Lord Oz

D&D Next/5E - some thoughts

2012-01-13T10:32:00.000-08:00

So unless you've been locked in a dungeon all week, you've probably heard that WotC announced the next edition of D&D was coming. Borrowing a page from Paizo's playbook, they were going to go to the gaming community for feedback, an open beta if you will.

The reason for this is that WotC alienated a large portion of the D&D player base with 4E, to the point that Paizo's iteration of 3.5 began outselling 4E. That made me think, what rubbed me the wrong way about 4E and caused me to give up my habit of buying D&D products?

So that you don't think this is just some Edition Wars rant, there were things that 4E got right. The math under the engine was balanced and easy to understand, putting together encounters was a snap for GMs, and monster stat blocks became easy to use.

So what didn't I like?

One of the first things that struck me was that WotC was going to scatter the "core" classes and races across 3 PHBs to make room for their own "new" classes and races. It felt like they were sacrificing the core game on the altars of establishing their own IP and forcing us to commit to buying the PHBs to get what we had before. I looked at dragonborn and tieflings as intruders that only existed to give 4E art a distinctive appearance, the warlord and the various new classes in PHB2 as interlopers that pushed out bards, druids and monks.

I didn't like that there were no more "simple" classes, as fighters took up just as much space as wizards with all of the power entries, while casters seemed dumbed down. The whole whiz-bang videogame feel felt wrong. Casters no longer had to worry about getting interrupted, targets were knocked about like soccer balls, and it seemed like everyone ended up with fairly similar powers.

The game lost its organic feel, become a game of structured encounters instead of stories. As a GM I hated the notion of a 16th level monster with 1 hit point, I never used the concept of giving players a wish list for their magic items, and I tossed out treasure parcels.

Fights, while balanced, took way too long. Combat over-relied on powers that forced movement on the grid, a grid that I almost never used.

What am I looking for from D&D Next? Give us back our core game with an organic world. Speed up fights and remove the reliance on movement inducing powers. Fights should feel like dramatic events, not entering an instance. Put some mystery back into magic. Quit trying to prove that D&D is your IP by flooding it with new classes and races.

Pondering Inititiative

2011-10-21T14:29:00.000-07:00

This post on Inititative got me thinking about how I handle Initiative in Skill20.

Right now, everyone declares actions, each side rolls a d12, and each combatant adds DEX bonus and if casting subtracts the level of the spell. This makes spell-casting a bit dicier and keeps things less predictable at the expense of rolling each round.

What the linked post proposes is that instead of rolling Initiative, use combat bonuses to determine order.

Since Skill20 doesn't use CB, I would have to use skills. In a way, it makes sense, as you would expect a highly skilled fighter to have the edge, and a more experienced spell-caster may well be likely to get his spell off quicker than a novice. The down side is that a halfway decent caster would be safe from lowbie monsters interrupting his spells before they went off.

I would need to keep the random element. Possibly have each side roll a d20 and individuals add their Skill/DEX asset to determine individuals scores (again, reduced by spell level for casters). That way Mr. Wizard wanting to fireball those pesky goblins would still be at risk if the dice were evil. The downside is that it might be too much swing.

A possibility is to make the opposition's Initiative static, effectively a DC to check against to see if you go first. So goblins with 2 ranks of Melee and a +2 DEX bonus would have an Initiative DC of 14 (10 + 2 + 2). If Mr. Wizard has 10 ranks of Magic, a DEX bonus of 1, and is casting Fireball (3rd level spell), he would add 8 to the Initiative die roll, meaning he would get his spell off on a 6 or better.

Hmm.

*Update*

I opened my combat rules document to type out new Initiative rules. My current rules for Initiative is one paragraph, two sentences. I decided to leave well enough alone.

Skill20: Margin and Damage Spikes

2011-08-16T15:53:00.001-07:00

I recently started a new sandbox campaign for my alpha testers and saw in practice how much damage can spike due to my Margin of Success rules. An opponent that has a 50% chance to hit can spike up to an extra 10 points of damage and average about 5 extra points of damage. This led to some ugliness when a handful of goblins with d4 damage weapons got a couple of lucky hits.

Characters with 14 or 16 hit points figured on being able to take a few d4 jabs over the course of the fight, none of us realizing the average damage going to be 7-8 and possibly as high as 14.

While I managed not to kill off any characters (though one player got to try out the dying rules), I realize I might need to mitigate damage a bit, even though the spikiness is, IMO, more realistic. And I need to do it in a way that won't overly complicate things.

Ideas:
Go On The Defense
My players had asked if there was a way to go all out defensive when they realized they were in trouble. Using a defensive maneuver that gives +4 Melee Defense reduces the odds of being hit and the margin. Assuming a 50% opponent, an opponent that hits now would have an average margin of 3 and a max of 6. I am debating halving the margin damage done to a character using this maneuver, though I may make that a feat.

Improve Armor
Right now, armor is pretty straightforward. It gives DR, ranging from 1 to 6 DR. While upping the DR would be easy, I don't want plate mail tanks clanking about the battlefield immune to harm. I'm considering adding a bonus to Melee Defense, as that would reduce the margins. But I don't want it to get too high... see aforementioned tanks.

Cap Margin Damage
Another idea would be to limit margin damage to the maximum of the weapon. That would cap a d4 weapon to +4 damage, and a d8 to +8. So far I like this idea the least.

Gen Con 2011 - Day 4

2011-08-16T15:29:00.001-07:00

When I signed our group up for events, I didn't bother with Sunday. Usually between the previous days and late night Saturday, a lot of people are burnt out by Sunday.

Having stayed downtown and needing to be out of my hotel room by 11 actually got me going earlier than I might have if I had gone home. Instead I put on my Ren Faire garb and headed back to the ICC.

Sunday I took in a couple of seminars. One was about starting your own game company. While that's not on my to-do list, I love seeing "behind the curtain" of the game industry and the panel had variety of perspectives, from the guy who started a one-man company to one of the founders of Cryptic Studios.

The other seminar was about steam punk. The panel talked about the history of steam punk as well as various iterations such as diesel punk.

One of my annual traditions is to be in the Exhibitor Hall is closed. I went around and said good-bye to some folks and looked for any end-of-show bargains. Once the closing was announced, I made a last quick circuit, then headed out.

Dinner plans (that ended up falling through) gave me a couple of hours to kill downtown, so I went over to Scottie's and had a couple of beers while things wound down there in preparation for a private post-Gen Con party (that I wasn't invited to :( ).

Finally I headed home, ending another Gen Con. Time to put in my request off for 2012.

GenCon 2011 - Day 3

2011-08-13T10:23:00.000-07:00

The big event for Saturday was the Steampunk LARP in the evening. That left me a lot of time to kill during the day. I was lucky enough to be able to check into my hotel early, then headed over to the Exhibitor Hall. It seems like no matter how many times I walk the XHall, I find something new.

I met up with Nicole for a bit, who was also in costume for the LARP. We had our pictures taken a few times, though I don't think it was for my dashing bowler. :)

Normally on Saturdays I take in the costume contest, which eats up a huge chunk of the afternoon between the actual event and the long time spent waiting in line. This year going to the contest would have left me no time to eat before the LARP (and it turned out the contest ran long). Other than taking a few minutes to watch the pre-contest parade, I found myself with a few hours to kill and wandered the Con.

The LARP itself was a hoot. It was the best run LARP I've played in, the players were all great, and it actually had a set. Who knew playing a Steampunk Amish Mushroom Expert could be some much fun (even if my Amish accent devolved into full-blown German)?

In previous years Saturday night was dominated by the White Wolf Party. This year White Wolf opted to have a small suite party that was invitation only. Needless to say, I'm not cool enough to merit an invite. My friend Jason and I decided to check out some of the post-parties running downtown. We'd seen advertisements for a couple of them, and after hitting the House for a beer headed out.

It's always funny to see the reactions of "muggles" to Gen Con attendees in costume roaming the streets. Jason and I both still in costume from the LARP, and at one point ran into a couple of other players that had been in the same LARP. Our conversation drew a lot of curious looks from the downtown regulars.

We recognized several people from previous White Wolf Parties at the Ugly Monkey. We debated whether the $10 cover charge would be worthwhile, decided to give it a go, and left within an hour.

We returned to the Blu Lounge (it was almost empty during our first stop) since there was no cover charge for anyone in costume. At the door, some gangsta wannabe was being refused admittance over dress code. Jason and I were waved in past him.

Bowler hat $65
Vest $55
The look on some rap-thug's face when I get in a club and he doesn't... priceless.

