Campaign 1

            Sorry for the no postings for a while now. School has started (I’m both teaching and taking classes), so I really don’t have time for nightly posts that I don’t need to be spending my time on. Instead I’m going to make time to time updates on a DnD campaign I’m working on.

            This campaign is going to start in a similar fashion to Song of Roland. The players are each leaders and will be given control over a group of soldiers (all minions) and will engage in combat against similarly large armies. I will use a variation of Savage Worlds rules for Using NPCs in order to speed things along.

            The campaign starts with a strategic retreat by their lord. Characters form the rear-guard and are to hold off the invading forces as long as possible. It is impossible to “win”  but players will be rewarded for each wave they successfully fend off before they are overrun and flee. The layout will allow for the players to choose several different defensive tactics. Additionally, if the characters stay too long, they can be killed. It is a very real possibility and will be used to set the tone of the story.  In addition to character experience and levels, I will also be implementing what I am going to call “general levels.” The goal of this is to encourage many parts of combat to involve a great deal of troops. There will be a time for small-man guerilla tactics and there will be a time for large scale war.  At every level even level, Characters will be able to select a general feat that will be seen as an improvement to their NPC minions.

            Options for this will include things like: “hardened soldiers” –minions take two hits to kill from non-elites, “sharpened blades” –NPCs deal +x damage, “Improved armor”--+x to AC, etc. This will cause characters not only to change the NPCs they choose to take into battle, but also tactics they will employ on the battlefield. One character may choose to focus his troops on being master marksman while another may utilize combat mobility to take advantageous positions. This will keep mass encounters from being stale and repetitive. Some abilities will manifest as an encounter power swap (that only swaps on large-scale battles) such as “fire on my mark” that allows all ranged units to fire at once or have a modifier to hit for that round.

            After the first combat, the players will return to their Lord’s keep to find that the forces they were holding off were just a distraction and their lord’s keep is under siege. As a result, returning to the castle is impossible. The keep is well provisioned and defended, so the players know they have some time (though not infinite) to go to the outlying provinces and raise an army to regain access to the keep.  This will now put the players in a solo mission (no army) to get to a village. The players will be given several village options and depending on which they choose, it will limit the available soldiers they can recruit (both in type and number). Players will also be allowed to make diplomacy/streetwise/intimidate checks in order gather information and raise forces.

            I’ll write more on how I am going to progress this storyline later.

Sun's Day--Pop music

            Sunday’s always seem to be the most difficult for me to write. Perhaps the sun’s domains are just too limiting for anything that I might want to write about. For tonight I finally decided to write on music. I really don’t want to make a habit of this, but it is something worth mentioning. I’m going to talk about how today’s pop music scene is destroying the art of music while at the same time being detrimental at society.  I’m going to talk about one artist in particular who is the embodiment of all that is wrong with today’s music trends. That artist is Ke$ha, the name alone should be reason enough.

            There are several reasons why she is doing terrible things. The first and simplest is that she cannot sing. It is obvious that she has no vocal talent and also uses auto-tune to the point that it’s just painful. The value of having a talented voice is apparently no longer needed in order to be a “singer.”

            Secondly, she doesn’t write her own music. I know there has long been a practice for songwriters to write for people, but that doesn’t make it a great option. Especially when the person who is having songs written for them can’t sing. It’s one thing for a virtuoso to have someone write music for them because they spend all of their time honing their talents; this is not the case.

            Thirdly, the lyrics to her songs are just terrible. They are terrible in two very important ways. They are lacking in any poetic structure, taste, rhyme, reason. Songs used to be poetry, complex and beautiful; her are… well, just bad. They are also perhaps some of the most morally depraved songs that are currently popular (I am fully aware that they would probably not make the top 50 dirtiest songs list, but one cannot deny they are rather bawdy).

            I could go into more detail, but frankly I just get more irritated. Her lyrics are poorly constructed, vulgar (in the commoner sense), and absurd. Couple that with poor  singing ability and the belittlement of good values. It leaves you with garbage that somehow is still being played, and, ridiculously enough, making profit. It is a sad state of affairs.

Saturn's Day-- Golden Age of Arcades

            Tonight’s post is going to be very short and sweet. This “golden age” topic is going to be about the wonderful side-scrolling arcade games from the late 80s early 90s (like the old TMNT, Simpsons, DnD, and, of course, X-men games). These are games that sadly, do not stand the test of time.

