Mr Thompson is a designer and a developer for Wizards of the Coast and he wants to improve the quality of WotC’s Adventures. And how is he going about this? He is asking the customers and fans for constructive advice and for examples of where they have got things right and got things wrong.

If you want to just post some thoughts, that’s fine by me, and I’ll be eager to read them. However, if you REALLY want to be a superstar, when you talk about something that can be improved, give me an example of a WotC adventure that does that thing badly (or not at all), and an example of an adventure that does that well.

The only other things I ask are this:

1) Be polite and respectful. I am not going to take you seriously if you rant and rave.

2) Avoid hyperbole. If I see the words “epic fail” or “worst adventure ever” there’s a good chance I won’t take your comments seriously.

3) Don’t use this as a soapbox from which to launch complaints about 4th Edition. We’re here to talk about adventures, people, not game systems.

I hope Rodney’s initiative pays off, and even if it has no impact, I appreciate his and WotC willingness to engage with the customers.

Thanks to RPG Treehouse for spotting this: WotC come out of the bunker.

Rodney’s initial message: HELP ME MAKE OUR ADVENTURES BETTER!

The idea that every RPG session on every table is different.

No two groups play exactly the same set of rules either deliberately (house rules), by misunderstanding the rules or simply forgetting some rules. Even stable groups will have subtle variations between sessions.

This variance increases the more complex the game and also based on factors like age. As a 13 year old newbie, I only had a very weak grasp of the rules but it didn’t stop me having fun.
But if we all do are own thing anyway and have fun doing it, what does this tell us about the nature of rules?

Rules: The Lingua Franca of the Gaming Table

A key aspect of rules is that they are written down. When a question or dispute arises in a game, having the rules in writing gives everyone a common reference point from which to start the discussions. This greatly eases the resolution of disputes and questions but it is only the starting point. Though, depending on personality, people put a lot of importance on the rules just because they are written down.

What really happens when a rules question arises is a complex group negotiation where factors such as social standing, communication skills and personality come into play.

Defining a Shared Reality

The beauty of RPGs is not just that they stimulate our own imagination but that they create a shared vision of the in-game world.

Every question and dispute helps the group negotiate between themselves what this shared vision is. Arguments over rules are often about the physics of the world but when question relate to something like D&D’s alignments system, it is deciding the nature of good an evil.

It is in this process that the very best aspects of playing RPGs are to be found. The process helps us discover how our fellow gamers think, leading to new friends and, sometimes, enemies. It gives us a sandpit to question the universe and a training ground for dealing with real-world disputes.

Do We Need Rules?

Imagine the perfect RPG session where everyone knew all the rules off by heart and there were no questions or issues about how they worked. Would this really be a great game? How much of the social interaction around your table is driven by rules related discussions?

The failure of ruleless of RPGs to dominate the world of RPGs suggests that most of us need rules in our games. Commercial factors do play a part here as there is little financial incentive to develop and promote ruleless games. There is also a nerdish need in many of us for details and minutia to learn and memorise. This is in part why there are vast numbers of 3.5 & 4e splat books.

Rethinking Rules

We need rules but there is a tendency in game developers to seek the perfect rules that are understood the same way by everyone but this is impossible and possibly undesirable.

Maybe what we need is to step back and think less about the rules defining the game. Instead we should recognise the important part discussing the rules plays in our enjoyment of RPGs.

Rules are the grit that irritate the oyster into making a pearl. If a game designer was to embrace this idea, what would our rules be like?

Available for pre-order now, our Larger Than Man-Sized pack contains Dark Trolls one and two plus our biggest ever figure, Giant with Great Sword. The giant weighs in at 169 grams (about 6.5 ounces). For comparison, the human in the photo below weighs 9 grams.

The trolls and giant enjoy a stroll with a scale 6′ human.

Not surprisingly, this makes the giant a pretty expensive figure. List price for the figure alone is £25 (roughly $40), which is pricey for a miniature. The two trolls are also pretty expensive (£10 and £12 respectively) but appear cheap next to the giant. To bring down the price a bit, we have bundled them all together into the Larger Than Man-Sized pack. This, through the miracle of bulk buying, allows us to sell the pack at £35, or £12 (~$20) off the list price.

If a £12 saving is not enough, we are also doing a pre-order discount of an additional £5 on all orders received before the 7th April.

For more details on the figures and 6d6’s We Won’t Take Your Money Promise, visit: Larger Than Man-Sized.

The review and feedback is from Andrew and came via a comment on the Gold Strike! page. The detail and nature of the Andrew’s comments are everything I could ask for and shows the power of getting draft / beta versions out as soon as possible.