The crowd had picked up and we ran into one the the GMs from the LARP and a lovely young lady who was a regular at the club and had attended previous Gen Cons. Fortunately there is no video when she, with the help of a few beers, got us on the dance floor.

I ended the night with the long walk back to my hotel, the JW Marriot. I think next year I'll pick one that is more centrally located.

Gen Con 2011 - Day 2

2011-08-11T13:55:00.000-07:00

Every year @knharter and I take in a mini painting class. It's always a roll of the dice, as we need to find one that will fit in with our schedule as well as be within our skill level. We ended up with the same instructor as last year, the very talented Mrika. I was a little concerned that we would just cover the same topics as last year, but thankfully there was plenty of new info to absorb.

The second event of the day was a 3.5 DnD game, Dinner With The King. We had a bunch of great role-players at the table, which was good because it was a RP heavy adventure. Early in the session my gruff barbarian voice drifted into Cookie Monster territory. "Bring me mutton and ale! On nom nom nom!"

Seeing as my chaotic evil barbarian was out to take the throne, it wasn't all polite dinner conversation. I lured the heir to the throne off to another room and let loose my war-cry "With Steel!" Half the ballroom silenced as heads turned our way.

After the game some power shopping ensued so that Nicole and I could finish our steampunk costumes for the Saturday LARP. After that was dinner, a few beers at the House, then home to rest up for Saturday.

Gen Con 2011 - Day 1

2011-08-09T17:14:00.000-07:00

I think this Gen Con I was signed up for more events than ever before. I feel like there was the right mix of free time set aside to hang out with friends and troll the XHall (Exhibit Hall) and time committed to games/events.

The big "thing" on Thursday mornings at Gen Con is the opening of the Exhibit Hall at 10 a.m.. I decided to wait a few minutes and avoid the pressing crush of gamers and backpacks before going in. The odd shape made it hard to judge, but it looked like the XHall was roughly the same size as in the old part of the convention center. Given that the vendor spots sold out, I wouldn't be surprised to see them open K Hall in addition to the ones used this year.

Two other differences were the lack of media guests and computer game companies. I would have thought Turbine, with D&D Online and Lord Of The Rings Online would have been there (then again they skipped last year also) and BioWare with The Old Republic coming out.

The first game of the day was a Pathfinder game, "We Be Goblins". Nicole, Mike , Weasel and I were all in the game and none of us had played Pathfinder before, but enough 3.5 had been played between us it wasn't a hindrance. Mike and I both ended up with pyromaniac bomb-flinging goblins. Our troop of goblins fought spiders, dogs, a horse (a which point we started making Bad Horse comments) and a goblin witch. When we found the witch's hideout we spotted a smokestack and I ended up dropping a bomb down it (while standing on a ladder leaning up against said smokestack - no one said goblins were bright).

The second game was Abney Park's Airship Pirates, a Steampunk RPG.

The system is pretty straight-forward and from what I heard is pretty similar to the FATE system. I ended up playing a character that was a what you would get if you took Inara from Firefly and added Saffron's conniving. The GM offered to let me switch the gender, to which I replied "that's okay, I can do dice drag."

One of the interesting aspects of the system was that each character had a pool of fate points to modify successes or change the plot. We each had eight points, and for six we could pretty much rewrite the plot of a scene which led to me taking the game off the rails when my character's twin sister sprung a trap capture all of the players. I told the GM I was spending 6 plot points to make the 50 guards sent to capture us that I was my sister and she was posing as me, so they arrested her and carted her off. To give the GM credit, he was pretty quick on his feet in adapting and figuring out how to get us to keep going through the plot now that we could no longer be coerced.

Greed is wonderful for motivating players.

Gen Con 2011 - Day 0

2011-08-08T06:32:00.000-07:00

While Gen Con is touted as the best four days in gaming, over the years activities have become increasingly popular on Wednesday, the day before the Con officially starts. Between open gaming both at the convention center and nearby establishments such as Scottie's or the Ram and events such as the annual Stink, there is stuff to do on the day before Gen Con.

What wasn't popular this year was the will call line and construction.

The will call line, used by those who order in advance then pick up their badges at the convention, was out of control. It stretched from the badge pick up area almost to the food court in front of the old Exhibit Hall. I thought about using my phone to video the length, but I haven't messed around with posting video.

While I know the Super Bowl is coming, the week of one of the biggest conventions of the year is not the time to tear up the street in front of the new entrance to the convention center. What the frak were you thinking, Indianapolis? (The answer: they weren't).

My big task for the day was collecting and transporting swag to Union Station for the Stink. We had three vendor donors - Midwest Clerics, USAopoly, and WarMage. In addition, Gen Con donated the usual stockpile of t-shirts in addition to other items.

Fortunately I had scouted out an indoors route from the convention center to Union Station. However, it was still a long haul that I had to repeat a few times. One cool thing was that I got to go inside the XHall (exhibit hall) during set-up. I love getting to see behind the scenes.

The Stink itself went well, finishing with Nordic Distance Dice (throwing huge dice). Afterwards I bolted for another Wednesday night before Gen Con tradition, N-Con. My friend Nicole plays host to some out-of-town exhibitors and on Wednesday there is a get-together for gaming and hanging out, a great warm-up for the four days to come.

Skill20: Initiative

2011-06-17T15:34:00.000-07:00

A post by Greywulf got me thinking about the old-school method of determining initiative every round and how I could integrate that into Skill20.

It meant that instead of Initiative being a resource, like focus and hit points, it would just be determined every round. I had to balance how that would impact spell casters, as before initiative was pretty predictable once the fight got under way. With initiative changing every round, casting spells, especially higher level ones, became dicier. I decided this is a good thing.

I debated old-fashioned weapon speeds for about 30 seconds, then dismissed the idea. Faster weapons almost always had less reach, and I decided the two balanced each other out enough for my purposes.

Different versions of D&D have used different dice for determining initiative. In my opinion, the d20 provided too much of a swing, while a d6 would seriously hamper spell casters and make any initiative bonus a major one. I split the difference and went with a d12. I'm still debating whether to add the Alertness bonus to initiative in addition to Dexterity or in place of it. (In Skill20 Alertness is an ability score, not a feat).

After the jump is my updated combat round breakdown and sections on declarations and initiative.

Combat Round (6 seconds)
1) Declarations
2) Roll Initiative
3) Start-of-round effects applied
4) Turns by Initiative order
5) End-of-round effects applied

Declarations
The players declare their actions and the GM decides on the opponents’ actions before initiative is rolled.
If an intended target is dropped, an attacker may attempt a DC 15 Skill/ALE check to switch targets. If successful, the attacker is at a -2 penalty vs. the new target, if not the action is wasted (but no focus is spent). The Skill is the one being used in the intended attack (Magic, Melee or Ranged). If a character has 10 or more ranks in the skill, a check is not required, but the penalty still applies.

Initiative
At the beginning of a round each side rolls 1d12, and then each character and monsters adds their Initiative Bonus and any penalties. This is their initiative score for the round.
Any initiative below zero counts as zero. A combatant with a zero initiative may only fight defensive, gain initiative, or second wind.

Skill20: Margin of Success

2011-06-12T10:44:00.000-07:00

Skill20 design is a constant battle between simplification and detail. Sometimes my brain will pop out some arcane design idea, only for me to chew it over a day or so and dismissing it as needlessly complicated.

A recent idea I had was to eliminate damage bonuses. As it stands, characters get a damage bonus with weapons equal half their skill rank, plus the appropriate stat bonus. Whether you hit dead even or by 10, the damage is the same. Then it occurred to me that in some other systems I use, the more you hit by, the more damage you do and I pondered how to incorporate that into Skill20.

Effectively a bonus to hit would be a bonus to damage. Likewise, even if a defensive action didn't keep you from getting hit, it would reduce the damage. Separate critical rules wouldn't be needed, as the damage of such an accurate hit would be reflected in the margin damage.

This would mean that fights against evenly matched opponents could take longer, as the margin on both sides would likely be small, while fights against goons (cannon fodder opponents) would probably be skewed more in favor of the PCs. The danger would be big-bads, like dragons and giants, I'll have to monitor their damage output carefully in playtest.

I'll also have to tweak some damage dealing spells. Instead of scaling dice of damage, I'm thinking a flat die amount for the spell plus margin. So instead of a fireball doing 1d6 per rank, up to 10d6, it would do 5d6 plus margin. Each +3.5 of margin is equivalent to a d6. Some more crunch to chew on during playtesting. It might slightly nerf magic damage output, which isn't necessarily a bad thing, but a wizard-type could still clear a room of 15 hp goblins.

