Another Post About Nothing

This comic about Seinfeld characters playing D&D (mirror here, it's getting Dugg) reminded me very much of this post on Seinfeldian magic items I did awhile back.

Seinfeld was never my favorite show in the universe, but I did watch it now and then and it did get me thinking a little this morning -- rarely a character shows up on that show that isn't put under a microscope and all their weird little idiosyncrasies examined in detail (and usually poked with a cattle prod, causing hilarity to ensue). I like it when D&D characters enjoy that same kind of character development. I frequently like it much more than I do the main plot of the story, which I'm sure is the source of at least six or seven aneurysms in Dante and the other DMs I've played with.

To wit: my favorite sessions are usually the first two or three, when the crap hasn't hit the fan yet and we're getting to know everyone, followed closely by the "break" sessions in the story where we usually follow one character's personal story (which may or may not be woven into the main story). But barring those weird times when we're all arguing about which direction to go because we can't figure out the clues laid before us, those sessions where we're not doing anything particularly "useful" per se are what I really look forward to, especially with a new character to play.

Making a character that has some strange personal idiosyncrasies, in addition to making everyday roleplay with your character more interesting, may have an impact on everyone's lives (good or bad!) in much the same way that the folks on Seinfeld frequently have misadventures because they're really freaking neurotic. I mean, they devoted half an episode to Kramer trying to defend himself from deadly birthday wishes. And I was enraptured.

I'm a believer in that the small stuff can be every bit as interesting as the epic. Characters should be more than a bunch of combat stat blocks! The difficulty, of course, is that as you get higher in level, the monsters you fight are optimized to be a challenge to people who are prepared to fight them. On several occasions (but especially with Bat Loaf), I've picked spells and items that weren't particularly combat-friendly and it cost me. It's just a fact of life that the vast, vast majority of D&D campaigns revolve around stuff killing other stuff and you need to keep that in mind before you go too overboard. If you don't, you'll quickly find yourself frustrated week after week.

But don't abandon the fact that you have a character to play. DM's -- let them! And try not to dogpile in the end battle on the guy that picked Percussion to give a little atmosphere to his nightly trysts with the barmaids. Dante.

The D&D Diaper Bag

Since recently becoming the father of a rather large and excellent baby boy, I have not had much time to write D&D stuff. Or play D&D. Or play anything aside from "wipe the butt". The first weeks were not easy and took a lot of adjustment. And since I was doing a lot of sitting in a dark nursery burping a newborn trying to figure out how to cope, it wasn't a real surprise when I started to wonder how people in a D&D setting would do things in my position. Thusly, I present to you the fruits of my sleep-deprived brain:

The contents of (the dreaded) D&D DIAPER BAG!!!!!!!!!!!!!

• Diapers (of Holding)
  
  Not so much absorbent as they are simply incredibly roomy, these should be changed at least daily lest the baby be tipped in an unfortunate direction rendering one's residence a good likeness of the Augean Stables.
  
  Much like the difference between brands of disposable diapers, Diapers of Disintegration may also be purchased for a premium. Parents who can afford these are reportedly considerably happier.
  


• Scroll - Sleep
  
  As many of these are purchased as one can afford, and they are used on both baby and parents alike.
  
  At least until the FDA (Fantasy Drug Administration) determines whether Sleep spells are habit-forming or have harmful developmental effects on infants. (But they'll just turn around and decide something different two years later anyway.)


• Scroll - Unseen Servant
  
  Perfect for when kobolds attack, you specialize in the two-handed sword, and you really need someone to burp the baby.
  


• Scroll - Silence, 10' Radius
  
  Almost as much of a staple as the Sleep spell, this lowers the DC of successfully letting your baby cry himself to sleep by 25. It also temporarily eases the heavy INT,WIS, and Diplomacy penalties on both exhausted parents resulting from bouts of incessant screaming.
  


• Breast Milk Golem
  
  Available only to the very wealthy, this golem has magnificent breasts that lactate upon utterance of a command word. Shrinks to pocket sized when not in use. Tirelessly feeds and burps babies through the night, allowing the parents to sleep. Frequently kept even after children are weaned by adventurers who are single fathers for "sentimental" reasons, though their full functionality is not typically utilized at this point.
  
  Also, I just wanted to say "Breast Milk Golem".
  


• Cloak of Invisibility
  
  Advanced Peek-A-Boo. 'Nuff Said.

DEAR FRIEND...

My friend Floyd at work has a wife named Tara. She's a stay at home mom, and apparently has a great deal of time on her hands because one of her favorite things to do is to send prank responses to Nigerian email scammers. Every week or so, Floyd comes in with a new story about something completely ridiculous Tara has sent to some poor bastard in a third world country attempting to relieve them of all their money.

Recently, Tara got really sick. And so it was that my sleep-deprived brain concocted a fitting get well card for her to try to make her feel better:

-----------

DEAR FRIEND,

I AM A HIGH PRIEST OF ODIN, THE ALL-FATHER. AS YOU KNOW, THE ALL-FATHER IS VERY DISPLEASED WITH THE DIRECTION THE SONS OF MIDGARD HAVE BEEN TAKING. THERE HAVE BEEN AN UNUSUAL NUMBER OF PEOPLE ARRIVING AT HEL'S DOORSTEP, NEVER HAVING EVEN ENGAGED IN COMBAT WITH THE ENEMY, AND THUSLY COMPLETELY DEVOID OF HONOR AND UNWORTHY TO ENTER VALHALLA. I WRITE THIS TO YOU BECAUSE I AM CERTAIN OF SEVERAL THINGS ABOUT YOU. ONE IS THAT YOU ARE YET UNWORTHY AS WELL AND THIS BOTHERS YOU AS IT WOULD ANY SON OF THE ALL-FATHER. TWO IS THAT YOU, AS A TRUE SON OF THE ALL-FATHER, COULD NEVER ALLOW THE SONS OF MIDGARD TO LANGUISH IN HEL'S FROZEN WASTES FOR ETERNITY.

