Here ya go.

Happy Norway Day!

Wikipedia does:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/W...Olympics_medal_count
This message was last edited by the GM at 15:11, Thu 17 May 2007.

The game menu says the old chat has 2500 posts, but the last post is number 2510.  ?

Hey, we're part Irish!  Or was it Scottish... dern, I can never remember!
Hold on, we're both!

Hey, jhpa4, there you are!

He's related to the duke of Ireland.

Cellist you are, famous you ain't.  Unless you are, and haven't told me.

She actually just told me she's never heard you play.

Yeah, I've never heard you play.
Wait a minute, you're related to the duke of Ireland?

dam You guys post alot here huh ( newb here )

I am curious , do alot of you read forgotten realm novels? Am I the only dork that reads those books?

No way dude. R.A. Salvatore is a GOD!!!!

I own a lot of them, have read about half of them, met several of the authors - one of these days I'll read the rest.

Ohh read plenty, just finished the war of the spider queen series, Masquerades and Tymora's Luck. Reading Stormlight now (my last chance for Storm to redeem herself in my eyes, I hated her in the Avatar Trilogy and in the Last Mythal trilogy). I'm not too impressed thus far, but I have enjoyed Ed Greenwoods books so far, so I'll give it a chance.

ahhhh ok cool , I read em all the time.

I just finished the Everis Cale trilogy I loved it. Always cool when you have the anti hero trying to do good.

( If you have not read it I suggest you check it out, pretty good to me )

I am sure you all read RA Salvatore so I will not even go there, although its strange how I went from rooting against Jarlaxle to rooting for him! , lol

Artemis Entreri is AWESOME!!!!

Th R.A.Salvatore books are good, but a little overrated in my opinion, and the series is starting to become a little worn for me (though I've yet to read promise of the witch king). The Cleric Quintet was quite good.

Waterdeep:CoS has to be one of my favourites, I only read it recently but it was fantasically well done (and Ed and Elaine were a great pair, though you could clearly see which part had whose touch to it hehe).

I'd also highly recommend Azure Bonds (an old but good one), Blackstaff, the War of the Spider Queen books, City of Ravens, and the additional books from the Avatar Trilogy.

Looking forward to reading the Erevis Cale trilogy myself too, as I've heard lots of good things about it (and I'm a bit of a fan of Mask). Having said that it might be a while as I've just ordered a copy of Pages of Pain, a planescape novel, as I love the way the Sigilisians (Cagers!) speak :)

Only when I have a lot to say, which isn't too often.

Azure Bonds was a great series.  The game module is one of my favourites as well, I wish they would revise it for 3.5 rules though.

I'm a big fan of Entreri and Jarlaxle.  I've kind of modeled one of my characters like Entreri here on the games - Barra Velve.

The Harper books are was pretty good too and I always have a soft spot for Ravenloft - Lord Soth all the way!

And we gotta keep our post counts up!

-K

Yup! :P

Welcome To Realms Of Adventure - Updated 17 Feb 2007

WW's last post says something about the gold that one gets when one levels...???

Am i reading that wrong?

I haven't made a post in a very long time in that thread, but perhaps another DM editied my post and bumped it.  I've certainly never posted anything about getting gold when leveling.  I'll go try and find what you're talking about though.

Is this what you are referring to?



If so, it is saying that if you use XP awards to level, even if it is at character creation, you do not get gold for that level.  I.e., if at character creation you use award or DM XPs to bump your character to fourth level, you still only get max gold for third level like everybody else.  Just another way we keep award and DM XPs from bumping PCs too much.
This message was last edited by the GM at 18:58, Sun 27 May 2007.

That's it exactly.  Thanks for doing the legwork.

'Property of'?  Does that mean you got hitched?

Not a problem.  Glad I could be of service.

Not yet, no.  He's got university to finish, and I've got a Master's degree to finish before we can do anything like that.  Have to be responsible adults first and all that jazz.  But that is the current plan.

I've purged the Stupid Blue Lights PM thread, as it's just not necessary for PCs. Using this to solve the problem just increases the problem.

I've mentioned it to jase & cruinne, but they probably didn't get my rMail. I'll try again soon, after some info gathering.

Now, it seems that it's just a problem for the DMs, right? PCs are unaffected?

And is anyone else having a wierd problem  where whenever they click on a PM or
quote - edit - delete in a post, the page jumps right to the top and nothing happens, and you have to click it again to get it to work?

Is it possible the PM thing is only a problem for coGMs, not primary ones?  I know my coGM in one game keeps complaining about it.  And that jumping to the top thing sounds familiar; did someone complain about it in one of the bug threads?  BTW the best place to comment is on the Beta site - there's not so much mess for things to get lost in there.

No, I'm getting it too, in all boards I am primary GM of.

Me too, even in the ones I'm primary GM of as well.

OK.  I don't seem to be having that problem, particularly, more just wonky notifications, that I have unread messages when I don't, that all messages are read when they aren't, and the like.  I had some of that in the old version, but not so persistently.

I have sent all the above problems to the Bug Reports.

a quick stupid question that might be in the wrong thread...lol

If we have a character sitting in a dead game, can we take that character out and enter him into another game ?

Thanks in advance....

Absolutely you can!  That's one of the benefits of RoA.  Whom do you need to place/move?

I've seen so many posts like this one that I've long since run out of fingers and toes to count them on.

What is it that people don't seem to like about playing clerics?  *is puzzled*

Anybody?

I like playing clerics! :)

there was a stretch where games in the Players wanted thead were looking for arcane casters. maybe casters in general have low appeal?

I like clerics as well, can do many things with them. I always wanted to play an evil cleric...never had a chance though...lol

Dm WW - thanks for your answer above. ;)

I also feel like having a new picture! :P

yea, evil clerics are very interesting, i dm'd a game once with evil characters, and the cleric had an army of half skeletons, (3.0 ed) so he and his army if childlike skeletons would go and rampage a village...

i think book of vile darkness is pretty much written for an evil cleric, lots of fun stuff there.

That's one of the secret perks of DMing.  You can try out some of the class ideas you like as an NPC to see if you like it before you need to commit to it as a player ;-)

I love clerics personally, heavy armour, not bad BAB, and 'full' spellcasting (plus spontaneous healing means you can memorise all those utility spells and not worry about the healing until it's necessary).

I have one player who wants to play an archer type, and I'm a firm believer of the clerical archer, so I mentioned it to him. If you worhsip Sheverash or Corellon you can take the Elf and War domains, meaning you get Point Blank Shot and Weapon Focus (Longbow) for free. With Divine Favour you have the equivalent attack bonus of a level 3 fighter, plus you have equivalent 2 'bonus feats' AND spellcasting!
Take zen archery, and later on combine it with Divine Power and Righteous Might and you have yourself a killing machine, one that can nearly keep up with a fighter before you even consider all the other spells you can cast.

Also clerics provide a great way to help roleplay. With the number of different gods out there, you can bet a clerics beliefs and personality will hold up fairly closely to his gods. If you're short on ideas, find a god you think it would be fun to emulate and make a cleric ;)

I honestly think Clerics and Fighters provide the most amount of 'variety' when making your character. How could anyone not like playing a cleric? I've not once seen one reduced to the infamous 'heal bot' that I hear of so much

I have to agree with DM Kaladorm. Clerics get mad powerful at higher level with 3rd edition rules.

Hmm, interesting idea, Kaladorm, I've never tried that one!

Yeah, I noticed that as well.  Out of my wizard, bard, cleric and knight, my level 3 cleric feels the most developed.  Don't really think he needs anything at all.

Maybe it's because clerics often end up as a 'primary healer', and that might be a problem.  People think they'll be forced to be nothing but the local infirmary.

Also I think people tend to want to be the melee characters because they tend to fit the 'heroic' template better than straight casters.

Dunno, a couple of guesses.

-K

In my mind fighters are possibly the most fun to develop in terms of combat (naturally), because of the vast amounts of available feats you can really make some absolute demons on the battlefield, including some very clever tactic (anyone think much of a dervish with acrobatic strike and expeditious dodge? or how about a spiked chain user with improved trip, robilars gambit, karmic strike, combat reflexes, and deft strike? The list goes on)
However, with fighters I find the most fun is in the building. Once you've perfected your tactic, assuming it isn't only applicable to a certain type or group of enemies, you tend to use it as much as possible.

However that doesn't necessarily mean they are the most 'heroic'. Support classes generally don't have as much of an 'oooh' factor. Nnot just in D&D, look for example at EQ2 when people said Bards were crap because they didn't really do much damage of any kind. But when you look deeper at 'implicit' damage (i.e. the amount they boost their comrades by) you realise that damage doesn't have to be directly caused by the character. In a similar way people tend to think "you just stick to keeping the fighter alive". It's the fighter who gets the praise for killing the thing, but who kept it going? Sports cars get the praise for going fast, but no one praises the fuel that it needs so badly ;)

Aside from the 'heal bot' Clerics can definitely handle their own (and druids too). If you look at the wizards optimisation board you will find people who know how to squeeze every beautiful combination and power out of every class/race/feat combination you can think of, and yet still one of the highly respected builds is - druid 20. hardly a blow for the divine casters there then?

So why aren't clerics popular? Who knows? I wish I could play in my game, clerics are great fun ;). Sure a party needs healing, but like I say I've rarely seen a cleric use nearly all his/her spells for just healing. In fact I'd say the proportion of healing spells used is maybe 1/3 at most. At low levels Bless, Bane, Divine Favor, Bulls Strength, Spiritual Weapon,.... etc can be just as useful if not more useful than a few extra hitpoints

I think I've rambled long enough. :)

I love playing clerics.  Just ask Annihilator.  I think my ratio is something like 60/40/10 (cleric, rogue, other).  :p

Anyway...I answered a question?  :p  When, what, where, who, why, how?  :p

Building a good fighter is a lot of hard work I find. All those feats! You have to decide on which tactics to focus on, and hope they continue to be useful. Its the weakest and plainest class, so you have to work to make it good and interesting. Its the easiest to learn and play, but the hardest to master.

As for clerics, I guess most people are uncomfortable with the idea of having a faith, a different faith, or find them just plain dorky. I used to feel the same way, but now I play two! FR's plethora of deities makes finding an interesting god  easy, and you don't have to play the standard ultra-devout cleric. You can literally call up your god and chat to him, so you can be as casual as you like about the faith. They're more like bosses than gods.

Heck, worship a dead god and you can do what you like! :D

I love playing clerics.  Best built in RP.  One of the most powerfull melee combatants post lvl 6 or 7.  The only available healing.  Second best buffing for other people.  One of my RoA characters is a dwarven cleric who just got going, and at lvl 3, he's still pretty much a beast in every way.

I don't have a clue why people don't like them or play them.

Whew!  I have a couple of minutes without a crying child...And I have a burning questions!  I need to know if Pirates 3 is as amazing as it looks on all the commercials I'm seeing while rocking my sick son.  So anybody that's seen it, please tell me if my hopes are going to be dashed.  I'd rather know now!  :p

Your opinions of Pirates 3 will probably be the exact same as your opinions of Pirates 2, whatever they happened to be.

I was really disappointed by the new PoC...I mean, I expected so much after the Part 2, and they totally blew it. But that's just me. Some of my friends liked it.

Clerics are nothing to sneeze at in my opinion.  They get 3/4th BaB progression, a d8 hitpoints the ability to spontaniously cast heal spells, the abliity to rack harm spells, and a whole slew of buff spells, and attack spells so while they might not be as good as the fighter in melee, they /can/ hold their own while wearing platemail.

On top of that at later levels Clerics get a version of Enlarge person and Tensers transformation, that are /way/ better than their arcane equivalent.  +6 to strength, your BaB becomes your caster level, you gain hitpoints, AND can still cast spells.  And then there's miracle.  It doesn't cost a cleric 5000XP to cast, and if what the Cleric is requesting is impossible, God just says "no" instead of the spell twisting your 'wish' and you comeing out with a monkey's paw..

Note with divine power that the base attack bonus becomes your character level, not your caster level (otherwise it could be nicely abused with some fighter levels and practiced pellcaster)

Any cleric with enough levels to cast Divine Power would be out of his mind to even concider taking Fighter-levels, heh.  :p

Got a dworven clereic in one game. he rules the battle with his axe and forth level spells.

Actually, if it were the caster level, I would stack up the caster level bonus stuff like Divine Spellpower and Beads of Karma (Can easily add +10ish at the level around the level you can cast Divine Power) as a straight Cleric and then, DMM: Persist it.

Wow, that would be horribly, horribly broken.  Around level 7, one would get BAB +16...

-K

my bad :-p I didn't have the book infront of me.  that's why I didn't name the spells.  I believe they are Divine power, and Righteous might, yes?  I seem to remember there's a third spell, forget what it's called, a friend of mine had a cleric of Thor named Thoden that had some elixers that did all three spells when quaffed..it was his digivolving potion..

Divine Favor is the first level one, gives you a luck bonus to attack rolls and damage rolls 1/three caster levels.

Actually if you look at the cleics attack progression, the attack bonus from divine favor plus BAB is equal to or better than a fighters (except at level 5 only). That's why clerics high enough level should 'always' take persistent spell - divine favor.
This message was last edited by the GM at 13:23, Fri 01 June 2007.

