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Review: GameMastery Pirate Ship Flip-Mat and Mines Map-Pack
From the Page to the Stage
When it comes to FRPG adventures, just about every professional designer will tell you that it all comes down to the map.
That doesn’t mean that a great map necessarily results in a great adventure. There are plenty of great maps in adventure products which still end up as merely fair to good adventures when assessing the adventure for its overall impact and quality. By the same token, there are plenty of otherwise great adventures that can’t grab the gold and achieve excellence because the quality of the map, either in its design or artistic cartography (and often both) just isn’t good enough to permit the adventure to advance to the top of the podium. The map matters; it matters a lot.
A great map won’t make a poor adventure great; but a poor map can certainly render an otherwise great adventure to be merely average. If nothing else, a good map in an otherwise undistinguished adventure is something that a GM can always repurpose and reuse for some other adventure or purpose. After all, most RPG maps are highly convertible game components.
The one aspect which isn’t so easily transportable, however, is getting a map from the page to the tabletop itself. When it comes to that last jump -- from paper to a tangible battlemap on the tabletop -- the last leg of that journey is usually the hardest. A variety of methods have emerged over time in order to allow the GM to make the jump from the page to the tabletop itself. Paizo's principle contributions to that effort, the Flip-Mat and Map-Pack are the subject of this week's Paizo product review.
Paizo’s Flip-Mat line
The original flip-mat was created by a small independent company, SteelSqwire. Originally conceived as a product that would compete with the ubiquitous Battlemat from Chessex, the flip-mat offered a few advantages when first released in 2005.
This transcript is paraphrased, with some responses shortened. It is compiled from various tweets (thanks especially to Critical Hits, E. Foley, and Rolling20s for their live tweeting - I suggest you check out their Twitter feeds) plus WotC's live chat feed, and other sources. In attendence: Monte Cook, Bruce Cordell, and Robert J. Schwalb.
Greg: Today we're going to be talking about Class Design, from Assassins to Wizards. To start things off, let's hear what your favorite class is and why.
Bruce: I would say the warlock in 4th edition. I really liked all the flavor and options that go into the class. I had a star pact warlock recently that was really fun to play.
Monte: The wizard. Historically it was the one that needed planning and forethought. It rewards good play above the others in my opinion.
Rob: My favorite class is the assassin. Even in first edition I could pretend to be a fighter, and then kill people. In 3rd and 4th I liked the versatility and options that I could have with the assassin.
Greg: How complex or simple do you think classes should be?
Bruce: I think, we think that different classes should have different levels of complexity. If you want something easier to pick up, there should be a class for that, if you want something that's a bit more challenging or has a bit more going on, you should be able to do that out the gate as well.
Monte: I would also add that we want different levels of complexity for classes. For example, if a guy wants to pick up a fighter and have an easy time of it, there should be options for that. But also, if another person wants to pick up a fighter and have lots of options and/or complexity, we want to provide that too. The base game is the foundation. If you opt in to character development options, you can get complexity.
Rob: There was discussion of complexity parity in the classes. There's a baseline complexity, but can add as needed.
Greg: Do you want to talk about some of the ways that this could be accomplished?
Monte: Sure. So for example, if your fighter goes up a level and would normally get some bonus damage or a bonus to hit, or something simple, then maybe instead you could choose to replace that with an option or options that allow you to do some cool moves that allow you to push people around, or protect your allies a bit more, or control the battlefield a little...[Click here to read the rest of this article]
Ever wonder how different celebrity minds, like Zach Hanks or Dan Milano, would approach a D&D adventure? Here’s your chance to find out and donate to a good cause at the same time!
On Saturday, January 28th, Wizards of the Coast, DnDMelt and Satine Phoenix will host the second annual CELEBRITY CHARITY DUNGEONS & DRAGONS GAME fundraising event to raise money for the Reach Out and Read program in Los Angeles. A slew of celebrities will come together to play the same Adventure, choosing from a short list of characters all written by celebrity D&D writer Keith Baker.
Each table will be videotaped and streamed live! By donating just $1, you can join the adventure from the comfort of your own home. You can access the live feed by going to http://MeltComics.com.
WHAT: 4 tables of up to 6 celebrity gamers per table play the same D&D Adventure using Characters written by Keith Baker.
