Deconstructing Mouse Guard

Mouse Guard is a brilliant comic by David Petersen about mice who live in a pseudo-medieval world of the territories beset by the dangers of the natural world.  The Guard protect the mouse territories by sword or by wits.  I first came across the comic at a small local comic convention, Vancouver ComicCon. Luke Crane adapted his acclaimed Burning Wheel roleplaying game to the world of Mouse Guard.  The game has won numerous awards including Roleplaying Game of the Year at Origins in 2009 beating out Dungeons and Dragons 4e.

Being a long time fan of the Mouse Guard comic, I ordered a copy of the RPG from Indie Press Revolution last year.  It is a beautiful book that lives up to the talented graphic design of the comic.  For a while I thumbed through it but didn’t know if my gaming group would take to mice with swords RPG.  I’ve since sat down to digest what is honestly my first indie story game and find myself loving it.

One of the primary reasons that I wanted to get the game was my son. He is 5 and I’ve been keeping an eye out for a way to share my passion for roleplaying games with him. Mouse Guard is a game with lighter subject matter than others like D&D. One which I hope will help fuel his growth as a person in the lessons it can teach.

The ChattyDM has advocated many of the concepts in his D&D 4e games over the past several months. Rather than trying to just read it and sell my group on it, I thought it might be a good idea to examine some of the core concepts of the game on my blog and try to deconstruct it in my own mind.

Beliefs

Character statistics in Mouse Guard are less about how easy it is to hit enemies or how much damage is dealt. They are more about digging deeper into the character and rewarding players on that portrayal.  The first core character concept presented is Beliefs.

The game defines beliefs as “a code or ethical stance… a snapshot view of how your character thinks.“[1] As such you are encouraged to create beliefs for your character that help define how they see the world. Are they honourable or selfish? Do they put action before knowledge?

For example a guard’s belief might be,

Mac believes that the guard should always stand up for the less fortunate.

Each character needs one simple sentence that will tell everyone else at the table what the character is about. Game Masters are then encouraged to challenge a character’s beliefs to really push on them to see how far their character will hold true.

Adopt[2]

Even in games that have not been set up around similar concepts, encouraging players to think deeper about their character is important if you are trying to draw more out of their roleplaying.  Beliefs are a great starting point when asking questions about a character.

It is important to follow through as a Game Master and make those beliefs important to the game if you want players to use them in game.  Mouse Guard gives some great advice on how to challenge beliefs  and draw them out. In the example above a GM might place an orphan in danger when doing so would draw the character away from their primary goals.

Another thing that Mouse Guard highlights with regards to beliefs is to reward players for drawing on those beliefs and making hard choices based on them.  Experience point rewards, further story rewards, or even unlocking situational rewards in the encounter itself are all ideas for rewards. Mouse Guard gives Fate Points for playing to beliefs and Persona Points for playing against them.

But where too next? Where can today’s modern web tools such as XHTML and HTML5.0 push design forward?

I recently read two very informative articles by two of RPG Blogging’s rising stars, Phillipe Menard (aka @ChattyDM) and Dave Chalker (aka @DavetheGame) that explored some of the possible scenarios that set my mind aflame.  Here were two popular vocal proponents advocating the same revolution in adventure design that I had been craving.

High Level Concept

Adventure Design 2.0 would feature some of today’s leading web application concepts to allow high quality content presented with the individual user (a DM in this case) in mind. Allowing that content to be dynamic, personalized, and shared.

Adventures designed to present different forms of media together in an application that allowed DMs to purchase access to an adventure that would be customized to their needs and allow for the DM to further modify and share their own customizations. The media incorporated, from maps and graphics, to text and formatted stat-blocks could be tailored to the DMs individual campaigns all in one tool.

Possible Features

Modular adventure content that can be customized and shared is a rather broad concept but some of the features that one can imagine include:

• System of Choice (4e, 3.5, PFRPG, OSRIC, etc) which would update all rules content in a saved adventure instance to that system.
• Adjustable scalable levels which could also update rules content and be saved.
• Customizable monsters that can be imported, exported, and saved.
• Customizable NPCs that can have additional notes or hooks added.
• Customizable treasure in the form of traditional loot or packet formats.
• Larger supporting images or links to external graphics.
• Hyperlinked content internally within the site or externally for referenced rules.
• Maps that allow you to hover over sections and display a quick synopsis or click to open the related encounter.
• The ability to share the customizations with other members.