I COME TO YOU AT THE TURN OF THE TIDE WITH AN OFFER OF FRIENDSHIP AND REDEMPTION. AT THE BASE OF THE TREE OF YGGDRASIL, WE BEGAN CONSTRUCTION OF A GLORIOUS SCHOOL OF BATTLE SO THAT THE SONS OF MIDGARD MIGHT LEARN THE WAYS OF HONORABLE COMBAT AND FIND THEIR WAY TO GLORIOUS VALHALLA WHERE THEY WILL AWAIT GLORIOUS SERVICE TO THE ALL-FATHER DURING RAGNAROK AGAINST THE LOATHSOME VANIR. DAILY THEY WILL ENGAGE IN HONORABLE COMBAT ON THE PLAINS OF ASGARD, PICK UP THEIR SEVERED LIMBS, AND REATTACH THEM BEFORE THE FEAST OF WARRIORS. IT IS THE BEST LIFE FOR A SON OF ODIN. AND NOW YOU CAN HELP.

OUR RECORDS INDICATE THAT YOU ARE CURRENTLY INFIRM AND WOULD NOT BE A SUITABLE CANDIDATE FOR THE BATTLE AGAINST THE FROST-GIANTS. HOWEVER THERE IS STILL SOMETHING YOU CAN DO, AND THE FATE OF MIDGARD DEPENDS ON YOUR COOPERATION SO IN ODIN'S NAME I BEG YOU TO CONSIDER MY WORDS CAREFULLY BEFORE YOU MAKE A DECISION. DURING THE CONSTRUCTION OF THE ALL-FATHER'S SCHOOL OF BATTLE, A GROUP OF TROLLS CALLING THEMSELVES THE "POLICE" (AGENTS OF LOKI THE TRICKSTER, NO DOUBT!) CAPTURED MANY OF OUR CONSTRUCTION WORKERS AND THROUGH VILE SORCERY WE ARE NO LONGER ABLE TO ACCESS OUR BANK ACCOUNTS.

I HAVE PRAYED FIERCELY TO ODIN EVERY FOURTEEN MINUTES FOR GUIDANCE AND ON THE SEVENTEENTH NIGHT I RECEIVED A VISION OF ODIN RIDING ACROSS THE RAINBOW BRIDGE BIFROST ON HIS 7 LEGGED HORSE SLEIPNR. AS THE ALL-FATHER STREAKED PAST MY UNWORTHY FORM AS SPEEDS NO MORTAL COULD COMPREHEND, HE BELLOWED YOUR EMAIL ADDRESS TO ME IN THE VOICE OF TEN THOUSAND LIONS. IN THIS VISION THE ALL-FATHER ALSO TOLD ME THAT YOU (AND YOUR SIXTEEN MILLION AMERICAN DOLLARS) WOULD BE MIDGARD'S LAST HOPE.

PLEASE RESPOND AS SOON AS YOU CAN AS THE FATE OF ALL MIDGARD RESTS UPON YOUR SHOULDERS. WE WILL DISCUSS THE TERMS OF THIS TRANSACTION, WHICH I AM CERTAIN YOU WILL FIND FAVORABLE AS I HAVE GREAT FAITH IN THE ALL-FATHER'S GRATITUDE AND YOU MAY YET FIND YOURSELF AT THE FEASTING TABLE IN GLORIOUS VALHALLA. I HOPE THE COMING DAYS FIND YOU IN GOOD HEALTH, FOR YOU ARE OF COURSE WELCOME TO ATTEND OUR SCHOOL OF BATTLE (WHICH WILL BE NAMED AFTER YOU) FREE OF CHARGE.

YOURS IN ODIN,

GRISHNAK BUTTERFANG
HIGH PRIEST OF THE ALMIGHTY ALL-FATHER ODIN
HEADMASTER OF THE TARA <name omitted> SCHOOL OF BATTLE REDEMPTION

P.S. GET WELL SOON!!!

----------

Not exactly D&D today, per se, but I hope you all enjoyed it anyway. I really didn't think this was all that weird but Dante is apparently convinced that I've been drinking paint thinner. It's not paint thinner, I have a 1 month old and I haven't been getting much sleep. Same effect, I guess!

Anyway, I hope you feel better soon, Tara.

Congratuations are definitely in order!

Vanir and his lovely wife efreak welcomed their son, Samuel Enzo, into the world yesterday afternoon at 4:15 pm. Everyone is doing fine, and we want to congratulate Vanir and efreak on their new bundle of joy!

The Airspeed Velocity Of An Unladen Balrog

OK, maybe not. But apparently, someone out there has thought at length about how to calculate the terminal velocity of the Balrog while he was fighting Gandalf in the motion picture version of The Two Towers. (link via Monkeyfilter)

Man, there are nerds, and there are neerrrrrrrds. I wanna be this dude when I grow up. :)

The Nail Of The Dragon

As I've mentioned before, since I'm a simulationist and I like it when things that happen in-game make a reasonable degree of sense, I've been having a lot of trouble with the idea that 4e is going to streamline a lot of stuff in the name of gameplay. Now, I'm all for gameplay -- but when stuff doesn't make sense, it tends to take me out of the game. Even when I'm being completely ridiculous and off the wall, what I'm doing generally tends to make sense in the game world unless I'm being deliberately anachronistic or something (as with my bard Bat Loaf, who prays to Sammy Hagar for spells). But that's intentional). When I watch a bad movie because it's a bad movie, I have fun. When I go to a good movie and I discover halfway through nothing makes sense, none of the plot or the characters mean anything to me anymore and I hate that like the sun hates the night. And don't kid yourself, the sun despises the night.

I'm not the only person out there who thinks this way, and WotC knows it. But it's not that they're ignoring us. The guys at Critical Hits recently did a great interview with Rob Heinsoo, lead developer of the 4e core rules. In reference to us simulationist types, he said "You know what, don’t tell them that they’re wrong. They’re right, in a simulationist world, the system they want to use is RIGHT. That is exactly what happens in real life, but guess what, it’s a real pain in the ass."

