Monster Manual II

It's nice having a new monster manual to work with while making this adventure, I may be able to give you guys something you haven't seen before. This means I'm going to have to cancel my previous adventure: Assault on the Gricklands: A Tale of the Gricklands.

Making A D&D Adventure

I've been building a D&D adventure for our group, and I was wondering how other people build adventures from scratch. I'll tell you my method: I looked at the monsters at the appropriate levels, then worked out some nice ideas for encounters, then worked out a general structure. It's not done yet, so we'll see.

Hint: There may be undead involved.

Banshrae Blowdarts

I noticed this at the last game: Banshrae use blowguns, does something seem odd about that fact?


A banshrae in its natural habitat

They don't have mouths, which is why they only communicate through telepathy. No mouths, but blowguns. I guess they just spin it above their head rapidly to propel the dart through centrifugal force.

More Descriptions In Combat, Please

I think our combat in D&D could use a little more description of what's being done, particularly what the NPC's are doing. I know we don't need to know the flavour text of the battle, but it helps me role-play, and draws people into the fight.

There are times when I have no idea what our opponents are doing other than attacking us. I'd like to know if they're breathing fire or whatever.

Early Levels

It's pretty sad that our highest Charisma is 10. This is what we get when we have a bunch of min-maxed characters and no warlords, paladins, bards, or warlocks. No charisma whatsoever.

Planning a party takes more work than we put into it. Sometime, I'd like to design the optimal party, it'd be an interesting exercise.

Good Feat In PHB II: Weapon/Implement Expertise

Weapon/Implement Expertise seems very good to me. Many classes, like my Warlord, only use one weapon, so it serves as a universal +1 to attack.

Apparently Wizards don't think people value bonuses to attack as highly as they should. I don't know who those people are; bonuses to attack are my #1 priority.

Giving Your Characters History (But Not Really)

In an undeniable sign of power-creep, recent D&D books have included the option to include a "character background" which gives you a small bonus. This bonus is small enough that I don't really mind it, but it's still odd that they would let players have an unambiguous benefit with literally no trade-off.

Anyway, it seems that we've misinterpreted the nature of this bonus. Where it may seem to give you a +2, or access to, more than one skill, it only conveys one of those bonuses. The Player's Handbook II is more explicit about the nature of these benefits.

I don't mind it so much, I just wish they wouldn't add stuff after the core book was already published.

Failure Is Another Word For Experience...Or Death

The performance of our level 1 characters was shameful. Truly embarrassing. But I think that we can use it as a learning experience.

First of all, building characters on-site is a crappy way to start. There are too many things to check, and too few books for everyone to do all the work they have to do. Also, we end up starting late and having less time to actually play the game.

Second, we need remedial tactics training. Lesson One: Don't split up your forces. Lesson Two: Don't be afraid to take an 8 hour rest. Lesson Three: Don't walk into an obvious trap; let the thief scout things out.

Next time, we'll have our characters built in advance, and I hope we won't have anyone decide that they're opposed to the party for no good reason.

Glossary: Raven Oath

Awesome session yesterday: the Raven Oath is great.

Raven Oath: n. A proof of courage. To demonstrate the sincerity of a promise, you jump out of a 10th story window with the person sharing in the oath. In game, it seems more silly than it does out of game, since we know that the characters can't possibly die from the fall.

PS. Raven Pact! Why didn't we call it the Raven Pact! I'm officially renaming it.

New Ground Rules

I'm not banning tea-bagging monsters, or sticking things up the anii of our opponents, I'm just asking, "Can we go one encounter without either? Just one? Please?"

Defences Compared

I looked through the defensive statistics of all the races that start with "A" in the Monster Manual. Here are my findings:

• Will is always easier to hit than AC. On average, Will is 4.222... lower.
• Reflex is almost always a better target, with only one instance of a higher Ref than AC. On average, Reflex is 3.62 lower than AC
• Fort is the least advantageous of the secondary defenses. It's equal to or worse than AC almost half the time. Despite this, it's still 1.5 lower than AC on average.

This isn't a sampling of all the monsters, but 27 of around 300. I think that's a pretty good sample size. I doubt that monsters that start will A are aberrant statistically.

Employment Practices

After Owlbear, (a Halfling,) was told about the guard's height requirement for employment:

"Oh, they have standards? It's funny that they hire dead men, because that's what you are, a dead man!" Then he barks at the guards as we drag him away, "Ruff! Ruff!"