Subscriptions

One of the difficult pieces of the puzzle centres around profitability. An enterprise like this would need serious capitol to succeed. Not only would you need to hire authors, artists, editors, and cartographers, but also web developers and the system to support it.

One particular model of financing such an endeavor would be around a subscriptions or around access purchases. So someone could buy an instance of a particular adventure for 4e at 1st level and gain access to the system for that adventure. Future adventure purchases could be added to the purchasers account and offered similar to how some game companies market download-able content.

In addition those customers could then be migrated to a subscription model where they gain access to a set number of adventures in a particular period and potentially to more advanced tools such as customization and sharing.

Dynamic Content

One of the features that was listed above that sounds the most intriguing is the customizability of content. If you look at the current list of WotC’s Dungeon adventures or Goodman Game’s DCCs you can see that there are adventures for many levels and I’m sure all levels will be covered eventually. But what if you like one adventure that is a couple of levels above the heads of your party.

Customizing that adventure is often left in the hands of the DMs often with no pointers from the authors. What if the adventure were written with a range in mind (similar to LFR/Pathfinder Society scenarios) that automatically updated the difficulty of the adventure.

Perhaps the adventure that really fits in a DM’s campaign is one from a system that their group does not use. Sure DMs could spend the countless hours converting that adventure to their system of choice but what if the adventure was already built with the appropriate monster stats, treasures, etc.

Even beyond altering adventures by overall settings what if a DM’s campaign features a specific set of villains such as the Order of the Emerald Claw or the Purifiers? A suite of tools could be available to import Monster Builder files and allow DMs to replace the opponents in a featured adventure, touch up encounter information, and make notes all without the difficult work of redesigning the whole thing.

In the grand scheme this is an immense idea and I hope to continue expanding on this little bit of brainstorming. Already I can picture user interfaces, data structures, and tools or modules that I’d want to build. Yes I’m more the guy who can design the system than write the adventure or draw the illustrations and maps.

Castle Shadowcrag © Wolfgang Baur, 2009

Wolfgang Baur is running another round of Open Design so this is the perfect time to get in on it.  This time is a little different as there are three proposals for people to vote on and any one or even all three can progress should they achieve enough funding.  I’ll outline below all 3 proposals, but only one is being written in 4e ~ Courts of the Shadow Fey! The Scathsidhe return from both the Ennie nominated Castle Shadowcrag and Wrath of the River King.

I have been a patron of Wolfgang Baur’s Open Design movement since Castle Shadowcrag (oh how I wish I’d signed on for Steam and Brass!).  At some point I’ll write a full description of all of the projects I’ve been a part of (Castle Shadowcrag, Empire of the Ghouls, Arabian Nights, Blood of the Gorgon, Tales of Zobeck, Wrath of the River King, and Halls of the Mountain King). For now I’d like to bring attention to the three projects up for patronage this round and a quick discussion on what is changing.

Patronage

Wolfgang Baur started the Open Design movement with the idea that during the Renaissance artists created works for private patrons, so RPG products could be written for a select small group of patrons who would provide input and direction into the process.  That simple idea has spawned a large following of people who get to watch first hand how a master writer crafts his finished works. Patrons also have the opportunity to provide input, suggest topics, pitch content, and in some cases even author some of the work.  There are two levels of patrons, the patron level which grants access to the discussion and allows patrons to provide input on the design; and the senior patron level who get advanced views of some content, is allowed to pitch suggestions, and takes part in deciding the next round of projects after the current one finishes.

In the past the projects were exclusive, only those who were patrons of the project while it was being written would get an electronic copy and would be given the ability to purchase the print on demand version. That changed a bit after the first project to allow those of the current project (ie. Halls of the Mountain King) to purchase the previous project (ie. Wrath of the River King). Only recently did Wolfgang open up the Ennie award winning Tales of Zobeck to the public because of the award.  With the three projects below, however, Wolfgang is not keeping them exclusive to patrons. Provided they achieve funding, each project will see the light of day as electronic books available for mass consumption. Patronage still has its perks as I’ve outlined above. For me the draw is seeing how an amazing adventure comes together behind the scenes.

Open Design Projects Seeking Patrons

Courts of the Shadow Fey ~ link ~ Sign up today!

Written by Wolfgang Baur, this adventure will be written for Dungeons & Dragons 4E. It has been pitched as a paragon level adventure that takes players to the Plane of Shadow when the intrigues of the Scathsidhe threaten the Free City of Zobeck.  The adventure will be one of politics, assassination, intrigue, and stealth. Personally this one gets my vote as it is both 4E and written by Wolfgang himself, oh and its set in Zobeck.  I loved both Shadowcrag and Wrath so I’m looking forward to more Shadow Fey goodness.

