Lords of Tyr blogs

Mike Mearles Saddened by Monte's Exit also announces May 24th Play Test

Chadarius — Thu, 26 Apr 2012 17:04:31 +0000

Mike Mearles put his two cents in regarding Monte's exit from Wizards of the Coast. But we all know the show must go on. I am still counting on the remaining team to make this a great new edition to the panteon of Dungeons and Dragons. Without skipping a beat Mearles announced that "our public playtest for the D&D Next project will commence on May 24th".

I know what the Tyrians will be doing soon after that on May 26th for our game night!

Regardless of Monte leaving I'm sure his impact on the game will continue to be felt. I am excited and yet also full of dread to see how awesome the new release will be and also prepared to be disappointed by corporate overload interferance (which I mentioned in my post regarding Monte's exit earlier).

Monte Cook Leaves DnDNext Project

Chadarius — Thu, 26 Apr 2012 14:37:30 +0000

Monte Cook just posted to his Live Journal Blog that he "decided that I would leave my contract position with Wizards of the Coast. I am no longer working on Dungeons & Dragons".

He also states, "My decision is one based on differences of opinion with the company. However, I want to take this time to stress that my differences were not with my fellow designers, Rob Schwalb and Bruce Cordell."

Marvel Heroic Roleplaying reviewed over at A Hero Twice A Month

A Hero — Sun, 11 Mar 2012 14:23:38 +0000

Since the Lords of Tyr were nice enough to pick me up a copy of the new Marvel Heroic Roleplaying game by Margaret Weiss Productions, I figured I would review it over at my blog.

A Hero Twice A Month - Random Reviews: Marvel Heroic Roleplaying

Be warned though, the article ends with a worst case scenario of what can happen when you decide to spend a plot point to convert physical stress to emotional stress!

Creating Table Tokens the NewbieDM Way

Chadarius — Fri, 09 Mar 2012 14:35:14 +0000

Go check out Newbie's article, NewbieDM Tutorial – Counters, Tokens, or Pogs. It is brilliantly simple and it looks like fun. If you are a digital gamer his article is still worth while because the entire first half is creating a digital token that can be used very effectively in Maptools. In fact he uses the Token tool from the RPTools suite to create the digital token.

I'm especially proud of Newbie for using GIMP as well. GIMP is an amazing free open source application that can be used instead of the expensive Adobe Photoshop. Great article!

March 4th is GM Day!

Chadarius — Fri, 02 Mar 2012 17:14:14 +0000

So be extra nice to your GM this weekend! Also there is a big sale over at DriveThruRPG.com.

http://rpg.drivethrustuff.com/rpg_gmsday.php

I picked up the new Marvel Cortex based RPG there for $9.74! It doesn't bet much better than that!

Geek's Dream Girl DNDNext First Glimpse

Chadarius — Fri, 27 Jan 2012 16:14:00 +0000

Geek's Dream Girl has a "First Glimpse" of the new edition of D&D from DDXP.

Monte wants to distill down what’s best about all the editions of D&D. He also mentioned the importance of the DM/player relationship; it’s a core part of the game that the player and DM should be able to communicate and be creative together. Also, fireballs.

Her DM was none other than Monte Cook!

If you follow me on Twitter, you may have noticed my silence for the next few hours. Here’s why:

Monte Cook. Srsly, do I need more reasons?

I couldn’t publish any crunchy details about the game, including any pics that might show character sheets. (Sorry!)

Our game was pretty freakin’ awesome.

It is a great write up. Go read it now!

Wizards to Reprint AD&D 1st Edition to Support Gygax Memorial

Chadarius — Thu, 19 Jan 2012 15:27:13 +0000

If you check the WotC product catalog you will see all three books, The Player's Handbook, The Dungeon Master's Guide, and The Monster Manual.

WotC states that proceeds will help support the Gygax Memorial Fund. The books will have all the original artwork, except for the covers which will be new. This is great for all those who want to see what the game used to be like. A nice walk down memory lane should help people appreciate how the game has evolved from its early stages. It would certainly be fun to play a 1E game this Spring.

Mike Mearles - Open Source Impacts His Views on OGL/GSL

Chadarius — Mon, 09 Jan 2012 23:24:38 +0000

Again from Greg Tito's article:

"We'll have more information on the GSL as it relates to the next edition in the near future. Personally, I have a copy of 'The Cathedral & the Bazaar' on the shelf at work," Mearls said, admitting the landmark essay regarding open source software systems impacts his views on the subject. "From my days as a programmer and as a freelance RPG designer, the bulk of my work involved open platforms which did a lot for a game that relies so much on individual creativity."

