Path: news.tuwien.ac.at!aconews.univie.ac.at!newscore.univie.ac.at!newsfeed.ecrc.net!nntp.abs.net!newsfeed.enteract.com!news.enteract.com!not-for-mail From: aardy@enteract.NOJUNK.com (Aardy R. DeVarque) Newsgroups: rec.games.frp.dnd Subject: rec.games.frp.dnd FAQ: 1/9 -- Introduction Date: Mon, 01 Feb 1999 13:53:55 GMT Organization: Aardy's Aardvark Emporium Lines: 300 Message-ID: <36b5b172.46507414@news.enteract.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: 207.229.149.73 Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Newsreader: Forte Agent 1.5/32.452 Xref: news.tuwien.ac.at rec.games.frp.dnd:364813 Archive-name: games/dnd/part1 Posting-frequency: monthly Last-modified: January 1999 URL: http://www.enteract.com/~aardy/faq/rgfdfaq.html FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS REC.GAMES.FRP.DND Version 4.78 Compiled by Joel Hahn Last revised 01/21/99 Introduction Welcome to the Rec.Games.Frp.Dnd Frequently Asked Questions document! Disclaimer TSR, Dungeons & Dragons, Advanced Dungeons & Dragons, D&D, AD&D, Dungeon Master, Dragon, Dungeon, Greyhawk, Forgotten Realms, DragonLance, Ravenloft, Planescape, Dark Sun, Mystara, Spelljammer, Birthright, and Player's Option are registered trademarks of TSR, Inc. Several other trademarked names also appear throughout this work; the author hereby states that he is using the names, including the above-mentioned ones, in editorial fashion only and to the benefit of the trademark owners, with no intention of infringing in any way upon the trademarks. The author is not affiliated with nor endorsed by TSR, Inc. or Wizards of the Coast. Throughout this FAQ, I use the male pronouns. This is not meant to belittle the contributions of female gamers, but rather to serve as a simple generic pronoun. Copyright notice, legal mumbo jumbo This FAQ is copyright (C) 1999 by Joel A. Hahn. All rights reserved. It may be redistributed freely, but only in its entirety; no part of it may be changed, added, or deleted. This means you, bub! Note for new users Before I get into the nitty-gritty, there's one thing which must be said. If you are new to Usenet, or if you aren't new but never heard about the guidelines & helpful pointers for Usenet, there are six posts you should go read as soon as possible in the newsgroup news.announce.newusers. These have the subjects: Emily Postnews Answers Your Questions on Netiquette Rules for posting to Usenet A Primer on How to Work With the Usenet Community Answers to Frequently Asked Questions about Usenet Hints on writing style for Usenet What is Usenet? If your server does not carry news.announce.newusers, your sysadmin is doing you a disservice--demand that it be added! These files are also available via FTP from rtfm.mit.edu, in the /pub/Usenet/news.announce.newusers/ directory. If you are new to Usenet, you should also think quite seriously about regularly reading the newsgroup news.newusers.questions. Some of the topics discussed there are repeated here, but the helpers there have and/or know about much more complete answers than are possible here. Now that we have that out of the way, on with the show! =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= Table of Contents * designates topics which have been updated. + designates topics which have been added. Part 1-----Introduction to rgfd Introduction Disclaimer Copyright notice, legal mumbo jumbo Note for new users Table of Contents A1: What is D&D? A2: What is rec.games.frp.dnd? A3: Where can I find the FAQ? Part 2-----Netiquette B1: What is this "netiquette" thing anyway? B2: So, what's the deal with this board? B3: Are there any gaming groups in my area? B4: What codes can I use for Distribution? B5: "...Me, too!" B6: Why should I play *D&D instead of Rolemaster, Torg, or some other RPG? B7: "D&D IS EVIL & SH*T, DON'T PLAY IT." What do I do when this gets posted? B8: Do those "MAKE MONEY FAST" ideas really work? B9: If X fought Y, who would win? * B10: Where can I buy/sell old books, modules, & other stuff? B11: How do I get past a certain point in this AD&D computer game? B12: Some people's posts go off the right edge of the screen; is my newsreader broken or something? B13: How creative should I get with my .signature file? B14: Do I have to be an elementalist mage to post a "flame" or start a "flamewar"? B15: Where can I post this? B16: Why hasn't anyone responded to my posts? B17: Why isn't anyone talking about Al-Qadim? B18: Would anyone like to start a campaign here on the newsgroup? B19: I missed a message; could someone please repost it? Part 3-----TSR TSR C1: What is the history of the game now called AD&D? C2: What does "TSR" stand for? C3: What does "T$R" stand for? C4: What is TSR's e-mail address? C5: What is TSR's snail-mail address? C6: What is TSR really working on in the way of TV shows and movies? C7: What's the deal with TSR's copyright policy? C8: Did TSR really try to trademark the word "Nazi"? C9: Didn't TSR just "borrow" everything from J.R.R. Tolkien's works? C10: How can I submit my latest work of literary genius to TSR? * C11: Where's Gary Gygax these days? Part 4-----1) Meta 2) Misc. 3) Religion Meta D1: I've found a mistake in the latest TSR module; where can I report it? D2: Where can I find a list of official TSR errata? D3: What is a PBEM and how do I get into one or start one? D4: What are the best *D&D products (books/modules/etc.) to get? D5: What do those letter/number combinations on older modules and handbooks stand for? D6: What font does TSR use for Planescape and where can I get it? D7: What is the chance of rolling up a character with all natural 18's? D8: I heard TSR put some *D&D modules on the web; where are they? Misc. E1: Wasn't there a Saturday morning cartoon about *D&D? E2: What *D&D-specific comic books have been published? E3: Whatever happened to SnarfQuest, What's New?, Wormy, and Yamara? E4: Wasn't there a TSR module that was banned? E5: Aren't these new core books actually the third edition of AD&D? E6: What was removed from Deities & Demigods? E7: Was Legends & Lore really originally a 1st ed. book? E8: What happened to my favorite TSR campaign world? E9: Where did all the devils, demons, daemons, and the rest go? E10: Who is this Cthulhu guy, anyway? E11: What are the major changes in AD&D, 2nd ed. from 1st ed.? Religion F1: Is *D&D really the tool of the Devil? F2: Yeah, but is *D&D really the tool of the Devil? F3: Is Al-Qadim actually one of the holy names of Allah? Part 5-----Glossary G1: What do those weird abbreviations mean? G2: How do you pronounce...? G3: How do you spell...? G4: What is a "newbie"? G5: What is a "Spoiler"? G6: What is bandwidth? How does one waste it? G7: What is "fluff?" G8: Who's this "Monty Haul" character I keep hearing about? G9: What is "munchkinism"? What does the Wizard of Oz have to do with *D&D? G10: What is "Spam"? G11: When is a troll not green, rubbery, or regenerative? G12: Are there any other terms I should be aware of? Part 6-----Resources 1: Internet Internet H1: What other newsgroups are out there for role-playing junkies like me? H2: Are there any FTP sites for *D&D? H3: What does .zip mean? And why can't I read this file I just downloaded? H4: Are there any WWW pages for *D&D? * H5: Where can I upload this neat program I just wrote? * H6: Is a complete index of Dragon Magazine available anywhere? H7: Is there a complete list of every *D&D product TSR has ever published? H8: Where can I find a complete list of every monster TSR has published for *D&D? H9: Is there really an "AD&D Guide to Sex?" H10: Where can I find the Net.*.Book? H11: Are there any *D&D-related mailing lists? H12: Are there any other *D&D-related resources on the Internet? Part 7-----Resources 2: Non-Internet Non-Internet * I1: What magazine resources are there for *D&D ? I2: What are some good books to read to get good ideas? I3: Where should I start looking in a library for more information? I4: What are some good fantasy movies to watch to get good ideas? I5: What is some good background or inspirational music for *D&D games? Part 8-----Gamespeak 1: For Player's Eyes For Player's Eyes J1: What books do I need in order to play? J2: Does the weapon proficiency "Ambidexterity" give me extra attacks? J3: Is the use of poison automatically an evil act? J4: What about slitting throats? Anything else? J5: Are all orcs inherently evil? What about orc babies? J6: Can mages wear armor? J7: I don't like the spell memorization system for clerics & wizards... J8: What does "Lawful/Neutral/Chaotic Good/Neutral/Evil" really indicate? J9: Is alignment really necessary? J10: What is a morning star? J11: But medieval combat wasn't anything like the way it is in *D&D! Part 9-----Gamespeak 2: For DM's Eyes For DM's Eyes K1: What books do I need in order to be a DM? K2: Which TSR campaign world should I use? K3: Stoneskin seems too unbalancing. What can I do? K4: What can I do about Bladesinging elves? K5: What can I do to prevent psionics from really unbalancing a game? K6: How do you deal with critical hits? A) Determination of criticals B) Resolution of criticals K7: What can I do to make crossbows as useful as normal bows? K8: How much do coins weigh? K9: What can I do to make the hit point system more true to life? K10: The energy drain power of greater undead sucks. What can I do? K11: Where else can I look for info about being a Dungeon Master? =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= A1: What is D&D? A: D&D is an abbreviation for Dungeons & Dragons, a fantasy role-playing game published by TSR, Inc. (Hereafter referred to as "TSR"). It made its first public appearance in 1973, hit the general market in 1974, and has been wildly popular ever since. It is generally referred to as "The grandfather of all role-playing games." It was later revised to become part of AD&D, or Advanced Dungeons & Dragons. AD&D is the most widely recognized and played role-playing game. For the purpose of preventing confusion, I use "*D&D" as a generic term referring to all of the forms this game has taken over the years. A2: What is rec.games.frp.dnd? A: Rec.games.frp.dnd is a Usenet newsgroup dedicated to discussions pertaining to AD&D, D&D, and anything else that happens to come up. It was voted into existence by a result of 357 to 84 in May 1992, as part of "The Great rec.games.frp Reorganization". Here is the charter for the group: NAME: rec.games.frp.dnd CHARTER: This unmoderated discussion newsgroup is for discussion of the official rules and settings of the D&D family of role-playing games, produced by TSR, Inc., including Collector's Edition Dungeons and Dragons (D&D), Basic D&D, Advanced Dungeons and Dragons (AD&D), and AD&D Second Edition. This proposed newsgroup would include discussion of TSR's rules and products and compatible products, such as: character classes; character races; monsters; magic spells; weapons; Greyhawk; the Forgotten Realms; the Known World; Dark Sun; Spelljammer; RavenLoft; Hollow World; City State of the Invincible Overlord; and so on. Crossposting between this group and other groups in the rec.games.frp hierarchy is discouraged, however issues of general interest that happen to involve a D&D rulebook or setting are more than welcome. A3: Where can I find the FAQ? A: The rec.games.frp.dnd FAQ (which you are currently reading) is posted to rec.games.frp.dnd monthly, on the first of each month. This is the best and easiest way to find it. It is also currently the only way to get the latest version, outside of the DejaNews web archives of Usenet, which is located at http://www.dejanews.com/. A slightly revised hypertext version is available through the World Wide Web at http://www.enteract.com/~aardy/faq/rgfdfaq.html; older versions are at http://sac.uky.edu/~mlmorr0/rgfdfaq.html and http://web.cs.ualberta.ca/~wade/HyperDnd/. If you are desperate for a copy of the most recent version of the FAQ, and can neither use the WWW, nor wait the less than thirty days until the next public posting, then you can write the keeper at . I will consider every request, but will usually just tell you to wait the short while until the next posting, unless circumstances allow me more Internet time than I normally have. ***End Part 1*** -- Aardy R. DeVarque Feudalism: Serf & Turf Rec.games.frp.dnd FAQ: http://www.enteract.com/~aardy/faq/rgfdfaq.html ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Path: news.tuwien.ac.at!aconews.univie.ac.at!newscore.univie.ac.at!uninett.no!news-feed.ifi.uio.no!newsfeed.berkeley.edu!newsfeed.enteract.com!news.enteract.com!not-for-mail From: aardy@enteract.NOJUNK.com (Aardy R. DeVarque) Newsgroups: rec.games.frp.dnd Subject: rec.games.frp.dnd FAQ: 2/9 -- Netiquette Date: Mon, 01 Feb 1999 13:53:57 GMT Organization: Aardy's Aardvark Emporium Lines: 692 Message-ID: <36b6b178.46513851@news.enteract.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: 207.229.149.73 Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Newsreader: Forte Agent 1.5/32.452 Xref: news.tuwien.ac.at rec.games.frp.dnd:364814 Archive-name: games/dnd/part2 Posting-frequency: monthly Last-modified: January 1999 URL: http://www.enteract.com/~aardy/faq/rgfdfaq.html REC.GAMES.FRP.DND FAQ Part 2 Netiquette =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= * designates topics which have been updated. + designated topics which have been added. B1: What is this "netiquette" thing anyway? B2: So, what's the deal with this board? B3: Are there any gaming groups in my area? B4: What codes can I use for Distribution? B5: "...Me, too!" B6: Why should I play *D&D instead of Rolemaster, Torg, or some other RPG? B7: "D&D IS EVIL & SH*T, DON'T PLAY IT." What do I do when this gets posted? B8: Do those "MAKE MONEY FAST" ideas really work? B9: If X fought Y, who would win? * B10: Where can I buy/sell old books, modules, & other stuff? B11: How do I get past a certain point in this AD&D computer game? B12: Some people's posts go off the right edge of the screen; is my newsreader broken or something? B13: How creative should I get with my .signature file? B14: Do I have to be an elementalist mage to post a "flame" or start a "flamewar"? B15: Where can I post this? B16: Why hasn't anyone responded to my posts? B17: Why isn't anyone talking about Al-Qadim? B18: Would anyone like to start a campaign here on the newsgroup? * B19: I missed a message; could someone please repost it? =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= B1: What is this "netiquette" thing anyway? A: Netiquette is shorthand for "net etiquette". Usenet is a cooperative community that only works for as long as people are cooperating. Thus, over the years each newsgroup and Usenet as a whole have created sets of rules and customs, essentially deciding what will and will not generally be tolerated by other posters--what constitutes good "net manners", if you will--in order for the maximum amount of readers to get the maximum enjoyment from each group. Examples of netiquette issues include what the proper newsgroups for certain topics are, and what constitutes a good general posting style. Usenet is all about communication. It is divided into separate hierarchies and newsgroups so that it is easier to find the topic you wish to discuss. Netiquette is about effective communication. If your posts are polite and easy to read, it is much more likely that people will want to communicate with you. If your posts make you look arrogant, or merely careless, clueless, or sloppy, few people will want to take the time to muddle through what you have to say to find the kernels of your posts. And those that do will not be very inclined to give you the benefit of the doubt. Many types of behavior which are acceptable elsewhere are not acceptable on Usenet; you can easily discover these potential pitfalls by reading through the files listed in the Note to New Users at the beginning of this FAQ. There are also many behaviors which may be acceptable on other newsgroups which are not acceptable here, and some things that are done here that may or may not be acceptable in any other groups on Usenet. Many of these are described in this section of the FAQ. The best way to understand what is and is not acceptable is to read through the entire FAQ and read every message in the group for at least two weeks before making your first post. As a poster to this group, it is your responsibility to learn the customs of Usenet and this group, hopefully before you write that first post. The individual "rules" of netiquette exist for various reasons, which include: To avoid looking like a clueless wonder or a total jerk, and thus avoid being treated as such by the rest of the readers of the group; To help make everyone's posts clear, legible, and able to be read and understood by the greatest number of people with the least amount of effort by all concerned; and To prevent a discussion group from becoming a clearing-house, where anything can be discussed, thus making it extremely difficult to find posts that actually deal with the name of the group Netiquette does not actually prevent anyone from posting whatever they darn well please; nothing and no one can do that, short of forging cancels. However, it is a good idea to follow netiquette, or at the very least take the time to learn why a given rule exists before challenging it. Breaking the customs (whether on purpose or on accident) may not seem like much to you in many cases, but it will usually cost you in terms of credibility and, to some extent, popularity. You appear as if you didn't bother to take the time or effort to find out about those things that this group considers important, behavior-wise. This turns most posters off--you'll already have one strike against you, making it that much more likely that you'll annoy or even anger the other posters, so they won't be in the mood to read what you're trying to say. Besides, if you can't be bothered to listen to the group, why should the group take the time to listen to you? Occasional mistakes or lapses of reason happen to everyone, and most people know to take this into account when considering a response to a post. If a poster consciously decides to use bad netiquette, though, especially after the error of his ways has been explained to him, that poster should be prepared to take flak for his decision, and be neither surprised nor indignant when the rest of the readers of the newsgroup bring societal pressures to bear on the "rogue" element to help him become a productive member of the microcommunity that is the newsgroup. If the decision to breach netiquette is due to an informed disagreement over what "proper" netiquette should be, arrived at after carefully reading of the existing documents and pondering the possible reasons behind the current rule and ramifications of changing that rule, that is one thing. Pure orneriness and/or total cluelessness is another matter altogether, and will usually prompt rebukes from other members of the group. This does not give everyone license to flame away whenever they see a breach of netiquette; that in itself is bad netiquette--a gentle reminder and suggestion of how to improve matters is usually a lot more productive than an outright flame. B2: So, what's the deal with this board? A: Once and for all, this is not AOL, nor Compuserve, nor Prodigy, nor Delphi, nor GEnie, nor Fidonet, nor a BBS. It is Usenet, one of the networks which is joined to the Internet. Specifically, this is one newsgroup from among the 12,000+ total newsgroups which make up Usenet. It is not a listserv (although there is an AD&D listserv, and some other groups are Usenet gateways for listservs), bboard, board, list, SIG, or base; several of those terms may technically describe Usenet, but they are no more "correct" than referring to the right side of a ship as anything other than starboard. This is a "newsgroup"--"group" for short--which is part of the Big 8, rec.