Author Archives: Jeffrey Tadlock

DCC RPG: The Thief

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This is the second post in my weekly series of looking at each of the Dungeon Crawl Classics RPG character classes. Last week I looked at the Warrior class and some of the unique ideas it brought to the table. This week I am taking a look at the thief character class.

The thief character class in DCC RPG can take the shape of the small, wily thief or the bigger, brute type of thief or anything in between. The thief will need to rely on their cunning though as their hit points are determined by a d6 at each level. Their trained weapon list is much smaller than the warrior I looked at last week as one would expect. Choice of armor will of course affect the skills of the thief as well.

The thief can choose one of the three alignments in DCC RPG. This choice will affect how their skills advance as their levels increase in the game.

Thieves’ Cant makes a welcome return in DCC RPG. The cant is spoken only and not written. I always liked thieves cant for those thieves in older editions that were members of a guild.

The thief class also comes with a more extensive list than the “your occupation determines your skills” methodology. We see 13 skills added to the thief class and include many of what I would call traditional thieving skills.  The list includes skills such as Backstab, Hide in Shadows, Pick Lock, Find Trap, and more.

The modifier progression for these skills are determined by alignment. A table outlines how much the modifier increases at each level for each of the three alignments. For example, a chaotic aligned thief has a Backstab skill that increases faster than either a Lawful or Neutral aligned thief. Whereas a lawful aligned thief has a find and disable trap modifier that increase faster than a chaotic aligned thief.

Finally the thief has a different luck mechanic than a typical character class. When a thief burns a point of luck they get to roll a “luck” die for each point of luck expended. The luck die increases as the thief increase in level, so from a d3 to a d4 to a d5 and so on. A thief can expend more than one point of luck to gain additional dice on a roll.

A thief also has the ability to recover luck. Each night the thief is able to recover a point of luck, not to exceed their starting luck score. This allows the thief character to rely on their luck and wits to make those crucial rolls due to the enhanced recovery of expended luck points.

The thief class in DCC RPG fits right in with my view of what a thief is. Surviving on luck and wits, access to thieves cant and a skill list that truly makes them the most skillful character class in the game while supporting traditional thieving roles, the thief in DCC RPG hits all the right notes for me.

The skill list helps boost the thief and make them a more skillful class than other character classes in the game. This skill list also gives the thief the ability to do the things thieves are known for – pick locks, pick pockets, move stealthily, and more.

The modified luck mechanic for the thief gives them the chance to use luck more frequently to boost an attack roll or make sure they succeed at a particularly important skill check. Due to their recovery of luck points they are able to do this just often enough to reinforce the notion of a lucky thief.

The last DCC RPG session I ran had a thief in it. The character seemed to work out pretty well in the party. I think the biggest adjustment for a player coming from 3.x/Pathfinder to DCC RPG is that the backstab skill does not quite equal sneak attack.

Backstab means you have to attacking with the target unaware. Simply flanking someone does not mean you are going to get the backstab bonus. The thief in the game I ran did work himself into positions where he could gain backstab, but after that initial attack, the opponent was obviously aware of him. I do not think this is a bad thing, but it is different from how sneak attack works in 3.x/Pathfinder.

As with the warrior I looked at last week, I think Dungeon Crawl Classics has again found the essence of the Appendix N thief and done a wonderful job emulating it with this ruleset.

What are your thoughts? Does the DCC RPG thief let you play the style of thief you would want? A brute? A skillful individual?

Review: Attack of the Frawgs

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Author:  Stephen Newton
Publisher:  Thick Skull Adventures
Price: PDF $4.99
Pages:   9
Tankard Rating:  4/5

Attack of the Frawgs is the most recent adventure from Thick Skull Adventures for the Dungeon Crawl Classics RPG. The adventure is designed for 8-14 0-level characters, but can be adapted for a party of 1st level characters. The adventure is a locale based adventure and can be played as a standalone adventure or used as part of the Princes of Kaimai adventure series.

The adventure starts in a remote location in a small village nestled at the base of a mountain range. When reports of walking frogs the size of men start passing about the village followed by a wounded trapper returning to the village the people need heroes to learn the fate of his partner.

As noted this is a locale based adventure and allows the characters to investigate the fate of the lost trapper in whichever direction they choose. The detailed encounter areas are all centered about Dead Goblin Lake once the character leave town. There is a map of the area around the Lake and two additional maps of areas of the adventure that require additional detail.

