Wizards of the Coast Starts the Sorry Tour

How exactly do you say your sorry for releasing a game system that was a huge risk? One that you justified by promising online play and easier access to new players. One that seemed to be making all o the character classes similar and forcing the use of miniatures or tokens. This is reality of the task Wizards of the Coast has with the release of the new Dungeons and Dragons edition (FKA 5th Edition)

WOTC is hoping that 5th Edition is the answer to that question. It is a little over a month away from the release date but this has been the edition where most of the surprises have already been revealed. The public play test of what is now to be called simply "Dungeons & Dragons" lasted well over a year. To get the play test materials all you had to do was ask. The answer to what is it like is simply that it is much closer to 3rd edition than 4th. It looks like they have removed all the MMOG power structure and returned D&D to its roots.

Now that Pathfinder has established itself as the main fantasy RPG how do you get players to even look at your new D&D rules? How about making them free? Yes, that's right the basic rules for D&D will be a free PDF download. Essentially WOTC wants to woo you back to the fold and a free copy of the rules as their gateway.

The other item that 4th edition was lacking in was third party support. The open licensing for 3.x editions and later Pathfinder ensured that many companies contributed material to the library of adventures and settings. The new edition is rumored to be working with third party designers right now to release non-official but authorized content for the new game. 

OK, so, root style play, free rules and third party support but that only gets us back to where we were before 4th edition. How about a spiffy new battle game based on the flight path mechanics of the Attack Wing games from WizKids? That's right Dungeons & Dragons: Attack Wing will be released within the year. It will add ground units to the Attack Wing system and dragons can move between the ground and the sky. It looks great and the dragon miniatures look like they'll be in 25 mm scale as will the other troops available.

Am I going back? I don't know for sure. I have leafed through the play test materials and pre-ordered the initial three books. I saw the Attack Wing game being played at Origins and I must say it looks very cool. But Pathfinder has become the new best friend when you old friend moved away. If he moves back you will always wonder if they'll move away again. The new D&D will have to go a ways to make up for its past misdeeds. As a game 4th edition was not bad, just not D&D. If they would have called Forgotten Realms Tactics or something like that they would have sold some new material while cultivating their existing audience. 

Here is the link where WOTC talks about free Basic D&D

http://www.wizards.com/dnd/Article.aspx?x=dnd/4ll/20140527

Origins 2014 Reactions

What can I say? I had a good time. I met some cool people including DM Scotty. The official line from GAMA is that attendance was up this year. I think there were more people there Thursday and Friday which were both dead days last year but Saturday did not really feel crowded to me. 

Please fix on-site registration. This had been a mess every year since the convention has been in Columbus. There was a picture, posted on Facebook, of the line to register on Saturday that one person claimed as proof of the success of the convention but I saw it as a failure in customer service. The line at the BMV in Ohio moves faster than the Origins line. Ohio is ranked #1 in customer experience but there is a lot more to issuing license plates or a driver's license than printing a badge to enter Origins. Other conventions have figured out how to take registration payments online after pre-registration so why can't Origins? At a Wizard World Con I was able to buy my tickets with my phone while in line and then move to the pre-registration pick up line.

Restore the vendor hall. The entire vendor hall seemed sparse this year. There were only one or two no-shows but the lack of independent miniature vendors and the large discount retailers made the hall feel empty. Moving some of the board game vendors to the board game hall was not a bad idea but I think many may have missed the memo. The companies I noticed the absence of were Chimera Hobby, Pulp Miniatures, Covert /Slugathon Gamers, Cardhaus and Looney Labs. I spent lots less in the vendor hall this year as compared to years past.

Help the GMs. Give them a count after registration closes for each event they are running. They should not have to ask for it. I waited with one poor GM Friday morning with a generic in hand hoping the at least two more players would show so that we could play his game. He like many of the others had no clue how many people had signed up for his game. Another great addition would be an online scheduling system that runs after pre-registration ends until the convention ends so that you don't have to wait in line to find out if  a game you want to play is sold out or worse show up for a game with a generic to find out it is sold out (or over booked!) These are problems that have been around a while and are relatively easy to fix.

Better Signs and/or Information. Where was Artemis? Geek Chic? Stronghold Games? WizKids?

I know GAMA/Origins has no control over the Greater Columbus Convention Center but it was not great that at least one of the snack areas was cash only. The Java City was able to take credit but not the snack vendor next to BattleTech. What gives? They had signs saying "cash only, sorry for the inconvenience" and thanks to a few cash only vendors <cough> Star Realms <cough> I was short on cash a couple of days and could not get my kettle corn and cotton candy fix.

