Category Archives: RPG

Week in Review: 2/19/2012

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Art Courtesy chiaralily of flickr.com

Welcome to another installment of this week in review at The Iron Tavern. I like to use these posts as a way to sum up some things that have been going on that might not warrant a post dedicated to the topic.

Timeless Adventures – The Tribute

Carl Bussler of Flagons and Dragons fame has released his Pathfinder Adventure The Tribute for $4.99 for the PDF. I have been quite tempted to do a review on this product, but I was involved with some of the early feedback on the product as he was working on it and feel that could lean my review one way versus another. So I am including in this week in review post.

An adventure for 7th level characters with the Pathfinder system you find yourself at the village of Honningstad and facing the difficult choice of saving the town or rescuing some villagers taken captive from an envoy. The characters must make the choice of which task to tackle first and then see if they can do solve both in a very short timeframe.

In addition to being a well-written adventure it uses a tracking device called the Scroll of Omens to help track the passage of time in an interesting manner. It also allows the characters to visibly see as they proceed in the adventure that their actions have consequences in relation to the timeline.

This one looks like a lot of fun for the GM and the players alike. You can pick it up over at DriveThruRPG.com.

Kingmaker Campaign

The Kingmaker campaign I am running continues to progress. We are midway through book six at the moment and it seems to be going well. Book six of the Kingmaker AP gets a few complaints that it comes out of nowhere in comparison to the first five books in the AP. I believe in my campaign that I have done a good job of foreshadowing the events in book six and it feels more logical. I hope so as at the moment it is my favorite portion of the campaign from behind the GM’s screen.

Our last two sessions have been over Google Hangouts and Skype due to some scheduling issues on my side. Next week’s session will be face to face again. I thought it might be the finale session, but I am not so sure at the moment. Due to some technical difficulties last week we had a late start, so we might have more left than we can fit into one more session. In either case we are getting close.

Campaign Next

See what I did there? Once the above Kingmaker campaign wraps up I will get a break from GMing for our local group for a while. Our normal group’s GM is going to run Council of Thieves for us. I am looking forward to the campaign as it is always nice to just be the player. Our normal GM does an excellent job of weaving together interesting sub-plots. Given the setting of Council of Thieves he should have a plethora of tools at his disposal to do so!

Troll in the Corner

For those that might have missed it, I have become a regular contributor over at Troll in the Corner. I write an article every Tuesday over there. It has been a fun experience so far. Definitely check the site out if you have not done so yet, there are several talented authors over there that post on a variety of gaming topics.

Open Design – Journeys West

The Journeys West Open Design project is progressing nicely over at the Kobold Quarterly site. The major turn-ins are starting to happen and the early rough drafts of the current turn-ins are starting to surface. It has definitely been a learning experience over there for me, both in honing some writing and learning what makes for a winning pitch. It also gives some insight in what goes into a project from start to finish.

Gaming With Kids

I still have been running a Pathfinder Campaign using the Beginner Box rules for the kids. They have been having a good time with the game. For the past couple of weeks my son has actually stepped up to start GMing his own adventures which I have posted about here. He has done a really good job on that. He has run at least one more adventure since my post here about his first experience. We made it part way through that last week, it was another pretty solid adventure from the mind of an eight year old boy!

Weekly Wrap

And this concludes a weekly review at The Iron Tavern. As always I have been keeping busy!

Review: Pathfinder City of Strangers

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Author(s): James L. Sutter
Audience: GM/Players
Price: Print – $19.99 / PDF – $13.99
Pages: 64

While I typically try to review items that have been released within the last two or three months, I am making an exception for City of Strangers. I picked up in preparation for an upcoming Play-by-Post game that is going to take place in Kaer Maga in the region of Varisia. I wanted to have some more information for my character build and this looked like the book to have. I am very glad I picked this one up, it does not disappoint!

Oh, and did I mention Kaer Maga sits atop a massive cliff and has been built in the ancient ruins of a fortress?  With six sides composed of eighty foot high stone walls, the city is an impressive sight sitting atop this massive cliff.

What is in this book

City of Strangers is a 64 page that is part of the Pathfinder Campaign Setting series of books from Paizo. This book is dedicated to the city of Kaer Maga which is located in the Varisia region of Golarion. The book includes a map of the city, history of the city, an overview of the city districts, the people of Kaer Maga, the area beneath Kaer Maga, a prestige class and a new monster.

Inside the front cover is a relatively detailed map of the city. The districts and locations described in further detail in the book are marked. The map was well done and helps the reader put things in relation to each other at a glance.