X-Men First Class review

2011-06-04T17:23:00.000-07:00

My capsule review of X-Men First Class - it is Marvel's apology to us for Last Stand and Wolverine.

Apology accepted.

It also proves that the 20th Century Fox side of Marvel movies can turn out just as good of one as Paramount. I would put this up there with Iron Man, Thor and Spider-Man 2 (IMO the best of the three Spider-man movies).

more after the jump...

To get the most out of the movie, you do have to make a couple of concessions. One is that it isn't going to follow Marvel canon too closely. Forget everything you know about Moira McTaggart, or that Havok is supposed to be Cyclop's brother, or how certain character's powers work in the comics (which the comic book writers are just as guilty of taking liberties) . The other is to not get too hung up on the previous X movies... just forget about the Emma Frost in Wolverine. Or that Moira in XM3 looks 40 tops despite 40 years passing.

The movie itself is part 60's James Bond ( a common opinion from what I've seen), part Batman Begins, with the X-Mythos as source material.

Not everything is different. Magneto's first scenes are almost exactly out of the first X-Men movie. There is an awesome cameo that ties in to the previous movies. Xavier's estate looks like what we've come to know as Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters.

There is also heaps of back-story... after all this is an origin story. And in many cases the liberties taken make sense.

The cast overall is spot on. James McAvoy gives Charles a believable (and true to canon) idealism without getting preachy or overly naive. Michael Fassbender makes Magneto's journey to "the dark side" much more believable than a certain Vader who will not be named. The biggest surprise for me was Jennifer Lawrence's Mystique. She made Raven a sympathetic character, as opposed to just "that hot chick in blue body paint".

The bad guys are given less depth, but to be fair there is only so much movie to work with here. Kevin Bacon's Sebastian Shaw channeled classic Bond villainy, including a secret sub, global war ambitions, and a white... oh, wait, that was Emma. Shaw's lackeys aren't really given any back story (though one is Nightcrawler's dad in the comics, and could be in the movie timeline).

There are a lot of little touches that will appeal to the comic geeks, such as the Blackbird, or the origin of the black and gold uniforms ("Do we have to wear these?" "Since none of our mutations cope with high-G stress or being riddled with bullets, I would say so").

Part of me hopes they make another, but really I think they could leave well enough alone. Because we know where Charles and Eric are going after this movie.

4.5 of 5 mutant-gened flying monkeys.

Roll a d6

2011-05-05T14:02:00.000-07:00

Continuing the trend of geek parodies of popular songs... while not on a par with Geek and Gamer Girls, this one is still amusing.

Goodbye Old Friend

2011-04-13T11:47:00.001-07:00

Rest in peace, Ryoga. I'll see you again someday in the Summerlands.

(more after the jump... there may be tears)

In the early hours of last Sunday, Ryoga became sick. I knew something was wrong when he wouldn't stop being sick. At first I resolved to sleeping on the couch, that way I could close off any part of the house with carpeting but still be with him. I was already fearing the worse, and had resolved not to leave him locked in a bathroom possibly to die alone if that was the case. But I was still hoping he was just sick and it would pass.

Within the hour, he looked miserable and sounded worse. Instead of being by my side as he had almost constantly been the past many years, he was hiding. I collected him and went to the emergency vet, crying and apologizing the whole way. I knew our time left was short.

While the vet examined him I clung to the hope that it wasn't the end, it would be something treatable, we could go home and he'd curl up in my lap as he'd always done.

It wasn't. We wouldn't. My last moments with him were approaching, to be spent in that cold, sterile room.

I listened as the vet explained. I knew that no matter how much money I threw at it, it would only be postponing the inevitable and dragging out the suffering, probably ending with him dying alone while I was at work or asleep. I couldn't do that to him just because I wasn't ready to say goodbye.

I told my vet my decision. They took him away to prep him, then brought him back so I could say goodbye. He almost seemed normal when I scratched him under his chin and my will almost crumbled. But I thought about what I'd have to put him through to buy a few weeks, and maybe only a few hours. I knocked on the door, signaling I was ready.

I stroked him, sobbing my farewell, as the drugs took effect. Then he was gone. My friend, in who's company I'd spent more time than any human's.

I drove home to my empty, silent house. Ryoga wouldn't be there to greet me, crying to be fed then jumping in my lap. He wouldn't curl up next to me as I slept, always being on whichever side I was facing. He wouldn't be there a couple of hours later when I woke up, asking for me to turn on the faucet in his sink while I brushed my teeth in mine.

I thought I'd lost him once. On a November night, the door to my apartment didn't catch and popped open over night. Ryoga wandered out and disappeared. Despite searching the complex and nearby woods, I couldn't find him. Then Christmas night, I was walking back from a friend's place in the same complex when I heard a familiar meow. It was Ryoga, walking down the sidewalk towards me. It was my best Christmas ever.

But this time there will be no Christmas.

Goodbye old friend.

So much for weekly...

2011-02-27T14:10:00.000-08:00

Facebook pretty much became the preferred way to share my net "discoveries" such as trailers or articles. Especially given the convenience of just having to hit a share button and bam, it's done.

Plus my GenCon plans getting trashed by work has caused me to lose my momentum on my game design work. No running a game at the Con means no pressure to finish up or have more betas.

And now Rift has started sucking my free time into its own dimensional vortex.

WotC scaling back D&D output

2011-01-13T07:16:00.000-08:00

The news from this Ampersand article has been lighting up the gaming blogosphere. WotC is cutting back on D&D production on a few fronts.

No more minis. WotC is ending production of its pre-painted plastic minis line. Minis may continue to be a part of board game products and there may be special releases. While that doesn't affect me much, and I think WotC bungled the way they sold minis, I could see this being a disappointment to those who liked having minis on the table but didn't have the time, talent or resources to paint up minis. In fact, I expect WotC to switch to counters like those used in Monster Vault to replace minis for tabletop.

Three books canceled. This is the "uh-oh" to me. The only reason to cancel these books is if WotC didn't think they make a profit, which means sales are decreasing. While I'm sure some will point to this as evidence that 4e "sucks", there are other factors besides the edition wars. WotC cranked out a lot of books early on, and now the market is saturated. There is also attrition due to people going to competitors like Pathfinder, the various home-brew clones, video/computer games, or leaving the hobby in general.

It also looks like WotC is abandoning the digest format used in the Essentials line, as an upcoming release has switched from digest to hardcover. The reasoning could be negative feedback regarding the new format or they will make more profit with a higher priced hardcover.

Finally, I assume the pulling books off the release schedule will fuel the fire of 5e conspiracy theorists.

No more Dragon or Dungeon compilations. To me, and I've read others express this, Dragon ceased when it went digital. So this change isn't a big deal to me, especially since I'm not a subscriber to D&D Insider. And based on the promise to continue the same digital output, it's not a big deal. I do wonder why, is there a cost associated with compiling the digital articles into monthly downloads? I would think this would be almost automated and would be worth keeping if it improved the satisfaction of a few customers.

While I find this news slightly concerning, mainly dropping books off the schedule, I also noticed hints that WotC will be putting more energy into other gaming products like board games. It reminds me of a FLGS that moved to a location in a fashionable mall. All of the RPG product was shoved to a back corner so the front of the store could feature board games and puzzles. Has WotC discovered there is more money in cardboard than books?

Sword Cam

2010-12-28T13:33:00.000-08:00

The Old Republic - IGN Preview

2010-12-17T18:41:00.000-08:00

More Star Wars: The Old Republic Videos

Stress Free GMing

2010-12-14T06:41:00.001-08:00

I just read a really good article over at Stuffer Shack on stress free GMing. The author's philosophies on GMing mirror mine a great deal. This is how I manage to juggle 3 concurrent campaigns and have campaigns that last years.

The alternative to stress free GMing can lead to this. Though to be fair, I don't serve pizza (or anything else) at my games.

New Pirates Of The Caribbean Trailer

2010-12-13T19:11:00.000-08:00

Here's hoping it will be more like the original... trailer after the jump.

Princess Bride With Lightsabers

2010-12-07T14:56:00.001-08:00

Star Trek LCARS Home Panel

2010-11-30T13:23:00.000-08:00

Needless to say... want.

Wolverine Gets A Manicure In Russia

2010-11-18T16:13:00.000-08:00

Check out the video after the jump...

The Grinch That Stole Thanksgiving

2010-11-14T11:35:00.000-08:00

Wal-Mart and Sears announced that they will be open Thanksgiving. Wal-Mart isn't surprising, but Sears is caving to pressure and joining the Evil Empire. I really hope sales suck and they get shellacked by the over-time expenses to discourage this ~~disease~~ trend from spreading.