5E: Base Set of Rules that Cover Entire Breadth of D&D's History

Chadarius — Mon, 09 Jan 2012 22:57:55 +0000

Greg Tito has a new article up at The Escapist about 5E. I've been enjoying his coverage of D&D quite a bit lately.

Here is a quote from Mike Mearles

Looking for DNDNext? Here is the community page

Chadarius — Mon, 09 Jan 2012 18:57:59 +0000

Here is the Wizards Community page for DNDNext.

Here is the official DNDNext team as listed on their community page.

Mike Mearls Team Lead @mikemearls
Greg Bilsland Team Producer @gregbilsland

Monte Cook Design Team Lead @montejcook
Bruce Cordell Designer @brucecordell
Robert J. Schwalb Designer @rjschwalb

Everything Old Is New Again - Wizards Announces 5th Edition - Updated

Chadarius — Mon, 09 Jan 2012 15:59:07 +0000

Everything old is new again. Here is a Forbes article about Wizards of the Coast and 5th edition D&D. Also a NY Times article as well.

Additionally a vague announcement on the Wizards site itself. If you want a sneak peak go to D&D Experience convention in January.

Update:

It looks like WotC is very interested in player feedback at this point. The Forbes article says that players can go to http://wizards.com/dndnext to sign up to participate in player feedback. However that link does not appear to be active yet. After many of the "throwback" changes to 4E with Essentials, I feel that we can expect 5E to continue in that general trajectory and provide more of a 3.x feel in many ways.

The Escapist Publishes the Past, Present, and Future of D&D

Chadarius — Fri, 06 Jan 2012 23:14:06 +0000

Lots of interesting reading in the following Escapist articles:

The Ghosts of D&D: Past

The State of D&D: Present

The State of D&D: Future

It also generated some really interesting insider perspectives and discussion over at ENWorld.

Here is a column (inspired by the Greg Tito Escapist articles) by Ryan Dancy and another post with even more material.

Shocker! Rich Baker Let Go from Wizards of the Coast

Chadarius — Thu, 15 Dec 2011 16:42:10 +0000

One of the Tyrian's favorite people, Rich Baker, has been let go from Wizards of the Coast. He has been a pillar of D&D, especially "The Forgotten Realms" for many many years.

Rich posted a blog entry here.

Alas, a change of plans.

Today, Wizards of the Coast eliminated my position. I have unfortunately been let go, after more than 20 years of employment with TSR/WotC.

House Rules and Fun Points!

Chadarius — Thu, 08 Dec 2011 19:19:13 +0000

I've really been enjoying Google Plus as of late. Partly because there are so many awesome gamers using the service. Today I stumbled on this really neat house rules post from Moe Tousignant. His house rules are based on a blog post by WoTC employee Greg Bilsland.

I created a nicely formatted Google Doc for it here.

A great deal of the document is focused on Fun Points

Every player can collect fun points. Fun points can be acquired for a variety of reasons all of which are listed below. Fun points can be used for two things:

Modifying a D20 die roll: After any standard roll (initiative, skill check, attack, etc) a player may spend any number of fun points to modify that die roll. This must be done before the results of the roll are known. Making a roll a 20 does not result in a critical hit.

Taking a roll on the Fun Point Table: A player can trade in 10 fun points for a roll on the fun point table (below). These give a wide variety of in game benefits.

The Fun Point Table is a 100 item long random table that you roll against. Its chalk full of fun stuff. One of my favorites is:

76. My Name is Enigo Montoya Keep fighting even while at negative hit points. You still make death saving throws.

You can get Fun Points for one time things, like creating a character background, creating a treasure wish list, and other character startup tasks. You can also get Fun Points for reading up on the rules regarding your character and general rules, as well as for things like showing up on time.

Its just plain cool. I've used a similar system in the past to encourage players to get their character backgrounds completed. But it was far simpler than this creative and fun setup. Thanks to Greg and Moe for post this. I love it!

Sales Stats: Wizards vs Paizo

Chadarius — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 18:37:05 +0000

I'm not sure how much weight I put into the ICV2 sales numbers but its always an interesting perspective on the sales of RPG games.

Paizo’s Pathfinder, #1 in the roleplaying game category, continued to gain momentum, with sharp differences in the number of releases between It and WotC’s category-defining Dungeons and Dragons. Some retailers told ICv2 of differences between the customers of the two games, with D&D 4.0 appealing to new players and people that don’t want to get super-involved in an RPG, and Pathfinder the choice of players that want to spend more time on playing.

