D&D Experience Liveblog

Final Post

Sun, 02 Mar 2008 23:27:22 -0500

I believe this to be my final post for this site. Thanks to everyone who sent in the kind words and posted the kind messages over on EN World. I wrote up a preview article of 4th edition that I plan to send Morrus’s way once I’ve had someone edit it. I’ll likely post it here as well.

In summary, I had a great time and I can’t wait to play 4e. The Wizards folks were great and the game is a lot of fun. They could have had more delve tables ready and a few more talks during the weekend. The DCI mini competition was a disaster for me but I don’t really play minis. Overall, however, it was a great great weekend.

See you at Gencon!

dnd.meetup.com

Sun, 02 Mar 2008 14:45:00 -0500

Stephen Wendell sent me an email with some solutions to the problem I brought up earlier. He mentioned that as an English speaker in France, he was in one of the more difficult situations for finding a good gaming group in the nearby area. His solution was to form a group using Meetup.com called “English-speaking Roleplaying Gamefreaks, Paris”. Meetup apparently has two different popular gaming groups: roleplayers.meetup.com and dnd.meetup.com. They both look like excellent ways to find gaming groups in your area.

Thank you for the note, Stephen!

Home again

Sun, 02 Mar 2008 13:45:34 -0500

Ddxp is over! Time for ice cream.

Crits

Sun, 02 Mar 2008 12:50:03 -0500

Critting on dailies is the new 4e definition of awesome.

Geletenous cube defeated!

Sun, 02 Mar 2008 12:03:37 -0500

We killed Andy’s geletenous cube - an elite mob. He mentioned that the delve monster sheets may be online! I also talked to Rob Heinsoo and the fellow who wrote City of the Spiderqueen about NPC and monster advancement. Npcs advance as monsters not pcs and monsters advance by shifting into elite versions of the normal mob. Building npcs in the fly can be as fast as a couple of minutes. Same with monster advancement.

Bugbears and a carrion crawler.

Sun, 02 Mar 2008 11:22:46 -0500

Bugbears and a carrion crawler.

Woot

Sun, 02 Mar 2008 11:17:24 -0500

A delve run by Andy Collins!

Late Start

Sun, 02 Mar 2008 08:41:42 -0500

We’re planning on doing a little gaming this Sunday morning but we’re going to get a late start so it may be just one or two delves. My hope is to meet more gamers overall - folks I will see at Gencon or perhaps around the Northern Virginia area.

Yesterday I did an gamer interview with Gamer Zero and Blue. When they asked me what I fear most with 4e I mentioned my greatest fear and the greatest problem I think any tabletop RPG faces: social isolation. I know there are a lot of folks who want to play D&D but can’t find a group. It can be pretty tough. We’re all a little introverted already so trying to meet five strangers and put together a group can be pretty tough. I’m lucky that I’ve had four really excellent gaming groups over the years but each of them was separated with a pretty significant gap of time when I didn’t play because I didn’t have a group.

There are two things that Wizards has done to help with this: RPGA and D&D Insider.

My problem with RPGA is that it seems more statistical than role playing. There are stories but the stories are secondary to the encounters. We had a really great DM yesterday but I remember him describing a town square by the location of difficult terrain. There wasn’t any discussion about what we should do with the scroll or what sort of information we could get out of the bribed town guards.

D&D Insider is another method but if I’m going to sit in front of my computer, I think I’d rather play WoW. D&D is a game for a table of friends. I know folks do play by post or other games over the net but if I have a hard time getting a group for an instance in WoW, I can’t imagine how tough it will be to get a group for a five hour campaign. I’m glad they’re trying but I’d like to see more options to get local gamers together.

Anyway, that is my greatest fear: that my groups will break up and I won’t find another way to play the game that I love.

My wife and I are planning to head back to the Delve at about 11am. I’ll post more then. Also, expect a weekend recap sometime over the next couple of days before the DDXP blog is complete.

Mike

Heading home

Sat, 01 Mar 2008 21:02:03 -0500

Three delves and a run through Sembia. Not a bad day. As hard as the creatures have been, I worry that level one guys will be too easy. Of course, the power curve may be a lot more shallow.

Rogue shadar-kai

Sat, 01 Mar 2008 20:56:35 -0500

This rogue fades in and out. When he comes back, his sword is on fire and hits with a 10 point fire hit ongoing.

Gnoll claw fighter

Sat, 01 Mar 2008 19:52:40 -0500

Gnoll claw fighter

Gnoll demonic scourge

Sat, 01 Mar 2008 19:51:03 -0500

Gnoll demonic scourge

Ggnoll stats from the monster manual

Sat, 01 Mar 2008 19:49:10 -0500

Ggnoll stats from the monster manual

Skill encounter details

Sat, 01 Mar 2008 18:33:06 -0500

Someone on enworld wanted more details on the skill encounter. Our first encounter was a traditional battle against city guards and a rogue who bribed them. When we had dispatched them a whole pile of new guards rushed our way. We were given the chance to roll skill checks against a variety of DCs of varying levels including easy(10) medium 15 and hard 20 different skills did different things. The dwarf tossed over a cart (med STR check) the ranger climbed to a roof (med acrobatic) and the warlock bluffed so well that he practically started ordering the guards around himself (hard bluff check). My clerics history skill seemed useless. The guards had no interest in the similar chase that had occurred two hundred years previous. After so many wins, we passed the encounter. I have no idea what would have happened on too many losses. Overall the skill checks really helped build a chaotic and evolving scene built spontanously in the minds of seven people and some d20 rolls. Fun stuff. I don’t know how much of this was hard mechanics and how much was the dm filling in the scene but it sure made skills a lot more fun. I used them rarely in my home game but not anymore. This is how skills should be.

Delve campers

Sat, 01 Mar 2008 18:09:06 -0500

Delve campers

Out to dinner at legal seafood.

Sat, 01 Mar 2008 17:02:05 -0500

Out to dinner at legal seafood.

We defeated "escape to cormyr"!

Sat, 01 Mar 2008 16:39:35 -0500

Sixth level chainfighter be damned! I hit him with a crit “cascade of light” for 38 damage. Instant kill!

“give us the scroll!”…”ok, here it...

Sat, 01 Mar 2008 16:16:07 -0500

“give us the scroll!”…”ok, here it is”

Skeletal battle on the cliff

Sat, 01 Mar 2008 15:20:09 -0500

Skeletal battle on the cliff

Escape from sembia hobgobbo battle

Sat, 01 Mar 2008 14:34:37 -0500

Escape from sembia hobgobbo battle