*, rec.games.*, and rec.games.frp.* hierarchies of newsgroups. B3: Are there any gaming groups in my area? A: Usenet is read by people around the world, from New Zealand to Norway. If you're looking for players in Galveston, Texas, it is pointless to ask people in Germany to come over and play. Doing so only wastes bandwidth, time, and money for everyone outside of your neighborhood who reads your request, and tends to really annoy people. There are several methods you can use to get your request out to the people who are most likely to be interested in your request for games or gamers, while reducing to almost nil the amount of potential aggravation for the majority of the people reading this group. Please use one of these courses of action. The main method is to post the request on the newsgroup rec.games. frp.announce. Anyone looking for a group, or any groups looking for players may read that group for announcements of this nature, thus leaving more space in this group for discussions pertaining to the game itself--as well as making the announcements easier to find, by fact of only having to page through a couple of dozen posts per week to find a particular one rather than the couple of hundred posts per day of rec.games.frp.dnd. In this, the set-up is similar to rec.games.frp.marketplace, and people who know how the hierarchy is arranged know to watch that group for such announcements. If your newserver does not get rec.games.frp.announce, try writing your newsadmin and requesting that it be added to your site's feed. Another good method is to use one of the web pages set up for finding gamers in your area. One such is the "Internet RolePlayer Registry" section of the WebRPG page, located at , and another is at and is run by Etrigan. TSR also runs a "Players Registry" of its own at . Either look into the existing requests to see if there are already people in your area looking for games or gamers, or input a request of your own and wait for any results. (If you are using Lynx or Mosaic, you may wish to try Etrigan's alternate page, at .) If neither these methods seem very palatable to you, then I suggest you find a local-area-only newsgroup (such as a university-, city-, or country-specific one; an example would be something along the lines of chi.wanted for a Chicago-specific group), or inquire if there is a message board in your local gaming shop and post a note there. These two actions are guaranteed to go only to the people most likely to respond to your requests. However, if you have your heart set on posting your request to rec.games.frp.dnd, then there is an additional course of action open to you, if your news reader has the capability. This is to limit the distribution of your message. Simply set the "Distribution:" line in the header of your message so that the message is only seen by a certain geographic area, for example, only North America (na), the United States (usa), Texas (tx), or Dallas-Ft. Worth (dfw). If you are unsure how to set the distribution on your newsreader, or cannot figure out the most applicable code to use, ask the sysop for your Usenet server. They're paid to tell you how to do such things. I am not. If you do take this route, it might be advisable to include a brief comment in the first line of your post that you are attempting to limit Distribution in this way, as that line of the headers is not always readily visible on most newsreaders; that way, if the post somehow makes it out of your area, people will know that you made the attempt and will hopefully go easy on you. Some things to remember when considering whether or not to use the Distribution feature: 1) Distributions don't work 100% of the time (in other words, they still might end up all over the world); using one of the other above methods, such as posting to a local hierarchy newsgroup, if available, is much more reliable. However, this is not an excuse for ignoring distributions when posting to a world-wide newsgroup! 2) You may only use a distribution if you are posting from within that distribution's area. IOW, Texans cannot limit articles just to a distribution of Illinois news servers. The way around this is for you to find someone inside the target distribution area who is willing to post the note for you and send that person your article through e-mail. 3) Try to use the most appropriate distribution for what you are trying to do. If you are looking for a local game, use your city, county, or state codes. If you are looking for people who are currently at a university but will be in your area for the summer, perhaps usa (or whatever country you are in) would be most appropriate. B4: Now that I've figured out how to use Distribution, what codes can I use? A: As stated above, there is a code for every inhabited continent, and most countries, as well as many, many move local codes, down to the city level. The most commonly-used geographic distributions: world *everywhere* [default] midlands Midlands, UK aa Ann Arbor, MI milw Milwaukee, WI ab Alberta, Canada mn Minnesota akron Akron, OH mo Missouri atl Atlanta, GA mtl Montreal, Quebec, Canada atl Atlantic Prov's (NB, PEI, Newf.) na North America (Mex, Can, USA) aus Australia ne New Engl. (CT, MA, ME, NH, RI, VT) austin Austin, TX neworleans New Orleans, LA az Arizona nj New Jersey ba San Francisco Bay area, CA no Norway bc British Columbia ns Nova Scotia belwue Baden-Wuerttemberg, Germany ny New York bergen Bergen County, NJ nyc New York City, NY ca California nz New Zealand can Canada oau Orlando, FL ch Switzerland oc Orange County, FL chi Chicago, IL oh Ohio chico Chico, CA ok Oklahoma cle Cleveland, OH ont Ontario, Canada cmh Columbus, OH or Oregon co Colorado ott Ottawa, Canada dc Washington, DC pa Pennsylvania det Detroit, MI pdx Portland, OR dfw Dallas-Ft. Worth, TX pgh Pittsburgh, PA dsm Des Moines, IA phl Philadelphia, PA ed Edinborough, Scotland, UK pnw Pacific Northwest (ID, OR,WA) edm Edmonton, UK qc Quebec, Canada es Spain rg Rio Grande Valley, NM fj Japan ru Russia fl Florida sac Sacramento, CA ga Georgia sba Santa Barbara, CA hfx Halifax, NS, Canada scot Scotland, UK hk Hong Kong sea Seattle, WA houston Houston, TX stgt Stuttgart, B-W, Germany hsv Huntsville, Alabama stl St. Louis, MO ia Iowa su Soviet Union ie Ireland tba Tampa Bay Area, FL il Illinois tn Tennessee il Israel tor Toronto, CA in Indiana tx Texas ka Karlsruhe, Germany ua Ukraine kc Kansas City metro area uk United Kingdom ks Kansas usa United States of America kw Kitchener-Waterloo, Ont., Canada utah Utah ky Kentucky va Virginia la Los Angeles County, CA vic Victoria, BC, Canada lon London area, UK wa Washington lou Louisiana wgtn Wellington, New Zealand md Maryland wi Wisconsin mi Michigan wny West NY (Rochester, Buffalo) miami Miami, FL za South Africa And there are also usually company, university, etc. codes, as well. 1) The distributions are cumulative, so someone in Dallas, TX will see all posts with a distribution of dfw, tx, usa, na, or world, but not (for example) ba, no, can, and so on. However, a post can only have one distribution area set, so if you want something read by Dallas and Houston, it would be prudent to set the distribution to tx. 2) Although many correspond to domain names, usenet hierarchies, and/or postal abbreviations, not all do; it's not particularly safe to assume in this case. If you're not sure, look it up above or ask a sysop! B5: "...Me, too!" A: A post that does nothing but quote back the previous post in its entirety and adds "Me too" on the bottom wastes the time of everyone who reads it. If you translate the wasted time into man-hours, you get a heck of a lot of wasted time. When you figure into the equation all of the people who pay by the message for Usenet access, it translates into a lot of lost money as well. If you see something you agree with, send the poster e-mail. If you want a copy of something, send the owner of whatever it is an e-mail message. Don't post it. This is simply good netiquette. I would ask that all new readers please peruse "Ask Emily Postnews," regularly posted to the newsgroup news.announce.newusers. 'Nuff said. B6: Why should I play *D&D instead of Rolemaster, Torg, or some other RPG? A: This is a group for discussing *D&D, in all the forms it has taken over the years. It is not a place to discuss the relative merits of those games when compared to non-TSR games. This includes discussion about why people should stop playing *D&D and switch to some other game. It just so happens, however, that there is a newsgroup which is dedicated solely to discussions of which game systems are the best and/or worst to play. It's just a few steps north of here, and is called rec.games.frp.advocacy. Try it, you might like it. The discussion there mainly centers around meta-game issues--i.e. what the best game mechanic for a given action is--rather than invective-filled flame-fests, so consider yourself warned. For other notes on where to post certain topics, see the question below and the newsgroups listing and descriptions in Part 6 of this FAQ. B7: "D&D IS EVIL & SH*T, DON'T PLAY IT." What do I do when this gets posted? A: Most likely, some poor schmuck walked away from his computer and a friend decided to play a practical joke. The best thing to do in such cases is to ignore it. That's right, don't even bother commenting on how much flamebait the unlucky poster is. Doing so just diverts time and energy away from discussion of our favorite game, and makes serious postings that much harder to find. For a hyperbolic, tongue-in-cheek take on this issue (which really is a parody, regardless of what the page may claim to the contrary), read Niilo Paasivirta's Game of Satan essay at . B8: Do those "MAKE MONEY FAST" ideas really work? A: No. Nyet. Absolutely not. Negatory on that, good buddy. The "Make Money Fast" schemes you usually see posted are almost always "Ponzi schemes," a.k.a. "pyramid schemes." The person who starts the pyramid of names may make the money he describes, but the poor schmucks at the bottom tend to actually lose money. Since the offer promises returns, and most people who reply don't see a red cent, the U.S. government considers such schemes to be fraud. Currently, if you send such a letter out via snailmail, you can be arrested for using the U.S. Mail for fraudulent purposes and end up doing jail time; the FCC is working on getting the sending of such messages over the Internet to be wire fraud, due to the fact that the Internet uses telephone lines for propagation. Currently, the U.S. federal laws on fraud & wire fraud do not take the Internet into account, but several state laws do. So spreading such schemes over the Internet is not technically illegal everywhere in the U.S. ... yet. And if your state is one that frowns on such things, you'd best watch your step. The easiest thing for everybody is to simply ignore the message. Since they are typically simultaneously posted to hundreds or thousands of newsgroups, the original poster will probably not see your witty discussion. Sending a private e-mail to the postmaster at the poster's site may be a good idea, but posting replies, even wildly humorous ones, just takes up bandwidth with useless topics. Just say "No" to "Make Money Fast" schemes. B9: If X fought Y, who would win? A: This type of question is most often found in the form "Enterprise vs. Death Star," or, more appropriately, "10th level fighter vs. 10th level mage," "Raistlin vs. Elminster," or "Driz'zt vs. Da Bears." (For the record, even with a mini-Ditka, Da Bears take it, 42-3; Da Bears let da elf have a last-second field goal so he don't feel so bad. Pass da brats, will ya?) Asking this type of question is also a sure-fire way to not make any friends among the long-time posters. The one true answer is...whomever the writer/poster wants to win, wins. Alternatively, in novels which feature one of TSR's big hitters, a la Driz'zt or Raistlin, all cross-world dueling is frowned upon; if it actually happens, it should end in a draw so that no group of fans feels that their hero got shafted. It may seem fun to speculate, but there is no sure way of determining a winner; and picking one just gets the fans of the character you picked to lose mad (and usually flaming) at you. In any case, almost every combination of X vs. Y has already been done to death on the group. It is not in the group's best interest to discuss such things further. In the case of one class archetype vs. another, the argument can go on and on ad nauseam, as everyone can come up with some reason for each one to win over all the others. What it usually comes down to, since the main four classes are pretty much balanced, is whichever character wins the initiative, gets luckier with the dice, or has more time to prepare, wins the battle. End of argument. B10: Where can I buy/sell old books, modules, & other stuff? A: Rec.games.frp.marketplace is dedicated to the buying and selling of gaming material of any nature. If there is a book you've always been looking for, or if you want to sell off some of your books, please post in rgfm. Such posts do not belong on rgfd, and only serve to make the natives restless and the poster the recipient of numerous flames. If you are thinking of checking out rec.games.frp.marketplace in hopes of finding those items you've always been looking for, a place to look first is ; it has a list of almost every D&D/AD&D item which has come up on the block, with the average prices for each, compiled from up to three years of data. If you are looking to buy gaming material, and have been unlucky in finding what you are looking for in rec.games.frp.marketplace, you may want to try an on-line store which traffics in gaming material; a list of those which are suggested most often when this question arises is contained in Section 6 of this FAQ, as part of the issue of *D&D web pages. For other notes on where to post certain topics, see the list below and the newsgroups listing and descriptions in Section 6 of this FAQ. B11: How do I get past a certain point in this AD&D computer game? A: As the old BASIC games used to go, "Thank you for playing... hope you had fun!" Sorry, but such questions really can't be answered here, as this group is for the discussion of role-playing games, not computer games. Try comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.rpg, comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.adventure, (or comp.sys.mac.games.adventure, for MacUsers), rec.games.video.sega, rec.games.video.nintendo, or rec.games.3do. Walkthroughs of many of the SSI games, including Eye of the Beholder II, III, and Dark Queen of Krynn are available through the Web at ; many other computer games, including the Bard's Tale series, are also represented there. Further information on the SSI games can be found at and . B12: Some people's posts go off the right edge of the screen; is my newsreader broken or something? A: Please, please, PLEASE remember to hit return every 75 characters or so. Many machines either do not allow lines longer than 80 spaces or do not wrap lines correctly. A 75 space line allows for easy reading, as many newsreaders will just ignore all characters in a line after character 80, and followup markers then won't cause lines to run over 80 characters as quickly. B13: How creative should I get with my .signature file? A: A signature file, or, for the UNIX-inclined, .signature (.sig for short), is a file that your newsreader can automatically attach onto the end of every Usenet post you make. It is intended to contain such information as your name, Internet address(es), other contact methods, and do forth, that you would otherwise have to manually type in each time you want to post. Many people also include witty quotes or comments, ASCII pictures, and other such fun bits. However, once you see the same .sig twenty times in one day (or one week, month, etc.), it can get quite tiresome. This is especially true for large sigs, and/or ASCII art. In the interest of preserving everyone's sanity, Usenet as a whole has unofficially adopted the standard of a four-line by 80 column .sig (otherwise known as the McQuary limit, named for George McQuary, one of the regulars over in alt.fan.warlord). That is, if you can't fit it into four lines of text or less, each of which is 80 