Expectations are high for the holiday season. “We’re ecstatic about how the fourth quarter is looking right now,” a distributor told us.

Wizards of the Coast's D&D line was beat out by Pathfinder. Wizards did put out fewer titles during this time than Paizo, however they have been neck and neck for the last year or so. Overall it is good news for everyone though. It seems like the entire industry was doing better over all.

The Deck of Many Things Actually Not so New

Chadarius — Sat, 15 Oct 2011 19:45:54 +0000

I don't know how I managed to miss this, but the fabled Deck of Many Things has been in existence since April 2010! Rodney Thompson wrote it for Dungeon issue number 177.

Within the PDF provided it contains all the rules for the Deck as well as all of the cards to print. It has both sides of the cards so you can print them with a nice front and back. The following is from the introduction of the article

Of all artifacts to grace the world with their presence, perhaps none is more dangerous than the infamous Deck of Many Things. The artifact has appeared in every edition of DUNGEONS & DRAGONS®, and it first appeared in the GREYHAWK® supplement in 1975. Through each of its iterations, the Deck of Many Things has remained a dangerous and chaotic artifact. This 4th Edition update of the classic artifact retains much of the traditional version’s chaotic nature while bring- ing its mechanics more in line with what modern Dungeon Masters can use in their games.

I will be excited to see if they match up nicely with the newly released cards from Gardmore Abbey. Which we may be using tonight! Oh the excitement! I can barely contain myself.

Lords of Tyr Game Night Live 20111001 on Google Plus!

Chadarius — Sat, 01 Oct 2011 23:45:09 +0000

Join us on Google Plus while we game.

Temple of the Weeping Goddess - Chatty DM's Zero Level Adventure in Dungeon #194

Chadarius — Fri, 23 Sep 2011 17:21:12 +0000

Temple of the Weeping Goddess - A group of untested adventurers must rescue a long-lost aspect of the goddess Avandra before it's too late. [Wizards of the Coast D&D]

A Hero's First Steps - To achieve glory and riches, every adventurer must start somewhere. [Wizards of the Coast D&D]

This is a a zero level adventure for 4E. It is a cool idea and something that might actually build real ties to a their own and each other's characters. You need to read "A Hero's First Steps" for the zero level character rules before starting the adventure. My favorite part about these new zero level rules is that you can use them to help find your character's role in the party. It is really quite ingenius.

This is a great way to get a group of first time players (young or old) introduced to the game in a much simpler way. It will help them understand the various roles that each character class might play. There are very few character decisions to make at first. Essentially, you can get a start up game going and play a full adventure before you roll up a character. The very act of playing this zero level character will inform your character creation process. Each zero level power has the ability for the character to add an extra Leader, Controller,Striker, or Defender effect by spending an experience token. If you find yourself using your experience tokens on primarily leader attacks that should probably say something loud and clear to you about filling a leader role in the party.

I especially like the "Where are they now?" section of "A Hero's First Steps". I'll be excited to try this out the next time I start a new 4e campaign.

Madness at Gardmore Abbey with the Deck of Many Things!

Chadarius — Wed, 21 Sep 2011 21:51:50 +0000

Madness at Gardmore Abbey - From a mention in the DMG, to PAX, we finally come to the madness that torments Gardmore Abbey. [Wizards of the Coast D&D]

You can win "Maddness" by going to Newbie DM's site and entering the contest sponsored by Gator Games. I just entered the contest myself. Good luck to everyone, but I'm totally winning this sucker! :)

I've been waiting for an actual "deck of many things" since they started releasing cards over a year ago! It looks like Amazon.com is going to get an order from me shortly :). I know some people are still freaking out about all of these card sets being released. I still don't get why. WotC has very specificlly made it so you don't ever need to use a card deck for any D&D game. Its just frosting on the cake. Something your DM can use to spice things up, just like our very own A Hero, Rob, has with his 4e RavenLoft adventure. Its been fun adding in some randomn stuff. There should be a heaviness or a cursed feeling as we adventure there. Its fun when it affects us all in different ways. The deck adds something to the game.

These card decks are actually a part of the very core of the entire D&D gaming system. A random table is very Gygaxian. If you don't feel like purchasing an actual deck then go modify one of the good old tables in 1st, 2nd, or 3rd edition and use that. Print our your own cards or just roll the dice. Its no difference.

There is something nice about having a quality card with some nice graphics on it, instead of some ratty thing you printed on your 5 year old inkjet printer and cut out with a scissors like a pre-school project.