Overall not a bad show. A little disappointing but I will hope that there are changes for the better next year.

Origins Show FAQ

What was the favorite game you played?

Fantasy Quest - Miniature Skirmish Rules

So, What did you buy?

Mice and Mystics with expansion set

Call of Catthulu RPG

Get Lucky (Kill Dr. Lucky card game)

2 Dystopia Rising Splat books

My son Nick bought Star Realms

What did you almost buy?

Myth by Merc Games

Dragon Head Trophy by David Lee Pancake

What did you want to buy but could not find?

WizKids Godzilla Figures

Formula E by Clever Mojo Games (Elephant Racing!)

What new product looks promising?

WizKids new Dragon Combat game licensed from Wizards of the Coast

What was the strangest vendor in the hall?

Vendor selling oysters each guaranteed to have a pearl 

Origins 2014

So, Origins is this week. Once again I am excited but I hope that GAMA has not painted themselves into a corner leading to the end of the convention or moving it to another city.

One issue that comes up every year is how long it takes to get everything related to the convention up and running. Events registration is always started within 6 weeks of the convention and details for the GMs for the events don't get released until the last minute. Contrast this with GenCon where the events are published months out and registration information (and even badges) are mailed out well in advance of the show. I will show up on Thursday morning wait in line and hope that the badge and events I signed up and paid for just over a week ago are waiting for me.

I stopped going to the convention several years ago. I got tired of the crush of time and never being able to sign up for the events I wanted as well as the shrinking number of vendors that seemed to show up. When a good chunk of the vendor area was taken up by the Mystery Van promoting the new Scooby Doo collectible card game I thought it was time for a break. What brought me back to Origins was something called the Fair Day Pass. A five dollar a day admission that gave you access to the vendor area and open areas of the convention with a family version that was 15 dollars.

The Fair Day Pass was available for several years but last year it was only usable on Saturday. This year GAMA has not eliminated the pass but raised the price to 20 dollars and is offering a Family Day Pass for Sunday at the cost of 15 dollars. Sunday is usually the slowest day of the convention so I am sure this is a move to bolster attendance on that day but I believe that eliminating the single version of the pass is a mistake. Now the absolute cheapest single day admission is 20 dollars. I always thought the five dollar pass was great because it brought people into the vendor hall to spend money who would not have come to the convention otherwise. Columbus is full of poor college students who would love to come spend a day at the convention but won't do if the price is high. And did I mention this year the Sunday of the convention falls on Father's Day? 

The last item to my rant goes out to the game masters who put their time and effort into making Origins great. I will not say anything that questions their commitment to this event. My problem is that the event times seem to be getting longer every year and some events seem only half ready when you get there. If you are a game master with a 4 hour slot for a RPG or miniatures please have characters and forces ready at the appointed start time.As an example, I signed up for a learn Aces and Eights rpg session a few years ago  and what we did was roll up characters for three and a half hours and run part of a bar room fight encounter. I have had other friends show up for RPG events where they are asked to roll up characters as quickly as possible but the GM does not have any character sheets and one copy of the rule book. I don't like to quit events but these are the kinds of things that drive me away from game sessions. Board games can be bad about this as well. The gamers are all seated around an empty table at the appointed time and the organizer shows up a few minutes late with the game under his arm.

Why do you go then Cap'n Grumpy? I go because there are bargains. I go because I like seeing the new innovations coming out in the industry. I go because I have formed friendships over the years with vendors and game designers. I go because there are always some games and accessories that are not available anywhere else. I go because I am never sure that GAMA will be able to pull it all together again next year.

Origins has had a great run in Columbus but there have been rumblings for years that maybe they should explore moving back to Baltimore or Philadelphia. That would make me sad but I would probably just spend my money on going to GenCon. I don't like that convention as well but three hours is not that long of a drive.

Build your own: Gelatinous Cube

This was a fun little project that took less than an hour. All you need is a transparency sheet, a straight edge, a sharp knife and glue gun. If you don't know what the heck this creature is check out this page: http://paizo.com/PRD/monsters/gelatinousCube.html

Essentially you simply create a plus sign using two inch squares from the transparency sheet. Then score the top edges to allow the sides to fold down. At this point I used the glue gun to add texture to the sides of the cube. Then carefully glue the sides together using more hot glue. I used a little more hot glue on the inside of the corners to shore up the joins and that's it.

There is a youtube channel called theDMScraft starring DM Scotty where you can watch step by step how to build your own Gelatinous Cube

Larry the Orc Pirate thinks his new flintlock will stop the cube.

