Controlling Your Destiny: A Look at the Fate RPG

On By Charlie BrooksIn Role-Playing GamesLeave a comment

Originally published on Sidekickcast.com April 19, 2016

The d20 System is the 800-pound gorilla in the RPG industry, powering the top-selling games like Dungeons & Dragons and Pathfinder. It’s a very good, very flexible system that is most ideal for games where combat is the cause of and solution to most of life’s problems. Today, we’re going to look at another robust system that powers multiple RPGs – one I consider to be the opposite of the d20 System in many ways. That system is called Fate.

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Comics & Quests: First Encounters, part two

On By Charlie BrooksIn Comics, Comics & Quests, Role-Playing GamesLeave a comment

Since we spent the first half of this volume of Dungeons & Dragons in the past, I thought it made sense to break the summary into two parts. We’re now back in the present, with our heroes trapped in the Feywild.

I’m not pumped about the word “Feywild,” which originated in 4th edition D&D along with its counterpart, the Shadowfell. However, I guess they’re catchier than the previously-used “Realm of Faerie” and “Plane of Shadow.” More importantly to Wizards of the Coast/Hasbro, they are trademarkable terms that the company can monetize.

In game terms, the Feywild and Shadowfell were meant to be more accessible than they used to be, allowing for lower-level adventurers to travel the planes without requiring high-level magic or bespoke magical gates. Almost every setting decision in 4th edition D&D was to create a world (and multiverse) full of perils where adventurers would find fights anywhere they went. So far, Fell’s Five are carrying that spirit with them well.

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Starships and Space Hippos: The Spelljammer Setting

On By Charlie BrooksIn Role-Playing GamesLeave a comment

Originally published on Sidekickcast.com April 5, 2016

The 1990s were a time of terrible business management for TSR, the company behind Dungeons & Dragons, but it was also a time of great creativity. Few people argue that the 2nd edition of Advanced Dungeons & Dragons was a really good system, but just about everybody loves the campaign settings.

Every other edition of D&D has stuck to pseudo-medieval European settings – stuff like Dragonlance, the Forgotten Realms, and Greyhawk. Even in the more modern Eberron setting, with robot PCs and magic-powered trains, a group of adventurers heading into a dungeon to recover an artifact is pretty much the assumed standard.

2nd edition created settings that broke the normal D&D assumptions. You had a setting where the PCs were dragons, a setting where magic destroyed the environment with every spell, and a setting where a character’s beliefs could literally reshape reality. Then there was the Spelljammer setting, which is what I’m going to talk about today.

Supposedly, the concept of Spelljammer came from a picture of an armored knight standing on the deck of a ship that was sailing through space. Rather than pick the concept apart because of things like gravity, air, and the merciless vacuum of space, the designers started to develop a setting where that picture could be a possibility. The result was a mix of Ptolematic physics, monster-run galactic empires, giant space hamsters, and more.

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My Kids Became a Butt-Kicking Princess and a Friendly Zombie

On By Charlie BrooksIn Parenting, Role-Playing GamesLeave a comment

Originally published on BabyCenter.com March 9, 2016

I don’t try to get my kids interested in my hobbies, but it’s inevitable to a certain degree. I spend time watching Little Einsteins and drinking imaginary tea, and in turn they want to join in my card games and help me write. That’s how they got involved in a role-playing game with me this past weekend.

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Deadly Penguins and Pacifist Wolves: The Mundane Animals of D&D

On By Charlie BrooksIn Role-Playing GamesLeave a comment

Originally published on Sidekickcast.com March 8, 2016

I’ve talked a lot about demon lords and magic in Dungeons & Dragons, but I’ve overlooked the mundane critters that populate the world. As it so happens, the Advanced Dungeons & Dragons 2nd edition Monstrous Manual, which is in my opinion the best and most comprehensive monster book in fantasy gaming, is available as a PDF from Wizards of the Coast. I was originally going to go through some of the more interesting critters therein, but I got sidetracked when I noticed the surprising amount of detail put into real-world (and real-world-ish) animals. So instead, let’s see what sort of information D&D has about birds, cats, and wolves.

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My Son’s 5 Important Football Questions Made Me Smile

On By Charlie BrooksIn ParentingLeave a comment

Originally published on BabyCenter.com February 10, 2016

As the Super Bowl approached, my son suddenly developed an interest in football. This works out for me, since American football is the one sport I know a good deal about. It did, however, bring me into the conundrum of how I should let him pick his favorite team.