Sure they do (if they're a cheese merchant) ;-)

Clerics can get frustrating. Either you use your spells to make yourself a handy combatant; or you save them for healing. Either way, you're going to have people cursing you.

I thought PotC: 3 was good. I can see why people felt let down by it; but nowhere near as much as, say, Spiderman 3 for example.

What is PoTC?

Pirates of the Caribbean.

Only one of the movies I absolutely cannot wait to see!  Pirates of the Caribbean!  I've asked if I will like it or not.  Since I don't go to places alone, I will not get to see it until it comes out on DVD, even though it's killing me to wait.  But none of my local friends like action/adventure movies like I do.  My girlfriends are "lightweights" as I call them, in that department.  My guyfriends, who would take me, I'm not having a whole lot to do with at the moment until the divorce is final, which hopefully won't take much longer!

So, in short, I drool at each commercial for it that I see while I'll have to wait months to actually see the entire movie.

Pirates of the Caribbean.

LOL.  Beat me to it guys :-)

The wife and I went to see it last week but we couldn't get seats together so we gave it a miss.  Definately one I want to catch before it closes though.
This message was last edited by the GM at 14:09, Sat 02 June 2007.

I know!  I'll fly to England real quick and see it with you two.  :p

Bring nachos ;-)

Is there a Hall where we remember the Fallen?

Are we expecting a sudden and horribly tragic loss of a player's prize anytime sone?

By that line of thought, have many characters died in RoA to date?

I've never had a character die.  But then again, my first character here hasn't even left the tavern yet...

I'm asking because usually, if a Player goes AWOL from my game, abandoning their Character, I replace them with another Player to continue on with the adventure if continuity necessitates.  When available, I allow the take-over player to introduce a character of their own.  At that point, I either make the old, abandoned PC an NPC, or I kill them off in a suitably dramatic way that advances the plot.

Well, I just killed one.  No, I'm not joking, and don't call me Shirley.  It's just that I don't know anyone named Ruth.

So do we remember them anywhere?  It might be nice to have a list of fallen heroes - and the names of the Players that went AWOL.

Well I have 3 to add if there is one... as I killed them off just recently.

It was of course highly dramatic and their deaths were suitable for heroes, covering the flanks of the active PCs in the wake of surging swarms of undeath.  Their bodies were given tribute in a pyre just after the ultimate goal was accomplished.

It would be appropriate that their names be accorded in some sort of legendary annal of RoA... as I believe at least one or two of the players who originally ran the PCs were in good standing or left on reasonable terms.

I honestly didn't think PC death - even as NPC - happened much here, if at all... so didn't even think to bring it up.

I know of a 'Ruth' so I assume that counts.  It's only when I'm not reminded of her that I'm entirely ruth'less' ~

And one of my PCs just killed another PC....

Hey don't look at me like that....

The DM set it up..I had no idea until it was too late...

Remembering dead pcs is a good thing. Perhaps a hall of hallowed heroes thread where the dead character name, class and a brief description of death could be listed.

LadyPhoenix mourning that her Evermeet Born, House Amarillis Elf is too high a level and to active in another region to join the region of her birth.

Does she have a younger sibling?  *grin*

I went last weekend with my 10 year old daughter. I had the POTC2 dvd for xmas and watched it one early evening. My daughter sat spellbound with me whilst my wife fell asleep after an hour and my daughter said then she wanted to see number 3 so off we went.

I really enjoyed the film and considering it is 3 hours long so did she, she only went to the toilet once and for the rest of it she really followed the plot. 8-D
This message was last edited by the player at 11:22, Fri 08 June 2007.

It is likely or cousins. Basically in the contest to see what family would become King/Queen of evermeet, it was the family with the most active and enduring moonblades that could judge the souls of weilders. House Moonflower had 6 and houw Amarillis had 6 but those of Amarillis went inactive in few generations than Moonflower so that Moonflower became the Royal Family. Probably a good thing since Amarillis as moon elf house tends to have lots of wanderers. Symbol of the house is the Green Dolphin. My pc is cousin to head of house (Mother's father was youngest brother to current head of house's father)
This message was last edited by the player at 15:21, Fri 08 June 2007.

Hi guys. My two friends and I are new to this website. We're looking for a skilled DM to take us in =)  We would really appreciate it and do our best, we're all able to post daily and ussually multiple times. So if you like a fairly fast paced game then you might like our company =) 2 of us are very experienced and one is completely new.

I plan to play a hexblade and my friends wish to play a cleric and an arcane archer. We don't mind others joining as well! =) Please message me if you're interested or have any questions.

P.S I hope this is the right place to post but I'm new here so please just message me =)

Hi everyone, just popping in to say hi. I'm new to ROA, but I've got some rping experience under my belt.

I'm looking foreward to blowing up another campaign world gaming with you.

Welcome to the new faces.

How come the regions I am in are so slow?  I love to roleplay, but its so rare for the regions I am in to develope my characters.  Heck I can't even move them due to the fact that the games they are in are so slow.  What can we do to at least get a notice on how fast these different regions post?  Maybe a thread in here stating the rate required for each region?  Just something to think about...

I sympathise with your situation 'Peekachu.  I got lucky when I joined RoA and got into a couple of regions that posted quite quickly (and thus allowed a lot of character development), but I also played in one that ran much slower and made it harder to develop the PC as I would of liked, so I know where you're coming from.

This is also something one of the DMs has mentioned recently over in the DMs Lounge and we have discussed ways of noting expected posting rates for the different regions.  It's still a work in progress at the moment but generally each DM mentions how quickly the game updates when they post an ad in the 'Availlable space for PCs' thread (particularly if it's different from the expected RoA norm of 3+ posts per week).  Of course, RL affects both players and DMs alike from time to time so maybe you just got unlucky?

I suggest you talk to your current DM(s) about it.  It may just be that he or she has RL stuff that's keeping them busy at the moment, but if not, then you can always consider moving to a new region with a posting rate that matches your own a little more closely in any case.

Besides having a suggested posting rate, how about also giving some idea what kind of campaign the DM has in mind?  Like a ratio of combat, puzzles, and roleplaying, whether it's primarily urban or rural, maybe a bit of a teaser for the plot?

Again, this info is generally posted with the advert in the 'Availlable space for PCs' thread.  More detailed information is invariably added in the ARP (adventure reply posts) where characters select what kind of adventure they want to participate in.

If you want to know more than is being offered in these then you can always ask the DM in question for a look at the game you're interested in.
This message was last edited by the GM at 00:11, Mon 11 June 2007.

A few DMs have begun listing their predicted post-rates in the DMs And Their Regions thread.

And of course, we always need new DMs. If you graduate from player to DM, you get to be part of creating the magic that is RoA (yep) and get that warm fuzzy feeling for providing an adventure for players just like you. Plus we have some small perks as a sweetener: XP and unusual options for your characters.

The following games are in need of new DMs:

Underdark
Thesk
Savage Species - bubble region for monstrous characters
Hunters - naval bubble region
Pirates - pirate bubble region
Non Good Moonsea Bubble - bubble region for evil characters
Psionics - bubble region for psionic characters

As far as the general idea of a campaign, I'm fairly certain that a lot of DMs here use the ARP format.  I know I do.  This ensures player enjoyment by providing them a democratic vote on several various themes/choices for how the game will run.

So as far as what kind of campaign it turns out to be, I'd say that is more a player option by majority as opposed to something the DM just levies off the bat. In cases where a region is established and seeking additional/replacement characters, an ARP may have already been decided or in the process of completion.  In a new region, for example: Evermeet... I'm waiting for at least 4 confirmed and approved characters before I establish the campaign.  I'm obviously not going to design an entire adventure set around the Coral Kingdom if I'm looking at a group of terran and aerial based PCs (as stands, one natural woodlands variant race and an avariel).  It will still be an option and I try to keep all the bases covered as most of us DMs do.  Roleplay, Puzzles, Combat.  One or two will be the focus of each scenario as well as an overall theme.

On posting rates, it's good to list these but I think they also vary.  There are several games who suffer from RL induced sluggishness, whether players are overwelmed or DMs.  You aren't going to be seeing too many games recruiting where the pace is currently or expected to be slow but there is no telling what RL has in store for most of us.

I tend to believe that is something that works itself out among the cast and crew (Players and DMs).

remaining relatively free with characters is my favorite sort. sandbox :D

Sembia could also use a new DM - I'll be running it until one comes along willing to take over, however.

I might try my hand at GMing again once I get a bit used to the game and know some more about FR.

Okay, let us know when you want to try it.

Update - the following regions could do with a new DM:

Sembia - levels 3-4
Underdark - levels 3-6
Thesk - levels 3-5
Savage Species - bubble region for monstrous characters; ECLs 4-8
Waterdeep levels 7-11
One-Shot Adventures - a wandering, disconnected campaign; levels 3-4
One-Shots & Orphanage - a planned holding region for spare PCs
Hunters / Sea Of Fallen Stars - naval bubble region; levels 3-4, ~7
Pirates - pirate bubble region; level 3
Non Good Moonsea Bubble - bubble region for evil characters; level 6
Psionics - bubble region for psionic characters; level any (3-6)
This message was last edited by the GM at 05:11, Tue 12 June 2007.

What are the level averages for the different areas needing DM's?  I may be willing to take one up with a an adventure idea.  As for the Psionic, Pirates, Savage Species, and Underdark where all are they allowed to go?

I've added the level ranges above, though some get complicated.

I'll PM you. And if anyone else is interested, PM Annihilator and myself.

Anyone here play NWN2?  I just caved in and bought it, working on a some modules right now that reflect my design for the regions I run.  If you have the game, I'll upload and make available my mods for you when they are done before I post them to the NWN comm sites.

Fun idea, RoA persistent world on NWN2?

I figure this is as good a place to post this as any.

I'm new to ROA (Hi by the way) and just wanted to know if the community has a non-evil necromancer yet?

From what I've read its allowed, but needs plenty of fluff to support it. Has anyone gone that route yet and if not is it really do-able without being done in a bubble region?

In other words, if I get a character approved by one GM that is not in a bubble region can that character move freely or does the character need to be re-approved?

well, each DM has a say on if they need a certain character type in their game, but if HacDoc approves the character for non bubble regions then at least the character doesn't need to be re approved.

i think its just easier if you start talking to the DM of the region you want to jump into, that way if they're looking for a thief, you aren't wasting your time creating a bard.

Actually, in the case of Necromancer, it's not that any sort of build is illegal/non-bubble, but the question of 'Do you want to have animated undead minions?' is the issue, when you consider non-bubble characters are restricted to non-evil alignment.

I'm sure you can build a Necromancer, and not animate undead, but use other necromancy spells (Heck, I'd allow Commanding Undead, to fight against other necromancers' minions)

But once you start animating corpses and having them follow you around and do the dirty job for you…well, you will have problem with the alignment issue, not to mention some social issues (Hey, these friends of yours smell bad, and their flesh is rotting.  You can't stay in this inn, sorry.)

-K

Now that sounds like a good idea...

I never played NWN2 but I did play the first one.

Was hooked....

I think you could even raise dead without being evil, so long as you had a non-evil reason for it and didn't use them for evil ends (and respected them to some degree).  See the Anita Blake books for an example.  (Main character is sort of a necromancer.  I recommend you look at the early books rather than the later books....)

Agreed.  At that point, those aren't your standard 'undead minions'.  Then again, how to work that out within the confine of standard RoA game, where you start out at level 3…I have no idea.  I'd love to hear if there's a good solution for this…

-K

A party I'm in has mutterings about bone puzzle and sentient undeads

I think bone puzzle makes them look alive, but I don't know how she plans to keep em sentient

Well, you can 'create' undead, and you'll end up with intelligent undeads.  Then again, we are talking about level 6 spells…will be a long time before we get those.  Even the Animate Undead (you get zombies and skeletons) spell is level 4.  Practically speaking, having undead-'companions' sounds like pretty difficult to do.

Now, if someone simply use necromancy spells to fight against evil things, I don't have much problem.  Use false-life to buff themselves, and primarily use necromancy attack oriented spells like Vamparic Touch or array of good ability damage causing spells like Chill Touch.  But I don't think those approaches are particularly popular.

-K

I've bounced around the idea of playing a neutral necromancer, one who studies life forces and how to manipulate them.  Not necessarily evil, as he'd be more than willing to destroy undead things, but he'd definitely have a "waste not, want not" mentality, not to mention a morbid streak wider than his back.

that would make a good cleric too, dedicated to a god of knowledge maybe

A Chaotic neutral type of character is what I'm going for really.

Having undead minions is sort of the idea, but having a good reason for raising them and then putting them back to rest once they have served their purpose.

The moral code of this character would simply be warped be the normal standards.

For example, killing an orc because he was attacking a village is a good act. Then raising the orc and having the skeleton rebuild the village is also a good act (by his standards). So is raising the orc and some of his friends and having them go after the remaing orcs so they don't attack again.

On the very edge of the moral code would be the question: Is it ok to raise the dead villagers to re-build the village for those that survived and attack the orcs. If the families of the villagers objected he would not do so, but if no one said anything then yes. Still it would only be after all the orcs bodies were used up. He would then make sure the undead village would put down and giving proper rights once their work was done.

On the flip side the necromacer would never enchant a living creature as controlling the mind of a living creature to do his bidding is evil by his standards. So would be summoning living creatures.