I suppose I can see that. The first thing that comes to mind that I really hate is camping and deciding who has what watch and how many hours of sleep everybody gets. Yes, it's a fantastic simulation of figuring out who sleeps when. It's also as fun as having my teeth drilled. I hope they severely gloss that part over in 4e. But combat? The new, more-official, very World of Warcraft-y combat roles they're rolling out with 4e make me a little nervous. Making me more nervous is that they want to make what you do in combat "cooler" and "more like the movies". This to me throws up about ten red flags that say "stupid things are about to happen that don't make sense". You know, like in almost every movie.

How A 500 Foot Monster Taught Me How To Love Again

I find the less I know about something, the more fun I have when I watch it. Sometimes I hate being a nerd. I saw Cloverfield a couple months ago, and shortly thereafter I read a very interesting article about what it might take to actually take out a 500 foot monster. Well, naturally that got me thinking about dealing with other giant monsters recently and how the lance our paladin hit the Tarrasque with wouldn't have done much damage at all and eventually my mind wandered back to a scenario I always wondered about ever since I first started playing D&D:

How in the HELL does a 6 foot tall adventurer take a wee (albeit powerful) little sword and kill a dragon that stands ten times his height? All he could realistically reach would be the dragon's feet! Maybe he could climb on there and attack an ankle. I don't know. But most plate-mail-wearing fighters aren't gonna pull a Legolas and climb and flip all over everything. Right? They're gonna wade in there, hopefully dodge the fiery death and razor sharp talons the dragon throws at them, and try to cut the dragon until it dies. Somehow.

Uh oh. It seems my desire for "making sense" has painted me into a corner. At this point, the only way to kill a dragon that really makes sense is that he hacks the dragon's toenail completely off. Hopefully the dragon is a hemophiliac, and bleeds out really fast before it gets a chance to have an order of fresh, delicious, flame-broiled Adventurer Nuggets.

It seems the concept of hit points has already abstracted out most of the battle for me. Because a fighter that winds up on top probably didn't just do 400hp of Toe Damage. He probably did a lot of really incredible things to make that dragon keel over dead. Things that set dragons to bleed, princesses to swoon, and bards to write furiously.

It seems what I was worried about had already come to pass -- several years before I was born, when D&D (and hit points) were created. And the world didn't end.

So Now What?

This revelation gave me the ability to handwave some of my fears about the upcoming fourth edition of D&D. But I'm not cured completely. I still want everything to make sense, but sometimes it's better if I don't know all the details. Or if those details get somewhat exaggerated. With the things our characters do, we're doing epic, legendary things. And let's face it -- a lot of mythology doesn't make a whole lot of sense.

I guess my chainmail panties are only in a half-twist now.

Resurrection in D&D: Don't Fear the Reaper?

I've been having some discussions recently with my cohorts about the concept of resurrection in D&D. Two of the guys in our gaming group, Sirgeekelot and Kanati, have vehemently argued that it is incredibly broken as it works now. Why?

Why resurrection Sucks

The primary complaint I hear on why resurrection sucks in D&D is that the players no longer fear death. This poses two problems. First, a player is far more apt to do things that may result in their death if they're pretty sure they're just going to get brought back to life after it's all over. They might just charge recklessly into battle, they may intentionally sacrifice their lives heroically, or they may just be more prone to taking big risks. In gameplay terms, no fear of death means players won't think so hard about smarter ways to fight something -- which means it's much more appealing to (as Kanati puts it) "swing your sword over your head and re-enact a scene from Braveheart".

The other problem with no fear of death is that it greatly sucks the drama out of a situation. You're going to be very, very interested in what's going on if your 18th level character you've raised from a puppy is near death and there's no bringing him back. Happy? Probably not -- unless, of course, he wins and continues to live! Drama is exciting. Fear of character death gives players a vested interest in not doing stupid things, and when the party does overcome the big baddie at the end of the dungeon against incredible odds it's like winning the Super Bowl. (Only better, and the rings give +2 to all saves.)

Why resurrection Might Not Be So Bad

I don't know about the rest of you, but I've played a lot of videogame RPGs in my day. In most of those games, if a PC dies, you can get them ressurected somewhere for a steep fee, or carry magic items to do it, or use magic. Just like in D&D. The only way the game ends is if the whole party croaks. But in videogames, you can typically restart at the last save point.

When you start getting into higher levels in both genres, they commonly start throwing enemies at you with abilities that can kill a character in one shot. The counter to that is to ressurect the dead PC. It's a gameplay mechanic, the antidote to the poison of death. Sure, this kind of approach to individual character death is about as dramatic as an oatmeal breakfast WITH EXCITING PEACH SLICES. I get that. To a player, the thought of their PC dying is more frustrating than it is sad or traumatic.

However, if the whole party bites it in D&D, there's no save. If the battle is close or going poorly for the group, it's dramatic. The players are all worried about dying then. They're all engaged. They all want to find some way to defeat the enemy and rise to victory. They could even engage in (gasp) team play in order to keep everybody alive.

Does It Blend?

In the end, I personally think resurrection fits the way D&D works currently simply because it's a needed gameplay element. I don't think it's necessarily bad, just different than the real world. It does take away from the drama of combat in some ways and it prevents certain story plots from occurring, but in my tiny little simulationist brain it fits the world around it. (I tend to think of it as fantasy healthcare for the rich and powerful.)

As I said before, even in our gaming group there's greatly differing opinions on this topic, so I'd love to hear yours. Please commence gentlemanly melee combat in our comments section if you so desire.

No matter how you feel on the topic -- as roleplayers, I would heartily suggest that you do not simply take your PC's lives for granted. Remember, you may not stay dead, but dying HURTS REALLY BAD!

Queen of Pork Belly Futures

There's a hilarious bit on the current Presidential candidates as D&D monsters over at Boing Boing this morning. As a person who has contemplated his own magic resistance, this RULED.