From the Shore to the Sea ~ link ~ Sign up today!

This one will be written by senior patron Brandon Hodge who contributed substantially to the Halls of the Mountain King project.  The project is being designed to use the newly released Pathfinder RPG rules and will hopefully be set in the Pathfinder campaign setting, Golarion (pending agreement by Paizo Publishing).  The adventure will draw players beneath the waves where an ancient kingdom of aboleth have reawakened and has enslaved an entire village.  The Pathfinder RPG shows promise and Golarion is one of the most intriguing settings currently being supported.

Red Eye of Azathoth ~ link ~ Sign up today!

Joshua Stevens is leading this Cthulhu-inspired collection of adventures.  The project will either use the Call of Cthulhu system or the Pathfinder RPG depending on how the patrons choose (talk about involvement!).  The adventures will span several time periods as sleeping elder gods seek to invade the mortal world.  These 5 adventures will be set on earth in 5 different periods of history and senior patrons for this project will get to pitch entire adventures.

Personally I wish I had funding available to join all three projects or even one at the senior patron level. As indicated the 4E adventure, Courts of the Shadow Fey is my current favorite.

RPG Blog Carnival

Just sliding in under the gun, here is my entry in the Steampunk RPG Blog Carnival, being put on by Mad Brew. When putting together my last game prior to the launch of 4e, my players decided to go with an Iron Kingdoms game. It was an intriguing setting that I’d never played so I was game. Unfortunately we only play once a month at most so it wasn’t too long before 4e came out and I was hooked. Deciding not to abandon the campaign we’d already started and given that the characters were all still 1st level we converted. It wasn’t too difficult to find resources on Privateer Press’ boards for fan conversions.

So for the carnival I thought I’d post up some links and feedback on the resources I found and how they played in the game before it ended in a TPK (my only one ever). Though it is a story for another day, I will say that it was not because of the 4e Iron Kingdoms fan resources used.

Trollkin ~ link

Trollkin were one of the easier conversions but I think Steamworks over at Privateer Press’ boards did a great job of bringing in the eating habits of these big thugs and their survivability. Their powers seem a little too close to dwarves in the end, but definitely playable.  Our player didn’t take it but a feat that grants 5 temp hit points for every healing surge spent seems like a bit much. I think I’d tone that down a bit, but overall well done.

Gun Mage ~ link

Gun mages are definitely one of the coolest elements of the setting and one of my players definitely wanted to keep that style of character in the conversion.  Again Steamworks came through with what I found was the most balanced conversion of the class.  There are a number (you can find them in the general list of links below) but his was well put together.  The damage is a little on the high side but overall it was balanced in play as an Arcane Striker. The class has only been built for heroic play but in the end that was perfect for our use.

Firearms ~ link

I’m not sure if Scott’s work was out while we were playing, but having seen a number of firearms rules I think those he posted at A Butterfly Dreaming are the best available.  They are balanced, creative, and definitely useful. I will likely include them in my Zobeck clockwork game in the near future.

General Link List

Steampunk has definitely invaded my gaming group as they are all enjoying games in that vein. Despite the lack of official or 3rd party published resources, there is a large fan following. I’m sure that many more blog posts will join those resources in this month’s carnival roundup.

Free RPG Day

Free RPG Day

Free RPG Day was held on June 20 this year. This was the first year that I was able to enjoy the day as it has not been supported outside the States before.  Here in Vancouver there were several stores who had received packages from the fine people running Free RPG Day. I went out to my FLGS, Imperial Hobbies, in Richmond in the late afternoon.

Even with the late time I managed to pick up quite a few products all of them phenomenal. From Keith Barker’s Eberron Adventure to a Rogue Trader introduction, all great promotional material.

WotC – D&D 4E – Khyber’s Harvest ~ link

Alright I’ll admit that this was the product I was most looking forward to. Keith Baker has put together a great 2nd level adventure in 4E Eberron in Khyber’s Harvest. During a conjunction between Mabar and Xoriat, Cultists of the Dragon Below attempt to open a gateway to Khyber. Your party must thwart their intentions before something from below emerges to devour the Shadow Marches. The adventure also came with a full Dungeon Tile as well depicting a Dragonmark-like symbol on a dungeon floor and purple crystals on a bare earthen floor on the other side.

