review Archives - Page 3 of 4 - Neitherworld Stories

June 7, 2007

A different kind of city book

I recently picked up Seven Cities, a book in the Penumbra d20 line that Atlas Games produced. I haven’t read the entire thing, but so far I like it. A lot. It has seven cities of various sizes – from thorp to large city. The detail is finer on the smaller towns, of course, but they did something rather smart...

May 29, 2007

Touched by the Hand of Fate

Yesterday I ran the Secret of Zir’an one-shot for the C-U Run Club. We didn’t quite have enough time to finish. I had a nice set-piece battle for the end that we never actually got to. Part of it was me not noticing the time (I would have rearranged things to speed the plot up), part of it was me...

May 15, 2007

Zir’an Frustrations

I’m finding preparations to run The Secret of Zir’an to be equal parts awesome and annoying. I’m creating pregenerated characters. Character creation? Awesome… and annoying. The concepts flow quickly. The process of creating a character uses a lifepath-like system that creates a well-rounded PC with unavoidable coolness. Unfortunately, the mechanical bits behind the lifepath system are less than intuitive and...

March 26, 2007

Real Magic Items: The Magic Item Compendium

So, despite not really being able to afford it, I picked up the Magic Item Compendium this past Friday from Dragon’s Table. (…which apparently has a blog. Who knew?) I haven’t read through the entire thing in detail yet, but what I have read is pretty impressive. Here are some of my initial impressions: New Item Types(…which may have been...

March 12, 2007

A Blast at The Past

So, today, RPGnet has posted a review of the first edition AD&D Dungeon Master’s Guide. I know a lot of people swear by “Uncle Gary,” but a few months back, I picked this thing up (to do something other than look up a magic item) for the first time in a long while. I was astounded at the apparent incoherency...

February 12, 2007

The Peace of Winter

Once again, I missed Winter War. Really, the big gaming draw for me was Jeff’s Encounter Critical game – but that filled up on Friday. The other big draw was dealers and the auction, but I wasn’t feeling like being around a crowd… and I really don’t need an excuse to drop a ton of money on gaming stuff. It...

January 30, 2007

Complete Scoundrel: A second look

Now that I have cooled down from my initial reaction to the Complete Scoundrel, I think I can see some really good stuff in there. I’m saddened that there were some missed opportunities. I can deal with that. Here are some highlights: Prestige Classes: The Master of Masks is one of the coolest prestige classes I’ve seen. I want to...

January 25, 2007

Complete Scoundrel: First Impressions

I’m feeling updatey today. This isn’t really going to be a review. I’ve skimmed through the book, but I haven’t read it in detail. I’ve already talked a bit about skill tricks and luck feats – two of the more notable things included in the Complete Scoundrel. After skimming through it, what do I think? I think this book would...

January 8, 2007

Run Club, Episode I

Yesterday was the first installation of the C-U Run Club. It had mixed results. Socially, it was a success. Game-wise, not so much. Dave ran Iron Gauntlets, a fantasy rpg that he’d never run, but was planning on running at Winter War, an upcoming local con. After yesterday, he changed his mind. Strictly speaking, I don’t think that Iron Gauntlets...

December 28, 2006

Order of the Stick

Last night, I played the Order of the Stick Adventure Game. The game is based on the Order of the Stick webcomic, one of the few webcomics I read regularly. The game’s production values are high, which was nice to see. It comes with a set of Quick-Start rules in comic form. The Quick-Start comic rules are several pages in...

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