Dungeons & Dragons 4th Edition: Teaser

D&D on Microsoft Surface - nuff said

Surfacescapes Demo Walkthrough from Visual Story TAs on Vimeo.

Now reading: The Second Generation

Since I finished Hourglass Mage, The Legend of Huma and The Fire Rose, I have been looking for the right fix to cure my newly found Dragonlance addiction. The bad thing about having this addiction is, that Dragonlance is more or less dead. Before I nail the coffin totally shut, I know there are a very few releases planned, so if you feel more comfortable saying that those releases constitute actual life in the setting, do not let me ruin your day.

Anyway, I started The Second Generation, which I have always kinda enjoyed because it moved the setting forward. My favorite short story is of course The Legacy, which was originally featured in The Magic of Krynn. So, if you haven’t read this collection of short stories, go get it here.

Raistlin Chronicles Omnibus

The Dragonlance Forums have a thread about the Raistlin Chronicles. Now, don’t get too excited, because it is just a reprint of The Soulforge and Brothers in Arms.

The cool thing is the artwork, which, even though it is not entirely canon, is quite cool. At least I like it quite a bit, Weis does not, and some of the people over at the Forums do not either.

Check it out here.

By the way; did you sign up for the Wizards’ community?

Wizards launch new Community

…and there was much rejoicing.

Wizards has just started a public beta test of their new community, which replaces the old horrible message boards. Taking a page out of the Facebook playbook, Wizards now allow you make more personal profile as well as adding friends. There’s also a blog engine, which I personally found pretty interesting. Unfortunately it doesn’t appear to be working, so I will stick with Blogger for now. To be honest I am not sure I will leave Blogger at all, since this old crappy blog engine is starting to grow on me.

I am really excited about this new community, because I feel that we really need a strong online presence, if our game is to survive. The Greyhawk people have done it for years, and the Dragonlance gang is rooted in the Dragonlance Nexus and the Dragonlance Forums. I really hope this signals a renewed interest in our game.

In the coming months I will blog a little bit more about the Wizards community and how I see the Interwebs as a catalyst for renewed interest in D&D.

By the way, I am McJuel @ Wizards so go add me as a friend.

First session completed

So we finished the first gamin session in about a year last night. It was not the longest session, which suited me fine. To be honest, it has been years since I pulled an all nighter.

So, we wake up in a wrecked ship with no recollection of how we got there. My wizard had no spell book, and none of the fighters had any armor or weapons. We are stranded on a little island with a light house, and true to our adventuring spirits we start to explore the island. I am not going into all the details here, but suffice to say here is that we found our equipment and and some magical swag. Furthermore, we ran into some sort of cult, which we decided to leave alone. We were outnumbered two to one, so we just let the worship whatever foul demon they wanted.

I accumulated enough XPs to advance to level 2, so now I have to actually fill out a character sheet and pick feats and skills. I am looking forward to it, since it always helps me to get a feel for my character. Unlike last time, I think this one will have to be somewhat of unlikeable guy.

Funny thing though. It turns out I was the only one who didn’t cheat with the dice rolls for the stat block. All the others had several 18s, while I have not a single one. The good thing about the 3.5 rules is that you get to enhance your ability scores as you progress.

All in all a fairly enjoyable evening, which we will repeat in about a month. And now I have two magic missiles pr. day. Good stuff.

Gaming session tonight

I am getting my gaming on tonight. For the first time in about a year and a half, my gaming group is meeting up again. As usual, we are playing in Mystara using 3.5 rules. I always likes the 3.5 rules, and Mystara is a classic setting, so I am happy.

The group is nowhere nearly as good as my original group(s), but it is all I can get, so I guess I am thankful for being able to play. The style is very hack and slash, with absolutely no role playing aspect to it. These guys have a computer game approach to the game, where it is all about the stats, the levels and the magical items. Fortunately we usually have a pretty good time, and who knows, maybe things will change a bit now.

I am playing a 1st level wizard from Glantri but since I haven’t played in years I cannot remember what spells are good. Being 1st level kinda solves that problem though, considering I only get to pick one or two spells. Anyway, hopefully I will be able to hide behind a bunch of big fighters and suck up some XPs.

I was thinking about keeping a gaming journal as we progress, but since I am due back at work in a week I am not sure if I will be able to keep it up. Here’s to hoping.