As an aside, I was trying to clean up a double-posted comment on Dante's post yesterday and apparently I was clicking like E. Honda because I have somehow managed to irreversibly delete both comments. Sorry 'bout that. We're not in the business of silencing people unless they're spamming or being abusive, so I just wanted to clear that up before someone called us evil Overlords or something.

Wait, if you feel like calling me that I totally did that on purpose.

Are You There, Pelor? It's Me, Margaret.

I didn't grow up in a particularly religious household, but I did grow up believing in God. But, being a little nerdy kid who wanted all the answers, I was never really big on the whole idea of faith. I wanted to know (among many things) where God was, where Heaven was, how exactly to get there, and how not to burn in Hell.

I suppose it was a little worse for me not going to church because at least people who do have scripture to try to answer a few of these questions, but by and large pretty much anybody who believes in a higher power just has to take it on faith that what they believe and the power they believe in are up there and they don't get a whole lot of proof to back it up. Unless, of course, you're a pantheist, in which case the air you breathe and the electricity powering your computer are proof enough. Having to take the existence of such a being on faith can lead a person to doubt that faith under the right circumstances. Even Mother Teresa wasn't immune to such things.

Your average D&D cleric, on the other hand, doesn't have this problem. Ever. They wake up in the morning, and pray, and then their deity grants them superpowers. A crisis of faith for a cleric doesn't typically consist of "does my god exist" (well, unless the spells stop coming some morning). It would be much more of a question of "do I believe in the values this deity stands for, and am I an appropriate champion for this person". A cleric basically embodies this deity's power and they are this god's physical presence in the mortal world. Sure, you hear about the gods visiting in person now and then. And you also hear about giant cataclysmic battles and gods dying and their bodies turning into mountain ranges and magic leaving the world for a time -- typically it royally sucks for mortals when the gods visit so they don't do it much. At any rate, an interesting roleplaying opportunity (if you are bored with your do-gooder standard cleric, for instance) would be to have him realize he's not on the right path. He could go several other directions including to a different class, or to a different god who suits him better. Not to say that this would be without consequences. In addition to disillusionment with life and general despair, loss of faith is loss of powers (and a haunted cemetery is a hell of a time to realize you and Corellon aren't getting along very well). Depending on the cleric's deity, there might even be a little divine retribution on the way. Which could be grandiose and mystical but more likely it's just some members of the cleric's former order coming by to play "dogpile on the blasphemer". All of this would make for fantastic roleplaying fodder (conflict is the mother of interesting characters, after all), but I would highly recommend working with one's DM beforehand if you plan to do this to avoid suddenly finding yourself in the aforementioned "haunted cemetery without the ability to turn undead" scenario and subsequent death from PHB trauma to your skull.

One thing I never did understand about gods (in D&D and real life) is why they desire (or require?) mortals to believe in them and worship. Especially for people in a fantasy realm who get superpowers, it seems like the gods are getting the raw end of the deal. But since they're gods, we mere mortals cannot comprehend their desires, and we just don't understand the rules. So when your god asks for macaroni pictures, just give them to him. This is not to say, of course, that the other all-powerful being in your D&D campaign (that's you, DMs!) cannot come up with a reason why the gods might want something, and consequently why the PCs need to do it for them.

One interesting thing to consider is that a non-cleric person in a fantasy realm might have a much easier time believing in their god because they've seen divine magic in action. Maybe their local cleric healed them or something. Watching the wound I got from a rabid opossum suddenly stop hurting and close up before my eyes would make me believe in something higher than myself. However, I don't imagine most peasants have any ranks in Knowledge(Arcana) and arcane magic is going to look like the work of the gods to them as well. (I suppose it is the work of the gods in the Forgotten Realms, in a way, but that's beside the point.) The PC's might be able to easily tell a mage from a priest, but even a low level wizard could fool the natives into following "the will of the gods" to his own ends. How many of us here have ever cast Light on something to fool a mob of rubes? You know, the more I think about it, the more I'm glad I'm not a peasant in the Forgotten Realms. I might see one gp my entire life, which some crooked illusionist will trick me out of, and then when I go out into the forest to chop wood I can get eaten by a manticore. I don't need to worry about manticores! I have way too much to worry about already!

One last thing lest I rant any further about my irrational fear of manticores: Katherine, who plays D&D regularly with the SR crew, recently played a character who was a cleric of the sun god Horus-Re. About halfway through the campaign, she had an extremely spectacular (and complicated) crisis of faith in our current campaign when her friend (a paladin of Horus-Re) got killed -- so much so that she spent the next several months after his death being generally disillusioned and hard to deal with. In the end, her character refused to be brought back from the dead due to her religious beliefs that the afterlife was a better place and a natural part of having lived and her role on the Prime Material was finished. (Think Buffy season 6 except without all the angst or coming back.) Now that's dedication to roleplaying, people! (Although it did rob us of our precious healing bitch.)

This particular incident was interesting to me both because it was well roleplayed and because of the player who did it. You see, Katherine is an ordained minister. When we first met her, we'd invited her husband to play with us and he mentioned his wife wanted to play as well. About three nights before they show up he mentions her job -- so we were initially somewhat hesitant when she wanted to play with us, because most of us were used to minsters thinking of D&D in rather negative terms. To be honest, I had visions of this new player demanding we play a modified version of D&D in which nobody casts spells lest our souls be damned and I wasn't about to have some newbie performing an exorcism in my dining room. Thankfully, Katherine turned out not only to be not like that at all, but to be a very deep and excellent roleplayer. Not only that, but she also writes a fantastic series on her blog called DMing the Bible in which she is, in her words "looking at Biblical texts with the eyes of a Biblical Scholar and as a Dungeon Master". I've never read anything like it before and even if you're not a Christian or religious, you're going to find what amounts to a gatling gun loaded with new and interesting ways to look at our chosen method of fun shooting you directly in the face and brain. It's really great stuff, and I wholeheartedly encourage you to read it. (And I'm not just saying that because she knows where I live!)

Gary Gygax 1938-2008

I just read that Gary Gygax died.