WHERE: Meltdown Comics Theater, 7522 Sunset Blvd. Hollywood, CA 90046.
WHEN: Saturday, January 28 from 1:00 p.m. to 6:00 p.m.
WHO: DnDMelt’s CCDD event brings together a creative cast of actors, musicians, writers, photographers, and artists.
BENEFITS: Reach Out and Read is a nonprofit organization promoting early literacy and school readiness in pediatric exam rooms nationwide by giving new books to children and advice to parents about the importance of reading aloud.
Donate: Viewers can watch each adventure unravel via live-stream for a minimum donation of $1 from 1pm-6pm. All proceeds will be added-up at the end of the event.
If you ask a group of a dozen gamers why they enjoy fantasy roleplaying, it’s likely that you’ll likely come up with a dozen different reasons why this type of game is so appealing. For some, it is the chance to become a legendary hero and do great deeds in a faraway land, but while others might contend that it is the chance to create and participate in stories like the fantasy novels they grew up enjoying. And for others, it is the chance to confront and overcome a great Evil, or to become rich and powerful, or simply to adventure through unknown lands where there are vistas and creatures only possible in realms of imagination – certainly, the list goes on and on.
But for some gamers, one of the great things about fantasy role-playing is the chance to do all of these things, often at the same time!
Rite Publishing released an adventure last fall offering many of those motivations which fantasy role-players look for – heroic action, a battle against Evil, and strange vistas which can only exist in a fantasy world – in the Pathfinder module, The Breaking of Forstor Nagar!
The Breaking of Forstor Nagar
Lead Designer: Ben MacFarland
Illustrations: Tyler Bartley (cover), Tyler Bartley, James ‘DevinNight’ Hazelett, Jonathan Roberts (interior) Jonathan Roberts (cartography)
The Breaking of Forstor Nagar is a complete Pathfinder adventure module for a party of 8th Level Characters, featuring free support for the Maptools. The adventure features a wide range of complex and varied encounters set in a fantastic city made of grinding glacial ice. In addition, the author provides five new magic items for use with the adventure designed under Pathfinder rules, as well as a new monster template, Hungering Creature, which is used extensively to create the evil forces breaking the great city down!
This transcript is paraphrased, with some responses shortened. It is compiled from various tweets (thanks especially to Critical Hits, E. Foley, and Rolling20s for their live tweeting - I suggest you check out their Twitter feeds) plus WotC's live chat feed, and other sources. Photo tweeted by Rolling20s.
Welcome to the D&D XP Seminar: Charting the Course: An Edition for all Editions! Please ask no questions about product releases, digital tools, etc. In attendence: Monte Cook, Mike Mearls, and Jeremy Crawford.
Q What needs to be preserved from older editions? Player/DM relationship? Monte: The core mechanic of #dnd is: player says 'I want to X' and DM responds. Therein lie the stories. Mike: Offering a wide variety of options so every player can play the way they want to. Jeremy: The game being a toolbox for players/DMs to create stories together. And fireballs. (Some jokes about the importance of fireballs).
Q: What are the essential elements of #dnd? Mike: The shared language: HP, AC, and things that lead to a shared culture.Shared stories: The Dread Gazeebo, the Head of Vecna, these things help make our common culture. Monte: Different players have different desires for their games, DMs, too. Take the distilled essence of #dnd, and build upon that in a modular way. Each group can use what they want. You like tactical, grid combat, or feats and extended skills? Use those. If you just like the core game, just use that. Jeremy: Our goal is to get something from the design team with a specific goal. It's analyzed and evaluated... We're there to reality-check and forecast what the proposed design thoughts would be, now, and down the road. My team also does a lot of number-crunching. We make sure that everything done fulfills the overall vision. A synthesis of the "Greatest Hits" of all editions of D&D. Present and past.
Q: How can we achieve balance in such a modular, flexible game? Jeremy: What's important to know is that module approach is a spectrum of playstyles. Jeremy: There's a baseline game that provides the foundation. From there, you add on what you want. The seeds are...[Click here to read the rest of this article]
Today is the first day of D&D Experience in Forte Wayne. The convention lasts four days, and is sponsored and attended by WotC.
