"Give a man a fire, and keep him warm for a day. Set him on fire, and keep him warm for life." -- Strategems in Life, Aplocal De'Sat.

Hi to my players and readers,

It has been a roller-coaster couple of months since I last posted on 9d20. We had sporadic DnD sessions during that time, with two of my original players not appearing from time to time due to RL commitments. Funny thing was, it all worked out rather fine in the end. (Out-of-game Hindsight check)

Weilian was MiA in his army camp for weeks, so I revamped him as one of the key NPCs instead. Pongtau moved over as a dwarven cleric to Shell's campaign, due to our lack of numbers in that campaign after Alex left the game (quit).
The party size was reduced to four- Guy, Fel, Trogdor and Drefonis.

The last two weeks have been great, with the first chapter of my story drawing to a close after the party returned intact from the Oasis, and were largely pivotal in the success of the double trial of Nate Bankers and Weilian.
We had great fun as the smaller group maintained cohesiveness while tackling battles and roleplaying encounters in a shorter timespan. Time was efficiently spent due to lesser distractions about, and we achieved more in the process.
I now firmly believe that DnD 4th Edition is best played with four or five players, period. No more, no less.

Of course, the four of them had to adapt to the new party size and increased danger factor. Some of the tactics formerly employed by the party had to be changed due to the reduction of AoE effects, and lesser DPS on the whole. (Both players who left were striker classes.)

Guy changed his build into a more offensive one, Fel changed his feats and improved his survivability. Trogdor is now making more use of his sacrificial and healing abilities, and Dre slowly honing up his rogue combinations.
They coped fine, with a few hairy moments here and there but nothing much that they could not realllly handle. (Mandingo's minions did give them quite a scare though.)

The party is now wiser, freshly level 8, and have clearly sorted out their characters' motivations as the chapter drew to its conclusion. The upcoming hooks are many, and the rewards unimaginable.

Meanwhile, we have decided to take a break from Caen for a couple of months.
I will be using this period to integrate new game-table rules (e.g. the DM rolling selected skills like Stealth, Perception and Insight for the players, so as to add an element of uncertainty).
I will be posting up carefully hand-selected Caen lore to allow players a deeper knowledge and feel of the world they have been adventuring in for the past year.

With these, I hope that the players will be able to understand more of Caen, and also make better choices for their characters' futures. A loose episodic theme will also be implemented as I revealed before in an earlier post (Heroes Encapsulated) on the blog.

I look forward to our next foray into Caen, and may the "Heroes of Maya" continue to write themselves into Caen folklore.

"And I'm telling you (I'm not going) !!" -- J. Hudson's screaming in Showgirls.

Hey all,

I hoped you guys had a really great Lunar New Year, and now its back to business again.

Actually not.

We, the group have been taking a break from table-top gaming, and Kat had just gone for his reservist training (two weeks). So, this gives us an opportunity to recharge our brain cells, and refresh whatever needs refreshing. We might also have to review the whole 4th Edition scene in our little community.

My Caen campaign is nearing the end of its arc, sputtering along with periodic sessions. Shell's campaign has been hit by "players" quitting/not coming etc, so the party line-up is left with me, Shane, PT, and Kat. It is just getting harder and harder for the group to meet up, due to various reasons. But one takes the cake though.

There is this particular player who reasons about not having fun, not touching 4th Edition EVER, and leaving the party without a second healer and in limbo (as we planned characters based on the players setup).
Such drastic action is usually just not cool. We kind of expected it from him, but to leave real-life friends hanging, even though we expected that too, is not too manly.

This reminds me of the Jennifer Hudson epic song titled "And I'm telling you (I'm not going)".

Diva? Hissy-fit induced tantrums? Black singer-wannabe douchebag punching his famous singer girlfriend?

Just not cool.

We, as a group, had learnt more about how to play DnD 4th Ed etc, but at the same time, we also learn that a good attitude is not taught, but more a natural upbringing and how different people deal with certain issues in life.

I have recently tried my hand at amateur tennis coaching, and I realized something. No, its not about lycra tights, spandex tops or pink headbands. I realized that I do not need a super-talented student with insane upside etc. What I am looking for is the show of a strong love for the tennis game itself.

That alone will create determination, commitment, and a willingness to listen and take advice/criticism. Of course, a good attitude for the coaching session is paramount too. I do not want to see pouting when I ask my students to pick up the stray balls, run an extra round etc. But I am glad to say that the current group that I have is not shabby at all.

These basic guidelines make a good learning/transfer of knowledge process. One might argue that DnD is not that, but who is to say DnD/RPGs does not involve transfer of knowledge? The DM will have to tell you the scene, and describe the consequences of your own actions to you. By the virtue of that, it is already transfer of knowledge.

