This encounter happens with the party about 300 feet from Richmond's lair, which is a ruined castle. There is something of a clear path through the forest to the ruins, but there are thick woods to either side. I've included co-ordinates so you can follow along on a hex map with 28 columns of 19. (Originally, I'd had the encounter begin farther from the lair, by about 1000 ft, since that's where Richmond could've easily [...]

The last time I ran a SciFi RPG it was SpaceMaster for my group when we were down to two regulars. All I remember is lots of charts and lots of blaster fights, usually with the PCs solidly behind cover and ambushing their opponents. Probably the only way to survive a combat using the SpaceMaster rules ;)

Stars Without Number is a much lighter system than SpaceMaster by far. That all being said, running a fantasy based OSR game is something I could almost do in my sleep. Not so sure I can say the same for a scifi based OSR game. I suspect I need to change tracks in my head, as I don't want this to just be "D&D in space".

Fantasy Flight Games. Es gibt mal wieder einige neue Krtchen fr das Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay 3rd Edition. Diesmal ist Grey Order Magic fllig.
Fr 6,95 (+ Shipping) erhlt der Old Worlder Wannabe die neue Print on Demand Erweiterung mit 15 Action Cards, 2 Item Cards und 3 Rules Cards, die diese Illusionisten und Trickbetrger selbstredend aufwerten.

Macht FFG jetzt alle paar Monate ein weiteres Kartenpckchen, um das Luftschloss eines lebendigen Rollenspiels aufrechtzuerhalten. Irrealitt gehrt mit Sicherheit zu den Spezialgebieten von Tischabenteurern, aber dass diese Vermarktung funktioniert, verwundert dennoch ein wenig.

Achtung! Cthulhu – Three Kings (Modiphius Entertainment)

Modiphius Entertainment. Die ersten beiden ersten Abenteuer Achtung! Cthulhu – Three Kings und Achtung! Cthulhu – Heroes of the Sea von Sarah Newtons im 2. Weltkrieg angesiedelter Zero Point-Rollenspielkampagne mit Tentakeln gibt es jetzt auch fr das Rollenspiel Trail of Cthulhu (Pelgrane Press).

Smith Adair bernahm die Konvertierung.

“Wartime roleplaying...
...with tentacles!

 

Achtung! Cthulhu brings you a two-fisted wartime TRIAL OF CTHULHU roleplaying game setting packed full of fiendish Nazis, terrifying ancient mysteries, legendary war machines, and enough writhing tentacles to fill ten Reichstags!

 

Three Kings is the first in a series of standalone adventure supplements in the [...]

Wait! What? You’re not celebrating Towel Day! It’s that special day of the year that you can really let your geek flag fly. Because it’s [...]

This seemed a fitting post for today.

So, after discussing the idea with my Saturday Night group, the majority is leaning towards Stars Without Number. There was also interest in Razor Coast, but that would be a trick and a half to make it low level and episodic. I could do it I'm sure if I avoided the major plots, but then that avoids most of what makes the Razor Coast what it is.

I figure we'll run SWN, which is a great choice as it's a strong rules system and is free in PDF, which allows us to expand the field for the "drop ins" part of this campaign.

I'll be throwing Starships & Spacemen in behind the scenes, as seems to be made for episodic play (it's inspiration is the [...]

Somehow I forgot all about the old Dodecahedron’zine when I compiled my list of ongoing projects. And to be honest, I’d pretty much dropped the idea of going back to publishing my 12-page zine in favor of putting work into the blog and publishing the finished works in a commercial format.

But then I started working on these monster character classes (I’ll post the final versions of the centaur and goblin classes later this week)… and I realized that this is exactly the kind of material that the Dodecahedron was made for. But before I could start working on an issue with monster classes, I really needed to finish off Issue 5 – part two of Erdea Manor.

Since the material for Issue 5 was written in December, it was about damned time I put it together into the zine in addition to the blog and of course Dyson’s Delves (that’s right – if you want Erdea Manor in print, you have two choices now – you can print out the two issues of the zine, or you can pick up a copy of Dyson’s Delves which has it along with a few other adventures from the history of the blog and [...]

Over on icv2.com, they have put together a top ten list for Kickstarter projects of a tabletop gaming nature.  See more here!  In a related article, Matt Forbeck provides some analysis for the success of the top funders here!  Furthermore, check out the detailed comparison of "IndieGoGo.com versus Kickstarter.com" by James Mathe here!

