Happy Holidays

Its a four-fer on the Holiday front

Happy Easter to secular folks , the Gaming Gang and any Christian Readers, Happy Passover to any Jewish readers and have a happy Feast of Eostra for my Pagan readers.
May today be blessed for whatever faith you hold.

M.A.R. Barker has passed

I'll link to Grognardia for this one.

Professor Barker was one of the founding fathers of our hobby, maybe not as well known as Gygax and Arneson but quite important in his own way.

His creation, the fabulous alien science fantasy world Tekumel showed the power of world building and imagination in new lights and that Role Playing is not all "Western"

That world was never my cup of tea, but his novel Man of Gold was excellent and the joy of craft could clearly be seen in his work.

He will be missed.

The Last of the Hate Posts: Thieves

I love the concept but for the most part I dislike the implementation as the "skill" system is a poor fit with the rest of the rules.

I tend to agree with Mearles and Philotomy here though I'll still use them but under a bit of protest.

Another Hate Post : Clerics

I hate Clerics. not Clerical spells which are fine , but the entire adventuring combat priest concept.

The overt religion is another thing that wrecks worlds for me and just my opinion, D&D is better off without them as we have them today ,...

A Hate Post : Spell I Hate

Just a short personal list, YMMV of course

Most of the instant travel magic (overland flight, teleport etc) because they such away travel which is part of the danger and fun

Any of the various Raise and Resurrect spells because the revolving door is silly


Continual Light (and the others like it) except as an enchantment or as part of a high level spell because it ruins game worlds.

Another CoupleSimple Questions? Why are You here? and Less Pathfinder More OSR?

Just a curious question, why do y'all visit my blog? What kind of content brings you and more importantly what kind o bait brings new blood heh heh ;)

Anyway I noticed that I don't get much interest in my Pathfinder posts. Few replies and few downloads either . As an example, Loadouts an actual illustrated product got maybe 25 downloads whereas poorly formatted house rules (OS/2 Warped) got near two hundred!

Still my low magic rules did pretty well (like a hundred or so) so I am wondering if thats a niche that needs filling.

So I guess I am a bit confused by this and am wondering of I might be better off forgoing most Pathfinder content, save maybe any professional-work I might do?

What do y'all think?

A Simple Question. Would more art or a prettier blog layout be welcome?

Just wondering if any of my readers would find more art posts to increase their enjoyment of my blog.

Also while I deliberately picked "functional minimalism" as a style, do any of y'all think a prettier set up would increase viewership here?

Pet Peeve: The Term Dead Tree

That one is simple. I hate this term. Its called paper or a book or magazine. In fact while we typically make ours out of renewable fast growing wood it can also be made of renewable cotton,unlike say a computer which is made of non renewable materials and which uses electricity on an enormous scale if you include Google and the other data centers that keep the Internet running.

Now don't get me wrong I am quite happy to take advantage of the benefits of PDF publishing but its not morally superior to print as the term dead tree suggests. Its its own thing with its ups and downs.

Realization: I am not the market for a lot of RPG's

As it happens I am a pretty traditional gamer. I like games with lots of imagination, a conventional GM/Player set up and pretty ordinary rules.

A lot of games these days are different, some of the Indie RPG's go in a more collaborative story telling direction, others like 4e more board gamey and others are just plain too strange for me.

Thats perfectly OK though. Between the various games I do like (GURPS, Pathfinder. OSR, Risus and others) there is more material than I can afford anyway.

As long as I can get players I am good to go.

A 4e Post Campaign Idea Dark Action Fantasy

A while back I was ranting that 4e was not D&D as I know it. I still haven't changed my mind about that.There is however one game I'd like to run using the rules. Dark Action Fantasy.

Here is my set up

Gothick Horror world, No Gunpowder (no good rules yet) Monster pallet includes undead, scary faeries and a few staples. No Cthulhu.

Races: Humans only with Dhampyr, The Possessed (from Alea Dragons's Horde #1) and Revenant allowed . The Revenant class has a unique entry. Upon being raised from the dead, the character is automtically retrained to this race and MUST become a Revenant. They come back different ....

Martial Classes , Feats and Powers Only

Rituals allowed including those from Goodman Games' Azagar's Book of Rituals. Prices will be tweaked as needed and ritual components allowed.

Low Magic Items Rules will be used

Options. At unanimous player request Half Elf "Changeling" and Half Orc "Caliban" will be allowed.