Needless to say his intentions are always good, but he has little use for laws regarding the undead. He also follows his own moral code so sometimes he might do "evil acts" such as raise the undead, but with good intentions. A very "means to an end" type character.
This message was last edited by the player at 00:14, Wed 13 June 2007.

   Are you saying they have released a fully functional, patched DM client for the NWN2 system? My brother has it and told me just last week they were still ironing out the kinks....

   Not to mention the single-player game has gotten such terrible reviews for the anti-storybook ending it forces on you for a conclusion....

Just remember - in D&D, alignment isn't just loose concepts of morality, it is the very fabric that binds reality.  Some deeds are inherently Evil, no matter what the reason for doing them is - and as Animate Dead and it's like has the [Evil]-descriptor, their use are always Evil.  Now, single acts of evil doesn't have to change a person's alignment, and many Good heroes have taken actions which were Evil for the greater Good.  This doesn't make them Evil (or even Neutral) by default - it just means they aren't Paladins, who are held to a much stricted moral code, prohibiting taking Evil actions even for the greater Good.

At any rate, animating undead creatures is very much Evil, and no justification will make it otherwise.  Good clerics cannot do it, at all.  A Good or Neutrally aligned Wizard/Sorcerer (or anyone else with the capability of using Animate Dead or it's like) can cast them, but it will be an Evil act, no matter why you're doing it.


Personally, I find the idea of a non-evil character focused on creating undead almost impossible to pull off, and I can count on one hand the number of players I know who I'd trust with playing.  Anyone who'd try it in my regions would probably find themselves being hunted by adventurers, as well as the churches of Kelemvor and Lathander.

That being said, I do have a PC playing a Necromancer in one of my regions, who is doing an excellent job of it, as well.  It's a perfectly fine concept to play, as long as you stay away from the [Evil] spells that are so often connected to this particular school of magic.

so, anyone know if ninjacow is actually here or not?

A cleric can’t cast spells of an alignment opposed to his own or his deity’s (if he has one). Spells associated with particular alignments are indicated by the chaos, evil, good, and law descriptors in their spell descriptions.

So no, there's no way a good Cleric can Animate minions, Create/summon undead, cast Death Knell and so on... Any Wizard and Neutral Cleric can cast them but as it has already been explained, they have the [Evil] descriptor and thus they are of the most evil acts in the eyes of the sheer majority of the population and also the gods of Faerun. Do it several times and your alignment is not the same again. You start finding it convenient/useful to commit an evil act to do what you want, so...

Desecrating the bodies of the dead, not letting them rest in piece, calling their souls back and not giving them an option to do anything else other than what you command them to do... That certainly can't be "neutral". And even if a person does that kind of thing to help others that can't be "neutral", or even if he thinks he makes those ones at fault pay for their crimes in that way it's just a very sick sense of justice. Had a person like that before in a game, he wasn't Chaotic Neutral but Lawful Evil instead, and he was in a neutral party and always fighting with the other members because of that reason.

Anyway, I'm the one behind that Necromancer DM Annihilator mentioned. Neutral, not a single spell with the [Evil] descriptor, yet. ^^ My character is only studying that School more than others, he has found that necromancy is what he's good at. Curiosity led him at first perhaps, his obsession to seek knowledge. But his personality, shaped through his background and the deity he worships, have led him on the right path and he hates those who misuse Necromancy or abuse it for their own gains. It's a concept I like a lot...

I was going to write something here, but Annihilator said it perfectly ;)

Annihilator always does.  *smiles proudly*

A good explaination and at least it lets me know what I'm in for in the ROA worlds.

I'm a use to a bit more flexibility in the alignments, but when in Rome...

Thanks for clearing that up.

Actually, I'm going to offer a counter point to this one.  It is not D&D's concept of morality as is, but it's setting specific idea.  Case in point is that Eberron has much looser concept of morality, I believe.

Of course, in FR setting, it's pretty rigid.

I prefer it Eberron way actually.  I would personally let good characters animate dead within reason (such as explained above, although, I still don't know if animating into a mindless undead, which I consider more like a drone/automaton, and not sure if having the mindless creature try to do good deed really 'amending evil deed'...but in any case, we aren't really argueing that here) if this were my personal game I'm running alone, with home brew world/etcs.

Having said that, this is a community game, and I'd rather see a unified continuity to the world view as a whole, so I had to tell one of my new player 'I'll be very difficult' to the animating necromancer idea.

Now, something to ponder about…If I remember correctly, there are 2 metamagic feat in Book of Exalted Deeds.  It adds [good] descriptor to a spell.  I think it's Conscecrate Spell and Purify feat.  I think one of them showed up in another book...one of them Complete books.

I am away from the book at the moment, so I can't say for sure.  But if you apply them to the Animate Dead spell, I believe the spell ends up with both [good] and [evil] descriptor (I don't think it'll erase the existing descriptor.  It simply adds [good], I think).  So, what's the consequence of casting that spell?

-K

The only thing that I can think of, is that neither Good or Evil clerics would be able to cast it, heh.  :p

I haven't checked it but can consecrate spell be applied to evil spells?

I will buy that a cleric cannot cast a spell of the Evil descriptor no matter what his motives if that is against his own or his deity's alignment.  That's right in the rule book:



Same thing for druids.  So a Good cleric/druid, or a cleric/druid of a Good deity, could not cast an Evil spell for any reason.  Period.  So sayath God, and you can't argue with that.

But what keeps a wizard or sorcerer from casting it?  It's an Evil spell, but that doesn't mean you are necessarily using it in an evil way.  Where does it say in the rules that you become evil if you cast enough evil spells (no matter their purpose)?

This is the SRD on Alignment, in part:





Take home points:

1.  Alignment is not a straight jacket; it is a tool to develop a character.
2.  Good vs. evil depends on your intent.  If your intent is to help people and make sacrifices to to do so, you are probably good.  If you want to oppress or hurt people, you are probably evil.  If you don't think of a decision in moral terms (like an animal) then it can't have alignment repercussions.

Nothing there leads me to believe you will turn evil if you cast enough evil descriptor spells--it leads me to believe that you might be walking the knife's edge, but it will still depend on your purpose and intent.

Let's see what the spell descriptor says:



OK, so it governs how it interacts with alignment--that's not a surprise.  Nothing about necessarily becoming evil.

Nothing in the rules I know of says you would become automatically evil casting repeated Animate Dead spells.

(In fact, if you did become automatically evil (or chaotic, or lawful, or whatever) casting these spells, why bother to have a rule that clerics cannot cast them if they are opposed to their alignment or their deities' alignment?  They would be smote down by heaven, or change their alignment involuntarily and lose their powers, etc.  A rule saying they couldn't cast them would be, at best, mostly duplicative, and at worst completely unnecessary.)

If nothing in the rules says you must become evil casting these spells, then it is a DM judgment call based upon the alignment rules.  The alignment rules emphasize the purpose of your moral judgments--sacrificing to help others vs. repressing others.

I could easily conceive of a Good Sorcerer Necromancer.

Again, see the Anita Blake books.  Let's say you have a sorcerer who concentrates on necromancy spells.  He was BORN to it--it's in his blood.  Maybe his father was a vampire, or something, who knows.  But his association with it is involuntary.  Yet, he has seen the evil worked by indiscriminate necromancy and he has consciously chosen the path of good.

Now, he uses Animate Dead.  The question under the rules should not be, "Did you cast an Evil spell multiple times?  Sorry guy, you are evil."  Instead, it appears to me that the question is, "You are casting an Evil spell?  You need to be VERY specific to tell me your reasons for this, and to justify it in the context of your alignment, or you are going to go downhill fast."

If the necromancer did things like people have suggested on this thread--raised the bodies of vicious, evil enemies to fight against the enemies' evil comrades, then let them go back to their "rest" afterwards, etc.--let's say in defense of a town--he is committing a good act.  The only problem is it is by an "evil" method.

But that is well-tread ground; people debate that sort of thing all the time.  Does it make you "evil" to torture someone if it is absolutely necessary to get information that would save a city?  Does it make you evil to, say, "Charm" someone (controlling their mind) if you need to do so to save, say, a room full of innocent children?

Torture is a good example.  Torture by itself is an evil act, I think most people would agree--you are intentionally causing someone pain to make them do something you want them to do.  But I don't think torturing people, even repeatedly, would make you evil by itself--you would have to have evil motives.  If you always had extremely good motives, then I don't see why the torture would make you evil.

Same thing for Raise Dead.

That said, you would certainly have to be extremely careful not to taint your motives.  If so, you would become evil very quickly.  But if all of your motives were pure, why would you become evil for saving the room full of kids, keeping the bomb from going off in the city, etc. etc.

In summary:

1.  There appears to be no rule that casting Evil descriptor spells will make you evil.  (Only that divine casters cannot cast them in violation of their or their deity's alignments.)
2.  The alignment description in the SRD indicates that alignment "isn't a straight jacket" and that what matters, for good and evil, is your intent.

Therefore I see no reason why an arcane caster could not be a good necromancer and make repeated, descriminating use of the Animate Dead spell for good ends.
This message was last edited by the player at 16:36, Wed 13 June 2007.

There don't appear to be any restriction on what kind of spells it can be applied...Just restriction on who can use'em (Good characters)

-K

PC Astos

I agree with you on the rules issue.  As I said, I think the alignemnt issue is not the D&D system issue under the 3.5 system.  I however think it's campaign setting/world view/flavor issue, and the Forgotten Realms setting, it appears to me, is pretty rigid on the interpretation on those issues.  Possibly have something to do with the fact that the setting originated from the older version of the game...

-K

DM Kremti,

I agree that, with "personal flavor" in mind you could do whatever you wanted to alignment and even stay within the alignment rules, because it is the DM's call as to whether someone's motives are as pure as they believe they are--it's an "objective" state of mind, after all (which basically means it is "objective" to the PCs and NPCs and almost perfectly subjective to the DM, since someone has to be the arbiter of what is "objective"!).

I don't know where in the published FR books it makes a solid enough statement of this alignment issue that a DM would have to feel bound by it, however.  I also don't know where the ROA rules lay it out.  I am not claiming to be an expert on either subject, but unless it is in black and white somewhere, wouldn't it be the ROA DM's prerogative?

and this is why I've only played 2 normal casters. Warlocks, rogues, and fighter-types never have these issues. I <3 warlocks.

Alignment, for the purposes of Player Characters, is a very vague subject, yes.  And it's almost always up to the DM in question, unless a character puts on one of those cursed helmets, or something like that.  But, some acts are inherently evil, despite the reason for doing them.  You cannot claim that killing a newborn child is a Good action, even if doing so will prevent the God of Murder from destroying your entire village.  It is an Evil act, done with Good intentions in mind.  But, as many (former) Paladins have experienced throughout various editions of D&D, doing Evil in the name of Good, is still doing Evil.  Undead are, by default, evil (with very few exceptions - I'm thinking maybe Ghosts?), and their creation goes against all which is Good - even if you're doing it for a very Good reason, it will at best average out to being Neutral in the end.  Not that there's anything wrong with being Neutral, mind you - and it doesn't make you any less a hero in the eyes of those you saved by doing foul, twisted magic.

But, in the end, it all boils down to the DMs decision - if your DM doesn't mind having Lawful Good characters walking around raising undead, summoning Evil Outsiders (who are actually made up of the very essence of Evil, making it very much a real thing for them), and kicking puppies, then nothing in the rules says that your alignment have to shift.

   Did you just say you 'boobs' warlocks? Oh, wait, that's a heart going in the other direction....   :P

PC Astos,



I agree, except I see it as somewhat unified front of all of DMs' stance, rather than individual DMs, when it relates so closely to character creation issue.

Again, if this were a stand alone game where I'm running the show, I have no problem with this.  But when I have to consider the possibility of my quitting DMing and someone else taking over the region, or, character deciding to move to different regions, I have to warn the player 'Hey, I think you are gonna have problems.' if I think it will (Note I'm practically the only 'loose alignment' DM at the moment :p  Heck, I play Hero System and GURPs normally.  I wouldn't have alignment system at all...).

It's the fact that the issue is closely related to the character creation.  I don't want to say Yes to the creation of such character now, and having to quit DMing in next few months, and then the next DM comes in and tell the player 'Hey, that thing you are doing (which is sort of the main focus of the character) isn't kosher' when it appears majority opinion thinks it's not kosher (I'm not expert on FR setting either, so someone enlighten us...).

-K

Yes, exactly!!  It's an evil act, but with good intentions.  That means that your alignment could remain good, as your intentions are what determines alignment.  It's an objective standard regarding your intentions, so the "crazy person" exception wouldn't apply--i.e., not only do you have to believe you are helping others, but it has to be a reasonable belief.  Other than that, the alignment rules don't say anything about it.

If, as DM Kremti says, the DMs are unified in not wanting such issues in their game, then that's that for ROA.  Under the SRD, and written ROA rules as I can find them, it should be ok with good intentions.  (With the provisos that the DM is the subjective arbiter of objective good intentions; and can exclude things from their game as a matter of "flavor" at will.)

Edit:  Also, as to the paladin example, paladins are "special".  They "lose all class abilities if they ever willingly commit an evil act."  In other words, like clerics, their class specifically restricts their ability to commit evil acts, rather than just their alignments.

