Tag: Dungeon’s Master

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Book Reviews Eberron

Review: Taint of the Black Brigade

Taint of the Black Brigade
The Chronicles of Abraxis Wren
Paul Crilley

An Eberron Novel

If you like a little bit more than the typical hack and slash in your fantasy fiction then you’re in for a treat. At its heart, Taint of the Black Brigade is a detective story. Even though it takes place in Eberron and the characters use magic it’s not your typical D&D novel. The focus of this story is a mystery and the lengths that a detective will go to solve it.

Taint of the Black Brigade is Crilley’s second novel featuring Abraxis Wren. The first, Night of the Long Shadows, was part of the Inquisitives series and although it took place before Taint of the Black Brigade it’s not necessary for you to read it first. I know that I read it when it was first released but all I remember about it besides that it was set in Eberron and featured an Inquisitive was that I really enjoyed it. So when I began reading Taint of the Black Brigade I was coming to it without any detail from the first book.

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DM Resources Skill Challenges

Inside Out Skill Challenge

When you look at the latest issues of Dungeon magazine or read through any LFR adventure, skill challenges are always presented in the same way. After a brief description of the high-level objective you’re presented with a laundry list of skills and then a brief description of what happens when these skills are used successfully. This presentation is ok, especially for a new DM trying to better understand the tasks that can be accomplished by using these skills. But what if we turned the skill challenge inside out? Instead of revolving the skill challenge around the list of skills, have the skill challenge revolve around the goals.

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Month in Review

Month in Review: September 2010

In September two topics dominated Dungeon’s Master: the Adventure Builder Workshop series and our coverage of D&D Encounters. These weren’t the only topics we covered but they certainly filled out the month. We also debated the pros and cons of LFR and began our series on the Tomb of Horrors. There was a lot of great gaming advice and lively debate happening at Dungeon’s Master in September. If you happened to miss any of it, here’s your changes to get caught up.

Our regular readers know that we normally publish our month in review article on the first day of the month. We were ready to publish it on Friday, but after reading about the proposed changes coming to LFR based on D&D Essentials we decided to preempt our normal schedule to cover this more timely topic. So without further delay, here are all of the highlights from September.

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Editorial Player Resources

Will D&D Essentials Ruin LFR?

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.

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Editorial

D&D Encounters: Keep on the Borderlands (Week 2)

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.

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DM Resources Editorial Player Resources

Unearthing the Tomb of Horrors

Welcome to a new series for Dungeon’s Master where I’ll be talking about encounter design, emergent storytelling, setting the tone of your game, finding ways to challenge your players, and revitalizing the classic dungeon crawl for a new generation of gamers – all through the lens of the classic Tomb of Horrors adventure as I run it as a mini-campaign for group of veteran gamers. The players will provide their perspective as well, as they talk about their preconceptions of the Tomb of Horrors and their character creation process for this iconic adventure. We’ll also have real-play podcasts of our entire Tomb of Horrors experiences hosted at the Shattered Sea in the coming weeks.

Today the Dungeon’s Master team welcomes Steampunked, our newest contributor. He brings a wealth of gaming experience to our blog and a unique perspective on D&D. He’s played and DMed many games with Ameron and Bauxtehude including LFR adventures, D&D Encounters and the Shattered Sea campaign.

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DM Resources

Adventure Builder Workshop: Repercussions

According to Newton’s laws of motion, “For every action there is always an equal and opposite reaction.” The same can be said of the actions of your players. Every decision that they make, every action they take, has a repercussion.

The village is burning, while rushing back the PCs encounter bandits with villagers as prisoners. The PCs can rescue the prisoners or attempt to save what’s left of the village. There is only time to take one of these actions, which actions will the PCs take and what will be the repercussions?

The PCs can eliminate a major force of evil in the campaign, but killing this foe will leave a power vacuum that other rival factions will seek to fill. Is the devil you know better than the ensuing chaos that will ensue with the death of this foe? If things go from bad to worse and it is common knowledge the PCs are the ones responsible, how will they be perceived by the common people?

This is the final instalment in the Adventure Builder Workshop, based on the seminar at GenCon this past August. To read the complete series view the articles listed below:

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DM Resources

Adventure Builder Workshop: Rewards

Every player likes treasure. From gold, to gems, to shiny magic swords, we love our treasure. Our eyes glaze over as we dream about the perfect item for our character. Players have been known to lie, cheat and steal to keep a larger share of the treasure for themselves. We just can’t help it, it’s in our nature. As a DM it’s your job to dole out those tantalizing parcels of loot to your players.

This is the seventh instalment in an ongoing series about the Adventure Builder Workshop, based on the seminar hosted by Wizards of the Coast at GenCon this year. The previous entries in the series are:

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Book Reviews Editorial

The Essentials On D&D Essentials

D&D Essentials have arrived and yesterday I received my copy of the Rules Compendium and Heroes of the Fallen Lands. I have to admit that at first I had no intention of picking up any books in the Essentials line. I figured I would wait for Character Builder to update and then look at the new options that are available. I’m glad I didn’t.

For those not aware D&D Essentials is an alternate path for advancement available to your D&D characters. The Essentials line is a series of 10 products that gaming shops are encouraged to keep in stock. They are essentially the new entry point for beginner players. That being said, players other than beginners may find the new options to their liking. For more information on the Essentials line, including release dates, read our post regarding the Wizards of the Coast Preview.

There has certainly been a lot of debate about the merit of the Essentials line and it’s place in 4e D&D. I’m not here to tell you Essentials is the best thing since sliced bread or that it’s the worst product WotC has produced in years. Instead I’ll give you my honest feedback of what I’ve read so far and leave you to make your own decisions.

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Player Resources

D&D Encounters Season 3 Characters

D&D Encounters season 3 begins today. Using new rules from the D&D Essentials line, the season 3 adventure is a re-imagining of the D&D classic, Keep on the Borderlands. The adventure is broken into five chapters, each one running four weeks (yes, that’s a total of 20 weeks for those of you doing the math).

Players are encouraged to create their own characters using the new D&D Essentials rules found in the recently released Red Box. Wizards of the Coast hinted that Character Builder would be updated with the Essentials materials in time for everyone to make suitable PCs for D&D Encounters season 3. Unfortunately that didn’t happen. So unless you’ve picked up the Red Box and are happy making a character without character builder, then for at least the first week you’ll have to use one of the six pre-generated characters provided.

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