I met him a couple times, he was always very nice. He helped make something that shaped the person I turned out to be, and we'll all miss him.

When I was at lunch, I bought a Mountain Dew and poured one out on the curb for our dear departed Dungeon Master. It seemed kinda silly, but I didn't really know what else to do.

Aim for the higher planes, old friend. :(

Critical Failure #5

Any time I get an idea that makes me snort-laugh more than twice, no matter how stupid it is, I must consider sharing it with the world. Sorry everyone!

I am equally sorry that this has also been made into a T-shirt, available for purchase at the Stupid Merchant. If I can see JUST ONE person wearing this at Gen Con this year, I will die happy. It will rekindle my belief in the mysteries of the universe.... AND the Internets!

Hey, at least it wasn't an "All Your Base" parody. :)

The Responsibility of Hosting

Every game needs to be hosted somewhere, even if it is in the mysterious tubes of the internets. But for those of us who have not yet received your brain jack implant, we usually pick somebody's house. After last week's post on dungeon management styles, I found myself looking for other similar topics and ran across an article by a rather smart man named Robert Donoghue called Utility of Manners.

There's a lot of really good stuff in that article that make me step back and think about things for a moment. For starters:

"the host often has additional authority to allow them to fulfill those responsibilities. This is non-dictatorial. With the exception of kicking people out, any authority granted to the host, such as the ability to establish a schedule, plan events and so on, is ceded to them by guests for any number of reasons. Most often it is because the guests understand that these things must happen, but they are not in a position to do so themselves."

I find this interesting because the DM might find themselves in this position one of two ways: as host of the game and as physical host of the group. I know a very large number of groups depend on the DM to do all the organizing and scheduling as well as planning and running the game.

"Sometimes guests step up and assist with these responsibilities - they clear dishes, clean up, drive people home and so on. Done right, this can greatly decrease the burden on the host, but this does not absolve the host of responsibility.

This is all opinion, so take it as that, but it is also something else: it is and explanation of what I consider the necessity of the GM.

(And as a small additional point, it is also part of the reason I object to the GM as host)"

The man's got a point. If the DM has to physically host the game, it's more for him to have to worry about than just planning the adventure.

Depending on your group (and your chosen host), getting ready for a session might take a little time or a lot. In our group, wherever we play (which could be several locations), the host generally tends to clean up the place before people show up and cleans up once everybody leaves. They get some help at the end of the night but by and large if we host at my house I spend 5-10 minutes cleaning up a mountain of soda cans and sweeping up crumbs. We order a pizza usually, which makes food prep and dish cleanup pretty easy -- but if you're the type of group that sits down to a home-cooked meal beforehand, this could get a lot more time-intensive.

If you're a DM and you feel like you have way too much to do and there's never enough time to get everything done before the session starts, this might be a good thing to look at. Talk to your group, and see if you can take some of the non-DM-specific responsibilities off your shoulders and put them on one of the five or six other pairs of shoulders in your group. Work it into your group's social contract. This will distract them so that you can more easily plan their untimely demises.

XYZ - Examine Your Dungeon Management Style

Okay, "dungeon management style" doesn't start with a "Z". So sue me.

Way back when I was in college (sweet Odin, has it really been almost 10 years?), I had to take classes on management and small group communication. It was lots of stuff that didn't interest me at the time, but ever since I left school and started working a real job I recognize little snippets of those classes' materials every now and then. Lately, I realized some of it might apply to roleplaying games too!

Herding +3 Cats

You're about to play DM for your group. You've carefully worked out a plot and encounters to run and now there's 6-8 people sitting there who are going to do things you never expected to happen in your wildest dreams. One of them is consuming mass quantities of E.L. Fudge cookies. You fear for the well-being of the story and the campaign, to say nothing of your sanity. You have also probably devised means by which to cope with this.

In management theory, you can view the roles of the management and employees lots of different ways. I'm going to briefly go over three of them commonly discussed together, known as XYZ management theory. X,Y, and Z are all different styles.

• Theory X assumes that workers hate work and believes that you have to exert a lot of direct control over the workforce or they'll never get anything done. The boss calls the shots, the workers don't get a say, and if anyone doesn't do what he says they're subject to disciplinary action. Theory X managers are generally not well-liked.
  
• Theory Y is different in that it assumes workers are creative or inspired and would be happy to do work of their own accord if left to their own devices. Management shares decisions with the group, and feedback is generally welcome.
• Theory Z is sort of a hybrid of X and Y. While less participative than Y, it has a much higher regard for the needs of the employees than X. It also assumes that the workforce is happy to do their jobs provided the management is going to support them and look out of their needs.

So what does all this have to do with roleplaying games? While I don't think that XYZ management theory maps 1:1 with everything we do in roleplaying, I do think some important parallels can be drawn.

Dungeon Management Theory X

I'm assuming many of our readers have had to play a session with a DM who might take enforcing the social contract just a smidge too seriously. I've seen amazing feats of douchebaggery such as EXP penalties for a player being late to the session.

This is an example of X, albeit an extreme one. This DM wants things done his way or he will exercise his vast powers and authority and put offenders back in their place. He's authoritarian. (And an asshole, but that is another story.) I'm all about setting guidelines for the group, and if there's a problem you bring it up as a group. If you can't work it out, then maybe it's time for the offender to find a different group to play with. But petty disciplinary action? You're playing D&D to have fun. In my opinion, this does a hell of a lot more harm than good and I for one advocate talking through things like grownups. Grownups wearing elven chainmail.

There are much saner versions of X you'll see now and then. From an administrative standpoint, Theory X groups typically follow the DM's lead. He may have come up with the social contract, or still be using the one that was there when he joined. The degree to which this goes varies between groups, of course. I've seen groups let the DM have sole jurisdiction over everything from where/when they play, if new players can join, to whether he gets free pizza. I've seen a lot of perfectly functional groups work this way, and I've seen some flame out and die when everybody wasn't on board with the man in charge.

