Tag Archives: RPG

DCC Monster: Crystal Aberration

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Art by: Larry Moore

Art by: Larry Moore of DwD Studios

Crystal Aberration

There are several theories on how these cyrstal aberrations originally form. Some say these crystal aberrations spontaneously form in rare circumstances when earth energies and crystal meld into one. Others say powerful wizards have mastered the earth element and can cause the crystal to meld together and become sentient. Some suggest these crystal creatures form as a result of some alien being starting the process in motion. No one can say for certain what the source of these creatures initial energy is.

Growing slowly over time, the crystal formations automate and begin to form symbiotic ties to crystal obelisks where they draw their growing energy. Left unchecked a multitude of these crystal aberrations will form, their power growing stronger as they harvest more crystal for the powering obelisk.

A crystal aberration uses its crystalline fists as weapons when close to other combatants. The creature can also unleash a shower of fast moving crystal shards towards an attacker, peppering the victim with hundreds of thin, needle-like crystal projectiles. Larger crystal aberrations gain a fire surge ability which is used for crafting crystal power obelisks and as an offensive capability.

Upon the destruction of a crystal aberration the energy that formed it is released in a violent explosion of crystal shards. This utter destruction of the creature showers the nearby area in thousands of crystalline needle-like projectiles.

As the crystal aberrations become sentient, they often begin crafting obelisks to further channel the earth energies to themselves. The obelisks are formed from crystal harvested from rocks and then melded with heat into the obelisk structure. As the obelisk grows larger the crystal aberrations in the area will also grow and become more powerful.

This obelisk’s power is one with the crystal aberrations. This symbiotic relationship between obelisk and chief crafter includes both crafter and obelisk being destroyed if either is destroyed. When either the obelisk or crafting crystal aberration is destroyed, both explode in a powerful blast of crystal shrapnel.

Crystal Aberration: Init +0; Atk slam +2 (1d6+1) or crystal shards (40’ range) +2 (2d4+1); AC 14; HD 2d8 12hp; MV 30’; Act 1d20; SP exploding body; SV Fort +4, Ref +0; Will +2; AL N

Exploding Body: Upon death the body of the crystal creature explodes in a shower of tiny crystal shards causing 1d6 damage to all in a 10’ radius (DC 10 Reflex Save to negate).

Greater Crystal Aberration: Init +2; Atk slam +4 (2d6+2) or crystal shards (40’ range) +2 (3d4+1); AC 16; HD 4d8 21hp; MV 30’; Act 1d20; SP exploding body, fire surge; SV Fort +6, Ref +1; Will +3; AL N

Exploding Body: Upon death the body of the crystal creature explodes in a shower of tiny crystal shards causing 2d6 damage to all in a 10’ radius (DC 10 Reflex Save to negate).

Fire Surge: The creature can cause a ray of fire to spring forth from an outstretched crystalline appendage. 4d6 damage (DC 12 Reflex Save for half)

Crystal Obelisk: Init -5; Atk none; AC 20; HD 6d8 32hp; MV 0’; Act 1d20; SP exploding body; SV Fort +10, Ref -2; Will +4; AL N

Exploding Body: Upon death the body of the crystal creature explodes in a shower of tiny crystal shards causing 4d6 damage to all in a 15’ radius (DC 10 Reflex Save to negate).

Roll20: TSR Endorsement and Tabletop Forge

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Roll20, the virtual tabletop, has been having a busy couple of weeks. Last week they released a press release announcing they had surpassed 100,000 users. This week Roll20 has released a press release announcing their endorsement by the newly launched TSR as their “official tabletop”. This week’s press release also announces Tabletop Forge ceasing development and joining in with Roll20!

My comments, particularly on the Tabletop Forge news, follow the press release presented here in its entirety.

ROLL20 GAINS THE SUPPORT OF TSR, TABLETOP FORGE
Application solidifies its status as the preeminent long distance gaming solution
Roll20 LogoWichita, Kansas (January 29th, 2013) – This week two major announcements regarding the popular online roleplaying program Roll20 became public.  The first involved the newly launched TSR company endorsing Roll20 as their “official tabletop,” the second pertained to the lead developer of competing game space Tabletop Forge announcing he was halting production on the program to instead help with future enrichments to Roll20.