Attitude towards tennis training can be linked to attitude towards the DM's response to a player's action, or the general vibe one gives at the session. Sleeping? Playing hand-held games/incessant SMSing/phone-hog? Showing excessive disinterest/sighing, dampening the mood?

Not optimal for tennis lessons, any lessons in general, DnD, and most aspects of life.

Think about that, while taking a dump in the toilet. And life will be clearer after you come out of the door.

And yes, I will be thinking hard about Shadowrun. A re-run of a lousy movie is never a good thing.

"Let it be known that all good things come in shady packages." (Read: Fie's Shadowrun 4th Ed Preview! and Darkfall Online)

Hey all,

A Happy Chinese "Niu"(New) Year to you! (This crap pun was taken from a crap commercial I saw on local TV.)

I mentioned in my earlier post that I will be touching on the new exciting stuff happening in my local gaming circle.

First off, there is the latest MMO hope- Darkfall Online, or DFO for short. This MMO is a bit like the Obama inauguration speech. The game is new, but its intrinsic values are old. No levels, player-run economy, freedom to do "whatever" you wish to. In fact, it is a UO/SwG/EvE inspired clone w/ a full-pvp ruleset twist. aka, "sandbox" full of bloodied sand.

In 2002, Adventurine S.A., a Greek-based independent gaming company, bought the game engine/concept over from another like-minded company who was going bankrupt. The years passed and nothing much was heard.

The interested public and fans thought that the game had gone into vaporware-mode. The signs were there. No publicity, no news, no new trailers, no developer's post, etc etc. But by an apparent act of God, snippets of the game resurfaced again a year ago, along with the announcement that it would be launched in the beginning of 2009.

Fast forward to now. A few days to the much-anticipated beta where players can actually try out this game without just reading/dreaming/jizzing about it. The beta will be paramount to soothe the many naysayers harping that this game is in fact an elaborate hoax, that it is too big, ambitious and with a concept far too dated for the WoW world of today.
(Update: 27/1/09: The 25th have passed and the beta is going along fine, albeit invites were only given to players in big guilds and only in the next few phases would a normal player like me get a chance (16%) to experience the beta.)

I have to admit I did have my reservations, as there is too little information out for a game that is supposedly coming out on the 25th Feb 2009. But then I realized that this is actually a small company with a limited budget. Being able to garner such publicity through sheer "word-of-internet-mouth" in fact saved them much in advertising costs. I have to add that being mysterious never fails to whet the appetites of gamers, especially those wanting to go back to 0ld-school roots.

But a major part of me wants this to game to work, so as Obama recited at the Washington Mall, (loosely translated by me) -


"In this icy winter of new-fangled MMOs without the RPG part, I urge all old-time gamers, to stick by the timeless values of relative integrity, player-run economy/quests, and above all, time. Give something time, and hope is born. And when hope is born, umm... Faith follows.
DnD loosely mirrors these values, even though it has been tainted by the ugly claws of commercialism, Wall Street (WoTC), whatever."



Okay. Obama did not exactly utter those words, at least not in public yet. So let us pray for a smooth delivery, and God bless us all.


Part 2 (Of this otherwise already amazing double-header post!)

Let us imagine if Darkfall turns out to be a complete hogwash and is actually a Pokemon Online rip, and we fail to see the light of it. Do not fret, gamers.

There is still, Shadowrun 4th Edition. I know I have been talking about SR4 for a couple of posts already and that all that I wanted to gush about it has already been gushed.

This time, I am going to show you something concrete.

Without further ado, I now present to you the gist of Fie the DM's first SR4 campaign set in the summer of 2070, Singapore Island-City.

Your eyes are glued on what is happening on Holo-Hub Channel 14, and so are the hundreds with you in the local pub. Nervous chattering is heard everywhere, and the stink of sweat permeates in the overcrowded space.
There had to be a reason why the taps ran dry and the electricity shut down two days ago. Shortages like these were frequent ever since the Workers Party came into power in 2068, but never had this been island-wide.
Yes, this is the real thing, only worse. The whole f'kin island is in blackout/full-loot mode.
Images of massive riots near City Hall protesting the virtual stoppage of the economy, crazed Sporeans smashing windows, fences and grabbing whatever foodstuff/furniture/items of value in the affluent residential districts of B.T. 9 (formerly known as Bukit Timah) and the Tri-Zonal East Towns (Tampines-1, Pasir Ris, Little Simei) are being shown. Suddenly, the images stopped and a familiar image appears on the holo-screen, fidgeting on his podium.