You can read more here.

Skill20 101

2010-11-13T06:08:00.000-08:00

In most incarnations of MicroLite, three stats (attributes) are used - Strength, Dexterity, and Mind. The trouble I ran into using the three stat system was that it put too much on Mind. While specifics were driven by skills, it still put everything from Intelligence, Wisdom and Charisma into one stat.

My solution was to add Alertness. It was the one area that wasn't well defined by a skill and that I was struggling with in game play. So my simple 3x9 skill chart had to expand to 4x9.

That's right, 9 skills. At least for Fantasy Skill20. Different settings could require different skills around subjects such as magic and technology.

Skills replace numbers such as Base Attack Bonus (use Melee or Ranged skill) as well as defenses. Without numbers derived from levels, there's no need for levels. Advancement is handled through advancing skills and stats. Advancing skills is fairly easy, growing more difficult with higher skill ranks, while advancing attributes are expensive and require a lot of work (xp).

The third part of the character building blocks is the selection of feats. Class abilities from other d20 incarnations are part of feats, as well as some familiar feats. The initial number of feats hinge on stat scores and are gained by improving stats and getting skills to certain break points (11 ranks of a given skill). Feat gain is fairly slow, though the initial helping may look generous. However, given that the player uses feats to emulate class abilities, they can get used up quickly.

The player can decide whether to focus their character and make it more versatile based on feat selection with the obvious trade off. The same holds true for skills. If a player dumps all xp into advancing their melee skill and load up on combat feats they will shine in toe-to-toe fights. The counter to this min-maxing is to have a well-rounded campaign with plenty of skill checks and challenges other than combat.

Lego Star Wars - Original Trilogy

2010-11-03T11:51:00.000-07:00

Even though this spin on the original Star Wars features Jar Jar, it's still worth a watch.

Game Name Game

2010-11-02T12:58:00.000-07:00

Back when 4E was looming on the horizon, I started working on what I called Project 39, my attempt to combine the best of what I had seen in the 4E mechanics with what I wanted to keep from 3.5.

4E hit, I blew up my campaign world to accommodate the huge shift it represented, and we converted our ongoing campaign to 4E. That last a few sessions until I hit on a way to do more granular advancement (something I frequently tinkered with in d20) and hit on the idea of 4lacarte, an a la carte advancement system where players bought powers, feats, skills and what not piecemeal, rather than a surge of power once in a while when they leveled.

Cruising the InterBlogs, I stumbled across Robin Stacey's Microlite system. The idea behind Microlite was to boil down D&D to its barest bones, with the basic rules taking up a couple pages. A small community developed around the idea, all doing their own takes on it. I realized it would be easy for me to distill down what I was doing into a simplified system, basically just expanding slightly on the Microlite idea but keeping my idea of advancement divorced from level. I called it MicroZ.

Microlite was bought by Seth Drebitko of Kobold Enterprise. Microlite20 or M20 continues to have its community and Mr. Drebitko is continuing to develop the system. However as thing progressed I could see his path and my development path were diverging enough that I felt that my system was not quite Micro and many of the mechanic introduced to M20 were not ones that met my needs.

I flirted with the name z20, a play off d20 and the z in Oz. But it isn't very descriptive, then I hit on an idea for a name that sums up the core of my iteration of d20. Skill20.

Advancement in Skill20 mostly hinges on Skills. While there is Stat (Ability or Attribute such as Strength) advancement, Stats don't change much over time. Skills are the driving force in this game. Hence the name.

I'll go into more details on Skill20 in a future post.

Veronica Mars - Season 4

2010-10-25T11:29:00.000-07:00

I stumbled across this, I had no clue that anything had even been shot for Season 4. It was a shame this show didn't keep going. There's been rumors of a Veronica Mars movie, but I consider that unlikely despite the fact that Kristen Bell has said she'd put up her own money.

A New Marvel RPG?

2010-10-12T15:59:00.000-07:00

I found this tidbit via EN World.

The important item is the mention of "role-playing items" by Hasbro. Hasbro owns WotC. Could we see yet another iteration of a Marvel Super-Heroes RPG? Will it be based on the 4e engine? Will I pretend that I'm not going to buy the first book for it anyways? Then again, the last Marvel "RPG" that came out was so bad in the previews I avoided it.

Babysitter Ghost Scare

2010-10-11T12:41:00.000-07:00

I don't know how old this clip is, but it's great. And given how old that television must be, I'd almost expect it to be haunted. Watch the spooky fun after the jump.

New D&D Ad Is A Metal Flashback

2010-10-06T14:43:00.000-07:00

Holy 1980 Batman! That is some old school art, mostly from the Fiend Folio if I remember correctly.

Comparing Tea Party To Religious Right

2010-10-05T13:46:00.000-07:00

The Tea Party has been making me nervous. While I am a fan of less government and less spending, I am vehemently opposed to the Religious Right's theocratic desires to put (their) God "back in government". My philosophy is keep religion out of the government and keep the government out of religion Evidently a lot of Tea Partiers feel different. Check out this article.

I'm A Behir

2010-09-29T19:32:00.001-07:00

D&D Home Page - What Monster Are You? - D&D Compendium

Star Wars Vs. Star Trek

2010-09-28T14:10:00.000-07:00

I'll admit that I'm not certain I haven't shared this before... the trouble is if you've seen enough mash-ups, they blur together some. But it won't keep me from sharing. Video after the jump.

Geek And Gamer Girls - Inside Info

2010-09-26T20:05:00.001-07:00

Michele Boyd, one of the ladies appearing in the Geek and Gamer Girls video embedded in an earlier post also appeared in The Guild (which IMO gives her added geek cred). On her website she talks about making the video. So if you are a fan of the video, go check it out.

DIY Guass Gun

2010-09-25T20:14:00.000-07:00

The article refers to the home-built weapon as a coil gun, but I think that most of my readers are used to referring to this kind of weapon as a Gauss gun, a la Traveller. I did notice that we don't see in the video (after the jump) how long it takes to charge up the capacitors or how many shots the batteries are good for... then again this guy built the thing himself.

Geek And Gamer Girls Music Video

2010-09-24T21:00:00.000-07:00

EMBED-Geek and Gamer Girls Song - Watch more free videos

German Star Trek Commercial

2010-09-16T21:21:00.000-07:00

I noticed that in Germany "SyFy" still seems to be using the SciFi moniker.

The Making Of The Empire Strikes Back

2010-09-15T14:53:00.001-07:00

LOTRO TV Spot

2010-09-09T21:07:00.000-07:00

PC Games - E3 2011 - The Lord Of The Rings Online

Rather clever, I think.

Wal-Mart .vs 1 Million Women

2010-09-08T06:00:00.000-07:00

Wal-Mart is the nation's largest employer. It is also the most sued entity, even more so than the U.S. government. While a good chunk of the latter may be because it is such a huge target, where there's lots of smoke, there's probably some fire.

In a case that has been brewing since 2001, the case of 1 million women filing a class action suit against Wal-Mart for discrimination looks like it is headed for the Supreme Court.

You check out an actual news article on the latest developments in the case here.

What will the Supremes do? Given Wal-Mart's arrogance when it comes to being held accountable, such as spending millions to avoid a $7,000 fine in the case of a temp worker trampled to death, the Court may let it proceed. Two lower courts have already ruled on this in favor of letting the case proceed as a class action suit.

Wal-Mart's revenue is in the neighborhood of half a trillion dollars. Their profit in 2009 was $14 billion. But a case this size could actually hurt given the numbers. We're not talking bankruptcy hurt, but it would give them a bloody nose for the fiscal year. Will it be enough to make them change their ways?

Ironically if Wal-Mart had settled the case when it was 7 women, they would have gotten away with a pittance compared to what they'll pay if they lose now. Kind of like spending millions to avoid a $7,000 fine.

MidiChlorian Rhapsody

2010-09-07T06:06:00.000-07:00

Used Games - Frugal Spending Or Development Theft?

2010-08-25T16:11:00.000-07:00

My exposure to this controversy started with this Penny Arcade comic. That led to further reading. And it looks like the dust-up was triggered by this article.

The ramblings that follow are just my opinion, not those of anyone like my employer (who I tend to leave out of my blogging.)

First, I'll admit that I had never given this issue much thought, and even thinking about it there are still two sides and I'm not 100% behind either.