Larry was wrong!

Basketball (Basket-brawl) GM Campaign Tool

So you want to create your own tournament for your D&D campaign. I have used this technique for years, mostly to amuse myself, but now your characters can feed their gambling addictions. Essentially the game results are a mini-game using the rolls of a handful of dice to produce the final score. You can use dice and most of us are looking for excuses to use more dice or I have created a spreadsheet that generates game results instantly.

Its easy to fit such a game into any campaign. Most large cities (even fantasy ones) can (or already do) support some kind of gaming contests. I like the basketball or basket-brawl idea because the dice create very convincing scores. The dice can be rolled behind the screen or out in the open allowing games to be played out real time and fortunes to be lost or won by the characters.

The core mechanic of the game is that there are six six-sided dice rolled per team, per half. Ideally, each die should be a different color as they represent the positions on a basketball team; guard, guard, forward, forward, center and bench. Rolled with no modifiers this will produce results that are not biased towards either team. 

In order to add something which makes one team more attractive or a higher seed in a tournament the following special abilities can be added into the teams.

Each team has 1 or 2 special abilities

3 Point barrage (x3 score for highest die score)

Twin Towers (Two Centers instead of two forwards at d10 each)

Stifling Defense (opponents -d10 per half)

Fast Breaks (+50% score for guards)

Superstar - position (x3 score for that die, d10)

Star Player - position (x2 score for that die, d8)

Strong Bench (x2 bench scoring)

Veteran Player (upgrade die by 1 level)

Master Coach (extra d8 in points, attributed to highest die for stats)

A total of 6 dice are rolled for each team per half. Each die represents one player. The dice are added and special abilities are calculated resulting in the half score per team. The dice are rolled a second time and the two results are added together for the final score.

Looking back on the original teams presented in my tourney:

Adventurer's Guild (Superstar Center, Stifling Defense) 

Pure Magic (Fast Breaks, Star Guard)

Gold Coins (Superstar Guard) 

Mongrel Maniacs (3 point Barrage) 

Secrets (Master Coach, Star Center) 

Open Hands (Strong Bench, Veteran Guard)

Guards (Twin Towers, Star Forward) 

Chili's Cohort (Star Guard, Veteran Center) 

I set up these teams based on guilds in my home brewed setting. The results can used to start an adventure because some NPC friend of the party bet too much money on the big game. I can share my Excel spreadsheet for quickly generating results if anyone is interested.

The Finals

Adventurer's Guild (1) vs Mongrel Maniacs (7)

The Guild started strong and amassed a 19 point lead by halftime. Dwight Minotaur scored 30 first half points and it looked like the Maniacs were going to get run out of the gym. The Maniacs kept plugging and Dwight Minotaur could not seem to put the ball in the basket and they were right back in it. The Goose Goblin three point miss at the buzzer sealed their fate as the Adventurer's Guild holds on to win the championship.

Adventurer's Guild				Mongrel Maniacs
Guard	2	3		Guard	2	1
Guard	4	3		Guard	6	4
Forward	6	1		Forward	2	6
Forward	6	2		Forward	4	6
Center	30	3		Center	2	6
Bench	3	4		Bench	5	5
Adjustments	0	0		Adjustments	11	5
Total	51	16	67	Total	32	33	65

Round 2 Results

Game 1

Adventurer's Guild (1) vs Secrets (3)

The Secrets jumped out to a huge lead in the first half but Dwight Minotaur was just too much in the second half for the Secrets. He scored 30 of his 33 points in the 2nd half as the Adventurer's Guild moves on to the finals.

Adventurer's Guild				Secrets
Guard	5	5		Guard	4	5
Guard	1	5		Guard	6	3
Forward	5	2		Forward	6	2
Forward	2	2		Forward	3	3
Center	3	30		Center	10	8
Bench	1	4		Bench	1	3
Adjustments	0	0		Adjustments	3	-2
Total	17	48	65	Total	33	22	55

Game 2

Chili's Cohorts (5) vs Mongrel Maniacs (7)

The Maniacs continue to surprise as they come from behind to beat the Cohorts. The relentless bombing from 3 point range once again proved to be the difference as they move into the finals against the Guild.

Chili's Cohorts				Mongrel Maniacs
Guard	16	6		Guard	4	2
Guard	3	2		Guard	4	4
Forward	6	5		Forward	5	6
Forward	1	2		Forward	3	1
Center	7	4		Center	4	4
Bench	4	5		Bench	2	3
Adjustments	0	0		Adjustments	10	12
Total	37	24	61	Total	32	32	64