“The most flattering part of all this is that they both came to us,” said Roll20 co-founder and lead developer Riley Dutton.  “It really helps make us feel like we must be doing something right.”

The new TSR was formed by Jayson Elliot to cover multiple aspects of gaming, beginning with the launch of “Gygax Magazine” next month.  Elliot was one of the first adopters of Roll20 in the Kickstarter phase.  Additionally, a feature by Roll20 co-founder Nolan T. Jones’ brother, Nevin P. Jones, will be in the initial issue of Gygax Magazine covering Nevin’s first roleplaying experience which was accomplished using his brother’s application.

Tabletop Forge was begun as a Google Hangout application by Joshuha Owen with the purpose of helping the vibrant Google+ roleplaying community to better realize their games.  The Google+ page for Tabletop Forge boasts over 11,000 members, many of whom supported the program’s KIckstarter last year.  However, Joshuha decided that the community would best be served by a single HTML5 solution.

“There are lots of options for roleplaying over the internet, but it became redundant to have both Roll20 and Tabletop Forge, as in many ways they were serving the same community and had similar features including a common goal of being lightweight and easy to use,” remarked Joshuha.  As such, the creators of both programs say they will be treating all Tabletop Forge’s Kickstarter backers as if they had made their pledges to Roll20, migrating Tabletop Forge assets to Roll20, and be working with a multitude of RPG artists to bring their content to the platform.

Roll20 began as an effort to keep developers Dutton, Jones, and Richard Zayas in touch via long distance gaming.  Their project went public with an eighteen day Kickstarter campaign in April of 2012.  Since then it has attracted over 100,000 users as a free service.  The program continues to be funded by subscribers who receive features that assist advanced gameplay.

The news of the TSR endorsement from Saturday’s Gygax Magazine unboxing has been out there for several days already. The TSR endorsement does not come as a big surprise to me. Roll20 is very easy to use and has remained so even as they continue to add more features. I have had very little trouble getting people connected and up and playing with Roll20. Congrats to Roll20 on this endorsement though, it can only grow their player base.

The Tabletop Forge news is the big item for me. My first experiences with VTTs in a Google+ Hangout environment was with Tabletop Forge. Several of my early G+ games were done over G+ Hangouts and Tabletop Forge. TTF development moved at a very rapid pace in the beginning. When they ran a Kickstarter for TTF I pitched in and I pointed several people to the Kickstarter to help support them.

Since then things slowed down from the TTF side. Development appeared to have slowed, art assets were slow to get released, etc. My groups ended up playing on Roll20 and really did not look back.

Joshuha Owen did a good job of communicating in the aftermath of the Kickstarter. Several of his developers who had been helping him left, leaving him with the Kickstarter ball. And though the process was slow, he did get the art assets to people via Google Drive, even if they weren’t integrated with TTF.

I think this move to bring content that was Kickstarted to Roll20 is a good move on Joshuha’s part. It seems like a very eloquent way to bring the TTF Kickstarter to a close and attempt to make everyone happy in the end.

This move will also likely benefit Roll20 rather significantly with an influx of art assets, map tiles, and such that were funded as part of TTF. And it will likely bring them an influx of more users as word gets out that Roll20 is the VTT that will continue moving forward.

BareBones Fantasy in Print

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My print copy of BareBone Fantasy arrived today. I ordered it from RPGNow and this is actually the first time I have ever ordered something in print from RPGNow. I am not sure if every experience is like this, but I received my print copy in a very timely manner. Looking back at my order history, I just ordered this on 1/21 and I had it in my mailbox today. Great turn-around in my opinion.

If you hang out in some of the same social media circles I do, you have likely seen mention of BareBones Fantasy. I will be doing a write-up of my initial thoughts on the system based on running a game this past weekend. But for those unfamiliar with the system it is a complete fantasy role-playing game contained in 80-ish pages. It uses a d00Lite system in that it is based on 10-sided dice. Attack rolls, skill checks, weapon damage, and more are all based on rolling under a certain percentage. One golden rule covers the gray areas – “The GM is in charge!”.