Combined Spellcasting.     This article was made due to a request of a Mage Blade player. The question was : "How can a spell have multiple spell casters and what is the benefit?" Well actually the answer is quite simple! Each caster must design the spell, that requires multiple casters. It can be a spell where all casters have the same role, or it can be a spell that each caster takes a specific role (for example casting a different element).
    In the case that all the casters cast the same spell, the system goes like this : -Each spell caster must start casting at the same initiative and the spell is finished when all spell casters are finished. -The spell has + 1 spell level of the designed spell level. -The spell has spell power = total [...]

DM Notes:

• This episode is the full recording of our Tomb of Horrors Actual Play.
• To get an idea of what you are in for, check out our Tomb of Horrors Actual Play trailer.
• Rather than write extensive show notes, I will follow up with a companion episode next week.
• If you have specific questions about this episode and you want them answered on the companion show, please send an email to feedback@burnedfx.com with the subject “ToH AP”

Special Thanks:

Thanks to NPC Cast for creating a commercial for this episode. Check out their show at http://npccast.wordpress.com/

Credits:

This episode uses many sounds from freesound.org. Please see our credits page for the full list.

TV clips used under non-commercial fair use.

Contact: If you have any general questions or feedback, please send an email to feedback@burnedfx.com

Original article: S1 – About 30 Years

©2013 The Delvers' Podcast. All Rights Reserved.

The last scenario for the Come Hell and High Water series, "The Ends of the Earth," finished in a very open-ended way. Because of that, it's hard to provide a direct sequel to it. For that reason, I'll be presenting a few possible ways to continue the story, depending on the choices of the PC's. Detailed here is one option.

-Nate



RetributionThis scenario is Part 16A of theCome Hell and High Water campaign, an adventure series for the Skull & Bones historical setting, for [...]

"Maybe the best D&D music ever comes from Basil Poledouris's soundtrack for Conan the Barbarian. Every player of a fighter or barbarian wants to be Arnold. If you play this, they will be. Of course, if you play it, don't expect them to find diplomatic solutions to problems."

--Mike Selinker, "The Definitive D&D Soundtrack," Dragon 272, Sept. 2000.

Let's face it: the original 1982 Conan the Barbarian movie would probably have sucked without this awesome soundtrack. Yes, there's bloody combat as Conan carves his way across the world, but there's lots of introspection, wherein the music plays as [...]

Like many younglings of my generation, Star Wars spoke to me in ways other movies never did.

People often talk about being "blown away" the first time they saw the Imperial Star Destroyer rumble into shot during the opening sequence of Star Wars.

It didn't have that effect on me - for me it was totally normal; in my 10-year-old mind's eye that's what spaceships had always looked like. This was space stuff as it always should have been!

My dad took me to see Star Wars when it first came out and it was one of those rare films that really bridged the age gap.

From seeing Star Wars on the big screen, with my dad, in 1977 a fanboy was born.

I started a scrap book (cover pictured above) of Star Wars newspaper and magazine articles, along with the "Who's Who"s from [...]

"Way I hear it, they'll rape us to death, eat our flesh, and sew our skins into their clothing. And if we're very, very lucky, they'll do it in that order."
   Knight-Captain Zoe Washburne, Lanthian Kingsguard

Bandits, brigands, thieves and cutthroats - there are always men who look to make a living outside the law. While most operate individualy, robbing innocent travellers and those who stumble down the wrong back alley, groups of these miscreants can make for a surprisingly tough nut to crack.

While working on a "Kingsguard" list, and its variants, I thought about making [...]

This is the Pacesetter incarnation of the Vampires supplement for Chill. It was released in 1985 and comes in at 96 pages. Inside the covers you will find ten fully fleshed out vampires that can be used in a Chill campaign. The cover for this book has always bothered me a little. Not because it was disturbing in any way but because the vampire on the cover looked a little too cheesy for me. In my mind he looked half porn star and half dandy.It wasn't until the release of The Beautician and the Beast that I realized that he looked way too much like Timothy Dalton (for the record the worst Bond ever). As much as I love zombie movies I have to rank vampires as my favorite horror monster. There is nothing like a cold and calculating undead to make one shudder in fear.

From the back of the 96-page sourcebook:

"VAMPIRES is a collection of stories, portraits, and accounts of ten bloodcurdling creatures who haunt the nights of our legends, the wastelands of our fears. Each of these vampires is not only the center of horrific reports and tales, but is also a fully drawn non-player character designed for use with the CHILL role-playing system."

