Dragon Magazine #275 (plus Map-a-Week)

It's time for another Map-a-Week before we dive into Dragon #275. This week's map is Undersea Caverns.

This is a set of six underwater locations that could be linked together in some ways, although I wouldn't care to try. I would likely use them as individual locations, particularly the sunken ship. And the bottom left looks more like a vertical map than a flat horizontal one with the water flooding areas 40 through 43. So, these would be separate for me. I'm going to have to hold off on stocking these until next month, since I don't have much in the way of aquatic monsters to work with until the Monster Manual arrives.

So, we jump to Dragon Magazine #275, which, as you can see from the above picture, is about warriors and combat. The issue starts with an editorial from the almighty Gygax, who talks about how the style of play has changed over the course of a quarter-century of game play. His conclusion? It hasn't changed all that much. Okay, then. I would tend to disagree, but then I've got the advantage of another quarter-century since then to see how a lot of gaming has gone to a 'story-based' style and de-emphasized a 'murderhobo' style.

The Profile article is about Monte Cook, who is a pretty big name in RPG circles even today. He was heavily involved in the revised edition, drawing upon his experience working with Iron Crown Enterprises to bring in some new mechanics. His focus on the new edition was the DMG, so it makes sense to profile him this month when that book was released.

My product list told me that the Pool of Radiance: Attack on Myth Drannor was released in September of 2000, but the Upcoming Product Guide in this issue says it's November. Checking the Forgotten Realms Wiki on the book, it was indeed November. So, I bought it early. Oh, well. I'll save it until then to review it.

Our first real article shows up on page 32; prior to that it was ads, Table of Contents, letters, profile,  more ads, convention calendar, a comic, and even more ads. The article is Unusual Suspects, and it's a grab-bag of ideas on how to make different character classes work with unusual races, i.e., races that weren't able to take those classes in earlier editions. Since this is the fighting issue, the classes here are the barbarian, paladin, and ranger.

The barbarian section includes some new armor types (bone, cord, and wood) that can be added to the list in the Player's Handbook. The ideas for the races are interesting; I particularly like the first elven one, which describes elves as a fallen race; instead of the otherworldly beauty that we are used to seeing in all the elf-stuff, the elves are savage and have forgotten their ancient history. That would be quite an interesting way to play elves, certainly far different from what we have seen before.

For the paladins, we have variant mounts for each race; dwarven paladins might get a giant lizard or a dire wolverine...yikes, I can't imagine how nasty that one would be. Elves can get griffons and unicorns, gnomes dire badgers and warponies, halflings riding dogs, and half-orc paladins can summon...a rhinoceros, brown bear, or elephant. You know what? I want a paladin on a rhino. Elephants are cool, but come on. A half-orc with a lance thundering down on you on a charging rhino? That is epic.

Rangers get interesting two-weapon combinations for the different races. Dwarves could get the two-axe combo (battle and hand), or heavy and light picks or hammers; elves might take different sword combinations, gnomes and halflings get short weapons, and half-orcs might wield a bastard sword in one hand and an axe in the other. I chose battle axe and hand axe for Relgar Bloodhawk, though. But then, I hadn't seen this issue yet.

Ah, the next article is quite useful: How to Design a Feat. Now this is the sort of thing that is great to see here, although it should have been included in either the Player's Handbook or the Dungeon Master's Guide. That's how useful this is. It goes over all the steps necessary to create feats that will work within the game and not break the campaign. There are two examples given, complete with design process and final writeup: Improved Rapid Shot (which works as a fighter bonus feat), and Delay Spell (a metamagic feat). The latter simulates the delayed blast fireball spell that high-level wizards like to throw around. As I said, great article that should have been included in the core rules.

Next up is more exotic weapons. Some of these are racial specific, such as the elven thinblade, the dwarven buckler-axe, and the orc crusher. There are both melee and ranged weapons here, all of which require the character to take the Exotic Weapon Proficiency feat to use correctly. Remember, that feat has to be taken per weapon, not a whole category like Martial and Simple weapons. Boomerangs, bolas and blowguns are all included here, as well as other weapons that don't start with 'B'.

