So, with all the attention that 4e is getting, I'm worried that I'm going to burn out on fantasy (again). I like other genres, so I try to keep my fingers in a lot of pies. I'm playing a human fighter in Terran's game and that should be pretty fun.
The cast for my game (as it stands now) is Trevor's human Fighter, Ernie's human Cleric, C.C.'s halfling Rogue, Amy's elf Paladin, and Dave's elf Ranger.
Two elves, two humans and a halfling. Not the greatest cross-section of diversity, but it'll do as a start.
I don't know if Dave and Ernie are going to be bored and/or confused by playing the same character in two different games, but I'm hoping one of them will break down and change their character to a wizard, as the team could use a controlling spellcaster type. If not, they'll have issues, but I don't think it's anything they can't deal with.
I've been poring over adventures and random generators and trying to find good story hooks and figuring a way for all of them to be linked together and on the same adventure, but in the end, it always comes down to a little suspension of disbelief and the team decides to go adventuring together.
Also, I'm looking at starting up a game for the guys at work, it would be a weekly game where we'd play in a conference room here after work. I'll run it by everyone and see who's interested. If there's enough interest, I'll post the character assortments and adventure logs here, too.
S.
Monday, January 26, 2009
Sunday, January 25, 2009
Session 3b: Running the Kobold Hall (Part Deux)
With a few cancellations (and people being out of town or unavailable), our regularly scheduled Star Wars game needed to be postponed, so Terran was gracious enough to run a (new) version of the Kobold Hall adventure found in the DM's Guide -- where I actually got to play this time, with varying levels of frustration.
The team for this adventure:
Vexille, Elf Ranger (Dave)
Saren, Human Cleric (Ernie)
Vutha, Dragonborn Rogue (Scoot)
Kalen, Human Fighter (Me)
Talindor, Eladrin Wizard (Trevor)
Starting right in front of the Hall's entrance, we had already geared up so down into the depths we went. Today was a "Bonk" session, so no real time was wasted on story -- "let's just go pillage" was the order of the day. A little time was spent figured out the lighting situation, and once that was settled, we started down.
The team battled through the first three rooms today (see previous posts for maps), and this time, nobody fell in (or was pushed in) to the sludge pits, much to my disappointment. Carving through the kobolds pretty quickly, with very little trouble in the first room, the team made their way through to (and through) the trap room. We've had varying levels of success with traps so far in 4e. I'm not sure if it was this particular adventure or traps as a whole, but these arrow-traps seemed way out of our rogue's league. Not only could he not find them, but once the ranger found one, he certainly wasn't able to disable them. Either their needs to be a vast reallocation of skill points, or the DCs were way too high, or our rogue just sucked. Or all three.
Taking only a short rest in between rooms, the whole team managed to earn themselves a milestone and gain an extra hero point. Which brings me to my next gripe: action points. Are they just useless or what? 4e completely nerfs Action Points. In Eberron (where they originated in the D&D world), they were used to improve the result of an attack roll, skill check, ability check or saving throw (there were feats and other classes that let you spend them in additional ways) and in 4e you can spend one (per encounter) to gain an extra action. Period. Boring.
And then there's the kobold gluepots. Fucking glue? Seriously? My character has a Strength of 16, and he has the same chance as a character with a Str 8 to free himself from the sticky glue. That means that a bugbear has the same chance as a gnome to get unstuck or stay immobilized. Really, there's something broken there. Dave proposed an Athletics check to escape (as per a grappling check) but the text was specific in its direction that a save ends, meaning "flip a coin". Granted, Kalen has the Human Perseverance feat, letting him add +1 to that chance, but that still means he has to roll a 9 or higher or be stuck. It's just really frustrating for the biggest, strongest character to have the same chance as the weakest.
After a few more kobolds (and their damn gluepots!), we ended just after finishing the third room, the kobold's "skull-skull" game area. We decapitated every kobold we've killed so far (about 20 in total), collecting skulls for the bounty offered by Fallcrest's Lord Warden, Faren Markelhay.
The kobolds gave us little actual trouble, but Kalen bit off a bit more than he could chew when the team busted down the wooden door and our poor doomed fighter was promptly attacked by both the guard drakes. Their combo-attack abilities instantly reduced him to -9 hit points, and I discovered that the rules for death & dying are a little frustrating. Granted, the fighter's job is to soak up damage. He's the defender. That's his job, and he did it well today.
