dungeons and dragons (D&D) anyone?

[squallumz]

so.. savage worlds has got me really excited to try out.

and guess what? i came up with the COOLEST game even today during mealtime.

ALIEN. savage worlds style. the problem is, convincing my woman to play. shes scared of it already. we are both big alien fans (sans AvP), so it goes back with us.

survival...aliens...ship... in SPAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAACE.



meanwhile, and just moments ago, i joined an online game via roll20.net.

first game is saturday. its a 3.5 game, and i never played 3.5 (they know).


im going to need help with building a character.

anyone got something for a 3.5 character generator or wanna help?

 

[D-rock]

so.. savage worlds has got me really excited to try out.

and guess what? i came up with the COOLEST game even today during mealtime.

ALIEN. savage worlds style. the problem is, convincing my woman to play. shes scared of it already. we are both big alien fans (sans AvP), so it goes back with us.

survival...aliens...ship... in SPAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAACE.



meanwhile, and just moments ago, i joined an online game via roll20.net.

first game is saturday. its a 3.5 game, and i never played 3.5 (they know).


im going to need help with building a character.

anyone got something for a 3.5 character generator or wanna help?

On of the things that might be hard with an Aliens setting is that as far as I know not a lot of the background or setting specific information exist on it. The movies don't really tell that much other than some soldiers being sent to confront a situation with them. Then again maybe it makes it easier if you can make up more of what you need yourself. I know I would want a little more of the setting's history just because players are eventually going to want to know.

As far as character generators go there is PCGen. It's free and should have just about all the old 3.5 stuff by now I would think, or at least the stuff put out by WotC. It's interface takes some getting used to and even still today it's a little clunky, but for being free it's a very good program.

The only other thing I could think of is Hero Lab. It's better than PCGen, but also a lot more expensive. It's also probably more than you need for what you are going to do. It does support several different games, but like I said it gets expensive.

 

[squallumz]

On of the things that might be hard with an Aliens setting is that as far as I know not a lot of the background or setting specific information exist on it. The movies don't really tell that much other than some soldiers being sent to confront a situation with them. Then again maybe it makes it easier if you can make up more of what you need yourself. I know I would want a little more of the setting's history just because players are eventually going to want to know.

As far as character generators go there is PCGen. It's free and should have just about all the old 3.5 stuff by now I would think, or at least the stuff put out by WotC. It's interface takes some getting used to and even still today it's a little clunky, but for being free it's a very good program.

The only other thing I could think of is Hero Lab. It's better than PCGen, but also a lot more expensive. It's also probably more than you need for what you are going to do. It does support several different games, but like I said it gets expensive.

i got the ALIEN game all planned out in my head. its going to be like the first movie. one small crew woken up out of hyper sleep. maybe its timed for when help arrives, or a self destruct sequence is put into place.

its not going to be a pleasant place.

the good thing about it is since we are really big fans, we got all those BTS DVDs and such where there is so much extra story and concept. that explains my yearly alien nightmares.


yeah, this 3.5 business is tough. looked at a ton of generators but its still foreign to me.

the real difference between 4th and 3.5? complication.

the skills are broke down more specifically. there's more empty spaces on the sheet.

 

[D-rock]

the real difference between 4th and 3.5? complication.

I'd would imagine it would be tougher for somebody that starts with 4th edition going to 3.5 than vice versa because of that. An argument could be made that with added complication comes more options though, and some would think it's better at simulation because of it or at least as much as a rules system can simulate real life in a make believe fantasy setting anyhow. On one hand it's more complex and harder to learn and run. On the other there are less wonky rules that create unique game mechanics for their own sake but are hard to explain how they can reasonably happen in the story, like healing surges and daily or limited use non-magical abilities.

 

[squallumz]

I'd would imagine it would be tougher for somebody that starts with 4th edition going to 3.5 than vice versa because of that. An argument could be made that with added complication comes more options though, and some would think it's better at simulation because of it or at least as much as a rules system can simulate real life in a make believe fantasy setting anyhow. On one hand it's more complex and harder to learn and run. On the other there are less wonky rules that create unique game mechanics for their own sake but are hard to explain how they can reasonably happen in the story, like healing surges and daily or limited use non-magical abilities.

yeah, i'm having a tough time with it in general.

with dailys and such, i often made thing's more believable by letting them have one back or so based on certain circumstances. rage, will, rewarding for being awesome.

honestly, if i make it through this 3.5 game, ill at least know what's really going on. besides character creation, it appears to be pretty similar as a whole. its the same game, just powers are dealt with differently, spells run out apparently (kinda weird), and the skills are broken down even more to individual specific things.

if i knew how to build a character, i'd be alright though. im getting help from on of the players finally. she's really into it.

 

[squallumz]

alright.. played 3.5 online last week, 2nd game in a couple days...

it was really fun. and im relieved that its essentially the same damn game.

 

[D-rock]

Are you sticking with just the basic stuff so far? It would probably be easier at first.

What type of character did you decide to make?

 

[squallumz]

Are you sticking with just the basic stuff so far? It would probably be easier at first.

What type of character did you decide to make?

very basic.

i'm a level 3 human fighter.

 

[squallumz]

i got a back to back game tomorrow. sorta.

my 4e weekly game got moved to sat this week and i have my online 3.5 game that night around 1am.

can't wait!

