Lords of Waterdeep

Lords of Waterdeep

Classified as a "European" style game by my friends, this game has been extraordinarily fun and quite enjoyable, if a bit complicated in learning how to play it.  The various aspects of this game have me wanting more games like it.  The game is very much a hybrid, providing the feel of a good combination of computer based MMO (quest completion and competing for limited resources) and tabletop RPG (making the decision on what, when and how to achieve goals).

The game starts with a combination of intrigue cards and quest cards, gives you a Lord of Waterdeep, a couple of agents and a money supply.  In the group pool of resources are gold, clerics, wizards, thieves and warriors.  On the board are more intrigue cards, quest cards, building cards, potential agent recruits and game control pieces.  Default locations on the board provide starting players with access to the various classes needed to complete quests and gain more gold.  Because only 1 building can be purchased each round, the selection of buildings (3 to choose from at any given time) can significantly affect your ability to complete quests.  As an aside, knowing which quest type your particular Lord wants can make a huge difference at the end of the game, so pay attention.

So far, there have been some obviously better quests/buildings/intrigue cards and some that seem to be after thought crap.  The difficulty in executing the quests varies and depending on how you approach it, can make a slow start erupt into a run-away winner.  

An important note, the execution order of each turn does seem to have a significant impact on play and determination of play by other players, so paying attention to the game is a must.  This is not a beer and pretzels game if you are trying to be competitive.  And while it can be complicated at first, getting to know and understand the little things about this game, make me like it even more.  But, because it has a fair bit of randomness, it does not benefit the regular player so much so that a new player cannot compete in their first game.

I highly enjoy this game, highly recommend this game and will consider purchasing this game upon my return from GenCon.

-

GenCon 2012

The flight is booked, the hotel is secured.  Now just got to go through the pages of events and get the tickets I want and decide on buying the pass early or waiting till I arrive.  I'm torn, last year I did will-call on tickets and stood in line for a good 2+ hours while there was basically nobody in line for just buying the tickets the day of.  Now I'm in a situation where I have to decide on trying to face will-call again or buying them once I get there.  My flight arrives around noon on Thursday the 16th meaning I'll probably have to stand in line either way, I'm just not sure which is going to be the better (shorter) choice.  Oh well, still a good amount of gaming at the best gaming event of the year.

Drop me a line if you are going to be there and let's see if we can't meet up for some dice throwing.

Next on DnDNext

Well, we are several games into the DnDNext playtest and several issues are starting to show.

Most notably the lighting system seems...strained at times to apply effectively.  There also seems to be an abundance of usefulness to some of the class specific stuff that may be making said class (cleric) a bit overpowered (again).  Granted, I usually play clerics, so being overpowered doesn't bother me so much, but for a play test environment, it seems *off*.  Some of the rule changes related to surprise also seem a bit ineffective or possibly not fully implemented, so I hope the next round of updates will address this.

However, on the whole, I'm enjoying the change from feat based character development of 3rd ed and complete uselessness of characters outside of combat that was 4th ed.

Combat seems to be flowing smoothly (outside of surprise situations) and the whole advantage/disadvantage thing so far seems to be working and easy enough for inexperienced players to grasp while granting enough randomness to the outcome for experienced players to accept.

Ok, next round of play test rules, I'm ready for your release.


On a side note, it seems my SWTOR server is one of the ones that will be shutting down soon as character transfers to Jung Ma have started and there is almost nobody in fleet anymore.  So, if you play on Jung Ma, let me know so I can look you up once my guild has transferred over.


-PA

D&D Next

Disclaimer: I am not yet endorsing this version in any way.

Our group test played DnD Next this past Thursday.  We had been playing some mish-mash of Swords and Wizardry and 4th Ed (don't ask, I still haven't figured out how it worked).  Fortunately, the pre-gen characters with the play test fit our group almost exactly so there was very little adaptation needed to convert the current game over.

The biggest difference was the amount of abilities that were is some way magical that the various characters could do - most notably magical light sources.  This is great considering we are running around on either the plane of shadow or some reasonable facsimile.

Since we only get about 2 hours of game play, most of the game was tied up in puzzle solving, both in game (interactively talking doors - 2 that were in different hallways, not visible to each other, but aware of each other's presence) and the puzzle of the new rules-set.  So, we didn't get to have a combat, but seeing how the various classes function out of combat was just as, if not more, interesting considering out little functionality 4th Ed provided for out of combat activities.

It should be interesting to see how the next session goes, hopefully some swords will get swung and spells cast in an aggressive manner.