I thought the encounters within the module all fit well together. They also meshed with the environment of the adventure quite well, while still offering an interesting variety of encounters.

The adventure also includes two new monsters for judges and one new item of magic.

The layout of the module is clean and well organized. I did notice that the module was a bit slow scrolling on my iPad (using Goodreader) and even a touch slow on my laptop. That is a minor complaint, though I am curious why it is a little sluggish even compared to much larger RPG PDFs.

This is my first look at a Thick Skull Adventures product and I was quite impressed with the offering. The module was easy to read and the way each encounter made sense in the larger scope of the adventure gave it a quality feel. While written as part of a series of modules, a judge could easily drop this into their own campaign world with minimal effort.

I look forward to reading future adventures from Thick Skull Adventures!

Tankard Rating
4 tankards out of 5 tankards

Note: The Iron Tavern was provided a review copy of this book.

AetherCon 2012

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With the rapid advancement of technology the ability to play RPGs online has steadily improved. Improved voice and video chat tools, higher bandwidth at people’s homes and the growing choice of Virtual Tabletops have presented players and GMs with many options to play online. Ways that no longer require a high level of technical expertise to participate in online gaming sessions.

With this increase in available tools the idea of an online gaming convention has really taken off. Online gaming conventions seek to bring a large number of people together for gaming, seminars and more over the course of several days, much like a convention with a physical location.

The Iron Tavern has an avid interest in online conventions as they fit my busy schedule better than many in-person conventions. With that in mind, The Iron Tavern has agreed to help get the word out about AetherCon coming in the Fall of 2012.

So grab your virtual dice bags and mark down November 16-18, 2012 on your calendar, as the AetherCon Online RPG Convention is coming to your computer! Best of all, it’s FREE!

They will be featuring tabletop RPGs of all types throughout the weekend, highlighted by four three-day tournaments of Pathfinder Call of Cthulhu, Pathfinder, Savage Worlds, and Shadowrun. Game tables will be run on the powerful, yet easy to use, Roll20 browser-based virtual tabletop. Learn more with the Roll20 tutorials and the Roll20 Live Stream.

Additionally vendors, industry guests, and artists are also in our plans. They will be releasing free downloadable wallpapers throughout the months leading up to the con.

Currently Members of the Artists Enclave include Paul Abrams (TSR, Shadowrun); Alex E. Alonso Bravo (DC Comics, Pixar, AEG); Brent Chumley (AEG); John L Kaufmann (Shadowrun); Eric Lofgren; (Paizo, White Wolf, Mongoose Publishing), Chris Malidore (Fantasy Flight Games, PEG), Patrick McAvoy (WotC, AEG, Fantasy Flight Games), Brad McDevitt (Chaosium, CGL, Battlefield Press), Jesse Mead (Fantasy Flight Games), Aaron B. Miller (WotC, AEG, Open Design), and Stanley Morrison (AEG) among other up and comers in the field.

Additionally, to date game publishers confirmed as taking part in AetherCon either through prize support, supplying guests, or taking a vendors booth include:

Battlefield Press, Catalyst Game Labs, Chaosium, Chronicles of the Void, Flying Buffalo Inc., Immersion Studios, Imperfekt Gammes, Kenzer and Company, Paizo, Pinnacle Entertainment Group, Scrying Eye Games, Skirmisher Publishing LLC, Stardust Publications, Sundered Epoch, The Design Mechanism, Third Eye Games, and Vigilance Press.

Confirmed guests to date are Wedge Smith and Doug Bush (Chronicles of the Void), Steven ‘Bull’ Ratkovich (CGL), James Sutter (Paizo), and Lawrence Whittaker and Pete Nash (The Design Mechanism).

Confirmed games to date include:

  • All Flesh Must Be Eaten
  • A Thousand and One Nights
  • Atomic Highway
  • Call of Cthulhu
  • Castles & Crusades
  • Dark Heresy
  • Eclipse Phase
  • Fantasy Craft
  • Labyrinth Lord
  • Legend of the Five Rings
  • Leverage
  • Mouse Guard
  • Mutants & Masterminds
  • Paranoia
  • Pathfinder
  • Pathfinder Society
  • RIFTs
  • Savage Worlds
  • Serenity
  • Shadowrun
  • Time Lord
  • Star Wars WEG D6
  • Swords and Wizardry

with more to come.