I’ve had the PDF since about mid-December. Since I wanted to play this with my son, I wanted to pick up a paper copy. He is not a fan of PDFs and if I want him to read the system he wants to have it in print. Plus the print copy is easier to hand around the table while I run off of the PDF on the iPad.

More in-depth commentary will be coming later this week, but I couldn’t hold off on posting up the pictures of my soft cover copy. hard to believe the whole system is packed into this lightweight book!

Until later this week, enjoy!

Gygax Magazine Unboxing

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Gygax MagazineToday’s post was going to be a review of the new Gygax Magazine. I thought along the way they had announced the magazine would be available digitally on Saturday the 26th as well. Looking back over some older interviews, I appear to have misunderstood. It looks like the PDF release will be in about two weeks on February 7th. That is a little disappointing in this day and age. It seems they want the print version to be people’s first experience with the magazine instead of a digital copy.

So instead of a full review of the magazine it will be some of The Iron Tavern’s thoughts on the new magazine based on the unboxing videos from Saturday. First, the look of the magazine will make anyone that read Dragon magazine from the 1980’s do a double-take. The cover, the fonts, and even the table of contents all look remarkably similar to the old Dragon of past years.

I consider the look and feel a good thing. When I think of Dragon magazine my mind always recalls images from the 80’s. The new Gygax Magazine certainly hits some of those same chords.

At this point I can only judge the book by its cover. The content of the magazine will be what reveals whether they also strike the same feel the Dragon magazine of the past had. I hope they do. Kobold Quarterly had been filling the gap for a print periodical and now it looks like Gygax Magazine might be positioned to step into that void rather quickly.

The Table of Contents has been floating around in the Internet for several weeks now. I will not list it in its entirety, but rather highlight a couple of articles I am looking forward to.

Leomund’s Secure Shelter by Lenard Lakofka promises to do some math and reveal which is better, a +1 to hit or a +1 to damage. Even from the unboxing video one could see there were some tables that went along with that. While not a power gamer, I do find the math behind the game interesting and always like reading about it when someone else does the math for me!

Gaming with a virtual tabletop by Nevin Jones lands in an area of interest for me. I play a good amount over a VTT. I always like to see what other people are doing in the virtual space. Perhaps I will pick up some new tricks or maybe it will cover things I already know. But I am always curious to hear how people are using tech in their games.

DMing for your toddler by Cory Doctorow will be interesting to me as well. As readers of The Iron Tavern know, I’ve been playing RPGs with my kids for a couple of years now. I like to see if other people’s experiences match up with mine or not.

There are several other articles that look interesting, but based on a scan of the Table of Contents those three are at the top of my list.

I took the risk and signed up for a subscription to the magazine. Given that US residents get free shipping if they sign up for a subscription and I will want to see at least a couple of issues before I make my final call on the magazine, it seemed like the way to go. I am already looking forward to my first issue arriving in my mailbox.

Once I receive my first issue and read it, you can be sure I will post a more in-depth review on the new Gygax Magazine here at The Iron Tavern.

Mini Review: D&D Basic PDF

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D&D Basic - MoldvayMost RPG fans are aware by now that Wizards of the Coast has started putting their PDF catalog up at DriveThruRPG.com or accessed via dndclassics.com. The latter option is the easiest to just browse the PDFs currently available. I believe they are going to continue putting product up on the site, so if you do not see your favorite product yet – just keep checking back.

In my other posts about D&D reprints, I have said if the Moldvay D&D Basic book was made available I would snatch it up without hesitation. While not quite a reprint, the PDF of the Moldvay rulebook for D&D Basic was one of the PDFs released. Once the server meltdown from the traffic to DriveThruRPG let up, I purchased the PDF that night and spent some time checking out the PDF.

Most are familiar with the D&D Basic set, so this mini-review is less about the content within and more on how does the PDF look and feel. I could not offer an unbiased review of the content, it is the D&D I started with and nostalgia would trump any objective review I could do. Moldvay D&D Basic is my D&D.

The PDF comes in at 7.9MB for my download. That makes it nice and portable, as well as quick to render on both the computer and older iPad model.

The PDF is extensively bookmarked. That makes navigating the PDF very easy. The text is also searchable as we have come to expect from PDFs.