"Hail all Sporeans, I am your Prime Administrator, Robert See. I do not have much time to speak, as this emergency power source, kindly sponsered by AdmerEALty Industries, *crackle* will *crackle* last us only a few minutes.
In this time of darkness, (ahem) I have to say that we will have to be patient as we ourselves do not know the source of this *crackle* madness. Rest assured that we are not not the only ones. I have received reliable sources that this phenomenon is in fact- worldwide.

For now, I say, and I repeat, that all existing electronic data island-wide have been wiped out, and past government records erased.

We have set up an Emergency Identification Process (EiP) whereby all Sporeans will have a week's grace to walk or cycle to City Hall during daylight, to re-register *crackle* yourself with our government as a citizen and show us proof of your assets in paper. Failure to do so will deem you as an illegal *crackle* immigrant and subject to law.

I promise to conclude this announcement with my assurance that *crackle* ..."
This is the starting story-plot of my campaign and I will be fleshing out the country and its various zones in subsequent handouts etc. The starting characters will be thrown into the scenario and enjoy the advancement of both their personal goals and the overhanging storyline.

SINner? Former contacts? A handy stash of equipment? Or just an alert mind? These can come in handy as you come to grasp with the new reality of life in ---

"SINgapore 2070 -- The Sun, the Sins and the Sea."

For now, enjoy the lunar festivities and I will talk to you again in a few RL days.

"As I run in the shadows of the Valley of Death..." (Rigger's Paradise, RCA Records)

Hey all,

Chinese New Year is around the corner.

It is one of those rare times in the year where work grinds to a halt in Singapore, and the festive mood takes over the Chinese majority. Same for us gamers. We will be taking a break for the next week, but might squeeze in a Saturday meet-up session just before Reunion Dinner on Sunday.

And honestly, we might even be able to meet up during the late night of the first day of Chinese New Year, as the modern Chinese nowadays tend to celebrate more on the first weekend of the Chinese New Year instead, with no work the next day (Sunday) to dampen their buoyant mood. (Read: they get to gamble/drink until the wee hours of the morning, and get to sleep like a pig the next day.)

This break will allow me to take a step back and read up more on Shadowrun: 4th Edition, and maybe even do up a campaign for a test-run.

Sometimes, I long for a proper roleplaying game with the right balance of combat/RP (not knocking the rest of the genre), and this might be it. We will never know until we try it, but at least there is a glimmer of hope in the Valley of Glitch Deaths.

The combat looks brutal and fast, and we will have to put more effort into the other aspects of the game, for we will not want a 1-hr mission, with the sheepish DM going," That's all for today folks. Thanks for making it all the way down to Simei for the fifty-five minute session." He adds," Go take your midnight cab now, as its already 2am."
I am looking forward to making a fun and action-packed campaign. There is much to figure out in the game though, and the DM preparation is more open-ended and tougher in a sense. As said, I will read up more thoroughly on the manual and work on it accordingly. No biggie I suppose.

To go forward, sometimes we have to take a step back. New fangled games just lose its roots while appealing to the new generation. Take a look at Fallout 3. FPS? Yes. Roleplaying? Umm, not so much. A whole legacy diminished, catered to new blood. They had to be realistic and look beyond the "isometric-view" dinosaur gamers, to get a bigger share of the pie. Yes, but please do not tell me that this is a follow up to Fallout 1 and 2.

Nuff' said. Let's take a trip back Old-school, y'all.

*turns on the Dinosaur-mobile, circa 1999-2003, cries a bit*

Ultima Online. SWG. Those were the two games which gave me a bit of the feel of a player-centric game. Player-run economies, quests etc... But those days are dead. Almost.

Now, its all WoW this and WoW that. A huge population of players slaving to the coolest employer around- Blizzard Entertainment.
They crow,"I downed this boss, 24 man raids, epic fails, leetsauce, weaksauce, threat, warlocks, warriors blah blah.." The players get happy when they see new WoW clones try but fail miserably as WoW had already bottlecapped the market, making it so hard to just survive in this already small pond. They are playing the best MMO in the world. Or more accurately, the only MMO in the world at this rate that it is going.
Colored loot, super-easy XP leading to less of a grind, so that one can meet his friend at level 60 in like two weeks. Guild Wars anyone? At least I did not need to pay monthly for GW.

Just to let you know, I am not bashing WoW. I know that it is one hell of an addictive game and is a complete MMO experience for most. Blizzard is one of the best game-makers around, and their track record is second to none. Diablo 2, for the record, ruined my life. :)
But all in all, WoW is just a game, nothing more. Interaction and role-playing? Players shaping up the world with their own hands? A girl in a lup-sup bar giving superficial love?

*crickets chirping*

Anyway, is that even important anymore? I wonder.

