So, the gift giving season is here... and I'm just as flustered with it as I am excited. I mean, I love getting gifts, but whenever anyone asks, I am at a loss to say what I might want. I mean, a man is the obvious choice for me... but I have one, and asking for two... well that would just be greedy!
Favorite things I'd like to see?
A subscription to Kobold Quarterly is high on my list... I mean, I have one, of course, but it can always be extended, right?
One of the new 4e Dungeons & Dragons books... I am still torn on the new edition, enough so that I haven't been buying everything that comes out. Also, the new books are expensive, so I am reluctant to shell out the big bucks for them. On the other hand, unlike many of my fellow grognards, I like the game, so the new Manual of the Planes or Draconomicon I: Chromatic Dragons might be nice...
On the Paizo side of things, the new Pathfinder system is gaining steam. In addition to their Adventure Paths (they are finishing up their third, so now is the time to get on board for the fourth, Legacy of Fire!), they have a dizzying array of products. One of the ones I haven't picked up yet and holds, frankly, a lot of attraction, is their Planet Stories line of books... yes, plain old non-rpg books. One of their best products is also currently free: the Beta playtest rules for the Pathfinder RPG, also sometimes referred to as 3.75 or 3.P - a Paizo spin on the OGL rules.
As for card games, I will stick with my very favorite... I still need to get my hands on a couple different decks for Killer Bunnies from Playroom entertainment.
For board games? I am still looking to get my hands on the new edition of Talisman.
What sort of gifts are you looking for? Have I missed a gem? Tell me soon... my man is demanding a list, or I will go without swag this year!
As I mentioned a few days ago, Dungeons & Dragons Insider is starting its subscriptions. When they said it would start in a matter of days, they weren't kidding. They gave the one day notice yesterday, and after some strange random down time this morning, the subscription sign ups became available.
Some of the recent full issues of Dragon, as well as the barbarian playtest are remaining available, but much, in fact likely most, new content will be behind the subscription login. I hope everyone got the articles they wanted before the subscriptions started!
I did get mine and will do some occasional reviews of what is going up so people know what they're missing. I've committed to a year to give it a chance.
Recently the "edition wars" over which edition of Dungeons & Dragons is the one true version have overwhelmed a lot of the best gaming forums out there. From the 3.5 and Pathfinder zealots at the Paizo forums, to the rabid 4e fans on the ENWorld and Wizard of the Coast forums, it has become difficult to have an interesting conversation about gaming. It's no secret to anyone who reads this site regularly that I'm a bit of a Paizo fanboi, but I confess, I've avoided their forums lately because of the polarized atmosphere that I see on their forums. That's not to say that I never go there and never contribute... I still do (it's like an addiction, really). ENWorld and the Wizard of the Coast forums are even worse (and I confess that I've pretty much stopped going to both of those entirely), and many of the other gaming forums are either too small or have too small a tabletop gaming fan base to keep conversations going.
So, I have a recommendation for a refuge. The forums at the Kobold Quarterly are friendly, knowledgeable, and it's still possible, at least for now, to carry on a decent conversation there. I read a lot of gaming forums (though stopping ENWorld and Gleemax/WotC certainly gave my reading time for the rest of them a boost!), and I am happy to have found a place again where I can just chat about gaming.
Oh, and if you want to check it out... the actual product Kobold Quarterly puts out is excellent, reminding me of the old Roger Moore and Kim Mohan days of Dragon. But I've plugged Kobold Quarterly the magazine enough before, for now, just check out the forums. If it helps, the site has some fun extras too... interviews with industry luminaries, free new monsters by some pretty damn good designers... really, just check it out!
By the way.... I'm not trying to attack passionate fans of Pathfinder or 4e... I'm a passionate fan of both. It's just frustrating to see the level of civil discourse descend to such depths. So visit Kobold Quarterly and say hi on the forums; it's still friendly there!
Has everyone enjoyed their free doses of Dungeons & Dragons Insider? I know there are a lot of jaded 3.5 edition and Pathfinder RPG fans out there, but for those who are fans of 4e, if you wanted to check it out before you have to get a subscription to do so... I'd hurry.