Overall, this was a very solid adventure. Party composition: ranger 3/fighter 2, monk 5, cleric 5, wizard 5.

The mine carts were a blast. The party failed their last check and I had great fun describing the crash and the resulting destruction.

I feel like there is insufficient reason for the miners in the lower camp to not have escaped. I inferred from the difficulty finding the lower camp that the miners may have tried to find their way back, but got lost. I played up the confusing, repetitive, and dangerous route to the base camp so that the miners’ confinement felt more real. The random encounters for this section are very good. The dwarf ghosts encounter spooked them pretty well.

The npcs were pretty well fleshed out for unimportant people. It was easy to role play them. Love the “itchy balls” comment. “Everyone I know has beards. Crazy old coot.” got a laugh from the players.

The lemure fight was fun, it was nice to give the impression of a devil horde streaming to the attack. I feel the caves the lemures in could have been a bit more fleshed out, perhaps with some relics of the ancient civilization such as pot shards and arrow heads.

In the junction between areas 8 and 9, I added a pool of water that the PCs had to submerge to get through. I don’t feel like there’s enough drainage here to leech all that water away swiftly. Significant pooling made it more realistic for me and scared the players when they thought they’d have to continue underwater. The wet, treacherous slope in area 9 was a real PITA for the pcs to climb up, and it was a great roleplaying opportunity as they bickered and whined about the climb.

The Cave of bones was pretty epic. When Bonski attacked, my bloodthirsty PCs chased him around and around the room, setting off traps and getting shot. After awhile they smartened up and headed for a corner to get their backs against a wall. From there, the monk struck out solo to find Bonski, deflecting his arrows and eventually cornering him before beating him to death. This fight depleted most of the cleric’s healing spells, which made the temple fight a lot harder. Badanistrax killed the party’s wizard before he went down.

The survivors exited via the goat path. I’m not sure about the path, it seems an awfully convenient way to say “see ya, dungeon” but the players were very relieved to not have to get back through areas 8 and 9. The ranger was a little upset that he didn’t find the goat path earlier when searching the plateau. The orcs were no challenge at all for the players, and the fight was awfully one-sided. Highlights include the monk throwing orc mooks down the mine shaft.

Overall, a very solid adventure. Usually when I run somebody else’s work, I edit the crap out of it. I ran this as-is besides the changes I mentioned, and it flowed really well. I like the layout of the material, it’s logically presented and easy to read. The sidebars were helpful, and I really like seeing the DCs for various actions called out without having to search through the text.

Lastly, here’s the remainder of the typos I found:

page 26 “you realises they are bones”, should be “realize”

page 26 “because of the evil all around this gave, is unknown but he has appointed himself”. The comma should come after unknown

page 27 “(In Undercommon, the Derro will say: You are not one of the chosen. You will not pass.) Not technically a typo but shouldn’t be in the read-aloud text

page 27 “some great magic must of been at work here”. Should be “must have”

page 27 “It almost seems like the a building” Strike “the”

page 27 “more like a gapping mouth” I think it should be “gaping”

page 28 “Badanistrax was so feint” “Faint”



Thanks for allowing us to playtest this! A great time was had by all.

Thank you Andrew for taking the time to play the adventure and give such useful feedback.

There were two games, an individual game and a team game. I took part in the team game, and the rules as I remember them were:

The Arena

• Each match consisted of three combats and at the end of each combat dead characters were resurrected.
• All characters were 1st level and from the PHB only.
• At the start of each combat, characters had full hit points, all their dailies and encounter powers plus one action point.
• Each combat lasted 12 minutes maximum. The GM controlling the tournament had to keep the game moving quickly.
• Initiative was determined at the start of the match and was kept the same over the three combats.
• The arena begins empty and on your initiative you randomly spawn in one of the four locations and take your turn.
• All the combat follows normal 4e rules and generally involves characters using their daily powers as quickly as possible.
• Points were scored based on how many on each side where killed per combat.

Deathmatch in Action

Regular readers may be surprised to find that I really enjoyed 4e for this combat. I think it works a lot better in this situation that 3rd Ed or any other edition would. Having a time limit and a GM to keep everyone moving was a real advantage as well.

Prizes by 6d6 and Chimera

The team prize for the Deathmatch was supplied by 6d6 and painted by Mike at Chimera in Beeston.

The trophies, based on our Forest Walker figures

Mike deserves a big thank-you for his hard work on these prizes. All I had to do was give him the figures and let him work his magic. Additional photos on our Facebook albums.