This year there will be public (but under NDA) playtests of the next iteration of D&D, as well as seminars, panels, and Q&A sessions. With luck, there will be plenty of juicy D&D Next scoops emerging from the convention - and if you're there and you have some information please don't hesitate to email me (morrus at hotmail dot com) so that I can share it with the rest of us who were unable to attend.
Today's main seminar is Charting the Course: An Edition for all Editions - "Join Mike Mearls, Monte Cook, and Jeremy Crawford as they discuss the origin for the idea to create an edition of Dungeons & Dragons that encompasses all previous editions. The designers discuss the challenges in creating compatibility and balance, as well as the exciting possibilities such a system creates. Seminar to be followed by a Q&A session."
The playtest is called Caves of Chaos: "Join the first public playtest of the next iteration of the Dungeons & Dragons roleplaying game. The playtest offers players the chance to run pre-generated 1st-level characters through the Caves of Chaos, a four-hour D&D adventure. Wizards of the Coast staff will be running several tables each day. As part of the playtest, participants must sign a special non-dislcosure agreement for playtesters."
Adventure Description: For years, Castellan Keep has stood on civilization’s frontier, commanding a grand view of that dismal realm known as the Borderlands. A forlorn place, rife with monsters and terrors beyond imagining, adventurers have used this fort to seek glory and plunder in this dangerous realm, to unearth fabulous treasures and destroy foul monsters. Of all the haunts found here, none equal the Caves of Chaos in both danger and the promise of reward. Rumors abound of the wicked humanoids, the sinister monsters, and the dark priests that run amok in this dungeon. Only the most cunning and bold adventurers dare to face the dreaded caverns. Do you have what it takes to survive the Caves of Chaos?
If I hear anything, I'll update this post! All updates below.
A game of D&D Next hosted by Alphastream. The group is battling a room full of orcs. From
The opportunity came up for me to spend some time touring, and playing the D&D Virtual Table with Rory Madden, Producer for Game Table Online the company responsible for bring you the D&D Virtual Table. Always looking for a new way to possibly improve my game, I jumped at the chance to see what the table can do although I have never been a fan of MMO's, or online rpgs. I have always been a face to face gamer. I was aware that the beta test had been going on for some time but since these sorts of programs have cast Confusion spells on me in the past, I had not looked at the Virtual Table much.
I took a look into the technical aspects of the table to make sure that I understood how it worked and was relieved to find out that it was Java based and wouldn't be a problem working across operating systems. That took care of my first hurdle and objection. Mac, Linux, and Windows would all work without issue. So I sat down to play a session with Rory in the DM role and myself taking up the role of the player. I quickly set the microphone up, which was a relief since when I tried this with Ventrilo and Baldur's Gate I was disappointed. The voice was excellent, much better than XBox Live and I could set it to press to talk, which eliminated background noise. So far so good although I still needed to find out if the virtual table could play D&D?
The dashboard controls really have everything you need to play any edition of D&D. You have a pointer so that you can interact with icons on the map. There is a line of sight feature which makes it easy as a click to tell if you have it or don't. There is another which lets you fiddle with area of effect templates. There is a pointer so that you can point things out to the other players and a feature so you can zoom in and out on the map. The DM has a tool available that allows for areas on the map to be revealed area by area. There is also a paint feature for the DM to use.
I have always been under the opinion that the role-playing element in the game would suffer in an on-line format. That is until I learned about the voice fonts the virtual table offers. This amazing feature alters your voice to about a dozen different voices. I liked the voice font that changed a man’s voice into a female voice or an elderly female voice. I think this is a great tool even at the face to face game table for that player that loves to play but perhaps is a bit reserved. The virtual table also has several sound effects such as a sword swing or a bowstring twang that are fun extras which help in an immersion process.
EN World is looking for voice actors for its upcoming animated series. We are testing the waters with an initial season of six episodes, each five minutes in length. These will be distributed online (iTunes, YouTube, on-site at EN World, etc.) by EN World TV for free. Anyone is welcome to participate in this open audition - no experience needed.
The show centers around a small group of fantasy adventurers who play a role-playing-game called “Real Life”; the game is set in our real world, which the characters view as a fantastical idea. Each episode deals with a different issue.
If you'd like to audition for one of the roles, please check out this PDF, which provides character summaries and audition instructions. Be quick, though - auditions end this week!