On the developers' side, I can see their point. They invest money in developing a game, not a cheap endeavor, on the hopes of selling enough copies to make a profit. Used game retail undercuts that model. And while the buyers of used games may use "being on a budget" to justify buying used instead of new, if they are that hard up maybe they shouldn't be spending money on a video game. The same justification is leading to the death of brick-and-mortar specialty retailers in favor of mass online retailers.

There are a couple of ways to end a large chunk of used game retail. An online verification model or digital distribution model would eliminate the ability to use used games. The people that will howl the loudest are the ones that, as THQ put it, aren't their customers anyways. Of course the latter model will kick the legs out from under video game retail as a whole, a very big Eff You to the retailers who have been peddling these companies wares over the years.

If you know me, you'd think that this would be the end of it. I'm all about being willing to pay and extra buck to make sure the right people get the money. I buy my comics from the same comic book store for years even though it would be cheaper to get them online.

Here's the dilemma. If we endorse this sort of restrictions on this type of media, how long until it spreads like wildfire to other media formats? Will I no longer be able to take a blu-ray I bought to a friend's house? Will someone not be able to take music from home to work? While these may seem like a stretch, it's a slippery slope.

Regardless, developers are already introducing disincentives to buying used games and it's not like second-hand shoppers can vote with their dollars. Actually, their refusal to buy the games used would help the publishers' cause. If you have Gamestop stock, you might want to reconsider.

Scott Pilgrim - Movie Review

2010-08-23T07:34:00.001-07:00

I've been slacking on movie reviews this summer. It's not that I haven't seen any, I just suck at not getting distracted. But I had to break out of my rut to speak up for Scott Pilgrim Vs. The World. In one word... awesome.

I've seen the movie twice. It's like someone took classic video games, a boy meets girl story, a dash of pop culture, then hit frappe on the blender and poured it over my dreamscape. From the Nintendo-esque take on the Universal Studios opening, you know this movie is aimed at nerds like us.

I haven't read the graphic novels, which I think is a good thing. People have complained how this or that got left out, and by not going in with a set idea of how the movie *should* be, I didn't have the baggage dragging down my geektastic enjoyment.

And I was a little bit wary of seeing Michael Cera play yet another iteration of the slightly fuddled slacker. But it totally works in this story. Plus I like that the main characters are flawed. Scott isn't the totally nice guy, and Ramona, as she put it, "dabbled in being a bitch." I think that this humanity in the middle of the surreal events keeps us engaged.

I'm sad that this movie didn't get the box office returns I think it deserves. Hopefully it will have better legs when it comes out on disc. I know I'll be buying a copy, I just need to come up with a drinking game that won't put my liver into "game over".

My rating: 5 of 5 8-bit bass-playing flying moneys.

MMO Junkies Sues Game Company

2010-08-20T10:25:00.000-07:00

Exhibit 2,762 on what's wrong with society, we have another example of a bullshit lawsuit. In this one, the plaintiff, a gamer who supposedly racked up 20,000 hours playing the MMO Lineage 2, is suing the game producer, NCSoft, for making the game "too addictive".

Not only should the lawyer who filed the suit be disbarred and required to pay NCSoft's legal fees, this guy should be banned from ever touching a computer again.

Check out the story on Wired.

TIE Interceptor At Celebrations V

2010-08-16T12:19:00.001-07:00

This goes on the list of things I'd want if I hit the Powerball. It could be parked next to the life-sized mock-up of the Serenity that I'd live in.

GenCon 2010 Recap - Part III

2010-08-11T19:14:00.000-07:00

I've already talked about gaming and the Exhibit Hall, but there's a lot more to the GenCon experience, and even more that I didn't partake of this year.

Attending the Costume Contest is a tradition of mine. Saturday days my friends usually split up to go do their own thing, and my thing is watching the contest. This means getting in line up to 2 hours early. I hope the Indianapolis Convention Center expansion will mean a bigger venue for the contest, hopefully one with a higher stage or tiered seating.

An important part of the Costume Contest for me is the entertainment, namely the Different Drummers Belly Dancers pre-show and Luke Ski's intermission performance. Unfortunately the contest ran long this year, so I had to take off before they got to the winners.

KNH and I took our traditional mini painting workshop, this year with the talented Marike Reimer. Every year we learn something new, and this year was no exception, though looking at Marike's minis made me feel like a neanderthal with a mastodon tail dipped in tar.

Saturday night is usually the double feature of the GenCon Dance and the White Wolf Party. KNH's costume was a huge hit. I ended up popping my fangs after an hour of fiddling with a loose one (try talking while holding in a fake tooth with your tongue). Fortunately WW went back to the original venue, as opposed to last year's oven of a venue ironically named The Ice Lounge.

Dining was 3 nights at Scotty's Brewhouse and 1 night at the Ram. I was advocating Scotty's a lot because IndyDav (the manager) is a gamer and went to lengths to make GenCon welcome, bringing over many traditions he had started at the Ram. That and their GenCon beer was a Scottish ale. The 501st Stormtrooper Legion was there, dice was given away, sci-fi/fantasy movies were playing, and there was lots of atmosphere. Unfortunately, I think the staff was overwhelmed. Two of three nights my order was wrong, two of three nights I didn't get my dice, beer service was slow, and the night they had a live "geek" act, the group was so loud you couldn't hear. Add to that the longish walk, it may be a hard sell for next year.

The Ram seemed to just phone it in. They had t-shirts and some signage, but I noticed the movies were gone. They know they will be at capacity without trying, so they don't really have to try.

GenCon 2010 Part II - Gaming

2010-08-10T16:59:00.000-07:00

What is GenCon without gaming? An expensive shopping trip with costumes. Fortunately I was able to get in some gaming this year, largely thanks to friends who signed me up while I was stuck working in the field.

Thursday was an Old School 2nd Edition D&D game where we played the minions of Sauron invading a dwarven hold in the Greenwood (which became Mirkwood). There were some great nostalgic moments as well as reminders of things we're better off without in modern gaming. In the first encounter we lost a party member to a failed save versus poison. Towards the climax of the session there was a demon (actually an ice devil) summoned, and the DM asked who wanted to play it. My friends looked at me because I put the ham in Hamlet. One of the joys of playing con games is that you can go over the top and try things you'd never do in an ongoing campaign.

(Picture by KNH)

Friday was Wild West Cthulhu, ran by friends of mine, Tim and Pat of Gamerz. I had encouraged several friends to play and was tickled to find out that I would get to play the leader of a Wild West gang that were also werewolves. It looked like the theme thus far, to quote Jayne was "let's be bad guys."

Needless to say, it was a hoot. My gang were among the few survivors, having immediately set up camp in the silver mine to keep anyone from making silver bullets, and delivered the best death the GM had seen in a long time. We suspected another character of being treasonous, pulled guns on him, and I said "either you're in cahoots with the other side or you're an idiot."
His answer was, "I'm not an idiot," which was immediately followed by my "bang!." Tim was so amused he had us re-enact the scene at recap.

My last game was a Courting Murder LARP. The world reminded me of the Dresen Files set in the 30's, and I am a sucker for any vintage atmosphere stuff. Last year several players had dressed up for the part, so I donned a shirt and tie to reprise my role of Charlie MacGregor, the "accountant". Sadly, almost no one else dressed for the part, several regulars from previous years didn't make it, and not only didn't anyone play my allies, no one played my rivals. This was the last year for this LARP, so Charlie's story ended with a fizzle.

I tried to avoid my default quasi-gaelic brogue that all of my accents seem to devolve into, but instead of sounding Canadian Charlie ended up sounding more like a New Yorker that said "aboot" and "eh?"

GenCon 2010 - Part I

2010-08-09T18:25:00.000-07:00

In years past I broke down my GenCon recaps day by day. Thanks to Twitter, Facebook and my EVO is was able to comment live this year. So instead of going day by day I'll just write about the Con by subject.

The Exhibition Hall (XHall)

The XHall is (to me) the heart of the Con. When it closes, that marks the end of GenCon. I spend many a hour here and this year was no exception. In addition to all of the cool stuff it is the best place for people, both of the watching variety and those people you bump into once a year in a crowd of 30,000.

One of the great things is the passion that exhibitors have for their wares. I don't mean in just selling goods, in many cases what the exhibitors are showing you is their creative baby, whether it's an artist, a games designer, a film maker or a performer. People don't vend at GenCon, or even get into the various business aspects of our game-geekdom to get rich. They do it because they love it, and that shows when you talk to them.

The coolest product I saw was the new Hoplite table prototype at Geek Chic with a touch-sensitive computer screen in the bottom of the table. Actual production was at least 6 months away. I think the most dangerous thing about the (non-computerized) Hoplite was that I looked at it and thought "that's the same size as my coffee table... and I could afford it."

