Endless Bag of Games

I just thought to inform you, our gaming group I mean, that my exchange period in Shanghai has now been confirmed and the time I will spend there is about three months starting March 2009.

This actually helps me in various ways. (1) My wife will be more happier that I’m not in China for so long. (2) It doesn’t necessarily mean that my character is permanently removed etc. from our Thranil 3.5 game and especially since the departure is in march, (3) I now have enough time conclude our first in-game goal in Aerithia without any rush. After that the campaign can continue in smooth way without me for a while.

Oh! And now to the Booksheld Additions. I actually could not resist ordering the Forgotten Realms Campaign and Player’s Guide for d&d 4th edition. What I have seen, those books will be a FINE addition to my rpg bookshelf Next supplements that I will buy for 4th edition d&d is going to be the Player’s Handbook 2

Nice session. Another level, good roleplaying and fun. Everything was perfect.

We were heading towards old city ruins with hopes to find ways to complete a ritual which could provide the party with very valuable information. As we moved onwards, the environment turned to marshes and soon our heroes found themselves fighting against vine horrors. The fight was intense, but heroes were victorius once again.

As we continued our journey, we managed to see a band of gnolls buying a griffon from two old grannies in the middle of the swamp. Grannies seemed to have a hut there and they sold the griffon to the gnolls. We decided to track the gnolls and set the mistreated creature free. Ambush, slaughter, free griffon and the players DID know that the creature was worth 9000gp.

At last, we reached our destination Kelnator city ruins. Avoiding possible encounters in undead and orc infested ruined city we investigated a strange portal in the middle of the city. For the surprise of the players, there were actually a wizard living still in the tower and he told the players that the portal which they had seen was a portal to Shadowfell. Grumpy wizard was making experiments and drove us away.

Next, the pyramid-like building. Ancient temple of Ioun and now a home of green dragon Rizherearailza. The one we met in session #3. After, in my opinion, VERY good roleplaying, our heroes managed to deal with the dragon without fighting and an agreement was made. This was actually a skill challenge which worked amazingly well. Everyone was contributing and it really enhanced the feeling of roleplaying. Like in 3.5 edition, it was usually done in a way that only one player where doing the “dirty work” but this way, everyone managed to do their part. After the agreement, players got little information they wanted and managed to avoid confrontation with the dragon and it kobold servants. Excellent!

Memorable moments. Bargaining with the green dragon.

So it’s time for my first post about our Thranil (Dungeons and dragons 3.5) campaign. Mainly I’m going to write about what happened during gaming session. At the end of this post you can see a little description about player characters. I don’t actually know everything about player characters since I was absent from this campaign for a while. Because of that, the introduction of player characters is somewhat short.

We continued our session in the middle of nowhere. Near the southern end of Krainn-mountains in the middle-parts of Thranil. We were there since Rashnak had found out that there were a little army of giants camped there taking great care of keeping their camp hidden. Our group have had some difficulties in many cities so they’re wanted for treason and some other things. So hunting giants in the middle of nowhere was actually quite a good idea.

We were running. A group of thirty trolls and ogres were after us since our presence was soon noticed after we had slayed few hunting parties they had sent out from their camp. Soon, we found a little natural cavern which was just enough for Rashnak’s large friend to squeeze in. After few stone shapes we had concealed the entrance and we had time finally for some rest. Or we thought that.. The giants weren’t all that stupid. They had their ways of tracking and soon they found out where we were. They were coming, until we headed deeper and collapsed the entrance. Now we had our time for the long longed resting.

While we were resting we actually now had some time to actually talk about what we were going to do next. Jack started to talk about a place where strings of life could be rearranged. Place of great wonder and amazement. After a few successful knowledge checks we decided to learn more about this ancient place. We had virtually no idea where to look from, but we no had time for that. We couldn’t do anything about army of giants so now, when they thought that we were dead, we could head for somewhere else and return later on if necessary. You can thank us Dungeon Master you’re welcome. The only leads that we had was that in Snowtop, big dwarven settlement in the north, we could find some leads since our groups Marduk and Dzergar were from there. But in order to go “back” to Snowtop we needed to retrieve some lost heirloom which was lost during our adventuring…

So once again, we headed to Merien, a biggest coastal city in eastern Thranil, where the heirlooms (shields) were supposed to be. This part of the session was a highlight for our bard who, by himself, managed to retrieve them after manipulating some lieutenant with dominate spell. Excellent work, considering our group had FAILed several times before when we had tried to retrieve them. Soon our bards little trick was found out and once again we fled the city in a haste. Mambojambo and *gasp! Teleport and we were in Tramel. First stop on our way to Snowtop. This is where the session ended. Nice session altogether and it was once again proved that Dungeon master rarely anticipates what the player characters are up to Next.. player characters:

Gael Gel’dun is an elf, skilled working in shadows and using some flashy art of swordfighting. Always eager to earn money or stab someone, if it is needed.