As a 1st-level fighter (who claims to be a paladin), Kalen has 30 hit points. Not the best ever, but pretty healthy. He had taken a couple scratches earlier in the combat, knocking him down to about 20. Nothing he couldn't handle. Then the guard drakes attacked. Both of them. At the same time. With their combo-Bite attack that gives them a 1d10+9 (each) to damage and (with Terran's penchant for rolling high on damage) reduced Kalen to -9 hit points in one small reptilian blur.
This is not the part I'm bitching about, since they're Level 2 Brutes and a pretty hefty enemy to take on solo -- you stand in front of a door as it goes down, you take what comes out, that's the deal. The part I'm actually concerned about is that any magical healing automatically brings him up to 0. Since a character doesn't "die" until they reach a negative number equal to their Bloodied value, Kalen could be at -14 and still be alive (unconscious and dying, but still alive), then receive 1 point of magical healing and be back to 0. That seems a little... well, for lack of a better word, nerfed.
I know it may sound a little weird that I'm complaining about it being too easy to stay alive, but hear me out.
My point is that it's very easy for PCs to avoid death. Without a healthy fear of permanent death, PCs (and players, which is the real problem) start to do stupid stuff and don't bother to think (or act) tactically. Why should they? They're not going to die. The DM's not going to kill them off, so why prepare? "Just go in and do whatever, you'll be okay."
The team needs a healthy respect for the Total Party Kill.
S.
The team for this adventure:
Vexille, Elf Ranger (Dave)
Saren, Human Cleric (Ernie)
Vutha, Dragonborn Rogue (Scoot)
Kalen, Human Fighter (Me)
Talindor, Eladrin Wizard (Trevor)
Starting right in front of the Hall's entrance, we had already geared up so down into the depths we went. Today was a "Bonk" session, so no real time was wasted on story -- "let's just go pillage" was the order of the day. A little time was spent figured out the lighting situation, and once that was settled, we started down.
The team battled through the first three rooms today (see previous posts for maps), and this time, nobody fell in (or was pushed in) to the sludge pits, much to my disappointment. Carving through the kobolds pretty quickly, with very little trouble in the first room, the team made their way through to (and through) the trap room. We've had varying levels of success with traps so far in 4e. I'm not sure if it was this particular adventure or traps as a whole, but these arrow-traps seemed way out of our rogue's league. Not only could he not find them, but once the ranger found one, he certainly wasn't able to disable them. Either their needs to be a vast reallocation of skill points, or the DCs were way too high, or our rogue just sucked. Or all three.
Taking only a short rest in between rooms, the whole team managed to earn themselves a milestone and gain an extra hero point. Which brings me to my next gripe: action points. Are they just useless or what? 4e completely nerfs Action Points. In Eberron (where they originated in the D&D world), they were used to improve the result of an attack roll, skill check, ability check or saving throw (there were feats and other classes that let you spend them in additional ways) and in 4e you can spend one (per encounter) to gain an extra action. Period. Boring.
And then there's the kobold gluepots. Fucking glue? Seriously? My character has a Strength of 16, and he has the same chance as a character with a Str 8 to free himself from the sticky glue. That means that a bugbear has the same chance as a gnome to get unstuck or stay immobilized. Really, there's something broken there. Dave proposed an Athletics check to escape (as per a grappling check) but the text was specific in its direction that a save ends, meaning "flip a coin". Granted, Kalen has the Human Perseverance feat, letting him add +1 to that chance, but that still means he has to roll a 9 or higher or be stuck. It's just really frustrating for the biggest, strongest character to have the same chance as the weakest.
After a few more kobolds (and their damn gluepots!), we ended just after finishing the third room, the kobold's "skull-skull" game area. We decapitated every kobold we've killed so far (about 20 in total), collecting skulls for the bounty offered by Fallcrest's Lord Warden, Faren Markelhay.
The kobolds gave us little actual trouble, but Kalen bit off a bit more than he could chew when the team busted down the wooden door and our poor doomed fighter was promptly attacked by both the guard drakes. Their combo-attack abilities instantly reduced him to -9 hit points, and I discovered that the rules for death & dying are a little frustrating. Granted, the fighter's job is to soak up damage. He's the defender. That's his job, and he did it well today.
