whatever look awesome
IpseDixitTreat me like a pirateAnd give me that bootyRegistered Userregular
edited January 2010
Things that they clearly put in the manual because some clever asshole thought he'd be cute:
When a power has an effect that occurs upon hitting a target—or reducing a target to 0 hit points—the power functions only when the target in question is a meaningful threat. Characters can gain no benefit from carrying a sack of rats in hopes of healing their allies by hitting the rats.
Things that they clearly put in the manual because some clever asshole thought he'd be cute:
When a power has an effect that occurs upon hitting a target—or reducing a target to 0 hit points—the power functions only when the target in question is a meaningful threat. Characters can gain no benefit from carrying a sack of rats in hopes of healing their allies by hitting the rats.
This was actually a serious problem in third edition.
edit: well not really a serious problem so much as something nerds laughed about on D&D message boards.
Posts
dude, buy some vellum. i bet you could find some.
alternatively, shoot you a fuckin rabbit and get someone to paint a map on that fucker's skin once you get it cured and shit. then you have a rad soft furry-backed map.
I had set up the whole thing for six level one players
four showed up, due to sickness
we decided, "You know what? Fuck it, let's do it anyway. If we go down, we'll go down swinging".
And there were a lot of moments when it came very, very close to that, but they managed to pull it off by the skin of their teeth. No healing surges left, cleric down to four hp, tank down to twelve, fighting a custom-made level five minor devil and his summoners, and they fucking started pulling crits out of their goddamn asses left and fucking right. Mowing down motherfuckers. Group tactics like bitch ain't shit. Incredible. The guys were absolutely standing up and cheering with every successful hit.
Two of the guys had never played D&D before in their lives. Absolutely stunning way to introduce them. They're all friends from school, so there's a solid chance we'll be able to turn this into an ongoing campaign, and I could not possibly be happier about it.
Also, the Critical Fail Result Cards that Fishman wrote up were a miracle in practice. Added so much excitement and fun to the natural ones.
God, I love that afterglow high of a really good game going well. I hadn't played since PAX, so this was definitely an itch that needed scratching, too.
And we are planning another game for Wednesday.
Stoked.
I'd love to make it a collaborative design, time allowing, if you'd be up for it, but if you wanna throw together a prototype of it, that'd be amazing.
sent over the text.
'night
I can't sleep, and having a good base adventure setup to draw from would help a ton. I wanna do some research, see what's available, and I seem to remember hearing good things.
The DM should never have an NPC in the party with more than 4 players, out of simple practicality if not respect.
Throw the DM's character minis on the floor and tell the dude to go play heroclix. Don't do it in anger, just grab them slowly and stare him down the whole time.
Doesn't sound like this was one of those, though.
I've run successful multi-NPC encounters; as rivals ("So sorry we can't stay and help you finish these Ogres, but there's only one Idol of Adelon!", as a co-operative team ("you hold them off, we'll open the gates!"), as objectives themselves (the prisoners you've released begin to arm themselves and assist you in fighting back the horde!).
Again, these are specific story-based examples which are presented as the exceptions to the rule. In general the DM shouldn't have ongoing PC's placed in the party as DMPC's.
If I recall correctly, Alchemist and Master Mixer from artificer are the only things that have trap like things one can make.
This is awesome.
also t rank-- That sounds like a sweet session. I hope our Rogue Trader game has a session as fun and rewarding as that.
tards I say.
There was a time when I excluded all Dragon/Dungeon magazine content from my games (as well as any 3rd party books) because I was of the viewpoint that none of it was internally checked and balanced against official content.
Which was, in fact, the case with much of it.
However, then I realized Wizards of the Coast doesn't even bother to internally check and balance official content against itself. At least, in the 3.5 days anyway.
So, it doesn't really matter, anyway. As a DM you can't really inherently trust anything for D&D to be properly balanced unless you've given it your own eyeball. What book it comes out of is basically meaningless because of how WotC does things.
4e is not perfect but in terms of balance and playtesting it puts 3.5 and earlier editions to shame.
