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D&D Is 30
mainframemouse writes "For those who have not seen the Beeb article, Dungeons and Dragons is 30 years old.
After many years of role-playing is wonderful to see the mother of all RPG's given respect and mention in the national press. There's even a note about the false accusations of the 80's." And for the record - flanking & attacks of opportunity in 3/3.5 Edition still irritate me. Combine a familiar with Master Tactician and some rogue levels, and you're off to the races.
Ah, D&D -- the flagship of geek hobbies. Many people do video games or comic books and want to include themselves in the group, but until you've re-written your character sheet 15 times, had discussions about what makes a good DM/GM, and carried around a fuzzy bag full of expensive dice, you aren't the real deal. :)
dmiessler.com -- grep understanding knowledge
It still hasn't kissed a girl!
And still proudly living in the parent's basement!
And for the record - flanking & attacks of opportunity in 3/3.5 Edition still irritate me. Combine a familiar with Master Tactician and some rogue levels, and you're off to the races.
Yep you are a nerd.
The other day with a friend about which type of dice hurt the worst to step on. we decided that, while a d4 was bad (the worst if you step straight down hard), that a d8 was really the worst because it rolled with your foot.
My girlfriend immediately said, "oh my god, i'm dating a nerd."
Thank you D&D.
~dijjnn
If they irritate you, change the rules. One of the things a good GM needs to do is to keep the game from becoming too cheezy. If they players are abusing the rules, nerf them! The 3rd Edition Harm spell is a perfect example of something that desperately needs it.
In my opinion, rules like flanking and attacks of opportunity add a whole lot more tactical depth to the combat without slowing it down much. It's certainly more fun than combat in old D&D.
...Ex-girlfriend?
G
http://www.chick.com/bc/2002/dnd.asp
Quote from the link: "The goal of the game [D&D] would be to see who could obtain the most erotic pleasure"
As my friend who sent me the link originally so accurately stated, "I don't know about you, but my D&D sessions were never like that."
Btw... D&D is 30... But what about its other attributes? What's its alignment? Strength, dexterity, intelligence, etc? Okay I'm a nerd.
It was even a cult at a Wisconsin naval base. "At one time every nuclear submarine had a D&D group," says Arneson.
... do you think the Commander-in-Chief knows about this?
- from the article
Nuclear submarines? D&D groups?
My God
-kgj
-kgj
I remember that "expose'" where they made D&D out to be some big satanic training session because (gasp!) there were demons and devils listed in the Field Folio. And then some shooter someplace had a DMG in his backpack or something like that...
Parents just ate that shit up. I think a lot of them couldn't understand why we just weren't spending our time watching TV like normal kids. We basically had to operate under the radar or risk losing a several of our players to easily paniced parents.
Every year during my review, I just pray the words "slashdot.org" aren't mentioned.
"The game was wrongly implicated in a missing persons case, a teen suicide and a number of murders. Some schools banned the game, and many parents refused to let their children play."
It bugged me at the time that for the amount of people playing the game, the incidence of suicide seemed lower than in the rest of the general public, but the press never seemed to report that.
Esteem isn't a zero sum game
Of course I ripped through all of the SSI games and the Baldur's Gate Series. Then came Neverwinter Nights. A beautiful game, but instead of controlling a party of people, it's just one character and a side-kick. This was a big mistake. However, the fact that one could assume the role of Dungeon Master made this game somewhat revolutionary.
But after playing multiplayer online a bit, I must say, that although I have found some new places to explore (people have spent some time on putting together some very cool levels), it still seems to come down to everyone being 40th level and killing each other. Maybe I'm just not playing in the right places?
Maybe I'm just missing the old days of getting together with pen paper and the dodecahedrons? I don't think so - who's got time for trying to orchestrate that?
And yes, I've tried Everquest and just couldn't seem to get into the flow of it. I couldn't see what the "big deal" was ...
I wish I had your mother. Mine was "progressive" and just let me go ahead and play. Now my soul belongs to Mephistopheles and I can look forward to an eternity in boiling excrement.
Isn't yours the 4" one handed sword?...and haven't you been playing with it enough already?
When the people fear their government, there is tyranny; when the government fears the people, there is liberty.
I'm sorry, the girl makes a saving throw against your 1st level charm spell
My ex-wife fell for my 1st level charm spell but it turns out she was Chaotic-Evil and when we split up she took all my GP.
Trolling is a art,
Another trait of geeks is obsessive hairsplitting. I mean my god, man.
Who cares about the obsessive hairsplitting? The important thing is the successful karma whoring.
-kgj
-kgj
Are you sure? The act of observing disturbs the observed. Until you have looked, you must consider D&D to be both 30 and not 30.
My blog can kick your blog's ass
Pardon the slight off-topicness... but some friends of mine from college started their own production company, and made a movie called "The Gamers". It certainly ain't no hollywood production, but that's the charm of it. Do yourself a favor and grab the DVD and watch it with your gaming buddies to celebrate D&D's 30th... I promise it'll be a good time. I think they have a quicktime trailer and stuff here.