The White Wolf booth had no games this year. It was all about advertising their upcoming convention in New Orleans, made to look like a New Orleans bar complete with booze(!). Of course they had the prerequisite fanged booth babes. Some game-bloggers have dissed them for this, but they paid for the space and really for the companies, GenCon is more about exposure and advertising than actually moving product. If they move enough the pay for coming, that's good. I guess WW and CCP (the company that puts out Eve Online) decided to dispense with dealing with shipping, merching, selling and return shipping books. One of the rumblings I've heard is that the New Orleans event will also be where they announce the World of Darkness MMO. But that's rumor.

The art show was about the same size as usual. While I wanted to buy some art I promised myself I wouldn't buy anymore until I put up the pieces I've already acquired and are accumulating dust. Also the Authors' Row was adjacent, so I stopped over there daily to say hello to Jonathan Rudder and his brother. Jonathan also happens to be a developer with Turbine's Lord of the Rings Online and probably knows more about LotR than anyone living.

I think this was the first year I didn't visit the Wizards of the Coast booth. I think the lack of compelling releases, the demise of the Star Wars line, and burn-out on the 4e drama left me with a healthy disinterest. It never seemed really busy and I have to wonder how bad the fallout from 4e and Essentials has discouraged their customer base.

I had an opportunity to talk to author Michael Stackpole while he was manning the Origins Game Fair booth. I've attended several of his seminars over the years and have read several of his books. What I didn't know about was his involvement in Origins and gaming. I had written off Origins, but after talking to him I may give it another try.

A huge difference this year was the return of the Media Guests. A as opposed to Actor-Who-Played-Bit-Character, GenCon lined up some truly geek-worthy guests this year, namely Felicia Day of the Guild (as well as Sandeep Parikh, Jeff Lewis, and Robin Thorsen) and Wil Wheaton.. I found it amusing that an article about GenCon noted that he played "Evil Wil Wheaton" on Big Bang Theory and didn't mention Wesley Crusher. I thought about going through the line just to meet Felicia but it would have been "Hi I'm Fan #5256 you've talked to today and I love your hair... I mean the air." Then she would have sprayed me with mace.

Speaking of Big Bang Theory, the big thing in t-shirts this year was Sheldon shirts. The funniest was for the ladies and simply said "Stop staring at my bazingas".

Another difference was the lack of computer game companies. The past few years a corner of the XHall was darkened so companies could demo their upcoming games. This year, nada. I expected Turbine to be there with Dungeons and Dragons Online and soon to release Free-to-Play Lord of the Rings Online, and SOE with DC Universe Online, but nada.

This is getting longish and it is getting late-ish. Tune in later for Part II.

Star Wars - The Phantom Menace Final Fight Sans Crap

2010-08-05T21:18:00.000-07:00

MicroZ First Beta

2010-07-31T14:19:00.001-07:00

A lot of this probably won't make complete sense as I've been a slacker about posting my MicroZ stuff online.

First off, MicroZ is a condensed d20 system, inspired by Microlite. The biggest difference is that I do away with the class/level system, making it skill based and using feats to define what would be class abilities. I keep some of the best aspects of the 4th Edition of the World's Most Popular RPG (4E for short) in the mechanics, namely having defenses instead of saves.

In Microlite and MicroZ, the Vancian system of magic is replaced with point fueled spell casting. In Microlite hit points are used, in MicroZ there is a separate pool of points called Focus. One of the big reasons for this was the healing loop... if someone can heal more hp than they spend to cast the healing spell, they can go on indefinitely.

Last night was my first beta test of the system and a scenario I want to run at GenCon in 2011. The group was composed of one of my alpha test players, several experienced gamers, and two players who had never played an RPG.

The good part was that the newbies were able to play the most complicated characters, both spell casters, fairly easily. The character sheets were easy to follow and the session didn't bog down for mechanics.

Overall the story of the scenario was well received. In a nutshell an undead mayor decided he was going to take a new wife, a farmer's daughter from the adjacent kingdom. It was the players' task to track her down and save her from the her wedding day.

The biggest flaw in the scenario was that the fights were too easy. The characters never felt like they were really in any danger and still had plenty of resources left at the end of the final fight.

The biggest system issue is that spell-casters need to be nerfed. They were able to blaze away with spells and didn't come close to running out of Focus. Right now I'm mulling on whether to reduce the amount of Focus characters get or raise the cost of casting. As usual interesting ideas flit through my mind that I discard to keep from complicating and bogging down the system.

The rogue feat was pretty under-powered. In the session, it gave the character +3 damage when flanking, on crits, and on surprise attacks. It never came into play, and compared to lightning bolts and searing rays, and extra +3 seemed pretty puny.

I was also concerned about the fighter feat, which adds the character's Strength bonus to the DR (damage reduction) of armor was over-powered, but the "tank" never got hit. Still, I need to revisit it, as most of the monsters would have needed a critical hit to hurt the tank.

All in all, I got a lot of good notes. I'm glad I'm doing this a year in advance rather than a week.

WotC Ditching 4e Core Books

2010-07-29T06:20:00.000-07:00

The rumor is out in the blogsphere and twitterverse that WotC is ceasing publication of the 4e core books in favor of the Essentials line.

Another blogger pointed out that it would make sense for WotC to stop printing the current core books because there is a ton of errata for 4e. Letting the channel run dry then starting a new print run with the books updated to include errata would make sense.

Maybe it's part of WotC's evil secret plot to ruin D&D? Or maybe it's just part of a business plan to keep selling product.

I'm just hoping I can hold on to the GenCon mojo long enough to work on MicroZ over my vacation.

Thor Trailer

2010-07-29T06:04:00.000-07:00

It looks like they are staying true to the Marvel version of Thor, with Asgard being a Kirbyesque fusion of magic and science.

Check out the Comic-Con trailer after the jump.

The Guild Goes Bollywood

2010-07-27T15:09:00.000-07:00

The Guild goes Bollywood in this season's music video "Game On".

<a href="http://www.bing.com/videos/browse?mkt=en-us&from=&vid=8cb424dc-cbdb-40be-90c5-8fb450462d2f&from=en-us" target="_new" title="Season 4 - Music Video - "Game On"">Video: Season 4 - Music Video - "Game On"</a>

I'll be in my bunk.

Sucker Punch Trailer

2010-07-27T14:31:00.000-07:00

This movie looks like samurai-steampunk-fantasy mixed with Alice In Wonderland. Cute girls with swords fighting Nazi dragons? I'm sold.

DCUO Cinematic Trailer

2010-07-24T14:13:00.000-07:00

The DC Universe Online cinematic trailer is out, done by Blur, the same folks that created the two awesome Star Wars: The Old Republic cinematics that we've seen. While I'm not a huge DC fan and don't plan on playing this game, I have to admit, the trailer looks pretty awesome.

Maybe Blur should start doing actual movies or episodes of something?

Video Games | DC Universe Online | Exclusive Who Do You Trust Trailer HD

XBox 360 | Playstation 3 | Nintendo Wii

Official: Whedon Directing Avengers

2010-07-23T06:15:00.001-07:00

Joss Whedon announced at Comic-Con that he is directing the upcoming Avengers movie. He did the announcement because "Marvel can't afford the press release."

Via io9.

Porcupine Pet

2010-07-20T15:18:00.000-07:00

Musings On DDI

2010-07-20T14:15:00.000-07:00

There is a lot of chatter in the gaming blogoshpere about 4e and the upcoming Essentials line. One of the items I see mentioned a lot is the DDI (D&D Interactive) Character Builder. While I have seen a great deal of praise for the tool, others bristle at the notion of having to pay a monthly fee.

I fall (or fell while I still played 4e) into the latter camp. After buying book after book at $30-$40 a pop, another $10 a month seemed like highway robbery.

The thing is, if DDI is as useful as its fans tout, maybe WotC should look at it as more of a tool to bring in more customers rather than a raw revenue stream. They could look at F2P and freemium MMOs as an example.

Buying a PHB would give you a code that would give you access to the character builder for races/classes contained in the PHB as well as access to Dragon. Buying a DMG would give you access to the Adventure Builder Tools and Dungeon magazine. Buying additional titles would give online access to the materials covered in those books. Of course, you could just buy the appropriate codes to gain access to the material you wanted.

Dragon and Dungeon become even more useful for previews to entice customers to buy those new books. I'm sure someone with more business savvy in the field could come up with more ideas along this vein.