The first portion of the book is the introduction which delves into the history of the city and then moves into a look at the city from an overview perspective. The various districts are touched upon, brief mention of the Undercity and the stat block for the city is listed.

The next section begins the in-depth review of the city. We get a closer look at the geography of the city including a description of its location and the appearance of the city once inside. We learn more about the eleven districts of the city and how eight of them are in the ring or the wall around the city and the remaining three are in the open air core of the city. This section also covers the resources and economy of the city.

This chapter then moves into a more detailed look at each of the districts within Kaer Maga.  Each district receives attention to what makes it unique from the other districts, a brief mention of certain notable locations and a mention of influential NPCs in that district. Within this section are some sidebars that include a magic item, a closer look at slavery in Kaer Maga, city plot hooks, and more.

The next chapter covers the people in Kaer Maga. It leads with the various Pathfinder classes and how they fit into the city. A similar approach is taken with the races as well. Next up in this chapter looks at the government in Kaer Maga and the city’s relationship with cities and bordering regions, followed by a look at religion in Kaer Maga.

This chapter then moves into a look at key players and factions within the city. There is everything from arcane power groups to golem making families of power to rival gangs in the Oriat district and more. There are many factions at work within the city and this section of the chapter helps describe each of these to the reader.

The next chapter in the book takes an in-depth look at what lies beneath the city of Kaer Maga. Built atop towering cliffs there is plenty of room for an undercity. The first portion covers the Halflight path which is an underground trade route that works its way up to the top of the cliffs. Going on from there the chapter talks about the rest of the Undercity and includes a well drawn map to give perspective to each section. A full page random encounters chart helps the GM have an idea of what one is apt to encounter beneath the city proper.

A new prestige class is included in this book as well, the Bloatmage. The Bloatmage is a mage that has figured out how to get their bodies to produce more blood than normal to gain greater spellcasting abiltity.

A new monster called the caulborn are also included in the book. These creatures were one of the early settlers of this mysterious city that is mentioned in the history of the city.

Thoughts about the book

The artwork and cartography are both very well done in this book as I have grown to expect from Paizo products. The map on the inside cover of the book is very well done and the map of the Undercity later in the book really helps give a perspective as to how things are situated under the city itself.

This book is definitely heavy on the fluff side, which is a positive to me. There are so many things going on in this city that the plot hooks for running in this city just leap out at a GM considering running a campaign in or near this city. If for some reason these ideas aren’t leaping off the page at you there are sidebars to help jumpstart your creativity.

The districts and factions in the book are well detailed, but still leave plenty of room for a GM to work their own ideas into the city. This blend caters to both GMs wanting ready-made organizations and structure as well as the GM wanting to bring their own flavor to the table.  For some reason the rivaling street gangs in Oriat were particularly appealing, likely because it brought modern day gang issues into a fantasy setting.

I also really liked the imagery this city brings to mind. It is easy to picture it perched atop these huge cliffs above the valley floor far below, thick walls that hold entire city districts within them. Coupled with an undercity that spans multiple levels for those that want to adventure underground there is a lot to experience in Kaer Maga.

The Bloatmage Prestige Class had lots of flavor to it and could see it being useful for an NPC. Not sure I would ever consider it for a PC, but certainly some fun to be had for GMs. The caulborn monster was an interesting critter, especially given the history of Kaer Maga. One can always use more critters, right?

I would definitely like to continue to see treatment of various cities in Golarion as Kaer Maga received in City of Strangers. I was very impressed with this book and cannot believe it took me this long to stumble across it.

Final Rating

I rate this book as a 5 out of 5 for its fluff content. The content is well done, interesting and just jumps out at you with ideas as a player and GM alike. This book has a minimal amount of crunch in it and while I like the flavor of it I rate it a 4 out of 5. Overall I give this book a 5 out 5 tankard rating. All city supplements should be more like this one.

Tankard Rating

5 tankards out of 5 tankards

The 8 Year Old GM

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Iron Tavern readers have certainly noticed I have written about the Pathfinder Beginner Box a fair amount. Everything from Beginner Box Anticipation, Hero Lab for the Beginner Box, mentions in weekly reviews and just earlier this week an actual play account of playing the Beginner Box. All of this has led to a final post about the Beginner Box, my eight year old son, whom we will call X, GMing his own adventure.

X has been studying the books in the Beginner Box since he received it in December. He will ask the occasional question out of the blue “What is DR?”, “Tell me more about alignments”, “Dad, why don’t black dragons deal acid damages with their bite too?” and several more over the past weeks.