Now, during the very early days of DDI, one of the main complaints was that the Dragon and Dungeon magazine articles were not getting compiled into issues regularly. While I would like to see the articles themselves follow a set schedule in being released more regularly (and there is some evidence that WotC is indeed moving to a model to enforce that), I am happy to say that since 4e was released the compiled versions of the magazines have been being released pretty much on schedule.
Are they worth it? There is a lot of grumbling that the articles are no better quality than the free stuff we used to get on the Wizards of the Coast website. I don't agree, myself. So far the articles have been pretty decent. Their plan for an Adventure Path is a bit ambitious, and so far I haven't been wowed by it, but they are still in the early stages of it, and it could shape up yet.
I'm pleased to see a little bit of Eberron content (and would like to see more, frankly), and the crunch in the articles has, for the most part, been useful. I'm not all glowing praise, however, since I'm still disappointed that the "gap" issues between the start of DDI and 4e have still not been compiled, and I do feel Eberron fans were let down when they did an Eberron conversion of module H1, but then only an FR conversion of H2.
I'm also a bit miffed that they are charging for the DDI and it is not yet finished. The character builder, dungeon builder, and game table... some of the eagerly awaited elements... are still missing. For an all in one online game solution, I find it still lacking.
Still, I will probably spring for their discounted subscription to get the online magazines, at least for the time being. The current look at the playtest of the barbarian as well as some of the previous playtests make me think that there will be some worthwhile content in the DDI, and I am willing to give Wizards a year to show me that it will be worth it.
For those interested in the playtesting aspect (as we've seen with the artificer and now the barbarian) you should be interested to know that those elements are almost certainly going to be limited to subscribers.
Greetings! I am happy to say my medical crap is now (finally) behind me so that I can start posting again. I want to start with a return to Game Of The Week, which lately has been more of a game of the month. My apologies. So on to it!
This week's Game of the Week is Wizard's Gambit. I discovered this game at GenCon Indy thanks to a good friend who recommended that I stop by the Gryphon Forge booth. I hadn't heard of this company before, frankly, and I had my doubts, but I found that the game play was pretty cool. Also, I'm all for some good non-collectible card games, since not all of us can afford to pump the regular funds into a game like that (yeah, I'm a recovering Magic: The Gathering addict).
Check behind the break for some more information on the game from the Gryphon Forge website.
With Magic: The Gathering set to expand its universe with the fivefold worlds of Shards of Alara this October, GayGamer and Velvet DiceBag are proud to host this exclusive spoiler card, Skeletonize, a flaming harbinger of death and eventual resurrection - in the enemy's hand. We're also sharing five other spoiler cards - after the jump - that each reflect the nature of one of Alara's sundered worlds.
What was long ago a single plane brimming with mana is now a sundered world of five realms, each divided along the lines of mana and with access to only three of the five colors of magic essence. Bant, Grixis, Jund, Esper and Naya represent five lands separated by magical alignment, each boasting an environment specialized to its mana color.
Make the jump to learn more about the Shards of Alara!
Greetings! I am currently a bit down because I wasn't at DragonCon (apparently the steampunk contingent stole the show--darn it I should have been there!), but that leaves me no excuse not to fill you in on the interesting things that happened this last week in our hobby!
• Chaosium released a sneak peek of its new product, Pulp Cthulhu, detailing one of its new occupations--the Reanimator.
• Wizards unveiled the Shards of Alara Orb of Insight for their new Magic: the Gathering set--write anything in the box and see how many times it will appear in the new cards!
• A new collectible miniatures game, Mutant Chronicles, is shipping now from Fantasy Flight Games.
• Games Workshop has a whole bunch of new Warhammer and Warhammer 40k stuff, including a new Dark Elf Battalion and bad-ass War Hydra, and a new 40k boxset that has everything you need to start playing the game--plus a new line of paints, Citadel Washes, that promise to make shading easier than ever before.
• Palladium's press release announced new products for the fall, including the Macross sourcebook for the Robotech RPG, and a new Zombie Apocalypse RPG called Dead Reign.
• A legendary Call of Cthulhu podcast has reached its end--YogSothoth.com's Bradford Players have completed Horror on the Orient Express!
More to come, of course, as the week progresses!
