The essential part of updates

Although this is mostly a post to get back into the Dungeons and Dragons mood, it is also a post to express my thoughts on a subject that has been (once again) been causing controversy among the Dungeons and Dragons players.

Well…controversy. I was a bit too new to roleplay to remember the transition between 3.0 and 3.5, but as far as I remember, a lot of DnD player were shouting fire and brimstone as they saw all their hard-earned books become useless by a rules update. And now there are the DnD essentials.

Yesterday I purchased the first two DnD essentials books. I already knew that I wanted to get the rules compendium; WotC has just been releasing way too many errata on my existing books for me to keep up with them all. So a book which has all these little rules updates together under one cover and on top of that explains some of the mechanics a little clearer. I also purchased the other book, Heroes of the Fallen Lands out of a morbid kind of curiosity. This book includes five “subclasses” for the cleric, fighter, rogue and wizard. These classes are basically easier to create and play than the normal versions of these classes. Further, it also contains some of the information from the PhB but, just like the rules compendium, this information has been condensed and rewritten to be more comprehensible.

Anyway, the controversy that is once again going all over the internet is that this is DnD 4.5. They fear that these products will oversimplify the game, and ruin the game forEVAR. I have to disagree. In the dark years of the transition between DnD 3.0 and 3.5 Wizards promised to keep the rules of the game compatible, but they didn’t. This time, they once again made this promise. And they actually kept it. The essential classes can exchange abilities and paragon paths with their normal counterparts. Further, these classes can play perfectly along with the normal and more complicated classes. “So why would I want to play a dumbed down class?” Well, you probably don’t want to. But maybe your friend who isn’t really familiar with DnD might. These classes are easier to understand and easier to play. They don’t pose any challenge to experienced players (personally, playing the Knight, one of the fighter paths, would bore me to tears) , but that is not why they are there. And this is not, as a certain Knight would put it “DnD for n00bs”. I mean, it is for new players, but these players are not necessarily idiots, something that the word n00b does imply. What the essential classes DO present is an opportunity for the new players to join the table with the big boys. The Knight is easier to play, but because he is compatible with the other classes, it gives people the opportunity to join the big boys (or girls) table. Basically, what it does, is decrease the learning curve.

But what the essential line does indicate, and this is my main gripe with the whole essential line, is that the medium is getting too old and cannot keep up with the technology. Wizards’ advanced into the 21^st century with the introduction of a serious online component to the experience. The problem is that they got stuck halfway. They are trying to stick to their books, despite them releasing an update every month. Heck, the July update updated almost EVERY single number in the Monster Manual 1 and 2. Because of these regular updates, it has become harder and harder for everyone to remember what has been changed. What I don’t get is that they don’t switch to a completely digital medium. Most people that are into roleplay at least have some kind of internet access. Especially with new gadgets like the Kindle, allowing people to bring their game to table without it being out of date.

After Action Report: Planescape Downfall, Session 1

Yes, I am a total copycat and a hack. But after action reports really are a good idea, it allows me to reminisce on my sessions and learn from them, and it allows other people to read about the awesome stuff that my players experienced.

Last night was the first session of what is hopefully going to become an ongoing campaign, so I did not have to worry that character introductions would take too long. Nonetheless, I decided to start media res. This gives me the advantage of exploring character back stories later on, but it also allows the players to adjust their characters where needed.

As I told before, we got a varied party which includes a human serious deathknight of the Raven Queen (Raymond), a wise githzerai artificer (Arno), a scared human girl with chaotic sorcerous powers (Myrthe), an oblivious and new-born shardmind psion (Alwin), a traitorous tiefling rogue with a mysterious past (Xavier) and a gnome who has mastered illusion magic (Jelte, a new addition to the Knights).

This colourful bunch experienced a flash of light and suddenly found themselves in a dark room, only lit by candlelight coming from a hallway. As they were trying to come to terms with their situation, an old bearded man greeted them. The players weren't really comfortable with a blind old man calling them clueless and trying to feel their faces (who would be comfortable with that anyway?). Especially Myrthe's character was confused with the situation, wondering if she went underground or something due to the dark nature of the building she is in. The old man did give them some clues that they were in a huge building in this place called "Sigil".