This is a higher standard, and that makes sense for paladins just like it does for clerics--you are representing a god, or a cause, or a church, and they require that, effectively, the ends never justify the means.  You cannot commit an evil act for a good purpose.

However, this exception just proves the rule--for most characters, this isn't the case.  You CAN commit an evil act for a good cause.  You will probably feel bad about the evil part of it, but you aren't going to change alignments if your intentions were pure and reasonable--at least according to the SRD!
This message was last edited by the player at 18:14, Wed 13 June 2007.

Astos:  In your SRD quote above, I still can't see where you get the idea that intentions are what really matters.  Many a villain have started out on that path, thinking that as long as they do evil for a just cause, it's okay.  I've seen several published NPCs who are/were like that - some of them still work for Good organizations, furthering their causes, but in the end, their personal alignment is still Evil.

Well I'm pretty certain calling someone back from the dead and commanding him to do something for you, or using the carnal remains of an intelligent being to create something mindless that would obey your command, whether that command is good or evil, does debase the life of the targeted subject. And innocent, well it is rather vague but the sinner is already dead and paid for his crimes with his life, right?

I cannot see another reason why WotC decided that the spell has the [Evil] descriptor. And coming right from the SRD quote that person who does such a thing is evil. Now, if that person has an alignment that does not include evil I fail to see why it is not so on the character sheet - it does need changing to evil, doesn't it?

And well, you could say "OK he's not evil, he's neutral cause he helps people with that". So that person goes about committing evil acts (by the rules) because he believes it is a way to do good, like desecrating the dead henchmen of a Necromancer so he can fight him on better odds, beat him and save the realms, and also give him "a taste of his sins"?

This case of doing evil in order to do good is very different from the example above. Doing evil and slaying the baby because if it stays alive millions will die for certain is so different from doing evil and animating the dead so you can do/fight something better. In the first case you do not have the option to do otherwise to save the people, but in the second you do have the option not to do evil in order to do good/accomplish your noble goals.
This message was last edited by the player at 19:23, Wed 13 June 2007.

Oh, I agree.  The path to Hell is paved with good intentions, and all that.  It is, after all, an objective standard.  If you are kidding yourself about whether your actions are good or not, then you will be evil.

As to why I believe it is the intentions that matter--first of all, it does not say so specifically, but it also does not say otherwise.  It's ambiguous.  Then you hit the animal description:

"Animals and other creatures incapable of moral action are neutral rather than good or evil. Even deadly vipers and tigers that eat people are neutral because they lack the capacity for morally right or wrong behavior."

In other words, animals can do evil things and not be evil.  What do animals lack that we have?  I would argue that since animals do things based on instinct, they cannot have good or bad intentions to their actions--they just do what they do.  If human beings reacted completely instinctually to things, we would also be excused.  In fact, the law does this to a degree--if you see your wife cheating on you, and kill the other man right then and there, it is considered depraved heart murder in most states, and you don't get as heavy of a penalty--because you were too angry to think straight, you just reacted.  Similarly, and more controversially, if you are deemed legally insane (which usually means something along the lines of, "Does not understand the difference between right and wrong," (flag that as disputed)), then you usually cannot be guilty of a crime, because you did not have the requisite mens rea ("guilty mind")--in other words, you did not have bad intentions.  (Instead they lock you up for life civially as a danger to the populace, but that's different!)

Similar to the above examples, a lion could come up and eat a baby--a terrible act!--and he wouldn't be evil in the SRD.  The only reason I can fathom for that is that that he did not "mean anything by it" when he ate the kid--to him, it was just a snack.

Therefore, it is completely reasonable to believe that the SRD looks at intentions--whether or not you truly (and correctly) believe that your actions are self-sacrificing, helping others, etc.  Under the SRD, it appears to be up to the DM whether or not someone's alignment changes.

I could understand how a DM might reasonably decide that, if you cast an Evil spell X number of times, eventually the ends don't justify the means and you will tilt towards neutral.  I could also completely understand how a DM might reasonably decide that, if your actions are actually helping others, then the ends can justify the means sufficiently for your alignment to stay good.  The SRD appears to allow for either view, since it concentrates on the objective measure of someone's consciousness (ie, whether the are trying to help others).

If ROA has a ruling otherwise, that's cool; I just don't think it is in the rules that repeated Raise Dead spells will necessarily make you evil.  It depends on the circumstance.

You flagged the key word there yourself--"innocent".  If a good person is acting in a way that will consistently harm innocent life, he will probably become evil.

However, you aren't necessarily harming innocent life casting an Animate Dead spell.  Let's take someone's example above.  Some orcs decide they want to raid a village, kill the men and rape the women.  All that stands between them and their evil scheme is one good necromancer.  He manages to kill a couple orcs with some spells, but he is going to be overwhelmed.  He decides to cast Animate Dead on the dead orcs to get reinforcements, and saves the village because of it.

Is that an evil act?  What innocent life is he debasing?

You can't just argue that he is debasing life and is therefore evil; it depends on the sort of life.  You can debase guilty lives, just like you can kill guilty lives--if not every PC would be evil for going out and slaying the archvillan rather than bringing them back for their life sentance in the Waterdeep prison.

So where are the innocents he is hurting in that scenario?  I don't see them.  I don't buy the fact that if the orcs died they paid for their crime--I bet Grummash is beaming down on them with his one good eye, and once they are gone they will spend the rest of eternity in some outer plane where they can drink and pillage 24/7 for their loyalty to his causes.  Hardly punishment. In fact, in the Forgotten Realms, death is arguably a wonderful thing, if you have been loyal to your god and he isn't a complete bastard.  (In fact, I often have a hard time figuring out why a PC would really fear death in the FR; I think it is often the player's fear more than the PC's fear.)

I would submit that if you raise those orcs to save the city, you are committing a very clear GOOD act, because you are saving a bunch of women and children from being murdered and worse.  Let's not even think about the worse!

But you used an EVIL spell for it!  Doesn't that matter?  Sure, it matters, just like torturing someone to get necessary information "matters"--it raises the bar:

1.  Anyone who believes that the ends cannot justify the means cannot do it.  (IE, paladins, arguably clerics.)
2.  Anyone whose deity--essentially a philosophy writ large--believes that evil acts should never be committed for any reason cannot do it (clerics, druids).
3.  Even those without such restrictions have to have a really, really good reason--you can't just go raise the dead to do your laundry, not without changing alignments!

It's just like torture--ask yourself when you would accept torture as an essentially "good" thing to do.  Everyone will have a point where they will assent that it is a good thing--if they are "loose" on this stuff, it will be something like "to save someone's life".  If they are "strict" on this stuff, it will be something like, "to save a city" or "to save the life of my child" or "to save my own life".  But everyone will get there.  (This range of "what is good" is why I think the DMs still have a lot of discretion no matter your interpretation, since it is an "objective" standard determined subjectively by the DM.)

Is it still an evil act?  Sure.  But are the results at that point good?  Yes.  So why would you change alignments?  Nothing in the SRD says you would!
This message was last edited by the player at 20:26, Wed 13 June 2007.

Just some quick input — I usually stay well away from discussions about alignment in D&D, it's a rather volatile subject.

http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/evil

Evil is defined as something that is "morally wrong", "harmful", and "characterized by misfortune or suffering".  The first part excludes non-sentient beings, such as animals and plants; they don't have the intelligence to make moral decisions, so are exempt from performing evil acts.  (They can actually DO things that people consider evil, but they don't have knowledge that it is wrong.)

Sins are committed when the person doing so has full knowledge of what they are doing, understand that it is harmful, and do it anyway.  Even if they feel guilty about it, it was still wrong.  (Let's leave it at that, I don't want this discussion to devolve into a religious argument.)

In the D&D game's magic system, casting any spell with an alignment descriptor is considered a full-fledged act toward that alignment.  Casting animate dead to create a zombie is just as evil as, say, murdering puppies.  (Again, I don't want to start arguments regarding degrees of wickedness.)  Most characters who cast evil spells should eventually become evil, though it should be a gradual process — and the player (if it's a PC) should be notified when his alignment is on the verge of changing.

Also note that clerics and druids are prohibited from casting spells that are opposite their alignment; good clerics cannot cast evil spells at all.  The restriction should also extend to paladins, but it's moot: their spell lists don't have any evil or chaotic spells at all.  The restriction applies to ALL spells, so a wizard who gains a level in cleric may lose access to some of his arcane spells.

They don't have rules on exactly how much you have to do to cause an alignment change because they were intentionally vague on that point.  The D&D alignment system is meant to be a reflection on the characters' moral and ethical viewpoints, which can change over time.  If a PC selects one alignment and consistently displays another one, talk to the player about changing to the one that fits.  Most classes suffer no penalties for changing alignment, because people's views DO change.  If the character in question would suffer — loss of class abilities, spell selection, or forced atonement — the player should know in advance before such changes, to allow him to adjust his character's behavior.

In the game I run at home, the group's neutral wizard has been gradually veering toward good, but this is the result of nearly a year's worth of battling evil.  Likewise, the CN rogue has just recently changed to CG.  He's still an individualist, but being put in a save-the-world position has made him more altruistic.  This is reflecting how the players have portrayed their characters, not some arbitrary "I'm changing things" decision.

Okay, I'm stopping here.  Otherwise, I'll take up an entire page on one post.  Heh.

But you are begging the question, DM Halaster.  Why exactly does committing an evil act, for a good purpose, make you evil alignment?  I can see how it is an evil act, sure.  But that's only half of the question.

Clerics, druids, paladins, they all have a special restriction that boils down to:  The ends don't justify the means.

For everyone else, there is no rule that says that.  That means the ends CAN justify the means.  Committing an evil act for a good purpose with good results doesn't not, in the SRD, affect anyone negatively except paladins, clerics, and druids.

Now, you are a DM and I don't dispute that you are perfectly, 100% certainly entitled to run your game in a manner where the ends cannot justify the means, and evil acts will make you evil over time no matter how many innocents you save with them.  However, the SRD does not require that.  (And if they were purposefully ambiguous, they were purposefully ambiguous for a reason--because there are multiple possibilities that are each reasonable under the SRD and they did not wish to choose one of them for you.)

Also, I am not sure the definition of "evil" gets us very far.  "Harmful" is too broad--it's harmful to hack off an orc's head, but that doesn't mean it is evil.  "Morally wrong" is begging the question--If an act is evil because it is morally wrong, why is it morally wrong?  You just sub "morally wrong" for "evil" in the above discussion and start all over.

And I don't think "feeling guilty" is a good litmus test for "morally wrong" (or evil, or anything else).  People feel guilty for lots of things that aren't morally wrong.  Witness the "Spider Man choice"--your girlfriend and an elevator full of people are both hurtling to their doom.  Which do you save?  I don't care which you pick, you are going to feel guilty the next day for the choice!  Yet few would argue that either choice would be "morally wrong".

Whether something is "morally wrong" in the D&D alignment context boils down to one's views on whether the ends justify the means.  If they do, it's not morally wrong.  If they don't, it is despite good intentions.  Nothing in the SRD resolves this debate (and it would be rather ambitious to try, considering the philosophers lined up on both sides!).

A DM would be perfectly reasonable taking either position, and unless there is an ROA house rule, it seems to me a DM would be perfectly reasonable to allow a good necromancer to cast Animate Dead numerous times if they were all in appropriate circumstances.
This message was last edited by the player at 22:02, Wed 13 June 2007.

Cleric, Druid, Palidin, that's a good chunk of the core classes, add to that Knight, samurai, probably a few others.  I have to agree, some actions, no matter how 'justified' they are, is still evil.

You travel back through time to murder a child that will become the destruction of mankind.  It's still murder, instead of murdering the guy, work against him to make sure he never comes to power to cause the end of the world.  Evil act averted..

Ok just interrupting real quick to change the subject line.  I changed it earlier this week on my last post as a joke to see how far it would go but didn't expect it to fill a page lol.  Starting to wig me out and I know noone is really paying attetion to it hehe..

Anyways, continue!

Aw, and here I meant it.  :p  *giggles*

Oh I agree--like I said, classes with a specific moral code might not be able to use any sort of an "ends justify means" argument.



I think that we are mixing several concepts here.  These are the questions I would ask.

1.  Q.  Is murdering the child an evil act?

    A.  Yes.  We agree on this point.  It is certainly an evil act.

2.  Q.  In the abstract, would there be circumstances where murdering the child could result in a good outcome and be done exclusively and explicitly for that purpose (helping others), and therefore would not shift a character's alignment towards evil?

    A.  Yes, certainly this is in theory possible.  If there was absolutely no way to stop this kid other than kill him, and he would rain death and destruction upon the earth, it could be a good outcome to kill him, and, depending on your view of whether ends justify means, could be a "good" thing to do on the alignment scale.  (Imagine for this purpose that you, say, cast powerful divination spells, Miracles, etc., and all the deities agree, there is no stopping the kid besides killing him.  Furthermore, all deities agree that killing him would save 1,000s of lives and make the world a safer place.)

I cannot tell if we disagree on this answer.

3.  Q.  If there are options other than killing the child, is it still good to kill the child?

    A.  No, you can't kill the kid out of expediency.  If there are other options, you need to use them.  That's part of "respecting life"--you have to do what you can to preserve it, and the farther you move from the "it's the only option" scenario the weaker your "the ends justify the means" argument becomes.  If you can achieve the same ends through a different means, that changes the scenario.