characters long or less, it probably isn't worth saying. This standard is flexible somewhat, as tasteful .sigs of five or six lines are usually tolerated. Anything longer than that wastes bandwidth and quickly becomes a target for flames. Anything longer than 80 characters will usually get mangled by newsreaders and end up almost completely incomprehensible--see the previous question for more information. For some reason which I just cannot fathom, people on this group seem to have a propensity towards the use of ASCII representations of dragons, castles, swords, and other such fantasy elements in their .sigs. This sort of thing is cute once, but quickly begins to grate on one's nerves, especially those people who end up having to pay to see a screen of nothing but someone else's .sig. Besides, if you've seen one sword .sig, you've seen them all. If you feel the creative urge, stop over in alt.fan.ascii-art in order to relieve it; don't do it here, as it takes up bandwidth better spent discussing *D&D. If you insist on keeping a gigantic .sig, with several comments and quotes, a multi-screen ASCII picture, all 15 ways to reach you from various points on the Internet, your snail-mail address, and your work and home phone numbers, then rgfd is not really the place for you. If this fits you to a 'T', then you need to hie yourself over to alt.fan.warlord, the Home of the Big .Sig. While on the subject of .signature files, please remember to delete the signature files from posts you respond to. You are the one writing the message so your signature is the only important one; no one needs to see or get confused by multiple different .sigs. If readers want to know who wrote any text you are quoting from the previous message, they have to look no further than the very first line of the post, where "Someone (someone@foo.bar.com) wrote:" is added by almost every newsreader in existence. B14: Do I have to be an elementalist mage to post a "flame" or start a "flamewar"? A: No you don't, and trust me, you don't want to try. Nor do you want to be on the receiving end of one. A flame is a nasty, inflammatory message. It does very little except repeatedly insult another poster, or the recipient, if it is sent via e-mail. A flamewar is a flame in response to a flame in response to a flame, and so on, ad nauseum. Neither flaming, nor getting involved in flamewars are conducive to a long net.life or a good net.reputation. Some topics are "hot buttons", which can do very little but devolve into flamewars. Many have very little to do with *D&D except tangentially. Some examples are homosexuality, the place of women in society, religion, rape, and ethics & what constitutes "good" or "evil". In general, if one of these topics comes up, don't bother posting! Each of these has been discussed to death in the past, whether or not you were here to see it. Very few posters here want to see more flamewars start, especially on these topics, so staying as far as possible from them is a good idea. There are also some rgfd-specific touchy subjects which, in general, are best to simply stay as far away from as possible. Some examples of these are the whole copyright issue, combat realism, which version of *D&D is the best/worst, and just about any other topic discussed either in this section or in later sections of the FAQ. There are several methods you can use to avoid flaming someone. First and foremost, do not post while you are angry. If a post incenses you so much that you are moved to flame the living daylights out of the poster (or if you notice that you are so angry you can't type straight), then stop. Don't post. Count to ten. Save the message for later reading and go on to the next message, or take a break from Usenet altogether. Then, when you've had a chance to calm down, read the post again and decide if it really deserves a reply, or if everyone is better off if you just ignore it altogether. If you notice that one person's posts consistently get under your skin, or if one topic really gets you hot under the collar (or for that matter, is just something in which you have zero interest), you should seriously consider using a killfile. That way, you would not see any posts by that poster, or with that topic at all, and would therefore have little temptation to burst into a flame. If you are unsure how to use a killfile with your newsreader, consult the help manual, or ask your friendly local sysop, as it changes too much from newsreader to newsreader to list all the possibilities here. B15: Where can I post this? A: There are several types of posts which are technically about *D&D, but do not belong on rec.games.frp.dnd. Some of them are dealt with in more detail above and in other sections of the FAQ, but here is a thumbnail guide to posting *D&D-related material. Please observe these guidelines, as it will make everybody happier in the long run. *D&D-related programs/binaries: alt.games.frp.dnd-utils, or rec.games.frp.archives Discussion of computer programs: alt.games.frp.dnd-utils TSR--They Suck, Really: alt.flame.tsr SSI/TSR computer games: comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.rpg "Test--Please ignore": misc.test Which RPG is the best: rec.games.frp.advocacy Which RPG is the worst: rec.games.frp.advocacy Which game company is best/worst: rec.games.frp.advocacy Convention announcements: rec.games.frp.announce Announcement of PBEM openings: rec.games.frp.announce Gamers wanted in Area "X": rec.games.frp.announce Fiction: rec.games.frp.archives Resources for *D&D (net.books): rec.games.frp.archives New rules for combat, init, psi: rec.games.frp.archives Multiple spells, monsters, NPCs: rec.games.frp.archives Unfinished resources for *D&D: rec.games.frp.archives, or r.g.f.dnd Very short resources for *D&D: rec.games.frp.archives, or r.g.f.dnd Discussion of *D&D resources: rec.games.frp.dnd Discussion of *D&D, etc.: rec.games.frp.dnd Buyout of TSR proposed by WotC: rec.games.frp.industry How to get an RPG published: rec.games.frp.industry Copyright and RPGs: rec.games.frp.industry For sale: rec.games.frp.marketplace Wanted to buy: rec.games.frp.marketplace Dragon Dice: rec.games.trading-cards.* or alt.games.dice When you post items in rec.games.frp.archives or if you post a program/binary in alt.games.frp.dnd-utils, it is suggested that you post a short note in rgfd pointing out where to go to find your post. However, this sort of short advertisement is discouraged (but permitted) when you post a sale in rec.games.frp.marketplace, and is strongly discouraged when you post items in r.g.f.announce. There isn't any need to post ads for sales on r.g.f.marketplace or for announcements on r.g.f.announce, because people who want sales or announcements should already know to monitor those groups. The basic type of material on r.g.f.archives or a.g.f.d-u changes from week to week, so that the contents of the groups aren't as predictable as "sales are on r.g.f.marketplace" or "con/game announcements are on r.g.f.advocacy." B16: Why hasn't anyone responded to my posts? A: Because Usenet is an asynchronous medium. In other words, when you send out a post, it spreads throughout the net, taking various routes to get to all of the many newservers in the world. It can arrive on some sites within minutes, or take days to get to those same sites. And sometimes technical problems at one site can delay the routing of messages. In any case, the vast majority of people reading Usenet are not constantly on-line and reading. It could be some time before people read a given message, even if it has already been sitting on their site for a while. So don't expect immediate responses. This is not a chat area, where people can quickly respond to anything that is said. In addition, it is possible that no one found anything in your post that they wanted to respond to. One of the largest causes of this are unqualified endorsements, e.g. a post whose entire message is "I think Planescape is cool. Does anybody else?". There isn't any substance to such a post, thus there isn't much to respond to, except to say, "Yes", and most people won't bother posting such trivial answers when there are tougher questions to answer, such as "Why can't mages wear armor?" Also, many people do not take the time to answer every post. Thus, it is very possible for the entire group to skim over a given post, assume that someone else will respond, and go on, leaving no responses to an otherwise good post. It happens to everybody on the group at one time or another. Just wait for a week or so, then try something else. There is also a possibility that your posting program has a glitch, and your messages are not getting out. If you suspect this is the case, do not post "test" messages to rgfd. Test messages should be posted in misc.test, or any of the other *.test groups. An autoresponder will tell you if the world saw your *.test post, whereas you'd have to guess if the world saw your test post in rgfd. Remember, however, that many newsreaders will not allow you to see your own messages, so it will seem as if they are not getting out when indeed, they are. If you suspect any of the above has happened, the best thing to do is wait a few days. If no one has responded after a week, do not repost the same message! Try writing on another topic, or following up to someone else's message and adding something to the conversation rather than adding an "I agree" and nothing else. If you suspect your posting mechanism is broken, check with a local sysadmin and/or try posting to misc.test. Multiple postings of the same post, "I agree" messages, and "Test--do not followup" messages do nothing but clutter the group. For everyone's sake, don't bother. B17: Why isn't anyone talking about Al-Qadim? A: It is difficult for any group to discuss every conceivable topic all the time. There are many topics which have come and gone, and, while they may be of interest to people, simply aren't being discussed at this point. This isn't a snub on those topics, but rather a rest from them. If there is a topic you feel isn't discussed enough, try bringing it up--but not in the form of the wording of this question. You might be surprised at the number of responses you get. B18: Would anyone like to start a campaign here on the newsgroup? A: No. This newsgroup is intended solely for discussion of the *D&D games, not actually playing them. Besides, there is already more than enough traffic as it is, without having an entire live, ongoing campaign added into the mix. In any case, the charter for this group precludes doing this, and the vast majority of readers are perfectly happy with this situation. If you are interested in roleplaying through Usenet, be sure to look into alt.dragons-inn, where that sort of thing is the entire purpose of the newsgroup. If you are simply looking for an on-line game, there are several possibilities to check out, including PBEMs, MUDs, and IRC. See the Resources section of this FAQ, as well as several questions elsewhere in the FAQ for more information on roleplaying via the net. B19: I missed a message; could someone please repost it? A: Probably, but it's easier on most other people--who'd rather see something new than a repost of the same-old same-old--if you can search the Usenet archives before requesting (or making) a repost. DejaNews () has all posts to rec.games.frp.dnd (and almost every other group in their newsfeed) archived back to April 1995, and regularly adds all new posts that have been sent to the group. When searching for a recent post to rgfd, you will want to create a filter, filling in rec.games.frp.dnd in the Forum box, as well as any other pieces of information you can use in order to narrow down the records searched and make it more likely that you will find the post you're looking for. Most World Wide Web search utilities (such as Alta Vista, at ) will also do searches of Usenet as well; so as long as you have any web access at all, you don't need to ask for someone to repost anything--the information is there for the finding. A final note: Every posted version of this FAQ since its first posting in April, 1995 is available on DejaNews; so if you miss a section, or are viewing the Web version and can't wait for the next update to that version, the newest version is still available to you. However, be forewarned that it often takes them a few days to load larger messages, so you may have to wait that long after it is posted to be able to retrieve the most recent version. ***End Part 2*** -- Aardy R. DeVarque Feudalism: Serf & Turf Rec.games.frp.dnd FAQ: http://www.enteract.com/~aardy/faq/rgfdfaq.html ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Path: news.tuwien.ac.at!aconews.univie.ac.at!newscore.univie.ac.at!uninett.no!news-feed.ifi.uio.no!newsfeed.berkeley.edu!newsfeed.enteract.com!news.enteract.com!not-for-mail From: aardy@enteract.NOJUNK.com (Aardy R. DeVarque) Newsgroups: rec.games.frp.dnd Subject: rec.games.frp.dnd FAQ: 3/9 -- TSR Date: Mon, 01 Feb 1999 13:54:05 GMT Organization: Aardy's Aardvark Emporium Lines: 605 Message-ID: <36b7b17e.46519416@news.enteract.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: 207.229.149.73 Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Newsreader: Forte Agent 1.5/32.452 Xref: news.tuwien.ac.at rec.games.frp.dnd:364815 Archive-name: games/dnd/part3 Posting-frequency: monthly Last-modified: January 1999 URL: http://www.enteract.com/~aardy/faq/rgfdfaq.html REC.GAMES.FRP.DND FAQ Part 3 TSR =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= * designates topics which have been updated. + designated topics which have been added. C1: What is the history of the game now called AD&D? C2: What does "TSR" stand for? C3: What does "T$R" stand for? C4: What is TSR's e-mail address? C5: What is TSR's snail-mail address? C6: What is TSR really working on in the way of TV shows and movies? C7: What's the deal with TSR's copyright policy? C8: Did TSR really try to trademark the word "Nazi"? C9: Didn't TSR just "borrow" everything from J.R.R. Tolkien's works? C10: How can I submit my latest work of literary genius to TSR? * C11: Where's Gary Gygax these days? =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= C1: What is the history of the game now called AD&D? A: E. Gary Gygax and Dave Arneson were tabletop wargamers; that is, they used lead miniatures to reconstruct historical battles or construct their own battles. Their favorite era to set their battles in was the medieval period. Gygax, along with Jeff Perren, codified a set of rules for conducting both individual and group combat. Then, along with Brian Blume, they published these rules through Guidon Games (which consisted of Gygax, et al. and was run out of Gygax's basement) in 1969 under the name Chainmail. At some point, their battles received an injection of fantasy. (Dave Arneson, possibly under the immediate influence of a Star Trek episode, is usually credited with actually starting the ball rolling.) Originally, the fantasy elements were limited to special military units for "wizards" and "heroes". Eventually, however, the basic concept behind the existing idea of the play-by-mail military campaign, where each player took the part of a ruler who sent out armies as well as engaged in diplomacy & intrigue, was soon combined with the game. Soon, the "wizard" and "hero" were removed from the battlefield and sent upon individual quests of mythic proportions, as Gygax and Arneson discovered that playing a single character was just as fun, if not more so, than playing an entire military unit or army. One of the first times this occurred was in 1970, when Dave Arneson created a scenario in which a group of adventurers had to sneak into a castle and open the gates from the inside. He brought his scenario to GenCon 4 (1971), and Gygax, who already had some individual adventuring guidelines of his own, was one of the people who played it. Gygax and Arneson then pooled their efforts to create a game specifically intended for fantasy adventuring. From there, the concept of character advancement was added, via "experience points and levels of proficiency" in combat and spell use, as well as a few other refinements. Thus individuals could grow in character and power, instead of just being anonymous members of battle units. This game was now far beyond wargaming, or even Chainmail. The group called it "The Fantasy Game," and proceeded to take it around to all the game manufacturers, including Avalon Hill. Every single company turned the game down, usually because it seemed too open-ended, without a way to "win". Not about to let mass rejection stop them, in 1973, Gygax and Don Kaye, later joined by Blume and Arneson, formed their own company, named Tactical Studies Rules (named after a local wargaming club, the Lake Geneva Tactical Studies Association) to market their "fantasy wargame to be played with paper and pencil", which they renamed "Dungeons & Dragons" after a suggestion by Gary's wife, Mary. The game first appeared at the 1973 EasterCon, had a limited availability throughout 1973, and the first print run of 1,000 copies was officially released (in a white box) in January of 1974. It sold out within the year. The game consisted of three booklets: Men and Magic, Monsters and Treasure, and Wilderness & Dungeon Adventures. It was also recommended that owners get a copy of Chainmail as well as the Avalon Hill game "Outdoor Survival." There were three classes: Fighting Man, Magic User, and Cleric. The terms were intentionally vague--much research was done to prevent putting anything into the game which actually resembled real-world "magic" systems. They eventually decided to base the game's magic system on the fantasy writings of Jack Vance; thus magic users must memorize spells daily and once cast, the spells are erased from the magic user's mind and must be rememorized. There were also four different races: human, dwarf, hobbit, and elf. Subsequent complaints and legal threats from the Tolkien estate caused "hobbit" to be changed to "halfling" later on. Humans could be any class, and could attain