A Life Full of Adventure

Last night was the twelfth sitting of our WarHammer 2e online campaign. My PC Mordrin Skorkinson, Giant Slayer. He is still looking for a giant to slay, as he doesn't feel the last giant was quite giant enough.  He is also the bemoaner of the doom that got away. His chosen weapon is a magical two handed war-hammer taken from a slain priest of Sigmar, its once faded runes now burn bright due to Mordrin's great deeds. My companions: Tibalt - A Brettonian Knight Udrin - A High Elf Scholar Gustav - A Human Initiate of Verena (Absent this sitting) Ato - A Wood Elf Wizard Apprentice (Absent this sitting) Inside the fraying mind of a Slayer: Mordrin went to sleep in a small clearing, his head resting on a rock. He awoke in a tent, on a bed, with a wispy piece of cloth draped over the bed. He did not know where he was nor how long he had been out. He reached for his hammer. Mordrin exited his tent at the same time he companions were coming from theirs. They were in ...

It looks like I'm a bit late in trying to sign up to run games at PortConMaine 2013. My school schedule keeps me out of the loop, and I didn't plan well enough ahead (though I've been thinking about it and talking about it). I'm actually OK with this, though I desperately wanted to run some games after last year. My free time these days doesn't allow for as much game prep as I would like. I'm also OK because the friend I usually go with is unable to attend this year. It's dampening my spirits a bit. All in all, I don't mind a calmer PortConMaine this year. I might spend some extra time with my wife in between games instead. This should give me more time to relax and, hopefully, more time to eat better. Maybe I'll be more alert and active during the games I play. Either way, I still expect to have a lot of fun!

Tiger Squirrel M  5  WS  41  BS  0  S  1  T  1  W  5  I  40  A  1  Dex  12  Ld  10  Int  10  Cl  15  WP 10  Fel  0 Tiger squirrels are vicious, fearless cousins of regular squirrels. They live in wooded areas and prey mainly on small rodents or birds. They can also supplement this diet with nuts and acorns. They are deceptively fast. They can jump up to 6 yards from tree to tree, with a drop of 1 yard. They can climb sheer surfaces easily. Tiger squirrels have little to do with humanoids, except when they are used as familiars or animal companions. Also, beware of the giant variety of this creature. Alignment: Neutral Special Rules: The bite of a tiger squirrel has a 15% chance of causing infected wounds via the bacteria,  Listeria monocytogenes Psychological Traits: Immune to Fear tests.

[Begin Transmission]  DodecaheDRONE  scouting mission report #3478 as uploaded by [DRONE12]. [DRONE12] = "Peeping" Tom HUNTER, re-purposed scout drone using SOLDIER chassis. Modifications include Enhanced Sensors and Solar Powered. Limited wi-fi connections to other DRONES within 100 ft. Also on this mission: [DRONE1] = "Sword" SOLDIER DRONE [DRONE2] = "Speaker" COMM DRONE Mission notes: Resources located 2 hours outside of STAF. DRONES sent to explore and retrieve, if possible. At site TOM scouted ahead. TOM identified a mass of shadows lurking in an open doorway. TOM also identified a group of 5 humans scavenging resources. Four of the humans worked while the fifth kept lookout. Logic circuits dictated attempting to avoid the shadowy figure while attempting to engage the humans in peaceful talks. SWORD caught the attention of the shadowy figure on the way by, and the DRONES were attacked by a giant insect. SOLDIER knocked the insect out with ...

Technology/Trap This is a land mine that, instead of blowing up, mechanically/electronically/neuroelectronically holds the victim in stasis and sends an electronic alarm (radio frequency) to a receiver. The receiver alerts when something/someone is held in the trap. You can touch the receiver's alert and a hologram/control panel opens up. The hologram shows which direction the activated trap is in, a picture of what's being held, and a few different options. The options are [Release], [Lock] (which holds the trapped person more permanently and can only be released/unlocked by using the receiver...or a Slider making a skill check), and...[Ignore] (meaning someone else is patrolling in that area and you are confident they will take care of it soon). You might want to be alerted without making it known to everyone around that the trap is set off (that is, not wanting the big boom). These traps would also be highly reusable.