The Guild - Season 4 Starts

2010-07-13T13:56:00.000-07:00

<a href="http://www.bing.com/videos/browse?mkt=en-us&from=&vid=9c194351-975c-4b54-9462-e85b3e87af8e&from=en-us" target="_new" title="Season 4 - Episode 1 - Epic Guilt">Video: Season 4 - Episode 1 - Epic Guilt</a>

Vader And Yoda On Tom Tom

2010-07-08T20:53:00.000-07:00

I couldn't decide which one to post up front, so they're both after the roundabound... I mean jump.

"Kissed A Nerd" Music Video

2010-07-08T06:28:00.001-07:00

WOTC OMG 4E WTF?

2010-07-07T14:56:00.000-07:00

It looks like the money train needed some steam, so WotC is revamping 4E with their "Essentials" line. As in it's essential they get more money out of us.

Supposedly they are simplifying things to try to make the game friendlier to new players, and maybe win back some that jumped ship to Pathfinder and the plethora of home-grown OSR (Old School Renaissance) systems.

And of course nothing says simply like 5 new books and a handful of other new products.

It looks like they are simplifying characters by eliminating daily powers and tweaking how encounter powers work, and paring things down to 8 classes and 10 races. While things are supposed to be cross compatible, so you don't feel like you wasted the last $500 you spent on 4E, the new classes will not be the same as the old classes. So you need the new books.

Or you can tell them to sod off like I am doing.

You check out the info here. But I'd save your money and go here instead.

Wal-Mart In The News

2010-07-07T14:15:00.000-07:00

Just a couple of interesting articles. The first is about how Wal-Mart has spent 2 million dollars fighting a $7,000 fine in the trampling death of one of their temp employees.

The second article has a lot of insight into Wal-Mart and is an interesting read. Anyone want to start a pool on how long until the Chicago unions try to get in the new Wal-Mart (which will be in a childhood neighborhood of mine, Pullman)?

SW:TOR Combat Video

2010-07-04T09:43:00.001-07:00

I like the use of "dialogue instances" that keep ass-hats from messing around in your scene. The instance triggered when the large green circle appeared and was so smooth I wouldn't have noticed it if I hadn't read about it.

Found via Massively.com, check out the video after the jump.

Sci-Fi Dinner Party

2010-07-03T08:33:00.000-07:00

Okay, this Sci-Fi Dinner Party is frigging brilliant.

iPhone Vs. Solar Death Ray

2010-07-01T20:30:00.000-07:00

To its credit, the iPhone keeps playing music well into its destruction via the best use of green energy I've seen all day, a solar death ray.

Check out the video after the jump.

Telcos = Greedy Bastards = No Surprise

2010-06-29T13:49:00.000-07:00

Here's a couple of interesting articles on how telecom companies are focusing on milking customers for short term, Wall Street appeasing gains rather than investing and keeping pace with the rest of the civilized world.

This article is really the core of the discussion, the second article mostly references the first but brings up at least one other good point.

Harry Potter And The Deathly Hollows Trailer

2010-06-29T13:18:00.000-07:00

I put the trailer after the jump to keep the front page of the blog from bogging down too much.

Battleship Yamato Trailer

2010-06-28T19:01:00.000-07:00

I remember getting up early to watch Starblazers on Channel 44 when I was a kid. I hope that this movie makes it to the states... it's chock full of nostalgia. I just wish the trailer showed the Wave-Motion Gun actually firing.

See more at io9.

Homemade General Grievous Costume

2010-06-24T19:10:00.000-07:00

I don't speak German, but I think he just said Grievous would lead Germany to victory.

All kidding aside, this guy did a great job with that costume... I bet it looks really creepy in dim lighting.

GM Etiquette

2010-06-23T15:21:00.000-07:00

Along the lines of Player Etiquette, a post about GMing has prompted me to write something along the lines good rules for GMs.

GMing can seem like a thankless job, but people do it because it's fun. Fortunately really bad GMs will winnow themselves out, driving away players. But good GMs can still engage in bad behaviors, I know that I've done it.

1)You are not the players' adversary. It is not your job to screw over or wipe out the players.

2) Don't play favorites. This goes double if you play with an SO or spouse and triple if you have a romantic interest in a player but no relationship.

3) Don't pick on players/characters. Yes, someone at your table may be irritating or you're annoyed at that rules lawyer. That doesn't mean he's suddenly wearing Axe for Monsters.

4) PCs should be the stars. The players aren't there to entertain or provide an audience for your NPCs.

5) Don't hinge the entire night on the players figuring out something that you think is obvious.

6) Don't run if you aren't up to it. GMs usually feel a certain sense of duty that makes them feel obliged to run a game even though they physically or mentally aren't up to it. Players would rather take a break, have a movie night, or play something else than sit through a sucky game.

7) Don't railroad. Even if you spent hours crafting the Dungeon of Woe, if your players decide they'd rather visit the village of Hamhock, let them. The dungeon will still be there.

8) Don't keep your players in a hopeless situation. Drama is good, boring despair is not. Role-playing through the characters' prolonged imprisonment with nightly torture is no fun. Time for a cut scene.

9) Be consistent and fair.

I know I haven't hit them all, but these were at the top of mind.

Player Etiquette

2010-06-19T06:25:00.000-07:00

I stumbled across this blog post, Five Things You hould Never Say To Your DM, and it got me thinking a little, namely about player etiquette. I have the good fortune to play with seasoned vets, but not every GM is so fortunate. And even us old-timers slip occasionally, my self included.

1) Don't hog the spotlight. Yes it's more fun when you're the focus of attention, but everyone is there to have fun. This includes in game and out of game.

2) Don't rules lawyer/setting lawyer. Unless the GM is making a mistake that will kill a character, wait until after the game to ask about it. You may know something more about a given setting or system than the GM, but you're not the one going to the effort of providing a game for everyone else and having to mentally juggle a zillion things. And half the times I've been called out on rules I've turned out to be right, and usually in the other cases I still stuck by my ruling (the exception being if my mistake would off a character).

3) Don't waste time. Nowadays, everyone's time is valuable and game time may be limited. Don't slow things down by playing with your iPhone, browsing the web or reading instead of paying attention and being ready when your turn comes. Sure what everyone else is doing may not be as interesting as that text message or the latest issue of Captain Thunder, but it's rude to make everyone else wait (and as a GM I personally would be tempted to skip that player's turn).

4) Limit the tangents. Try to keep down the distracting funny comments, smart aleck remarks and side conversations. I'm often guilty of this as well, and it can be hard, but if you only have 3-4 hours to play and lose an hour to banter... that's 25-33% of everyone's game time gone.

5) Don't whine. If the GM was really out to get you, your character would probably be dead already.

6) Don't make "joke" actions. See above about wasting time and an evil GM (we're all evil) may decide your character carries out whatever stupid thing you thought would be funny.

7) Don't harp on the setting or system. Not everyone is going to like every setting equally, and no game system is perfect. But the GM picked those for a reason, and when you run a game you can pick your favorite setting and system. Rubbing the flaws of the current game in the GM's face wins you no points.

8) Don't cheat. I think this should go without saying, but some people have done it in the past and it happens at tables out there. And people will notice if your mech seems to have extra armor points or you snatch up your dice as soon as you roll.

I know this list isn't exhaustive, but it's a good start and probably similar to advice you'll find in other sources. Like I said, as a GM, I'm pretty lucky. Now I need to come up with the GM Etiquette side.

Lightsaber Laser

2010-06-16T15:52:00.000-07:00

Wicked Lasers has come out with a 1W blue laser housed in what looks like a lightsaber hilt. This $200 toy is "extremely dangerous", capable of causing instant permanent retina damage and burning your skin off.

While the geek part of me wants one, I'd almost be afraid to turn the thing on.

More in an article on io9.

New TOR Trailer

2010-06-14T20:18:00.000-07:00

A new trailer is out for Star Wars: The Old Republic, and it is full of awesome. Check it out after the jump.

CNN Article On D&D

2010-06-12T05:27:00.000-07:00

No, it's not the old-school "D&D is devil-worship" kind of article. It's a story about the new D&D Encounters, a program that WotC is running in game stores trying to bring people back to the hobby or get them to try it for the first time.

The article talks about how a lot of players have left the hobby due to lifestyle changes, which is true. People get jobs, families and other obligations and can't make the time to play.

A couple of things I find interesting. One is no mention for another reason for loss of players from the current game, the "edition wars" between the Old School/ 3.5 camps and 4e. These are people that still play, but don't buy WotC's product in doing so.

The other thing is that one of the complaints about 4e is that fights take too long. WotC deals with this by prepackaging everything for the adventure as opposed to looking at the mechanics.