Goodman Games – D&D 4E – Immortal Heroes/Hearts of Chaos ~ link

The Immortal Heroes section of this flip book presents 9 epic destinies by Aeryn “Blackdirge” Rudel the editor in chief of Goodman Games’ Level Up! magazine.  They run the gambit from Archfiend to Radiant Master to Sidhe.  The other side is a preview adventure of Goodman Games’ upcoming Amethyst RPG that uses 4E rules in a modern setting that has collided with the Fantastical.  Magic, monsters, and machine guns all feature strongly in this new game coming in September.

Paizo Publishing – PFRPG – Bonus Bestiary ~ link

With Pathfinder RPG launching at Gencon this year, Paizo has released teasers of changes made to characters but this is the first preview of creatures created under the new rules. Pathfinder RPG is one of the most anticipated releases this year with over 50,000 people participating in the Open Beta test over the past year. The bestiary includes creatures like the Allip, Dragonne, and Shadow Mastiff all with incredibly high quality presentation as we’ve come to expect from Paizo.  The interesting parts come not only in the stats revealed but the introduction detailing how the new rules apply like Combat Maneuver Bonus and Defence and diseases and poisons.

Fantasy Flight – Warhammer 40K Rogue Trader – Forsaken Bounty ~ link

I’ve not had the chance to play the Warhammer 40K RPG yet, but I used to play the miniatures games fanatically for several years during university. The Rogue Trader RPG looks fascinating, putting characters in the position of merchants and traders on the fringes of the empire.  The preview also contains the short adventure Forsaken Bounty in which characters are given salvage rights to the Emperor’s Bounty, a vessel lost in the Maw.

White Wolf – Geist the Sin-Eaters – Quickstart Rules and Adventure ~ link

Again showing my recent monogamous gaming habits, I’ve not had the opportunity to play any of the new World of Darkness games despite having enjoyed Vampire, Werewolf and Mage in the past.  Geist is a game featuring people who’ve thwarted death just before passing over in a Faustian bargain with spirits or geists.  Those geists demand the saved allow them to ride along in a symbiotic relationship with the Sin-Eater. Also included is an adventure ‘The Return of Mr. Monster’ for the game.

Mongoose Publishing – Paranoia – Citizen’s Guide to Surviving Alpha Complex ~ link

Are there ever a lot of great games from back in the day being given new life. Mongoose Publishing has been publishing many Paranoia supplements and included this small digest sized introduction to the game.  Commie Mutant Traitors beware, the Computer’s Troubleshooters are being given higher and higher levels of access in order to track you down. Infiltrators beware should the Computer’s agents get wind of your treachery.

Imperial Hobbies – d6 ~link

My local FLGS is great. Not one to miss out on the marketing opportunity they created several d6s with their name and phone number on them.  A nice little touch to be sure, though my wife has claimed mine

I have no idea if there were more companies participating in the event, but I had a great time. I appreciate the marketing effort that went into all of these top notch products and I’m sure I’ll give some of them a shot.  I hope that this event continues in Canada every year.

After starting this blog about 3 months ago with the dream of joining the network, it has finally become a reality.  I had wanted to ensure that I could keep up a steady pace of interesting content for readers as suggested in the network’s requirements.  Having kept at it for the past 3 months I like to think I’m there. I’ve tried a number of different formats to see what I can keep up with so you may still see a variety in voice.

Alya Portrait by Apis Teicher

Inspired by the work of The Core Mechanic, Mad Brew Labs, At-Will who have started a project they call Portrait of a Villain, as well as by Sly Flourish’s Twitter DM Tips, I’ve decided to create a twitter project of my own.  For the moment I call it Twitter Villains, though I might migrate it into a broader project in the future. I have lots of ideas on creating more than just villains in 140 characters or less. This is also an attempt to tighten my writing skills and garner interest in my blog.

With Twitter Villains, I’ve posted my first one on twitter already under my account ~ twitter.com/erekose13. I’ll post a log ever once in a while though you can always follow the twitter column under the tag #villain. The format for each post will remain the same: #villain Name; description; motivations & goals.  Stats are purposely not included anywhere as they would defeat the purpose of a twitter column.  Though popular posts might garner a full treatment here on the blog.

Without further ado, here is the first twitter villain:

#villain Elegast; quickling w/billowing smokelike hair who hunts fey on the mortal world due to a misguided love of the fomorian Lord Gryme

RPG Blog Carnival

Samuel Van Der Wall over at Roleplaying Pro is hosting this month’s Blog Carnival on the Future of Roleplaying.  Inspired by a video produced by Microsoft Labs on the future of technology, I thought I’d put together a list of ten things I’d love to see at the table top. Additional sources of inspiration follow the list below.

