Elf, Dwarf, Gnome, Halfling. Since the first edition of D&D players have had a wide variety of fantasy races to choose from when creating their characters. With 4e D&D the list of races is quite extensive and it continues to expand with every new version of the Players Handbook and with every monthly update of the character builder. The worlds of D&D are full of tolerant people willing to accept everyone based on deeds rather than their race. No matter what race your PC happens to be, he’s usually accepted as a hero and welcomed into villages, towns and cities. An adventuring party that consists of a Dragonborn, a Drow, a Half-Elf, a Tiefling, a Half-Orc and a Gnome doesn’t draw attention, ridicule or suspicion as they enter a tavern for the first time. We don’t question it; we just accept that this is how things work when you’re playing D&D.
Category: Editorial
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I Wish for a Wish Spell in 4e D&D
In previous editions of D&D you knew that your PC reached the pinnacle of power when he could cast the wish spell. Wish always represented the most powerful and complicated spell in the PHB no matter which version of D&D you were playing. As if to make wish even more desirable, there existed limited wish – a spell that’s only purpose was to give you a diluted taste of the real thing. Now we have 4e D&D and I can’t find wish anywhere. What happened to the wish spell?
A lot has been said about combat being too slow in 4e D&D. We’ve shared our ideas for Speeding Up Your Game and provided More Tips for Speeding Up Your Game. But over the past few weeks we discovered what I believe is a solution to the slow combat problem: familiarity and cooperation. Here’s how it happened.
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Styles Of Play
The traditional style of play for most RPGs focuses on the long-term campaign. A compelling storyline that both players and DMs invest in. It’s a shared experience that develops over the course of months and in some cases years. Typical campaigns require a level of commitment from all involved to attend regular gaming sessions.
Change is coming to World of Warcraft with the announcement of the new expansion: Cataclysm. Whether you’re familiar with WoW or not change in fantasy games can be a good thing.
With the launch of 4e D&D, Wizards of the Coast brought change to the Forgotten Realms by advancing the timeline almost 100 years. This kind of change is pretty major and significant, but what about the smaller changes. I’m not talking about world breaking change. You don’t need to redefine the geography or have the PCs survive an apocalypse. I’m talking about smaller, subtler change to keep things interesting for the PCs.
When was the last time you brought change to your game?
Keith Baker, creator of Eberron, took time out of his busy schedule to answer 13 questions for us.
When we ran our early Eberron Campaign Guide review in July, it generated a lot of buzz and a lot of comments. I was thrilled to see that the book’s author, Mr. Baker himself, not only took the time to read our review but offered his 2 cents by leaving some comments of his own.
I was fortunate enough to meet Mr. Baker in person a few times during this summer’s GenCon. He’s a very friendly and down-to-earth guy. I sat in on his free-for-all discussion about Eberron and it was well worth it. As you’d probably expect, he speaks of Eberron with remarkable enthusiasm. His insights into the draconic prophecy, resurrection in Eberron and undersea adventuring was awesome.
When Mr. Baker agreed to answer a few questions for us, the team at Dungeon’s Master tried to come up with something unique. We wanted to pose questions that Mr. Baker may not have been asked before or probably isn’t asked that often. We finally decided to just ask the questions that we, as gamers who play in Eberron every week, would find interesting. We hope that you find this Q&A as enlightening and enjoyable as we do.
The character builder is great. I’d even go so far as to say that it’s the most important and valuable resource currently available for 4e D&D. It makes creating new character fast and easy. It incorporates all legal source materials from Wizards of the Coast and makes them available with the click of a button. From what I saw at GenCon it looks like the vast majority of gamers are using the character builder. The days of pen and paper character creation are gone. But is this acceptance by the masses of the character builder a good thing?
Dear Wizards,
At this year’s GenCon I participated in my very first D&D Championship. My team did remarkably well and we advanced to the final round. Unfortunately we did finish in the top three and did not win any prizes. Looking back on my experience with the 2009 D&D Championship I have some feedback for you, and for anyone thinking of participating in this kind of event at future cons.
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GenCon: D&D Championship Finals
I made it. My team advanced to the finals of the 2009 GenCon D&D Championship. We played it smart in the qualifying round, and even though we didn’t complete all four encounters we still advanced. The semi-finals were even more difficult and only because two characters had training in Thievery did we make it through the second round of the D&D Championship. With only eleven teams remaining, we still had a legitimate shot at winning some fabulous prizes.
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GenCon: D&D Championship Semi-Finals
I was pleased to learn that my party did advance to the semi-finals of the D&D Championship even though we only completed three of the four encounters during the qualifying round. This time around we finished the entire adventure and it was a very rough ride for a whole bunch of different reasons.