Popping the Hardcore Cherry

We rolled up characters for Labyrinth Lord (effectively original DnD) last week.  The players agreed to go "hardcore", meaning 3d6 straight down the line.  I know that two of the players really enjoy this type of game, one of the players has played enough RPGs to appreciate this, but one of the players gaming experience is limited to 3.5/Pathfinder and WoD (old rules).  Initially, I was concerned that this style of game might be more than she would be comfortable with - she proved me wrong and jumped right on board with the hardcore style.  The one non-hardcore option I invoked was to give them more starting funds than they would normally have.  In retrospect, I didn't really care, but maybe I was trying to give them a bit more survivability - weakness in a DM for a hardcore group, it will not happen again.

So here's what was rolled up:
Elf
Mage
Thief
Cleric

My plan is to run them through a series of the "best of" modules for DnD - starting with The Keep on the Borderlands, then The Temple of Elemental Evil, Tomb of Horrors and into Against the Giants.  Maybe overly grand plans for an every-other-week group, but a guy can dream can't he?

I'm thinking I'll use the Locks & Keys document provided by -C on Hack & Slash where appropriate.

Quotes and Notes

I've been thinking back over some of the best at-the-table quotes from the numerous groups I've played with.  Thought I'd share a few:

DM: "You feel kinda funny."
Player (Husband of DM, mage): "Like ha-ha funny?"
Dm: "No, like you lost a level funny."

Player (standing on the back of a ship in middle of the ocean, druid): "If you are going to jump, jump now."  Proceeds to throw an entire necklace of fireballs at his feet.

Player (fighter): "They never put minotaurs on the first level of dungeon."

Player (mage): "I am unkillable."
DM: "Roll a save vs. death, you'll need a 20."
Player rolls - 20.
DM: "Damn you."

Other players around the table: "Why are knocking the lizardmen back into the water?!?!?!"
Player (druid): "And now, the dire shark."

Players (4 in horrible Scottish accents) in unison: "BEER!!!! and PICKLES!?!?!"

Player (paladin): "I take off all my armor and stand in the middle of the road waiting on the giants."

Player (druid): "How come I can't talk to the ogre about joining us before he attacks?"

Player (paladin to town guard): "Don't you know who I am?  Can't you see I'm wearing the hat!"

Player (monk): "Forget the stick, use the kick."

DM: "What's your AC?"
Player (fighter): "-8"
DM: "Bullshit, let me see your character sheet.  Plate +(inaudible), Shield +(inaudible), +Dex bonus and magic buff - shit, ok."

Player (berserker): "I challenge the hobgoblin chief to a one-on-one battle for leadership of the tribe."
DM: "Ok, he's about 4 levels higher than you."
Player: "Oh well."
Several dice rolls later...
Player: "My army is now at your service fellow adventurers."

Players: "Wait, we're level 3, that's a beholder."
DM: "Some of you should survive the encounter."


More to come as I remember them.

Dungeon Crawl Classic - swirling down the funnel part II

In reflecting on the previous sessions and anticipating the upcoming DCC session(s).  I think I have come upon what irritates me about this - the complete openness of player options and the complete lack of player choice.  Yes, you read that correctly - I can't stand having all the options available without actually being able to make a decision that matters.

But I can do anything I want - yup, I can play a fighter with 7 str and 4 con; I can play a wizard with 9 int and 16 dex - the stats don't matter.  But they do matter, in that I have had 25+ years of games conditioning me to think that they do matter and 36 (soon to be 37) years of life telling me that you do what you are good at.  There's a reason I'm not a translator for the UN (not good with foreign languages) or a fighter pilot (poor eyesight).  There is a reason I'm a computer guy (I understand the logic of a computer) and practice kenpo (good coordination and physical ability). 

But ultimately, I'm not sold on the system because I'm not playing what I want to play in the manner that I want to play it (yeah, I know, boo-fucking-hoo).  I don't play a lot of console games because I didn't want to play Hero X who has powers Q, 7, Power Gleek and Flash Bang.  I'd rather play a computer game where I get to choose Defensive Power: Shield Increase or Offensive Power: Ice Spell Enhancement.  (Yes, I know that console games have moved more towards the latter in the recent years - I'm too cheap to go buy a new TV, console, extra controllers and games). 

So what to do about this issue?  Well, I don't know.  Any advice is welcome, but don't get butt hurt if I think your opinion or idea stinks.  In the mean time, let's see how the character creation of DCC plays out and this module -C is running us through: Malice of the Medusa.

