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Showing posts from 2015

The Lamest Magic Swords of All Time

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Excalibur. Narsil. Stormbringer. Shieldbreaker. The Vorpal Sword. Lauralee . These are mighty swords of power and legend, of myth and song, blades that shall be remembered until the end of time. The following blades, however, are probably best forgotten. Not every sword can be an artifact of immense power. Not every sword is even a boring "long sword +1." And not every sword can be cursed. Some swords, despite their enchantment and pomp and circumstance, are merely, "meh." These are those swords. Sword of Itching The grey, rough blade of this sword chips and splinters easily. A fine powder - like iron filings - flakes off it almost constantly. When it's first found in its scabbard, if it hasn't been used in awhile it's probably even covered with a layer of rust and corrosion. This irritating, flaky oxidized iron powder is transferred to anyone wounded by the blade, and will remain in the victim's body if they survive being struck by the

The Swords of Splatter-Elf

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Splatter Elf's back, man! Well, as a literary genre, it's never gone anywhere and is actually alive and well in the a new series of stories by Philip T.D. Overby (they're available on Amazon !). But now, for the first time in quite a while, Splatter Elf the game makes a triumphant return. The main character in Philip's stories is a half-elf mercenary obsessed with collecting swords, so I decided to stat out a few of her favourite weapons for use in Splatter Elf: The RPG . Now, these weapons are specifically designed for the SE version 0.3 rules, which have not been widely shared, but you get the idea. Also of note, these are completely unofficial versions of the weapons and how I envisioned them to be used in the game. Philip would have his own take on them, which obviously supersedes anything I say here. Hey Phil, does this mean you've now generated your first fan fiction? Lauralee "The warped, cracked blade looked like hammered shit, but i

Casting the Dungeons & Dragons TV Show, Season 2

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Last year around this time I wrote a post about who I would cast in a D&D TV series . Such an event wouldn't be completely out of the realm of possibility: with the glut of fantasy and sci-fi filling our screens these days, there has never been a better time to get Fireballs and Magic Missiles on our TV screens. Plus, with the recently released 5th Edition going strong, Hasbro/WotC would be foolish not to jump on the chance for some cross promotion. It can't possibly be as bad as the old official D&D movies. I'm hoping with a decent budget and a cable network that wouldn't shy away from blood and violence, we could have a fun little show on our hands. This could be the next Game of Thrones or Walking Dead , people... And hey, even if this doesn't work out, there's a sequel to Hawk the Slayer in the works... RETURNING MAIN CAST Emily Blunt as Tasty Sugarbush Tasty graduated from Action Girl last season to Heroine this year as her me

How Role-Playing Games Make You a Better Writer

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It's probably not the reason you're thinking. Full disclosure: My debut novel is now available as an eBook on Amazon. The following is a description of a gaming trick that worked for me, that helped me to develop better stories. You may not find the same thing to be true, and you may completely disagree with me and think I'm full of shit. That's okay. I respect your right to be wrong. When most young writers start playing role-playing games, especially Game-Mastering, they fall into a very common trap (I know I did) - they write their story and expect the other players/PCs to follow through it. The would-be writer doesn't want the players to be active members of the narrative - they want the party to stumble through his detailed adventure/novel, hitting HIS beats and telling the stories the way HE wants them told. How do you know your GM is one of those who just runs you through the script of his novels? The following are pretty obvious tells: "You c

Steal this New Map

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After watching these videos , I started playing around and drawing up some topographical maps in photoshop. They aren't my typical style, but I think my first effort turned out pretty decent. So, here you go. Key up this map and use it for your game. The only thing I ask is that if you post it on your blog/Twitter/Google+/Facebook that you link back to here, or my Twitter , my Google+ , or my Facebook page . Have fun. The picture is quite large, so don't forget to zoom in to see the details. ......................................... Several people have inquired whether they could my maps in their commercial (for profit) projects. The answer is: No, you cannot use these maps for any commercial project. Read the creative commons copyright below. But, if you are a DIY RPG person, with little to no money, and really want to use one of the maps for something that you're working on, that might earn you a bit of money, let me know. We can talk, and if I like your

Time Keeps On Slippin' Slippin' Slippin'...

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Anyone who is a regular reader of this blog (there are at least 2 or 3 of you, right??) will notice a distinct lack of posts over the last 3 months or so.  If I were getting paid for this, I'm sure I would have been fired by now.  Between the holidays, work, and some other hobbies , I haven't had time to write.  In fact I haven't even had time to play any games.  So this brings up the point of this post: How do you find time to play? A couple of posts ago I talked about my new PBEM game.  It fell apart soon after that post.  I take a huge part of the blame for it, as I  tried to build intrigue and world events before I built any reason for the players to care for their characters.  I also didn't introduce the combat mechanics soon enough, so I think the players weren't sure how to react to events as they didn't know how easily they could die.  Beyond these issues though, was also just a lack of time on everyone's part.  At first everyone posted a respon

Touching Can Also Be Funny.

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Hmmm, that title doesn't quite sound right.  Oh well.      Last weekend I had the pleasure of attending the wedding of Alex and Emily, two of the people in my current table top gaming group.  They play with us a lot less often than I'd like, but that's only because they currently live in the UK and can only play when they come back to Canada for a visit. Ironically, the first visit back from England that we played at, they introduced us to Great Fire of London:1666 .  At the wedding, another from our group, the brilliant  Kathryn K  gave one of the most impressive wedding speeches I've ever heard.  Here it is in all of its unabashed glory: Kathryn and the Astronaut "Friends and family,  3 years ago I met Alex and Emily working at St. Michael's College School and it was the greatest things about working there.... that and meeting Chris Hadfield, that was pretty great- Alex and Emily are a very close second to Chris Hadfield.             They've as