any level of proficiency. Dwarves and hobbits were limited to being Fighting Men, and were restricted in the levels they could reach. Elves could alternate between Fighting Man and Magic User, but could only switch classes at the beginning of an adventure. Finally, there were three alignments, based on the fantasy writings of Michael Moorcock: Law, Neutrality, and Chaos. The original intentions of the game equated "law" with "good" and "chaos" with "evil". At this point, both Gygax and Arneson were running their own campaigns using the game. When the game started getting somewhat popular after the first year or so, they decided to publish some of the details of their campaigns, along with some expansion rules for the game. This product was the original "Greyhawk". It introduced the Thief character class, and had notes on magic, monsters, and more. Then they published "Blackmoor", which introduced the Monk and Assassin classes, and included the very first module: Temple of the Frog. Then came "Eldritch Wizardry", which introduced the Druid class, as well as Psionics. The last book of this series was "Gods, Demigods, and Heroes", which listed several pantheons for use with the game. During this period, TSR also began publishing two magazines; The Strategic Review (note the creative acronym) in spring of 1975, and The Dragon (soon renamed to Dragon, and then to Dragon Magazine in the middle 1980's) in summer of 1976. In 1975, Arneson and Gygax split ways, and Don Kaye had a heart attack; Kaye's wife decided, along Gygax and Blume, to break up the company. Gygax & Blume went on to create TSR Hobbies, Inc. later that year. At this point, there were a lot of rules, spread throughout books, supplements, and magazines. In addition, Gygax had amassed a pile of campaign notes and new rules which he wished to add to the game. So it was decided to create a new edition of the game. However, instead of calling it a second edition and discontinuing the first, TSR launched Advanced Dungeons & Dragons in 1977 with the release of the the Monster Manual; followed in 1978 by Player's Handbook and in 1979 by the Dungeon Master's Guide, and continued to produce the slightly-renamed Basic Dungeons & Dragons. AD&D was originally intended to be a standardized system which included all of the new and updated rules in one location, thus making it the version of choice for tournaments, as everyone would be following the same set of rules. The "Advanced/Basic" idea was apparently done the way it was because of money. When Arneson and Gygax had split ways in 1975, Arneson, under the terms of the original partnership, still held some royalty rights to the D&D game, and Gygax went ahead with the new edition without paying Arneson the additional royalties which possibly would be due him. Arneson took TSR to court in 1979, and the matter was settled in 1981 when both parties signed a mutual agreement. Advanced Dungeons & Dragons skyrocketed in popularity. So much so that TSR came out with sourcebook after sourcebook, and published most of the now-classic modules, set in the World of Greyhawk. The first issue of Polyhedron was published in 1981. Then, in 1984, TSR released the Dragonlance Saga. This was followed in 1986 by the first issue of Dungeon. The very next year, Ed Greenwood's campaigns first saw light as the Forgotten Realms campaign setting. By the end of the 1980's, the game was enormous, with rules and campaign information spread out further than it had been when AD&D was first created. TSR (by this time, the word "Hobbies" had been dropped from the name) decided to once again create a new edition and roll a lot of the new rules into the core books, as well as revamp many of the existing core rules. In this way, gamers would have all of the necessary rules in one place, and tournaments once again would not have to worry as much about gamers coming in with various backgrounds of house rules. Thus was AD&D, 2nd edition born in February 1989. However, just as it had previously, the game ballooned out with the release of various additional sourcebooks and several new campaign settings. In 1995, TSR revamped the look of the 2nd edition core books and came out with three sourcebooks designed to be "optional" changes to the system, rather than creating a third edition or trying to reference rules spread throughout some twenty books. Since there is therefore no real need to roll any of the new rules into the existing second edition core books, there should not be a true third edition for many years yet. In 1997, TSR was bought by Wizards of the Coast, best-known for the collectible card game "Magic: the Gathering." What impact, if any, this will have on the game remains to be seen. C2: What does "TSR" stand for? A: No, it doesn't stand for "They Sue Regularly." As outlined above, it originally stood for "Tactical Studies Rules." When the company incorporated, it changed its official name to "TSR Hobbies, Inc.," and later to "TSR, Inc.," which isn't short for anything. C3: What does "T$R" stand for? A: For some, the dollar sign is a pretty good ASCII representation of TSR's dragon logo. For others, it is a way of referring to TSR without using any of their trademarks. However, "T$R" is more commonly used by disgruntled gamers to refer to the Great Undescribable Bloodsucking Lawful Evil Force which has possessed the *D&D game market and created oppressive policies, ever-more-expensive and ever- lower-quality products, has no care for the common gamer, and any other Truly Evil acts one can imagine which have the end result of alienating customers and making money. TSR, on the other hand, is a company made up of a bunch of hard-working people who genuinely care about the game and what happens to it, in it, and to how people feel about it. They may occasionally make mistakes, but generally do what they think is the best job they can. Please note that the employees working on the AD&D product lines generally don't take kindly to being referred to as employees of "T$R." At best they will ignore any post that features this epithet, which means that it is not an effective way to get the attention of the company being railed against; at worst, they will be very offended by it and tell you so in no uncertain terms before ignoring whatever point you were trying to make. In most cases, it is an outlet for people who are otherwise fed up with what they feel to be lack of respect for customers and the game itself and need a way to thumb their nose at "T$R, the unfeeling, uncaring megacorporation". Those people who feel the need to resort to what is essentially petty namecalling rather than try to conduct rational discourse about their grievances should find the newsgroup alt.flame.tsr interesting reading; request that your newsadmin add it if your site doesn't already get it. C4: What is TSR's e-mail address? A: TSR has been active on the Internet for some time now, as evidenced by the various e-mail addresses they have accumulated. Several TSR staffers and ex-staffers lurk on the 'net. A couple are even regular or semi-regular posters in rgfd, alt.fan.dragonlance, and on the various mailing RPG-related lists. Here is a list of some addresses with which one may reach TSR: Corporate Accounts: custserv@wizards.com WotC's Customer Services Dept. question@wizards.com Games rules division of WotC's Customer Services Dept.; any questions about game rules for TSR's games Dragon@tsr.com Direct line to Dragon Magazine Dungeon@tsr.com Direct line to Dungeon Magazine dmail@tsr.com Letters to Dragon's editor forum@tsr.com Letters to Dragon's Forum column TheSage@tsr.com Sage Advice submissions; there are no personal replies, though RPGAhq@tsr.com Main RPGA address tsr.rpga@genie.geis.com Secondary RPGA address webmaster@tsr.com TSR's Webmaster Personal accounts: mavra@wizards.com Peter Adkison (CEO of WotC) BillS@tsr.com Bill Slavicsek (Director of RPG R&D) RyanD@frpg.com Ryan Dancey (TSR brand manager) oracle@tsr.com Jim Butler (ALT brand manager) wiseguy@tsr.com David Wise (D&D campaign settings br.man.) kij@tsr.com Harold "Kij" Johnson (BR/GH brand manager) aikiboy@tsr.com Keith Strohm (AD&D/PS brand manager) gcqueen@tsr.com Cindy Rick (Gen Con "Queen") thordog@tsr.com Dawn Murin (TSR art director) miko@tsr.com Michelle Carter (PS editor) drgndale@tsr.com Dale Donovan (FR designer & editor) gumdrop@tsr.com Miranda Horner (DL editor & designer) FRdeity@tsr.com Julia Martin (FR editor) jonp@tsr.com Jon Pickens (AD&D editor) jquick@tsr.com Jeff Quick (Polyhedron editor) Cindi@tsr.com Cindi Rice (RL editor) StanB@tsr.com Steve Brown (DL designer, also OD&D questions) monte@tsr.com Monte Cook (PS/AD&D designer) Cordell@tsr.com Bruce Cordell (AD&D designer) modelguy@tsr.com Dennis Kauth (cartographer/model builder) lazz@tsr.com Rob Lazzaretti (cartographer) ergothian@aol.com Steve Miller (RL/DL designer) skreyn@tsr.com Sean Reynolds (GH designer, DD "guru") seschend@tsr.com Steven Schend (FR designer) ted@tsr.com Ed Stark (BR designer) TheSage@tsr.com Skip Williams (Sage Advice, AD&D designer; no replies guaranteed, though) ALT = Alternity, BR = Birthright, BW = Blood Wars, DD = Dragon Dice, DL = Dragonlance, DS = Dark Sun, FR = Forgotten Realms, Lankh = Lankhmar, PS = PlaneScape, RL = Ravenloft, SF = Spellfire If you plan to send e-mail to TSR or TSR employees and would like to receive some sort of response, it's a good idea to refer to the company as TSR, not T$R. You may be disgruntled with the corporation that is TSR, but that's not a reason to rub it in the employees' noses. C5: What is TSR's snail-mail address? A: To send regular mail to someone at TSR, address it to: TSR, Inc. PO Box 707 Renton, WA 98057-0707 Or, for those in Europe: TSR, Ltd. 120 Church End Cherry Hinton Cambridge CB1 3LB United Kingdom C6: What is TSR really working on in the way of TV shows and movies? A: There have been three known projects in various stages of production in recent times. Whether of not any of the three ever see the light is another thing altogether, as one has been terminated (though TSR is still interested in doing it), and the other two are currently in production limbo. MCA/Universal, TSR, and Ground Zero Productions were last known to be working on a live action (live action combined with animation and computer-generated images, that is) TV show basically set in the Spelljammer campaign setting and entitled "Wildspace." They planned to shoot 22 one hour episodes for the first season, to be aired during prime time on network TV. They were aiming for a premiere sometime in 1996, but more exact information, including which network it would appear on (if at all) is not known. The release of the show would be closely followed by a Wildspace game (whether role-playing or board is not known), and a series of books. They were also developing a related theme park attraction at Universal Studios, most likely in the form of an interactive attraction as part of the Universal Studio Tours attraction, and were looking into the possibilities of merchandizing electronic games and action figures. TSR has not said whether or not the popularity of this show would cause the return of Spelljammer products to their production schedule. The movie & merchandizing rights to a Dungeons & Dragons movie were bought by Sweetpea Entertainment; they have started work on it and hope to release it sometime in the near future. They were at one point aiming at a production cost of $50 million. The movie was originally conceived to be a combination of live action and computer animation. Stan Winston, the man behind the digital effects in _Terminator II_ and _Jurassic Park_, was brought in to aid Sweetpea with the movie, though what help, if any, he is currently giving is unknown. The original script, which was written by Topper Lilien and Carrol Cartwright and was apparently not based on a specific TSR product, involved an inexperienced sorceress and a quick-witted rogue on a quest to find an artifact (which could control gold dragons) before the villain, who happened to be a wizard, could acquire it. This may or may not be the script that is being used now. Stay tuned to rgfd for any further announcements about this movie. The Dragonlance movie, which was being animated by Nelvana, is no more. The deal between TSR and Nelvana fell through, and all work on the movie has ceased. However, TSR has apparently begun putting out tentative feelers to see if any other companies might be interested in trying their hands at a Dragonlance movie. For further information, read alt.fan.dragonlance, check out the alt.fan.dragonlance DL Movie Web page at , or watch Dragon magazine for periodic updates. C7: What's the deal with TSR's copyright policy? A: The deal is that when TSR started to develop a real presence on the Internet, some of the things they found were scans of their books and artwork, many trademark violations, a number of additional copyright violations, and other such infringements of their intellectual property. In August 1994, TSR announced a very restrictive policy regarding the use of TSR-copyrighted information, as well as the use of TSR's trademarks. This was followed by several years of fairly regular flamewars and general hard feelings all around on the subject. Almost exactly three years later, in September 1997, TSR radically changed this policy, giving a lot more free reign to the creation and distribution by gamers of AD&D material. Now, as long as you don't make any money off of it, don't use TSR's graphics, don't misuse TSR's trademarks, don't quote a lot from TSR's books, and don't mislead anyone as to the "officialness" of a file or web page, you're basically in the clear. The current policy can be found at . For more information on the history of this touchy subject, see the World Wide Web site at which has some information on the topic, or ftp the file TSR_TM.ZIP from ftp.umd.umich.edu\pub\frp\dnd, unzip the file, and run the file TSR_TM.EXE. This latter method runs only on IBM clones. Note that neither of these resources has been updated recently, but they do give a good background of the early days of the situation. You may also want to check out the actual statutes in question, in which case a trip to the Library of Congress' Copyright information page at is in order. For on-line texts of the U.S. copyright code and the Berne Convention, see the various pages at or the links at . You may also find that the (unofficial) opinions of practicing IP lawyers in the misc.int-property newsgroup are a good resource, as well. C8: Did TSR really try to trademark the word "Nazi"? A: No, though that is a popular rumor, especially among people who are looking for any excuse to hate TSR. This incident comes out of the Indiana Jones RPG. The statement in question actually says "NAZI(TM)*; (TM) & (C) LFL 1984; *trademarks of Lucasfilm, Ltd. used under authorization." In other words, TSR has never made any claim to a trademark on the word "Nazi," but Lucasfilm, Ltd. has made such a claim. However, before anyone decides to start railing on Lucasfilm, realize that the trademark in question is of the word and the associated artwork. That is, there is no claim that the word "Nazi" by itself is a trademark, but there is apparently a trademark on the word when accompanied by the specific artwork that was seen with it in that module. In any case, if you must flame someone over this issue, please take it to rec.games.frp.misc, where discussion of the Indiana Jones RPG goes, or to rec.arts.movies.starwars.*, where most discussion of Lucasfilm goes. C9: Didn't TSR just "borrow" everything from J.R.R. Tolkien's works? A: No. See the section on books below for a long list of books which influenced the creators of the game. Medieval fantasy was a popular genre during the time when the creators of Basic D&D were growing up. However, Tolkien's books are simply the most widely known of the core resource books which directly influenced Gary Gygax and friends. The magic system was based on the fantasy works of Jack Vance, and the green, rubbery, regenerating trolls were taken from Poul Anderson's book, _Three Hearts and Three Lions_. Halflings are indeed based on Tolkien's Hobbits (they were actually called "Hobbits" until the Tolkien estate demanded that the practice stop), and while the elf varieties are similar to Tolkien's various elf races, the general description of elves is a jumble of several different influences. So no, *D&D is not a direct outgrowth of Tolkien's Middle Earth (which has its own roleplaying game). C10: How can I submit my latest work of literary genius to TSR? A: Specific guidelines for submission (writers' guidelines for Dragon and Dungeon, more details on the submission process, and other stuff) are available via GEnie, TSR's web page at , FTP to ftp.mpgn.com, or by sending an e-mail request to TSRInc@aol.com. 1) Do not, I repeat, not e-mail a complete product either to any TSR staffers, or to a TSR "official" e-mail account. They cannot look at it at all, as they might end up in hot water if TSR happened to be already working on a similar product. 2) Do not e-mail a "complete proposal", for the same reasons as #1. 