As a 1st-level fighter (who claims to be a paladin), Kalen has 30 hit points. Not the best ever, but pretty healthy. He had taken a couple scratches earlier in the combat, knocking him down to about 20. Nothing he couldn't handle. Then the guard drakes attacked. Both of them. At the same time. With their combo-Bite attack that gives them a 1d10+9 (each) to damage and (with Terran's penchant for rolling high on damage) reduced Kalen to -9 hit points in one small reptilian blur.
This is not the part I'm bitching about, since they're Level 2 Brutes and a pretty hefty enemy to take on solo -- you stand in front of a door as it goes down, you take what comes out, that's the deal. The part I'm actually concerned about is that any magical healing automatically brings him up to 0. Since a character doesn't "die" until they reach a negative number equal to their Bloodied value, Kalen could be at -14 and still be alive (unconscious and dying, but still alive), then receive 1 point of magical healing and be back to 0. That seems a little... well, for lack of a better word, nerfed.
I know it may sound a little weird that I'm complaining about it being too easy to stay alive, but hear me out.
My point is that it's very easy for PCs to avoid death. Without a healthy fear of permanent death, PCs (and players, which is the real problem) start to do stupid stuff and don't bother to think (or act) tactically. Why should they? They're not going to die. The DM's not going to kill them off, so why prepare? "Just go in and do whatever, you'll be okay."
The team needs a healthy respect for the Total Party Kill.
S.
Monday, January 12, 2009
DM (Dungeon Musings)
I have come to the conclusion that we've been spoiled by playing at Dave's workplace. The 15-foot table, multiple blackboards, plenty of powerstrips, loads of food -- and David buying pizza... Mmmm... Definitely spoiled.Finding myself needing a better way to keep track of which enemy is which when the miniatures are similar (or in some cases, identical). I thought I had a white-board somewhere around, but the notepad and pen just doesn't compare to having a 6-foot blackboard to write the initiative list and see it all laid out in front of us.
Also, some kind of table is a necessity if we're going to play at our apartment. Lack of furniture is great for making the living room look spacious, but seriously, we need more chairs and to use a table, especially when three out of the four players have their own laptops.
Speaking of which: next big purchase for Steve-O -- a laptop for gaming. Not like PC games and WoW and shit, but just something to keep a million little notes on, Wrd Documents, and PDF files...
In the "Good News" category, I absolutely love the Dungeon Tiles that WotC produces (thanks, little bro!). Great stuff for those of us with out an erasable map, although I do miss being able to just write right on the dungeon floor for area effects. Set up takes only slightly longer (though this is debatable, depending on who's doing the mapping...) but is totally worth it. A couple more packs of these tiles ought to set me up for a while.
The new miniatures I got for Christmas are also awesome (thanks again, little brother!) and I plan on picking up a few more boxes this week. Though I have yet to be able to use the Huge white dragon mini, I look forward to facing off against that icy little bastard soon.
All in all, 4e is going well, and I'm looking forward to getting a regular campaign going with a regular gaming team. Combat is flowing better (in my head, at least) and I definitely love the concept of Instant/Encounter/Daily powers. As we level up, it'll be easier to learn the powers as we go, but this is one system where I'm actually looking forward to using ALL the classes and ALL the races. (Thanks for making half-elf a playable race!)
I think once everyone gets used to their powers and starts learning what their abilities are, it'll run even quicker. Can't wait for speedy combat so we can get to the meat of the story -- like why the team is down in the dungeon to begin with. I'm such a firm believer in motivation. If a crew doesn't have a reason to go dungeon delving beyond "loot" and "greed", then it gets boring very quickly. Or maybe that's just me.
Also, nothing beats Ennio Morricone for mood music. Creepy Italian bastard music is awesome for listening to during "travel time" between towns and adventures.
S.
Session 2a: Running the Kobold Hall (Redux)
We played a new version of the Kobold Hall adventure found in the DM's Guide and I think I enjoy 4e more every time I play it.