If you remember your times long past playing D&D fondly - heck, if you're still playing it - you really owe it to yourself to check out some independent roleplaying game producers. They're cheap, they're great, they're a break from THAC0 and saving throws and god only knows what else. A great place to start is with The Forge, which specializes in such games.
And while you're their, a shout out please for Lumpley, an old friend of mine, and the author of kill puppies for satan: an unfunny roleplaying game. (I'd link directly to his site, but I doubt it could take the slashdotting. Still, I must advise folks to look him up. And send him money.)
And sometimes, D&D gives back:
~wavylines~
Anyone remember when mainstream thought D&D was evil and was corrupting our young minds? Apparently anyone who played it couldn't tell the difference between Fantasy and Reality and ended up killing themselves.
My father (by chance a paranoid hypocondriac) read or heard one such article. This is when I was 18, and not living with him, which of course made him even MORE worried. He tried to sit me down and discourage me from my Evil Ways, and said that he read an article where someone said that people who play D&D can't tell fantasy from reality.
I told him that that's nonsense, and if I ever see the person who wrote that article I'd cast a fireball at them.
So he tried to get me into counselling.
Oh, did I mention my dad has NO sense of humour?
In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is kinky.
And for the record - flanking & attacks of opportunity in 3/3.5 Edition still irritate me. Combine a familiar with Master Tactician and some rogue levels, and you're off to the races.
First, I don't know what "Master Tactician" is; you are probably referring to "Expert Tactician" which allows you to make an additional attack whenever someone is denied their dex bonus to AC. Since a Rogue also adds sneak attack damage to any attack when the opponent is denied their dex bonus to their AC this is a good combination.
However flanking does not deny the opponents dex bonus to their AC, so the familiar flanking example you used would not work to give you an extra sneak attack as you suggest. Additionally if your familiar is killed there are harsh penalties. You must make Fortitude save DC 15 or lose 200xp per master level (save for half). You also cannot get another familiar for a year unless you raise dead. Since you will be progressing as a Rogue and not a Wizard or a Sorcerer, your familiar will not increase along with you. By level 6 opponents will simply squash your familiar like a bug, costing you 6750gp each time for a scroll of raise dead.
AC: Armor Class, how hard you are to hit in combat.
Dex Bonus: Dexterity is a measure of how nimble a person is, the bonus from this score adds to your AC.
XP: Experience Points, a measure used to determine the level of your character.
DC: Difficulty Class, in order to succeed you must roll a twenty sided dice (d20) and add your relevant bonus and get a result equal or higher.
GP: Gold Pieces.
of Mephistopheles, I'd like to point out that the excrement is kept boiling due to Federal regulations. I'd also like to point out that the AC will not, in fact, be spending all eternity in the boiling excrement. Every 10 years, the vats of excrement are switched out. During the 15 minutes that this procedure involves, the AC (and all similar clients) will be kept in a pit of superheated beaver vomit. Again, this is the mandated Federal procedure.
1. The typical customer is male, unattractive, and socially handicapped
2. Both are frequently enjoyed in dark basements
3. The size of your collection is obscene
4. It's not a good idea to talk about either on a first date
5. Both revolve around fantasy and obtaining the unobtainable
6. The artwork depicts images impossible in the real world
7. When purchasing either in a store, you always ask for a bag
8. It may be fun to make your own at home, but rarely turns out as good as the professionally produced stuff
9. If you saw a woman buying either, you'd probably want to ask her out
10. Extra excitement can be added with the use of props and / or costumes
11. Low quality versions of both can be found for free on the Internet
12. Countless Usenet groups are dedicated to both
13. In either case, a gang of heavily-muscled men in leather with whips spells trouble
14. Everyone uses a silly, made-up name
15. It is not uncommon for participants to assume the opposite gender
16. Both are frowned upon by the conservative right
17. You usually take interest in both around age 13
18. New purchases are usually looked at once, then put on the shelf
19. The best and worst examples of each was produced in the '70s
20. The German versions of each are the most bizarre
21. Both are plagued with bad dialogue
22. You usually spend a lot more time enjoying each alone than with a group of friends
23. Everyone's called in to work sick at least once to stay home and enjoy one or the other
24. Both make excellent bathroom reading
25. There's always a big finish when you get to fire your gun
26. Hollywood's attempts to mainstream both have been largely unsuccessful
27. The hero's prized possession is his big, black gun
28. Plots are often present only to serve the action scenes
29. The story can be set anywhere from spaceships to dungeons
30. While the person directing the action is usually blamed for a bad experience, it's usually the fault of poor writing
31. Characters can have either high APPEARANCE or STAMINA, but rarely both
32. You can tell the climax is imminent when the characters start screaming
33. Candles and music enhance the mood
34. You can meet your favorite B-list stars at the annual convention
35. One word: Dwarves
you can not get Array out of Bounds errors on pen and paper D&D
You enter a 10 x 10 array. You see a Null Pointer Exception guarding an Object of type Chest. What do you do?
Whine that it's all MS's fault and reboot.