If you’d like to play in a game use our Player Pre-Registration Tool.

If you’d like to run a game use our GM Pre-Registration Tool.

If you don’t see your game in our lineup, would like to lend a hand, or need to inquire for any other reason, feel free to use our Contact Us page to do so.

The Iron Tavern will post the occasional update as information is released. Also keep checking back to see what we will be running at AetherCon!

The One Ring Extended Index

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Last week Cubicle 7 announced the release of an extended index for The One Ring RPG. This is not just any index though, this is a 19 page index that was created by a team of volunteers.

One of the complaints frequently levied against The One Ring was that while an index was included it was not entirely useful during game play. This prompted Cubicle 7 to form this volunteer team to create this extended index for The One Ring RPG.

The extended index has been posted in full color version and a printer friendly version and placed on The One Ring downloads page.

Even after a brief look at the extended index it is readily apparent how thorough this index is. The index contains extensive cross-referencing to ease finding the information you seek. It clearly denotes which book the information you seek is in, the Adventurer’s Book or the Loremaster’s Book and it highlights the pages with the most material by underlining the page number.

It is wonderful to see such an index released to such quality post-production. Cubicle 7 and the community support that went into this via volunteers deserve to be applauded for this effort.

RPG publishers should take note of this. Gamers value their indexes! Wizards of the Coast used to take flak for leaving out indexes several years ago from some of their source books. This should have been the indicator smaller publishers needed to realize indexes are needed. Not only are they needed, but they also need to be good indexes that are actually useful.

There are many RPG books that are released with inadequate or even without any index! (DCC RPG, I am looking at you!) While creating a good, useful index can be time consuming, please do not shortcut this area in your book.

DCC RPG: The Warrior

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I thought it would be interesting to take a look at some of the character classes in Dungeon Crawl Classics. Each week I am going to choose one of the DCC RPG character classes and take a closer look at it. This week I am going to start with the Warrior class.

Many people new to an RPG system take a look at the fighter class or equivalent of that class to get a feel for the game. The primary melee class of a game can tell you a bit about combat and comparing fighter’s from one system to another can be a little simpler than comparing some of the magic using classes who may have vastly different systems of magic from one RPG system to another.

In DCC RPG the primary melee class carries the name of warrior. The warrior entry in the rulebook only covers three pages including the tables that cover level advancement over the course of the game.

The warrior gets the highest starting hit die of any class, which should come as no surprise. In addition the warrior has the broadest choice of trained weapons at their disposal.

The warrior class also has a higher chance of scoring a critical hit, starting at 19-20 and then increasing that threat range as they advance higher in level. In addition, when a warrior does score a critical hit they get to roll on a critical table that has effects of greater impact.

Additional perks of the warrior class include getting to add their class level to the initiative roll and getting to apply their Luck modifier to one weapon type that is chosen at first level.

The piece that really makes warriors (and dwarves which we will talk about in another post) is the Mighty Deed of Arms feature of the warrior class. But lets back up a step before we get into Mighty Deeds.

A warrior in DCC RPG does not get a static modifier such as a Base Attack Bonus we would see in D&D or Pathfinder. Instead they get an extra dice called a deed die. When a warrior makes an attack roll they roll their action dice (typically a d20) and a deed die, which starts as a d3 and then increases as the warrior increases in level. This deed die determines the warrior’s bonus to hit instead of a static BAB mechanic. This roll also determines extra damage.

I find the deed die mechanic interesting as it shakes things up a bit for the warrior. One attack may find you only getting an additional +1 to hit and damage, while the very next round the warrior might get a +2 or even +3 to hit and damage. It is a small detail, but one that keeps things a little different from one round of combat to the next.

Now, back to the Mighty Deed of Arms. The Mighty Deed of Arms mechanic is what lets a warrior do cool stuff! There are not complex trip attack, disarming rules, or combat maneuvers in DCC RPG. Instead, the player can be creative for their warrior and come up with the action they want to attempt and then use the Might Deed mechanic to determine success.

To succeed at a Mighty Deed the player only needs to roll a 3 or higher on their Mighty Deed roll. If they meet or beat that target number their action succeeds. Want to disarm someone? Declare it your Mighty Deed action and roll away. Want to jump from the balcony down into the theater seats below? Declare it your Mighty Deed action and roll away!