So, let's take your example.  You go back in time.  Let's say you can stay back in time as long as you want, and working against this kid is likely to do the trick.  As a DM, I would assign an alignment shift "counter" (for lack of a better word) to someone who just kills the kid out of expediency--they had other options.

On the other hand, let's say your Time Travel spell only lets you stay back in time for 20 minutes.  Assume that leaves you no option but to kill the kid if you want to stop him.  I would rule that the ends justify the means in that situation, and no one would receive an alignment shift "counter".  (However, paladins would lose their special abilities subject to atonement rules, as they committed an evil act, and the ends cannot justify the means for them under their strict moral code.)

I believe we agree on this answer.

I don't know about you all, but this issue has come up in my campaigns all the time!  You don't need time travel--you just need baby orcs.  The old MM provided for baby orcs in orc communities, and faithfully following it I would insert youngsters.  The moral debate was always, "Should we kill the baby orcs?"  Orcs by definition are inherently evil (or at least were back in the day, who knows now) and if let grow up they were assumed to be evil and continue their evil ways.  Is it an evil act, then, to kill them?

Tough question, and I think that there are (or at least were) a number of reasonable answers to it.  I did not make my PCs evil for killing them, or even neutral, if they truly believed they were doing it to save lives, and that the orc had no chance to grow up to be other than evil and wicked.  (And I believed this was probably true.  In early AD&D I think it was; I am not sure it is in 3.5 or was in late AD&D.  But you get the point.)
This message was last edited by the player at 22:27, Wed 13 June 2007.

write a manifesto, not just with what the kid will do and how to counteract it with out killing him, also put other stuff that a person of your choice would find out to know the manuscript is correct, accurate and true.  Travel back in time, spend 20 minutes there, and give the book to that trusted palidin, who happens to be your ancestor..

And I said, "Assume this means you have no other option but to kill the kid if you want to stop him."  That's the crux of the issue, but if you want a better alternate hypothetical:

Assume the Time Travel spell puts you back in time for 6 seconds (1 combat round), that you appear in the nursery right by the Ultimate Evil Kid's cradle, you are naked and have no possessions (no books, no paper, etc.), there is nothing in the room except a wooden cradle with a kid in it (they are tough parents; maybe that's why he is evil!), and no one is around except the kid.  You have Improved Unarmed Strike and have just enough time to Coup De Grace the youngster and do a short victory dance before you zoosh back through time to the new future.
This message was last edited by the player at 22:32, Wed 13 June 2007.

Ehh, it all boils down IMO, 'Heroes don't kill the helpless, or the weak, no matter what the ends of doing such might be'

That's a fine philosophy, and I think it's grand if you run your game based on it, but I don't see a requirement for it in the SRD.  The SRD allows room for both views.

Looks like your changed subject line didn't hold, Steel.

I think we need to close off this discussion, there's entirely too many opinions about it, and most of the games in RoA really don't go that far into 'shades of gray' morality.  (At least, I don't think they do.)  Besides, if we dwell too much on the topic of whether or not killing things is wrong, we'll end up derailing one of the staples of D&D — killing monsters.

And without that, we remove all the action, most of the game-mechanics, and (in my opinion) a major reason to play D&D in the first place: laying the smack-down on evil critters that deserve what they get.

Players, if you have a question about the moral and/or ethical status of your character, discuss it with your DM privately, or with your group in your local OOC forum.  DMs, if you feel that someone is acting contrary to their alignment, talk it out with the player; a change of alignment might be appropriate, or the player can adjust her character's actions.

I'm not against discussing the matter, mind you, but it's one of the thorniest subjects in RPGs, and everyone has their own opinions about it.  We'll never reach a consensus on it, either.  So let's change the subject, please.

I could see how you would never reach a consensus on what the correct moral view is--I agree with that completely. If philosophers can't manage it, we have pretty poor odds ourselves.  However,  I would think you could reach a consensus that the SRD does not require one method or another, but instead leaves that choice, essentially, to the DM.
This message was last edited by the player at 22:48, Wed 13 June 2007.

*raises hand*

I noticed, but I didn't feel like saying anything, it's a common enough practice in most of my game's OOCs

as is everything else.  The DM is god, if he wants something to work a certain way, they can.  here's an example with my RL group.

Death isn't at -10 it's 1 round after you've reached -con score
Kip-up is a DC20 tumble check
in the games I run, there is no such thing as improved familiar, it works like a pally's or a druids companion/mount,
spells that you have to roll to hit, have a critical of 20 x2 unless stated otherwise in the spells description. (ray of enfeeblement is an example of this rule being applied)
various other rules I can't remember are there as well, these are just the majority.

you want haste to age a person 1 year like in 2nd ed, sure, go ahead, want it to give spell casters the ability to cast 2 spells like in 3.0? go ahead..etc etc.a DM doesn't have to follow the rules, he can consider them guidelines.

DMs get a rule 0: DM does whatever he wants with the rules
Players get theirs: DM goes overboard, you get fed up, leave


you can only go so far before noone will play with you

Oh noes! An alignment debate!

For the record, morality in Forgotten Realms is as shades-of-grey as it is in Eberron or anywhere else. The only difference is that the gods are real and pay attention. The whole alignment system and associated debates only really creeped in from standard D&D (Greyhawk).

Actual Alignment doesn't matter so much in FR. Gods are more interested in pursuing their portfolios, and as a result churches of supposedly Good deities have caused a lot of trouble. Well-intentioned acts have threatened the world, and evil acts have saved it. A LG silver dragon has ruined one nation, while a CE red dragon has saved another.

We do allow Necromancers (that is, Wizards specialising in Necromancy) here in RoA, and Neutral Clerics with a Necromancy focus. We even allowed the Dread Necromancer with a Restricted clause. These, as with Chaotic Neutral or Clerics of Evil deities, or any character with something iffy or problematic in their concept, should be worked out carefully with the DM. If being the cliche necromancer who digs up graves to steal corpses to animate as minions is going to cause problems - such as disgusted party members or paladins and torch-wielding villagers hunting him down - then the DM is free to turn it down. What matters is everyone's enjoyment of the game.

But if anyone comes up with a necromancy-focused character who can work in a traditional party and goodly campaign, then they'd probably be welcome to. All it really needs is a different spin.

Here's some ideas for non-evil necromancers I sketched out once, some useful, some not:

Undead Hunter: Fight fire with fire. The best way to fight undead as a wizard is with necromantic spells. And undead servants are resistant to many of another undead's attacks. If you can't beat 'em, join 'em. This kind of character walks a very narrow and dangerous path. Not to mention that people might mistake him for a genuine necromancer.

Baelnorn: FR Elves have been doing the Aerenal thing for ages, with good liches acting as guardians of ancient lore and heritage. They just haven't discovered Deathless yet. The character is an elf, or from some other culture where undeath is accepted, studying to be a baelnorn or something like it. Long-dead honoured ancestors are happy to rise again to help out.

Mortician/Funeral Director: Bit like above, but it's more of a job. Uses necromancy spells to make granny look nice for her funeral, and gets her moving again so she can attend it. And she can take care of a few loose ends, or the mortician does it for her. More to the point, this character is a shepherd of the dead, who helps them cross to the other side, defends graveyards, and generally honours the deceased.

Cursed: Got on the wrong side of a powerful lich or death god and now for some reason, all his spells are necromantic and he just can't help it. Gee. And zombies keep appearing to serve him. This requires glazing over the nature of wizards preparing spells in the morning. And acting dumb.

Take a look at Libris Mortis or the Spell Compendium for some necromancy spells that have useful benefits: healing, buffs, and undead destruction.

Lots of posts here since I last checked these boards, but I figured I'd mention that the Champions of Ruin FR-sourcebook mentions 'The end justify the means' as one of several 'Philosophies of Evil'. . .  :p

For the record, I've never suggested that any one evil act, no matter how big (except for jamming kittens down your pants) should affect your alignment, though a series of them probably should, even if done for a good and just cause.  That's my personal opinion, though - those of my fellow RoA DMs might vary.  :-)

silly people...

I never really have alignment problems, I don't play many classes that require alignments, so basically I get to play whatever alignments I want, just changing it and telling the GM when I feel it's appropriate.

alignment is so subjective, basically I'd just let the GM decide what he thinks is best, he's the boss.

The Undead Hunter that BCM mentioned could indeed be a very interesting one. Especially taking the Heretic of the Faith and worshipping Kelemvor, now that would be interesting :D

I am with DM Annihilator on this.  Back when I still had a table-top group, several of the guys had a really tough time playing their alignments.

"But I'm Chaotic Good, so it's okay for me to just go blazing into that inn and kill the one Zhent I know to be in there, even though I'm going to kill at least ten innocent people since I don't really know which one is the Zhent anyway."

That was just an example, but unfortunately that attitude was prevalent with a couple of them.  It disgusted everybody else, myself included.  So when I DM'd I added a spot to my record sheet where I kept track of each PCs stats and things.  It looked like a timeline and had their alignment firmly in the middle.  The top part was for Chaotic vs. Lawful and the bottom was for Good vs. Evil.  (Note: I never allow evil since I know I couldn't handle running that.)  Whenever a PC made a big shift as in the example I provided, I made a little mark that took him closer to the left on the bottom, where I had evil written.  More actions like that took him even closer.  Halfway there, he got a warning.  Three-quarters of the way there, a second warning.  Finally he did turn evil, and the idea turned out to be a hit.  Everybody in the game could see the path the guy took and nobody, not even the guy, was very upset that I made him change his alignment.  By the same token, though, an evil person could atone and change for the good.

Anyway, I'm awful at putting things in here, but I'll try to give you a visual.  If the person did a really good thing to atone for an evil act, I of course erased one of the marks.  A big part of that, except for evil spells and such, is DM discrtion, of course.

Chaotic            | Neutral             Lawful
-----------------------------------------------
Evil         | | | | Neutral               Good

Except that here on RoA, we don't have a singular 'GM'.  We have the collective GMs, and we all have different ideas/styles.

When I say yes to a character for my region (which is non-bubble) I would like it to be something that works for most GMs, and not just myself.  So it's good to know what the general concensus among all of the GMs are.

That's the meat of this discussion is about (Or, at least, what the initial question was about, to me anyways).  I'm pretty sure we all agree that everyone won't really agree on the idea of 'What is good/evil/etcs.'  But it's nice to have some sort of guideline and idea about things like 'Can a player play the classic necromancer archtype?' or 'What sort of necromancy focused characters are workable within RoA?'

-K

QFT.

I like that gradient thing

yes, it's a good idea, and if you think of it that way, then raising the dead, while evil, gets balanced out by the good things one does with them. Now, if you did selfish things once in a while with them, then you might need to do some non-undead good, but that's doable.

Ummmm wow....

I thought the dicussion was over and I come back a day or two later and I've got two full pages of posts to read.

I am in no way trying to start this discussion up again, or fan the flames if people still have more to say but I'm still confused and have one more question.

************************************************
Who has the final say on my character's concept?
************************************************

I know my first DM does, but like it was brought up by someone what if that DM decides to become a PC and drops the game. Is there a DM concil that decides stuff like this?

Not that it would matter much, but I did see several people post in directions my concept doesn't plan on going.

My concept is a cleric class.

The character would have a Chaotic netruel allignement that would allow the cleric to wield negative energy and cast evil spells. From my understanding that cleric would also be able to cast good spells as well. (Not sure on this)

The character would have a Major vampire bloodline (Good job on whoever called that), so being around "undead" is sort of a way of life.

The moral reasons would be simply failing to see undead as evil (Even though they are) and uses the tools he has to do good works to make up for his hertiatage. His intentions are key as he wants to do good, just with evil tools.

Now I'll be happy to write up a great deal more on the character's moral code, ethics, and anything else suggested/required, but what I really don't want is to have this character hung out to dry if my game dies/changes hands.

I wanted to try the necromacer for two reasons. One the moral conflict is very interesting as can be seen by the comments. Two is that every group I've ever joined always has someone "Having to play" the cleric/healer rather then "wanting to play" the cleric/healer.

I can tell I've never played with you then.  I love to play the cleric/healer.  :)

As do I, I've been having a lot of fun playing a cleric of Lathander in the North.  (I just wish the pace would pick back up, there's evil to smite and all.)  I'm also the 'find a need and fill it' type of player, finding out what roles everyone else has taken and making a character that fills in the gaps.  One thing I hate to hear from a DM is "forget the others, just play what you want."
   I tend to respond with "what I WANT is a well-rounded group, so tell me what they've got already."

As for the alignment/channeling energy/casting aligned spells, it's true that a neutral cleric can both channel negative energy (i.e., rebuking undead) and cast good-aligned spells.  It's an odd dichotomy, but workable; the group that playtested the Age of Worms campaign at Paizo's offices included such a cleric.

While you can definitely argue toward the usefulness of turning the enemy to your side, I don't think it compares with the option of clearing a crowded battlefield of zombies with one action.  (I tend to get pretty descriptive with clerics' turning undead, and spellcasting in general.  So I'm a sucker for special effects.)