Art by William Cauthern Cellar Man Career Class: Rogue Cellars in the Old World hold many valuable commodities. Some of these commodities need the expertise of a specialist to keep them in pristine condition. All the commodities need a protector or guardian.  The prevalence and expertise of a particular Cellar Man depends on the commodity one wishes to protect. A village’s tavern is not likely to have a Cellar Man to protect the swill they dare to call beer, however a city tavern may have a Cellar Man to guard his elven wine or dwarven ale.  Often there are even more valuable things to guard than a taverns alcohol. There are jewels, magicks, people’s lives, and other secrets. A  Cellar Man may turn adventurer when he gets tired of his confines. In the wider world, their guardian skills are very valuable to those with which they align. Advance Scheme WS +10 BS +10 T +1 W +2 I +10 Dex +10 Cl +10 WP +10 Skills Acute Hearing Concealmen...

I have been asked about possibly playing in a Warhammer 3rd edition game this summer.  I would love to give it a try. Now I'm trying to figure out what type of character would be good for just a one-summer knock off. I really want to save my character of intrigue as a back up character for the 2e game I play on Google+. The odds really are in favor of my slayer dying sooner rather than later.  Usually I play a fighter class when I'm first learning a system, but I've been playing my slayer for quite a while now. I'd like to branch out a bit. I'm leaning toward a Grave Robber.  I'm not even sure that's in third edition. This could be exciting!

I think I've said it before, but the GI Joe cartoon has some of the neatest locations. There always seems to be a Cobra hideout in some tropical jungle or idyllic island. The cartoon takes us to deserts and polar ice caps. I really like the inspiration of those settings. I want to use more visuals in my RPGs. By now, computers have probably made visuals more commonplace is a good number of games. However, I still play at conventions where DMs ignore the opportunity. I think a laptop and/or a tablet gives the DM a perfect opportunity to share a visual and get the player immersed even further into the game. This is my goal from now on.

I've decided that if I get a chance to run anything at PortCon this year, it will be the beginning of the Doomstones campaign. I'm down to one month (or less) to prepare, and this is the latest game I have read. I have also run it before (many, many moons ago). Now I need to double check with the convention and see if it's too late to sign up as Staff so I can run a few games. They don't allow rogue walk-on or part-time GMs.

This idea didn't come from a cartoon like most of my other Gaming Inspirations do. However, I think our settings, our flavor text, need to include more sick and diseased townsfolk. Most games have healers, clerics, physicians, etc. who can cure those who are sick, but not every NPC could afford the cost. Not every healer  could have the time to cure all the diseased. When townsfolk see your cleric want into town, they need to crowd around him/her asking for mercy. There's a way to add flavor!

Thursday night was the eleventh sitting of our WarHammer 2e online campaign. My PC Mordrin Skorkinson, Giant Slayer. The giant he slayed was a 12 foot tall troglodyte. It counts.  He is also the bemoaner of the doom that got away. And, he is starting his hand in secrets and duplicity. His chosen weapon is a magical two handed war-hammer taken from a slain priest of Sigmar. Don't fret; the priest deserved it. My companions: Tibalt - A Brettonian Knight Udrin - A High Elf Scholar Gustav - A Human Initiate of Verena Ato - A Wood Elf Wizard Apprentice Encounters and notes: We began in a tavern called the Northern Pony. The town is 150 miles or so from where we should be. We were teleported here by advanced druchii magics. The elf scholar may be bleeding to death, but all the knight and the dwarf care about are getting some drinks.  We are joined in the Pony by a couple of High Elves pretending to be Wood Elves. Seriously, it makes no sense, but these are elve...

Recently I watched an episode of TNG entitled The Drumhead . The title referred to an ad-hoc judge sitting on a drumhead dispensing summary justice. Unfortunately, these judges knew very little of the case involved and were just overanxious to find some guilt, any guilt, they could punish. The way that the investigators came onto the ship and tried to uncover conspiracy, whether there was one or not, reminded me of the Witch Hunter career in Warhammer. Since the investigators were convinced there was a conspiracy, they kept digging into anyone and everyone's past to find something they could punish. The investigation went far off its original intended course.  In the end, things were just made up. In Warhammer, the Witch Hunter is the ultimate authority. They have the backing of the church. They uncover the evils of chaos everywhere they go...even if there isn't any to uncover. The guilty run and the innocents hope to go unnoticed. The guilty must be punished, and everyone ...

The X-Men cartoon from the 90s was one of my favorites. The voice actors who played the X-Men were forever set in my mind as the way Wolverine, Xavier, Beast, and Rogue should sound. Naturally, nothing produced since has been able to live up. There is one area where I think the cartoon dropped the ball, and I think it would be a very interesting addition to an RPG. At the beginning of the third season, they add an extremely dangerous predator whose ship crashed thousands of years ago. Wolverine inadvertently looses the predator, and the X-Men have to deal with a creature they can't really touch.  I was disappointed when I saw the "ultimate predator" was just some sort of incorporeal spirit drinker. For my game's predator, I want to release a dangerous killer into lands the party cares about. It may be based off the creature from the movie Predator, or it may be based of...say...the Terrasque. Either way, it needs to be an indiscriminate killing machine a...