Hmm...the next article is a set of tables for encounters when traveling on roads or rivers. 100 choices per table, and there are also two tables for barrel and jar contents, and crate and wagon contents in case the characters decide to poach a merchant caravan or something. Not very exciting, but it could provide some quick encounter ideas for a DM who hasn't planned everything out. It's only two pages, so it's not like it wastes a lot of space.

Heraldry. There are actually two articles here on the subject; one is a fantasy version where you can design your own devices without having to spend a lot of time learning how heraldry works in our own world. There are suggestions for devices for different groups, such as magic, giants, elves, and war. For example, you might have a design of a bulette on your shield, or a an anchor with a trident head for a ship at sea. There are some handy tables as well to inspire some ideas.

Then there's the article on real heraldry. This gets into the whole gamut of colors, tinctures, metals, furs, how to describe a coat of arms, the terminology involved, postures of animals, etc. It's not the first time Dragon Magazine has done heraldry, but it has been a while. Still, it's useful for newer players, and not too overwhelming.

Okay, now we have an article on ways for players to drive the story. This is about using a character's backstory to help the DM come up with ways to involve your character directly. It's much more important for the story-based style of play; murderhobos aren't interested in that stuff. But it can help players and DMs bring their characters into the wider world. Suggestions include quests, atonement, curses, lost love, and disinheritance. Again, this is all focused on character development and story games, not dungeon-delving. I'll rate this article as 'meh'.

Ah, here we go. "The Definitive D&D Soundtrack". This is a lengthy article on using various musical sources for inspirational gaming music. You want the pulse-pounding drama of a barbarian horde coming down on your heads? Play the theme from the 1982 Conan the Barbarian movie. If you're sneaking through a dungeon, however, that wouldn't be the best choice; just hearing that music will get your players ready to take on Tiamat with a butter-knife.

There are suggestions for rock music (particularly bands like Led Zeppelin and Stevie Nicks), Celtic melodies (you can get hours of this stuff on YouTube for free), instrumental rock, soundtracks, and classical music. The latter, particularly 19th-century stuff, is just chock-full of gaming goodness. There's even a handy color-coded chart listing all sorts of music and what scenarios they would be good for, from battle to sorcery to Hell itself. This is a great article, one I heartily recommend.

Our fiction this month is Songbirds by Kristine Katherine Rusch, whom I have interacted online with before (but more her husband, Dean Wesley Smith). The two of them were primary inspirations for me to get my own writing career started. This is a story about a magic hunter (a hunter hunting magic, not a magical hunter) who is tasked by an arrogant king to capture a songbird. It's got a nice premise, and an interesting resolution. I liked it.

Ooh, I love finding new spells in magazines. It's the return of Arcane Lore! This is a set of spells from Alister's Augmentations, spells that enhance the capabilities of others rather than directly affecting enemies. They are a bit niche sometimes, but warriors will appreciate wizards and sorcerers who have these spells handy. Fighting skeletons but you only have a dagger? Cast weapon shift and turn it into a mace so you're doing full damage. Heroics allows the target to temporarily choose a fighter bonus feat (but the target has to have at least one level of fighter to benefit). Want to intimidate your warrior-buddy's opponent? Cast bristle on his armor and watch the spikes grow out of it, spikes that will do 1d4 damage apiece. There are thirteen spells in total here.

But what about the paladin in the party? Is there anything here for them? Why, yes, as a matter of fact. Who wants magic armor designed specifically for paladins? Here are six of them. They could all be considered unique, although there are creation guidelines for all of them. Most of them are full plate as a base, but there is one set of leather armor that is a match to the leather barding that would go on your special mount. Drachensgaard is for dragon fighters; Hellshield is for fighting outsiders (devils and demons). Humillianthir is the leather set that let the rider teleport back to his mount when necessary. Praesidium Luminata acts like a bless spell to allies, a doom spell to enemies, exposes invisible creatures, and reveals shapeshifters. Spellcease absorbs evil magic (including spells cast by evil wizards), while Truedeath is the anti-undead armor.