Interestingly, I've also seen Theory X groups play and switch DM's. Then it's the new guy's call on everything. (And I've seen a lot of scared looks around the table when the new guy does something way different than the old one.)

As far as actual gameplay goes, I've seen several DMs (myself included) attempt to put the session "on rails", where the players are still doing things but by and large what happens is in full control of the DM. Invisible walls are a tool I've seen used to do this, as are powerful creatures that the PCs can attack all day but never hurt - and the DM explains away everything. This is not to say that Theory X gameplay is necessarily bad, but having the players' destiny out of their own hands too long can lead to unrest.

Dungeon Management Theory Y

Administratively speaking, in a Theory Y group, most things are subject to vote by the group. Where you play, when you play, who's in, who's out, what's for dinner. The group establishes the social contract, and they can collectively change it whenever they feel like it.

In gameplay under a Theory Y campaign, the DM lays out places the party can go and things they can do, and the party decides where to go. They get nudges now and then, but for the most part it's the party's decision. Theory Y can lead to some seriously amazing adventures and it feels wonderful working as a group -- unless the group has no idea where the hell they are supposed to go and they are blind to Leopold the Dancing Plot Point who is doing the Riverdance right in front of them. Then they get frustrated. Too much of that, and you've got unrest among the ranks!

You can't win! OR CAN YOU?

Dungeon Management Theory Z

“If you tighten the string too much, it will snap. And if you leave it too slack, it won’t play.”
- Siddhartha, Epic Level Buddhist

Like its management theory counterpart, Theory Z is a hybrid between X and Y. The DM has a bit more weight in the decision making process than the rest of the group, but the group still makes the bigger decisions for itself. For instance, in our gaming group, the DMs sometimes make a call on where we should play so they can sequester in the basement and plan our demise. But other times, we play somewhere else in case someone can't get a babysitter.

Gameplay under Theory Z is, unsurprisingly, a mix between X and Y. The world may be wide open for exploration sometimes, but there's places to go and things to do that need to be accomplished, and the DM will nudge a bit harder to get them there.
Players in a Theory Z game might recognize the signs that this nudging is occurring, and metagame just a little to go with the flow. There's give and take, and the players know the DM is going to throw them a bone eventually in the name of fun.

But Which One Is My Group?

Good question! Your group may not map to one of these exactly, or it might handle things like Theory X administratively but play like a Theory Y. The point isn't to have a label to assign to your group and to your DM, it's to get you to step back and take a look at how you play. Knowing how you play and how you think might be more fun for everyone might make the difference for your group's roleplaying experience -- especially if some players aren't having a good time right now!

Well, now I don't feel quite so much like all those hours in class were such a waste of time. How does your group play? Are there any variations that your group does that I haven't described here? Throw us a comment, and let us know!

Someone Set Gen Con Up The Bomb

In internets time this is old news, but some of you may have noticed that Gen Con filed for bankruptcy yesterday. For those of you who haven't read the article, the con is thankfully still on this August. Apparently, all this nastiness is a result of them being sued by Lucasfilm. You don't mess with George Lucas. Stormtroopers are really nothing but his gigantic legal team dressed in costume, except in real life they CAN hit the broad side of a barn. And I'm no stormtrooper, but last time I checked, Chapter 11 bankruptcy means sometimes the creditor winds up getting the assets of the debtor. That could mean a Lucas-owned Gen Con.

I really have to wonder what Gary Gygax thinks of all this stuff since the first Gen Con was held at his house. I somehow doubt he looked into a crystal ball and said "One day, this will be owned by Hasbro but then sold to a private individual who made a fortune off of cards with paintings and numbers them who was then sued by the people who will one day make a great space movie trilogy and then three seriously lackluster prequels". Perhaps I am wrong?

Times Change

I don't know if I'm the only one, but in recent years, I have noticed a change in the 'con -- and not necessarily for the better. I have noticed the sales floor shrinking rapidly. I noticed the Art Show suddenly occupying 1/3 of what used to be the sales floor two years ago. I saw less special guests brought by the convention itself and more from individual companies. Because, you know, Hayden Panettiere hawking a CCG about horses is what I drive to Indy for.

Up until a couple years ago, this really bothered me. Used to be, I came to Gen Con so I could basically do aggravated damage to my visa account. My first 'con was in 1997, and I beheld stuff with my own eyes that I had only seen in Dragon magazine before when I was a kid. The only place that sold D&D books around me was Waldenbooks, and they didn't have much. And I didn't have any money to buy anything back then, so this was like retail Christmas. The Chessex booth alone damn near killed me. Now, it's different. And I wonder whether it's the 'con or just times changing. These days, you can get pretty much anything your little heart desires on the Internet. And they've gotten rid of most of the really fun shops that sell stuff you can't find other places. (Apparently, you can find bootleg copies of old cartoons on the Internet. Who knew??!)

Why I'll Still Be Going

For me, though, there was a silver lining for all of this. Once the "main attractions" started to get worse for me and I started wondering if this yearly trek was worth it, I decided to go one last time and actually try some events. That got me into Nascrag and True Dungeon.

I could care less at this point if they can get big name actors to show up. I could care less if the sales floor is giant and tempting. It's close enough for me to get to easily, and it draws enough people that I can still have a lot of fun with new friends. And as long as that's still there, I'll be on the road every August. We are Gen Con. All of us. And as long as we keep going somewhere each year to have fun, none of this matters.

We're looking forward to this year in particular because this website has revealed to us a lot of new friends and readers we'd like to meet. I envision unparalleled levels of Completely Awesome.

Gen Con is one of my favorite events of the entire year, and I really wish the folks at Gen Con well. I hope they can weather all of this and keep on producing the event we've all come to know and love.

I Love My Wife Dearly, But She Is Really Strange Sometimes

I do have to mention, though, that when I told my wife Efreak (who is a professional graphic designer) about the whole bankruptcy thing, she got this evil gleam in her eye and said "does this mean you'll be going to Dragon*Con from now on?"