A little over a week ago he started mentioning that he wanted to try to run an adventure. I told him we could take a week off our normal weekend game and he could run what he had come up with. I showed him how the creatures had challenge ratings and gave him a rough idea of how he could use those to gauge semi-appropriate encounters. He picked up on the concept and ran with it.

So this past weekend he announced he was ready to run his adventure. I built up a quick Dwarven Barbarian and advanced him to second level. His younger sister broke out her 2nd level cleric and we took along Merisiel as a pre-gen. While I put the finishing touches on my character he took care of rolling out my battle mat, getting the wet erase markers ready and picking out his pawns he would need for the adventure.

He started us off in Sandpoint with the mayor summoning us for some assistance. Apparently various weapons and minor valuables had been taken from people’s homes over the course of the past five nights. The mayor requested our help with investigating and tracking down who was responsible for these thefts. We did some dialoging with the mayor and then headed off through town to check out the most recent house that had been burgled.

We approached cautiously and observed the house for a bit to make sure it was not being watched. Then we approached and searched around and found tracks. The tracks were not human tracks he said and after a knowledge nature check we were able to determine they were lizard, web footed like tracks. We also found some scratch marks on the door from some sort of clawed hand.

We then talked to the owners of the house and asked to see the locations where things had been taken from. X did a pretty good job of playing this out and seemed to pick right up with responding to the questioning.

Soon we found ourselves heading out of town and towards the swamps. We traveled for a bit and found a roguish looking individual whom we spoke with. We dialoged a bit with him and learned of some lizard, frog like creatures off the main trail in the woods. Sounding like someone we might be interested in we headed off that way.

We traipsed through the woods a bit and came across an enormous tree where we encountered a few goblins, several of which tried to sneak up on us after we had already engaged the first few.

With those goblins dispatched we found a hole that seemed to lead into an area near the tree roots. My dwarven barbarian promptly went in and we encountered several giant centipedes. The fight was a bit on the tough side with Merisiel getting poisoned multiple times, but we were victorious.

Unusually enough we found two boggards who had been prisoner beneath these tree roots. We quickly realized their feet could have made the prints we found in town. With information from the two we found we plunged further into the woods.

We met a trio of people that we thought could possibly be bandits but it never came to blows, so we simply used information from them to further close in on the boggard camp. As we headed that way we did encounter an abandoned building of sorts which we checked for more clues, but found little else than a series of traps!

With that we reached the final encounter. Up until this point all of the encounters had been fairly balanced. It seems X is a chip off the old block and is a firm believer in tough final encounters. Turns out these six boggards had a boss. Their boss just happened to be a young black dragon!

We fought and we fought hard, but in the end the party fell one by one, finally losing our cleric which soon led to my barbarian falling in battle as well. We actually managed to take the dragon down, but the remaining boggards made easy work of a bruised and battered party at that point. I think this encounter worked out to the ballpark of a CR7/CR8 encounter. Just a tad much for us!

All in all X did a great job running this adventure. Frankly, given the number of mock battles he likes to play through on his own, I expected it would be one encounter of random monster after another. He surprised me with opening with an investigative scenario and handling the investigation questions pretty well!

From there he dropped in some roleplaying encounters on the road (ideas he said he picked up from the Game Master’s Guide) before reaching our first actual combat encounter. He chose interesting terrain for that encounter and the dug out opening under the tree’s roots was a nice touch. His dropping some boggard prisoners in there was a great link to the actual enemy who had been causing the town’s problems.

The final encounter was a little overwhelming, which I chalk up to inexperience. We’ve all been there I think where an encounter turned out a little tougher than originally intended. The fact the boggards had a big boss orchestrating the whole thing was great though!

To me this really helps show how awesome the Pathfinder Beginner Box is. It enabled an eight year old boy with an interest in the game to learn the rules to the degree of actually being able to run a session himself. He did this with only a few questions of me as he studied the rulebooks and pieced it all together himself. I fully consider the Pathfinder Beginner Box a success in bringing the game to people new to the hobby – both young and old.

Playing RPGs Online

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photo by Kurainisei

Gaming has come a long way from the time when I started. Having grown up in a very rural area it was quite difficult finding a reliable group, much less one where we had a convenient location to play. Persistence paid off though and through many of my school years I had a group to play with despite the logistics.

Even today I still live in a rural area. I have a major city within thirty minutes, which helps, but it does mean hosting the game at my house is a rare opportunity. The difference between my youth and today (besides better modes of transportation) is that the opportunities for gaming online option exists.

Here at The Iron Tavern I have covered Play-by-Post gaming through a series of advice posts for a successful PbP game. This is still a great option for those that have scheduling issues. But as we all know, PbP gaming is slow, bordering on tedious. Luckily today we have even more options for online gaming.