There you have it. Tactical Horror 4e. Castlevania here I come.

The "I Write Like" Toy

I write like
Cory Doctorow

I Write Like by Mémoires, Mac journal software. Analyze your writing!

Kind of cool actually though I'd have thought my style was bit more old fashioned.

Character Generation in my Campaign

This really isn't germane to any products I will be doing or to anything old school. However I thought folks here might find "how someone else does char-gen" to be of some interest. Think of this as sharing a bit of the DM's notebook if you like ;)

Welcome to the Midrea Campaign!

All characters are assumed to be reasonably loyal to one another and "adventurous" by nature. If this doesn't fit. Don't play.

Char Gen is as follows

All races on my race lists are available although you should check with me for any modifications.

Humans will receive a background as per Thieves World. See me for further details

Races that are LA+0 will receive 32 points as per the DMG, LA +1 races will receive 28 points.

Starting level is 2 and multi classing to a maximum of 3 classes and 2 prestige classes is allowed. Preferred class is not used and no Pathfinder bonuses hp or skill bonuses will be granted.

Any class may be selected from the class list however all spell casting classes except those requiring spell preparation must be taken at 1st level.

Action points will be used with the the added ability that they may be spent after an enemies to hit roll stop negate a hit.

Fractional BAB and Saves will be in use

Hit points will Max at L1 and Greyhawk Average after.

In lower magic item or lower magic setting settings an untyped bonus of 1/2 level will be added to AC. 1/2 of this bonus (1/4 level) will be added to AC vs touch attacks.

Starting skills are at +2 for all classes with skills used as per pathfinder

Starting money is 1000GP in standard magic campaigns. Items than can be made by the character can be purchased at half cost. Starting money is L1 funds in lower magic campaigns with 1's rerolled.

If you have any other questions feel free to ask by E-Mail or Post


Well folks, there you have it. The simplified guidelines for character generation for my campaign. Hope it was a least not boring....

A lazy Post: My 4e D&D class

Its not even old school but hey ...

D&D Home Page - What Class Are You? - Build A Character - D&D Compendium

As it happens I often play sorcerers in 3x and Pathfinder. Its a fun class and while some may find repeating the same effects boring, I find that less bookkeeping and resource counting (buying spells) makes up for it.

I'll also note that old school games do not have this issue as much. You'll probably have as many spells with a magic user as with 3x Wizard but you don't have the GP management issues 3x has.

You might be a gamer if...

With apologies to Jeff Foxworthy..

I found this jewel while randomly roaming the web .. Kind of outdated but still funny.

A few samples

# You don’t think of a Russian bazooka when someone says “RPG”.You can figure the odds (in your head) of getting a certain result when rolling variable sized dice pools.
# You know that all dice are not square shaped.
# You own a 30 or a 100 sided die.
# losing your dice bag would be a serious financial blow.
You knew what I meant when I said TS:SI.
you’ve ever tried to explain gaming to a school counselor, parent, or other PW/OC (Person With/Out Clue).
# you’ve suceeded.
you’ve mistaken a d12 or a double d10 for a d20 while playing AD&D and had a THAC0 low enough to hit the 8HD monster, anyway…
you carry AD&D insurance.
your AC is so low that even you can’t hit yourself.

The Accent Toolbox

Funny enough the only accents I lack are good upper class ones. This rarely matters much in game,as the P.C's don't usually move in those circles. Still having a wide range of accents can improve RP fun, if you know when to use them and the other players don't mind or have real world issues with them.
I'd be curious as to what accents you can do well enough to get away with in game?

My list includes

Canadian (Toronto-ish)
Highland Scots via Groundskeeper Willie (like most gamers)
Generic Eastender/Chav
Bad Eighties Russian
"Bushie" Aussie complete with outdated strine.
Generic Native American (something like Graham Greene)
Northern Irish (I sound like Gerry Adams from Sein Fein )
Mexico City (learned in Spanish Class)
a kind of German via the Pulps
"Gangster" Italian
80's style Street Hood
L.A. Gangsta (this is more slang than accent)
Evil Southern Sheriff
Arkansas Regional via Slingblade
Boomhauer (from King of the Hill if you call that an accent. I use it for a Ghoul Clan)
and Generic Cowboy

Memorial Day

Today is Memorial Day in the States.

While this blog is a-political I still have to say, bless those who gave their lives to defend my liberty.

Happy Earth Day!

Like the subject says

Happy Earth Day everyone!