            These games often evoke very fond memories for any who played them (or still play them) in the arcades at various pizza parlors, putt-putt courses, bowling alleys, or maybe, just maybe, an actual arcade. Countless hours and quarters were pumped into these machines in our days of youth (and well into our days of “adulthood”). Most of these games are now being made available through X-Box Live, Wiiware, emulators, etc.. The problem is that they just don’t feel as fun to play, and the reason is simple. These games were designed to take ridiculous amounts of quarters.

            These are games that were designed to make profit through continual addition of quarters rather than today’s one time purchase fee. So when we had limited income (or our parents would only give us a dollar) it became a challenge to make it as far as possible on these machines, each time making the further we got a greater sense of achievement. If this element is removed, the game ceases to hold that euphoria and becomes revealed for a game with levels of endless enemies and bad bosses all designed to make you take damage eventually to continue repeatedly.

            This is why I choose not to play these games. I have very fond memories of wonderful times, but I don’t want to sully these memories by re-playing the games and revealing the actual nature. At least, I won’t play them at home on a console. I still enjoy taking between 2 and 4 quarters with a friend and playing these at the arcade (or more likely, CiCi’s pizza). It’s still fun and the euphoria remains.

Freyja's Day-- Infection

            In the past week a new keyword ability was revealed for the MTG expansion, Scars of Mirrodin. This new keyword is “Infection,” which is essentially a combination of poison and wither. This keyword may finally allow poison to become a viable win strategy, at least in draft.

            The power of this ability is that wither was already a great ability, especially given that the darksteel creatures will likely be making a return. Additionally poison was always ineffective as a win condition (barring that one two-headed giant tournament win with virulent slivers) because of the inability for poison creatures (all very weak) to knock through quick enough not to be negated by their weenie stature.

            Infection has the ability to deal poison damage if they drop early (and more than one token per creature, another fatal flaw of poison counters) and the ability to always weaken the tougher creatures (thus slowing down the titan ramp onslaught). This ability has me very excited for its potential.

            MTG has been making a shift towards much heavier creature play instead of some crazy combos. This is great, but j\dropping creatures and swinging repeatedly can be a bit dull. This addition keeps the power with the creatures, but allows for more creature subterfuge and alternate win conditions. Now players can deal 20 damage, 10 poison damage, or 53 deck damage to win. Note I do not believe milling will be a successful standard strategy in Scars (though don’t forget my post on 2HG drafting, that’s a different story).

            I’ve always been a fan of alternate win conditions because it makes things more interesting and requires a much better sideboard. It also could potentially change the drafting scenario entirely depending on how many infection creatures/enchantments there are, and their actual playability. It seems likely that infection will be heavy green black in color, serpents and bugs like last time perhaps. Time will tell how they worked this out.

Thor's Day -- Colossi

            This is apparently going to be a week heavy in Dungeons and Dragons material. Probably because I have plenty to say about it, and I can write it up fairly quickly (in comparison to, say, poetry). Today I’m going to take a page from a very good video game and also Transformers. I’m talking about Shadow of the Colossus and Trypticon (or Unicron if you want to go all sorts of crazy).

            The goal here for the resourceful DM is to create a unique experience where players feel immensely dwarfed and unable to conquer something so much bigger than themselves. This is met in true Thorean (you know, eventually this will be accepted as a real word) style with giant-slaying. Now DnD has colossal size monsters, but there isn’t much in the way of interaction with them. What I’m talking about is an encounter against a monster so large that it is an actual “map” itself in which the players must navigate through a great series of skill checks (hanging on to a monster is difficult work). Imagine the sense of accomplishment the players have once they finally reach the vital spots of these monsters and put them out of commission.

            Obviously it’s not just a moving map, there can be all sorts of obstacles depending on the type of monster your players are facing. Giant parasites (like in Cloverfield) can be running amuck on the back of the giant, or dodging limbs flailing (thing of all of the falling damage rolls that can be made), or if the creature is a giant golem city (like Trypticon, Unicron, or even Rook for a simpler giant). Also, I recommend a time limit for these, i.e. the giant is heading towards a city to destroy it and the PCs have X turns before it reaches the city. This sense of urgency will really help keep things alive and intense.

