Summon Monster

How often does monster summoning by the PCs come into play in a typical game of D&D?  I'd have to say before we started playing third edition, it basically never happened.  I'm not sure if it was the casting time of the spells, or the added complexity or what but I don't think I can recall a single time before 2000 where at any of the tables I played at there was monster summoning that influenced combat.  Sure, the DM might gate extra demons in using a demon's power to bring in more of its kind, but the PCs wouldn't be calling creatures from beyond to fight for them.  3E changed that for us.  All of the sudden the clerics, sorcerers and wizards of the party were regularly bringing in celestial bisons and whatnot.  It made for some pretty entertaining combat situations as these short lived and expendable minions came in and were used to mix it up.  To some extent, the concept of summoning creatures from beyond the world always seemed in fantasy like it should involve elaborate expensive rituals and time consuming casting.  The 3E spells were more like hey Rocky, watch me pull a rabbit out of a hat.  I think both ideas work in a game situation, though I'm not sure in a single campaign if I'd want to blend the two styles.  Thoughts?

Mind over Matter

Do psionics belong in the D&D game?  It's always been an outside system, something stuck on top of the game in an appendix or supplement rather than right in the middle of the core rules.  Despite the mechanical differences the system has seen over the years, I think the main reasons that it doesn't get used are more flavor driven.  Psionics to a lot of folks doesn't feel right for a medieval fantasy setting.  I think that's part of the reason it saw success in the more post-apocalyptic Dark Sun.  Well that and the fact that for that setting they made a point of assuming it as part of the setting rather than have it tacked on.  Personally, I think psionics are cool but they won't fit every campaign and they need to be incorporated from the start.

Best Demon Lord

D&D's demon lords are among the best big bads the game has ever seen.  A number of them have been added to the game over the years.  I was looking at the 3E Fiendish Codex I: Hordes of the Abyss last night which is a great supplement.  Who's your favorite demon lord of the ones in the book?
Baphomet, Prince of Beasts
Dagon, Prince of the Depths
Demogorgon, Prince of Demons
Fraz-Urb'Luu, Prince of Deception
Graz'zt, The Dark Prince
Juiblex, The Faceless Lord
Kostchtchie, Prince of Wrath
Malcanthet, Queen of the Succubi
Obox-Ob, Prince of Vermin
Orcus, Prince of the Undead
Pale Night, The Mother of Demons
Pazuzu, Prince of the Lower Aerial Kingdoms
Yeenoghu, Prince of Gnolls
Zuggtmoy, Lady of Fungi

Here there be monsters

I think one of the best ways for the DM to make an adventure or campaign unique is through the use of the monsters you throw at your PCs.  Monsters, in my opinion, should not just be thrown randomly at the party.  I'm not saying you don't have wandering monsters.  I'm saying the monsters need to make sense, at least from the perspective of where the PCs are.  Most of the monsters in a normal environment will be similar to each other or part of the same organization.  You won't find a goblin sharing a room with a black pudding for example unless he's some kind of pudding master or something.

Additionally, I think that the DM should consider the following categories when adding monsters to their adventure.

1. Include monsters that are part of the overall campaign thread.  So if there's a githyanki invasion going on that links the adventures together, you should have some githyanki or their agents included.
2. Include that particular adventure's main monster.  If the PCs are in a dragon's lair, you probably need to have a dragon.
3. There should be some common monsters within the context of the adventure.  These are the typical grunts and minions.  In the evil priest's lair, he might have skeletons walking around that guard the place.
4. Lastly, you probably need to throw in one unexpected monster that's included as a set piece to surprise the PCs, while still giving it a reason for being there.

Vile Darkness

The Book of Vile Darkness is one of the more interesting third edition D&D books.  Targeted at a mature audience, it's goal is to introduce rules, villains and monsters that really bring the evil of your campaign's evil to the foreground.  Here is a book that talks about all of the nasty things the enemies of your PCs can and will do to the innocent.  Personally, I think it's a great addition to the DM's arsenal, especially if they are running a game with a particular emphasis on horror and horrific villains.  Yes, I would agree this is a book that isn't for children, it is one that delivers what it promises.  If you want to scare, disgust or gross out your PCs, this book has some ideas for you.

Savage Species

The Savage Species supplement for late D&D 3.0 is one of those products that I've always really liked.  This product gives you all the options to play a monster, whether an almost human but nasty goblin, orc or bugbear to something weird like a minotaur or mind flayer.  It's just well done with lots of fun sounding options and good art.  But for some reason it's something I've never used. Maybe part of the reason is the mechanical aspects of it, figuring out how your character fits in with normal PCs.  Maybe it's more about how it assumes a different type of campaign since monsters don't normally just get to walk into the tavern.  Maybe I just haven't found the time to use it yet.  Have you played a monster today and if so, what kind?