So for all of the old schoolers who love their 1st or 2nd edition games and are poo-pooing 4E for becoming a "card collector's game", just remember where the whole random table idea originated. The old editions are great. I love them dearly. In fact I would play any edition of D&D if there was time or opportunity. I've been seeing a whole lot of ridiculous and unnecessary edition wars crap on the 'Net the last day or two (Brought on by a 5E panic with Monte Cook being rehired by Wizards of the Coast).

I'd like to quote @dungonebastard yesterday on Twitter.

"Edition Wars are like trying to tell your best friend exactly why his prom date is ugly. You may be right, BUT YOU'RE STILL A DICK! #dnd"

Let's honor the past and even revel in it. But let's also respect the future. Relax! Its just a darn card deck :).

Monte Cook Returns to Wizards of the Coast!

Chadarius — Tue, 20 Sep 2011 15:56:30 +0000

DM Rules and Exciting News - Here are the traits that I think make the difference between an average DM and a good one. [Wizards of the Coast D&D]

From Mike Mearls in the same article...

i've spent the past several months talking about D&D's past and how that relates to its future. It's now time to focus much more on the future of the game. Monte has an unmatched design pedigree in the RPG field, and for that reason we've brought him on board to work with R&D in making D&D the greatest RPG the world has seen. Over the next few weeks, Monte will use this column to share his thoughts about the game. As we look to chart D&D's future course, this column will continue to be a place where we share our ideas and listen to yours, and we hope you'll keep reading, discussing the contents, and sharing your feedback and thoughts with us and the larger D&D community. That's what makes Legends & Lore a conversation that we can all participate in.

Wow! This is big news. Monte brings a lot of credibility with him. I hope his special brand of genius will flourish. His mark on Dungeons and Dragons 3rd edition is indelible. I know he was a rules consultant for Paizo's Pathfinder a few years ago (2009?). It is hard to tell how much effect he had there, but Paizo has certainly been exceeding most people's expectations with Pathfinder.

Lords of Tyr Game Night Live 6pm (ish) Central Sept 17, 2011! Game of Thrones d20

Chadarius — Sat, 17 Sep 2011 20:19:27 +0000

Tonight we are playing the Game of Thrones d20 campaign that I started DMing way back in June (?). We had a blast with all the intrigue and roleplaying. There wasn't even any fighting. That will change tonight. Oh don't worry. There will still be lots of roleplaying. But something is wrong in the little river village of Hearthsport. Something very wrong!

Watch us live on Ustream as always and see us using Google Plus and MapTool for our remote players benefit.

The Lords of Tyr take D&D Pub Trivia!

rook103 — Wed, 17 Aug 2011 21:16:56 +0000

What happens when 4 members of Lords of Tyr decide to play D&D trivia? Well a nice dinner and Rob whopping some 1st Edition Trivia Ass! That's what!

#suttonsc, #chadarius, #rook103, #rdjazo

We did really well in the Obscure Origins of D&D section of Round 1 and kicked it up a notch in the Nightmare portion! Then we sat back and let Rob take over. Round 2 was all about 1st Edition Monsters. Rob was a machine, only missing 1. But no one did any better then him and way.

Round 3 was all about D&D in Pop Culture....we had a perfect round! We were only beaten in Round 3 by a single Bonus point for knowing Aeorfeld's full name in the PvP Celebrity Game Podcasts!

Our reward:

Thanks #WotC and gang (#Trevor_WotC, #michaelrobles, #gregbilsland) for a fun event!

New Hybrid and Multiclass Options

Chadarius — Wed, 10 Aug 2011 18:25:12 +0000

New Hybrid and Multiclass Options - Introducing multiclass and hybrid options that you can use with characters who have access to shadow magic. [Wizards of the Coast D&D]

This also includes options for Sentinals! I may have to revisit my sentinal build. How crazy would it be to hybrid with shaman? I'm already a bit of a one elf traffic jam. Having an animal and a spirit companion would be spectacular. Now if only I had time to mess with my sentinal character! Oh it has all the other "shadow" stuff in it for all you "shadow" liking people (hrm Mike!).

Mithral Jackets are Real!

Chadarius — Wed, 27 Jul 2011 00:37:46 +0000

Mithral jackets are real... real expensive! This is a jacket made with Kevlar fibers. Its a soft shell, not hard like a Kevlar vest. It is really tough, warm, and wind resistant. I hear you can also cut through Orcs without worry of serious injury.

-- By Klattermusen

Lords of Tyr Game Night Live! Using Google Plus 07/23/2011

Chadarius — Sun, 24 Jul 2011 01:07:42 +0000