            Now, if you are pressed for time, you can simply draw out an outline for your monster on graph paper, but where’s the fun in that. The simple, yet attractive, way to make your giant is through papercraft. Good sturdy cardstock can support those plastic DnD minis without much problem. You can even use double-sided tape to get the PCs hanging in all sorts of 3-dimensial options. If you want something a little more fleshed out, or permanent, I recommend going to a hobby shop and getting some Styrofoam blocks/circles as the basis. You can do something very similar to the Penny Arcade DnD encounter with flying planets.

            However you seek to achieve this, I highly recommend you give it a try. The key to making DnD games (or really any system you are using, think of playing out the Battle of Hoth in a similar manner) both exciting and memorable is to create unique experiences that do more than just follow what is written in the pages of the DMG. A good DM is a creator of worlds and memories. It is not an easy task, but one that is rewarding. 

Woden's Day-- DM Cinematics

            Today’s installment will take a page out of the All-Father’s playbook and talk about DMing (you like that nice stretch from being the all-father to being a DM). One of the keys to good DMing is allowing and encouraging theatricality in combat. As I previously discussed, the rules for combat in 4E DnD are very streamlined and good, but a good DM knows that this is merely a good starting point, but that to make combat memorable, it takes a unique touch

            The key to this is two-fold; first, a good DM must set the scene in rich detail. A basic combat layout won’t do. Every detail you include has two effects; it aids the players in visualization and role-play, and it creates a malleable environment for the players to interact with. From here, the DM needs to get the players to interact.

            The second step is to get the players to use the environment rather than just have them exist in it. Depending on the resourcefulness or denseness of your players, you may have to do some gentle nudging. The easiest step is to have the monsters or NPCs do this. If the PCs see that the environment can be manipulated, they will also do so.

            Preparation for this can also be handled two ways (lots of twos…). You can either place specific items of landscape that you want the PCs to interact with (like a chandelier hanging over the villain tied to a rope) or just describe a whole bunch of items and let the PCs imagination run wild. This will also add the element of surprise for the DM making your combat a little more exciting. As the DM holds the ultimate power, you can always keep things from getting too out of hand.

            It is also important to just let PCs accomplish whatever they try. Getting the PCs to interact with their environment also encourages skill checks. Be creative on what you use to require a skill check. In Urban settings, make sure to use streetwise as often as possible. Using Athletics and Acrobatics over and over will make things boring, so utilize all of them, especially some of the less useful ones. You’re the DM, make up a reason.

            Eventually your PCs will be trying to attempt MacGyver or A-Team quality stunts. I also recommend trying to avoid some of the more hackneyed events from popular film (We’ve all seen enough Legolas surfing down the stairs on a shield), while there is a place for classic shenanigans (see chandelier example), but you want to make sure that your characters create defining moments for their PCs not re-living moments that defined other characters. So I’m going to go out on a limb here and say to try and avoid LotR, Star Wars, Star Trek, and then others depending on your group (you may have some avid Stargate, Farscape, Dr. Who, etc. fans).

            Ultimately doing this will add some freshness to the game while encourages out of the box thinking. It also creates some surprise for the DM (or a more thorough chess defense). Players will stop just getting into formation and wading through combat. The battlefield becomes a new player to contest with and manipulate to one’s advantage.

Tyr's Day -- Fighting

            Short post on fighting today. I was doing an exhibition with my coach on Saturday, and we did a round of light sparring. The result was me taking a hard right high kick to the face. I know have a very tender face and a very black eye. It is important, and I can not stress this enough, that one always keep their hands up.

            There is a tendency in fighting to let one’s arms drop when they get tired during a fight, and that is when bad things happen. I know this lesson, but I have yet to get my muscle memory conditioned enough to do that unconsciously.

            I know my coach, he fights with a very definite pattern. He likes to use his right roundhouse kicks to feel out his opponents in the way that most people use a jab. He is that fast and flexible. I knew I needed to be prepared for some hard kicks, but I didn’t have a strong strategy going into the sparring, and the result was a hard hit to the face.

            Tonight at our sparring class, I went in with a game plan. I stayed southpaw (I am a leftie) to negate his ability to initialize an attack with kicks (or at least strong ones). While he is still much better than me (I wouldn’t train there otherwise), but my strategy proved very effective.

            It is important for a fighter to not only have strong muscle memory of how to respond to threats (as I still need to strengthen) but also to analyze and adapt to a fighter’s style. By removing my coach’s initial kicking advantage (while maximizing mine), I forced him into a defensive position allowing me to have some leeway from constant attacks.