Virtual Table Tops

Virtual Table Tops is certainly one of the game changers. Providing the ability for connected users to view a battle mat, move tokens and in many cases resolve combat via a series of clicks. Built in chat, frameworks for enhanced system support are features of many of them making gaming via the Internet much easier.

I’ve toyed with many of the VTTs out there and have played actual games on both TTopRPG and MapTool. Others such as Fantasy Grounds are nice VTTs as well, but I tend towards the free VTTs when possible as I find it lowers the cost of entry. Among the freely available ones I prefer MapTool for several reasons.

photo by benimoto

MapTool works on both Windows systems and Mac systems, which is a tremendous, plus for it. MapTool can be as easy or as complex as you want it. If you want easy, it can act as just a battle mat to move tokens on. Or you can use a framework for the system of your choice and use vision blocking and fog of war for a complete experience.

I have also used TTopRPG in actual gaming situations. It only runs on Windows but is pretty easy to get up and running. The macro system is simple, but easy to get the hang out. The lack of support for the Mac is the biggest thing that keeps me from investing my time into this VTT.

Voice Communications

There are several ways to handle voice chat over the Internet these days. The more popular options include Skype or Ventrilo. There are pros and cons to each. I like Ventrilo because it seems to consume fewer system resources. Skype seems more familiar to people. I have played with both. Despite my preference for Ventrilo, I have probably played more games over Skype.

Wizards of the Coast has a VTT in beta that has voice chat built in. I have heard good things about it, but I have not used it to comment on the quality of its voice chat. While I prefer a modular approach, there could be some advantage to having the voice chat built in to the VTT itself.

Video Communication

Some people prefer video for when they play. I tend towards just audio, though that is largely due to bandwidth constraints on my end than anything else. Skype has a video chat option, but you have to pay to do video conferencing with it.

Enter Google Plus with its Google Hangouts feature. This enables group video chat for up to ten people I believe if your bandwidth will support it.

Other Battlemat options

Some find the VTT option a little overwhelming or they do not want to deal with troubleshooting connections to the person hosting the server.

One that I hear mentioned frequently is Twiddla. Twiddla is a free online whiteboard that does have some interesting features. I played with adding an image to the whiteboard and adding some tokens and it seemed to work well. The advantage to this approach is that people connect to a shared whiteboard instance and do not need to connect to a server running VTT software at someone’s house. It makes for a lightweight solution.

Another option is to share Google Drawing document, which also allows you to place tokens on an image (i.e. of a map) in the Google Drawing document and allow people to move them as representations of their character.

Bringing it Together

As you can see there are a lot of pieces to gaming online. Using the applications mentioned above you can combine them in several different ways. You can go with a full on VTT and Skype with just voice. You can go with a VTT and Google Hangouts with video chat. Or you can go all Google Hangouts and maybe just share a Google Drawing or use Twiddla to meet your needs. There are a lot of choices out there now to meet your online gaming needs.

One other factor that comes to bear on your decision of what tool to use is your game system of choice. If you tend towards the more complex systems that lend themselves to the use of battlemats then a full on VTT might be the best option for you.

If you use a more rules light game where combat is less reliant on a battlemat, then simply using a Google Hangout with only voice or video might serve your need.

In any case, gamers today have much better opportunities to game today than we did just a couple of years ago. You are no longer limited to gaming with people within driving radius of you, but you have the whole world to find gamers to game with!

New Year, New Games

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photo rights to canonsnapper

The folks over at Gnome Stew are hosting a New Year, New Game blog carnival as part of their 2012 New Year, New Game contest. This post is The Iron Tavern’s participation in their blog carnival.

New year, new game. Sometimes groups get in their groove and neglect checking out new games. I am extremely guilty of this. In fact, of the people in my local weekly gaming group, I am likely the one most guilty of not playing a lot of new games. I tend to get pretty focused on a system and not drift too much from that.

I always have good intentions of course. But with what limited gaming time I have, I try not to spread myself too thin or not want to give up a gaming night to another system that I would be learning from scratch. This results in me sticking with my game of choice at the moment.

Now over the course of 2011 I did get to play some games outside of my normal preference of the fantasy genre. The Kingmaker game I am running went on hiatus for a few months and this presented a great time for others in my group to run a few things. So we saw Supernatural run, Call of Cthulhu and a mini-arc Star Wars campaign. Okay, I admit, I’ve played Star Wars before, but the others were new to me. I had a good time playing the different games and I should make a more conscious effort of trying games outside of my norm more often.

Given the routine I get in, let’s look at some of the things that do get me interested in breaking that rut and trying something new.