3) Do send a "query letter"; ethically and legally, any TSR staffers reading your message can then actually follow up on and look into your query. This makes life that much easier for all involved, and makes you seem that much more professional. A query letter spells out an idea for a project in very vague terms, whereas a complete proposal gets into the nitty-gritty to some extent, and a complete product is the finished work. Here is an example of a query letter (Thanks to Bryan Maloney for the letter): TO: Bigshot Avalon Hill Gaming Guys From: The EGG of Coot Dear sirs: I have been working on a variant upon the classic model of the wargame that I believe to be both innovative and entertaining. It concentrates upon the play of individuals and their day-to-day conflicts in a heroic or mythic setting. The working title of this game is "Dungeons and Dragons". I believe that this product will fit well into an untapped market niche, specifically that of the "fantasy" or "science-fiction" literature fan, who may not be interested in strict military simulation but might be willing to purchase a product that permitted them to enact and create their own "adventures" similar to those in "fantasy" literature, a la J.R.R. Tolkien. The sales of this sort of literature have been on the upswing in recent years, and I think that my product would be able to capitalize upon this potential market. In addition, since it addresses the concept of conflict-gaming from an original angle, it may open up an entirely new marketing niche altogether. I hope to hear from you soon. Thank you for your time, The EGG of Coot. EGG of Coot 0000 Coot St., Apt. 0 Cootvile, WI, 00000 The appropriate response would be, if Avalon Hill has any brains, to send out a release form and a response letter saying that they'd be interested in taking a look. However, it is also likely that the company decides that that is not a direction they wish to go at this time and send you a refusal letter, at which point you take your material to another company. When submitting anything to TSR, the following rules apply: 1) Dragon & Dungeon will likely accept query letters via e-mail, but any further correspondence must be via snail-mail. They will also accept query letters via snail-mail. 2) TSR does *not* accept unsolicited query letters for game products; such letters should be sent to Dragon or Dungeon. 3) TSR will accept query letters for fiction, but only via snail- mail (Attn: Book Dept.). 4) With any snail-mail correspondence, people must enclose a legal-size self-addressed, stamped envelope if they want any sort of response. The description of the rest of the submission process is taken, in a slightly edited form, from a very informative post by Bryan Maloney (bjm10@cornell.edu): Okay, so you get the release form. Look it over--the first thing you should note is that it claims what you do is "work for hire". That is, even if you originated the idea and wrote it all yourself, TSR will get the copyright upon paying you. Don't wail and moan, you aren't important enough to demand copyright. However, if TSR tries to claim any further legal rights upon your work in addition to that single product, this is excessive. Cross out any such lines and initial them. No corporation has the right to demand that you sign away rights to works you have not yet presented to them unless you are a regular employee and have signed an intellectual property agreement. TSR does have the right to insist that the specific product you are proposing is "work for hire". Wait until you've written an Origins Award-winning game and/or gotten the Hugo or Nebula in SF/Fantasy before you start to demand copyright. Now, don't worry about how much they'll pay you, it won't be crap, believe me. You're not important enough to pay well, and the game industry is the worst possible market of any fiction market. You're taking a shot at publicity, the money is just gravy. Okay, so you've got the release forms. You'll notice that they ask for a "brief description" and give you a little space. Type "see enclosed proposal" on that space. Write a real "complete proposal". What is that? A complete outline (with estimated page counts) and two chapters. If you can't do an outline and two chapters, you're not ready to write. Also, include a proposed schedule for you to be able to complete the product upon TSR's acceptance of your proposal. Be realistic, not "impressive". Deadlines that are made are better than early deadlines that are missed. If you're feeling daring, try some sample ad copy or back-cover copy for the proposed product. This is a great way to show that you understand the target audience. Mail the forms, typed, signed and dated, with your proposal. Check the proposal for spelling errors and grammatical errors. TSR gets so many proposals that they can afford to chuck most of them. Have the proposal typed or laser-printed. Don't use a daisy wheel. Rule of thumb: It should be able to go through a fifth-generation Xerox copy and still be legible. Now, why send a proposal and not the whole shebang? Two reasons: 1) If you can do a credible proposal, you have shown that you have a little organizational skill. 2) A proposal is less work than a complete product, and TSR can then evaluate your work with less effort from you. If they think it's crap, it won't matter if it's from a proposal or the whole thing, likewise if they like it. If TSR turns you down, don't cry about it--they're allowed to turn you down. Every great author's dream house was built upon a foundation of rejection slips. If TSR turns you down and you see "your idea" three months later, they didn't steal it. There is no way that anything can go from proposal to publication in only three months. Believe me, I have encountered so many ideas that I had, jotted down, told nobody about, and found on the shelves a few months later. You are not a genius, nothing you think of is unique--somebody else will think of it, too. If you were a genius, you wouldn't need to read this. If TSR accepts your proposal, get it to them under deadline. With this "draft final", include a letter letting them know that you would be happy to help with any editorial or revisions they would like to do. Don't expect them to go for it. The majority of amateur game designers are prima donnas who get all huffy if their sacred words are meddled with. TSR knows this, and is leery of giving amateurs too much authority. Also, like most game companies, TSR has a production schedule that would make any other publishing company fire its production managers and hire somebody with a grip on reality. Editorial is not the evil part of TSR, the guys who set the production schedule are the evil ones. So, get your final draft in under deadline, and don't complain when TSR changes it without consulting you. I'd wager that they don't even have their production/editing apparatus completely networked, yet. Once that happens, designers might get more input, but I doubt it. So, when do you get paid? You don't for a while. You'll probably get paid after TSR gets into the black on your product, so you'd better make it very good. C11: Where's Gary Gygax these days? A: Mr. Gygax and TSR parted ways in 1986. Gary went on to create the Cyborg Commando game for New Infinities, which never really caught on, and the Dangerous Journeys game for GDW, which started to catch on, then ended up in court; as a result of an out-of-court agreement, Dangerous Journeys is now owned by TSR. Gary also wrote two books on how to role-play, titled _Role-Playing Mastery_ and _Master of the Game_. He is now rumored to be living in the Oregon back country with the Sasquatch and Elvis. Actually, he still lives, works, games, and works on his web page () in Lake Geneva, Wisconsin; he's even been known to occasionally pop up in various places on the internet. Gary and TSR are now once again on speaking terms, so who knows what the future may hold? ***End Part 3*** -- Aardy R. DeVarque Feudalism: Serf & Turf Rec.games.frp.dnd FAQ: http://www.enteract.com/~aardy/faq/rgfdfaq.html ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Path: news.tuwien.ac.at!aconews.univie.ac.at!newscore.univie.ac.at!uninett.no!news.net.uni-c.dk!newsfeed1.uni2.dk!newsfeed1.swip.net!swipnet!news.idt.net!netnews.com!newsfeed.enteract.com!news.enteract.com!not-for-mail From: aardy@enteract.NOJUNK.com (Aardy R. DeVarque) Newsgroups: rec.games.frp.dnd Subject: rec.games.frp.dnd FAQ: 4/9 -- Meta, Misc., Religion Date: Mon, 01 Feb 1999 13:54:11 GMT Organization: Aardy's Aardvark Emporium Lines: 789 Message-ID: <36b8b183.46525082@news.enteract.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: 207.229.149.73 Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Newsreader: Forte Agent 1.5/32.452 Xref: news.tuwien.ac.at rec.games.frp.dnd:364818 Archive-name: games/dnd/part4 Posting-frequency: monthly Last-modified: January 1999 URL: http://www.enteract.com/~aardy/faq/rgfdfaq.html REC.GAMES.FRP.DND FAQ Part 4 1) Meta 2) Misc. 3) Religion =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= * designates topics which have been updated. + designated topics which have been added. Meta D1: I've found a mistake in the latest TSR module; where can I report it? D2: Where can I find a list of official TSR errata? D3: What is a PBEM and how do I get into one or start one? * D4: What are the best *D&D products (books/modules/etc.) to get? D5: What do those letter/number combinations on older modules and handbooks stand for? D6: What font does TSR use for Planescape and where can I get it? D7: What is the chance of rolling up a character with all natural 18's? D8: I heard TSR put some *D&D modules on the web; where are they? Misc. E1: Wasn't there a Saturday morning cartoon about *D&D? E2: What *D&D-specific comic books have been published? E3: Whatever happened to SnarfQuest, What's New?, Wormy, and Yamara? E4: Wasn't there a TSR module that was banned? E5: Aren't these new core books actually the third edition of AD&D? E6: What was removed from Deities & Demigods? E7: Was Legends & Lore really originally a 1st ed. book? E8: What happened to my favorite TSR campaign world? E9: Where did all the devils, demons, daemons, and the rest go? E10: Who is this Cthulhu guy, anyway? E11: What are the major changes in AD&D, 2nd ed. from 1st ed.? Religion F1: Is *D&D really the tool of the Devil? F2: Yeah, but is *D&D really the tool of the Devil? F3: Isn't Al-Qadim actually one of the holy names of Allah? =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= Meta D1: I've found a mistake in the latest TSR module; where can I report it? A: If you discover a major typo or other mistake in a TSR publication, such as the infamous 'damage/dawizard' transposition, or a reversed or missing map or table, feel free to write to TSR and report it. The contact person for errata reports is Keith Strom (aikiboy@tsr.com); he will see to it that the appropriate people at TSR are notified of the error and/or are castigated for it. There is not much need to post reports of typos or errata for all to see unless it actually affects gameplay in some way, such as a Fighter/Ranger/Paladin experience table blunder in the first printing of the PH2R or mislabeled maps in modules. D2: Where can I find a list of official TSR errata? A: The official errata for the new core books and the Player's Option books are available on TSR's web page, at . You can find the official errata for the 1st printing of the original PH2, as well as a list of Forgotten Realms errata on various sites around the net. Search MPGN first, then ask around the newsgroup. TSR at one point also released an official errata page for the Complete Psionics Handbook; electronic copies of it are floating around and shouldn't be too tough to find. Other than that, look through the Sage Advice column in back issues of Dragon Magazine; every once in awhile, Skip prints an official correction of some errata or other. D3: What is a PBEM and how do I get into one or start one? A: Whoa, whoa, whoa! Hold on there, Tex, that there's three questions in one. In way of an answer, PBEM (or PBeM) stands for "Play By E-Mail," campaigns which are run via the DM sending out turns to each of the players, who respond with their characters' intended actions. Such campaigns are the outgrowth of Play-By-Mail baseball leagues, the Illuminati PBM, and just plain *D&D PBM's. To get into a PBEM, monitor rgf.announce and wait. When you're done with that, wait some more. After that, wait a couple of whiles. By that time, somebody probably will have posted a message to rgf.announce indicating that they are starting (or that an opening has appeared in) a PBEM; rules for character submission will usually be included. Follow the rules and mail off a character. If the PBEM chooses your character, you're in. There. That wasn't so hard, was it? If you don't want to wait that long (and it could be as quick as tomorrow, or it could take several months), you could try to start up your own PBEM campaign. However, be warned--running a PBEM might sap any and all free time you think you have and then some, and isn't necessarily as easy as it might sound. For a wealth of helpful tips, tricks, and suggestions for running as well as playing a character in PBEM's, read "An Argosy of Play By E-Mail Advice," which can be found via the web at . Another excellent place to look for information on PBEMs is , which has a plethora of files on the topic, from advice to listings of currently active PBEMs. D4: What are the best *D&D books and/or modules to get a hold of? A: This depends on who you ask. Everybody has their own opinions on which products are great and which are trash. However, there was a survey done by Anthony Brooks on rgfd and ADND-L of every *D&D product TSR has ever put out, as of around January 1995. It rates each product on a 0-10 scale, based on the average of all of the responses, and includes comments on the products by the people who responded. Only those products which received 5 or more votes appear in the listings, but there are comments included on several non-listed products. The results are available via MPGN, in the /Gaming/ADND/Reviews directory, and can be accessed via the web at . The results of that survey were used as the starting point for an ongoing survey on the web, which can be found at . This survey includes every D&D and AD&D product TSR has published up to the current date, as well as every AD&D-compatible product which Judges Guild published. Since it is ongoing, the results will naturally change from week to week, as more people vote and new products are added. D5: What do those letter/number combinations on older modules and handbooks stand for? A: Up until late 1994, TSR game every product an alphanumeric code, as well as a numeric product code. The letter codes were based in some way on the product, and the number following the letter designated which one in the series it was. For example, Against the _G_iants was G1-3, the Vault of the _D_row was D1-3, and _Q_ueen of the Demonweb Pits was Q1. Some codes were based on other factors; for example, Competition modules for tournament use were given a C designation, and the Special series was labeled with an S. This use carried over into 2nd ed., with the Players HandBook Reference series (PHBR), Dungeon Masters Guide Reference (DMGR), and Historic Reference (HR) series, as well as the GA/R (General Adventure/Reference) RA/R (Ravenloft A/R), WGA/R (World of Greyhawk A/R), et al. series. Late in 1994, TSR decided that this system was getting out of hand (what with the [class] Challenge series being given HHQ1-4 !?), and dropped the system. Now, products are only coded by product number, a four-digit code that TSR uses to track its products. For more information on what the letter/number codes stood for, see the complete TSR Product Guide maintained by Gavin Bartell and found (in short form) at ftp.mpgn.com/Gaming/ADND/Modules/modules.z and (long form) /Gaming/ADND/TSRGuides/TSRGuides.000.Z through TSRGuides.018.Z; it can also be accessed from MPGN through the Great Net.Book of Net.Books at . D6: What font does TSR use for Planescape and where can I get it? A: The Planescape font is called Exocet (technically it's two fonts, Exocet Light for regular text and Exocet Heavy for titles, etc.); it is a commercial font sold by Emigre. You can see a sample of it and purchase it at Emigre's web page, at . Visitation is a free font which is quite similar to Exocet and is available on various and sundry pages throughout the World Wide Web. D7: What is the chance of rolling up a character with all natural 18's? A: If one is using the basic 3d6 method of character creation, this means rolling 18 sixes with 18 dice. The chance of this happening is thus 1/6^18, or 1/101,559,956,668,400. (This assumes fair dice, of course.) In other words, "slim to none, but technically possible." D8: I heard TSR put some *D&D modules on the web; where are they? A: Yes they did. Not just modules, either. A couple sourcebooks or accessories, as well, and also some products that, for one reason or another were pulled from the production schedule and published on the web instead. Here are the URLs to the various pages: AD&D, Birthright, Mystara, Savage Coast, Dark Sun downloads: http://www.tsr.com/ADND/Downloads.html Forgotten Realms Downloads: http://www.tsr.com/ForgottenRealms/Downloads.html Greyhawk Downloads: http://www.tsr.com/Greyhawk/Downloads.html Planescape Downloads: http://www.tsr.com/Planescape/Downloads.html Ravenloft Downloads: http://www.tsr.com/Ravenloft/Downloads.html Dragon Magazine backissues: http://www.tsr.com/Dragon/Backissues/Welcome.html Dungeon Magazine backissues: http://www.tsr.com/Dungeon/Backissues/Welcome.html The material available on these pages does sometimes change, as TSR scans and edits more items, or decides to no longer offer a particular product via the web, so you may find it useful to check a favorite page every few months or so. Misc. E1: Wasn't there a Saturday morning cartoon about *D&D? A: Yes, there was. _Dungeons & Dragons_ premiered on September 17, 1983 on CBS, and ran for a season or three. The main characters were all real-world people who rode the new "D&D" roller-coaster at the local theme park and somehow got transported by the Dungeon Master to a fantasy world. Each of the main characters had a personal magic item, and a vast majority of the show's plots revolved around the evil Venger trying (and failing) to get their items so that he could become all-powerful, while the heroes tried to find portals back to the "real" world and failed to use every one for one reason or another. All of the episodes were available on video at one point, (though they are currently without a distributor) so it may be possible to find them at conventions, in video stores, or in rec.games.frp.marketplace. The main characters were: Hank (Ranger): The leader. His bow shot magic arrows that never missed. Eric (Cavalier): The scaredy-cat, which wasn't very cavalier of him, but