This one simple mechanic gives no one a reason to declare a melee only class boring. You are only limited by your own creativity. Come up with something out of the ordinary and you have the chance to try it with an easy to remember mechanic to determine success. To make it even better you can use a Mighty Deed of Arms every round if you wish.

This is the mechanic that really stands out to me in regards to the warrior class. No more memorizing complex rules or only having a short chart of options to see what your fighter or warrior can do. Now a player is only limited by their imagination as the rules provide the mechanics to resolve these creative actions.

During a DCC RPG session earlier this week that I ran on Google+ one could see Mighty Deeds in action. I was running for a group of 2nd level characters and they had encountered what was essentially a swarm of rats. The warrior in the group wanted to attack one rat and then use a Might Deed to knock that rat into another rat, either in attempt to knock the second rat off course or outright damage it.

As the judge I only had to say go for it and watch what the deed die came up as. The warrior was rolling really well that night and he managed to take more than one rat this way to great success. I felt the mechanic allowed the player to get creative and rules wise still have an easy way to resolve the action.

Overall I really like the warrior class in DCC RPG. It is not hamstrung by a lot of complex rules and keeps the warrior from being limited by some set of tables declaring what special moves they can make. Instead the player is given creative license to have fun with the class and an easy to use mechanic to back it up. The warrior is finally heroic again!

What do you think of the warrior? Have you liked how it has played? How do you think it compares to primary melee classes from other systems?

A Look At Roll20

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A couple of weeks ago I took a look at Tabletop Forge, a VTT for use in a Google+ Hangout. I used it to run a Dungeon Crawl Classics RPG one-shot game. One of the comments on that post asked about Roll20, another VTT that has the ability to be used within a Google+ Hangout. I had glanced at the Roll20 VTT prior to that comment but that spurred me to take a closer look.

This week I ran another Dungeon Crawl Classics RPG game over Google+ Hangouts using the Roll20 application. Roll20 is in open beta and has a good sized features list. Roll20 can be accessed via a web browser and includes its own voice and video system. It can also be integrated into a Google+ Hangout as an application. The testing I did with it was as a Google+ Hangout application, so this commentary will not cover the integrated voice and video chat of Roll20.

Roll20 has several other features including a searchable art library to allow easily dragging tokens and such to the map, a jukebox to play background music to the players, built in text chat, dice rolling, macros, fog of war, turn tracker, drawing tools, health bars and more. Roll20 also allows you to prep a campaign file prior to the game and it will be there when you connect for your actual session.

For the game I ran I did some pre-game prep. Roll20 let me prep multiple map pages before the game. So on the first map I just dropped the module cover into the map. As players assembled in my Google Hangout and launched Roll20, they saw the initial opening image.

On the second map I used a player copy of the map from the adventure I ran and applied the fog of war to it. Since DCC RPG is able to be played gridless, I dropped a single token on the map to indicate the party’s location, but did not represent each character. I tested the revealing of the fog and it seemed to work great during my prep.

Fog of War in Action.

I also took advantage of the macros and setup attack rolls and damage rolls for each of the encounters in the module. This was a nice feature as when combat occurred I could just call my macro and get the roll I needed. It was relatively simple to setup.

Come game time I went to the Roll20 website and chose launch the campaign in a Google+ Hangout. That launched the Hangout, I invited my circle of gamers for this game and the Hangout was live. As players connected I had them go to the apps tab in the Hangout and launch Roll20 from there. All save one connected with no issue. The player with problems launching the app did need to reboot, but quite likely not fault of Roll20.

Page Selection in Roll20

Once the players were connected I moved the player ribbon from the start page with the module cover to the map I had prepped. The fog of war feature worked great and we used the chat based dice roller for our rolls. All seemed to work well and a good time was had.

I followed up with my players this morning and asked them what they thought of the setup and had overwhelmingly positive reactions from them. The fog of war received good reviews. Some thought the dice rolling was a little complicated for doing some of the multiple dice rolls needed in DCC RPG. Some of these issues could be minimized with a little more time with the tool I think.