The biggest thing? One-shots. Tell me the game is a one-shot and I am much more open to trying a game. The risk with a one-shot is minimal, if I don’t like it I only spent one evening on it and still managed to hang out with friends. If I do like it, then we can go from there and maybe work the game into rotation more frequently.

Next up is the excitement from the person proposing the new game and how good they do selling it. Want me to be interested in trying out a different game? Tell me how it is cool, what makes it unique? Do you seem excited when you tell me about it? The pitch for the new game is a big factor in how warm I am to trying it. Sell me on it.

Finally, I like for the person that will be running the game to know the rules pretty well. A lot of questions come up in one-shots. How does this work? I want to do this, what do I need to roll? What skill do I use? Do I want to roll high or low? Quick answers to these questions keep things moving quickly and keep things from getting bogged down during play.

I have been pretty spoiled by our de facto RPG expert in our group. He is very well versed in all things RPG and is an encyclopedia of rules knowledge of a myriad of systems. When he’s pitching a new game system I am much more apt to say yes.

Now that I have covered what gets me most interested in breaking my routine and trying a new game, let’s look at what I most want to try out in 2012. I have three games on that list. Fiasco, The One Ring, and Dragon Age.

Fiasco interests me because I keep hearing great things about it on various social networks. It is also outside my norm from what I understand, yet it still intrigues me. My RPG expert in my group is familiar with it, now I just need to talk him into running it!

The One Ring is a game I have purchased and also have interest in either running or playing a small mini-campaign in. Followers of The Iron Tavern have seen me talk about the game before, but it looks like it does an excellent job of painting a Tolkien world through game mechanics. The combat system also looks interesting too me and quite different than many of the d20 systems I am used to.

And finally, Dragon Age has recently caught my eye. The artwork on the cover of the upcoming 3rd set is very impressive and I downloaded the Quickstart Guide as a result. It looks very promising and might be a viable option for remote play over Google Hangouts or Skype due to less dependence on a battlemat.

In closing, here’s to breaking out of your normal gaming routine to try something a little different in 2012!

Week In Review: 1/15/2012

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image from Brendan Adkins

Welcome to another week in review at The Iron Tavern. I use these review posts to cover several items in one post that do not quite merit a post in and of itself.

Troll in the Corner

I recently became a contributing author over at Troll in the Corner. Ben had gone on a search for more authors to keep the content over there fresh and interesting. It looks like he has brought on a good crew and I am looking forward to see what the other new folk bring to the site. If you are interested you can catch my articles over there on Tuesdays.

Kingmaker Campaign

Things are going well in the Kingmaker campaign I am running. We missed this past week as one of our players could not make it and there was something that involved his character coming up that I did not want him to miss. Normally we would have gamed one player down, but circumstances and story dictated otherwise.

The group has faced their first major threat to their kingdom from another kingdom. The group was not real happy with the mass combat rules. I tried to let them know it was not a full mass combat system ahead of time so there would not be disappointment. We made it through, but I think their expectations were higher. Given the level of the characters when this occurs I think it might have been better to have the mass combat come earlier when the players would have been more content to lead armies than put themselves on the front lines.

If we can keep up our schedule for the next month and a half or so I suspect we will be wrapping the Kingmaker campaign up in early to mid-March. We shall see. It has been a fun campaign, but I will be looking forward to a chance to be a player again for a bit.

Open Design – Journeys West

I have been participating in the Journeys West project by the Open Design folks. So far I have been extremely pleased with my decision to participate in the project. Everything from the practice of pitching to the other patrons, to watching the others design and build and tweak to the Google Hangout opportunities with some of the others has made it a worthwhile experience.  I have made several pitches for various items so far and I think I have been making some improvements along the way. I look forward to what lies ahead for this Open Design project.

Timeless Adventures

Carl Bussler of Flagons and Dragons fame has been working on his self-publishing effort under the guise of Timeless Adventures. He’s tweeted a bit about it and been active on Google Plus as well. He has previewed various maps along they way and it looks like the project is going well.

I volunteered as a reader and hopeful play tester of the adventure. Those of us doing so received the first part of the module earlier this week and the final part arrived today. It looks very interesting and I am particularly interested to see how one mechanic works out.

I’ve started wrangling a play test group together. It is shaping up to be a remote session for those involved. At the moment I am leaning towards using Google Hangouts and sharing a Google Drawing document for combat encounters. I played with that setup earlier today and it seems promising and more lightweight than a full on MapTool session. Hopefully schedules will cooperate and we will get to see how that goes – both the adventure and the Google Hangouts and Drawing combination.