that's another matter. His shield projected a force field. Presto/Andrew (Wizard): The comedian. He could pull items out of his hat, but rarely, if ever, got what he wanted. Sheila (Thief): The 2nd in command. Her cloak made her invisible when she put on the hood. Diana (Acrobat): The token minority. Her 10" pole could extend to 10' on command. Bobby (Barbarian): Sheila's kid brother. His club caused a mini- earthquake when he struck the ground, and gave powerful blows to any enemies he hit with it. Uni (Unicorn): Token cute creature. How can you hate a show that features a baby unicorn with big, blue eyes and a plaintful bleat? Dungeon Master (DM): The DM, of course. Short, bald guy who talked in riddles and sent the party into the face of certain doom, from which they always managed to solve his riddles and survive, yet always fail to get home. Venger (Fiend): The bad guy. He had one horn, fangs, and rode a winged nightmare. He always had some scheme to take over the world, and it usually involved stealing the heroes' weapons first. Tiamat (Dragon): The really bad girl. What's really big, has five heads, a nasty temper, is mindlessly evil, and wants revenge on Venger for something that happened in the first episode? I don't know, but it's standing right behind you... RAAAAAAAAHHHHRRRRRR!!! E2: What *D&D-specific comic books have been published? A: There have been a number of comic series over the years which dealt with various TSR worlds, almost always published by DC in conjunction with TSR. Here is a list of known *D&D-related comic books: Advanced Dungeons & Dragons (DC) #1-36, Annual #1 Avatar (DC) #1-3 Birthright: The Serpent's Eye (TSR freebie) Dragonlance (DC) #1-34 Dragonlance (TSR freebie) Dragonlance Saga (TSR) #1-3 Dragonlance Saga (DC) #4-5 Dragon Strike (Marvel) #1 Fineous Fingers collection (TSR) Forgotten Realms (DC) #1-25, Annual #1 Forgotten Realms: The Grand Tour (TSR freebie) Gammarauders (DC) #1-10 Knights of the Dinner Table #1-4 (AEG) Knights of the Dinner Table #5-[ongoing] (Kenzer) Knights of the Dinner Table: Bundle of Trouble (Kenzer) Knights of the Dinner Table: Tales From the Vault (Kenzer) Labyrinth of Madness (TSR freebie) Planescape (TSR freebie) [finished, but never printed] SnarfQuest collection (TSR) Spelljammer (DC) #1-18 TSR Worlds (DC) Annual #1 What's New? collection #1-2 (Palliard Press) Yamara collection (Steve Jackson Games) E3: Whatever happened to SnarfQuest, What's New?, Wormy, and Yamara? A: For those who don't recognize those names, all four were very popular, long-running sequential art features in Dragon at one time or another, and references to and queries about these regularly crop up on the group. (Other regular features have been Fineous Fingers, Pinsom, Tal'n'Alan, The Twilight Empire (Robinson's War), Floyd, and Knights of the Dinner Table; these don't come up for discussion nearly as often as the main four). In alphabetical order: SnarfQuest, by Larry Elmore, began in issue #75 and ran for several years. The episodes were collected together into a single book in the late 80's (long since out of print, unfortunately), and a special one-shot episode appeared in Dragon #200. Larry currently works freelance, and his material graces the pages of many a TSR product. What's New? with Phil & Dixie, by Phil Foglio, first appeared shortly before issue #50 and ran until issue #84, when Phil decided that exactly three years was long enough and left to work on other projects. One of those projects was the comic book adaptation of Robert Asprin's _Another Fine Myth_; Phil, Dixie, and the dragon made a special guest appearance in issue #5. The entirety of the Dragon run of What's New, as well as two new episodes ("How They Met", and the long-threatened "Sex and D&D"), were published in two parts in 1991 and 1994 by Palliard Press; it is currently still available. New episodes of What's New? currently appear in the pages of the Duelist magazine, though they are now based on collectible card games rather than role-playing games. Wormy, by Dave Trampier, ran concurrently with What's New? and SnarfQuest. It ended suddenly in the middle of a story, and has been the center of no small amount of confusion and consternation. What is known for certain is that Dave solicited orders for a Wormy collection at one point (around Dragon #102), but for whatever reason, it fell through and was never published (everyone who ordered a copy got their money back). No one, and I mean no one, in either the gaming or art industries has seen or heard from him since; though it is known that he is still out there somewhere. Without his permission, there is zero chance for a Wormy collection to be printed within our lifetimes. As for the reason Wormy was dropped from Dragon in the first place, therein lies a mystery. The most likely story to surface so far (as told by an artist who was with TSR at the time) is that Trampier wanted more money and threw a major tantrum over the issue, at which point the editors returned the remainder of the episodes to him, unpublished. Since Trampier cannot be located, and the editors of Dragon at that time will not comment, this story cannot be verified. Yamara was the most recent strip of these four; it ended its several-year run in 1996. A Yamara collection (up through at least the episode from Dragon #202, and including descriptions of each of the characters) was released around 1994 and is currently available from Steve Jackson Games. Yamara is now available as a web strip, at . The creators of Yamara can be reached at Yamara@earthlink.net. E4: Wasn't there a TSR module that was banned? A: No, there have been no "banned" modules; but there was one which was recalled & re-released in a different form, thus making the original a rare find. The story, according to Frank Mentzer (ex-TSR editor), is that back in 1980, a woman named Jean Wells wrote an adventure for TSR entitled "Palace of the Silver Princess." It was edited by Frank Mentzer, with art by Erol Otus. It was published in 1981 for D&D Basic characters as module B3, levels 1-3, and had an orange cover. Shortly after publication, TSR discovered many serious flaws in the dungeon layout and also had it pointed out to them that some of the included artwork was of very questionable taste, almost bordering on pornographic. So for the first (and possibly only) time in TSR's history, they recalled a product. Every copy of B3 TSR could locate was returned and destroyed. Then TSR heavily revised the module, fixing the errors and inserting new art. It was re-released shortly thereafter, only with a green cover this time. However, not every copy of the original version had been returned. The first time this was publically discovered was at the auction at the 1984 GENCON, where one came up for sale and went for $300. A couple of other copies have come up for sale since, but none have sold for quite that much. E5: Aren't these new core books actually the third edition of AD&D? A: The new printings of the Players Handbook and Dungeon Master's Guide are definitely not "third edition AD&D". They are essentially just the umpteenth printings of the same old second edition books, except with a different typeface and page layout, new artwork, and the addition of a couple of small new sections. That's it. If you read the introduction to the new printing, they come right out and state that this is absolutely not a third edition, and that TSR has no plans for a third edition any time in the next decade. The books may look different, but any perceived major rules changes are probably the result of one of the numerous typos which crept in when TSR transferred the books from their previous hard-copy form onto disk for this printing. A complete list of the known typos is available; see the above question on errata for more details. E6: What was removed from Deities & Demigods? A: The first printing of Deities & Demigods included the mythoi of Cthulhu and Melnibone. The licenses to game representations of these two mythoi were not, however owned by TSR, but by Chaosium, who had given their permission for TSR to include them in the first printing--this latter point is proved by the thank-you TSR printed under the preface to the DDG: "Special thanks are given to Chaosium, Inc. for permission to use the material found in the Cthulhu Mythos and the Melnibonean Mythos." (This statement was not included on some of the earliest runs of the first printing.) For whatever reasons, TSR was later asked to remove them from the book; when the book went into its second printing, they were gone. Later, the book was republished under the name Legends & Lore, and the two mythoi were still gone. When Legends & Lore was updated to 2nd ed. AD&D, several more mythoi were removed, namely the Babylonian, Finnish, Nonhuman, and Sumerian mythoi; the Central American mythos was renamed the Aztec mythos. Contrary to rumor, the Newhon mythos was never removed, and, in fact, was included in the 2nd ed. L&L, probably due to the fact that it is TSR who owns the license to produce Lankhmar materials. The deities of the nonhumans were reintroduced in Monster Mythology. E7: Was Legends & Lore really originally a 1st ed. book? A: As a matter of fact, yes. As stated in the above question, Legends & Lore was a reprinting of Deities & Demigods, and was later recast into a 2nd ed. book. Here is the publishing history of *D&D mythological supplements. First, there was D&D. A supplement called Gods, Demigods, & Heroes came out. Then, there was AD&D. A book called Deities & Demigods came out; it included two mythoi it should not have, namely the Cthulhu and Melnibonean. When TSR was told to remove the offending mythoi, they reprinted Deities & Demigods with the two mythoi taken out. Later, TSR decided to repackage the book by giving it a new cover and renaming it Legends & Lore. Inside, it was identical to the second version of Deities & Demigods. Finally, there was 2nd ed. AD&D. This new version of the game needed its own book of mythoi, so TSR updated the info in Legends & Lore, removed a few mythoi, renamed another, and released it to the public, as detailed in the previous question. E8: What happened to my favorite TSR campaign world? A: One of a couple of things. Despite their popularity in some groups, sales of products for some worlds--for example, Mystara, Spelljammer, Greyhawk, and Dark Sun--end up dipping very low. People use the worlds, but simply not enough buy new products for those worlds to warrant TSR putting time and money into new products. Therefore, TSR sometimes decides to drop active promotion of worlds too few people seem to be interested in in order to spend more time, energy, and money on existing worlds for which customers are interested in buying new products, or for new worlds that may spark interest. Another possibility is the fact that some TSR campaign worlds are designed to be limited in scope--they are active for a certain number of years, after which point are longer actively supported. Al-Qadim was one of these; it was conceived to be a two-year project, but due to its popularity, TSR opted to extend the project an extra year. At this point, the only new material from TSR for any of these worlds appears in Dragon magazine, Dungeon magazine, and TSR's web page. TSR has the option of printing new material for these worlds as part of their Odyssey line (from whence came material such as Tale of the Comet), but has not done so to this point. They may also re-examine the potential of these campaign worlds after a few years on the shelf and bring them back in some form in the future. E9: Where did all the devils, demons, daemons, and the rest go? A: According to some sects, they have been banished to the last of the infinite layers of the Abyss by an indescribable force known only as Pae-Sae. Thus was removed one of the Six Signs of Evil in the world. However, according to MC8, as well as material for the Planescape campaign setting, they never left. What happened was that sages discovered that the names used for them by those small-minded people who know naught of the true nature of the planes of existence are not the names by which these creatures refer to themselves. Thus, what you once knew as "devils" are properly called "Baatezu"; "demons" are really "Tanar'ri"; and "daemons" are actually "Yugoloths". Several of the Outer Planes themselves also have had their true names recently discovered; the names of these planes have trickled down into common usage by residents of the Prime Material almost as quickly as the others have. E10: Who is this Cthulhu guy, anyway? A: Once and for all, Cthulhu is a fictional character. Anyone who tells you differently is pulling your leg. The Cthulhu mythos (including the infamous Necronomicon and Miskatonic University) was the creation of H.P. Lovecraft, originating in a group of science fiction/horror stories he wrote in the early twentieth century. Several of his friends, including August Derleth, decided to also write stories about the octopoid being whose visage drives men insane, and these tales, along with Lovecraft's own, form the basis of the "Cthulhu Mythos." Cthulhu himself is portrayed as a being from the stars who sleeps in his temple on an Atlantis-like sunken island and thinks of humans much the same way humans think of ants or rats. Cthulhu stories are still being written today by friends and fans of Lovecraft. For more information, see alt.horror.cthulhu. E11: What are the major changes in AD&D, 2nd ed. from 1st ed.? A: When the time came to write the 2nd edition of AD&D, TSR took the opportunity to take some of the changes made in later 1st ed. supplements and some of what seemed to be the more popular house rules, and merged them together with the rules presented in the Players Handbook and Dungeon Masters Guide. Some of the changes were important alterations, some were made into "optional" rules, and others were merely cosmetic additions. What follows is a list of the major changes, compiled by Lawrence "DMGorgon" Mead and Ian Malcomson . Note: Because some of the changes actually occurred with later 1st ed. books such as Unearthed Arcana and the Dungeoneers Survival Guide, players who adopted the rules presented in those books saw fewer changes to the core rules when 2nd ed. came out. When a change was made with UA or DSG, that is noted below. Also, some of the affected rules were often ignored by 1st ed. players, and/or are often ignored by 2nd ed. players, so the changes listed below may not be "major" for all players. CHARACTERS * Monk, illusionist, and assassin were removed as as distinct character classes; the four basic classes have been renamed as warrior, wizard, priest, and rogue * Druids can now progress up to 20th level, with a new progression table (UA) * Thief abilities now have a degree of player choice in their improvement * Rangers were reworked; they now get d10 for hit dice, no mage spells, etc. * Wizards may now have specialties (e.g. illusionist, necromancer, etc.) with enhanced spell capabilities within each specialty; the mage is but one subset of the wizard class, as is each of the specialist wizards * Mages' hit dice extend only to 10d4 instead of 11d4 * Druid spells are now mixed in with clerical spells * Illusionist spells are now mixed in with mage spells. * Non-weapon proficiencies added to core rules as an "option" in name only (DSG) * Half-orcs are no longer a standard race * Some stats' tables (e.g. dexterity bonuses) have been changed * Clerics now have "spheres" of influence, instead of automatically having access to every spell on the list. * Bards have been totally reworked and are now a subclass of thieves ("rogues"). * Experience points given per gp of treasure acquired is now optional. * Optional experience bonuses may be given for "in class" actions (e.g. spell casting), and for role-play. The majority of experience is given for scenario completion. COMBAT * "Segments" no longer exist. That is, casting times are given, but in arbitrary short periods which are not directly a measure of time. * A d10 is rolled for initiative instead of d6, with optional modifiers (casting time, weapon speed factors, etc.). * The THAC0 system is now standard; combat charts with six 20's no longer exist. A natural 20 always hits, a natural 1 always misses. * Unarmored combat has been greatly simplified. (UA) * Weapon size and length effects have been deleted from standard rules. * (Optional) Weapon specialization possible for the cost of a certain number of weapon proficiency points. (e.g., a 1st level fighter could specialize in long sword giving him 3 attacks per 2 rounds at +1 to hit/+2 to damage. (originally introduced in UA, changed futher yet in the 2nd ed. version) SPELLS * Damaging spells (e.g. fireball, lightning bolt, etc) are limited to 10 dice of damage. * Almost all spells common to both versions have had minor details changed or added (e.g. identify has different % chances to determine powers), sometimes even the level of the spell has changed (e.g. stoneskin). * Illusions now do temporary damage instead of real damage if believed; they can kill by system shock or cause victims to faint under certain circumstances. * Some spells which cause aging in the caster now age by different amounts (e.g. wish has changed from 3 years to 5 years); a system shock roll is now required for all magical aging (e.g. if you are hasted, age one year and roll a system shock to see if death ensues) Note: the latter rule is often ignored by 2nd ed. players. * Mages must now be 9th level rather than 7th level before they can scribe scrolls. * Number of mage spells omitted in 2nd ed.: 12 * Number of mage spells added in 2nd ed.: 89 (many from UA) * Number of clerical spells omitted in 2nd ed.: 11 * Number of clerical spells added in 2nd ed.: 43 (many from UA) * Casting times of less than a round are now optional initiative modifiers and not the actual time a spell takes to cast (though they retain their name); spells with casting times of a round or more go into effect at the end of the last round/turn/etc. of casting time. MONSTERS * Many monsters have had some details changed, if only the number of experience points awarded for their defeat; xp awarded is higher in 2nd ed. than in 1st ed. Some changes include a strengthening of the creatures' combat ability (e.g. the "Balor" now has a vorpal sword). The changes are often minimal in nature and the reader will recognize an orc as an orc. Only giants, dragons and outer-planar creatures have had major reworkings (see below). * Some monsters from 1st ed. were removed from the core collections of monsters (either the Monstrous Compendium vol. 1-2, or the Monstrous Manual). Others were added from books and scenarios other than the core monster manuals (MM and MMII). Outer planar creatures (demon princes etc.) were originally solely detailed in supplementary 2nd ed. texts; some have been added to the core Monstrous Manual. * Dragons have been completely reworked; in general, being more powerful than their 1st ed. counterparts. They are rolled up differently, have magic resistance, cannot be subdued, etc. MISCELLANEOUS * Many small changes: open doors rolls, surprise rolls, monetary exchange values and coin weights, addition of a death by massive damage rule, removal of artifact descriptions from the DMG, etc. Too many and generally too minor to list here. Religion F1: Is *D&D really the tool of the Devil? A: No. See GAMA's response to this, a seminar on which is summarized below. Another place for information on this subject is the Internet posters' response to role-playing & Satanism in the rec.games.frp.