The show must to go on! Just because Ameron is on vacation is no excuse for Dungeon’s Master not to have a D&D Encounters weekly recap. I reached out to one of our loyal readers and he gratefully agreed to share his groups’ experiences with D&D Encounters week 6. Thanks to Rob Quinton (who you know as Lahrs, a frequent commenter at Dungeon’s Master) for his excellent summary of D&D Encounters week 6. Lahrs has been a player and a DM for the last twelve years and is currently running the D&D Encounters program at his FLGS.
Category: Editorial
It looks like the LFR Global Admins have pretty much nailed how magic items will work after D&D Essentials becomes part of Living Forgotten Realms. Yesterday M. Sean Molley (posting as soccerref73) provided us with a preview in the article LFR Campaign Guide: Upcoming Magic Item Changes. Although the details are still not 100% finalized, this looks and sounds like a solid model and they pretty much say that in the article.
They’re never going to please everyone, but I think these changes sound fair and will please most of the people most of the time. They are still asking for your feedback so be sure to leave your comments. They’re especially concerned about gaps or loopholes that they might have missed.
Chapter 2 of the Keep on the Borderlands – A Season of Serpents began this week. This season of D&D Encounters is running well at my FLGS. We’ve managed to run one solid table every week. On top of that new players keep coming out to try their hand at D&D. Some with absolutely no 4e D&D experience and other who are old pros looking for a pick-up game.
Even though we see new faces every week we’re having difficulty getting them all to come back. The good news is that the interest is there and that the players seem to be having a really good time (I know I am). The negativity that clouded our FLGS during the final weeks of D&D Encounters Dark Sun seems to have disappeared and we’re picking up a lot of positive momentum. I think we’ll start to see more regular attendance moving forward and perhaps have enough people to run two tables.
If you live in the Greater Toronto Area and want to join us, we play on Wednesday night at Dueling Grounds. D&D Encounters begins a 6 p.m. every week.
Categories
Play Neverwinter
Last week I enjoyed the nostalgia that highlighting the History of Dungeons & Dragons Computer Games. Today I want to look to the future. In August Atari announced the next release for D&D on the computer. Coming in Q4 of 2011 is Neverwinter and on the surface it looks promising.
I say that as an individual who doesn’t think there are enough D&D computer titles on the shelves these days. Looking back at past releases we saw that between 1990 and 1993, 17 titles were released. Clearly designing and releasing a computer game today is not what it was 20 years ago, but I would like to see more D&D video game releases.
There are more changes on the horizon for LFR. A couple of weeks ago in the article Will Essentials Ruin LFR? we talked about forthcoming changes to magical treasure and PC equipment necessitated by D&D Essentials. Last week Greg Marks (posting as Skerrit) one of the Global Admins for LFR posted another article on the Wizards forums announcing more changes to LFR. In the article CCG Update he talks about changes to the way adventures are going to be structured in 2011.
Video games were my introduction to Dungeons & Dragons, specifically SSI’s Pool of Radiance. Playing this game led me to purchase the original Red Box Set and guided me down the path to playing D&D. With the announcement of Neverwinter I started thinking about all of the D&D computer games that have been released. I’ve always felt that D&D having a digital presence through computer games is a great way to expand the presence of the brand. These games also serve as a great introduction to the hobby for the uninitiated.
Last week Ronnik tried to eliminate any evidence that might tie him to the Cult of Tiamat or Gordi’s kidnapping. Time was of the essence, so the PCs headed to the Well Hideout specified on the map they found in Ronnik’s wall safe.
This week we had a full party of six made up of Merric, Quinn, Hagen, Sola and two Berrians. After running two characters last week I opted to go back to just one character this week – Sola. We had a new player join our table this week. The last time he played D&D was AD&D 2e. So after a quick 10 minute primer on d20 mechanics, and a 5 minute recap of what happened during weeks 1-3 we moved on to D&D Encounters week 4.
Sometimes it’s nice to play an encounter that’s just hack and slash. Show up, sit down, roll initiative and kill monsters. I’m not saying I’d be happy with this week after week, but it was a welcome change after two weeks with some heavy role-playing.
When last week’s encounter ended the PCs barely had time for a short rest before they noticed Ronnik’s bank was on fire. The action picked up immediately where last week’s left off. Sal cried out, “Ronnik’s trying to destroy evidence of his evil affiliation by burning his own shop.” The PCs rolled initiative and rushed towards the burning building in search of survivors among the flames or evidence of Ronnik’s deeds.
Love it or hate it, D&D Essentials is here to stay. Some of the changes presented in D&D Essentials are optional, however many are not. The Living Forgotten Realms (LFR) program is in the process of getting a makeover in order to adhere to the new core rules introduced with D&D Essentials. Some players like LFR as it is today and wouldn’t change a thing. Others have been grumbling about power-creep for some time. Perhaps these changes will address some of those concerns. But regardless of which side of the fence you’re on, be forewarned that change are in the works so get ready.
Week 2 proved to be a great mix of role-playing and action. As promised during the D&D Encounters seminar at Gencon, this adventure has plenty of opportunity for role-playing and skill challenges in addition to the hack and slash. Our group is fortunate to have players that are looking for more than just a chance to roll dice and kill monsters. The DM is fostering a great atmosphere for fleshing out the characters and the story.
Before jumping into the recap I wanted to talk about the pre-generated characters. Although we’ve only had two weeks to use the pre-generated characters, I’ve found them great to play and a lot of fun. More thought and consideration went into building these PCs than we saw in the Dark Sun pre-gens. I wonder how much of this praise should go to the creative team who built the PCs and how much should go to the D&D Essentials rules? In either case, I’m happy to keep playing the pre-gens and really have no interest in rolling up a new PC once character builder is updated.