I have seen several praise these PDFs for their scan quality. The scan quality is certainly decent and legible, but on my iPad and computer they do seem a little fuzzy. You can see the text start to break apart on zooming in. Even at 119% in Adobe Reader you can start to see some of the fuzziness creep in. Apparently still a huge improvement over the previously released PDFs and as far as scans go, quality scans. I am just not sure I would rave about their quality unless directly comparing them to the previously released PDF’s quality. Perfectly legible and usable though.

I paid $4.99 to pick up the D&D Basic rules in PDF. I think the price point was very fair for the product. Certainly a reasonable value for my money.

Overall I am quite pleased to have access to PDFs of the older D&D products. I am very happy to have a legal copy of the Moldvay D&D Basic Rules in electronic form that does not involve subscriptions or gimmicky software to access. I will certainly be picking up some more products in the future.

I think this is a great move by Wizards of the Coast and I am quite happy to see them step into the digital era of RPG publishing.

D&D PDFs at DriveThruRPG

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drivethru_logo

It appears the news that leaked last week is indeed true. This morning several D&D PDFs from editions past showed up on DriveThruRPG.com’s site.

A quick glance through shows the old green covered campaign sourcebooks (the HRx series) are available. The Basic Rulebook from the 1981 release of D&D Basic is up there. In Search of the Unknown is available for free. Several fun ones to look through.

The PDFs are also available through the dndclassics.com site as well. dndclassics.com is a DriveThruRPG site, so your logon works at it too!

I have not had a chance yet to really do a close look, I am sure social media will be alive with commentary today on this move.

wizards_logo

Roll20 Passes 100,000 Users

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Today the folks at Roll20, the Virtual Tabletop, put out a press release announcing they had passed the 100,000 user mark! Here is the press release in its entirety:

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASERoll20 Logo

ROLL20 “VIRTUAL TABLETOP” PASSES 100,000 USERS

Wichita, Kansas (January 21st, 2013) Just under a year ago, Wichita, KS programmer Riley Dutton had grown envious about the gaming joys of his former college roommate Nolan T. Jones, now of Las Vegas, NV.

“We’d talk on the phone, and he’d talk about how much fun he was having getting back into tabletop roleplaying games. And I realized how much I wanted to play with my friends again, but we were literally spread across the country. That’s when I had the idea, and tried to get Nolan to talk me out of it,” said Dutton.

But Jones talked Dutton into pursuing his idea, and with the help of another former roommate — Richard Zayas of Arlington, VA — they started testing a system to play table based games online. After two months of testing they took their program to Kickstarter, an online “crowdfunding” platform where entrepreneurs pitch projects for funding to users that only expect a working product and input in return for their investment. They made over $39,000 in an eighteen day campaign at the end of April 2012. By June they moved the program into an open beta test and in September declared Roll20.net to be in regular service. Today Roll20 has logged its 100,000th account, with over one hundred and fifty-four years of gametime amassed by their users.

“We knew we were filling a need– both in reuniting people across long distances and giving potential newcomers to tabletop gaming a safe way to try these games from home. But I don’t think any of us knew this would become so popular so quickly. The community that’s rallied around this program has been incredible,” said Zayas.

The system is free to use, but has subscription options for those who desire more advanced features. The creators say that the most popular games used in Roll20 are various editions of “Dungeons & Dragons” and “Pathfinder”, but the system is capable of handling a variety of popular card and board games. Currently the group is working on expanding the social elements of their website along with making game setup faster.

“Our success to this point has been based in being easy to use– which is a result of us building Roll20 for our own use. We intend to keep using it, so we intend for it to keep getting easier to pick up and play,” said Jones.

Contact: Nolan T. Jones
http://www.roll20.net

Congrats to the folks at Roll20 for this milestone! I have been using Roll20 on a near weekly basis since about July or August of 2012. It has been a wonderful tool and has done a marvelous job of lowering the technical barrier to effective play over the Internet.

New Year, New Game 2013

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New Games 2013

Photo by StarsApart – Flickr

This post was written for the second annual New Year, New Game blog carnival hosted by Gnome Stew as part of the 2013 New Year, New Game challenge.