Superheroine redesigns seem to be all the rage today.

Here is a Zatanna redesign by Meredith McClaren.
http://iniquitousfish.blogspot.com/


I like her look here to be honest.  The vest still pulls in elements of her old style.  I would have made her pants pinstripes myself and of course given her a top hat.

"He went up, both terrible and gracefully, advancing one little step after the other. When he sang, the entire universe listened with awe and disgust combined..."The horror monster is a thing of terrible beauty. It's not just terrible, and it's not just beautiful, but a combination of both of them. A monster that is terrible alone is a monster, maybe even a frightening one, but it's the kind of fear so commonly associated with "boo!" movies, this movies where the monster says boo and we're all supposed to remain frightened for the rest of the movie, those movies which utilize [...]

Just a bunch of assorted links for you: Transscript and discussion of the Indiana Jones brainstorming sessions.- highly recommended People actually do build elaborate secret tunnels etc. In this case, the BBC reports on Mafia hideouts. The Antarctic Snow Cruiser … Continue reading →

1. Ropemaker Boardwalk
2. Frog Beach
3. Kent Lagerberg Parade
4. Chieftan Crossing
5. Ezerhan Kadri Fords
6. Demon Fords
7. Bullfrog Garden
8. Thyra Holden Curve
9. Embalmer Cross
10. Skalla-Gauk Bjarnisson Plaza

Eternal Lies (Pelgrane Press)

Pelgrane Press. Endlich! Das Warten hat ein Ende. Mit dem Erscheinen des hauseigenen Online Magazins See Page XXMay/June 2013 flatterte das Angebot zu der seit Jahren angekndigten Trail of Cthulhu-Kampagne Eternal Lies (Will Hindmarch und Jeff Tidbal mit Jeremy Keller) ins Haus.

Der britische Verlag bietet verschiedene Vorbestelloptionen an. Die Strange Aeons Edition beinhaltet das PDF mit 388 Seiten vorab, Artwork, eine signierte Hardcopy voraussichtlich im August 2013, Dein Name in den Credits, ein Vorkaufsrecht fr die Limited Edition und bei Bedarf gleich noch einen passenden Soundtrack dazu.

“A decade ago, a band of occult investigators battled against the [...]

I talked this week about ways of handling the party disliking your slated-to-be-important NPC, both to do and to avoid. I’ve been lucky; most of my NPCs have only gotten that reaction when they were meant to. But as a player I’ve seen them go well, and I’ve seen them go poorly. There are two I can think of who were at the extremes---and who, to aid comparison more, had two thirds of the party worth of overlap between them.

The first of these was Dalowag. He ticked the group off partly by being one of the focuses of what felt [...]

In nearly 15 years of participating in the online D&D world, I've come across and collected a huge pile of netbooks, documents, files, and other treasures. It's time to share them with the world, since many of the sites they were found at are no longer around.

I'll be housing them at Stone Kobold's Secret Stash, a folder on Google Drive that everyone is free to browse and download!

All files are complete and unedited for content. All I'm doing is turning them into PDF files, formatting them for modern viewing (since a great many of them are [...]

The clock is ticking on Game Chef 2013 and submissions are due when it is no longer May 26th anywhere in the world. Naturally, with less than 48 hours left on the clock I have decided that my time is better spent updating my blog than actually working on the game. It's all part of the creative process, I swear!

I have stepped away from designing and proofreading to tease the character sheet for my entry and without further ado, here it is:
I could explain everything on this sheet to you, but I think it will be more [...]

DM NOTES from 2005

Part 5

I shallregale my tale of the first encounter my kids remember from Earthdawn, which they talk about to this day. So I was running the starter adventure for 3e for them, and we're at the cadaver men. Sean is playing an archer, and of course wounds a cadaver man...never a good idea...worse when there's only two players. So the Cadaver man rushes up and slam Sean's archer's head into a tree,

Roa - taken from Ra.

The Draken god of the Sky, the Sun, Fire, and serpents. Roa is so enormous that he takes up the whole of the heavens. The sun is merely one, burning eye of the great snake. Everything in creation falls under his gaze, but so very little on the earth is worthy of his consideration.

Draken strive to be noticed by the endless serpent. Their lives must be very laudable indeed to garnish even a fleeting glance from the Eternal One.

Humans lost contact with the Draken of the tropics for many many [...]