More Savage Island

During the afternoon, I took the opportunity to run my Savage Island adventure. As this was whilst the individual Deathmatch was going on, the line up for my game changed several times early on but then settled down. This group managed to get to the island’s high plateau and make peaceful contact with the inhabitants. Something neither of the two previous groups has managed.

Yours truly as the party approach the mysterious tower

Thank you to everyone who took part in my game and thank you to the East Midlands RPG group for hosting it. If you are in the Nottingham, Derby or Leicester area and looking for a game of D&D and other RPGs, check them out. They are a friendly bunch and there are always GMs looking for players.

Bad Title

The title of my article was unfair because I not basing my opinions on the book but on the book’s blub. The copywriting designed to make the book appealing to would-be buyers. Without the book itself, I and all of the commentators cannot make informed comments on the content. Despite some further digging I’ve not found any previews, table of contents or other information of what is going into the book.

So a fairer title to my article would of been:

D&D Player’s Strategy Guide:
How Much Does This Blurb Suck?

Because it is the blurb, and what it implies about the book content, that I find deeply annoying. But more of that later. First, an issue various commentators brought up.

Humourous, Entertaining, Tongue-in-Cheek

Based on the blurb “… includes entertaining sidebar essays written by celebrity gamers and a distinctive comic art style …” and the fact that the cover art is by Gabe of Penny Arcade fame, there was an assumption by some commentators that this book will be tongue-in-cheek or humourous in nature. Well, there is simply no evidence for this.

Apart from the mention of “entertaining” sidebar essays, there is no mention in the blurb that the book is meant to be anything else than a serious guide to D&D. Author James Wyatt is D&D Design Manager at Wizards and has no history of being involved in humorous or tongue-in-cheek writing before.

Oddly, none of the celebrity gamers writing the sidebars are identified. The point of using celebrities is that their names grab people’s attention which is why you often see “With introduction by …” on books. Yet no names are listed. This is just another indicator that the book is a serious supplement, meant to be no different from any of the other 4e books.

An Odd Choice of Artwork

I admit that I did not recognise the Penny Arcade style of artwork when I saw the cover. What I saw is what I suspect a lot of average gamers will see, artwork that does not compare well with the other 4e supplement books. Sitting next to the PHBs and DMGs, the cover for the D&D Player’s Strategy Guide does not look good.

The problem is that though they have gone for a different style of art, everything else about the book is standard. The position and font of the tile, the D&D logo, even the size and format of the book is the same as all the other books.

This is a mistake. Wizards clearly wanted to give this book a distinctive look but they were not radical enough. After spending the last 2 years building a well defined 4e look and feel, changing the art style does is just not enough. It is like adding drag-racing wheels to a family car. They look out of place and they don’t make the car go any faster.

The final word on this subject goes to the artist themselves.

I was really surprised that they asked me to do this. All the D&D book covers have such a strong and classic aesthetic. I was nervous about doing the cover because my style doesn’t really match up with the rest of the books, but they assured me they wanted this particular book to have a different/distinctive look. 

Source: Dungeons and Dragons on Penny Arcade.

The Blurb Sucks

You may be thinking that I’m over-reacting to a hundred words used to sell one book and you would be right. However, the blurb is symptomatic of Wizards approach to selling in recent years.

For comparison, here is the full text to D&D Player’s Strategy Guide side-by-side to the nearest equivalent book from an earlier edition: Hero Builder’s Guidebook published in 2000 for 3rd Ed.

Whilst both clearly are being sold to power gamers (see below), the one on the right actually attempts to sell the book on making your character a better character. On other hand, the one on the left is about looking cool and being “awesome”.

I don’t know about other GMs but if I’m going to have a power gamer at the table, I want the player to be doing it because they believe it makes a better character, not because it makes them cool.

Power Gamers! What Are They Good For?

The D&D Player’s Strategy Guide is clearly aimed at want-to-be power gamers and this is what really annoys me. The hobby is called role-playing, not power-playing. Mechanics are part of the hobby and getting the best of out of the rules is part of the game but it is not the game itself.

The people who buy this book, based on this blurb, will be the sort of people who believe that buying the same type of golf clubs that Tiger Woods uses will make them better golfers. In both D&D and golf, it is not the type of club that matters, it is what you do with it.

One final thought …

If nothing else has convinced you, ask yourself this question.

How many times have wished there were more power gamers in your gaming group?