Check out the article, if nothing else it's nice to see D&D get some press that doesn't involve us being evil. Along with comic books and rock & roll.

15 Imperial Marches

2010-06-02T14:12:00.000-07:00

Check the rest out at The Swedish Bed.

New Thundercats (Again)

2010-06-02T13:45:00.000-07:00

The last incarnation of a revived Thundercats I heard was the live action rock band version (ugh). The newest attempt to bring back the Thundercats sounds like it may actually be watchable. Check out this io9 article.

Felica Day Will Be At GenCon

2010-05-29T10:55:00.000-07:00

News trickled out on social sites yesterday that Felicia Day of The Guild and Dr. Horrible will be a Media Guest at this year's GenCon.

I expect large crowds for this... large, sweaty, awkward, black-t-shirt-clad crowds.

Riker And Troi Reunion

2010-05-20T07:12:00.000-07:00

Found via io9, this interview includes Frakes and Sirtis' tongue-in-cheek pitch for a "Rikers In Space" sitcom, a cross between TNG and GalaxyQuest.

You also get to see some of the unused original wedding footage that was supposed to be in the beginning of Nemesis.

Watch the video after the jump.

D&D Gets A New Manager

2010-05-20T06:17:00.000-07:00

It also gets a new boss. After a volley of layoffs, Mike Mearls was announced as the new manager of the D&D RPG. However, that is only one, albeit big, slice of the D&D pie. Bill Slavicsek was named as the brand manager for D&D.

What does this mean for me or for D&D players in general?

Reading Mike Mearl's post on EN World, his heart seems to be in the right place. It seems like he realizes a lot of the community is not happy with 4e and that he gets where "Old school" players are coming from.

That doesn't mean he can really change anything, even if he wants to do so.

WotC has so much sunk into 4e and is so intent on developing its own IP around it (hence Slavicsek's position), they aren't going to scrap 4e and bring out a 5th edition that combines what people miss about previous editions with what was actually improved in the game engine by 4e.

Then again, 4e may have run out of ammo. All of the classes and races they've strung out over three editions of the PHB are out. There are no players waiting for a PHB4, as that would just continue race and class bloat and a myriad of powers that seem to blur together. And for WotC to keep making money they need to keep printing books that players will buy. Looking at the upcoming line-up, it's a mix of recycled product and splat books to give you even more versions of "2W and slide 1" powers and builds.

Maybe Mearls will bring something back to the game that it's missing and I wish him well, but my appetite for 4e product is sated.

New ABC Show = Live Action Incredibles

2010-05-19T15:31:00.000-07:00

I can't claim credit for the comparison, but I think it's apt. I'll certainly give this show a looksie when it comes out, it could be a hoot.

Check out the preview video after the jump.

Of course, it could also be Season 2 of Heroes... full of disappointment.

Super-Power Periodic Table

2010-05-18T14:54:00.000-07:00

This may be a blast from the past, but I'm too lazy to go scour the archives and too forgetful to remember, so check it out.

LOTRO Videos

2010-05-17T20:04:00.000-07:00

Lord of the Rings - Online "I am warden" from EveNArtworkS on Vimeo.

These are a couple of awesome videos for Lord Of The Rings Online done by players. Turbine should hire these guys to do videos for all of the classes.

The Lord of the Rings - Online "Loremaster Trailer" from EveNArtworkS on Vimeo.

The Geek Alphabet

2010-05-16T12:12:00.001-07:00

Speaking of alphabets... check out the Geek Alphabet.

Joss Whedon PSA

2010-05-13T19:38:00.000-07:00

F Is For Fastball Special

2010-05-13T05:59:00.000-07:00

An artist made a Wolverine ABCs chart. Found via io9, the artist's site is here.

Movie Review - Iron Man 2

2010-05-08T15:13:00.000-07:00

It goes without saying that expectations are high for this movie. And while it isn't horrible, it doesn't live up to those expectations. There are 2 main beefs I have with this film.

One is the bad guys. Whiplash was an old dude in a high-tech wife-beater and a couple of electrified whips. With as much skin as Whiplash had exposed, it's amazing no one put a bullet in his melon or just threw a bucket of water on him, let alone flying debris and flammables. Justin Hammer was a cartoon character of a bad guy. He wasn't menacing, he was just a smarmy asshole and smarmy doesn't work going against Tony Stark / Robert Downey Jr.

The second is the tech. While the suitcase armor is a nice callback to the classic cartoon, it just doesn't seem realistic. Some of the other stuff is spoiler material, so you'll have to see for yourself.

The movie was mostly saved by Downey. He is still spot on as Stark, though not as much a playboy as last time around. Scarlett Johannson was great to look at and competent in her role (can't fault her for not being "Russian" enough as it would be hard to maintain a cover with a Boris and Natasha accent) but some of her fight scenes looked more like gymnastic routines than bad ass.

Overall 3.5 armored-suit-wearing billionaire flying monkeys.

First Pic Of Movie Thor

2010-05-01T08:31:00.000-07:00

Looks a lot like the current Thor's outfit. You can see where I found it and fan reaction on io9.

PS: Stay to the end of the credits on Iron Man 2.

This Art > Clone Wars

2010-04-22T07:33:00.000-07:00

I stumbled across this post, which features the work of this artist.

I think this guy should be doing the art for an animated Star Wars series... I like it better than the clay sculpture look of the Clone Wars.

I'm a d8

2010-04-21T14:29:00.000-07:00

Take the quiz at dicepool.com

You are a d8: You are the true adventurer! Dragons rescued, princesses slayed, and all that business while O Fortuna plays in the background. Your social calender is crammed with heroic deeds, and you've personally saved the world from ultimate destruction at least twice. You are reliable, perhaps a bit predictable, but overall a shining example of what happens when courage meets determination.

I *think* the dragon and princess thing is backwards.

30,000 hits

2010-04-21T14:28:00.000-07:00

And that's without a refresh macro script. Granted, it's what a real web site got in hits since you started reading this, but I think it's cool.

Smallville -The RPG

2010-04-19T14:14:00.000-07:00

Margaret Weis Productions seems to be making a niche for itself in making licensed RPGs based on popular sci-fi tv series. The latest addition to their lineup is the Smallville RPG. The core book comes out in August (GenCon!) with two more books slated to follow.

I'll be curious to see how this turns out.

We Hate You Luke Skywalker

2010-04-18T15:41:00.001-07:00

There is a gallery full of genius like the above, following the (mis)adventures of two stormtrooper action figures. The implication by the "3" in the gallery title is that there are two more out there somewhere.

Cats smarter than supercomputers?

2010-04-18T12:36:00.000-07:00

see more Lolcats and funny pictures

At least they are when it comes to recognizing human faces, to the tune of 83x faster.

It's important to know who brings the gooshy food.

Check out the article.

Standing Cat Zorro

2010-04-15T08:25:00.000-07:00

All he needs is an Antonio Banderas voice-over.

iPad - $600 Cat Toy?

2010-04-15T08:06:00.000-07:00

I have to admit that iPads are kind of neat. I played with using one for a work dashboard the other night and suggested to my district boss the company should expense one for me to use for that purpose.

He suggested I should wait until after work to drink.

The trouble is, for me an iPad isn't $600 worth of neat. There is a lot it can't do, and those are things I would need such a device to be able to do.

However, other people have found uses for their iPads. One I stumbled across on Geekologie. The video is after the jump.

Star Wars Uncut Coming To Theaters

2010-04-12T20:17:00.000-07:00

Star Wars Uncut took A New Hope (the original Star Wars in case a non-geek has stumbled on to this site), split it into 15 second scenes, and divided it up amongst fans to film their own version.

The trippy result looks to be coming to at least a few theaters. You can check out the trailer after the jump.

Star Wars Uncut "The Escape" from Casey Pugh on Vimeo.

Subtitled Trailer For Adele Blanc-Sec

2010-04-12T07:30:00.000-07:00

The Steampunky looking French female Indiana Jones movie now has a sub-titled trailer. You can check out the site and see the trailer after the jump.

Vader + Batmobile = Win

2010-04-09T14:17:00.001-07:00

Want.

More info and pics here.

Gamer View On Net Neutrality

2010-04-07T15:51:00.000-07:00

Right now Comcast's fat cats are high fiving each other over the courts finding that the FCC can't force net neutrality under current regulation. A chunk of that is because the FCC classifies broadband as lightly regulated. Before Comcast and their ilk celebrate too much, they need to remember that the FCC could reclassify broadband as a higher regulated category.

Meanwhile, here is an interesting article from Massively.com.