Today is a day of international geek celebration, it is Towel Day (honouring the memory and work of Douglas Adams), Geek Pride Day (the anniversary of the opening of Star Wars in 1977) and The Glorious 25th Of May (a special day for fans of Terry Pratchett's Discworld novels).

Oh, and it also happens to be my wedding anniversary!

So make sure you do something particularly geeky today to mark these great events and please join me in a dignified rendition of the Sirius Cybernetic Corporation's Complaints Department theme song - Share And Enjoy to welcome our latest recruit:

• Niels

The Path to Survival has never looked this good!

To continue the list of Eclipse defenses we'll once again be starting off with one that deserves to be on the top of the list.

• Reflex Training (Perfect, Variable Options) lets you do more than you normally could. For an emergency defense the best option is the limited use version that allows you to basically insert a private standard action in the middle of someone else's action. Obviously enough, that offers you some wonderful defense-or-escape options. You can use that extra action to cast a protective spell, move away from an attack or [...]

Eclipse was intended to patch as many of the problems with d20 as I could possibly manage, It's certainly not perfect, and (of course) has a few brand-new holes all it's own – but I like to think that there aren't all that many.

The way to stop Rocket Tag is to take the emphasis off of getting in the first shot (and, incidentally, to make the fights last longer). Thus we'll be looking at Defenses in Eclipse – and how you can defend against a huge attack more cheaply than you can build one.

There are some basic ways for defenses [...]

In honor of the Mekton Zero Kickstarter, I'm doing something a bit different for a Flashback Friday. It's a flashback of some of my old material that I've recovered from the Internet Archive. This is the only Mekton design I was able to get (the archive is very spotty for my old website for some reason) but I'll also be reposting some other stuff like house rules and campaign outlines over the weekend. I've cleaned up the design a little bit and expanded on it. Hit the link below for the Google Docs sheet (sorry, no mecha design sheet...yet).
EMA-120 [...]

I’ve been working on the experience and advancement system forClaustrophobia!Theoriginalgame didn’t have rules for XP because I figured gnomes would die before they had a chance to level, or that sessions would be once off affairs. After play-testing and thinking about it more, I figured it was necessary and an important way to award players [...]

Miami did his downtimes this fortnight to gather some more information on his unsolved murder.  I'll post up the prop kit from his murder a little later for those who want to see all of the connections themselves.  For now, suffice to say, he and his wife were killed by members of a Miami University fraternity who raped, mutilated and killed his wife and *merely* mutilated and put him into a coma - he later died of his injuries and his body was taken by Prometheus for possession. One of the other frat boys called the police who arrested the [...]

Welcome to a Wombat's Writing Tips article. Check out the main page for more.

Today we detour deep into the editing process.

I've been following John Adamus's article series entitled Editing Out In The Open. If you haven't, click through immediately and go catch up. The two examples of editing he gives really open up the process and give a great overview of what to expect if you've never worked with an editor before.

His latest article gives an example of Game Flavor Text. We got to talking on G+ and he talked me into Line Editing the same manuscript [...]

If you have not already heard, at this year's GenCon GaleForce Nine is offering an exclusive book containing some pre-generated characters, and four adventures intended to run you from level 1 to 10, and the winning sheet from the character sheet contest.

Oh, and if you pre-order it you also get a free mini.

A lot of people are understandably miffed that this is going to be a GenCon exclusive. I do not see any reason for it, as people might be able to afford a $30 book, but not the ticket prices, possibly travel fees, and/or the [...]

Actually, you do not want to have to rely on these to save you.

It’s often called “Rocket Tag” – the premise being that when offense far outpowers defense, whoever strikes first tends to win , with all other factors becoming distinctly secondary.

Remember: even in d20 terms, a near-duplicate of your party as you were three levels ago – possibly with some cheaper items – is a “balanced encounter”. If that fight would turn out to be a disaster if the slightly-downgraded copies roll high for their initiative while the actual party rolls low… then your party has too much offense [...]

As part of their release of their new miniatures game Star Trek: Attack Wing during GenCon, Wizkids announced yesterday that it will be hosting sealed/constructed format mini-tournaments in the tournament hall.  As explained in the release on their website:

"In these sealed/constructed battles, players will be grouped into pods of 4 players.  Each player will receive one of the initial 8 expansion packs by random draw.  Players must use the expansion ship they receive to fill out a 100 point build (players will need to bring their own collection of ships from the Starter Set and/or expansion sets which will be available for purchase at the WizKids Games booth).  Players in the group will be paired up randomly for the first round of head-to-head play.  The winners from the first round will play against each other in a second round to determine a final winner of the mini-tournament.  The [...]