FYI -C is holding back posting his take on the whole thing till it's over and he can evaluate it.  I'm taking the opposite approach and posting about how I feel at each step of the evaluation.

Dungeon Crawl Classic - swirling down the funnel

My Wednesday gaming group completed the funnel portion of the new Dungeon Crawl Classic Beta last night. 

We all started with 5 0-th level 3X5 notecard characters with little more than a pickfork/hammer/pick for weapons, a helmet for armor and some pretty random inventory items: 10' of chain, lantern (no oil), 1lb of clay, empty vials, a cow, dog, mule, goose, duck, etc. etc.  The purpose is to play through the funnel, have 1 or 2 of the notecard characters survive and then they become your 1st level character(s).

My overall reaction to the experience, to the dismay of my DM, was - meh.  I understand people's desire to go old-school on stuff.  I understand the appeal of 60's-70's-80's themed parties, but I don't attend them.  Maybe I'm not old-school enough, but I remember not really liking playing Advanced Dungeons and Dragons once I was exposed to other game systems, to the point that I pretty much swore I'd never play AD&D again - ahh, youth and powerful declarations.

What don't I like about it?  Nothing and everything, I think.  I really can't quantify what I don't like, -C is convinced that I'm just burned out on *high* fantasy settings - maybe.  But that doesn't change the fact that I'm just pretty underwhelmed with what I've seen so far.  The upside is that apparently, the actual character classes are pretty powerful and interesting, so I'm at least looking forward to seeing what involved there.  I think I'll d/l DCC and read it over the holiday weekend.

Wrath of Ashardalon and Castle Ravenloft

So after the initial success of Castle Ravenloft we picked up Wrath of Ashardalon.  Awesomely, they work together to form a 3-part "Campaign".  We attempted the first stage of the campaign - to limited success.

The kicker, both with the core games and the campaign, is the limited number of healing surges - but I'll get to that in a bit.

So we randomly picked what characters to play and ended up with the Dwarf Cleric, Dwarf Fighter, Human Rogue and Human Ranger.  The ranger is both exciting and frightening because, for some reason, rangers in our games always die, always.  ALWAYS.

So the goal of the first session is to free several kidnapped townsfolk.  Simple enough, go into the dungeon, save the innocent, kill some baddies, get some treasure, maybe even level up - we can do this.  Once we got our marching order figured out, using the fighter to move ahead first, then the ranger to distance scout a tile, rogue/ranger/fighter kill the spawned monster, cleric staying on the previous tile to prevent to much trap damage.

So some treasure, a level-up and 11 tiles later, we find the townsfolk and the nightmare that is NPCs in this system.  These shits cower, wander, and do randomly the stupidest things they possibly can, then turn into fucking wraiths when they die.  We actually considered killing all but one of the townsfolk just to make our escape from the dungeon easier - we should have.  If you play any computer/console games, you've likely done at least one escort mission - they suck there and they suck here.  We found and freed the townsfolk only using 1 healing surge.  By the time we got 1 of those fuckers out of the dungeon we had used all but 1 healing surge.  Now this is where those healing surges become important - you only get a limited number of healing surges for the entire campaign and the clerics decent healing abilities are the utility and daily powers (effectively once per session).

So, net result, we'll have to replay the first stage due to townsfolk being *not the brightest, swiftest, most eager* individuals to get out of a *deadly, monster-filled, death pit* dungeon.

Monster Battle Tactics - Wyvern

Dragon-lite and dragon-like.  Experienced players know to fear dragons, new players think they should fear dragons.  I like to throw in a caveat at the beginning of my games that not all monsters in my games will perfectly resemble the monster manuals incarnation - thus, dragons may not always have 4 legs or be highly intelligent plot devices.  So when a wyvern shows up in the story with players in the 2-5 level range, they get fairly anxious about what it actually it. 

Wyverns do a great job of teaching players how to use their equipment/skills/magic to greatest effect.  They also serve as great additions to combined arms encounters.  Being large creatures with feats such as grab, rake and fly-by attack allows me to get creative in what I do to the party, like disarming a polearm or bow.  It's often inevitable that at least one player has chosen a small race and that's just a grab, gain altitude and drop sequence waiting to happen.  The look on players faces when a wyvern has grabbed the little person and gained about 30 feet of altitude is priceless - do they try to shoot the wyvern out of the air or try to catch the precious cargo on the drop?