Overall as a GM I found the Roll20 app a really solid product offering. The application easily integrated with Google+ Hangouts which is nice as Google+ provided me with the tools to meet gamers, schedule the games and then a place to play. The fog of war worked well for me to show a map as the players moves along and the macros were quite useful as well for pre-prep. I could easily see myself running more games over the Roll20 application.

VTTs have come a long, long way in a few short years. With a lot of my online gaming happening over Google+ Hangouts it is great to have two very strong VTT contenders. At the moment I probably give Roll20 a bit of an edge. But with Tabletop Forge’s kickstarter complete I expect them to close the gap in very little time.

I will be keeping a close eye on both Tabletop Forge and Roll20 going forward.

PaizoCon 2012 Banquet Commentary

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PaizoCon 2012 was this weekend in Redmond, Washington. PaizoCon is sponsored by Paizo of course and an event packed with Pathfinder fans. While I did not attend the event, thanks to social media I was able to keep up with the announcements that occurred at The PaizoCon Banquet that happened on Saturday night. The Banquet is where upcoming products are shown and secrets revealed.

Using what I have picked up via various social media locations including Twitter, Facebook and Paizo‘s own blog The Iron Tavern will take a look at some of the product announcements and comment on them. (I will provide a short summary of the announcement and then follow it with a comments section).

Ultimate Equipment Guide

The Ultimate Equipment Guide release is coming up quickly. The book will include all core source material and more. There will be pictures of each piece of equipment referenced in the core book and includes a section on mundane equipment. This book will use a new way to present the material and wondrous items will be presented by slot for those times your character is looking to fill a particular slot.

Comments

I am looking forward to this release. I like equipment and I am one of the types that even enjoys mundane equipment. I am likely looking forward to that chapter more than anything else! Having the equipment consolidated into one book will be quite handy and I see this as being an excellent resource for Pathfinder games (and possibly borrowing equipment for other games).

I certainly understand organizing wondrous items by slot, though it does lend to the feeling of the book being a shopping catalog for players. It will be interesting to see if it turns players into “shoppers” more so than they are now or not. Regardless, there has to be some organization system and I suppose by slot works as well as another despite the possible implication.

NPC Codex

This sourcebook was announced for November of this year and weighs in at 320 pages. It will contain one page per NPC and a statblock for every class in the core book. The builds in this book will alternate between typical builds and more atypical builds using even and odd levels as the differential.

Comments

I am in the middle of the road on this one. I will likely have a better idea of where I fall on this one after it is released. While there is certainly a need for NPCs and such, I feel like I have a good number to work now from various sources.

There is certainly something to be said in having them all in one place though. Also knowing that you can find a certain class at a certain level when picking up the book will also be a pro. At this point I am thinking this will be a good PDF resource for me, not sure I would go in for the physical product.

Ultimate Campaign

This book will be coming in the Spring of 2013 and cover what happens between adventures. Things such as improving skills, running guilds, building keeps, managing businesses and more will be included. Rules for waging war and building kingdoms will also be included as well as information for random background generation.

Comments

This book looks promising to me. There has long been an interest in some of the items that happen between adventures. Building ones estate, wealth, and such has been an area where GMs have frequently cobbled together rules for their campaigns. It will be interesting to see what the folks at Paizo come out with for this. This book could be a very valuable resource to cover all of those things between adventures we have typically run off the cuff or turned to previous edition rulebooks for.

Player Companion Line

The next volume will cover Varisia and feature a visual redesign. The idea is that these books are read in brief, five minute increments and are being designed to reflect that. Roads with distances will be added to the Varisia maps with this release.

The line is moving to a monthly release cycle and a rules index will be put in place to help make finding information easier.

Comments

I do not purchase as lot of the Player Companion Line presently. I pick one up here or there, sometimes based on reviews or if one covers a topic I have a particular interest in at the moment.

It will be interesting to see how the redesign affects my purchasing habits. Roads on maps sounds intriguing. More traits and crunch is a downside for me as I tend to feel overwhelmed by the amount of crunch via traits, feats, and archetypes as the Pathfinder line grows. I love the fluff, the crunch not so much. I am sure others enjoy the flow of mechanics with these releases, so I suspect this will prove a good move for Paizo despite my preferences.

Adventure Paths

Shattered Star is the next Adventure Path coming around the corner. This one sounds a little more like a traditional dungeon crawl. Expect gray maidens, giants, drow, a demi-lich and more from this one. Also players will be able to play as member of a Pathfinder faction.