Gaming With Kids

As I have mentioned on the blog previously, my son received the Beginner Box for his birthday in December. We have had several sessions with that and he has been having a great time. He has also been studying the rule books on his own and seems to be retaining a lot of the information. He certainly reminds me of myself when I was only a year or so older than him and learning the D&D Basic Set.

We missed last weekend as I did not get an adventure prepared in time. I am all set for this weekend and will be playing Hollows Last Hope later today. He has been playing a Dwarven Wizard and his sister helps out as an Elven Cleric. We usually bring along one of the pregens as well. I let him choose which pregen to bring and he usually chooses either Merisiel or Valeros.

Weekly Wrap

And that is the week in review! I have certainly been keeping busy. Remember to watch for my Tuesday article at Troll in the Corner and keep an eye here for more!

New Version of D&D?

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As everyone knows by now, Wizards of the Coast announced yesterday that they are indeed working on the next version of D&D (links to EN World, as the stunt NY Times pulled releasing the news early was playing dirty). This really does not come as a surprise to me, especially in light of recent events such as hiring Monte Cook and the feel of the Legends and Lore articles.

The Internet is abuzz with talk either on your favorite RPG forum, Facebook, Twitter or any number of other outlets. Several bloggers have written open letters to Wizards about what they would like to see and such as well. I feel I would be remiss if I did not at least put my two coppers in here at The Iron Tavern.

Regular readers will know that I tend towards the Pathfinder game for my fantasy gaming fix. I never really found 4e that attractive. Maybe I wrote it off too soon, but from the reading I did and the reading I still do there were just several parts of 4e that did not fit my wants in a fantasy RPG game. With that said, I have nothing against the people that do like to play 4e. I am glad there are plenty of games for people to enjoy and do not disparage one system over another.

This recent announcement of a new D&D version does have my interest, much more so than the release of 4e did. 4e was not the game for me, so seeing a rework of D&D as released by Wizards is welcome. Coupled with some of the talent they have on the design team, Monte Cook and Mike Mearls weighing in strongly in my opinion. I have also found myself agreeing more with the Legends and Lore articles than disagreeing with them, which I take to be a positive sign.

So at the very least they have my attention. While everyone that has played early iterations of the game are under NDAs to not talk about it, I do have some show stoppers in how likely I am to adopt the game that aren’t wholly related to the rules themselves.

First up, DDI. I do not like the concept of the DDI subscription with 4e and I would not like it with the next version either. Don’t get me wrong, I like electronically distributed content, but I like it to be in a form I can continue to use with a one time fee, not something I have to pay a monthly fee for continued access.

I want PDFs I can read on my iPad. PDFs allow me to read them when I am offline and I retain ownership of them should I not wish to pay a subscription. I like choices in character builders and I like character builders that I do not have to pay for on a monthly basis. Note that I did not say I don’t want to pay for a character builder, I just want to own it after I pay my money, not rent it.

So if 5e makes heavy use of DDI in the same manner 4e does I don’t see myself making any substantial moves to the new D&D version.

Another aspect that I have some concern about is the licensing of the next D&D version. I consider the GSL that 4e was released under subpar compared to the OGL that 3.x was released under. I really enjoyed the third party supplements that came out during that era of D&D. Was there content released that was not stellar during that era? Certainly. But there were some real gems out there. The more open license also allowed for better electronic tool support from third parties as well. I valued these things and the open license helped facilitate these things. A restrictive license with the new D&D version will likely also turn me away from the release.

Despite these reservations I am remaining cautiously optimistic about the next version of D&D. Hopefully good things come of it. If nothing else it will certainly be an interesting year watching how the next version of D&D evolves through play testing!

The Dragon Hoard

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This post is part of the Got Loot RPG Blog Festival. Make sure to check out the other posts under the banner of this festival!

The dragon’s hoard. The very image of a dragon’s hoard is sure to draw immediate visions grandeur to any fantasy gamer’s head. Think about it for a moment, what images came to your mind when you read the title of this post?

I remember as a kid thinking of that huge red dragon dwelling in some deep, dark cavern lit by the glow of dimming embers from some unknown source. The floor of the cavern mounded high with coins, a mound that rivaled the size of the small hill at the local park. Amidst the near uncountable coin pile were more treasures – portions of armor, shields, swords of unknown legend, rings, chests and don’t forget the gems of a dizzying array of colors.

These images of a dragon’s riches have been a staple of fantasy for a long time. Smaug from The Hobbit was the first dragon to conjure this image for me. Later reading of various D&D rulebooks and monster tomes further cemented this thought of great red dragons sitting atop piles of riches.