First, I definitely believe that the table top RPG game is going to stick around, there is so much more than just getting together and killing monsters and taking their stuff. Even if that’s what your group is into, sitting around and enjoying some social time together is a far more enjoyable experience than doing the same thing online.

On to the list!

1. Smart Phone Character Sheets

Sure you can carry around your iPlay4e character sheet to reference, but what if you could lay your phone on the table and it would automatically load your character sheet onto the table surface.  You could then access, update or share pieces of your sheet as the game progressed. All in-game calculations could be handled based on the loaded sheet, including character visualization.

2. Tabletop Integrated Rule Books

I’m a PDF convert ever since Monte Cook released the Book of Eldritch Might and I miss WotC’s PDF books that were previously available.  I’ve not used pdfs at the game table yet, though I will be soon. I’ve just always found laptops a little cumbersome at the table. Now if the computer were the table… Rule books could be searched, retrieved, and displayed for anyone at the table.

3. Auto Calculating Dice Rolls

While dice rolling software is available for your Smart Phone or iPhone, I’m still a fan of the tactile sensation of polyhedrons shuffling in hand to give that up. What is sometimes awkward is remembering all the modifiers that are applied to your roll. Imagine if you rolled your dice onto the digital tabletop and when it stopped, the display automatically output all the calculations next to the number. You could then send the roll over to the DM to determine if the roll was successful.

4. 3D Interactive Battle Map

There is a scene in the video above where a project manager is skimming through a 3D graphical representation of their project, isolating and zooming in sections to make changes. Apply all those concepts to a visual 3D game table and you’re on to something. Now let all players at the table see the game table through various lenses (fog of war style) and interact with it and you’ve got one heck of a miniature game.

5. Ease of Condition Tracking

Whether you play D&D or not, most of today’s games rely on conditions from health to blindness to dying.  Many innovative solutions have been created to help track all these conditions flying around, especially with 4E’s reliance on them.  Why would you want to take care of all that when the interactive gaming table can do that for you.

6. Ease of Resource Tracking

Along the same lines, most games use resources that players need to keep track of, be they encounter powers, action points, or spells.  The interactive table already has your full character sheet and is tracking any conditions affecting you, resource management is an easy one to throw in there.

7. Visual Aid Distribution

When it comes to visual aids, from images, to maps, to props, I’ve always had found it difficult to include them at the table. Online games its easy and really helps, but at the table pulling out the Monster Manual or dropping the full geographic map on the table is at times cumbersome.  With surface based sharing you can display images to all (or just one?) at the table and those that wanted to could even grab a shot of it and store it for their own reference later on.

8. Personalized Note Taking Interface

Pen and paper gaming already has one of the most personalized note tacking devices built in, that’s right ~ the pen and paper.  Many gamers have experimented with laptops, netbooks, or smart phones to take notes as well but that can take up a lot of space.  Having the ability to record notes on a multi-touch tabletop interface would allow players and DMs a like to jot down anything they needed to and save it for a later date.

9. Full Game Recording

With all of these innovations above relying on the tabletop computer to display, manage, and manipulate it would be an easy matter to include recording.  DMs would be able to replay scenes to allow for easier preparation for the next session and players could access quick summaries from the records.

10. Enhanced DM Tool-kits

All of the above suggestions have been targeted at making the game better from a table top perspective, but I’d be remiss at leaving DM prep work out of the mix. So many advances are taking place already to allow DMs to modify creatures on the fly or have advance preparations available should players alter the course of play. What if all those tools were available in game immediately at your finger tips. Encounter too easy? introduce new elements immediately. Need information on an NPC from 6 sessions ago? pull them up with a couple of clicks. Events being handled earlier than planned? update other events automatically with the changes to the play environment.

I’ve only scratched the surface with these ideas, but I was so taken with how companies are looking at future technology that I couldn’t help myself. Heck any one of these ideas could be expanded on drastically.  I’ve already mentioned the Microsoft Future of Technology video, but some of the other inspirational pieces include the BBC’s Inside Microsoft’s Home of the Future video and CNN’s Just Imagine: 2020 series.

Play by Post (PbP) is a unique gaming experience, one full of fun, excitement, and sometimes frustration.  I’ve been playing PbP for about 7 years now, largely over at ENWorld’s fantastic PbP community.  I’ll go through a few of the attractions of the format and how it is different from many other forms of gaming, and I’ll touch on a few tricks of the trade so to speak.