Boxed sets

Back in the early 80s when I started playing D&D and other RPGs, it was very common for companies to produce boxed sets, especially for the initial product in a game line.  The classic Mentzer Red Box D&D set is a great example of that period.  For the AD&D line, there were a bunch of boxed sets in the 90s, but those were mostly for campaign settings (Ravenloft, Planescape, Dark Sun, etc.).  Then the boxed set went out of style.  The hardback rulebook returned as king.  But now, in the last few years since around 2008-2009 boxed sets are back.  D&D Essentials, Doctor Who, Dragon Age, Warhammer Fantasy and more.  So are they back for nostalgia reasons?  Are they back for design reasons - combining the rules, dice, adventure all in one box?  Are they back because of marketing, a choice to have the boxes on store shelves like "regular games" instead of books?  I'm guessing it's a combination of these.  In any event I'm glad to see them although to be fair I can't say I've really seen them much in the big box stores yet, not counting the big book chains.

What is in a name?

I was reading over the Faces of Evil supplement for Planescape last night and I was reminded of house TSR had decided not to call the demons and devils by those straight forward titles to avoid the whole hysteria about how D&D got kids into cults and whatnot.  They instead used the names ta'nari and baatezu.  While it has no impact on how any such creatures got used in play, it made the fluff different.  In hindsight, my take is that this wasn't all bad and giving the creatures alien sounding names for their races is kind of cool.  I like how in 3rd edition they pretty much made use of both the plain titles (to organize them in the monster manual) and the fancier TSR ones and even used those names to distinguish between different categories of demons for instance.  What do you think?

Desert Island RPG books

Like a lot of RPG book collectors I haved numerous game products from numerous companies and game lines.  Most of them are good for a casual read or in preparing or running a particular adventure.  A lot of them have cool art or layout.  Some just have sentimental value.  But every once in a while a game book comes along that falls into the Desert Island category, namely, this is a game product so well done and complete that if you were stuck on a desert island and could only have one RPG book with you, this is the one you'd take.

For me, that book is the 1991 D&D Rules Cyclopedia by Aaron Allston from TSR.  This book compiled together the majority of the content from the BECM Frank Mentzer D&D boxed sets into a single rulebook.  It really has everything you'd need to run a game of D&D.  It has character classes that go from first to 36th level.  It has magic items and treasure.  It has monsters. It has a rough outline of the D&D Known World Mystara and it's Hollow World interior as a default campaign setting.  It has rules for skills and weapon mastery and mass combat.  I could easily run any number of RPG sessions from this book alone.

Is it perfect?  No.  The art of the book is often criticized and I have to say that some of it is only ok.  I like the Easley cover but it's far from my favorite work of his or the other main line TSR artists of the time.  The book is fairly readable but the page numbers are microscopic.  There's no real sample dungeon or short adventure.  Still, if like me and a lot of other people who got it at the time you already had some of the earlier copies of the rules and you had the Gazetteers and adventures to use, or were making your own, this book was one stop shopping to bring to your game table.  And if you never had the chance to play the classic BECM D&D rules, this book is your ticket to that.

So what game book would you take with you to the island?

Planar Adventures

Back in the second edition days I became a big fan of the Planescape setting with it's unique concepts, great art and amazing style and layout.  Before then, I think I mostly thought of the planes as just a source for really tough monsters like devils and demons and elementals.  Afterwards, they became living, breathing parts of the D&D universe and really felt like locations for adventure.  Despite this and despite enjoying the various planar supplements for third edition and now 4E as well, I'm not sure if pressed for time that I'd choose to run a game based in the planes over a more traditional material world setting with dungeon crawls, wilderness exploration and urban intrigue.  Are the outer planes just too different to make for a game setting you can use full time because the DM has too much scenery to convey?  Or is it just a case of not having tried running a planar game that's kept me from using them?

Future of the Hobby

There are always a lot of debates about where the RPG hobby is headed.  Is it slowly dying out?  Is there new blood joining the fold of gamers?  Are video games replacing in person games?  My quick take is that there will always be people who play tabletop RPGs and there will always be a high degree of overlap between those who play in person with those who enjoy video games, in particular games played online.  The real factor here is the shared social experience.  From an industry perspective though, I feel as if RPGs are going to fall into two categories: a collection of companies with well supported, high quality physical products with online support tools and a whole lot of fan generated, free or inexpensive PDF products.  I think in both cases there will be an overall improvement in the quality and quantity of material, it's just the number of books you'll find in brick and mortar stores will gradually decline except for a few titles from big companies.