Thoughts on Dwimmermount

Dwimmermount, the cautionary tale of this corner of the blogosphere.  I understand that an update has been posted on the Dwimmermount thread on th RPGsite.  I am not a disgruntled backer, so other than the human fascination with train wrecks, I don't have an interest in the situation.

Except, that James M's old Grognardia blog is one of the reasons I became involved blogging.  I always enjoyed his posts on old games and modules and I loved his game reports.  That's one of the reasons I post mine.  His blog was my gateway into the community.

With that in mind, I have to say I feel sorry for James, whatever he's doing now. Not only did he lose a family member as I recall; but he cut himself off from what had been an important part of his life.  The backers suffered a financial loss, albeit on a speculative investment; and we all lost a leader in this community.

Remember, you must be at least 10th level to throw a flamestrike in the comments.

February 2014 Blog Hop Day 6

My first character death in D&D didn't happen until about 2008 or 2009.  We were in 'The Prime Dungeon', where all the rooms were numbered in an unknown script, with the important rooms being prime numbers.  Of course we turned the wrong way, so we didn't hit the rooms in order, so we never figured that out.  Anyway, getting back to my paladin, the party was about to enter the room and the plan was, if they're too tough we'll back out quickly - Unless (there's always an unless), that !@#$ wizard is in there.  Well, we popped open the door, paladin in the lead and there was the wizard with overwhelming force.  Being the paladin, I cut straight for him, I think the rest of the group did back out, but I stuck to the agreement and attacked.  I always felt it was an appropriate way for that character to go.

My first RPG character to die was a Traveller character, the ship's doctor.  He took an RPG, as in rocket propelled grenade, through the dash of the Air/Raft and through his chest I might add.  Even back then I wasn't upset, it's only a game.

February 2014 Blog Hop Day 5

My highest character was a 1e Ranger that made it to 10th or 11th level.  As a DM some of my players made it from 1st to 20th over the course of about four years of monthly gaming.  The other DMs in my group tend to run shorter campaigns, focused on levels 3 - 8.

I loved that ranger, he was a classic 15 Wisdom, with 12 points in reserve type - straight out of Fineous Fingers.  Had a helmet made out of the dragon head from a chimera and he had builta keg of holding into the saddle on his pegasus .  He filled  the keg with Everclear which he created by casting purify food & water on a barrel of wine.  He also had a price on his with every orc, since he was in the habit of desecrating altars of Gruumish.

New Pickup - Castle of the Mad Archmage

I picked up Castle of the Mad Archmage Sunday - I waited until AFTER I ran the February session.  Otherwise, I would have been distracted.  Oh look a squirrel! This is the re-imaging of Castle Greyhawk by +Joseph Bloch . Which as I was one of the people TSR ripped off with their re-imaging of it, I was very happy to come across.  If I can find taht one in a box in the basement, perhaps I'll do a compare (there isn't any) and contrast piece on them.   So far I've read down to level 5, haven't gotten to the Maps and Illustrations books yet, but it is very well done.  I picked up both the PDF and the soft covers, so I should have a package arriving in a few weeks.  At this rate ,looong before Autarch gets my Domains at War Kickstarter book to print.

February 2014 Blog Hop Day 4

My first dragon slaying was at the end of the war with Iuz. Not the TSR 3e reboot, this was in our college campaign just before the DM graduated.  Ancient huge Red dragon, flying straight at me, killed in one shot; it crashed and destroyed  the wall I was standing on - but it doesn't count as the DM had given my character an Arrow of Law (as chaotic as that ranger was, I was worried about holding it) which was a Plot Device to make the story unfold as he desired.

My first real one was a young green dragon, that my gnome Assassin/Illusionist and his friend the monk subdued so that they could use it to haul out it's own hoard for them.

The Shark has been Jumped...Repeat, the Shark has been Jumped

We're in our second session of  my new campaign using the Pathfinder rules.  I called for initiative rolls and one of the players pipes up he was on 30.  I let them start their characters between 2nd and 5th level and I knew he had a 4th level character, but I didn't remember him having bought anything that would boost his initiative that high so I asked, 'just out of curiosity how did you get that?'  Not really doubting him, he's one of the DMs in our group and has DMed for the local Pathfinder Society, he knows the rules better than I do. Being a smart alec, he responded 'I rolled a 19'.  Then we started breaking down where he got +11 at 4th level.  Improved initiative +4, high dexterity +3 and then he trots out this trait -'Reactionary' which gives a +2 initiative bonus.
   What the h3ll?  Shouldn't the improved initiative feat trump that?  Not in Piazo's world.  When the game is so set up to reward playing the mechanics rather than playing the character, I've lost interest completely.  I just can't bring myself to care.  I'll continue to DM and play Pathfinder with the group because of the group not the game, but from now on all characters will be rolled straight 3d6 in order.  Anybody in The Cities have an open seat at an OSR game?

February 2014 Blog Hop Day 3

My first dungeon?  Beats me, it didn't have any name that I can remember, nor does the actual play stick in my head the way that running through the Vaults of the Drow did.  Of course down there someone's paladin had a ring of cursed wishes, the DM was using the dictionary to find random results.  Were we lucky when he said "I wish someone was here to help us and Bahomet showed up instead of any other named being in the Monster Manual.