It's no secret that I like Pathfinder. While I've become somewhat disillusioned with the excess of rules and wish the game was somewhat lighter, it is still one of my favorite games on the market and my go-to choice for fantasy gaming.

However, I'm very aware of the problems that are inherent to both Pathfinder and other games based on the d20 system. For example, it's a very common belief that the d20 system begins to break down at higher levels. While I don't think the problem is as drastic as some would make it out to be, the [...]

This will be the last of my how to build a campaign world posts on my own site for a little while and in a funny way this one does not really relate to building the world, more about how you are going to play in it once it is built.  Sandbox games are named after the idea of a kid in a sandbox.  They make their own fun from their imagination.  They may build a castle and have an epic war trying to knock it down or treat the sand as the dunes of a faraway planet.  The direction [...]

This is the third installment in a series of character builds designed for players new to Savage Worlds. The builds take you from character creation up to the first Legendary rank. The first few character builds will demonstrate how to create characters which progress like those in traditional fantasy classes. So far we've seen theThe Fighterand The Thiefcharacter builds.In this installment

Art By Matt Bulahao
'Lectric Lizard

Hit Dice: 4 (20 HP)
Armor Class: 3[16]
Attacks: Bite 1d6 plus 2d6 electrical damage (save for half) / Special
Saving Throw: 13
Special: Successful attacks against a 'Lectric Lizard with a metal weapon inflicts 1 point electrical damage on the attacker. Two or more "Lectric Lizards within a 10' distance of each other generate an electric field, charging the air. Save each round in the area or take 1d4 electrical damage (save means no damage - penalty of -2 to the save if wearing metal armor)
Move: 9
Alignment: Neutral
Number Encountered: 2-8
Challenge Level/XP: 6 / 400

'Lectric Lizards grow to an average size of 5' from head to tail. Generally only agressive when [...]

This seed is being planted for Leagues of Adventure. Aimed at scientists and inventors, it touches on ideas of competition, jealousy, and social obligation… with just a hint of brutal murder. My Saturday Seeds also reappear onAncient Scrollon random Saturdays~ The seed The seed involves a series of robberies and killings happening near the club … Read more

So, the day has come for my very own miniatures range, Grinning Skull Miniatures to be available on general release! It’s been a long journey to get them from their humble beginnings to the fully fledged range as they are, and I’m really glad that this project has bore fruit! The excellent team at 15mm.co.uk […]

Character creation and leveling up can be confusing, even for experienced players. There's a lot of keep track of, including abilities to choose and statistics to be recalculated.

The Character Workbook line for the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game is a series of game aids designed to walk you through the process and help you keep track of all those changes. It's not a character sheet -- you'll still need one of those -- but it will help you make sure you've filled out your character sheet completely and correctly. You'll never have to worry that your character has been short-changed. If you [...]

Going to have character creation and watch Game of Thrones episode one today. Will probably play some too.

WizKids/NECA, LLC (WizKids), the leader in collectible gaming, announced theDominion War Organized Play eventfor the forthcoming Star Trek HeroClix miniatures...

With your hosts, Liz and Mike! Mike wastes some time reviews some online casual games. Liz sends her descendants down into a Dungeon to die! And we spend some time in the inky blackness of space.

• Website: www.nearlyenoughdice.com

• iTunes! Leave us a review! Rate us! Subscribe!

• Stitcher!

• General Podcasty stuff, including feedback: podcast@nearlyenoughdice.com

Geeky Week!

• Mike couldn't go to Tuesday

• Liz has a LOAD of mage to fill you in on!

• UK GAMES EXPO THIS WEEKEND WOOOOoooo!

• Mike has a Raspberry Pi!

• Game of Thrones / Doctor Who chat

 

News

So, while perusing my old gaming notes on my laptop, I found a conversion I had worked up for running a Firefly game a while back. I borrowed liberally from the MiniSix Perdition setting, which is pretty much Firefly's 'Verse with the serial numbers filed off. I added some Perks, Complications and rules from other settings, and a few of my own devising, including rules for making ships more of a part of the crew.

Today, I'll post up some of the character creation stuff, and next time it will be the ship creation guide, along with a few [...]