* FAQ. This is a slightly edited version of a very informative post by sos@oz.plymouth.edu (Steffan O'Sullivan): A report on Mike Stackpole's "Satanism & Gaming" seminar at Northeast Wars, Burlington, VT, March 20, 1993. Mike Stackpole is the chair of GAMA's "Industry Watch" committee. (GAMA, for those who don't know, is the GAme Manufacturer's Association, which exists to promote the hobby.) Mike is also the author of many gaming books from many companies, including Mercenaries, Spies & Private Eyes and Battletech novels. As such (and, in fact, long before he was head of the Industry Watch Committee), Mike has been very interested in anti-gaming attitudes that exist in the media and what we, as gamers, can do about it. Much of his talk was background: he told of Pat Pulling and the formation of BADD (Bothered About Dungeons & Dragons), Dr. Radecke, Cruel Doubt, etc., etc. He then went on to describe how's fought this anti-gaming media blitz: research. Yes, the answer is largely plain, simple, non-glamorous research. Mike has researched every single case of so-called "gaming-related" suicides and murder. To this day he still carries on correspondence with two murderers in prison, whose cases BADD touted as having been gaming-influenced. He has written statements from both men that gaming had nothing to do with it: they were sick individuals long before they heard of roleplaying. Likewise, he has testimony concerning every single case the enemies of FRPs have ever touted - that he knows about, that is. He admits there are cases he knows nothing of - more on that in a bit. [snip a section about radio shows] Mike feels the battle is going well. GAMA has only taken an active role in combatting anti-gaming attitudes since 1989, but great strides have been made. Pat Pulling has been discredited, as have some of the other big names who were lambasting gaming. The media is still attracted to the flash of fantasy gaming and a link to crime, but law enforcement has become aware that such links are illusory. Mike says that GAMA has spoken to many gatherings of law enforcement people and come across as responsible businessmen who really don't want their customer base committing suicide, since it would hurt sales. (It's amazing how putting it that way can convince those in power! They understand such arguments.) GAMA has also told law enforcement that they don't want gaming being used as an insanity plea, and will give them facts to combat this defense in any case. This is how you win over your opponents: by joining them in ways they can understand. The talk ended with a "what can you do?" His suggestions, summarized, are as follows: 1) Don't try to "freak the mundanes." If someone says they've heard these games are evil, and can they come watch one, don't put on devil's horns and have fog flowing out of a bowl on a candle-lit table. Just be yourselves and have a good game. If you ever do have a chance to call in to a radio or even TV station that is discussing a case of gaming & crime, please be polite and intelligent. In other words, be a responsible gamer. 2) Tell your local game store to order, from GAMA, some pamphlets they have produced as educational tools. Most game store owners would be glad to have something they can show worried parents. For members of GAMA, these are free. For others, they cost $2/dozen to cover shipping and handling. GAMA address is below. 3) If you hear of any cases where people are claiming gaming is related to a murder, suicide or other crime, let GAMA know right away so they can investigate it. Use the address below, or Mike said you can call him direct - he's listed in the Scottsdale, AZ, phone book. You can also contact Loren Wiseman, vice-chair of the Industry Watch Committee. (Loren is at GDW.) 4) If you hear of an out-of-town "big name gaming expert" coming to condemn RPGs, contact GAMA as soon as possible! Mike says there is a small discretionary fund that will let him fly in to debate such people and discredit them. It's easy for him to discredit such folk because he's been researching these cases since 1985, and has all the facts on his portable computer. It would be harder for you, and you might end up losing a debate, which would not be good. GAMA's address is: GAMA P.O. Box 602 Swanton, OH 43558 or call the Executive Director's officce at (419) 826-4262 or FAX (419) 826-4242 between 9 am and 5 pm, Central Time. The pamphlet which you (or your game store owner) can buy for $2/dozen (free for GAMA members) is called "Questions & Answers About Role-Playing Games." F2: Yeah, but is *D&D really the tool of the Devil? A: Not for many people, no. The rest of this answer assumes the reader is Christian, so if that doesn't apply, the reader may wish to skip ahead to the next question. When one reads a fantasy novel, for example, C.S. Lewis' series _The Chronicles of Narnia_, one will probably come across many things which, in the real world, could be considered evil--or at the very least, non-Christian. Magic use, satyrs, dragons, talking animals, man-beasts, battle, killing, and miracles are all examples of such things which many Christians would look at askance if they showed up in the real world. However, the book is not the real world. Most people can sufficiently differentiate between the real world and a fantasy world to tell that Susan's *Horn of Summoning* isn't something one is going to stumble across when cleaning out your Uncle Pete's attic, and isn't something worth trying to construct. Fantasy role-playing is essentially a form of interactive fiction. The players and game master work together to tell a story, but do so from the characters' perspectives rather than from an omniscient third-person perspective. For those people who are strong in their faith, and can tell the difference between fiction and reality, there isn't a problem. During the game, they realize that none of it is any more real than the Tooth Fairy. When the game ends, they go on with their lives. If they choose, they can even use the game and the fictional characters therein to try to explore different elements of their faith, such as how to react to extreme bigotry and prejudice, what the best approach is to certain situations like warfare in a violent world, what can happen if one takes a single element of a religion too far, or even what can happen if one strays too far from one's faith. In this way, the game can be used as an aid to faith, helping to quantify it and build it up. The game can also be use to simulate The Good Fight, allowing one to pretend to directly defeat evil and restore hope in the players that it is also possible to defeat the more insidious and harder to nail down evils of the real world. Or it can be just a game, used as a way to get together with some good friends for an evening of fun and relaxation. However, for those people who are not strong in their faith, or who have problems differentiating between fiction and reality to the point where they start trying to live in the fantasy world, there very well could be a problem. For such people, shaking their faith or feeding their fantasies can be dangerous things. They could fall away from the church, decide they like a fantasy religion better, or completely retreat into their fantasy world. One should be very careful of these things when gaming with such people--I'm sure most gamers have met a couple people at one time or another for whom the game is a bit too real, or for whom game elements start to spill over into their real life, or for whom the game becomes the chief driving element in their lives; these are the kinds of people we're talking about here. In other words, the game itself is not inherently evil, not really a tool of the Devil--though, like anything and everything in this world, the Devil can use it as a tool to get into our hearts, just like books, movies, stray thoughts, money, possessions, and so forth. If one feels the game is interfering with one's faith, then one should stop playing the game. This is an individual choice, just as with anything else that starts to interfere with one's faith--significant other, pursuit of money, car, tv set, anything. This does not mean one should start a crusade against it, since it may not interfere with others' faith, only that one should work to keep it out of one's own life. However, for those who have a firm foundation in their faith and can tell where the fictional world ends and the real one begins, there isn't any more of a problem than with reading C.S. Lewis' Narnia books--which, by the way, use a fantasy world to tell the story of Christianity and show examples of many of its tenets. F3: Is Al-Qadim actually one of the holy names of Allah? A: No. Well, not really. Al-Qadim is an adjective meaning "the ancient" or "the old". In that context, might be occasionally used by Muslims to refer to Allah, but it is normally used as a regular adjective in everyday speech. A Christian equivalent would be claiming "eternal" is a holy name reserved for God; I don't think many people actually believe the word "eternal" is reserved solely for use of referencing God, and Al-Qadim is not reserved solely for use of referencing Allah. For what it's worth, Jeff Grubb and the creative team behind the Al-Qadim setting did their homework, checking English-Arabic dictionaries and asking professional linguists and Arabic speakers how the term was currently used in the Islamic world in order that they could avoid offending anyone. The above is what they came up with. More recently, Mr. Grubb asked about this matter on the newsgroup soc.culture.arabian; the responses he got confirmed the above, and one also added that it depends on part on the pronunciation: the pronunciation TSR used (short A sound, stress on the second syllable) means "the ancient", while a pronunciation with a long A sound and a stress on the first syllable means "the approaching" or "the next one". No mention of this term being used as a official alternative for "Allah" was given in any of the responses, and several mentioned that it is an everyday adjective. ***End Part 4*** -- Aardy R. DeVarque Feudalism: Serf & Turf Rec.games.frp.dnd FAQ: http://www.enteract.com/~aardy/faq/rgfdfaq.html ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Path: news.tuwien.ac.at!aconews.univie.ac.at!newscore.univie.ac.at!skynet.be!209.98.98.32.MISMATCH!chippy.visi.com!news-out.visi.com!newsfeed.enteract.com!news.enteract.com!not-for-mail From: aardy@enteract.NOJUNK.com (Aardy R. DeVarque) Newsgroups: rec.games.frp.dnd Subject: rec.games.frp.dnd FAQ: 5/9 -- Glossary Date: Mon, 01 Feb 1999 13:54:19 GMT Organization: Aardy's Aardvark Emporium Lines: 435 Message-ID: <36b9b188.46529909@news.enteract.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: 207.229.149.73 Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Newsreader: Forte Agent 1.5/32.452 Xref: news.tuwien.ac.at rec.games.frp.dnd:364816 Archive-name: games/dnd/part5 Posting-frequency: monthly Last-modified: January 1999 URL: http://www.enteract.com/~aardy/faq/rgfdfaq.html REC.GAMES.FRP.DND FAQ Part 5 Glossary =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= * designates topics which have been updated. + designates topics which have been added. G1: What do those weird abbreviations mean? G2: How do you pronounce...? G3: How do you spell...? G4: What is a "newbie"? G5: What is a "Spoiler"? G6: What is bandwidth? How does one waste it? G7: What is "fluff?" G8: Who's this "Monty Haul" character I keep hearing about? G9: What is "munchkinism"? What does the Wizard of Oz have to do with *D&D? G10: What is "Spam"? G11: When is a troll not green, rubbery, or regenerative? G12: Are there any other terms I should be aware of? =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= G1: What do those weird abbreviations mean? A: Here is a guide to the most common abbreviations and acronyms found on rec.games.frp.dnd. The first list is those terms which are found almost exclusively in posts to rec.games.frp.dnd and/or the entire rec.games.frp.* hierarchy. The second list is those terms which are in general use on Usenet and the rest of the Internet. Gaming-Related *D&D Any version of the D&D game AD&D, ADnD Advanced Dungeons & Dragons, any edition AD&D1 Advanced Dungeons & Dragons, 1st edition AD&D2 Advanced Dungeons & Dragons, 2nd edition AD&D2R Advanced Dungeons & Dragons, revised 2nd edition AD&D2.5 Advanced Dungeons & Dragons, revised 2nd edition ADND-L AD&D discussion mailing list AoE Area of Effect BD&D, BDnD Basic Dungeons & Dragons, as opposed to Advanced D&D BoA Book of Artifacts BR Birthright C*HB Complete Handbook series Fighter's, Priest's, Thief's, Wizard's, Psionics, Ranger's, Bard's, Druid's, Paladin's, Barbarian's, Necromancer's, Ninja's CB* Complete Book of series Elves, Dwarves, Gnomes & Halflings, Humanoids CT, C&T Player's Option: Combat & Tactics D&D, DnD Dungeons & Dragons, any version except Advanced DDG Deities and Demigods DL DragonLance DMG Dungeon Masters Guide, any edition DMG1 Dungeon Masters Guide, 1st edition DMG2 Dungeon Masters Guide, 2nd edition DMG2R Dungeon Masters Guide, Revised 2nd edition DMO Dungeon Master's Option book(s) DS Dark Sun FR Forgotten Realms GAMA GAme Manufacturers Association GH Greyhawk GM Game Master HLC Dungeon Master's Option: High-Level Campaigns HW Hollow World IMC In My Campaign IYC In Your Campaign L&L, LL Legends & Lore LC Living Campaign (RPGA campaign usually found at cons) LK Lankhmar MC Monstrous Compendium (usually followed by the appendix number) MM Monster Manual/Monstrous Manual MMII Monster Manual II MoP Manual of the Planes MPGN ftp.mpgn.com, the Multi-Player Gaming Network site MUD Multiple-User Dungeon OA Oriental Adventures OD&D Old/Original D&D, as opposed to the later Advanced D&D PBeM Play By E-Mail PBWWW Play By World Wide Web PH Player's Handbook, any edition PH1 Player's Handbook, 1st edition PH2 Player's Handbook, 2nd edition PH2R Player's Handbook, Revised 2nd edition PO Player's Option books PS Planescape rgfd Rec.games.frp.dnd rgf.* Rec.games.frp.