Me too, me too!  You and I, it seems, are a lot alike.  :p

In all due fun I'd like to point out the slot that was open for DM Halaster to fill was a cleric slot. (I assume because the others wanted to play something else.)


I'm not saying clerics are not fun to play, I'm simply saying people would rather play other classes when given the choice.

You know, I was thinking about that, Halaster, while watching a soccer/football game which, of course, reminded me of Annihilator.  He's always telling me to play what I want to play.  That's great, but what I want to play is what we need.  :p  *giggles*

clerics can be fun, but I've only played one once, so you all probably know better

Clerics rule! I'm having a blast playing my greatsword-wielding dwarven powerhouse. I'm not sure he's that excellent as a healer, but as soon as I get access to lvl 2 spells and can start self-buffing more seriously he should be able to cut through hordes like a hot knife through butter!

They don't call them CoD-Zilla for nothing.

human cleric of kord here, I skimped on cha and dex, but she was such fun in combat, I got to wade in with her greatsword and then be close enough to help heal the front line easily

What's a CoD-Zilla?

Cleric or Druid - Zilla.  Get big, start pulling high tension wires down and hitting things with commuter trains.  Out Fighter your Fighter, and patch him up after combat, too.

Both use self buffs to beef up, and then wade into combat.  Druids have some great self buffs, a pet, and a number of animal forms that are really good.  Clerics have decent HD, good armor, access to feats like Divine Vigor, and fantastic self buffs starting with Divine Power and only getting better after that.

If you play a druid, try to convince your DM to allow you to have familiarity with jungle terrain, especially the sort that has dinosaurs in it.  (In Eberron, this is very easy to do.)  That way, once you make 5th level and get the wild shape ability, you can change into a velociraptor.

Impressive damage, the pounce ability, and a 60-foot land speed.  Can't ask for more.

Well, the Fleshraker Dinosaur from MMIII is the default stupidly powerful critter for druids.  Better damage, poison on 3 attacks, pounce, free trip attempts, free grapple and automatic pins, and 50 ft movement.

Probably only applicable for games where seeing a polar bear piloting a fighter jet is a real possibility.

I'll probably never play a druid, all the funky abilities would make my head go kablooey.

Alignment is one of the trickiest things in the game. One evil act is not going to make you evil. Repeated such acts will. One really bad act might put you on border of being Neutral depending on what it is. Good intentions do NOT though mean the act is less evil.

Good: The means matter as much as the ends
Neutral: Then ends justify the means somewhat (some evil means for a very good end) that is why alignment is balanced between the two poles
Evil: Ends justify any means and almost any means goes.

If your character does a evil act for very very good reasons repeatedly, you will end up neutral (and staying there). Alignments generally shift slowly depending the degree. Killing 10 babies because one will become the evil overlord will likely shift you to neutral immediately. Killing the 1 baby that will become evil overlord will be a small shift to start the degeneration. One game that I like is vampire (the original one) with its path of humanity for alignment. In that game, you have a humanity rating (very much like a rating on the good/evil scale). Each act is assigned a rating level and you do an act below your current level, you risk dropping down. Alignments are like that too. You do an evil act and you drop toward evil. Do a completely good act and you rise toward good. A neutral will have a good balance of the two, a good character will be almost all good.

However to help with spells, certain spells are classified as evil or Good (and lawful and chaotic) to clarify things. For example. No good cleric can EVER cast animate dead. It is an evil spell and good clerics can't cast spells of Evil. They can't summon fiendish creatures because such is evil spell. In another game elsewhere my good wizard used summon monster 5 to summon an evil creature. She had to, it was only way to defeat a regenerating monster far more powerful than her that was killing innocents. (Devil with weapon that caused bleeding 2/round that could not be healed normally, no stopping it since creature had no healing magic). She knew when she cast it was an evil act and hated it and regretted that there was no other way. It was a hit to her alignment. This is where tragedy sometimes enters into games and good characters can fall.

This actually is why my character in the Cormyr region is having problems. The so called Good harpers have been using means in her eyes that seem to match the evil Zhentarim. So much so that she isn't sure icly that they are the harpers and the ones coming to attack are Zhents instead of vice versa. That one of them is half drow and my character is gold elf with usual racial biases just makes it that much worse.

Again, this is your opinion of how the philosophies should work, and it is certainly one way a DM could handle it, but where does it say in the SRD that this is how it has to work?

I think people get an idea into their head about how this stuff should work and assume that it is in the SRD somewhere, when it isn't.  By the SRD the DM could legitimately handle it several other ways, including allowing the ends to justify the means when it is a really good end, the bad means is the only option, and the character truly intends to do good.

man... fitting everything into 26 pounds of carrying capacity is tough, but that's what I get for having 8 strength

If you murder 10 babies to kill one potential overlord, I don't care how good your end is, the means make it an evil act. This is why many of the realms harpers have shifted to neutral alignment for the western branch. The harpers did some evil acts for good means and Alienated both the temple of Tyr, the city of waterdeep and the morals of many of the east branch (lead by storm).

There are sayings that the road to hell is paved with good intentions. This is the same sort of thing. No matter how good the end, evil occured and you take the hit to your alignment for doing the evil deeds. Now your good deeds might counter it enough that your alignment stays put or that you only drop neutral but you did evil.

Just to throw two more weapons into the arena...


In the Complete Scoundrel there is a PRc called the Malconvoker. Basically the class summons fiends and other evil outsiders to do good works. The alignment restriction on the class is non-evil. This is in direct conflict with the concept below.


In the Book of Exalted Deeds it says very clearly that the concept of "Means to an End" is not acceptable. That means a Good character is expect to allow the whole world to die rather then kill one baby. Regardless of the inhuman quality to this view, it seems pretty clear what the intent is. Good characters simply can not do evil acts for any reason.

Now one last thing to throw out there. I've heard no one talk about this evil character turning good because he did a good act. It's a two way road after all.
Would a character be good, evil, or netrual, if they did a good act for evil ends. For example:

A character kills a dragon that was destorying the villages (A good act)

The reason the character did this was to get to the gold the draong had (A selfish possibly evil act)

The reason the character wanted the gold was to build an army to enslave the villages the character just "saved". (An obviously evil act)

Is this character evil?  If yes, at what point is he evil? Was he evil because of his intentions? (Keep in mind he has not enslaved the villagers yet, base your ruling on what the character has done so far.)
This message was last edited by the player at 06:58, Sun 17 June 2007.

No, this means an exalted character cannot do evil acts for any reason. An exalted character could probably lose their powersfor doing that, while a good character might take a hit against their alignment.

good =/= exalted

now, that's not to say that my good characters would kill the baby, most of my characters don't have the rigid view of fate being a one track thing, and thus would feel that stealing it and putting it in the care of an undisputibly good person would be sufficient, though they wouldn't be too happy about taking it away fom it's family.
This message was last edited by the player at 08:44, Sun 17 June 2007.

Is there any chance we can stall this argument?  Theologians have been debating for centuries about just what constitutes "evil".  That's why the Book of Exalted Deeds is rated M, it brings up some very complicated moral issues.  If you REALLY want to discuss degrees of evil and all the morality that goes along with it, I'll gladly make another forum for it.

Seriously, people, the constant debate is really interfering with the signal-to-noise ratio in this thread.  I'm glad to see the amount of posting, but can we take it outside the general OOC area?

we could talk about something cheerier

so, has anyone caught my edit of the subject?

lol pink, pretty much did for my part but I was staying out of this discussion as a whole.  I think that, while all of us are very intelligent and capable of making sound arguments... this is one of those discussions that just needs to be let go.

I mean, come on, we're discussing morality and good versus evil in realistic terms... alignment is the biggest farce of dnd.  It's just there to give some sense of identity.  Ruleswise, paladins and what else... let's see... cleric deities need it to gauge character depth and portrayability?

In real life I would consider myself chaotic good.  I hate the law but I obide by it.  Why?  Because I'm not rich.  If I broke the law, I would be sentenced tried and punished to full extent because I cannot afford lawyers who have the ability to bend the rules through their economically based connections to the powers that be.

Law is a craptastic alternative to logical application of imprejudice.  As such, if you are a piece of crap or not at all becomes irrelevant, that you broke the law regardless of your intention or the circumstances prevailing *and* how much  money you can afford to spend to validate your actions is, in fact, what justifies all lawful decision as to your good or evil judgement.

Look at Paris Hilton for example.  She broke the law by driving on a suspended license.  She is sentenced accordingly and it is a top news story for some God forsaken reason.  I grow sick and tired of it day by day but it is as severe a breakdown in the lawful/chaos dynamic as anything I can imagine.  In reality, lawful application of the rules creates chaos.  Chaotic application of the rules creates chaos.  Means to an end is irrelevant, all means lead to chaos.

My point is alignment is a retarded (not mentally instable for those of you who mistake my use of the word as nonPC... instead retarded as in flame-retardant maybe... if you come at me with some freaking massive uproar in the defense of mentally unstable people, I'm going to proclaim you severely mentally instable) application of means to an end.  It is ridiculous to even take seriously.  Good people sometimes do bad things and bad people sometimes do good things.  What we each, as individuals, think to be  good or bad is - in the large picture - not at all aplicable.
This message was last edited by the GM at 09:33, Sun 17 June 2007.

I'd probably be around NG, but I have my moments for all of the alignments, with the possible exception of LN

the truth is that people don't really fit into 9 distinct slots, the world works on shades of grey
This message was last edited by the player at 10:17, Sun 17 June 2007.

Hi!
Anyone know of an exotic (light) thrown weapon (preferably somewhat similar to the dagger)? Dagger won't do because I want to take classes in exotic weapon master. I would like it to be 19-20 critical (otherwise I would just use shuriken).

Frostburn (The book) has a couple of wierd Exotic Thrown weapons.

Glot and Razer Skipdisk.  They both have 18-20 critical.  Glot let you do trip attack, even.

-K

nice, I looked a bit for ya, but would never have even thought of looking in frostburn.

<- Cold Lands DM, otherwise, I wouldn't have known.

-K

Wow thanks!

Um, any idea what kind of weapons they are? How do you exactly attack with them (rp sense)?

Both of them are sort of thrown low the the ground and skipped across.  As such, they have 10' range increment, but their range increment increases to 20' on solid ground, and 30' when skipped across icy ground.

-K

so you're essentially taking EWP(hockeypuck)

Indeed.  It says you *can* throw normally (Like to the air bourne target) at 10' increment...but where's the fun in that!

-K

Dungeons&Dragons: Tactics for the PSP is coming later this year, check out the official homepage: http://www.atari.com/d&dtactics/

I see this as an excellent tool for character build trials...

these things never really work like pen and paper (or online), they lack human flexibility :(

That's the main reason I dislike RPG video games, specially the ones that are based off DnD.

now if DnD online had gone with forgotten realms instead of Ebberon, I /would/ have bought it..Sure, I might not be able to play a custom build character like I can in Tabletop, but it's F@#$ing Forgotten Realms! ...my soul weeps..

Sure, the games are a bit one-dimensional and many aspects of roleplaying are lost (like actual roleplaying). But, for testing builds and parties in combat, they work very nicely, revealing strengths and weaknesses. And it gives me a D&D fix!

*giggles*  I'm thinking of getting the game.  Not necessarily to try things out, but just to play a violent video game.  :)

Gamewise, it should be a little like Baldurs Gate, rather than NWN. You manage a whole party, with a protagonist and supporting characters. A major difference will be that combat will be strictly turn based, rather than the pseudo real-time combat offered by Bioware.

Turn=based is better for me what with my "helper" and all.  :p  My son always has to "play" with me and so real-time games and I no longer get along.  But when he's asleep I love to play games like Empire Earth and Age of Empires in real-time.

A really good game for turn-based D&D combat is Temple of Elemental Evil.  While there are some aspects of the game it doesn't use (like grappling), it does just about everything else right.  If you have an ability that can be used in increments (like Power Attack, or laying on hands), it gives you a slider to set how much you use.  It does counterspelling, metamagic, spontaneous conversion of spells*, everything.  None of the class abilities are nerfed, and it doesn't have NWN's thing of giving clerics half their domain spells.  Basically, it's as close you can get to playing the pen-n-paper rules on a computer, short of using something like RPoL or Fantasy Grounds.

* Spontaneous healing in ToEE has a strange bug that I discovered, that makes the game a LOT easier to go through.  I won't reveal it here, though.

Any idea where I could get that pretty cheap?  I'm strapped for cash while hunting for that ever elusive first teaching job and raising three kids by myself.

I picked up my copy of ToEE at Wal-mart for $10 in their bargain rack. However, since I started playing World of Warcraft, I almost can't play linear single-player type games. (Though BGII is an exception since it is not so linear, but NWN2 is painful - I am waiting for expansions/modules)

I just ordered a copy on Halaster's advice.  It's also 10 bucks on Amazon, but you have to pay for shipping.  ($4 more or so I think.)

Ugh, ToEE.

I found that game to be buggy and awkward. Not to mention slow and boring. And the voice acting is excruciating. Most encounters are terribly easy, while others are painfully difficult.

There's a fan-made patch/mod floating around that fixes most bugs, but introduces a few others. It also gives masterwork weapons which is a bonus.

There's an internal encyclopaedia (it's the PHB essentially) which is helpful, though not readily accessible.