So if something retarded is printed in Dragon it stood just as much chance getting published in Player handbook 3
Rock Band DLC | GW:OttW - arrcd | WLD - Thortar
or something similar to them.
especially if it is an internet-exclusive class or from a Dragon magazine or some shit
I don't know anything about it, hard to plan encounters for shit you're not experienced in dealing with, and man, I'm the DM, I got plenty to keep track of already without all that shit
if you ain't got the book with you, you ain't likely to be able to talk me into letting you playing it
Though the play tests tend to be hit or miss but they're play tests for that reason.
I mean I've usually got my laptop with me at games anyways, but I would sympathise
I've DMed enough ridiculous bullshit to understand that nobody else wants to do that
and I allow some of that stuff
but some of it is pretty sketchy - how do I write encounters for the seventy fucking billion things they keep adding all the time
I like to keep stuff simple and manageable. Okay, PHB2 is printed, go for it, you can use that stuff. PHB3 isn't, so no, you can't. I love the DM tools and character creator, and to be honest I allow a lot of shit I don't actually have physical documentation for, but in terms of general classes and shit I really prefer printed materials for them.
And yeah, the Assassin looks shit hot, but I'm not ready to allow someone to play it in a game I'm running, especially one that looks like it might be long term, unless I know they really understand it and can help me understand how it works in play, and that I know they're capable of playing something as different as that.
And I'm kinda playing devil's advocate here.
If i was trying to play something from DDI i would present all relevant stuff to the DM and discuss it until an understanding was met.
Do agree about not allowing phb3 stuff yet, though more because it's only a half of class and not very well supported yet, might make the player feel under powered. Not so much because it's not in print yet.
This has earned me a lot of resentment.
I'm playing a Pacifist Cleric, which means if I hurt something that's bloodied I get stunned until the end of my next turn, but all my healing powers are insanely good.
It's pretty damn fun, I thought that because my damage output was practically nil I'd be getting bored but I'm having to coordinate all my attacks so that the right monster gets the right debuff so the right ally hits him and gets my healing. It's really awesome to have to plan stuff out a lot more tactically then I usually do with a defender or striker. The last battle I was able to completely shut down the enemies with a single daily power, saving my group a crapload of resources they would've otherwise been forced to spend to win the fight.
Yeah. Unless you have learned every power and ability of every core class by heart, adding DDI-exclusive stuff won't exactly be revelatory or groundbreaking. Hell, some of the published classes have stranger new mechanics than the DDI-exclusive stuff (looking at you, shaman's spirit companion). The assassin class in particular is easy to understand and is essentially a variant rogue. And it's not like it's hard to print out the relevant pages of a Dragon article and show it to the DM.
I am a pretty good DM and I don't fucking know what any of my players' powers are. I rely on them to keep track of stuff. So far, no problems.
sure two of them where new to DnD but the other's knew what was up. They where afraid to leave the town ever again.
Shortest adventure ever.
I have a bad habit of interrupting during their turn and saying "Oh why don't you use such-and-such power on this monster so your buddy here can shift to this square and get combat advantage for his daily power."
Also sitting there waiting for a player to announce an immediate interrupt I just triggered when they either don't want to use it just yet or have forgotten they even have it.
Worst DM, I know.
did it ever occur to you that you may have completely ruined dnd for two newcomers? Being the best is NOT what DMing is about.
Gee, maybe the part where i am saying i'm a bad dm puts some insight on this.
They decided to press on and try their luck, and the gamble paid off. They were on the edge of their goddamned seats and were absolutely floored when they managed to survive, and the two new players were fuckign hooked.
I can't wait until tomorrow, I'm working the Chaos Scar short adventures into the game, as they're pretty well designed short adventures (like three to four encounters max) and they all work together into a cohesive storyline with a little imagination, so it saves me a lot of time. I've got three different ones printed out that they could discover, so leaving it open like that gives them a bit more sandbox-y room to discover things on their own.
Very tempted to waste some of my xmas gift card on some 4e books
And some of the "legends" monsters or whatever look awesome
This was actually a serious problem in third edition.
edit: well not really a serious problem so much as something nerds laughed about on D&D message boards.