It was…a good death.

I started a new campaign this last weekend. It has all the potential of one of those long-running campaigns that will feature heroics that the players will be talking about years to come. But of late it is endings that I have been thinking of the most. The end of my long-running “Willow and Tara” Unisystem game a few years back, the end of my epic AD&D 1st edition game that spanned my high school years.

The end of that game ended in the deaths in many characters, but they were all good and heroic deaths. Well except for one, but I’ll talk about her later.

The deaths were honorable, heroic and did what they were supposed to do. Clear the slate for me fo when I went to college (and unknown to me at the time, pick up 2nd Edition AD&D).

That final battle was part of a war that had been building for a long time and finally exploded across the globe. It destroyed my DM’s own countries (he had some areas outside of the former Suel Empire) and tore mine to near shreds, I was HQed in Glantri on the other side of the world. Everywhere knew war. We called it the Shadow War. On my side of the world, the armies of Hell were marching in in an attempt to take the magical artifacts we were protecting. The war was long and it claimed the life of the King, his oldest son and their chief advisor. The head of the mercenaries’ guild vowed to stay uninvolved till his wife was killed and he disappeared. His son pledged his loyalty to the new 9-year-old Queen. It was a dark time.

The game took a little over two years in real time from say about May/June 1986 to mid-1989. Once I learned there was 2nd Edition coming (hard to believe we lived in a time where we didn’t know everything about a game line) I extended it. I took the individual battle scenes and played them all out. The return of the King’s son from Ravenloft (he wasn’t dead), the advisor, the guild master with an army of his own. Also, all my “lesser” characters that I may have rolled up and used once or twice in games got a chance to take center stage.

Here is one.  More to come.

Fjalar Snowcrest, was a dwarf thief. Kicked out of his homeland and disgraced and dishonored. He was in the city when the armies of hell overran the settled areas inside the walls. He was running, looking for a fight or to get away when he heard screaming. A few bearded devils (hamatula) had broken into a school, killed the teacher and were making their way to kids. Fjalar, never a brave dwarf, still hated bullies. When the war was over, Fjalar was dead. But all the children were alive. They told a tale of this dwarf with an axe of fire and muscles of stone who protected them from the monsters. Even when he was wounded and losing blood he continued to chop at the devils. Fjalar’s broken body was discovered, on top of 20 (though the children would later say 50 if not 100) Hamatula. At the end of the War of Shadows statues were raised to all the lost heroes. Fjalar’s was set in a public square where the dwarf stood majestically with several children behind him and his axe in front of him. The Queen herself invited his father and mother to come to see, they finally came 10 years later. She told them the story and said she knew of his dishonor, which is why his hands had been placed covering his family crest on the axe. The family said nothing till dozens of young adults and their collected scores of children came to the square. They had been the children saved that day and with them were their own children. Many children who bore names similar to Fjalar and Snowcrest.  The Snowcrest parents were moved. They said that they could not undo the dishonor their son had done and his name was still cursed, but that they were proud of their brave and honorable son.

Test Post: Willow and Tara vs. Purgatori

Just a test post.


Willow and Tara vs Purgatori 0 by ~WebWarlock on deviantART

Trying out linking my Deviant Art account to Blogger.

Willow and Tara battle the vampire hell goddess Purgatori.

Part 2:  Tara has a solution!


Willow and Tara vs. Purgatori by ~WebWarlock on deviantART

Dice

I am...



Take the quiz at dicepool.com

Thanks to Trollsmyth for the link (and then on to his friend Jeff).

Pathfinder, Game 2: The Big Kids

We started what will hopefully be a long running Pathfinder game with the "big kids".  This is my normal play-test group of the last few years, plus some guys that my DM Greg knows.  So far it has been a lot of fun.  Some of our players are missing the over the top acrobatics and "cinematic fantasy combat" of 4e and we are still making references to 4e in the game, I think it will go over well.

Our DM Greg is posting the play reports over on his blog, Rhonin's Ramblings, so some of my discussion about the game might end up over there as well. http://rhoninsramblings.blogspot.com/2010/04/pathfinder-campaign-chapter-11.html

We call it the "Big Kids" game since it is not the Pathfinder game I am currently playing with our kids; Greg's three boys and my two. In both games I am playing very different characters.  A witch in the "little kids" game and a paladin in the "big kids" one.  It is working out well I think.  I have made "mirror" versions of them in 4e and it will be interesting to see how they evolve together, but separate.  Or rather I made the 4e versions first and am now playing the Pathfinder versions.  One day I'll come up with a crossover adventure that involves all four characters in one world.