The new iteration and what the open playtest will look like, what it means to the future of D&D and the current edition have really seemed to get the fans talking. This week Wizards of the Coast gives us lots to look forward to for the 4th Edition and asks what the players of the game want in the next edition.
Monte Cook muses on The Genius of D&D in his weekly Legends & Lore article. He reveals what elements are important to him in character design and asks the same question to the readers. I really think we can take a look at the articles and the polls attached to them to get a good gauge on where the game will go.
Amazon.com now lists Ed Greenwood Presents Elminster's Forgotten Realms: A Dungeons & Dragons Supplement. I will see what I can find out about this hardcover due October 16, 2012 in the next few weeks.
Monk, another Heroes of the Elemental Chaos excerpt by Bart Carroll presents several options for the disciplined warriors. The book will offer two new monastic traditions and you can get an advanced look at the Eternal Tide tradition as well as several new powers.
Character Themes: Heroes of the Elemental Chaos opens the cover of the soon to be released supplement and give you a look at the Janissary theme. Themes were a great edition to the game and I hope to see a whole lot more when the book hits the streets. Would you keep themes in the new edition?
Tracy Hurley looks at Gamer Resolutions for the new year in Joining the Party. There are always great tips and lots of different links to things you may have missed around the internet. Lots of these and more can be found on the news page here at enworld.org.
Rodney Thompson takes the reins on Rule of Three and answers your questions about what everybody around the Wizards of the Coast office are working on, playtest feedback on the next edition, and what submissions are not needed for Dungeon and Dragon magazines. My playtest starts Tuesday and I love what I have seen so far. If you failed to do it before
This is the pilot episode of our new show, EN World Presents with Matt James. It's a short, weekly blast of RPG news and commentary in a bite-sized chunk. In this episode, Matt introduces himself and briefly comments on the Edition Wars and on the newly announced iteration of D&D. Watch it below (or, if you're seeing this in the newsletter or on one of our mobile apps, you may need to click through to here). Click here to subscribe to all episodes on YouTube and make sure you don't miss any, or see the options below the video to get it in podcast form on iTunes and more.
EN World Presents with Matt James (Episode 1 / Pilot Episode). This is the pilot episode of our new show, EN World Presents with Matt James. It's a short, weekly blast of RPG news and commentary in a bite-sized chunk. In this episode, Matt introduces himself and briefly comments on the Edition Wars and on the newly announced iteration of D&D.
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Review: GameMastery Pirate Ship Flip-Mat and Mines Map-Pack
Paizo’s Flip-Mat line
If you ask a group of a dozen gamers why they enjoy fantasy roleplaying, it’s likely that you’ll likely come up with a dozen different reasons why this type of game is so appealing. For some, it is the chance to become a legendary hero and do great deeds in a faraway land, but while others might contend that it is the chance to create and participate in stories like the fantasy novels they grew up enjoying. And for others, it is the chance to confront and overcome a great Evil, or to become rich and powerful, or simply to adventure through unknown lands where there are vistas and creatures only possible in realms of imagination – certainly, the list goes on and on.
The opportunity came up for me to spend some time touring, and playing the D&D Virtual Table with Rory Madden, Producer for Game Table Online the company responsible for bring you the D&D Virtual Table. Always looking for a new way to possibly improve my game, I jumped at the chance to see what the table can do although I have never been a fan of MMO's, or online rpgs. I have always been a face to face gamer. I was aware that the beta test had been going on for some time but since these sorts of programs have cast Confusion spells on me in the past, I had not looked at the Virtual Table much.
The dashboard controls really have everything you need to play any edition of D&D. You have a pointer so that you can interact with icons on the map. There is a line of sight feature which makes it easy as a click to tell if you have it or don't. There is another which lets you fiddle with area of effect templates. There is a pointer so that you can point things out to the other players and a feature so you can zoom in and out on the map. The DM has a tool available that allows for areas on the map to be revealed area by area. There is also a paint feature for the DM to use.
EN World is looking for voice actors for its upcoming animated series. We are testing the waters with an initial season of six episodes, each five minutes in length. These will be distributed online (iTunes, YouTube, on-site at EN World, etc.) by 
The new iteration and what the open playtest will look like, what it means to the future of D&D and the current edition have really seemed to get the fans talking. This week Wizards of the Coast gives us lots to look forward to for the 4th Edition and asks what the players of the game want in the next edition. 
