The cast of characters

Sorry that it has taken so long for me to get back on track here but hopefully I’ll be writing up the D&D campaign summary notes today. First I wanted to write a character background summary and post it. Some of the backgrounds are more fleshed out than others but hopefully that will change the more we play.

• Rochor (Played by John) - Rochor is a young goliath warden that has been forced out of his ancestral home by a large tribe of Giants, led by the infamous Troog Ironclub. This tribe killed or enslaved Rochor’s whole clan and made the goliath’s caverns their new lair. Rochor only escaped this fate because he was out hunting at the time of the invasion. When he returned from hunting he found that there was nothing he could do to save his home from the giants. He tried to rescue his enslaved clansmen but failed. The only item that he could even salvage from his home was the “Oath Stone”. This polished piece of marble was used by the goliath clan to seal every marriage, was sworn on at coming of age ceremony, and presided in a place of honor during funerals. The Oath Stone is Rochors most precious possession and he carries it in his backpack wherever he goes. After wondering aimlessly for several years the young goliath eventually settled down in the small village of Miners Haven. He was made a deputy by the town’s sheriff, Tolin Goldenhammer. The old dwarf had taken the youth under his wing and trained him to be his replacement. After a year Tolin felt that Rochor was ready, so the long beard left the mainly human village of Miners Haven for his clan’s home in the nearby mountains. Rochor is now the new sheriff of Miners Haven.
• Labya Vagee (played by Gil) - Labya Vagee is a deva cleric of Sehanine Moonbow. Like most of her kind she has lived and died many times before and this body is only her current form of existence. Labya has long worshiped the goddess Sehanine but it is only in her most recent incarnation that she decided to become a cleric. The memories of the many atrocities preformed during her most recent lives forced the “young” deva into a life of serving others and spreading joy. She traveled from town to town for several years ministering to the needy and spreading joy wherever she went. Eventually she met a young gruff goliath named Rachor that had lost everything that he had held dear. The two became fast friends and Labya settled down (at least for now) in the town that he was a deputy in. After Rochor became sheriff of the small village he convinced Labya to become one of his deputies and the two now serve as protectors of the small village of Miners Haven.
• Reva Tallfellow (played by Tim) - Reva Tallfellow is the closest thing that the small village of Miners Haven has to a criminal underground. For several generations his family has run a small time operation that buys and sells items that cannot be found in most lawful establishments. An old secondhand store serves as a thin cover for the operation. It is a very transparent cover because it is well known that Reva is the only fence within 200 or 300 miles. Unfortunately, the territory around the town is sparsely populated so Reve is often struggling to keep his operation in “business”. The halfling rogue does have an understanding however with the local law enforcement. He will not steal from the locals but the caravans and miners that come through town are free game as long as he does not get caught. If he his caught a jail cell awaits him until the traveler leaves town. In exchange for the sheriff’s leniency Reva has to help with any problems that arise where his particular skill set will help solve the problem.
• Rhyme Tallfellow ("Jack" John) - Rhyme Tallfellow is Reva’s cousin. Rhyme comes from a famous family of bards that have long been known as the muses of Vesta (Vesta is the largest city on the frontier). Young Rhyme never really fit in with the rest of the family because he had no interest in the arts or music. In truth, Rhyme actually hates music and he especially hates minstrels. He was almost kicked out of his home by his father when he first enrolled in the local magic school but his mother prevented this. Eventually Rhyme became a fully fledged wizard and he left Vesta on his own accord to live with Reva in Miners Haven. It seems that Reva isn’t particularly happy about his cousin living with him but family is family after all.

That's what I have right now. I still need more information from Nate and Ricky on their caracters to flesh them out. Nate is a Dwarf Shaman (old man of mountain) and Ricky is a dragonborn Warlord (the other deputy).

D&D campaign overview

I’ve been putting a lot of thought into getting ready to continue our local D&D campaign. Unfortunately, I’m not sure that this is really a “continuation” because our last session about five months ago ended with a total party kill. I’m considering it a continuation because the new story line is going to deal with the repercussions of the failed mission. I came up with the idea for this setting to make it easier to use the large miniature collection that I have without having to think out to much why something was there.

In my D&D world I’ve taken the concept of “many points of light. Fighting off the darkness” and of portals leading to different plains to a new level. This world contains many portals that lead to different worlds altogether. These portals can be opened from either side but only sealed shut from the side that the PCs inhabit. Many of the inhabitants of this world grew tired of their world serving as a cosmic battle ground for other worlds and as a result a great crusade was fought to destroy or close most of these portals result long ago. Unfortunately, since the fall of the great Dragonborn Empire over six hundred years ago there has been no organized effort making sure that these portals remain close. As a result many of these portals are becoming active once more.

In the last adventures one of the PCs were on a holy quest to make sure that one of these portals remain closed. On they way to close the portal the PCs encountered missionaries from Protectorate of Menoth (had come through a portal but the PCs didn’t know that), killed off a tribe of Kobolds, and rescued some badly needed supplies for a small village. Unfortunately once the group entered the Dungeon the real trouble began. The first two or three encounters were relatively easy but then the party decided to make camp in a room with only one way in and one way out. Then at night they were attacked by a mob of hobgoblins that wiped out all but two party members (that’s 4 dead characters). These two guys only survived because they made a run for it while the Paladin held off the hobgoblins for 5 or so rounds.