Another Warlock Thing

The Warlock gets a variety of types of damage: cold, fear, fire, psychic, untyped, and radiant. That choice could be nice in situations. There's even an at-will that does radiant. That has its benefits.

Warlocks Vs. Rangers

There's this idea that Warlocks are underpowered compared to the other classes. While I can't say for certain, I can compare them to the most similar class, the Ranger while using a bow. Both have an ability that locks on a person and does extra damage to that person. Both have the Prime Shot ability. While the Ranger has a +2 proficiency bonus from the bow, the Warlock can attack against Will, Fortitude, and Reflex.

The difference is mainly the sort of effect you do with attacks. Rangers largely move themselves around, then do plain ol' damage to the target, where Warlocks do all sorts of effects to the target, but don't get any bonus to maneuvering or escaping.

As far as I can tell, Warlocks actually get a bonus that the Ranger lacks: where the ranger can get a bonus from a magic weapon, the Warlock can get a bonus from an Orb and a Wand, cumulative, so far as I can tell. In the late game, that really adds up.

Damage Aura

I've thought of a title for the D&D adventure: The Attack Of The Killer Zombies That Have A Damage Aura Which Stacks With Other Similar Zombies.

The subtitle would be: "And the guys who killed them all".

Yes, We're Cool

Bloodied Dragonborn

It's nice to finally discover that the +1 to-hit a dragonborn gets when bloodied actually has a game effect. I was beginning to think it was mythological, like a natural 20 on a daily power.

A New Low

It was a new low in lame jokes when I said, "We're the Raven Pack; we're Raven Packed with action."

Then someone said, "that's pretty good."

Although I do like the idea that our characters are like macabre puppets, somehow animated by the ravens stuffed inside our bodies. When we fought, ravens would fly out instead of blood and viscera.

Spiders From Hell

Giant spiders are the worst thing on this godforsaken cave. I'd venture to say that they are the worst thing in the world, but I think aimless dungeons themselves are far worse than any living thing.

Project for the fans: make a pic of a spider in top hat with mustache. Or Nazi regalia.

PS. I can't believe that we didn't remember about our banner. That healing really adds up, when we remember to use the thing.

Adventures of the RAVEN PACK 2.0

After fleeing the fallen city of Doppleoppolis, the Raven Pack heads north over the mountains in search of safety for the refugees of the city...

7:30 The Raven Pack reaches a small city with friendly but suspicious inhabitants

7:33 A debate starts over the origins of "reimburse", why does no one ever use the word imburse?

7:35 ITS A TRAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAP

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . _________
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7:45 False alarm.

8:08 It is possible that they are cannibal cultists. We try to convince them that our npc companions are much tastier than we are.

8:20 Owlbear goes in the middle of the night to investigate the Church. The "Church" is filled with soldiers.

9:04 We prepare to head back to the doppleoppolis refugees but run into a village elder. Owlbear and Ba'har leave the town to meet with the refugees. Chisel Chest and Duri stay in town.

9:10 At a tavern, a guy offers to polish our swords. What kind of town is this?

9:21 Superman v. Mohamed Ali, who would win?

9:30 Duri attempts to get information out of a local by getting him drunk, but he doesn't learn anything.

9:37 Owlbear and Ba'har encounter spectral panthers on their journey back. 50% of the time, they are insubstantial all the time.

10:09 The spectral panthers are defeated.

10:10 Chisel Chest challenges a trapper to an archery contest and wins. Meanwhile Duri attempts unsuccessfully to get soldiers drunk for information.

10:29 The group meets up with the refugees while the GM dances the robot. Back in town, the doppleganger npc has become ill, possibly due to poison.

10:36 Upon reaching the town, the village elder reveals that there are hundreds of soldiers hidden by illusion. The real doppleoppolis II is hidden beneath the city in the cellar.

10:40 Apparently the rune we were after was a fake, and the real one is being held by zombies. Braiiinnnnsss....

11:00 Shopping!

12:14 The party is rewarded with a box of gold, Owlbear sells the box.

12:30 The Raven Pack sets out on its newest, most glorious adventure: to find a secret artifact held by some undead.

12:42 A clue to the entrance of the dungeon is brilliantly hidden under some gravel. When the sun sets it reveals the location of the entrance.

1:01 Zombie spiders, Awww snap. This spider came out of no where, BULL SHIT.

1:04 A giant (possibly zombie) spider attacks Chisel Chest, that will teach him to roll well on endurance.

1:16 Moar Spiders.

2:08 Spiders dispatched. The inanimate banner is MVP.