Despite living in New England, I’m a Giants fan. Sorry, Patriots, but my dad followed football before you guys were a franchise, and the Giants used to hold their training camp up here in Vermont. I like Tom Brady and company, but I just can’t bring myself to really care about their success or failure.

At the same time, I don’t want my kids to select their preferences based only on what I like. My dad was a pro at this – he would take deliberately contrary views, sometimes even spouting some very offensive ideology, with the ultimate goal of making us stand up for our beliefs. He used this tactic for just about everything, from sports to serious issues like racism.

I can take my dad’s lessons to heart, but I can’t replicate them, even with something as trivial as sports. If my kids ever become Cowboys fans, they’re just going to have to deal with me throwing up in my mouth a little whenever they wear something with that damned star on it.

(Then again, if my kids ever wind up playing or working for the Cowboys, go Dallas!)

We have biased our kids a little bit toward the Giants, but I deem that to be necessary. Our son’s first football season saw them reach the Super Bowl, so we couldn’t not get him some Giants gear. They’ve gone 22-34 since our daughter was born, so she hasn’t been quite so lucky.

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Comics & Quests: First Encounters, part one

On By Charlie BrooksIn Comics, Comics & Quests, Role-Playing GamesLeave a comment

To me, the most disappointing thing about D&D comics is that they don’t last. The stories tend to be fun, the worldbuilding is nice, and the cast of characters is usually great. But licensing issues or low sales often lead to the cancellation of a series within a couple of years.

This is the case with the 4th edition Dungeons & Dragons comic, which is an especially big shame because the second arc spends time introducing our heroes’ backstories. Write John Rogers really created a story that had room to grow, but situations beyond his control prevented the seeds he planted from fully bearing fruit.

Still, it’s a fun ride while it lasts. With that said, let’s jump into the middle arc of this series, “First Encounters.”

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Getting Villainous: Suicide Squad as an RPG Campaign

On By Charlie BrooksIn Comics, Role-Playing GamesLeave a comment

Originally published on Sidekickcast.com February 9, 2016

Running an RPG with evil characters tends to be difficult. While it’s perfectly possible for players to create complex evil characters (and I’ve seen it done at my table before), they just as frequently interpret the “E” in their alignment block as a reason to maim and kill every NPC they come across.

Personally, the next time I run a game with evil PCs, I’ll probably hit my comics collection for inspiration. Specifically, the John Ostrander-written Suicide Squad title that launched in 1987 is one of the best examples of a story that made the audience cheer for the bad guys.

The concept behind Suicide Squad wasn’t all that groundbreaking – the government selects a group of super criminals to take on jobs that heroes can’t – but the execution was brilliant. Taking it into an RPG requires players who really like the concept, but I think it could work quite well in the right circumstances.

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What do You do When Your Kid Can’t Stand You?

On By Charlie BrooksIn ParentingLeave a comment

Originally published on BabyCenter.com February 3, 2016

For my daughter the words, “Do you want to spend time with Daddy?” often elicit tears and shrieks. I don’t want to say she doesn’t like me, but I’m clearly not her favorite parent. In fact, there are times when it seems like she’d rather be alone than have me in the room at all.

That’s not to say there aren’t times when we’re buddies. If she’s napped well during the day and my wife isn’t around, she’ll play with me, dance with me, and genuinely enjoy herself. But if she’s tired or Mommy is an option at all, she usually wants me to keep my distance.

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Ambush at the Oasis: A Pathfinder 1st Edition Encounter

On By Charlie BrooksIn Role-Playing GamesLeave a comment

Finalist, Lethal Lairs 2015 contest, KoboldPress.com

“Ambush at the Oasis” is a CR 9 encounter for the Pathfinder Role-Playing Game. It is set in the Southlands campaign setting, available through Kobold Press, but can be adapted for use in any fantasy setting that has a desert.

According to legend, the blue wyrm Azdrar once looked upon his life and saw an emptiness that all his greed and machinations could not fill. Determined to turn over a new leaf, he spent the last decades of his life aiding travelers through the Sarklan Desert, serving as one of the only examples of a benevolent blue dragon the world has ever known.

Whether Azdrar truly reformed or not, a small desert spring in the Hariek Hills holds his bleached white bones and a ring of desert lupines that always seem to retain a vibrant hue. It is said that the waters of the oasis sprang forth from the tears of remorse the wyrm shed and that they possess curative properties.

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