Earthdawn 3e: Character Generation

ByDankelzahn

earthdawn At the last session with my group, we came up with character concepts and had decided to do the actual generation this week. I wanted to get it taken care on my end prior, so that I could both familiarize myself with the changes to 3e character generation enough to answer questions and be available to do so instead of needing to work on my own character.   So earlier last week I finished up my human warrior.

If you’re like me, one of your initial reactions to that last sentence is “a race and a discipline isn’t a character concept,” and you’d be right.   However, for this post I want to specifically talk about some of the changes to Earthdawn from a character generation standpoint.   So while a character back-story and personality are crucial to a good character, they’re going to be outside the scope of this discussion.

Read More “Earthdawn 3e: Character Generation”

Photography Woes

ByDankelzahn

I’ve been less than satisfied with most of the pictures from my last few rounds of miniature photography.   I’m not sure what the problem is, but my color balance has been all kinds of out of whack.   Even the manual color balance option on my camera hasn’t been able to produce the results I’m after.

The miniatures that I’ve put in my last couple of site updates have each been photographed a few times now, and there are about half as many up as there should be, simply because they haven’t turned out any good.   I’m using the same photography set up I’ve been using for a few years now, but suddenly it’s like I’ve forgotten what I was doing.

I’m just going to have to keep trying to fix my color balance and re-trying, but my goal of getting caught up by the end of the year is looking frustratingly less and less likely.

Earthdawn 3rd Edition: Initial Paces

ByDankelzahn

ed3rdI finally got a chance to try out the Earthdawn Third Edition rules last Saturday when a friend ran Misguided Ambitions, the demo adventure available on the Earthdawn home page.   Though there were some obvious tweaks and mods to the Step System to help streamline play, the game still feels very much like Earthdawn.   Considering how much I enjoy the Eartdawn game – both the system and the setting – that’s about the highest “initial impression” I can offer.

Read More “Earthdawn 3rd Edition: Initial Paces”

Nostalgia Night: Hero Quest

ByDankelzahn
The Heroes(tm) begin their quest...
The Heroes(tm) on a Quest(tm)

While my role-playing group is between campaigns, we’re filling our weekly sessions with boardgames and one-shots.   Last week was a blast from the past: Hero Quest by Milton Bradley.   I couldn’t find the doors and a few figures were MIA (the elf in particular) and had to be proxied, but the old school charm remained.

Matt took on the role of the vile Zargon for the first two quests, leaving Chad, Wayne, and me to take on the mantles of the Elf (Elfen John), Wizard (Mr. Wizard), and Barbarian (Thud).   The Dwarf (Ale) was thrown in for good measure.   For the third and final game I took over behind the screen and Matt claimed the Dwarf.

We fully embraced the camp of the game, with “Zargon” reading the boxed text before each adventure with as much melodrama as could be mustered.   As casually as we treated the game, our role-playing roots came through and there were a few more descriptions than dictated by the adventure book as we stomped around the dungeon, hacking up orcs, goblins, and other minions of Chaos.

Read More “Nostalgia Night: Hero Quest”

Anticipation: Borderlands

ByDankelzahn

borderlands Due in no small part to the obsession of Ravious, our resident representative of Spugnation, I’ve started getting excited for the upcoming release of Borderlands on the PC next week.   The group of friends with whom I play online games typically enjoy both RPG and FPS style games, so this seems like it should be right up our alley.

Borderlands has been described as a FPS version of Diablo II, which is a fairly accurate description.   You are given a choice of one of four classes, each of which has three skill trees which you can choose from to customize your character to your liking.   Loot seems to be a big part of the game, and the constant variety keeps you engaged by ensuring there’s always the possibility of something better than what you have dropping from the next enemy.

Read More “Anticipation: Borderlands”

A First and a Last in St. Louis

ByDankelzahn

Although Warmachine MkII has brought positive changes to the Warmachine community, it unfortunately coincides with the closing of Game On!, a game store that has always been a strong supporter of the Warmachine community.   On Wednesday the 14th, we had a last blast 35-point Mangled Metal MkII event – our first MkII event in St. Louis.

After throwing around a few possible casters, I decided on some of my lesser-used options to see how they changed in MkII.   I was curious to see if they and their battlegroups would fit my playstyle better now, or if I would be able to change my playstyle to better suit their abilities.
Read More “A First and a Last in St. Louis”

Warmachine Weekend 2009, Day 1

ByDankelzahn

Carl, better known as Clutch, does a fantastic job organizing  Warmachine Weekend every year in Springfield, Missouri.   He always packs a ton of events into the weekend and Privateer Press and   Meta-Games Unlimited provides some fantastic prize support.   In addition EXPLOSIVO!!! has outdone himself with this year’s awesome trophies. You should see the finished versions!

I’m sitting back in my room after day 1 tired but still ready for tomorrow’s events.   I arrived last night with Brakus so we were there for the 500-point Mixed Steamroller event that kicked off the weekend.       There were already a lot of familiar faces showing up, which was a bonus.   Last year I met a lot of great players at Warmachine Weekend and it was good to see many of them making it back.

Read More “Warmachine Weekend 2009, Day 1”