Reign of Winter will be the next AP and brings Baba Yaga to Golarion. They announced some of the titles of each installment:

  • Snows of Summer
  • The Shackled Hut
  • Maiden Mother Crone
  • Rasputin Must Die
  • Revenge of the Witch Queen

Comments

Shattered Star will likely see my return to an Adventure Path subscriber. While I have enjoyed Paizo’s playing around the edges with the past few APs, I am looking forward to a return to a more traditional series.

Reign of Winter also sounds interesting as well. I like the area this is likely to take place in after my reading of Winter Witch and some of the scenarios from the Pathfinder Society Play.

Looks like a promising time ahead for the Adventure Path series from where I sit.

Paizo GameSpace

This is Paizo’s entry into the virtual tabletop space. Expected this summer this is a virtual tabletop that runs in a browser, no plug-ins required. It will be cross-platform as well. The VTT will not implement the Pathfinder rules system, but does include an initiative tracker and dice roller.

In efforts to minimize GM prep-work high resolution maps and tokens will be provided for adventure paths to get people up and running quickly with less prep. It will support zooming on the map and token movement. They were doing demos of this at the banquet.

The VTT will be free to use for people though it sounds like there will be pay for options for additions. The details to this are still being worked out at the moment. The primary motivation for this VTT is to provide a place for the community to play.

Comments

This strikes me as one of the big two announcements that came from PaizoCon. Gamers all around know Wizards has been working on getting a VTT out the door and to the public since 4e was announced. There have been some setbacks for them along the way and it seems that Paizo is possibly trying to fill this gap.

I think they are approaching this the right way for the moment. They have said that software is an evolving thing, so the plan is to release it early and possibly update as time goes on. The focus being to get something out there on the market and fix issues post release. By keeping the rules out of it that simplifies the project a fair amount.

The part of this announcement I am not a huge fan of is that I would like to have seen them support one of the existing free VTTs already out there. Either something like MapTool, the upcoming Tabletop Forge  or even the other newcomer, Roll20.net. These tools have a lot of the heavy lifting already complete or near complete and could readily take campaign files provided by Paizo.

I suspect Paizo is choosing to release their own simply for the control factor, i.e. they do not want to see what they base their releases on fold leaving them without a VTT. The other possibility is if they do manage to work the purchase of assets into their VTT for enhancements they stand more to gain by controlling the VTT as a whole.

I am interested to see how this one shapes up. VTTs are an excellent way to facilitate more people gaming.

Pathfinder Adventure Card Game

This was the other big announcement from the banquet in my eyes – a deck building card game from Paizo. This game is to be released at GenCon 2013 and the first set will have 400 cards. From what I have read so far it is a cooperative game and plays in about an hour.

Comments

I have mixed feelings about this. While I have no idea of the inner workings at Paizo it seems Paizo is trying to do a lot of things in a rather short time frame. We have the support of an MMO, card games, minis, VTT, and increasing the release cycle for some of their subscriptions. I just hope they don’t lose focus on producing high quality supplements and APs as we move forward.

There are some smart people that have been around this business for a long time though. I am sure they have looked at the market, the risks and what it can do for their business before these projects were given the go ahead.

With that said, I am not really in the market for a deck building game and will likely pass on this offering when it is released next year. Perhaps my initial thoughts about this game will change as the year passes.

Overall it looks like a very exciting PaizoCon Banquet this year! Lots of new things coming from Paizo as they continue to keep everyone in the RPG industry on their toes!

My DM Gave Me Homework!

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As regular readers know I have been playing in an online Google+ Hangouts game of Dungeon Crawl Classics RPG being run by Carl Bussler. We are only a couple of sessions in, but we have all been having a great time with the game.

Frequently, once a session is over for the night several of us will hangout and chat a bit before logging off for the evening. During our last session we started talking about the large Appendix N influence on DCC RPG. By the end of this discussion the we had all received a homework assignment! By the next gaming session we were to have read one work from Appendix N. We of course graciously accepted the homework assignment!

What exactly is Appendix N? Appendix N was included in the Dungeon Masters Guide written by Gary Gygax in 1979. Page 224 of the book included an appendix called Appendix N: Inspirational and Educational Reading. This list included many of the influential works to the game of Dungeons and Dragons.