PbP is played on message boards and as such is similar to Play by Email in that a DM will post to the game and all of the players have time to put together their responses.  PbP allows both players and DMs time to craft a response and deliver top notch roleplaying and well thought out tactics.

It can, however, be very slow moving.  In steady games, leveling takes about 6 months to a year if at all.  Many DMs and players do not have the stamina to stick it through and fade away. But there are many communities that provide support for DMs to continue delivering quality games.

At ENWorld, community members have formed persistent Living Worlds that have some similarities with the organized play several companies put on. Similar in that all of the games take place in a shared world with consistent characters who can adventure together through a series of games with a variety of DMs.  Not so similar in that it is more loosely organized and DMs are free to run what ever adventures they want.

Living ENWorld (a 3.5 shared world), Living 4th Edition (a 4e shared world), Living Eberron (a 3.5 Eberron setting), and Living Superheroes (a M&M world) all embrace different shared worlds where a number of games are being run concurrently.  In addition there are the general PbP forums where people gather in all sorts of games together.

One of the most important things to remember if you are going to get in to PbP is to post. Keep posting and the games will stay alive.  So many people fade away because they lack the commitment. Have that and you are all set.

I’ll come back to more tips such as in character vs. out of character discussion, mapping techniques, and more next time.

With this update falling on a Wednesday we have a few more exciting pieces of news from Wizards of the Coast to include in this post. Not only have Dungeon and Dragon magazine delivered some great pieces with the Prince of Frost and the Remains of the Empire adventure, but the D&D Character Builder and Compendium have been updated. Probably the biggest piece of news this week, however, is that WotC is giving away D&D for Free! Read below for more.

Dragon Magazine

Note that these articles require a subscription to DDI to access.

Court of Stars: Prince of Frost ~ link

This article by Keith Baker is portrays one of the Winter Fey, the Prince of Frost and his palace the Fortress of Frozen Tears.  Keith delves into the history of this great eladrin lord and his court.  As a fully detailed opponent, this article shows us the goals and motives of the price, adventure hooks, and even a full write up of the prince as a level 31 solo controller. Several allies are presented as well including Mournwind and Soulsorrow the Sisters of Lament. In addition player options accompany these NPCs in the form of a paragon path and a Warlock feat for fey pact warlocks to tie themselves more closely to the Winter Fey.

Playtest: The Wilden ~ link

From PH3, the Wilden are the spiritual ancestors of the Killoren who appeared in the Races of the Wild for 3.5.  The Wilden are fey who take on aspects of their ancestors in their eternal battle against the encroaching forces of the Far Realm. With bonuses in Constitution and Wisdom along with their 3 different aspects which can change each extended rest, the Wilden are appropriate as druids or shaman.

Dungeon Magazine

Note that these articles require a subscription to DDI to access.

Remains of the Empire [Heroic - L3]~ link

In this adventure by Kolja Raven Liquette the characters befriend a unique, docile drake who accompanies them to an ancient Dragonborn citadel that fell from the sky centuries ago. The citadel shattered across a mountain time with pieces of the tower suspended in mid air.  The party must unravel the plot of a zealous dragonborn intent on raising the citadel to its former glory.  Filled with interesting skill challenges and unique encounter locations, this article features some amazing art as well.

Dungeoncraft: Background ~ link

In this issue of Dungeoncraft James Wyatt reviews his implementation of PH2’s background system for his Greenbrier game. He discusses the player’s choices and how, as a DM, he will incorporate those choices into the campaign.

D&Di

Character Builder and Compendium Update ~ link

The Character Builder and Compendium were updated with the information from Arcane Power, Dragon 373, Dungeon 164, E1 Death’s Reach, and the Player’s Handbook Heroes I miniature series. I’m looking forward to re-tooling my wizard as a conjurer with the Tome of Readiness.

D&D Test Drive ~ link

Wizards of the Coast is giving away D&D 4E for free. You can now download the quick start rules that were published last May in Keep on the Shadowfell and you can get the entire adventure as well.  Linked from this page is the Character Builder free version with all information for levels 1-3.

From a great adventure to an incredibly well written piece by Keith Baker this week’s updates couldn’t get any better until they released all the Arcane Power content into CB and gave away KoS for free! Proof that WotC is trying to engage their online fans more and more. If only they could bring back PDF sales as well.