 

[myminrym]

I love D&D.
I usually GM, but when I'm a player I play a Half-Elf Rogue or a Tiefling Sorcerer.

 

[Petra]

I love D&D.
I usually GM, but when I'm a player I play a Half-Elf Rogue or a Tiefling Sorcerer.

If I'm forced to play D&D, it's usually a half elf rogue as well. You can min max them to death. ;-)

 

[D-rock]

All the 5th edition stuff I've seen seems like it's going in the right direction. It' s much better than forth, which is the only edition of it I refuse to play. Unfortunately, it's way more than a day late and a dollar short by this time. I've already moved on. For a D&D type fix there's Pathfinder and for everything else I want to play there is something better.

Plus I don't feel like buying all those books all over again, and I trust WotC's corporate competence with the D&D brand and it's integrity, along with the fictional settings IPs it controls, about as far as I can throw my car.

 

[FreeOnes_Adam]

All the 5th edition stuff I've seen seems like it's going in the right direction. It' s much better than forth, which is the only edition of it I refuse to play. Unfortunately, it's way more than a day late and a dollar short by this time. I've already moved on. For a D&D type fix there's Pathfinder and for everything else I want to play there is something better.

Plus I don't feel like buying all those books all over again, and I trust WotC's corporate competence with the D&D brand and it's integrity, along with the fictional settings IPs it controls, about as far as I can throw my car.

I'm playing in a D&D 5e group weekly right now while I'm looking to start my own group that I will DM and I'm having a blast so far.

5e basic rules are now FREE and more than enough to play and DM with. The starter kit for 5e was 12.95, and quite the steal and you can get to level 5 with those. Basically, its a great game. Really great. Its like Savage Worlds and D&D mixed.

http://dnd.wizards.com/articles/features/basicrules

You can preoder the books now, and save big time on amazon.


This is gonna be great. The game is wickedly fast, easy as shit to build your character finally, and dangerous. It's quite impressive.

 

[Petra]

For a break, I've brought my players into a modern day vampire game which is set up based on their choices from the dark ages game. ;-)

Not too bad of a break so far.

 

[D-rock]

For a break, I've brought my players into a modern day vampire game which is set up based on their choices from the dark ages game. ;-)

Not too bad of a break so far.

So they get to play in a messed up world that they themselves are responsible for messing up? Nice.

 

[StarDebut]

Hey Petra Squallumz and D-Rock. Hows things? see this thread is still alive. You must be buffing a healer ! I've been going through a lot of sh*t recently, just quit my comic store group after running through 4ed, playtest, and 5th. Maaaan, there is nothing like DMing D&D encounters to drain your energy and sanity ! Anyway I am looking to play or run for adults now. Its going to be pretty vanilla, but just with mature themes, basically the same shit as fantasy roleplaying helping deal with MY shit (for once) if anybody else is interested in playing (new roleplayers) welcome you can just PM me. I've DM'd on roll20.net so that's v.likely where I want to start this adventure. Not sure how long, average game last 1-2 months.

If however you got a game running I could join in on that'd be mighty fine 2 !

 

[FreeOnes_Adam]

So, I've recently finally watched the Star Wars movies. And yes, the older original ones. I thought it wasn't so bad. I finally got into it.

I've now been running a Star Wars Age of Rebellion RPG game. The dice mechanics are really cool. I panicked at first, but it's really simple. Here's the dice:

 

[D-rock]

So, I've recently finally watched the Star Wars movies. And yes, the older original ones. I thought it wasn't so bad. I finally got into it.

I've now been running a Star Wars Age of Rebellion RPG game. The dice mechanics are really cool. I panicked at first, but it's really simple. Here's the dice:

View attachment 422718

I got to be honest. That whole new Star Wars RPG seems like mostly a scheme for people to needlessly buy a lot of dice.

 

[FreeOnes_Adam]

I got to be honest. That whole new Star Wars RPG seems like mostly a scheme for people to needlessly buy a lot of dice.

Yeah. They even have an app option for 5 bucks. No thanks. You COULD use your normal d6s, d8s, and d12s and use a very complicated conversion chart to figure them out.

However, having played and ran it, the results are pretty cool. You could fail and have enough advantage to trigger happy surprises or succeed and have enough threat to trigger something bad.

Example. I had someone fail their throw on a grenade toss. They had so much "threat" aka disadvantage to it I told them the thing was a dud and didn't explode, just sat there in the snow. Later that encounter, someone failed a blaster shot at an Imperial officer but had some advantage in the end.

I took that result, and told him his shot hit a small snow bank and missed the intended target but it triggered the dud grenade, detonating it for 10 damage!


14 bucks for these stupid dice, but you know what? They actually work. Colour me surprised.

 

[Petra]

I got to be honest. That whole new Star Wars RPG seems like mostly a scheme for people to needlessly buy a lot of dice.

It's not really a scheme to get people to buy the dice. It's more about trying to set themselves apart from everyone else.

Mechanically speaking, almost anything you can dream of doing with the standard dice has been done and then the only thing left to do is kind of piecemeal different mechanical structures together. For example, I beta tested the new Paranoia that's coming out. One of the dice systems they've "come up" with is pretty much a combo of shadow run and vampire the masquerade.

So games are starting to develop their own dice so they can use a system unique to the table top world.