But as said, there is still hope. A new hope. When all is gone and the lights goes off, darkness falls.

Darkfall. ----> Feb 25th, 2009. Mark that date down in your calendar.

More about that in my next post.

"Battlegrounds Hack-n-Slash d20 System, less on the roleplay, thanks!" (Thoughts on the current RPG scene)

Every game has its good and bad points. But like chicken rice, no matter good or bad, there is usually still the chicken and the rice. Which brings us to a role-playing game. It needs role-playing elements and of course, it must be enjoyable as a game.

4th Edition DnD.

It is a roleplaying game. With a filmsy Skill Challenge system for determining complicated role-playing encounters which doesn't work anyway, and an elaborate tactical grid combat model. We can definitely see where WoTC concentrated their effort on in 4th Ed.
This also conveniently allows WoTC to heighten demand for their overpriced plastic miniatures (some of them which I do admit looks quite okay in terms of mass-produced China-sweatshop standard).
All in all, the game sometimes degenerates into a hack-and-slash fest, sadly even when the DM does not want it that way, as the combat in 4th Ed takes around half an hour, all the way up to two hours for "epic" fights.

"No zombies or motorized hacksaws please as we continue to mow down the minions, thanks."

We experienced this quite often in our heroic-tier campaigns, and the players can expect the bulk of the four-hour long DnD sessions to be combat-oriented if at least two such 4th Ed encounters are thrown in.

Okay, you must be asking, but if the combat is fun and all, won't we want to spend more time in the part of the game which is indeniably the game's strength?

Umm, yes.

If combat was does not end up being an inevitable household chore (think washing stacks of dishes and plates after a hard day of work, and you had just wanted to go to bed in the first place.)
Combat in 4th Ed is fun on paper with the various at-will, encounter and daily powers given to us by the game, but pardon the cliche, after a while, it does feels a bit like an MMO, where I am clicking my character's special powers on his on-screen HUD. The various status effects inflicted on mobs/players is reminiscent of MMOs in general as well. (and boy does it feel like the dishes and plates analogy.)

Too many skills depend on tactical placement and the cooperation of the party, which is important for most games, but to keep track of all these on the battleground (kitchen table), means distracting one from roleplaying his fighter in the old days, where one can shout,

" I hack at him wildly with my great axe. Arrrrr!!!"

*rolls a 1 on a d20* - loses an arm and a finger according to Shell's Custom Crit System (CCS)

In fact, that might be the only thing that the fighter could do as an attacking option (besides Power Attack etc) in the old days. But by keeping it simple, it allows one to flesh out his toon (character) in his own unique way rather than allowing the name of the power to compensate for it.
Constantly having to wonder which three squares to move away to get concealment, which exact few squares to stand on to get the most out of the entire's party power array etc, starts to grate on the party and the DM alike, like say, an hour into an epic fight.
The sheer number of status modifiers accumulating on the mobs and players does not help with the ease of book-keeping too.

All in all, I feel that DnD 4th Ed is too clunky in combat form after playing firsthand, contrary to their boast of a cleaner/faster system. The "Powers" system did simplify the creation of a character, but not the actual time spent in a fight due to unforseen "splash damage" time taken from remembering the sheer number of status effect modifiers, the 202th time a mark moved in the same battle, and trying to optimize play between 4-6 players with individual powers requiring specific placement.

It is of no fault of the players or the DM that they want to optimize play, but the system itself is rather flawed when so much time have to be spent to do it efficiently. WoTC should buck up and start "patching" the existing game content first, before churning out endless sourcebooks/splashbooks in a short-term attempt to grab quick cash.

I am still having fun playing the game though.

I play the game primarily for friends, for their companionship and interaction, and of course, a four-hour journey into a different body/soul/mind. I enjoy the personal challenge, trying to keep myself in character, longer and longer as the weeks go by, until one day, when Pongtau, Shell, Lex or Shane ask me to buy a drink at the vending machine next to our gaming table, I can snarl to him in Deep Speech,

"Get it yourself, thrall, before I siphon your brain and mush your senses!"

By then, I would have hopefully snapped to my senses, and go about buying the drinks.

I never viewed myself as a great roleplayer, as all these things should come naturally to the great and the gifted. But I do try my best, and for what I lack in, I make up for it in intensity and the willingness to grind on and improve oneself.

Three words to all our players, vets included.

"Do-not-f*cking give up."

Peace all, and stay tuned next time when I will be touching on the original 4th Edition game which came into existence way before DnD 4th Edition. (Clue: It rhymes with Shallow Buns.)





p/s: Vek is selling his custom-made dice which rolls a 6 approx. 32.1 percent of the time. Word goes that the local casinos are trying to head-hunt him for his mad skills.