As they made their way through the building, they discovered that they arrived in Sigil's Mortuary, where several guys in brown cloaks were treating corpses and trying to send them off to their home worlds as a burial rite. Especially Alwin's character was puzzled by this entirely strange and new situation, and even tried to telepathically link to a corpse.

Finally, the party arrived at the bottom floor of the huge building that they arrived in. A huge and sprawling metropolis awaited them. As they first tasted and smelled the Sigil air, they noticed that the square in front of them was crowded, overcrowded at least. Apparently they weren't the only new arrivals. At the bottom of the Mortuary a little argument was taking place between this small, mousy, gnome and this huge bear of a man in full plate. "Alright, you little twerp, you are going to guide us around, even if you don't want to!" the hulking bastard shouted in the gnome's face. "Ah there they are! See! I told you my clients would arrive at any time!" the gnome retorted, pointing at the party. "We'll see who you will work for if they are DEAD!" was the response. Poor Raymond tried to be reasonable with this rather unreasonable fellow.

A new rival party appeared!

This was a fairly easy combat, especially because I designed it for five players originally, but I decided to not add a 6th combatant on the enemy side so that I could assess how much trouble Jelte would have with mastering a new system.

Apperantly he had no trouble at all, because the combat went quite smoothly except for some GM screw-ups (But as Xavier pointed out: Cut the new GM some slack). The party ended up in a skirmish against their foes as the crowd watched on (the crowd counted as difficult terrain for gameplay purposes). The first opponent to bite the dust was the female wizard. As she died, in the back, behind the crowd, a huge magical glyph appeared in the sky, over the crowd.

The party battled on, pwning their opponents one by one (Alwin actually mind controlled the brutal enemy fighter and had him kill his own partymember, nasty). And then the Dabus decided to intervene. A level 14 artillery creature using his stunning-save-ends-close burst 5 recharge power isn't fun. Despite the huge level difference, the Dabus nearly missed Myrthe's character. At that point, only the enemy paladin and dwarf were left standing. At this point, I just decided to let the dice do the talking, the party had every in-character reason at this point to finish up the party and then go for the dabus, thanks to their lack of knowledge of the setting. Fortunately for them, and unfortunately for the enemy dwarf, the dwarf made his save vs. the stun and decided to charge the Dabus before the party had the chance to do the same. His head went splut as the dabus enveloped it with magical runes. (He only had 5 HP left anyway.)

BOTH paladins (Raymond and the NPC) took at least 5 turns to roll higher than 10 on their save. But after that humiliation, they followed the Dabus into town. The Dabus were trying to round up all the adventurers causing trouble and they were trying to lead them to the many inns in Sigil to offer them shelter. Thanks to the unfortunate location where the party spawned, they were the last adventurers to be picked up.

Just before we had to end the session, we ended up at the Dead Dragon Den. One of the seediest inns in the whole Hive. The inn partially consists of the dead bones of a HUGE wyvern, covered in canvas, with a rowdy common hall underneath it. The innkeeper (a surly bauriaur) was rather relucntant to let the party stay in his already crowded inn, but a quick rebuttal with a dabus convinced him otherwise. Unfortunately, at this point, I had to cut the session short and I had to railroad the players a little to stay together. I promised to go back to this point in time next session so we can explore some more roleplay. But before we ended, I introduced them to their home away from home, for now: The honeymoon suite, located in the wyvern's skull.

All in all, it was a really good session, it felt a lot better than my GURPS one-shot. Less chaotic, more structured and the players seemed to have more fun. Laughs were had, and I got to expose a little of the mood that I am trying to go for. I just hope we can get some more story in next session and that I keep improving my GM skills.

Locations: Sigil

Alright, time to get pumped for my first planescape session!

And what better way to do it than to describe some of the AWESOME things I have in store for my players? I think I will regulary try to post a few bits and pieces on the locations and people I plan to have in my campaign. I kind of hope that this will give me a better feel for the locations that my players will be visiting.

So, first up:

Sigil

Sigil is one of the older cities in the dungeons and dragons setting, first popping up in second edition. Several chapters and books alone were devoted to it's affairs and people. Then came third edition, reducing the once glorious campaign city to a measily paragraph in the manual of the planes. But now, in fourth edition, WotC decided to once again focus on the City of Doors. It even got a whole chapter in the DMG2! (I guess they just needed filler.)