While I plan on using Spears of the Dawn for my basis of the South Lands, I was also looking for a locale to place some snake-themed creatures. Lustria has its lizardmen, skinks, and sauruses. The Old World has lizardmen and troglodyes. The South Lands are ripe for the addition of other snake creatures.  Here are some I plan to use, as well as some description of how they may fit in: Amphisbaena These creatures are large, two-headed snakes (one head on either end of the body...I don't know how that works physiologically, but the creature is in the book).  These would be the most normal of the snake creatures, found on a hill or hiding in the grass. Naga These will have to be carried over from D&D. There they are described as "snake-like creatures with human heads. They prefer warmer climates and tend not to wander far from their lairs." The Monstrous Manual has them listed as highly intelligent, with magical abilities. I run Warhammer as more of a low-magic s...

I saw a link to this comic on Google+ the other day and figured I'd pop down to the local comic book shop to check it out. The cover was extremely evocative, and the art inside was pretty good, so I decided to grab it. $2.99 isn't overly much for a comic and there were other things I also wanted while I was at the store. For $2.99 it wasn't too shabby. The interior art was well done. Teela definitely gets the "T&A treatment", to quote a concern from Google+. She is walking around in her underwear at one point in the comic. One of my original concerns during the comic shop flip-through was that there wasn't enough text, so I assumed that would mean dragging out multiple issues to get a basic premise for the first story arc. That's not the case. The story is set up well. The story references some events that I'm not familiar with but the writers seem to expect the audience knows. I would have liked to see more of the other characters bes...

On Thursday Gothridge Manor posted a whole 'last minute game setup' post. What caught my eye was an alternative trap to put on a chest. Tim's idea was, instead of having a needle trap or a fireball trap, to use a teleport trap on the chest. I want use the idea and expand it a bit 1-A thief can use Find/Remove traps to find the trap, but there is a penalty due to the magical instead of mechanical nature of the trap. 2-The opener of the chest gets a saving throw vs spells. If the opener fails, they are teleported to a cell deeper in the dungeon/structure. 3-The spell is a proximity spell, so it is going to effect whoever opens the chest. It doesn't matter which direction the chest is facing, for instance. 4-The opener needs to make a second saving throw vs spells or they will also succumb to a sleep spell. 5-The cell to which they are transported has a permanent Silence spell cast on it.  The imprisoned PC is potentially asleep and is silence and ...

Damien is a layabout lout who wants everything in life handed to him without him having to work for it. As the apothecary's son, a relatively prosperous future has been set out for him, but he's not interested in the work that it's going to take to achieve.  His father is busy every hour of the day, and Damien has no interest in following in those footsteps. However, his does expect to inherit the business' modest fortune when his father finally dies. Which is why Damien became suspicious of late when another alchemist (Danica) moved to town and started spending a lot of time working in the shop with his dad. Damien thinks his dad might turn the shop over to her instead. The opportunity recently arose for Damien to betray his fellow townsfolk for a little shiny coin and some respect (albeit from orcs). During Hobbly Pie Week , Damien let an orc scout party into the town at night through a tunnel in his house's basement.

I bet your game doesn't have enough goblin fanatics (suicide flailers).

I have been rewatching some of the iconic cartoons of my youth, mostly just for the fun of it and to have a complete viewing of every episode. One lucky side effect from this is the inspiration I get for my RPGs. This time it's an idea I've seen time and time again on Transformers, but it just hit me how cool it would be. In Transformers, the Decepticons have a space bridge from Earth to Cybertron. Whenever it strikes the writers' fancies, Transformers find themselves transporting through space between planets. I've never been one to want to mix my sci-fi with my fantasy, but certain ideas (like this) have me thinking about changing my tune. Dwimmermount has a space bridge, of sorts, between the home planet and the planet of the red elves. I know there is theoretically plenty of area to explore on one home planet, but the idea of transporting to another for adventure is growing on me. The new planet doesn't have to be highly technological. The technology tha...