Marduk and Dzergar Fireshield. Marduk is a Favored Soul of Moradin while Dzergar is a fighter/wizard some weird combination I don’t remember. Both like beer and keep things simple and blunt.

Jack Trench is a bard and something else. He is a con man who for some reason is one the side of goodness or at least at some parts. I don’t actually know much about his character so that’s enough of that.

Duensel. Wizard, don’t know much about him. Lots and lots of teleporting by his hands.

Rashnak Vokon. This is my character, a druid who travels with his animal companion brown bear called Jargon. Rashnak is a neutral character. Sometimes he thinks things trough. Sometimes he don’t. Sublety is not his forte. This character has been more of an npc in other campaigns so sometimes I have even difficulties to play with him nowadays.

I just started to wonder, how many different characters I have played and I realized that not so many actually. Well I have been roleplaying on a weekly basis few years, but here are the characters that, at least, I remember:

1. Memnon: This was a pirate in MERP. Fearless fellow who managed to swallow his tongue in enthusiasm when finishing helpless goblin. This character was the most brutal and savage character I have ever played. Eventually our groups irc-channel was named after him.

2. Valion Orius: My earthdawn character which was a rogue (I cannot remember the actual class name no longer) who used to throw knives a lot.

3. Rashnak Vokon: My second character that I still use in our d&d 3.5 games. Half-orc druid. Big and smutty character who enjoys only wilderness.

4. Ilyin Sarkofas: Beguiler in d&d 3.5. It was a short campaign and especially fun character to play. Rich in detail and history.

5. ______________: One dwarf weapon specialist in our Shadowrun 4th edition mini-campaign. Liked to detonate.. everything and almost did.

6. Talon Reethas: My first Star Wars SAGA edition character. A mixture of jedi and a crime lord. Fun to play and successful character.

7. Valak Marnu: Miralukan Star Wars character. Only few session with him until campaign suddenly ended.

8. Moira Eldana: My first female character. Cloistered cleric of Fharhlangg in d&d 3.5 One of my favorite characters. Used a crossbow and spells.

9. Tarman Maurok: A lord of Summerport. Character in our e-mail based campaign. Died in a duel.

10. Fèi Xing Fú: My assassin character in fantasy campaign that we play trough e-mail.

11. Victalas Elanaye: My Rogue/Feylock in dungeons and dragons 4th edition. Still playing and it has been fun. Resembles at some parts a mixture of my Rashnak and Ilyin.

12. Tharim Aewys: My Wheel of Time character. Latest addition to my character pool. He’s a farmer who doesn’t know about his abilities. We have agreed this with DM that he will reveal the in a WoT fashion during gameplay. E-mail campaign.

This amount of character reflects a lot that we have been having lots of campaigns which have, for reason or another, ended very soon. People have moved etc. Also I have been the Game Master in many campaigns, so I actually have a quite a lot of characters if I think about that. While I have been writing this post it has made me realize how much I am waiting that someday my studies will come to an end and I will buy a house with my wife. At least I won’t have to think about new characters or new campaigns all the time after that.

Well.. soon I have to go to china for a six months so I think that thinking new character’s and such is not over.. yet..

One nice gaming session behind once again. Today I got the opportunity to actually play the whole session since I wasn’t on the DM seat today.

We trudged towards Kelnator once again only to got our hands full of monster once the farms and civilization was left behind. First, we met a halfling merchant who’s friends were captured due orc raid. Now the poor halfling was surrounded with pack of wolves and was fighting them all alone until we entered the scene. We quickly managed to drive those wolves away and learn what was happened.

After the poor halfling told us what had happened we quickly started to track that party of orcs. After few hours our scouts (which were my character and our ranger) found them and soon we had an ambush ready for them. The fight was a slaughter, we mercilessly cut down the orcs, but the halflings weren’t there. After following the tracks we found the camp of those orcs and the halflings who where taken. Another fight, but this time it was lot tougher. Most of our character hitpoints rise and fell like a roller-coaster ride, but we survived. We thought that finally there was a little time of resting after series of fighting but no…

After the orc camp was destroyed and the orcs with it we released the poor halflings from their restraints. But while we were doing that we found out that the camp wasn’t only meant for the orcs and once again *gasp! we were fighting. Two big ogres attacked us without hesitation. Once the other ogre was down due the spells of our wizard other members of the party hacked and slashed the unconscious ogre very quickly. Only one left and we soon finished the job. Almost every member were out of their healing surges and really tired from the battle royale.

The halfling gave us their thanks and we looted the area to head onwards to our destination which was still a weeks journey away. We knew the area to be heavily infested with monsters. Especially goblins and orcs, so it wasn’t really a surprise only to wake up during the night to the spill some blood.