Yes, Gen Con was a while ago, and no, I didn't go to Gen Con, sadly, being a student stranded in the Great White North. But I do love vicariously living through people's Gen Con experiences by their (sometimes extensive) play-by-play recaps, longing for the day that I get to go myself!
Experience Gen Con through the viewpoint of:
• "One Cool Thing I Saw At GenCon"--a video of huge variety of people giving their answers to exactly that.
• Paul Tevis and Ryan Macklin, giving their perspectives in the This Just In From Gen Con podcasts.
• Palladium
• Magic: the Gathering (long and excellent)
• Fantasy Flight Games (both pictures and video!)
• Pinnacle Entertainment
• Mayfair Games
And of course, if you missed them, here are the winners of the 2008 ENnie awards.
There are a few days left to vote in White Wolf's Hunter: The Vigil trailer-making contest.
The four finalists can be found here, here, here and here.
They're really very good--obviously a lot of love went into these. My personal favourite is the third, since it depicts all the different ways Hunters can approach their callings. And it's very White Wolf, melodramatic but pretty.
Cast your vote at the White Wolf livejournal here!
"Reckless Adventures in the 1930s!" is its oh-so-intriguing subtitle. For those who want to bring in the autumn with a bit of two-fisted cosmic-horrors-can-eat-lead action--and who doesn't?--Pulp Cthulhu has been officially announced by Chaosium for a fall release! You can adjust the level of pulp to meet your gaming group's needs, of course, and "insane scientists, reanimators, mentalists, gadgeteers, professor-sorcerers, supernatural detectives" are said to abound in the setting. Well done!
In other Chaosium news, The Klarkash-Ton Cycle is currently shipping--a collection of Mythos tales by Clark Ashton Smith, these freaky-but-slightly-goofy tales will certainly put you in the mood for your upcoming Pulp Cthulhu campaign.
From GayGamer: On an article posted to John McCain's website yesterday in response to plagiarism charges from the liberal blogosphere, McCain's campaign bashes gamers in a venomous ad hominem attack tucked into the last paragraph:
It may be typical of the pro-Obama Dungeons & Dragons crowd to disparage a fellow countryman's memory of war from the comfort of mom's basement, but most Americans have the humility and gratitude to respect and learn from the memories of men who suffered on behalf of others.
Right - because gamers can't quite possibly understand the sacrifice our troops make to keep us safe. Good job, ignorant and bitter McCain campaign staffer; you've shown the same amount of savvy that a typical High School bully shows as he kicks around the little guy in the classroom.
In that one sentence you've not only insulted gamers like me who have utter respect for our troops, but you've insulted those members of the military who themselves enjoy rolling the dice and dungeon crawling as an enjoyable hobby. There are at least three members of my regular gaming group who are service members, and you just insulted every single one of them.
Way to go.
Smears the Left Can Fight For [McCain]
Ok, pictures may be coming soon... depends on whether I can get them downloaded from the con (otherwise they may need to be added in later).
I'm here, live at GenCon, and I have to say it's an exciting time. Wizards of the Coast is touting their new 4th edition Dungeons & Dragons rules with the release of the Forgotten Realms Campaign Setting, which has sold out within a few hours of the exhibit hall opening on both days of the con so far. It's uncertain whether there will be any more copies tomorrow, so I'm afraid I can't report much on the contents yet. Personally, I'm trying more for a copy of the DM's screen, which I'm pleased to report is not a flimsy cardstock screen this time around.
Paizo also has a strong presence at the con, with a number of GenCon releases. In addition to a hardcover Pathfinder setting book, they also have the Pathfinder RPG Beta Rules.... or they did until very early this morning when they sold out. Josh Frost reported happily at one of the seminars that the free downloadable version available at paizo.com had over 1000 unique downloads in the first hour it was up. Paizo's organized play division, the Pathfinder Society, hit the ground running with 8 a.m. timeslots. (Many were heard to groan "Damn you, Josh Frost!" at the con in reference to the early start times, and I heard rumors of tshirts being made with that slogan!).
Other notable releases include the upper levels of Gary Gygax's castle dungeon for Castles & Crusades, Hunter: The Vigil from White Wolf, and many others. I plan on spending a good deal of time in the exhibit hall tomorrow, and hopefully will be able to post again with more news from the con before the weekend is over!
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