But here is my own view on the city, and why it is perfect to start my campaign in:

First, let's start with a musical theme.

Why did I choose this theme? I really don't know, it just sets the right mystical mood for the city. You can almost hear the cavernous nature of a city which is basically a big donut in the sky.

But what is the city like?

The smell of a light drizzle enters your nostrils as your feet touch the muddy street. When you look around, you can see that you are no longer in the kind of city that you knew. The brown, dirty streets are filled with strange creatures; halflings, orcs, elves, humans and things you don't even know about. You can even see the celestial light of an angel reflecting from a dirty window across you. The buildings here are strange, there is no coherent style; Some of them would fit your hometown nicely, while their neighbours seem gothic, elven or even more outlandish. And then you look up; the city doesn't seem to end, instead of the blue sky, you see a mild fog, rain and the roofs of this very same city. The city loops in on itself, filling the entire horizonless sky.

As you first set foot in the City of Doors, you will feel clueless. Which is fitting, because that is the nickname that the inhabitants of Sigil have for newcomers; Clueless. You are unsoiled, but also unknowing of the nature of the planes and of the city itself.

Personally, I see the city as the perfect starting point of a planescape campaign because of its very nature. You can see that the game designers had a city in mind from where the players could get to the planes without having to fear nasty things all the time. The Lady of Pain herself is especially a nice plot device, because she keeps out the gods, adds flavor and makes the players feel a bit more humble, even if they hit their mid 10's. Further, the city itself is WEIRD. Its shape, its mood, its people; they all have a feel to them that you won't find in your average DnD setting. I also believe that they seem a bit more detailed, this might be due to the large amount of fluff that was written on the city, but I also believe it is because planescape as a setting, requires you to think more about things. You cannot just have a town with a lousy king/duke/whatever person in charge. They would get pwned by basically whatever is out there. Which makes for a fine plotline, but you don't want this happening to the main city of the setting. At least not straight away...

But what purpose will Sigil have in my campaign? I plan to use it less as a safe-haven, and more as a point of attachment. The players will be traveling a lot, and as such, won't have many people that would normally stick around. But thanks to the many portals that lead to and from Sigil, it becomes easier to bring back old faces, and give them something to grow attached to. Or at least I hope they will grow attached to it.

Planescape: Downfall, character creation

You know, I am a lazy bastard. I just can't be arsed to put effort into things. And that needs to change.

That's why I am going to try to maintain a blog and hopefully not forget about it within two weeks. (I probably will).

Anyway, following the example of the Great Dover, I've decided to post some stuff concerning my sessions, to at least keep track of whatever the hell I was thinking at the time. So that brings me to my first point of attention:

I've started my first real campaign at the Knights. It is going to be a nice little 4th edition DnD game. Why DnD? Because A) I barely know any other systems B) Because it works perfectly for a high and mighty adventure game and C) Because the game is going to be located in the Planescape setting.

I've always had a soft spot for Planescape. It is an unique setting that allows the DM and the players to explore more things than just the typical "Let's go into a cave/dungeon/castle/lair/shopping mall and kill stuff" kind of game. I hope that the game gets into philosophical areas at some points (I think the main turning point will at least leave players thinking), but if we don't: At least I hope it will be awesome!

Last friday, we've started with our character creation session. Unfortunately one of my players couldn't make it, but it was still nice to have everyone seated at the same table. I nearly felt like a DM. I also noticed that creating characters together makes for an immediate bond between players, everyone sort of knows what everyone else can do, and I believe it also creates a bit of a sense of attachment to the other guy's character sheet, if that makes any sense.

So, what did we come up with as my party:
The tank: human paladin champion of the Raven Queen

The leader: githzerai artificer

The controller: shardmind psion

The ranged striker: chaos sorceress

The melee striker: tiefling rogue

As you can see, a rather nice bunch of ragtag misfits that is going to be visiting the City of Doors. Now I just hope I can give them a sense of wonder and excitement in my first real 4th edition DnD game in the first real session!