Dungeon Crawl Classics RPG is also heavily influenced by Appendix N and attempts to marry that feel with more modern mechanics. Many believe it has successfully done so.

Enough Appendix N background. With the holiday this week, we actually had two weeks to complete this homework assignment. I started looking to see which books from the list were available on the Kindle or some other electronic format. It did not take long to decide that a trip to Half Price Books was in order.

It took three trips to Half Price Books to finally find a time they were not closed due to power outages from the recent storms that passed through Ohio. I had my list with me and started the assignment by looking for any books by the following authors:

  • L. Sprague de Camp & Pratt
  • R. E. Howard
  • Fritz Leiber
  • Jack Vance
  • H. P. Lovecraft
  • A. A. Merritt

I chose these as these authors are listed as having the most influence. Given how few of them I had actually read I wanted to start with the ones being noted for having the most influence.

I had pretty good luck at finding several books and left the store with the following five books:

  • The Complete Compleat Enchanter by L. Sprague de Camp & Fletcher Pratt
  • The Enchanter Reborn by L. Sprague de Camp and Christopher Stasheff
  • The Goblin Tower by L. Sprague de Camp
  • Swords in the Mist by Fritz Leiber
  • The Knight and Knaves of Swords by Fritz Leiber

I decided to start with The Complete Compleat Enchanter for the homework assignment.

The read has been quite enjoyable so far. Already I can see the influence of random magic in DCC RPG as the enchanters cast various spells and frequently get less than desired results as they learn the laws of magic.

While our homework assignment was to read one book, I am looking forward to reading many of the titles from the Appendix N list. It is sort of amazing that I have been playing these games as long as I have and not read very many of the authors on the list. This homework was just what I needed to get started with reading more items off of this list.

Others in my group have been busy picking up their reading assignments as well. I have seen several photos popping up on Google+ from the other people in our group. It has been interesting to see their finds as well as they get them posted.

Has your DM ever given you homework that was not directly related to the game? Did you find it homework that was fun to do? Homework that contributed to your gaming experience?

Review: City of the Fallen Sky

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Author:  Tim Pratt
Publisher:  Paizo Publishing
Price:  Print – $9.99 / PDF $6.99
Pages:   384
Tankard Rating:  4.5/5

City of the Fallen Sky is a recent release in the Pathfinder Tales line written by Tim Pratt. Tim Pratt has had stories appearing in The Best American Short Stories and  The Year’s Best Fantasy and Horror among others. He also has a Hugo award to his name and Rhysling Award for best speculative poetry. This is the first Pathfinder Tales novel by Tim Pratt.

The tale starts in the city of Almas, the capital city of Andoran, following an alchemist by the name of Alaeron. Alaeron maintains an alchemist lab in the city, formerly his father’s lab. We soon learn that Alaeron has an intense interest in relics and has had associations with the Technic League in Numeria where he made off with relics of the Silver Mount.

Soon Alaeron finds himself caught up in the affairs of lovely woman that has fallen afoul of a prominent crime lord in Almas. Left with little choice but to assist her in paying her debt to this crime lord, Alaeron, the woman named Jaya and the thief Skiver sent to make sure they stay on task. The trio is tasked with located the fallen floating city of Kho and retrieving some relics to bring back to the crime lord to settle debts.

The novel chronicles their journey across Golarion to reach the ruins in the southern reaches. Once there the reader learns more of the fallen city Kho and the trio’s challenge of retrieving a relic from the ruins all while being pursued by Alaeron’s past.

As noted the story focues on Alaeron, the alchemist. I found Alaeron an interesting character and also an opportunity to get a closer look at alchemists and alchemy in the world of Golarion. From the alchemists lab to how alchemy works within this particular fantasy world the reader soon learns how alchemy works in this fantasy world.

The other members of the trio are also interesting. Jaya, the woman that drew Alaeron into this debt to be paid off was glossed over a bit in my opinion. Some of this is pawned off with her story simply meant to be a bit mysterious. We do not learn as much about her as I might have liked.

Skiver, the brute rogue type, was an interesting character. Starting out as one you didn’t want to like the reader soon is drawn in to actually liking this character despite his rather ruthless ways. By the end of the novel I greatly enjoyed the character.