Spears of the Dawn is an RPG set in the fertile adventure grounds of Africa. From the book: Spears of the Dawn is a game that provides classic old-school fantasy adventure in an African-flavored setting. Just as many early role-playing games created compound worlds of mixed medieval European elements, so Spears of the Dawn creates an African pastiche built for accessible fun at the table. This is not a game about historical Africa any more than early fantasy RPGs were games about historical Europe. Instead, like its predecessors, it tries to use elements of history and legend to build a fun and workable setting for flavorful adventure. I scimmed through the book when I received it, and I really liked what I saw. From the tagline of "Fantastic Adventure in an Untamed Land," to the page long setting summary (I'll link that at the end) to the bestiary, maps, and characters, everything about this game triggered my Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay mind. When I buy new games,...

I think WarHammer FRP forever changed the way I think about my characters, especially fighters. I can't just make a character and call him a fighter. I have to know what he did before he decided to become and adventurer. For thieves and mages, I can hand wave this a little more. A thief may have been living off this slight of hand his whole life. A mage may have gone straight from youth to apprentice. But fighters? Fighters I want a little more back story on.

I have no trouble admitting that Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay (WFRP) is my favorite RPG. Appropriately, the greatest percentage of my posts will be about WFRP. First edition (1e) was my first love, and I have binders full of homebrew rules for 1e.  Most of the rules have to do with specific adventures or campaigns and really don't look to be interesting enough to share on the internet. I do still get excited when I find something that does seem interesting enough to share. However, I did want to point out some other topics I'm interested in, lest someone wanders in and decides not to hang around because they are not interested in Warhammer. I love to read books , and I may post a little note about what makes them interesting, or I may post a little plug for the author hoping you'll check them out. Cascade Failure is a sci-fi RPG by Greg Christopher. I see it as a Star Wars meets with catastrophic failure. I think it's a perfect place to set a Firefly game into. I...

This item presents as a finely woven decorative cord, as may be seen around the neck of a priest or academic character. These cords come in various colors and patterns. When 'empty' the cord radiates a faint magical aura for those detecting magic. The cord can be charged with magical power, however, either by the Meditate skill (Warhammer) or Spellcraft nonweapon proficiency (D&D) or the like (for whatever system you use). The cord is charged as per the Meditate skill (Warhammer) or 1 spell level per hour (D&D). Charging the cord means that the spellcaster's own personal magic stores are not regenerated, so the caster must wisely decide if he needs the power or if it can be stored. Stored magical energy can be used for casting spells, like a Jewel of Power (Warhammer) or Rod of Spellcasting (D&D). When desired by the caster, the spell energy is utilized from the cord instead and the caster retains all their own spell energies.

Last night was the tenth sitting of our WarHammer 2e online campaign. My PC Mordrin Skorkinson, Troll Slayer*. Though he hasn't actually slain a troll. At least not since I've been running him. Apparently there was the potential for a troll in this sitting, but either the fickleness of Roll20 or our actions kept it from appearing. I didn't quite catch which it was. He now wields a magical two handed war-hammer taken from a slain priest of Sigmar. Don't fret; the priest deserved it. My companions: Tibalt - A Brettonian Knight Udrin - A High Elf Scholar Gustav - A Human Scribe Ato - A Wood Elf Wizard Apprentice Encounters and notes: We began where we left off last week facing an orb of great and ruinous power. There were grey pillars spaced around the orb and an evil elvish voice casting unseen from the other side. I charged the evil elf voice, as the other elves in my party had given me permission to kill an elf. There's something I don't think an...

I've always had high regard for the medic/physician/healer of the party. This person keeps everyone else healthy, often at the character's own risk. I've pretty much always thought the party healer beyond reproach. Dr McCoy, Dr Crusher, Dr Polaski (yes, those are a lot of Star Trek examples) always put the patient above themselves. The healers and clerics in our RPG games would often be in the thick of the fight, helping to heal others. Now this Dr Julia in Earth2...she's a mole/informant and possibly a traitor. It's changing my world upside down. I need to use this scenario in a game. Think about healers for a moment. Do you automatically trust them, too? If not, why not?

Wow. I just finished queuing up my last April A-Z post (Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay themed). It has been an extremely fun experience. I really should have participated before this. I fully realize that my posts were about as basic as possible, but I understood that would be the case going in. I consider it a warm-up year. This whole A-Z thing may be "so 5 years ago," but it was a new experience for me to participate. I found some blogs that I will continue to follow (see below). It was a worthwhile event for me, if for no other reason than that. Next time it is my intention to delve a little deeper. Unfortunately, I will still be in college during the next two A-Z challenges, so I may not be able to designate as much time as I currently intend. I'm not sure if I want to use the theme of Advanced Careers, Dwarf Terms, or Notable Personalities. The latter two would take a little more time and energy. We'll see. There are 11 months to come up with other themes. He...