Sources:
1d12 questions with James Wyatt

James Wyatt on D&D Wikia

Dungeons & Dragons Player’s Strategy Guide: A 4th Edition D&D Supplement (Hardcover)

Hero Builder’s Guidebook (Dungeons & Dragons d20 3.0 Fantasy Roleplaying) (Paperback)
Is D&D 4E really like WoW …? from RPG.Net

Player’s Strategy Guide: Your opinion

A 4e book I want, but at the same time, want to never have existed from the LJ Roleplayers community

Warning! Old Guy Ranting Ahead

Coming out in May 2010 is the D&D Player’s Strategy Guide and judging by the pre-release blurb, it is going to suck big time. Just read the blurb, just look at the cover art.

The D&D Player’s Strategy Guide is aimed at D&D players who crave the envy of their gamer peers. If you want a character that is jaw-droppingly cool, this book is for you. It provides tips and tricks for optimizing your D&D characters — to make them more awesome and fun to play at the game table.

Notice those words – “envy” “cool” “optimizing” “awesome” – does that make you think this will be a book that enhances your game? Or do you think it is the sort of thing 13 year olds will buy to make them better power gamers?

Hey Wizards! How about a player’s guide that stimulates player’s imagination? After after, D&D is a game of imagination not a board game where the person with the most powers wins.

Or how about a book that focuses on improving characterisation or how to enhance the experience of everyone in your table by using better descriptions and narrative to your play? How about ways of improving your problem solving skills or even better table manners and tactics for making your group work better together? What about a vocabulary guide so players can say something more intelligent than “cool” and “awesome”.

I appreciate that I may be judging this book by its cover and it would not be the first great book ruined by bad publicity blurb. If this is the case, I apologise to author James Wyatt and direct all my bile towards which ever editor at Wizards approved decided on the marketting strategy.

Just in case you think the book doesn’t look bad enough alreay. Here is the rest of the blurb:

In addition to character optimization tips and player advice, this book includes entertaining sidebar essays written by celebrity gamers and a distinctive comic art style unlike other books in the D&D game line.

The worst thing about the D&D Player’s Strategy Guide is that it is going to sell by the truckload.

Now excuse me, I’m off to cry over my mint copy of Chainmail.

Above is a close up of Troll-Drk-2 (Dark Troll with Flail and Dagger). Photographing larger-than-man-sezed figures is both easier and harder than standard 28mms. The size makes it simpler to show the detailing on the figure but it this also means the imperfections stand out more.

Large sized figures can also make a mockery of your carefully prepared set-up.

To photograph the giant above, I had to resort to turning off all my lamps and flash, relying instead on a one second exposure time. Why? Because the silver helmet reflected too much light and a lot of definition was lost. On a standard 28mm miniature, the amount of reflection from the helmet is minimal but when the head is bigger than many miniatures it becomes a real problem.

Over in the USA, Chgowiz has been review our miniatures and said some nice thing about them.

They have a very old school/Grenadier look to them, which depending on your preferences may or may not be a good thing, but overall, I like them!
… I think these figures are a great addition to my miniatures lineup and I highly recommend them.

Source: Review: 6d6 Fireball miniatures – Forest Walkers.

(c) Chgowiz

Thanks to Chgowiz for the very kind review and permission to use the photo. I love the paint job on the Forest Walkers.

Checkout out Facebook page for many, many more photos of our Dark Trolls and Giant.

East Midlands RPG Meet-Up

The excellent East Midlands RPG group monthly meet-up is this Saturday. 6d6 will be there running a couple of sessions of The Savage Island. As well as my game, there is a 4e Deathmatch competition happening and lots of socialising.

It starts at 2pm at the Brunswick Inn in Derby, very close to the train station, and runs until late at night.

Con-Quest

I’m really looking forward to Con-Quest, a one day gaming convention in Derby. It is years since I’ve been to a games con and the prospect of spending a day with a couple of hundred fellow gamers fills me with excitement.

We plan to have a table where we will be flogging our figures and running games. If you are anywhere near Derby, UK on the 10th April, come along. Its only £7 to get in and free for under-16s if accompanied by a paying adult.

“What are these men? These men, sire, are those whom will think absolutely nothing of killing every single one of your guards if you send them onto their group. They will further never rest at that point from hunting you down and killing you because you have betrayed them. They value this perception of gratitude and their own infallibility more than they value your life or the lives of all of your men. Worse, your guards will prove to be meaningless to these assassins. They wield powers that can shake the very foundations of the castle and bring down the walls with such ease as you might consider them an earthquake. Their warriors can slice up dozens of armed men and take hundreds of arrow bolts without dying. They survive fireballs and bolts of lightning from the Heaven and seem to grow stronger as they kill.”

Read the full text: You have no idea how amusing I find this courtesy of Tashiro.