Thursday July 16th 2009

	DND Update 5:33 am-Turk Comments (8) D20, Games Permalink (No Ratings Yet) So we have had about two real games of dnd so far. The 4th and the vacation killed a few Saturday games. This second game though has the beginnings of what I wanted in the first place. A good long campaign to keep me entertained. Man, I had fun. The group is playing The Scales of War an adventure path from the Dungeon magazine. We just started the first part of this and it’s called  Rescue at Rivenroar. It starts out with the player characters relaxing and drinking at a tavern. Not too long after, monsters of course bust in and try to start some shit. A recap on the players. My Niece (age 9) playing a Cleric My Nephew (age 8) playing a Fighter The DM’s Kid (age 8) playing a Wizard The Newb (age 35) playing a Paladin Me (age 37) playing a Fighter So once the first combat started till the end of the session a few things of note happened. Shows the different egos or attitudes at play. First was the argument between me and the Pally about where the Wizard should plant his fire spell. The thing does 1 burst damage which means where it’s fired off it flows out in every direction around the place it was ignited. Basically I wanted the Wizard to fire it off in a spot that would hit three monsters. The Pally wanted one square back so it only hit the two monsters. The way I wanted it to go would make it hit me and the Pally as well as the three monsters. The Pally wanted it to just target the two monsters in the back and spare the good guys any friendly fire. Now I felt it was an acceptable risk to hit where I wanted. I would rather see three monsters hurt than two. Both the Pally and I have good hitpoints and armor class. We could have took it. There was a good chance the Wizard would miss us anyway. I backed down and let the Pally have it his way. The next point that I enjoyed was after the combat was over and we got to do some talking to npc’s. Generally speaking this is the shit I hate. I’m the type that clicks through the quest text in mmo’s like WoW. I want to kill shit. This time it was different. We had a monster to interrogate. A monster who was held in a stockade. It couldn’t get to us. Man, I couldn’t wait for two reasons: First, I was going to see how far I could push the DM with my kind of bullshit. Second, I just couldn’t pass up the chance to fuck with a monster Jack Bauer style. There were a few roadblocks to get through before I could mess with the monster. There were guards around that would not allow the monster to come to any harm that would cause it to not be able to stand trial for its bad deeds. So first I had to get rid of the pesky guards. I had the Wizard use Ghost Sound. Ghost Sound Wizard Cantrips 1 With a wink, you create an illusory sound that emanates from somewhere close by. At-Will, Arcane, Illusion Standard Action Ranged 10 Target: One object or unoccupied square Effect: You cause a sound as quiet as a whisper or as loud as a yelling or fighting creature to emanate from the target. You can produce nonvocal sounds such as the ringing of a sword blow, jingling armor, or scraping stone. If you whisper, you can whisper quietly enough that only creatures adjacent to the target can hear your words. So with this I had him create the sounds of battle in the distance. Four of the six guards took off to check it out. The last two I managed to convince that I would not kill the monster. So there was no worry if it would miss hanging at the gallows after it was found guilty at a trial. So I introduced myself to the monster and played the nice guy. I asked it about its base of operations and its leader. We even had the Pally speak goblin to it in hopes it would play ball and give us good info. After it was done I went up to it and leaned close to its face and told it if it was lying I would come back and kill it. To prove my threat I pulled one of my longswords out and pressed it up against the right side of its head and cut its ear off. The kids were of course very amused that I was behaving this way. I just wanted to get a feel for how far one could go with this DM. Next time in addition to another ear (for my new necklace I’m making) I’m going see if the DM will let me cut off a monsters testicles. I want to build a name for myself in the game world. Plus it’s damn fun to abuse the poor monsters in this manner. But somehow I doubt I’m the first player to do so. I can’t wait for next weeks game. Hopefully more monsters will learn to fear the name Turk Shakespeare.
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Monday March 23rd 2009

	DnD 4E Update 6:08 am-Turk Comments (1) D20, Games Permalink (No Ratings Yet) So my first step into the world of Dungeons and Dragons 4th Edition was pretty successful. Spending the money on the books and all the accessories was well worth it. The group I ended with was a perfect example of how easy it is to start playing Dungeon and Dragons. The players were: My Niece (age 9) played a Cleric My Nephew (age 8) played a Fighter The Newb (age 35) played a Paladin The old Bellman (age unknown) played a Wizard The Bellman’s kid (age 14) played a Rogue Other than me and the Newb none of the players have ever played any pen and paper RPGs. The kids have dabbled in some of the MMOs I’ve played so some of the concepts were not to alien to them. I was the Dungeon Master and I sucked. Running combat was fine. But anything were I had to try to convey a story of any sort using NPCs just was horrible. I felt like a dork trying to speak as if I’m the NPCs. I ended up awkwardly reading the text out of the adventure book. We made it through two encounters and the one awkward bit with npc interaction. Total time spent playing was around five hours or so. A little after the first encounter was finished the Teacher came over. The Teacher lives next door to the Newb. He’s played DnD and has been a Dungeon Master before. I was hoping he would show up as we played. In the back of my head I was hoping I would be able to pawn off the DM duties to him. By the end of the session it was decided he would borrow the books and read up on the new stuff in 4E. With any luck I will have some people to play Dungeon and Dragons with. I want to play. I don’t want to be the DM. I do think I’ll continue to abuse the kids and run a kids game for them. I’ll try to practice getting over my feeling like a putz when speaking for NPCs. k QYUYsopNFKDAmuD
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Thursday March 19th 2009

	DnD 4E 5:24 am-Turk Comments (2) D20, Games Permalink (No Ratings Yet) So I’ve been listening to these DnD podcasts were the Penny Arcade guys play the new Dungeons and Dragons 4th Edition. The first episode is here and the rest you can find at the D&D podcast page. There is two series now of these guys playing the 4th Edition and it sounds like they are having a lot of fun. Slowly over the time I’ve listened to them all the desire to play 4E DnD has slowly been building up. I’ve ended up blowing a hundred bucks or so on the 3 core books the Player’s Handbook, the Dungeon Master’s Guide, and the Monster Manual last saturday. Since then I’ve also picked up a Dungeon Master’s Screen and a Level 1-3 adventure called Keep on the Shadowfell. I have dice from the last time I bought some DnD stuff when the 3rd Edition came out. Of course you can’t do anything with all of this without people to play with. So I of course started to talk it up to my 8 year old nephew. Who seemed to take a liking to how combat is played using the dice. His sister will play because she like doing stuff with us. I’m using the angle that she can be a Elf Princess or something to hook her in. Then it’s just having to convince the Newb to play. I had seemed to have him in up until the point I explained all the at will powers. The Newb played the old stuff back in high school and some of these new rules are hard for him to accept. I think it makes the game fun. I hope. Saturday I will unleash it all on them. After getting a few more suckers to volunteer. It all seems fitting for us all to play on saturday since it is the official Worldwide D&D Game Day saturday. It’s celebrating the release of the Player’s Handbook 2. This is going to be my first time running a game so I’m a little nervous. With any luck everyone will have a good time. Minor edit to add the new poll to the post: Do you play pen and paper role playing games? Yes No View Results  Loading ...
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