There's few good magic items, and most of the good magic weapons are exotic, like bastard swords and spiked chains. I'd advise you to check out websites that list them all so you don't wind up taking Weapon Focus in useless weapons.

And Magic Item Crafting barely works. You can get maybe 1 enchantment on an item. Afterwards, it just fails and nothing happens.

Don't play a Diviner. IIRC, there weren't even enough divination spells to fill the bonus spell-slots, and none of them were useful.

Killing Zuggtmoy at the end was fun though. Mainly in the sense of "thank the gods I've finished that accursed game!"

Do you have a specific patch / website you recommend?  I will just install the patch straight off.

I think it was called Circle Of 8, or by a group of fans called Circle of 8. It's difficult to find though. Don't forget to get official patches as well.

GameBanshee is pretty good for RPG games. Here's ToEE:
http://www.gamebanshee.com/templeofelementalevil/

I'd strongly recommend getting the fanmod, myself.  It adds some new quests, fixes some things that were messed up (and, really, what software doesn't ship with a few bugs anymore?), and adds a lot more items.

http://www.co8.org/forum/showthread.php?t=3543

I wouldn't recommend finishing the extra side-quest they added to the town though.  Whenever I tried to, it would freeze the game.  That might've been fixed by now, and it might've just been something with my computer, but your mileage may vary.

Do you want to DM for RoA? Please say you want to DM for RoA.

'Coz we need DMs, lots of them, for all sorts of games to run for your fellow PCs. You too can become part of this grand adventure, and have all the fun your DM is no doubt having.

We DM for you - will you DM for us?

PM DMs Annihilator and BadCatMan to discuss.

Besides, Mike throws toga parties with lots of pizza over in the DM's lounge.  ;)  *giggles*

And he brings all kind of pizza as well. What do you want. American style or italian style. We got it all. Come joine us.

do you have hawaiian?

We3ll I can always make some if you want it. I'm the chef at the lounge and can make whatever you want. I promise that you will not be dissapointed.

After 20 minuites a wolf come over with a hawaiian on the back.

I'm in, mmmmmmm, pinapples ^.^

(I was in anyway)
This message was last edited by the player at 22:15, Sun 24 June 2007.

Oh the prospective DM kind of made me unsure that you where all the way through the door and it was shut. But It seems it is.

I kinda think badcatman forgot to change it over

or maybe he wwas planning to change it when I started

I've updated your access here, and if you've been given GM access you'll have to change your name by yourself.  The only person in each RoA that could change it for you would be the owner, so you could ask either BCM or Anni to change it for you depending on where you're at.

Check out a new arena game:

link to "Arena at the Vortex of Worlds (DnD 3.5 Gestalt)"

Hope to see some of you there!

I've slowly been paying attention around here.

I see the talk about NWN2... How is it?  Is it better then the first?  I liked the first, but I wasn't overly keen on the small party... and in the BG games, I wasn't keen on not being able to build your party, just the main character.

When answering, please don't compare the game to Evercrap, or World of Worsecraft.  Both of those suck.  Horribly.  And I refuse to downgrade my CPU to a pile of junk just to play either of those.  I wasn't thrilled with DDO either.

When it comes to MMORPGs... Gimme my Advanced Power Armor, and my Mini Gatling Laser in Fallout 3, and my Pipboy, and I'll be fine. :D

House!  My favorite show, my favorite doctor!  The only doctor I like, actually.  :p  Wait!  I forgot Dr. Kovac, or however you spell it.  He's awesome, too.  :)
This message was last edited by the GM at 14:07, Thu 28 June 2007.

It is a great show.

I like the entire cast.

I noticed something about this game though...  Why am I being pegged with PMs that I can't see?

I do too.  But he's always been one of my favorite actors.  Ever since the old English show Black Adder.  It's Monty Python-esque.

Anyway, it's likely because of your name change.

I still play Fallout 1 & 2 for enjoyment, I didn't know they had a 3rd.

hello mr. house!

is it lupus?

gotta love that show

I'm visiting Hell for a few days.

If anyone needs me or my characters, then I'm probably unavailable.

This place?

Sadly no, just metaphorically.

My PhD supervisor has a habit of surprising me with big projects based on unfinished work shortly before they're due. This tends to happen when I accidentally meet her around the building, which makes me wonder just when she was planning on telling me. :(

yeah anyone have Never winter nights 2 ? Worth buying or no?

Worth buying, if you've got the hardware to handle it.  I'm running a 1.9 GHz machine with 768 MB of RAM and a 512 MB video card, and it runs around 20 FPS with all the graphics turned down; acceptable for MY standards, but a lot of people on the forums are spoiled for that all-important 60 FPS framerate.

The story is a lot more involved, and better told, than the one in NWN1.  They've updated things to the 3.5 rules, and even included things from some of the new splatbooks — you can play a warlock, for instance.  They have the same array of prestige classes, with some new ones thrown in.  They've added a lot more spells as well, for all classes.

Unlike NWN1, they actually allow subraces in fact, rather than just making it a name you select.  If you want to play a tiefling, or a dark elf, or an aasimar, you can, though you have to deal with the level-adjustment penalty.  You can also start with a background trait, which gives some minor bonuses and penalties, and affects how some people act toward you.

You start getting henchmen pretty early, without having to shell out coin for them.  Each has his or her own agenda, and the way they respond in the later stages of the game depend on how you'd been treating them beforehand.  The problem is, the game limits how many of them you can bring along at any one time (usually three), and character-relevant stories only happen if you have the relevant NPC in your party when you encounter the event.

There is a cheat code that lets you increase the number of followers, and I highly recommend using this.  It makes the fights a lot easier, since you have more combatants, and ensures you'll get those cutscenes and freebies.  When your group gets very large (more than about six members), you'll take a framerate hit in large fights, but I think it's worth the price.

Unlike NWN1, you can tweak the UI itself; there's a lot of people that have made alternate inventory windows, more toolbars, resized minimaps, etc.  There's also a community that's working on making all of the core and prestige classes from the various rulebooks available.  I don't know what their progress is on it, but you'd be able to play things like duskblades and warmages.

Oh, for those of you who're playing Temple of Elemental Evil, if you want to know that bug I found that makes the game a LOT easier, I'll share it via PM.

http://fallout.bethsoft.com/teaser.html

There.  For the question concerning Fallout 3...  There's the teaser link.

Well, I'm back from Hell. But excuse me while I recuperate and catch-up.

Despite everything, I got absolutely not a damned thing done.

Because Linux is evil. Pure evil and madness spawned from the outer darkness.

I was all ready to run my calculations and simulations, and went off to university. On a Saturday. I hate working weekends. I log into the computers, make my changes then compile. All bad, errors and wierdness. It turns out one of the other guys had decided to do an update of the computers last night. Although it started out looking fine, it had in fact screwed over the compilers and other stuff. The update itself was buggy.

I spent the rest of the day fiddling and waiting for him to fix it, while he got nowhere. At one stage he tried a dodgy hack and broke everything, though luckily for him he fixed that later. He's probably still working on it.

You see, this is all because Linux is hideously complicated and makes it all to easy to screw everything up.

So big waste of time, nothing done, all effort for naught, no images of acoustic waves propagating through funky environments calculated for talks and conference, and me just too tired and frustrated to even muck about with RoA.

At least I won the argument on Windows vs Linux. :D And by default, Apple Macs. Windows is the lesser of three evils.

SHAME ON YOU!!!!! Apple Macs rule, they are far superior to any windows model, end of story.

'pends on what yo want to do with them

if you're a normal, well adjusted person they're great, if your a computer geek wanting to tinker with it, not so fine

I am "the" computer geek and the only thing I will ever use is a Mac!! Windows is extremely bad and don't come close to what a mac can do, ohhh and no viruses XD

get a firewall, don't download porn, don't pirate things from questionable places, and windows is fine

Apples are round and fruity and dull, like the fruit. Fruit-flavoured lollypop computers for the technologically illiterate masses. Granted, it probably wouldn't have broken, but of course, one wouldn't be able to do anything of import with it in the first place. They only get so few viruses (yes, there are some) because 90% of the computer-using population know better than to use them, and 99.99% of virus makers are looking for more spread.

Of course, the virus makers are most likely to be embittered Linux-wielding loners out to prove their misplaced sense of superiority. "Yes, you tinker with the inner most workings of your machine, and congratulations, you just broke it. Now you can spend a week rebuilding it."

Only for the basic average person. Me? I'm not so normal, heheheheh. So only the Mac shall suit my taste, anyway I do alot of photography and you know Windows can not come close to what a mac can do with photography!

Oh yeah, have you ever seen an elderly Mac? Like more than a few years old? I'm talking iMacs. You can't even clean them out and reinstall.

A boulder with a seam of silicon has more computing power, while a PC is still marching on just fine.

Yeah, multimedia doesn't count. :p Now, networking, programming and playing games - these are all worthwhile computational pursuits.

FTWindows!

This by far is one of biggest debates of modern day and we can argue all day, I say MAC RULES and since I am of course god it is/will be true!

<Music>

Tale as old as time,
Song as old as rhyme
PC and the beast

</music>

Thank you, thank you very much! *lip curls*

Ok, to get us off the everlasting PC/Mac Debate, I thought I'd share a treasure that I found with you all...

My wife and I were going to garage sales yesterday, and hadn't found anything that caught our eye.  But then I saw IT laying there on a blanket amongst some toys...  A HeroQuest game!  I hurried over to it, and picked it up, not even caring how much it was.  I opened it, and found everything there (except I now see the information (gm) screen isn't there), and all in mint condition!  (Some of the skeletons still had the little plastic bits between their skull and scythe)  The tag on the top said $1.50!  I couldn't believe it!  The kid who was sitting next to the woman running the sale said that he tried playing it once, but couldn't figure it out.  He then admitted that he hadn't even read the rules book.  They didn't know how much that game is worth.  I searched for prices, and have found anywhere from $49 to $111 (excluding the Ebay auctions that start at around $9.99.  I'm hoping to actually play it today, but I might have to wait until my gaming group gets together in a week.  :D

Someones lucky!! I wish I went to that garage sale!! = /

Hero Quest.

Very first "RPG" game I ever played. :P

And to add to the mix of coolness about the game, I used to always take the monster cards and mix them with the treasure cards and keep it behind my screen so the players couldn't see what was next.  I remember even building my own maps and stuff for that game...  Oooollllld school!

I saw that post from Annihilator. Just wanted to say that I have
Slept in Hell
Dinned in Hell
Watched TV in Hell.

HQ very strongly encourages the players to exploit a loophole in the rules, the one regarding the 'search for treasure' action.  The rules state that, if a monster is drawn on the attempt, that said monster appears in a space adjacent to the searcher.  So, with 4 heroes, stick one in a corner, and have the other three surround him before he searches.  No adjacent spaces open, so no monster.

It was an interesting game, for a short time, but I don't think it's worth upwards of $100.

Actually, in the rules I have, it states if no adjacent square is present, it appears in the closest open square...  No loophole there.

I guess they fixed it! I've always heard of that game but have never seen it.

Thanks Halaster, I might actully go out and purchase NWN2, I was just waiting and figured I would buy a ps3 instead.

Still going to get a ps3 but might add that game to the cart....

instead of mac vs pc

how  about 360 vs ps3 ??????

or is it no contest? lol

The Wii beats both systems, its cheap, its good and its a helluva alota fun!

I go for the Wii too, just because I like the thing... and because anybody can pick it up and play it.

But the 360 is still a beast that smears the PS3 all the way around the board.

PS3 is a great Blu Ray DVD player--and that's about it at the moment.  The system itself is great, but there are no games for it that I would even call decent, let alone good.  I only use mine for DVDs and PS2 games, and that's sad.  If you buy a PS3 you are buying it on hopes for the future releases.  Personally I would wait to buy one unless you want a Blue Ray player.

Wii is a lot of fun; seems to be more group games though, besides Zelda.  We love it though... it has my wife playing some video games for the first time ever.  And my 80-year-old grandmother, who was a champion bowler but has never touched a video game in her life, firmly trounced me at Wii bowling.  It's impressively intuitive to use.

...And certain titles you may expect to see on PS3 are actually making the jump to 360 instead.

Such as Devil May Cry...

For next gen the order of best consoles in my opinion is:

Wii (cuase its cheap, fun and is overall a really cool system)
XBox 360 (medium pricing, great graphics with a bunch of great titles out and coming out)
PS3 (way too over-priced, not many good titles and the blue-ray technology is not very popular so alot of the money invested in PS3 is gone to waste)

It is funny how I go to different sites and talk to my friends and EVERYONE I mean EVERYONE agrees that the Wii is the best.

Wii
360
ps3

in that order and like everyone stated above its because of those simply reasons. no games for the ps3....

I was going to buy a ps3 but figured I would wait. I have heard horror stories about the 360 dying out in about 8 months ( hence why I did not get one right away )so who knows

But I live in California and I cannot find a Wii for the life of me, LOL all sold out. Dammit to hell.

That's crazy.  Wii's are all over the place here. :)

I found that HeroQuest game at a thrift store, mint condition, every single piece there, for $1.00.  It's how I'm going to introduce the kidlets to DnD rules and stuff when they're a bit older.  I found a copy of RailBaron once for $1.50 at a thrift store, mint, and it ebays for upwards of $75.  In the condition it's in, I could clear $100 easy.