Our crew for this adventure:
Tiefling Warlock (Gray)
Eladrin Wizard (Ernie)
Dragonborn Rogue (Scoot)
Dwarven Fighter (Steve)
Instead of any pretense, I started the team right in front of the entrance to the Kobold Hall -- less story, but more game time, and the whole point was to see how the combat system worked for Graham and Scoot's first time playing 4e.
They actually got a little further than the last time, but not by much. We went slow, exploring everything, reading every description of every power, every condition and every combat option. I think everyone enjoyed it, and even though Scoot's a huge 3.5e advocate, even he said he had fun.
We got through the first room (see previous post for map), with two different characters falling into the sludge pit (the dwarf fighter and the dragonborn rogue). I had a bit of an advantage (as the DM) since I knew the pit is a pain in the ass. The dwarf fell in while trying to shove one of the kobold skirmishers into the pit, then the kobolds picked up the idea and shoved the dragonborn rogue in after the dwarf climbed out.
We ended just as they entered the second room, with three kobolds on the far east end of the room, and our intrepid rogue failing miserably to detect any traps in the room. They cleverly took a prisoner in the first room, and intimidated the kobold into telling them a secret -- "Stay to the north edge of the room to avoid the traps." But apparently they forgot between rooms, and Scooter's Dragonborn rogue managed to set off a dart trap... So now the team has to maneuver to the far end while taking fire from the kobolds and avoiding the other trapped tiles... Good luck.
Maybe one of these sessions will have a crew actually get to the end of the adventure...
S.
Our crew for this adventure:
Tiefling Warlock (Gray)
Eladrin Wizard (Ernie)
Dragonborn Rogue (Scoot)
Dwarven Fighter (Steve)
Instead of any pretense, I started the team right in front of the entrance to the Kobold Hall -- less story, but more game time, and the whole point was to see how the combat system worked for Graham and Scoot's first time playing 4e.
They actually got a little further than the last time, but not by much. We went slow, exploring everything, reading every description of every power, every condition and every combat option. I think everyone enjoyed it, and even though Scoot's a huge 3.5e advocate, even he said he had fun.
We got through the first room (see previous post for map), with two different characters falling into the sludge pit (the dwarf fighter and the dragonborn rogue). I had a bit of an advantage (as the DM) since I knew the pit is a pain in the ass. The dwarf fell in while trying to shove one of the kobold skirmishers into the pit, then the kobolds picked up the idea and shoved the dragonborn rogue in after the dwarf climbed out.
We ended just as they entered the second room, with three kobolds on the far east end of the room, and our intrepid rogue failing miserably to detect any traps in the room. They cleverly took a prisoner in the first room, and intimidated the kobold into telling them a secret -- "Stay to the north edge of the room to avoid the traps." But apparently they forgot between rooms, and Scooter's Dragonborn rogue managed to set off a dart trap... So now the team has to maneuver to the far end while taking fire from the kobolds and avoiding the other trapped tiles... Good luck.
Maybe one of these sessions will have a crew actually get to the end of the adventure...
S.
Friday, January 2, 2009
In-Between Sessions and Prepping for the Real Thing
Well, I think we've finally got our cast of characters rounded out. Ernie will be joining us with a lecherous Cleric and Amy will be playing a prideful elf Paladin.
Dave is officially changing his character from the forgetful Wizard to an elf Ranger, so that will make things interesting.
So, our cast currently looks like this:
Human Fighter (Trevor)
Human Cleric (Ernie)
Halfling Rogue (C.C.)
Elf Paladin (Amy)
Elf Ranger (Dave)
All in all pretty good... Oh wait. What's wrong with this picture? No spellcaster. Not a warlock or wizard in the bunch, eh? Hmmmm. You guys are screwed... Hehehe.
(Oh dear, did I say that out loud?)
S.
Dave is officially changing his character from the forgetful Wizard to an elf Ranger, so that will make things interesting.
So, our cast currently looks like this:
Human Fighter (Trevor)
Human Cleric (Ernie)
Halfling Rogue (C.C.)
Elf Paladin (Amy)
Elf Ranger (Dave)
All in all pretty good... Oh wait. What's wrong with this picture? No spellcaster. Not a warlock or wizard in the bunch, eh? Hmmmm. You guys are screwed... Hehehe.
(Oh dear, did I say that out loud?)
S.
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