That was then, this is now

Of course as we gamers play the game longer some of the things that once held mystery and excitement become the mundane. After defeating the great red dragon its treasure hoard becomes simply a pile of game statistics. How many gold coins, how many silver coins? Then a series of detect magics for sorting the magical items from the non-magical items which is soon followed by a series of identify spells and spellcraft checks to figure out just how many pluses and special abilities does that glowing sword have.

Treasure becoming mundane is not just a problem with dragon hoards. It is just the prime example of if even the dragon’s hoard can become mundane, loot held by other creatures during the course of a gaming adventure has no chance.

In fact I have posted previously about this issue in my Putting the Magic Back article just a month ago. That article was a broader look at magic items becoming mundane, here we will be focusing in on the dragon’s hoard and bringing the magic and mystery back to it.

Turning it around

Where do we start as a GM? What can we do to put the wonder back into this hoard of treasure the heroes are going to get when they put an end to that evil red dragon living under the mountain?

First, as the GM you must embrace the wonderful opportunity you have to make this dragon hoard part of something much more! This is your chance to introduce plot hooks galore or simply offer ways to explore the history of your world.

The ordinary

Let’s take a look at the more predominant item in the dragon’s hoard – gold coins! Lots of them! This dragon has been the terror of this region of your world for many years, right? It will only make sense that the coins in this hoard will not be ones the party is used to seeing in day to day exchanges. There will be coins from ancient civilizations. Describe some of these coins to the party as they find them. Note unusual depictions, perhaps of great structures that no longer exist or that serve to make the characters curious. Some of the coins are likely to have the visage of great leaders, or perhaps dictators of years past. Use these coins to build depth to your world with its histories and tie-ins to your present time in your world.

The hoard is quite likely to also contain normal objects from a different era as well. Lanterns of an old style, masterwork leather backpacks with unusual cuts or design and other such items a dragon is bound to accumulate over the years. Take a little extra time to write some short descriptions for some of these items. The extra attention to detail here will help convey a sense of age to this hoard.

The magical

Any dragon hoard worth its merit will have a plethora of magical items. Take some time as a GM and give a few of these items some stories. Not every magical item needs such detail but use enough to spice up the hoard with flavor.

That bastard sword with the unusual carving in the hilt, how did it get there? Perhaps a hero that fell to the dragon’s breath many years ago? Maybe the sword has a hidden opening in the pommel to hold something of personal value to the original hero that carried it, or maybe the sword is an intelligent sword to be unlocked and recant past tales of the hero, tales that could lead this current set of characters on to other locations and treasures.

That Bag of Holding that you find in the hoard, certainly it isn’t empty. Perhaps it held the belongings of another fallen hero. Belongings that may be magical in nature, or maybe it holds a normal walking stick that has carvings from the travelers day on the road.

The near complete skeleton found at the edge of the treasure hoard, the one with singed leather armor and torn backpack. Inside that backpack is an incomplete letter back home, perhaps a letter talking of the final days leading up to this adventurer’s assault on the dragon’s lair that ended so direly for him. The current party can end up with a feeling of others who have fell to the dragon’s wrath and possibly be motivated to return these remains to the fallen’s family.

Bringing it together

I have made several suggestions on how to make the dragon’s hoard a little more mysterious and magical. The hoard can serve many roles to a GM willing to put some extra time into the details. These small details can serve as the spice to build verisimilitude in your world, to introduce other hooks for the characters and so many other things. In addition to providing the GM powerful tools to further the campaign, they can equally serve to make the dragon hoard mysterious and wondrous again!

Week In Review: 12/18/2011

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The last week got away from me and I missed getting out a post here at The Iron Tavern. I have had several things keeping me busy and I will put some of the related ones up here for a week in review post!

Kingmaker Transition

My weekly gaming group just transitioned into Book Five of the Kingmaker Adventure Path. I always find blending the transition from one installment to another takes a bit more work in my game preparation. Without some additional preparation it seems a little rough going from one book to another. I am not sure why this is; it really shouldn’t be any different than any other transition in the campaign.

Our most recent session found them investigating some disgruntled pixies in the forest who had a rather unusual surprise for them, then to the Kingdom of Pitax to partake in a festival there, followed by an attack on their own kingdom by some unknown armies at this time. The session went well and it feels good to have the Kingmaker campaign back on track again!

Pathfinder Beginner Box

This week was also IronPup’s birthday. He received the Pathfinder Beginner Box for it and was quite excited to unwrap it. He spent this week writing up his character. He will be going with a Dwarven Wizard for the first session. He worked through most of it on his own and I sat down to help him get his information transferred to a character sheet yesterday. Later this afternoon we will be running through the first adventure in the set. He is looking forward to it. This initial session will be part of the actual play review I write up for The Iron Tavern.