I think I'm going to take Anni yard saling and to some thrift stores.  So far he loves the U.S.  He got a free meal at Taco Bell for being a foreigner his first time in one.  :p

That's sweet.  I'd have been the guy to hook him up, too.  Well, except I don't work at Taco Bell.  I work at a bar, and I'm a caterer for big parties, but I'd have still hooked him up. :D

I still have my HeroQuest game.  Now the box is shot, but I still have all of the pieces (and manual... I even have the cutout card thingies for the players) and all of it looks fine to me.  :D

Here's an interesting question...

And it really brings to mind, a quote by my good friend Carlos Mencia "De Dee De".

Why, would you play a priest of death, and go around talking about how you're going to raise an undead army, and then wonder why nobody wants you in their group?

Happy 4^th of July! =D

I wonder what type of Character I should play now?  I am thinking maybe a Warmage, or perhaps just a regular Wizard, with the Invocation school specialty.  Thoughts from the other gamers & DMs?

Vicodin popping healer, I think.

-K

Ironically enough, I was thinking a Half-Orc Paladin (2) / Cleric (1) of Tyr from the Dalelands.

Anybody know where I can get a download for dungeon map making program?

Dungeon Crafter is pretty good. Very simple to use, and has some tilesets to be found on the web.

v1.41 and v2
http://www.geocities.com/blood_tyger/index.html

v3, though I haven't tried it yet
http://www.dungeoncrafter3.com/download.php

Well I have tried v 1.41 and v2. They are good, but it's a shame that you can't downloaad it any more.

As for v3. I would not recommend it. I think it's not better then the other two versions.

Version 3 is also still in development; they released a download to let people play around with it, bug-test it, and make up tiles for it.

And you CAN download 1.4, just look in the Legacy section of the site.  If you're having trouble locating it, I'll be happy to send you a direct link to the file.

Could you send me the link pls.

Here you go. Now that I found it I downloaded it as well.

For those that missed it, this is the link to download the older versions of DC, along with their tilesets:

http://dungeoncrafter3.com/legacy/

I was told in no uncertian terms to make sure I came in and checked in in here, and said hello, so if there was anyone that missed me, well, I'm here, I'm fine, I'm alive and in one piece, and most of my sanity is still intact.
   How have you all been doing? I Missed you guys.

and we have missed you fairiefire. We are doing good right

*waves hello to the unknown person*
This message was last edited by the GM at 08:43, Tue 17 July 2007.

*big hug for FairieFire*  Whew, am I glad to see you back here!  :-)  I was worried about you!

*makes sweeping bow to FaerieFire*

Greetings and welcome back, lady.  You've been missed.  Hope you're doing better.

FairieFire?! Welcome back!

Yay! Good to have you back!

Welcome back!

That's because we've been claiming cover.  Get that Dexterity up, you might hit next time.  :)

Believe it or not, even I missed you.

Hello to you FaerieFire and welcome back.

Thanks for all the welcome backs, you guys always make me feel right at home. I see we have some new faces here that is very good.....

I've got Dungeon Crafter 2, but I don't like any of the overland selections that come with it.

I've also got the Campaign Mapper software that came with the old DnD Core Rules program years ago.

I need to know how I can save the map file from campaign mapper (trust me, it doesn't let you save it as a readable file - at least anything my cpu can read) so that I can use my maps drawn on it...

Or, I need some good overland stuff for DC 2.

Anybody? :D

IIRC, the tiles for DC2 are jpg files.  Small ones are 20x20, and larger ones are combinations of it.

So what you need to do is somehow get those images from Campaign Mapper, put it into some sort of image editing software like Photoshop, or Paint, crop what you want, change the size into 20x20 or multiple there of, and save as .jpg file.

If you really can't figure out how to have Photoshop/etcs read the Campaign Mapper, your last resort should be opening the map/map segments you want in Campaign Mapper, and then take the screenshot.

Let me know if you need to know more specifics.

-K

*grins big time*

Anni and I have been so worried!  We talk about you often, wondering how you are.  We are both so thrilled your back, safe and sound!  *lots of hugs*

On a completely unrelated note, our wizard for Underdark has been unresponsive for over a month, anyone with an orphan arcanist, or less than 2 characters who is interested, shoot me a PM.

May be we ought to expand our realms I have made a tottaly new world it doesn't exactly fit standards but I can make it adapt to any style I like.

Well, we have 'bubble' system, where a DM can open up his/her campaign of choice, and *not* follow the RoA standard.  There are Monster-Race-As-Player bubble region, Psionics bubble region, and so on.  The characters are then labeled 'Bubble', and may not move around to other regions easily.

If you are interested in DMing, you should send PM to…someone.  BadCatMan, I think :p

-K

Not necessarily a bad idea...but it is very hard to find DMs for bubble regions if the DM of that region, for some reason, needs to quit or disappears.  I am not the boss, but I would say anybody that wants to run a bubble region should be firmly established as both a player and a DM before opening a new bubble region.

However, I am not trying to stifle the idea whatsoever.  Perhaps, jhpa4, you could try DMing or CO-DMing here in RoA for awhile and then, when the timing is right, if it is okay with RoA leadership, try that idea.

DM Kremti is right, though, PM DM BadCatMan to discuss this.  He very well might say it's okay as is.  Either way, he'll know what you should do.

if the campaign settings are different, you'd probably want to have a "ROA 9: Adventures, Assorted" or some such

I'll take the advise to try to establish my self here.

[10 blank lines suppressed]

 off subject Is anyone here thinking of starting a Lord of the rings community for if you are I would like to help you any way I can.

I've got some people interested, no more PMs for underdak, ok? :D

You know there is a role play game they made for films.  I like the system but nobody seem to have it or what play it.

What's it called, Elerndale?  And what do you mean by 'made for films'?  Do you roleplay actors/actresses?  Or is a film design tool that happens to also be a game?

OK history of Lord of the Rings and roleplay.

Back in days before the Lord of the Rings Films there was Lord of the rings role play game.  It was a type of Rolemaster if know that set of rules.  We talking 1980+

This not game I am talking about.

When the films came out they came up with two major games.  Table top figures game.  Not this game.  They also make a Lord of Rings Role play game.  It called The Lord of The Rings Roleplay Game.

It system is very link to world and film.  If your looking for fireballs and flying magic user - forget it.  It made by decipher

Link:- http://lotrrpg.fanhq.com/

If anybody starts one I have elf law-master I really want play.

I've never loved mucking around in someone elses setting which was constructed for one epic adventure, but not much else. I've never felt confortable.

How many Books have you read by Tolkin?

Actually, the one from the 80's was sold by Iron Crown, and was called Middle Earth Role Playing or MERP.  It was based very strongly on the Rolemaster/Character Law rules.  Not a bad system, and some fascinating sourcebooks.

I have seen the new one in stores, but have never played it.  You really seem to like it, though.  Tell me about it.  What really stands out as a plus for that game system?

And even though your last question wasn't directed at me, I've read most of the Tolkien that I've been able to track down since I first read the Hobbit in about 1975.  I've even read some of the stuff that Christopher has extracted from his father's notes and files, but they generally seem to lack the flair that the professor brought to his material.

I only read the book - yet to play :(

The main thing is keeps to idea of world.
You play main race and class (If played Lord of rings on line it like them).

You have both health and fatigue.
Spells are limited and skill based often.
No - fire ball, cure light wounds, spells are nature based (unless your evil).
Character creation is complicated but give you change make own character not just another fighter and not just another fighter.

Your wounds effect how effective you are - make complicated but it realistic.
No you taken 50 hp and only have 4 left but still running around as if not wounded.

You have additional class to work to wards.

Class and race traits which effect your character but again you have choose.

It give good feel of being in middle earth and dangers.

Sounds like fun.  If I see it again, I'll probably give it a closer look.

I have a PDF floating around here somewhere that details how to use the Rolemaster rules in Middle-Earth, and it doesn't limit itself to the period covered in J. R. R.'s trilogy (i.e., the Third Age) — it has information on races, classes, and skills to allow people to run games in any age between the First and the Fourth.

Incidentally, MERP was first, and Rolemaster evolved as a non-Middle-Earth version, though much of what was covered there remained.  (They just made things like the 'human' races, and languages, non-setting-specific, though it's easy enough to change some of it back.)

I tried setting up a game using this document and the RM rules in another site, but everyone involved had different versions of the game (there are four or five, and while they're essentially the same, the differences can catch you off-guard), and my initial ideas for what to tell became moot with the character-types that everyone opted for.

I've entertained the idea of trying again here, but I'd really want to get my hands on the latest version of RM (some of the minor changes have a big impact on play), and I'd prefer to have a scripted scenario first.  I'm running way too many games as it is, I'd pretty much have to make it a no-brainer for myself.

all of the LOTR books, including hobbit, and I tried to read that thing with all the mythology, but it was horrible :(

it still goes that I don't feel comfortable in that setting, though that shouldn't stop anyone else playing in it.

The Silmarillion? Sitting on my shelf,but I only got a few chapter in befoer I gave up with it :)

that one, yea, it's not as good.

On another note, just finished harry potter last night, somebody finish so I can talk about it.

Finished it Monday evening!

I woulda finished it saturday, but I've been busy :(

Yes isn't it terrible when RL gets in the way of really important matters.

yea, too bad I need the munnies to buy more books.

Thats why I didn't say to much in the pm. I don't want to spoil it for anyone but its hard as no one else I know has finished it. 8-(
This message was last edited by the player at 11:12, Thu 26 July 2007.

Anyway is anybody interested in running a game using the new rules.
As said you have 4 ages to play with and loads of battle without getting near the ring quest.

If you want to talk about it, please use the <spoiler> command

I might like to watch a game, but I don't have time to run one, and don't have the rules yet anyway.  If you find one though, please let me know.

I finished the HP book in less than 11 hours, and that's not subtracting the time it took for me to feed the kids, put them to bed, post on RPoL and RoA, etc., and so on.  Great book.

that's about what I take usually, course, I did it in spurts over 3 days

The quickest I've ever read a novel was less then 6 hours.  It was Watchers, by Dean Koontz.

Other then that, the other novels I read very quickly are the Richard Marcinko novels.  But those to me, are pretty quick reads.

I can read a normal novel, like DragonLance, FR, Laurell K. Hamilton, etc., in about three hours with only potty/beverage breaks.  I love to read.

I know a guy who can read David Eddings's entire Belgariad or Mallorean in a single day. These are 6-7 book series, and big books too.

But then he reads them on a regular basis out of habit, and books get quicker with familiarity.

Actually each series consist of five books. I was about to that myself, but finding an entire day for uninterrupted reading is pretty rare now, but when I was a teenager I could knock out both in a single weekend. Of course my books are pretty well falling apart by now. I just recently had to rebuy the Belgariad as a two book compilation set.

I kill those similarly quickly, I consider them semi-lite novels. "animal farm" took me an hour years ago. The novels that take me the longest are RR Martin, I have to take breaks to mourn when he kills off one of the characters I like. I took a week long break when he killed off one of the major characters.

On the topic of FR novels and stuff, I've recently found Elaine cunningham, which "windwalker" most likely knows... wow, I'm going to have to go on a book-raid soon. I'd be broke if the second hand bookstore didn't have so many FR novels.

I do, yes.  Somewhere I think I have something of hers...  Can't remember now and I'm not at home with my books so I'm not sure.

so your name is windwalker and in no way related to elaine cunningham?

starlight and shadows, Liriel?

It wasn't no.  I 'made it up' on my own.  I wanted a name for a fairy because at the time, two of the other three female DMs here were fairies (and Raven is an angel according to littlewing).  So I did it on my own.  Later on I did see that Windwalker book at a used book store by Cunningham, and I bought it.  But I haven't read it yet.  I need to get the other books first.

Those books are cool. I wanna be like Fyodor when I grow up!

her books are better than salvatore in my opinion, the style and characterization tend to be a bit better.

The Belgariad!

I haven't read (or for that matter, seen) those books / that name since I was in school.

Bah.

Belgarian of Riva.

I was fond of Kal Zakath myself. :P

I recall one particular scene where he's discussing plans of war with his council, and one of them tells him that war on two fronts is madness, and that war on three fronts is suicide.

wait, huh?

Go Belgarian! One of my favorite series! (sorry for the jumping into conversation)

we don't mind, it's the OOC, you're fine

now, do that in an IC thread and you're dead :P

The windwalker series...good trilogy

Although the first two books were in 2nd ed ....thats when Drow weapons were destroyed once they were in sunlight.

I forgot all about Fydor....

I like elaine and Salvatore...both good decent writers.

My all time Personal Fav

Everis Cale

Elfshadow was my first Forgotten Realms novel and I love it. I like Salvatore too. Drizzt is one of my favorite characters. I really don't understand how that adventuring group fights wuthout a cleric. :)

Easy, darlin', they don't get hit very often.  :p  Except for Bruener, but he's a tough old coot and can take it.  *giggles*

*grabs Kindred and hugs him like crazy before letting him go again with more giggles*

adventuring sin cleric is more suspenseful, and planning becomes much more important

I've done it for a while, befre we got a cleric :P

On the other hand, our D20 Modern party did fine without a healer for ages... then an NPC medic showed up and mysteriously we all started getting a lot more badly injured...