I still have my D&D 3.x (3.0, 3.5, BESM d20 and other d20 stuff mixed in) that I play with my two sons and we are supposed to get a 4.0/1st Ed cross-over game going sometime too.

That's a lot of D&D.

The cool thing is it gives me a chance to really get a feel for all the versions of D&D.  When my 3.x games ends I have to decide where to take it next.  The choices are continue with the hybrid 3.x game (throwing a bit of Pathfinder in), move up to 4e or even try something "new" like Labyrinth Lord or the D&D RC.

Our Big Kids game is once a month (or so) and the Little Kids game is about the same.  Advancement will be slow, but I am looking forward to it all.

Of Orcus and Generalists

Lots of comments this week.

Orcus vs. Demogorgon
If this were the demonic throwdown then Orcus overwhelms Demogorgon.  Far more comments and hits.  I have to say though a large part of that is because of the Tod Lockwood art.   But even when I have something similar in the past Orcus usually wins too.  I like Demogorgon and think there is tons of untapped horror there and even something that makes him more demon than Orcus.  But Orcus looks like he could be on the cover of an 80's metal album.  Yeah I can see than, some band out of England in the 80's or a Death Metal band out of Norway or Finland today.  Name them Orküs or something like that.  Some one get Raggi on the phone, he would know.

Generalist vs. Specialists
Generalist seems to be the rule of the day here too.  But that is also not a surprise given the population that reads this blog.  I throw out stats for Unisystem, WitchGirls, d20, D&D of all shapes and size. You all must like that stuff.  The Specialists have their own blogs.  There are also seem to be dabblers.  People that are Specialists in one or two systems and fluent in a dozen more.
I still wish though that I had a better name for Generalist.

More later including a "new" game for me...Rifts.

Gen Con Schedule tool.

Thanks to Joethelawyer I have this cool Gen Con webpage/app.

http://gencon.highprogrammer.com/gencon-indy-2010.cgi

Let's you see what is happening and allows me to check on my Ghosts of Albion games.
What I thought was really cool was the ability to send it right to my Google Calendar, which I have connected to my Pre and my work account.  So with a click I now have it all stored and ready to go.

Now to find some games to play.

System Specialist or System Generalist?

So it should come as no surprise that I know a lot of gamers. A lot of a lot.

And while tags like "simulationist" or "immersion" or even "rollplayer vs. roleplayer" get thrown about like they are important, there is one classification that actually interests me.
System Specialist vs. System Generalists.

The System Specialist plays one system only and that is it.  So they only play AD&D 1st ed or d20 or GURPS. This is not to say they have tried other systems.  I am going to bet many have, but they have found one system that they have decided that is all they need.
I like the System Specialist because they usually become experts of their chosen system.  They in a sense achieve in their system that elusive "fade into the background" element that so many designers strive for, whether it was a design principle of that system or not.  Great system specialists seem like elder sages of their system, knowing rules or situations at such a higher level to even surprise the designers.

The System Generalist (wish I had a better name) plays a large number of systems and may have tried even more.  They are comfortable using True20, FUDGE or Rifts in any given situation and they can often give you informed opinions of why X system is perfect for Y situation.  A lot of game designers I know fall under this category.
I like the System Generalist because they are usually able to adapt to newer systems easier and transfer over concepts from one system to the other to improve their own game play.  Game play details are often rendered in short-hand, "oh it is like BLANK from Call of Cthulhu" or "BLANK from Kult".

There are negatives too, but I am not so much interested in those to be honest.

It should not surprise anyone, but I tend to view myself as a System Generalist.  I like having multiple systems laying around, I like reading new ones, playing old ones and even mixing them is strange and odd ways.
I come very, very close to being a System Specialist when it comes to Cinematic Unisystem.   But I still forget some esoteric bit during play, and sometimes even important ones.  For example, for the life of me I can never remember the formula for life points.  I know it is a function of Strength and Constituion.  I know there is addition in there, and some multiplication and 3 and 10 work into it.  I know you 3 extra points per level of Hard to Kill, but that is it.  Pathetic huh?  I have made what, a few hundred characters for CineUnisystem?
The nice thing though outside of that I can run a Cine Unisystem game without books.  If it Ghosts of Albion chances are I don't even need to look up the spells.  I used to be like that for AD&D first ed, but those memories have faded over the years, or more to the point supplanted by similar rules in other versions of the game.

Where do you see yourself?  Generalist or Specialist?  What do you think are the pros of being...well you?