So these two guys go back to town and round up a new party (along with some NPC help). This group made it all the way to the portal room but the group was pretty beat up by the time they reached there (keep in mind the party knew that they were up against a time limit before the portal was opened). They tried to stop the ritual but the party was too beat up and did not have enough time to accomplish their goal. Once the ritual was complete, the portal opened and an army of rat-men (yes Skaven) marched through. As the last of the players died he was able to collapse the exit to the dungeon (slowing the rat-men down but not stopping them). So that was 6 more dead characters for a total of 12 over about 5 sessions (I had killed two earlier).

Now the new game is going to pick up a few weeks after the last one ended so Skaven will slowly start to show up in great numbers. I guess we’ll just have to see what happens.

Stepping up to DM again

I have been thinking about running a few sessions of 4th edition D&D for the guys while we wait for Wizards of the Coast to get their act together and release the online gaming table. While I’ve been thinking of what adventure to run, I’ve also been reminiscing about previous D&D games.

One game in particular keeps coming to mind. It was a third edition game and I was running an old second edition Forgotten Realms module, Storm Riders. In the beginning of this module the PCs are suppose to flee from a horde of barbarians (think Mongols) and then meet a woman that serves as the adventure hook for the whole module. First I almost had to kill the party to get them to run away from the 100,000 barbarians (we can take them was actually said at one point). Then when the mystery woman saved the party by forming a bridge made of smoke over a chasm the group’s barbarian almost killed her (I hit her in the head with my sword). The bridge then disappeared with one of the PCs still on it (some lucky rolls saved him from certain death). This introduction went so badly that I should have known that this game was just not going end well. The next three hours were spent role-playing through many diplomatic encounters until will finally reached the next combat encounter. This series of combat encounters took place in a monster infested monastery. Unfortunately the party’s lawful good monk noticed that the thief kept stealing from the monastery’s treasures. When the monk ordered the thief to put back his ill-gotten gains a combat erupted within the party. When the dust settled, 4 of the six party members were dead. The only surviving party members belonged to the two players who had been smart enough to leave the monastery when the fighting began. At this point I looked at my friend Derek and told him that he was DMing from now on.

Hopefully these few sessions that I’m about to run will end better.

D&D forth edition demo

I ran my first demo of forth edition Dungeons and Dragons at the local gaming store today. It was a small turn-out so, I ended up running the game for only three people. I wanted to get the players into combat as soon as possible so we went a bit light on role-playing and I threw the small party right into combat. This way the new players could get a better grasp of the new game mechanics. I figured role-playing is role-playing whatever rules set you use so the main purpose of a demo should be to demonstrate how the rules work. After defeating a hoard of Kobolds, Everyone decided that they liked the new system and wanted to try playing with more players. I committed to running a few more games if the owner of the shop can get the party up to 4 or 5 people.

I’m officially drinking the 4th Edition D&D Kool-Aid

Like many members of Dungeons and Dragon’s “old guard” (people that started playing the game in 1st and 2nd edition), I was furious when Wizards of the Coast announced that they were releasing 4th Edition D&D in 2008. I was sitting in front of my computer browsing the web when I found out and actually yelled at my computer (using a lot of language that cannot be repeated here). How could they do this? D&D 3.5 was only released about four or five years ago! It appeared that I was destined to become one of those gamers that refuses to upgrade to the latest version of my beloved Role-playing game (you know one of those old grouchy guys, sitting in the back of your local game shop and telling anyone who’d listen about how great Advanced Dungeon and Dragons is). Then I began to see previews for this new version of the granddaddy of all RPGs and, surprisingly, I actually found myself liking what I saw.
After talking my D&D group into giving the new version of the game a try, we discovered that we love the new version of this classic game. We have been playing D&D more frequently than we have for years and everyone is having a wonderful time. All of my players have bought the player’s handbook and it looks like the group will be playing forth edition exclusively from now on. Here are a few observations that our group has made:
· This game has to be played with miniatures. If your not going to use miniatures stay with 3rd edition. I personally prefer not to use the D&D miniature line. The modals are just too small and in a weird scale that no other line uses. I suggest the following lines, they’re all pretty close to scale and look fine next to each other on the table:
o Classic Ral Partha (if you can find them)
o Reaver (great for Player Character models and affordable)
o Heroscape models (already painted)
o Mageknight (Very cheap on ebay but you may have to do some rebasing)
o Fantasy warhamer (expensive but great models)
o War-machine/Hoards (expensive but some great monster models to round out your collection)
· Get a good battle-mat. Make sure that it has a grid system already on it and that you can write on it with erasable marker. The “Dungeon Tile” sets put out by Wizards of the Coast are also worth looking into (not to mention great values)
· This new system concentrates on strategic combat. However, you can still role-play any situation in 4th that you could in 3rd. Don’t let someone tell you otherwise
· First level characters actually have a tendency to live, not one to die. Players still die but it is usually because the players did something foolish or the party members are not working together and filling the roles assigned to each class.
· Initially, people look at these new characters and go, “My God, these guys are powerful! Nothing should be able to kill these guys”. The monsters are just as powerful as the characters. Everything just got a boost so that a lucky hit or two doesn’t kill low level players and monsters anymore.
· Teamwork among party members is more important in this edition of D&D than it ever has been before.
I would be willing to still play 3rd edition but I’ll never DM it again (forth edition is just so much easier to run). Oh well, looks like Wizards of the Coast will be getting even more of my money than before.