As I am a Pathfinder GM and player one of the reasons I enjoy Pathfinder Tales novels is the tour of Golarion the reader receives as they read the various novels. In this novel I learn more about Numeria, the cities of Almas, Absalom and then on to the lands of Osiron and on to the Mwangi Expanse. The description of the lands is of interest to both the non-Pathfinder gamer and to the GM to help give one an even better feel to the world of Golarion.

The pacing in the book is excellent, easily drawing the reader in to keep them turning pages. The balance between moving the story forward while providing enough detail to bring the world alive is excellent. There was enough action to keep the reader interested and on the edge of their seat without being too over the top.

I had two minor complaints about the tale. The first of which being that in some small portions of the book the descriptions of alchemists felt very “gamey”. You could feel the RPG mechanics oozing through in how an alchemists mutagens and potions worked. While true to the RPG it felt a bit jarring to the readery.

The other minor qualm was there were some portions of the book that felt very “Terminator”-like. This happened at several portions in the book and sort of broke my mind from the fantasy story at hand to visions of the Terminator movie.

Both of these were minor complaints and overall I found this book a very good read. I would certainly like to read more from Tim Pratt in the Pathfinder Tales line. This is yet another example of a very strong line of fiction being put out by Paizo Publishing. If you have not started reading novels from this line and you enjoy fantasy fiction, you are missing out.

4.5 out of 5 Tankards

DCC Funky Dice

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One of the unusual facets of Dungeon Crawl Classics RPG is the use of “funky” dice. Now for the established RPG gamer, the concept of “funky” dice can be unusual. After all we already play with d20’s, d12’s, d8’s, d10’s and the beloved d4. We already play with funky dice, right?

Nope! Dungeon Crawl Classics RPG brings us some more unusual dice, including the d3, d5, d7, d14, d16, d24 and d30. This set of dice is also known as the Zocchi Dice. Some people find this an attraction to the game and others find it as a detriment. I fall into the former camp and enjoyed hunting down the new dice and rolling them during the game.

Dungeon Crawl Classics RPG uses an improved die and reduced die mechanic that moves you up and down a dice chain when rolling. For example, bumping up from a d20 with an improved die roll would be a d24 and a reduced roll from a d20 is a d16. There are also some other charts and mechanics that make use of the funky dice to determine certain results during the course of a game.

When Joseph Goodman was asked about the inclusion of these funky dice in DCC by Suvudo he replied that he simply liked funky dice. In the interview he goes on to say that part of the nostalgia surrounding old-school gaming is related to the unusual dice of the time. Back when the d20 and d4 were unusual to the old-school gamer. As time has come on those types of dice have become “normal”. DCC RPG attempts to bring some of the nostalgia back by using these funky dice that are even new to a lot of us long timer gamers.

While some dislike them, I think Goodman Games really succeeded with the use of “funky” dice in the game. I haven’t been that excited about dice for a long time. But with DCC RPG I enjoyed reading up on just what dice I needed and hunting them down on the Internet. I found the experience enjoyable and not all that difficult to do, despite what some folks seem to be saying.

For those that really want to try DCC RPG, but do not want to hunt down dice, the rulebook describe ways to emulate the “funky” dice with normal dice. We used this way of rolling for the first funnel adventure I played with my son. It worked well, certainly well enough to get a feel for the game.

Over on the Goodman Games forums for DCC RPG someone has shown a way to use only the d8, d10, and d12 in using this method:

  • d3 = d12 divided by four
  • d4 = d8 divided by two -or- d12 divided by three
  • d5 = d10 divided by two
  • d6 = d12 divided by two
  • d7 = d8 re-roll 8’s
  • d8 = standard
  • d10 = standard (I’m old and remember when it wasn’t)
  • d12 = standard
  • d14 = same as d7 but with a control die (high is +7)
  • d16 = d8 with an control die (high is +8)
  • d20 = d10 with a control die (high is +10)
  • d24 = d12 with a control die (high is +12)
  • d30 = d10 with a control die (middle is +10, high is +20)

While I prefer to roll the “funky” dice the above methods work as good substitutes as folks decide whether to purchase their own sets of “funky” dice.

In either case – do not let the “funky” dice or Zocchi dice keep you from trying out Dungeon Crawl Classics RPG. Even if you do not feel like purchasing new dice for the game (and come on, what gamer doesn’t like to buy dice!), there are ways to play the game with “normal” dice we RPG gamers all used to.