She's the only person I know who would have me travel another 800 miles just because she hates Gen Con Indy's checkered-flag logo.

Admittedly, it's about as "nerd" as having a deer's antlered head in some crosshairs and having the text appear in camouflage tones. Or maybe a mud-covered pickup truck. Or HHH and Mankind IN A PINK SLIP ON A POLE MATCH.

Throw Up The Horns

Every now and then, I find out something that just transcends the boundaries of awesome.

I grew up in a time where the best musicians had big guitars and bigger hair. They saw a million faces, and they rocked them all. I love rock. I have been known to throw up the horns during meetings at work.

I never really gave much thought to the gesture's origins. I'd heard it was "devil horns" once or twice, but I never really worried about it (any more than I worried about, say, Black Sabbath's music corrupting me). Admittedly, when I was a teenager, I was accidentally throwing up American Sign Language for "I love you", which is about as metal as oatmeal. I have since rectified this.

And now, I come to find out that the Rock Horns are actually a Protection Against Evil spell.

Frankly, the part of the article that suggests that a rock concert is "forming an enormous shield against the evil eye" is the coolest thing I have ever heard. Although I must question why some more powerful demons would fear a minotaur. Perhaps shadow-puppetry is their secret weakness?

Regardless, I seriously think if I go outside there is going to be a motorcycle equipped with bat wings waiting for me right now.


---

Speaking of rocking out, we here at SR have become hopelessly addicted to the Guitar Hero series (and Rock Band) as of late. Me, I'm stuck on (ironically, The Metal on Expert).

If you'd like to compare scores or test your *ahem* mettle against the might of Bat Loaf, go ahead and shoot me a message or a friend request. BUT BE WARNED!!!! I choke in multiplayer!!!!!!!

Vanir's Xbox 360 Gamertag:


Vanir's guitarhero.com profile:
batloaf

Dante and Stupid Ranger's guitarhero.com profile (the family that rocks together, stays together):
Dante8

If there's enough interest, maybe we could even start up a tour group?

Either way, rock on, and keep on casting Protection From Evil!

<Vanir has left the building>

More Random Thoughts

I read an article on The DM's Blog earlier this week that talked about how one of his friend won't play 4E until they get rid of hitpoints. And since I was writing about random number generation about the same time, that got me thinking about why on Earth hitpoints should be random. I always hate rolling for them because I'm always scared I'm going to roll a 1 or a 2 every level for the life of the character and end up with this anemic dude who is afraid to walk in tall grass for fear it will whip him unconscious if the wind blows.

That got me wondering why we roll for stat points when we create our characters. And that got me thinking about how it'd be super keen if we could just have a pool of stat points to distribute however we wanted. Then I remembered that there were already point buy systems in D&D and I hated them.

Well THAT got me thinking why I hated them. Sure, it's fair and you can construct your character however you choose. But I don't like to point buy because it encourages a lot of seriously bland, mediocre characters maximized for a purpose. If you roll your stats at random, you might wind up with some uberstats and some horrible ones, all uber, all crap, all mediocre -- you don't know what you're gonna get. You can base a character around their strong points and their flaws, and you could do that with the point buy too. But a lot of times, that's how an idea for a character pops into my head -- Lumbar came about when I had high STR and high WIS and a low CON. So I decided he was a powerful warrior who drank heavily but couldn't hold his liquor (or stay conscious in battle) due to inheriting his father's "delicate constitution". You can draw inspiration from LOTS of places -- this happens to be one of my favorites.

Life might not be random, per se, but it's certainly not constant and invariable -- sometimes you're never quite sure what you're going to get hit with next. Randomness gives us a little taste of that. I'm very very curious to see how 4E is going to handle such things, as they seem to be taking a much more hands-on approach to character development this time around, what with the new skill and ability trees.

Personally, I'm a little worried that they're going to blandify things. Dante is currently alternating between trying to ease my mind with reassuring words and silencing my nervous bleating with the Official DM Half-Nelson. Stupid carotid artery. Either way, one of these months I will awaken from being rendered unconscious and we will see how this "fourth edition" plays out.

Random Thoughts

Every now and then I hear an argument that has been around as long as there have been laptops and PDA's to bring to the D&D table: "You're not using REAL DICE!"

Some say it takes away from the spirit of the game or sucks the magic out. I've seen go so far as to accuse the guy running a dieroller program of cheating. I have to say, I don't really get either of those.

In Which Vanir Divulges The OTHER Reason He Is Surprised He Successfully Wed

I'm a computer programmer by trade, and I've been coding since I was literally about 5. Granted, the programs back then were about the Dukes of Hazzard and didn't really do much aside from:

10 PRINT "BOSS HOGG IS MEAN"

20 GOTO 10

Regardless, once I got a little older and learned about generating random numbers, it wasn't really a giant mental leap when I realized rolling dice was just random number generation for luddites. And while I can say there is a definite thrill in rolling a d20 during a critical moment and having everyone watch the die roll from your hand, hearts leaping in anticipation with every bounce to see if they all live or die -- well, that anticipation is still there if the player clicks "ROLL" in his die roller. It does suck a little that everyone can't see what you rolled, but then again I know lots of people who use DM screens or simply just have too much junk on the table for people to see what got rolled. And I can't honestly say I haven't still cheered when one of our laptop-die-rollers saves the day.

"But", you say, "dierollers aren't TRULY RANDOM!" Well, no. But it's close enough. Computers usually use what's called pseudorandom numbers, which in a nutshell means the computer takes some number it has access to that is going to change rapidly and often (like the computer's internal clock) and does some math on it that produces a number that is, for most intents and purposes, random. If you're going to run quantum physics experiments, or you're a hardcore computer scientist, or you're just THAT ANAL, then yeah, pseudorandom numbers might not work for you. Rolling d20 to hit a goblin? Not really an issue so much!