Writing Contests Galore

It seems to be a busy time for writing contests! First we have Paizo’s RPG Superstar 2012. This is an annual contest that Paizo puts on and is probably the best chance an unknown freelancer has of getting noticed by Paizo. The number of entrants is rumored to be quite high and the bar for making the first cut of 32 is also quite high. I am entering the contest this year and hope to learn some things through the process by being more vested in it with an actual contest entry.

Today is also the last day of @Brainclouds‘ design a treasure vault contest. He has posted a blank treasure map with some interesting features to act as a blank canvas to design what is in that room. I have some ideas scrawled down on a print out of a map, I just need to get them written up and submitted by midnight tonight!

Basement Remodel (a.k.a. Game Room)

And finally I have been busy the past several weekends working on phase one of a basement remodel of which a portion will be used for a game room. I am not doing anything overly elaborate. First phase consists of painting the basement walls. I believe I finally have that portion wrapped up. Phase two is to clear out way too many years of computer equipment and parts along with other things accumulated over the years. Phase three will be putting up a wall to keep the utilities and storage side of the basement hidden away. Phase four will be to improve the lighting a bit to not be so industrial.

Once those phases are complete I will begin work on getting a portion of the basement ready for a gaming area. I see a decent table and comfortable chairs as must haves. I will also include an area for some easy access to minis and hang some small speakers for background music and easy sound effects. I am also planning on hanging a webcam to possibly open the door for streaming a video of the battle mat for remote players. We will see how that all works out!

Where the Week Went

That sums up where the following week went for me. With holidays approaching it is likely to be a busy next couple of weeks!

Beginner Box Anticipation

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Anticipation? The Beginner Box has been out for well over a month you say?

Yes, I have a still shrink-wrapped, unopened Pathfinder Beginner Box on the top shelf of my closet. Why in the world do I have that? It is going to be a gift for IronPup’s rapidly approaching birthday next week. So far I have made all of my Will Saves to keep from peeling away the shrink-wrap and peering inside. This in spite of numerous blog postings, tweets and message board forums talking about how great the set is.

I will admit that I did take the money I saved by ordering from Amazon and picked up the PDF of the set from Paizo. But honestly, that’s just so I can be ready to run it when IronPup opens the set himself on his birthday! Well, that is the story I am sticking to!

That is why you have not seen a review or unboxing of the Beginner Box at the Iron Tavern yet, because it is sitting on the top shelf of my closet.

The Iron Tavern and the Beginner Box

I will be taking pictures of the set similar to my other unboxings here at The Iron Tavern. The caveat being that IronPup will be the one doing all of the opening initially. I hope to at least get some good shots of the pawns up, included battle mat and dice that come with it. That post will come pretty early after opening next week.

Even with the delayed opening I still plan on reviewing it once it has been opened. To help make up for the late review I will be holding off on reviewing until after we have had a chance to play it, then I can justify the later review with an actual play review! Not only will it be an actual play review, but it will also be one with a youth. He has some Pathfinder experience already, but through my own trimming down of the rules. I think with the Beginner Box he will be able to read and verify the rules himself and possibly build his own adventures to run me through as well.

So keep an eye on The Iron Tavern for these upcoming posts coming in the next couple of weeks. If there is anything in particular you want to know about feel free to drop a comment here and I will try to include it in the unboxing or actual play review.

Beginner Box Campaign

I also have plans as to how I will be using the Beginner Box with IronPup once he opens it. We will certainly start with the first solo adventure at the beginning of the Player’s Guide to start.

One IronPup finishes that we will roll into character creation for a character we will embark on a longer term campaign with. We’ll start with the introductory adventure and then the freely downloadable one form the Paizo site. If he is happy with his character we will probably get some friends together and start off a mini-campaign with The Crypt of the Everflame. I am hoping to get a few friends together, possibly over Skype and play a few hours on the weekend every other week.

If all goes well with that then we’ll add in Masks of the Living God and  City of Golden Death to round out the mini-campaign arc.  Where we go from there is undecided. A lot will depend on how much IronPup seems to enjoy the game and how he wants to proceed. I am looking forward to seeing how it plays out!

Your Beginner Box Plans

Now you know my plans for the Beginner Box, both for The Iron Tavern and games I plan to run with it. How have your experiences with the Beginner Box been? Anyone else planning on running a campaign with the Beginner Box and use it for more than just an intro to Pathfinder?