August was a big month for D&D and for D&D fans. Most notably, GenCon gave gamers from around the world an opportunity to get together and play D&D. Wizards of the Coast made numerous announcements about upcoming D&D releases at GenCon during their seminars, many of which we wrote about. In August we returned our attention to skill challenges, a topic we’ve always felt strongly about. And of course, we had another report from D&D camp. This time the kids tackled the Tomb of Horrors. August was a busy month for gaming and if you missed any of our articles this is your chance to get caught up.
Highlights
GenCon 2010
We were fortunate enough to get a couple of GenCon-related shout-outs from Wizards of the Coast in their August News. They linked to our coverage of the D&D Preview Seminar on August 10 and to our coverage of the Adventure Builder’s Workshop on August 11.
- GenCon Awaits – Wimwick shared his thoughts and anticipation of his first GenCon.
- GenCon: D&D Convention Delve – Lair of the Dread Witch – We shared our first taste of D&D Essentials as we played in the Con Delve.
- GenCon: D&D Adventure Builder’s Workshop – Wimwick reports on the highs and lows of the Adventure Builder’s Workshop.
- Wizards of the Coast: 2010-2011 Preview (Part 1: D&D Essentials) – Find out what’s coming out for D&D Essentials and when.
- Wizards of the Coast: 2010-2011 Preview (Part 2) – Want to know what else is coming in the next year? We’ve got it all here.
- The 2010 D&D Open Championship – Read about our preparation, participation and post-mortem of the Championship.
- What Makes An Encounter Legendary? – We only completed one encounter in five hours but it was our best D&D experience ever!
- A DM’s Debut: The Story of First Time GenCon Judge – Getting a fresh perspective on judging at GenCon from a first timer.
D&D Encounters
In addition to sharing my weekly experiences of D&D Encounters Dark Sun, I also shared my thoughts on the future of D&D Encoutners. Check out the Wizards of the Coast podcast of the D&D Encounters seminar. Yes, that’s me plugging Dungeon’s Master around the 10 minute mark.
- The Future of D&D Encounters
- D&D Encounters Dark Sun (Week 10)
- D&D Encounters Dark Sun (Week 11)
- D&D Encounters Dark Sun (Week 12)
Skill Challenges
- Skill Challenge: Road Trip to GenCon – A real-life skill challenge encapsulating the long car ride to GenCon.
- Skill Challenges Without Skills – Let the narrative drive your skill challenges and not the numbers.
- Skill Checks vs. Skill Challenges – We discus when to use a skill challenge as opposed to just a few skill checks.
- How Difficult Is It To Sneak Past A City Guard? – We discus rationale for skill checks and power creep.
DM Resources
- Adventure Hooks: Welcome to the Sun & Moon Tavern (Part 1) – Digging through some dusty papers revealed 15 adventure hooks from the Sun & Moon Tavern.
- Adventure Hooks: Welcome to the Sun & Moon Tavern (Part 2) – Here are 16 more adventure hook to keep things exciting.
- The DM Is The Key – Never underestimate the value or importance of a good DM.
Player Resources
- D&D Camp and the Tomb of Horrors – See how a bunch of 9-15 year-olds handle the most deadly adventure in the history of D&D.
- Creating A Character Around A Concept – Don’t let the numbers dictate your choices, find an interesting concept and work to that when creating a character.
- Open Game Table 2 – You’ll find three of our articles in this fantastic publication featuring articles from around the blogsphere.
- Achievement Rewards Are Coming To D&D – Is D&D becoming an MMO?
Looking Ahead
We have two big projects on the horizon for September. The first is more skill challenges. When we were at GenCon and the folks from Wizards asked who wanted more skill challenges everyone put up their hand. So we’re going to give the public what they want. More skill challenges and more articles on how to keep them fresh and fun. The second project is the Tomb of Horrors. We’re playing for keeps. Six hard-core gamers who have never played the Tomb of Horrors before bring one character each and try to emerge victorious. We’ll have articles from the DM and the players as well as podcasts of the actual games. Of course we’ll have many other great D&D articles in September so be sure to visit every day.