Within the core books for the 4th Edition of Dungeons & Dragons, a base world is being set up which is intended to give new players and especially new Dungeon Masters a much easier time getting into their first game. The setting is called “Points of Light” and is summed up on their site as:
The Dungeons & Dragons game assumes many things about its setting: The world is populated by a variety of intelligent races, strange monsters lurk on other planes, ancient empires have left ruins across the face of the world, and so on. But one of the new key conceits about the D&D world is simply this: Civilized folk live in small, isolated points of light scattered across a big, dark, dangerous world.
One of the reasons this is such a big deal is that in previous editions of the game there was nothing like a base setting which shipped with the core books, instead there were expansion books for settings such as Forgotten Realms, Greyhawk, Eberron, and several others. Each of these worlds provides a different style of play for a game, whether it’s with established characters that have been read about in novels, familiar events and locales, or more general concepts such as the inclusion of elements like the Warforged as a more commonplace feature. These settings provide a framework on which the DM and players can then build their own stories, simultaneously elevated a lot of the tough work in running a game while providing a rich context and consistent themes.
Some people feel that this encourages players to be less creative, and discourages a DM from creating a whole world of his own, instead taking the easy route and just using what is in the book. While we haven’t yet seen what has gone to print, what is much more likely is that the core books provide a simple base on which ideas can be laid with a lot less effort than it would take to generate everything from scratch. Read the rest
Enjoy the most award-winning trivia game ever (made by Maryland’s own North Star Games) from the comfort of your own Xbox.
I only got a chance to play a few rounds this morning, but it does look like there are a few rules changes from the board game. However, the core game is definitely there, and I look forward to crushing all of you with my “leet trivia skills”.
This past weekend while picking up my free comics, I grabbed the Mouse Guard: Fall 1152 collection. This is a great fantasy comic series about elite mice who protect a tiny kingdom from threats both external (crabs, snakes, and other large creatures) and internal (traitorous officials.) I had owned several of the individual issues before and noted how RPGish the comic was, but upon reading the whole collection I was struck by the setting. The kingdom in which Mouse Guard takes place is a network of smaller kingdoms, each with their own governments but overseen by one central government. In between the cities, there are monsters (well, animals) that merchants and travellers must brave to go from place to place, and certain skilled warriors go on adventures in this setting. Sound familiar? Yes, it seems as though the world of Mouse Guard is an ideal Points of Light setting!
Well, in some ways great minds think alike, as CBR reports that there is going to be a Mouse Guard RPG released at Gen Con this year. Game design is going to be handled by Luke Crane, the creator of the widely-praised Burning Wheel RPG. (Luke also purportedly runs some of the best RPG demo sessions ever.)
This implies to me that the Mouse Guard RPG will either run on Burning Wheel or be its own indie-ish system, and not D&D. I’ll be picking up the book for sure, both for ideas and for the art.
Thus, I declared it to be unofficial review weekend! As the summer continues, we’ll be sure to bring you more of our impressions of new products, from as many different people as I can talk into it.
Last week, we asked if you were a multi-classer, or not, or sometimes. All throughout the week the voting was neck and neck between single-classing all the way and multi-classing every time. At the end, it seems that the single classers have edged out by 1 vote. The sometimes option was not that far behind either. It just shows it takes all types to make a party.
joshx0rfz suggested the following poll, despite being a self-proclaimed ignoramus of comicdom. Unless you are awesome at avoiding spoilers (and here comes one), you know that post-credits in Iron Man features Sam Jackson as Nick Fury, Agent of SHIELD, recruiting for something. To date, only one other flesh and blood actor has dared take on the role of the cigar-chomping, eye-patch wearing superspy and that man, of course, is The Hoff.
There’s some really excellent stuff there, and the few reports I’ve read have said that the interface is pretty slick (since it was programmed by the GameTableOnline people.) When I have some time (ha!) I’ll try to dive in. I play Acquire on my PDA several times a day, so I’m curious how the Gleemax version stacks up. And I’ve been meaning to try Vegas Showdown for a while now, so this seems like a good way to do it.
The whole Gleemax thing is still totally confusing. Obviously, they’re planning to charge for these games at some point. But does it somehow relate to the fee I would pay if I joined D&D Insider, since Gleemax is supposed to be the social networking portion of the Digital Initiative? Will there be a separate membership for Gleemax games, or Gleemax in general, that just adds on or overlaps? There’s no obvious clue, but hey, at least there’s some free games up for the time being.
It’s quite simple really, I felt like reviewing a Video Game and this here site here actually covers that particular niche better than mine (Obligatory shameless plug? Check.)
So we’re cool? Cool!
Ok, here’s the thing. My lovely wife is currently gone for a few days, working as a consulting Speech Pathologist in the Frozen Wastelands of Northern Quebec (I’m from Montreal if you don’t know me.) This leaves me to guard the fort with my two very adorable children: My 6 year old son and “4 and half” daughter.
Since my wife is out there getting paid consultant fees, I decided that we could afford some new games for our consoles (PS2 and Wii) and that it was my duty as caring father to provide my kids with quality interactive entertainment.
(Chatty pauses, expecting lightning to strike him while he weaves all that BS into a hopefully entertaining narrative.)
Long story short, we got Mario Kart Wii from the local EBGames (along with a Disney Princess Game and a DDR game.)
By the way, they were “selling” Mario Kart Wii for 10$ in exchange for a copy of Super Mario Galaxy, Super Mario Strikers or Mario Party 8. I don’t know if the Stateside EBGames offer this deal but it’s ongoing in Baconada (Obligatory Canadian Bacon reference? Check!) Read the rest
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Within the core books for the 4th Edition of Dungeons & Dragons, a base world is being set up which is intended to give new players and especially new Dungeon Masters a much easier time getting into their first game. The setting is called “Points of Light” and is summed up on their site as:
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