Dirty Rotten Cheaters

As far as cheating, anybody who thinks dice are 100% fair is kidding themselves. Loaded dice have been around ever since it became profitable to cheat, and they even sell loaded polyhedrals at Gen Con. And I can remember attempting to come up with harebrained schemes at a teenager with a friend of mine on how to influence our die rolls by spinning the dice or palming a certain number up. It didn't always work, but it did sometimes. I'd be willing to bet holding the dice funny would get you really closely watched at a casino at the very least!

Sure, writing a computer program that cooked the results wouldn't be very hard. And I suppose it might be a little harder to detect if cheating had occurred. But if you're rolling 19 or 20 every other roll, people are going to look at you funny no matter what you're using.

Besides, people who cheat at D&D need to die from blunt force cranial trauma from a PHB regardless of method.


Die Roller Resources

For those of you who want to use a die roller on your PC or Mac, here's a good one that probably does WAAAAAY more than you need it to.

http://www.aroooo.com/rpg_stuff/dice_roller/

Linux guys, sorry -- they don't have a version of that out for you. But if you install Ruby, you can use this instead! (Or write your own, I know how you guys are.)

http://www.rubyquiz.com/quiz61.html

There's a swell web-based die roller at Pen, Paper, Pixel:

http://www.penpaperpixel.org/tools/d20dicebag.htm

If you have an iPhone, you could always try out this web-based iPhone dice roller (but don't tell Yax -- he didn't much care for it!)

http://yoav.org/dice/index.html

Me, I stick to real dice most of the time but if I'm playing somewhere without a real table to roll on I'm using a homebrew application on my Nintendo DS (you'll need a cartridge that lets you run homebrew).

http://forums.gleemax.com/showpost.php?p=14642664&postcount=2



No matter what you use, it's always a good idea to check in with your DM to make sure using your shiny new die roller is kosher. PHB's don't do subdual!

Can't say any big surprises here....

Law's Game Style created with QuizFarm.com

You scored as Method Actor You think that gaming is a form of creative expression. You may view rules as, at best, a necessary evil, preferring sessions where the dice never come out of the bag. You enjoy situations that test or deepen your character's personality traits. Method Actor 100% Storyteller 83% Specialist 83% Tactician 75% Butt-Kicker 67% Power Gamer 50% Casual Gamer 8%

Win 4e Books at Dungeon Mastering

Our good buddy Yax over at Dungeon Mastering is hosting a contest where you can win a free set of D&D 4E books if you subscribe to his RSS feed via email, and he's asked us to spread the word.

So, if you:

A. like getting emails with cool D&D stuff in them

and

B. enjoy getting free D&D books

then I would highly recommend you go get more information at the following link lest we think you have taken temporary stat damage to your INT and WIS scores.



http://www.dungeonmastering.com/news/dnd-4e-subscribe-and-win

Consider yourselves informed!!!!!!!!!!

If Swapping Feats Does Not Make Sense, You Must Acquit

Saturday night while leveling up, we all were pleased to discover we were level 21 and thusly able to take our first real live Epic Feat. I decided to go for Epic Inspiration from the DMG, which would make many of the effects of my music last 10x longer. However, way back at first level, I had taken Lingering Song from Song & Silence, which just doubled it.

Given that I now had redundant feats, I decided to use the retraining rules from the PHB2 that let you swap feats. I was all ready to take this cool feat that let my music affect the undead and swap out Lingering Song when I read a little passage that basically derailed my plans. Apparently, if you're going to swap a feat out, you can only take another feat that you would have met the prerequisites for at the time you took the first feat. And since I took Lingering Song at first level.... I couldn't so much do it.

Well, needless to say, this got my bardic panties in an uproar and I immediately brought this offense to the attention of our DM's. It simply did not make sense that I wouldn't be able to swap these, not knowing that I would need to keep track of my prerequisites when I take every feat. Hell, the PHB2 and this silly rule wasn't even out when I made Bat Loaf. Plus it was redundant and it was sort of an upgrade anyway. And I didn't meet the prerequisites then but I certainly do NOW. And I should be able to swap my feats without these silly arbitrary rules getting in the way dammit!

Our DM's carefully thought about the situation and determined that no, there's a reason for this. Taking a feat with prerequisites means it's more powerful. And if I can just swap out all my first level feats for stuff that I couldn't take until 15th level, I'm going to be a lot more powerful. Some might even say unbalanced.

Unfortunately, that made sense to me, so I was forced to stop my campaign to get my feat swapped out. Fortunately, the Stupid Ranger was at the table and quickly determined two things. First, I had taken Skill Focus (Perform) as my last feat, which I could take whenever the hell I wanted (including first level). Secondly, I had somehow forgotten to take a feat somewhere along the way. Which she figured out two seconds after seeing my list of feats somehow. ("Are you a human? Did you forget your bonus feat at first level?") She scares me sometimes, but I am really glad she is on our side.

Anyway, now I've got all the feats I wanted plus one I didn't know I was going to get. The moral of the story? There are two, in my mind:

• As a DM, you are going to have players (like me) who are going to argue that rules should be changed because they "don't make sense".
• As a player, you must realize that some rules really don't make sense, but are necessary for game balance.

Honestly, I sort of suspected there was a reason behind the feat-swapping rule, but I just wanted to see if I could push my luck. But one of the hardest things for me to deal with when roleplaying is a rule that exists just to support part of the system. A good example of this is the rumored 4th edition rule where a magic ring will work for an 11th level character but not for a 10th.

I ran across a fantastic post on the ENworld forums that helped explain it a little to me -- there are Simulationists (people like me, who think the rules should reflect how things would work in the "real" world) and Gamists (people who think gaming systems should be balanced and the world constructed to meet those rules). I think 4E is going more toward the Gamists, which I can't honestly say I'm happy about, but I did realize something important that is going to help me deal when 4E drops:

The real world isn't fair. People have unfair advantages all the time. People get screwed all the time. That's just the way it works. Gaming (well, good gaming) doesn't work like that. Steps are taken to ensure that play is balanced so everybody has a good time. And if you attempt to make sense and install order in a simulation of the real world (or a fantasy version thereof), it starts to get arbitrary and unnatural. The trick, I t