But combined arms is the most fun place to use wyverns.  Giants, ogres, ettins and even goblinoids work great for setting up a wyvern fly-by or a wyvern fly-by sets up a ground assault perfectly.  In one game, the PCs had set up an extremely elaborate trap for a pair of hill giants - they didn't bother to check to find out if there was anything else assisting the giants.  So the half-dragon paladin acts as bait to sucker the hill giants into the kill zone.  The hill giants (not because I knew what the players were planning) decided it was a much better idea to have the pet wyvern just go fetch the juicy dinner for them - result, one very squishy half-dragon paladin.

In a previous post, I indicated that I don't like having one poison type per monster, so as with snakes, spiders, scorpions, I randomly decide what type of poison a wyvern has.  Yes, I know this is a house rule, but why should a wyvern in one world or region have exactly the same everything as a wyvern in a different world or region.  Diversity is why we have cougars, panthers, jaguars, cheetahs, lions, tigers, bobcats, ligers, tigons - yes, they are all big cats and all have mostly the same attacks/damage/hit points, but there are differences.  Embrace those differences to give your campaign a unique feel.

Monster Battle Tactics - Otyugh

Otyugh - the wonderfully nasty cross between Beholders, Pak'ma'ra and Illithid.  Disease is a mechanic that has lost favor in current editions due to forcing the DM/GM to have to remember specific events in the game.  However, I'm leaning more and more towards just marking down when a PC has the chance to be diseased and not saying anything, then asking that player to roll the save at the end of the night.  Often they have forgotten about whatever might have happened to cause said requested die role.  This prevents them from immediately knowing to get a cure disease spell and heightens the mystery of what is happening.

Yeah, so disease, that's great, what else makes them interesting?  Well, for one, they are large with long reach (longer than PCs with long weapons if you are using minis).  If you aren't, then the players have to say they are getting close enough to attack, which should give you ample opportunity to attack, trip, grapple them.

The other thing I love about Otyugh's is that they often have deals worked out with more intelligent beings in the area.  Meaning that if the PCs kill an Otyugh, they've probably pissed-off the locals.  So?  Well, the locals are probably going to notice when their trash isn't being taken care of when they expect it to.  So if you have PCs trying to sneak through an area, they may have inadvertently given away their presence.  If they aren't trying to sneak through that Drow/Druegar/Illithid controlled zone, the Otyugh probably has a deal worked out to let their "employers" know that intruders are in the area.

Yeah, that's not really a battle tactic.  Sure it is, cause why would an intelligent monster straight up attack an armed invading force.  They don't, they go tell those who's job it is to get rid of the intruders, then it's time for the buffet.

Ok, so here's something to think about.  The party is probably going to search out a defeated monsters lair, well, that's GREAT.  What's in an Otyugh's lair, DISEASE, rats (possibly dire size), spiders (possibly large), DISEASE, some coin, maybe a potion or two, DISEASE, a couple of gems, a minor magic item, DISEASE, a mate or offspring or two, possibly some traps and the fact that if the party spends any time in the lair, they are going to smell of carrion - always pleasant when trying to negotiate passage through neutral or hostile terrain.

Monster Battle Tactics - Manticore

Another entry in the "I hate cats, but love..." family.

If I haven't mentioned it earlier, I love flying.  I've spent hundreds of hours in private aviation aircraft (both fixed wing and rotor).   The fighter pilot creed goes: Speed is Life.  For a manticore, that isn't the case.  They are poor/clumsy/whatever edition description of flyers.  Effectively this means that they move in straight lines, making it easier to deal with 3 dimensions. 

What makes up for their poor flight is that they have an omni-directional long range attack - tail spikes.  24 of them to be specific, all at a decently high attack bonus and damage output.  So use them, use them all, if you haven't worn down the party enough for the manticore to swoop in and grab a snack, then have the manticore leave the area.  If however, you do have a nice, tasty dinner laying on the ground, then what happens?

Well, depending on your edition, feats can allow a manticore to have hover, fly-by attack, grab, etc.  Otherwise, just make it up.  If that halfling thief is laying motionless on the ground, then there's no reason you cannot get creative with how the manticore takes it's lunch to go.  (It might even spark some creativity in your players.)

But what happens when the manticore lands?  Simple, it doesn't, unless everything is laying on the ground dying.  If the party is to powerful for the manticore to attack directly or alone, they have great tracking ability.  Have it follow the party for awhile, days even.  Then when the party gets preoccupied with something else, like camping, climbing a mountain, crossing a river on a rope bridge, fighting a different creature - BANG, BANG, BANG, BANG and that nice juicy mage/sorcerer/summoner is a piece of manticore cheese, just waiting to be picked up at the next window.