Looking Back

The Iron Tavern participated last year in the New Year, New Game blog carnival. Last year I talked about some of the things that made it hard for me to get out of my groove and try out new games. I also listed the three games I wanted to try at the table in the year 2012. They were:

Fiasco
The One Ring
Dragon Age

How did I do? Well, I did not get the chance to play any of the games on the list I made last year. The year was not a loss however! I did play two new RPG games in 2012 and added several others to my collection.

New Games for 2012

What games did I play? First up was Dungeon Crawl Classics RPG. This one is obvious to regular readers of The Iron Tavern as I have made many posts about it. I bought the book because I wanted it for the artwork. Then I started reading the book and I wanted to play it. I ended up in a brief game on Google+ Hangouts and was hooked. From there I started running a few one-shots on Google+ Hangouts and finally broke down and started running a weekly DCC RPG game on Google+ Hangouts and Roll20.

A little later in the year one of my DCC RPG players mentioned a game available for free download called Dungeonslayers. I ended up playing in a Christmas themed Dungeonslayers game that he ran. The game was a good time, something about the opposed roll mechanic that made each round of combat something a little more than rolling a 20-sider and seeing if you hit and then rolling damage. That game has evolved into a regular weekly game as we moved into 2013.

Added to my collection in the year 2012 were numerous Castles and Crusades books and Barebones Fantasy. Only the lack of time prevents me from playing either one of those. I would actually like to see one of those systems replace my default Pathfinder game, but I need to try them out to see which seems a better fit for my go-to game.

New Games for 2013

Despite not playing any of the games I mentioned wanting to play in my post last year on this topic, I am going to risk listing the games I want to play in the upcoming year. I have already mentioned two of the games from the list of three. First:

Castles and Crusades. This game has been around for quite some time. I’ve started collecting most of the hard covers, I am just waiting for an opportunity to play it. I am attracted to it because it is a lighter than my current go-to game of Pathfinder, but so close to the D&D feel that it seems a really good fit. Add in I can easily convert 3.x/Pathfinder adventures down to it and 1e and 2e stuff up to it, I’d have modules to select and choose from for a very long time.

Barebones FantasyBarebones Fantasy. This game has been getting excellent reviews over at RPG Now and across several of my social media circles. A rules-light game with simple mechanics and an interesting “skills” system as class. I’ve done a read through of this book and really want to give it a spin this year. Just waiting for a time that a G+ game opens up at a time that I can participate.

Fiasco. This game was on my 2012 list as well, but I am keeping it around for 2013. This one doesn’t seem to be catching the same talk on social media it was last year, or maybe I have gravitated to different circles. In either case, I would like to try it out to see what it is all about.

New Games, New Year

New games, New Year was a good thing for me. It got me thinking about breaking out of my normal groove. And though I did not play the games I had listed in 2012, I did get out there and play some new games. Not only were these new games a great time, but I met a lot of great people playing them. I

I have made new online friends and met several of them in-person at Gen Con. I’ve drifted to new social circles that are full of people doing cool things. So even though I did not actually play a single game on my list from 2012, I did get out there and play some new games, met some new people both virtually and at cons. I call that a success.

So, get out there and play some new games! Break out of your rut of playing whatever your game of choice is now and try something a little different. It has been a blast for me and I have met a lot of great people by expanding my gaming circles a bit!

D&D 2nd Edition Reprints

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PHBb 2nd ReprintAs seen on Tenkar’s Tavern this morning (seriously if you want up to date news on items in the OSR niche of the RPG world, you need to add Tenkar’s Tavern to your feed), the 2nd edition D&D reprints have popped up at Wizard’s site. The Player’s Handbook, Dungeon Master’s Guide, and Monstrous Manual are all there, going for $49.95 per book. Looks like the currently advertised release date is 5/21/2013.

Reprints

So far we’ve seen the 1st edition D&D reprints, the 3.5 D&D edition reprints and now the 2nd D&D edition reprints surface. It certainly seems Wizards is going through their back catalog and re-releasing older editions to the market. They likely have little choice but to do this. It is a relatively easy way for them to get some revenue while they are in this lull between editions. By announcing D&D Next so early for the sake of the playtest, they certainly have made a large dent in their 4e sales.