More Forgotten Realms lore from Volo; this time we read about the Crumbling Stair, and dear God, it is annoying as hell that they are using a '6' as a 'b' in article titles. I absolutely hate that. Anyway, this is just a long-destroyed building where all that's left is this partial staircase ascending to nowhere along with some cellars. Ghosts have been seen here, as well as will-o-wisps, so there's potential for adventure here if the DM wants, although there's absolutely no gaming stats or maps here; it's just lore. Greenwood does a lot of that, I've noticed.

Class Acts introduces another prestige class, the duelist. He doesn't wear armor, but gets extra defensive bonuses as well as the Precise Strike ability, which does extra damage with weapons like rapiers and daggers. Instead of Fortitude saves, they get good Reflex saves, and their class skills include things like Balance, Escape Artist, and Innuendo. Fighters, rangers, rogues and bards are the best classes for this, although you could get away with a wizard or monk, since armor isn't allowed for these guys anyway. It's an interesting choice for characters, depending on the type of game you're playing; this would work for Robin Hood or the Three Musketeers, not Conan or John Carter of Mars.

Next is the Creature Codex, which introduces us to the darkmantle. This will apparently be in the Monster Manual, and it's basically an evolved piercer. And now there's upside-down 7s and 3s in the title. Was there really a time when people though this was edgy and cool? Because it's just really stupid.

Anyway, the darkmantle is given a nice writeup here (not stats, but descriptive) in the familiar form of the Ecology articles of the earlier editions. And now that I think about it, it was an excellent choice for this article. Why? Because, as I said, this is basically an evolved piercer. And the piercer was the subject of the very first Ecology article back in Dragon #72 in 1982 or 1983. So, it's fitting that its spiritual descendant be the subject of the first 3rd edition Ecology article.

We get another first in the next article, which is called 'Vs. Goblins'. Actually, it's 'Go6lins', which is stupid and pretentious. Anyway, this is just a one-page article talking about ways to deal with goblins as a player, with tactical suggestions and feats that would be useful to help fight them, such as Cleave and Whirlwind Attack. Not bad for a single page.

Puzzles, cartoons...ah, the Forum. Talking about the new edition, of course. Some people hate it, some people love it. Either way, the point is made that this is D&D going forward, so deal with it.

Role Models gives us a gnoll miniature design, along with a full stats writeup. This gnoll is wielding an urgrosh (a double-weapon with a spear head at one end and an axehead at the other). The article itself talks about the new minis that will be available from Wizards of the Coast, something I have no interest in.

Sage Advice continues to explain things in the new rules, as well as adding some more of those juicy Power Play sidebars. You can make a gnome who is fantastic at not getting hurt by traps, or use ranged weapon feats on certain spells (such as ray attacks) to make them much more effective. Oh, and there is already some official errata, this one on the sepia snake sigil spell.

Dungeoncraft gives us a quiz. I would assume this would be easier if you'd been reading Dungeoncraft since the beginning, which was about twenty issues ago. So for new players, they're not passing this test. It's not that it's difficult, it's just that the series had a particular slant in how it developed its game world, so it's not something you'll just pick up in an issue or two.

Finally, there's Silicon Sorcery with that stupid '6' in the title again. I can't stress enough how annoying that is. The article itself has some things you can take from the new Icewind Dale computer game to help your own game. This time it's ways you can improve the style of play, such as using short introductions and transitions to advance the story, use 'dump-stat scenarios' for players who think they can just focus on the combat abilities, terrain challenges, etc. Some nice ideas here, although I find Icewind Dale to be far less interesting than Baldur's Gate.

And that's it! A useful issue with plenty of fun stuff to add to the game. My favorites would be the music article, the spells, and the Unusual Suspects. But there was plenty of goodness here, so I recommend this issue.

Next up, the first official adventure for the new game: The Sunless Citadel! This one is considered a classic, so I'm looking forward to it.