Good gaming session. Lots of fighting and ability to use our characters abilities to the fullest. Oh and I even got the test my rogues new warlock ability Next week we play our 3.5 Thranil Campaign and week after that we play Aerithia once again. And for next Aerithia Session.. I have some most EVIL things in my sleeve waiting to be used. (Image from Wizards.com)

Ok, I happened to order these books today, but it’ll take time for the goods to arrive to my bookshelf. That’s why they’re Octobers bookshelf additions. The books that I ordered now are: Adventurer’s Vault: A 4th Edition D&D Supplement and Star Wars Roleplaying Game: Force Unleashed Campaign Guide. [EDIT] I have already received the items, that’s why they are still September Bookshelf Additions.

Adventurer’s vault will be a good addition to enhance our 4th edition d&d gaming. If you want some sneak peak just click here and you’ll soon find out the reasons why I ordered this book. Search for Excerpts for Adventurer’s vault. The reason why I ordered the Force Unleashed Campaign guide is mainly the same why I ordered KOTOR Campaign guide. I like Star Wars RPG and these books will add lots and lots of talents and feats and info and such.. well you know..

So.. no we just have to wait until the goods arrive!

What makes successful roleplaying trough e-mail? Is it possible? Due the lack of time many people don’t have the possibility to play pen&paper games even if they would want to. Sometimes the urge for roleplaying makes those people to find alternative ways to extinguish their thirst for roleplaying. One way to do it is trough e-mail based roleplaying. What do successful roleplaying trough e-mail needs? What are the pros and cons? These are the things that now I am going to wander about. Or at least.. here are some of my random thoughts about the subject

I have played few e-mail based campaigns before and still playing, but it seems that it really takes time to find the mutual tune in e-mail based games. It feels like that learning to play trough e-mail takes a lot more time than it normally would with friends (and few beers and chips) in someones home. I am not only talking about the system, I’m talking about that it is difficult to find common rules for e-mail based games in order to keep it smoothly going. The pace in e-mail based games are much slower of course, so forget about rolling for each hit when there is a combat situation. Forget to roll when you’re trying to search information. In e-mail based games the best way to do it trough the art of describing. Finally you have the ability to do it without thinking fast during the gameplay. At least, as a GM, I encourage people to do it in tabletop games as well. In e-mail based games, it is essential.

What Do You Need? (1) Roleplaying trough e-mail takes time to find the mutual tone between player’s and gamemaster. (2) When you’re talking about the game itself and a player character, remember to be really precise. Consider things like: Is my character hero of the game or is he just a pawn in the big bad world? For PC, ask yourself things like: What I’m really good at? What is my place in the world? Describe your character really well, details, attitudes, npc-relations and such. (3) You need patience and the right attitude. The pace of the game depends of the response rate of your mails. (4) Imagination and describing skills. Since usually it is good that there are no rolling in e-mail based games you need to be creative. Describe things well when you i.e attack the villain. It is not enough in e-mail based gamest that your whole mail reply is “I hit the guy”. Remember, that in e-mail based games you’re not so restricted since you possibly dont even have a character sheet. At least one with stats in it. (5) Good and fair gamemaster is needed. One who rewards you with your clever ideas. One who is aware what are your characters strengths and weaknesses.

Example of play might go like this:
(GM) Narrator: [describing things when character is entering i.e a spooky mansion]
(PC) Character name: This place is ages old.. I wonder if.. so character is thinking. Then [I take a torch from my bag and toss it to the old curtains on the left]

Pros and Cons of e-mail based roleplaying.
- Speed of the Game (Depends a lot from players)
- Possibility of misunderstanding (poor describing can cause this)
- Lot to remember (NPC’s usually play bigger parts in e-mail games)
- Some replies take a lot of time. Some dont at all.
+ World around is alive. Rich in detail and description
+ Deeper PC characters (especially when there is only GM and 1 PC)
+ Ease of reference (Just scroll back to your previous mails)
+ Additional files and handouts are easy to send with mails.
+ You can play wherever you have access to your e-mail.

Suggestions I suggest that when you’re trying to play trough e-mail, do not describe things like. “My character takes the axe from..” but instead write the mails as character “I take the axe from…” and write your characters thoughts etc. to deepen your character. Everybody remembers the annoying parts from Salvatore’s books when it was time for Drizzt’s journal part. Well in e-mail based games it works if there is the right amount of it. Anyway, I have played with one of my friends trough e-mail a variety of campaigns. There has been Star Wars campaign, Fantasy campaigns etc. and I think e-mail based gaming is a good option if you want to play even if you cannot squeeze it to your schedule. Play when you have the time. For me, it has given a lot more than it has taken so try it and see how it feels.