Reprints and Me

I’ve picked up the 1st edition reprints. I was most attracted by those when they were first announced, but then decided I did not want to pay that much. Not that the price was bad, it was more my frugal side than disagreement with their pricing. Amazon tempted me with their prices, but I resisted. Then at Gen Con I found a booth that was selling them for slightly less than one could get them at Amazon. I could not resist and picked all three of the 1e reprints up.

I wasn’t tempted at all by the 3.5 reprints. I have my 3.5 books still and Pathfinder fills any need for this era of gaming for me. I have picked them up at the local Barnes and Noble, but still did not feel the need to purchase them.

MM 2nd ReprintThe 2nd edition reprints falls into the same area as the 3.5 ones did with me. I still have my 2e books and do not really feel the need to replace them with the reprints. I am sure that many have their roots in 2e though and will feel compelled to pick them up.

There are two products if re-released in this manner I would purchase. The Rules Cyclopedia and a re-release of the Moldvay boxed set. Moldvay is what I cut my teeth on and I have somehow never picked up a Rules Cyclopedia. The local Half Price Books had one marked up to $50, but it was in horrible shape.

The Reprint Decision for Wizards

I understand why Wizards has chosen to release reprints. They need something to generate revenue while folks wait for D&D Next to come out. Given the amount of 4e books I see at the local Half Price Books, I suspect a lot of folks have been unloading their 4e books. I also suspect it is hard to sell a 4e book at the moment with the new version on the horizon. Selling reprints gives Wizards an easy way to generate some short term revenue while the playtest continues.

I do have to wonder if they further fracturing their market though with all of the previous editions coming back out to the market. I would suspect they are bound to lose sales to these older editions. Of course, maybe they folks they are selling these to would never have made the move to D&D Next, so they are just subsidizing D&D Next development with the dollars of gamers who likely would not have made the move to the new edition to begin with.

I do not have a horse in this race, so for me the reprints work out just great. I managed to get my 1e reprints for a great price and I have hope they will at least release a Rules Cyclopedia. With talks of some of the older module series coming back in print, I can use those with whichever system I am playing at the time. So it is a win situation for me. We’ll see if it is a win situation for Wizards of the Coast when D&D Next is released in 2014.

DCC Monster: Thaggnaerian Snare-Beast

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Things have been a bit hectic for me this week, but luckily one of my Dungeon Crawl Classics players stepped up with a creature he created for a one-shot game he ran! Continuing The Iron Tavern’s apparent tradition of posting DCC RPG related content on Fridays, I introduce Dustin Clark’s Thaggnaerian Snare-Beast for your game!

Thaggnaerian Snare-Beast

Init +2; Atk tentacle +1 (1d3) and tentacle +1 (1d3); AC 12; HD 1d8+2; MV 20’; Act 2d20; SP Infravision, half damage from non-magical weapons and fire; SV Fort +2, Ref +2, Will +2; AL C

The Thaggnaerian Snare-Beast is a minion of the demon lord Thaggnaer, not quite a demon itself but the spawn of the Breeding Pits of Thaggos. Thaggnaerian Snare-Beasts feature the head of a featherless, crimson skinned four-beaked bird with three eyes, and have the torso, legs, and shell of a turtle and reddish tentacle arms like those from an octopus. The Snare-Beast walks upright but hunched over, with its pitch black shell not quite allowing it to stand straight. It can see perfectly in the dark, and is partially resistant to fire damage and damage from normal weapons.

This hideous cross-breed of featherless bird, turtle and octopus lurches forward, struggling against its shell to walk upright and lashing out with fierce, strong tentacles. It’s four-beaked mouth chatters and clips incessantly as it drags itself across the floor towards you.

Greater Thaggnaerian Snare-Beast

Init +0; Atk 4 (four) tentacles +1 (1d6); AC 13; HD 2d8+4; MV 20’; Act 4d20; SP Infravision, half damage from non-magical weapons and fire, constrict automatic (1d8 dmg if two or more tentacle attacks hit); SV Fort +2, Ref +0, Will +2; AL C

The Greater Thaggnaerian Snare-Beast is a larger, slower and even more aggressive brother to its smaller namesake. This greater form of outsider is nearly a demon in strength, and has two additional tentacles for arms, and a slew of smaller tentacles hanging grotesquely from its neck and stomach.