Closing Out May...

Overall I've been pretty happy with my posting schedule this month.  We went to Disney World for a week and I took time off from everything.

I'm currently struggling for a direction for some of my creative outlets.  With DnD Next they've spoken about the direction Next will take and I've tinkered with it to emulate that, but I feel it's well past time for a new packet.  I've received my preorder PDF for 13th Age and the book will be as gorgeous as the rules.  I keep thinking about Weird War Stories and mixing it with 13th Age, as well.  Then the Dead AGE game kind of haunts me.  And finally, I picked up the Fate Accelerated Edition and it seems to fix all of the problems I had with Spirit of the Century/Dresden Files/Fate, which was a very pleasant surprise.  Now I wish I'd backed the Fate Dice Kickstarter :(

I did wrap up my Dragon Age for John W.'s group.  It was extended more than I'd like, yet we didn't accomplish as much as I'd hoped.

I'm continually reminded that the older I get, the more I appreciate smaller gaming groups, but it's difficult to find the right size.  Too small and you miss sessions when a player has to miss.  Too big and it's chaotic at the table and you look forward to when a player has to miss.

We'll see what June brings.

Playing with D&D Next House Rules

So tonight I got to implement the changes I wrote about in this post.

I think they went very, very smoothly.

The Areas of Knowledge work very, very well and it's fairly easy to work out the different levels of knowledge in a minute or two.

The only class that still had Skill Dice was the Rogue and I'm seriously contemplating just changing that to gaining Advantage in those areas.

I think it streamlined things to simply ask the players to make Ability checks and slightly reduced the clutter on the character sheets.

Proficiencies didn't really come up, but I can see them being useful.  I have a character that's a musician and simply listing the instruments he played as Proficiencies was easy and painless.

Honestly, I'm even contemplating spell lists, I have some creative players and may simply define basic attack and healing spells and then let them generate their spell effects on the fly...we'll see about that one.

I'm not sure when we'll see a new packet, but I'm pretty happy with what I have.

Obscure Fantasy RPG Appreciation Day: Shades of Fantasy

Shades of Fantasy was written by a customer of mine located here, in Northern Kentucky.  I'm not sure how wide distribution was, but all three of our stores carried it and I bought up before I began working there.  The author, Steve Bode is an acquaintance of mine.

Here's the description from the back of the book:
"Inside you will find: * 40+ Character Occupations including Exorcists, Witch Hunters, Knights, Holy Knights (5 orders: Knights Inquisitor, the Grey Angels, Knights Imprimatur, Knights of St. Justinian, and Knights Macabre), Sturmguard, Vermitic Warlocks, Militant Wizards, Luminati, and many more! * 15 detailed Fantasy Races including the Fey Folk, Banruks, Gimnar, Nith, Ordrue, and more. Also included are human derivative races like the fey influenced Changelings and the half human, half demonic Devilkin. * 110 Creatures, 100+ Skills and Advantages, 130+ Spells, detailed Religions, a sample History, and Enchanted Items. Flexible rules for Character Creation. Innovative rules for Magik, Combat, Exorcism and Possession. Critical Hit and Fumble Charts, and much more! CONVERTS TO MOST POPULAR ROLEPLAYING GAMES"

I know the game was designed to fix the author's dissatisfaction for fantasy RPG's that were in print at that time.

I remember that some that tread some ground that DnD 3.0 would eventually tread and it was fun for several evenings for our group.

It's even got a review on RPG.net!

Battle Beasts Tuesday: Triple Threat Snake for D&D Next

Triple Threat Snake

Medium Humanoid

Armor Class 12

Hit Points 14 (4d8) 

Speed 35 ft.; 

Str 16 (+3)     Dex  12 (+1 )    Con 9 (-1)

Int  12 (+1)    Wis 10  (+0)   Cha  8  (-1)

Alignment lawful

Languages common, parseltongue

TRAITS______________________________________

Constrictor:  When Triple Threat Snake misses with a coils attack roll, the target takes 3 points of water damage.

(Optional) Heart of Water: Triple Threat Snake is vulnerable to wood damage.

(Optional) Riptide: Triple Threat Snake is resistant to fire damage.

ACTIONS_____________________________________

Melee Attack—Coils: +5 to hit (reach 10 ft.; one creature). 

Hit: 9 (1d10+3) water damage.

Ranged Attack—Venom Spit: +3 to hit (range 25 ft./50 ft.; one creature). 

Hit: 5 (1d6+1) water damage.

ENCOUNTER BUILDING 

Level 4                   XP 250

ParaMilitary: Reichsraptor for 13th Age

France 1946
Agents of Project: Crystal Ball have reported facing a new type of Nazi soldiers, known as uberfalkoniers, who are commanding highly trained dinosaurs on the field of battle.  Obviously, this was surprising to the agents because they firmly believed dinosaurs were extinct.  

Mystics working for Crystal Ball have discerned that the Reich's program is in it's infancy and hope to sabotage it quickly.  Additionally, there are ongoing concerns on how the Reich acquired these monstrosities.

REICHSRAPTOR

They guard enemy strongholds, telepathically communicating with their handlers and learning each and every one of humankind's weaknesses...

3rd level scrapper troop [DINOSAUR]
Initiative: +6

Natural Born Killer +8 vs. AC—10 damage
     Natural even hit: The target takes the escalation die in damage
        from razor-sharp teeth.

Nastier Specials
Sidekick:  On a miss the target takes 4 damage from the uberfalkonier.

AC   19
PD   17                             HP 45
MD  15

Call of Cthulhu 7th Edition Kickstarter is now live...or is that undead?!

I guess when Chaosium jumps onboard something, it's fully arrived?  Or is WotC the last bastion?

Either way, CoC 7 has a Kickstarter.  Check it out.

Weird War Stories Icons for 13th Age

One of the unique aspects to 13th Age are Icons, they are the equivalent of the powerful NPC's that aid or oppose your player's in the course of the campaign.

Here is how the Icons are represented in my Weird War Stories setting:

The Archmage is Zatara.

The Crusaders are the Losers.

The Diabolist is the Ultra-Humanite.

The Dwarf King is G.I. Robot

The Elven Queen is Madame Xanadu.

The Emperor is the Unknown Soldier.

The Great Gold Wyrm is Sgt. Rock.

The High Druid is Solomon Grundy.

The White Queen is Mary, Queen of Blood.

The Orc Lord is the Iron Major.

The Hierophant is the Haunted Tank.

The Prince of Shadows is Blackhawk.

The Three are Abnegazar, Rath, and Ghast.