* hierarchy RL Ravenloft RPGA Role-Playing Gamers' Association SP, S&P Player's Option: Skills & Powers Sp&M, SPaM Player's Option: Spells & Magic ToM Tome of Magic ToVK Tome of Vast Knolwedge (computer program) UA Unearthed Arcana WoG, WG World of Greyhawk WotC Wizards of the Coast General :-) Smiley (tilt your head 90 degrees); with endless variations AFAIK As Far As I Know BTW By The Way CFV Call For Votes FWIW For What It's Worth IDH(T)*IFOM I Don't Have (The) In Front Of Me IIRC If I Remember Correctly IMHO In My Humble/Honest Opinion (but rarely actually is) IOW In Other Words IRC Internet Relay Chat (realtime text-based conferencing system) LOL Laughing Out Loud Ob... Obligatory reference to... (e.g. ObD&D, ObCthulhu, in a post otherwise about something else) REQ Request RFC Request For Comments RFD Request For Discussion ROTFL Rolling On The Floor Laughing RTFM Read The F***ing Manual! SO Significant Other (i.e. date/fiance(e)/spouse) TPTB The Powers That Be WRT With Regard/Respect To YHBT You Have Been Trolled YMMV Your Mileage May Vary G2: How do you pronounce...? A: Here are some commonly mispronounced words, with their dictionary pronunciations, where available, and common practice/TSR rulings where not. For more general pronunciation help, see the article "Ay pronunseeAYshun gyd" by Frank Mentzer in Dragon #93 (Jan. 1985); for help pronouncing Forgotten Realms-specific words and names, see the Forgotten Realms box set; for help pronouncing the names of the various Tanar'ri and Baatezu types, see MC8 Outer Planes Appendix or the Planescape MC appendices. Note: the "correct" pronunciation of Drow is taken from Page 9 of _A Grand Tour of the Realms_ (2nd edition Forgotten Realms boxed set) where it states, "Dark elves, also called Drow (pronounced to rhyme with now or how)..." Aarakocra = a-rah-KO-krah Arquebus = AR-keh-bus (like "Masque of the Red Death") Baatezu = bay-AH-teh-zu Bardiche = bar-DEESH Bulette = boo-LAY Catoblepus = kuht-OH-bleh-puhs, also kah-TA-ble-pus Chatkcha = CHAT-k-cha [Thri-keen throwing weapon] Chimaera = ky-MAEE-ruh, or ky-MAI-ruh (rhymes with "care of") Chimera = ky-MIER-uh, or kuh-MIER-uh ("MIER" rhymes with pier) Chitin = KITE-in Cuirass = KWEE-rass Drow = DROU (as in drowsy), (however, DROH is often heard anyway) Dweomer = DWEH-mer (rhymes with "hem her"), or DWIH-mer Falchion = FAL-shee-on FAQ = FACK, eff-ay-cue, or, as sometimes heard on rec.arts.comics.marvel.xbooks, fuh-cue Geas = GEE-ass, or GYASS (both with a hard "g") Gygax = GY-gaks Halberd = HAL-berd, (not HAL-bread) Herb = ERB Ioun = EYE-oon Iuz = YOOZ, or EE-uz Ixitxachitl = iks-it-ZATCH-i-til, or ik-zit-zah-chih-tull Lich = LITCH (as in ditch), *not* LIKE or LICK Lycanthrope = LY-kun-throhp, LY-kan-throhp (like lichen rope/my tan rope) Lycanthropy = ly-KAN-thruh-pee Mage = MAGE (as in age), *not* MADGE (as in badger) Mana = MA-nah (MA = as in cat), MAH-nah Melee = Either MAY-lay (preferred), may-LAY, or meh-LAY Otyugh = AHT-yuhg Palladium = puh-LAY-dee-um Sahuagin = sah-HWAH-ghin Scythe = SYTH (rhymes with tithe) Svirfneblin = svirf-NEB-lin Tanar'ri = tah-NAHR-ree Tarrasque = tar-RASK (like "Masque of the Red Death") THAC0 = Either THAK-oh (preferred), or THAKE-oh Wyvern = WIH-vern (as in did), or WHY-vern Vargouille = var-GWEEL Vrock = vrahk Zaknafein = zack-NAY-fee-in G3: How do you spell...? A: Some tricky spellings from the world of fantasy roleplaying: aarakocra dispel medieval rogue Baatezu dweomer mythoi Tanar'ri Cthulhu falchion paladin tarrasque deity/deities ixitxachitl rakshasa thief G4: What is a "newbie"? A: A newbie is person who is new to the Internet, to Usenet, or just to the newsgroup in question, and makes all of the silly mistakes many people make when they first began using the Internet. Its use on the Internet originated in the MUDs, and has spread from there. One can avoid many of these mistakes by reading through the files listed in the Note to New Users at the beginning of this FAQ and taking their advice to heart, and by reading this group for several weeks before making your first post, in order to get a feel for the atmosphere of the group as well as for what is and is not allowed here. The opposite of "newbie" is "dino" (as in "dinosaur," not as in the Flintstone's pet). G5: What is a "Spoiler"? A: When someone tells you how a movie you haven't seen before is going to end, he has "spoiled" it for you; your ability to enjoy a good surprise has been severely impaired. The same idea works in the gaming world. If you wish to post any details about any TSR products, please include the word SPOILER in the subject, and leave a full page of blank space, either by inserting a form feed character (which does not display correctly on most machines) or by hitting Return about 20 times. This is especially appropriate for descriptions of modules ("We just finished S4; had a dickens of a time opening those pesky doors, but here's how we did it..."), because there will always be people on Usenet who have not played that module, or who are currently running through that module. Most DM's do not enjoy it when someone else give their groups all the details of their next few adventures. So no matter how old a module is, always include spoiler warnings if you are divulging any vital details. Including spoiler warnings is also appropriate when discussing novels, movies, some sourcebooks, and such. In general, use your best judgement; if there is a detail that could affect others' games ("Iuz gets killed by Rary in the latest GH box set, _Good Triumphs At Last_!"), then be sure to include spoiler warning, whether or not you think that everyone must have already read the item you are discussing. G6: What is bandwidth? How does one waste it? A: Bandwidth is the amount of information that can be moved over a cable. The transfer of information over the Internet is limited by the physical limitations of the cables the information is transmitted through; thus, a post to Usenet which, for example, merely quotes back the entire 300 lines of a previous post and adds "I agree" to the bottom takes up space in the cables which could better be used by other posts. If enough bandwidth is wasted, no other posts can get through, as the cables would already be transmitting their maximum amount of data. New technology in cable manufacture has made it a challenge to even come close to using up all the bandwidth in most areas, but that still doesn't make it a good idea to take up lots of space with frivolous posts. In fact, the ever-increasing number of posts to Usenet has resulted in some systems reducing the expiration times on posts to only a couple days; thus it is not all that difficult for an increase of "worthless" posts to push "worthwhile" posts out the end of many servers before people on those sites have a chance to read the good posts. G7: What is "fluff?" A: Fluff is a term used for stories written and distributed on the Internet. In the case of rec.games.frp.dnd, it takes the form of stories based on the results of role-playing sessions. Some people like reading fluff, some don't mind it, and some rabidly detest it. If you feel you must post your fluff, please put STORY: at the beginning of the subject line so that is can be easily found or avoided, as the case may be. This is ok for one-shot short stories, but if you are writing longer works, such as stories based on entire campaigns, then please do not post the chapters to rgfd. Instead, send them to the rec.games.frp.archives moderator, and then post a note in rgfd stating that anyone who wishes to read your story may find it in rec.games.frp.archives. G8: Who's this "Monty Haul" character I keep hearing about? A: Monty Hall was the host of the 60's & 70's, and 90's American game show _Let's Make a Deal_. People would dress up in silly costumes, then be chosen out of the crowd to play the game. Monty would give the lucky contestant a handful of money, then talk them into trading the money for whatever was behind door number one, door number two, door number three, or what was in the box, or they could just keep the money. Each time they traded, he would give them another choice. After they decided to stick with a choice, Monty revealed what had been won. Prizes could be anything, good or bad, such as money, cars, jewelry, a years supply of auto wax, goats, inner tubes, exotic vacations, a pound of confetti, etc. Gary Gygax named the style of play where game masters hid treasures behind some doors, monsters behind others and then let the players choose their fate "Monty Haul" gaming, making a pun on the game show host's name. The term has come to be used to refer to sessions where game masters encourage munchkin players; basically any game can be considered a Monty Haul game where the game master sets up unfathomable amounts of treasure and earth-shattering magic items guarded by weak and wimpy monsters, thus giving enormous amounts of power to beginning-level characters. G9: What is "munchkinism?" What does the Wizard of Oz have to do with *D&D? A: Munchkinism is often confused with Monty Haul gaming in that both involve incredibly high power levels with a minimum of risk. However, where Monty Haul is usually the fault of the GM, munchkinism is usually the demesne of players, although one can encourage the other. Munchkin players often view the game as a contest which can be won, and done with a minimum of struggle and uncertainty. The player is winning when he defeats everything the DM throws at the character and does so without breaking a sweat. Thus, having a character who can deal out large amounts of damage every round is more pleasurable, as it gives the player a better chance of "winning." Some DM's foster this "them vs. me" type of atmosphere (especially Monty Haul DM's), but it is usually not the DM's fault. Well, it somewhat is, as the DM has to allow the character in the first place, but it is the player who has the real problem here. Munchkin characters are created by "min/maxing," or rather, "rules rape," wherein the player finds any and all advantages the rules (and especially any loopholes contained therein) allow the character, with few, if any drawbacks. They are also outfitted with the equivalent magic items of an entire party of many, many more levels of experience. Such characters tend to be ultra-powerful, and can destroy whole armies in one round. Any such character choices are made solely from a power-level standpoint, and not from a role-playing point of view. This is not to say that all "power gaming" is munchkin and bad, as it is possible and common for a group to decide to run a campaign with incredibly high amounts of power, yet have it contain just as much challenge and roleplaying as any other campaign. The enemies are usually as well equipped as the players, and are played extremely intelligently, to boot. With this kind of game, there is actually some question as to whether or not any or all of the characters could survive a given encounter, but the point is not basic survival, but a balance of power and role-playing. Characters also tend to have character flaws of some sort which balance out the power level in some meaningful role-playing-based way. In addition, most of the characters in a "power game" environment actually have to work (and role-play) for each and every powerful item they gain, instead of turning into a walking magic shop when "my two rich uncles just willed all of their magic items to me," or some such. A stress is put on role-playing, so that the game isn't just all "power" and no "game." However, it is easy to fall into the trap of treating such a game like an arcade game--blast all the baddies into oblivion and you win! It is at that point, when the power, and not role-playing, is all that matters that a power game becomes munchkinism. Munchkin characters usually come to light when a player wishes to bring in a favorite character who was "allowed" in a previous GM's campaign, one with the maximum ability scores, proficiencies, abilities, and enough magic and special items to take out both Death Stars simultaneously from across the galaxy. No one seems to know exactly how such characters have come to be identified with the tiny folk from L. Frank Baum's books, but it probably has something to do with the sheer annoyance factor such characters exude. Another theory is that, since it seems that most munchkin players are the younger set of players, say pre-teens and down, that someone's term for people younger than themselves morphed into a term for the type of players described above, and has since changed meaning to also include the characters created by such players. G10: What is "Spam"? A: Spam is a meat-like product (the word is an abbreviation of "SPiced hAM"), rumored to contain a mixture of ham and pork, made popular when it was distributed to soldiers on the fronts during World War II. It was also the focus of a sketch on _Monty Python's Flying Circus_ involving a diner which featured meals such as "spam, egg, spam, spam, bacon and spam" and "spam, spam, spam, spam, spam, spam, baked beans, spam, spam, spam, and spam". Also in the diner were several Vikings, who would break into "The Spam Song" whenever someone mentioned "Spam". Trying to find anything in that diner which was not Spam quickly became quite difficult. This idea has been carried over onto Usenet, so that when someone posts the same thing in thousands of newsgroups, or when one person (or a group of people) fill up a newsgroup with off-topic posts or many copies of the same off-topic post, it is called "spamming the net"; the individual posts are called "spam". G11: When is a troll not green, rubbery, or regenerative? A: When someone is posts a message to a Usenet newsgroup with the sole intention of inciting anger. This comes from a fishing term; a fishermen who pulls a hook through the water is said to be trolling for bites. Usenet trolls are usually messages which contain no content except for crass insults and flames of the topic of a particular newsgroup and the people who frequent that group, or which intentionally raise touchy topics in insensitive ways. Some trolls are more insidious, especially when the person behind them actually puts some thought into his actions. These trolls aren't as blatant, and tend to take the form of someone who appears on a group, posts a few on-topic messages, then begins posting things which the group has made known are not tolerated there. Eventually the person starts throwing in little jibes and insults at the people who try to inform him that such posts are inappropriate, trying to see if he can really make people mad, then leaving to do the same to other newsgroups just as the entire group explodes into a flamewar. Trolls will not be tolerated in rec.games.frp.dnd. If you see a post which appears to be a troll, ignore it. If you see a poster who consistently seems to do little else but try to get on people's nerves, ignore him. Don't bother wasting your breath, sanity, and connect time on such drivel. These people are often just looking for attention, and will usually eventually move on to other groups if they don't get it. G12: Are there any other terms I should be aware of? A: Here are a few quick looks at some other potentially mystifying terms: kill file: A file usable in several popular newsreaders which allows one to filter out disliked topics or posters. Also, "to killfile" lurker: someone who reads a newsgroup but does not post. Also, "to lurk" September: This is the time of year when the net experiences a large influx of newbies due to college freshmen getting internet accounts. The term is also used whenever a large access provider, such as AOL, Compuserve, or Delphi, first allows Usenet access for its users. signal-to-noise ratio: On Usenet, this is the proportion of useful articles to useless ones. In order that the most people might enjoy reading this group, please try to keep the signal as high as possible and the noise as low as possible. If you've gotten this far and still haven't found an explanation for a particular word, phrase, or acronym that you just can't figure out, see the Language of the Internet page at ; chances are one of the pages linked there will have the answer you are looking for. ***End Part 5*** -- Aardy R. DeVarque Feudalism: Serf & Turf Rec.games.frp.dnd FAQ: http://www.enteract.com/~aardy/faq/rgfdfaq.html ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Path: news.tuwien.ac.at!aconews.univie.ac.at!newscore.univie.ac.at!skynet.be!209.98.98.32.MISMATCH!chippy.visi.com!news-out.visi.com!newsfeed.enteract.com!news.enteract.com!not-for-mail From: aardy@enteract.NOJUNK.com (Aardy R. DeVarque) Newsgroups: rec.games.frp.dnd Subject: rec.games.frp.dnd FAQ: 6/9 -- Resources 1: Internet Date: Mon, 01 Feb 1999 13:54:23 GMT Organization: Aardy's Aardvark Emporium Lines: 822 Message-ID: <36bab18e.46535534@news.enteract.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: 207.229.149.73 Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Newsreader: Forte Agent 1.5/32.452 Xref: news.tuwien.ac.at rec.games.frp.dnd:364817 Archive-name: games/dnd/part6 Posting-frequency: monthly Last-modified: January 1999 URL: http://www.enteract.com/~aardy/faq/rgfdfaq.html REC.GAMES.FRP.DND FAQ Part 6 Resources 1: Internet =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= Internet H1: What other newsgroups are out there for role-playing junkies like me? H2: Are there any FTP sites for *D&D? H3: What does .zip mean? And why can't I read this file I just downloaded? H4: Are there any WWW pages for *D&D? * H5: Where can I upload this neat program I just wrote? * H6: Is a complete index to Dragon Magazine available anywhere? H7: Is there a complete list of every *D&D product TSR has ever published? H8: Where can I find a complete list of every monster TSR has published for *D&D? H9: Is there really an "AD&D Guide to Sex?" H10: Where can I find the Net.*.Book? H11: Are there any *D&D-related mailing lists? H12: Are there any other *D&D-related resources on the Internet? =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= Internet H1: What other newsgroups are out there for role-playing junkies like me? A: There are several groups dedicated to role-playing games. The vast majority are, naturally, found in the rec.games.frp.* hierarchy, but several others are in the alt groups. alt.dragons-inn Role-playing via Usenet alt.fan.dragonlance Fans of Dragonlance, unite! alt.games.frp.2000ad Discussion of the 2000 AD game alt.games.frp.dnd-util Posting & discussion of util's, etc. alt.games.frp.live-action Discussion of live-action fantasy rpg's alt.games.frp.tekumel Discussion of the Tekumel game comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.adventure Discussion of IBM adventure games comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.rpg Discussion of IBM computer RPGs comp.sys.mac.games.adventure Discussion of Mac computer RPGs rec.games.frp.advocacy Which game system is the best/worst? *rec.games.frp.announce Con announcements, gamers/games wanted *rec.games.frp.archives Fiction, programs, house rules, etc. rec.games.frp.cyber Discussion of rpg's involving cyberware rec.games.frp.dnd Discussion of *D&D rec.games.frp.gurps Discussion of GURPS rec.games.frp.industry Industry issues, concerns, discussion rec.games.frp.live-action Discussion of live-action fantasy rpg's rec.games.frp.marketplace Buy/sell (usually used) gaming supplies rec.games.frp.misc Discussion of all other RPG's rec.games.frp.storyteller Discussion of White Wolf's games rec.games.frp.super-heroes Discussion of super-hero games * Moderated newsgroups; all posts are automatically mailed to the moderator, who then decides which ones are of posting calibre and posts them. If you have something to say which doesn't really fit in rgfd, but seems to fit more in one of the others, please post it there. This is especially true for auctions, sales, and items wanted posts, which belong in rec.games.frp.marketplace, and entire combat or magic systems, which belong in r.g.f.archives. There are many other newsgroups that may be of interest to someone looking for ways to spice up a fantasy role-playing game; far too many to list here. However, some groups deserving of notable mention are: rec.games.pbm Discussion of PBMs and PBEMs *rec.games.mud.announce Advertisements for MUDs rec.games.mud.diku Discussion of DikuMUDs rec.games.mud.misc Discussion of MUDs in general rec.games.mud.tiny Discussion of TinyMUDs, MUSHes, etc. rec.heraldry Discussion of coats of arms rec.org.sca The Society for Creative Anachronism soc.genealogy.medieval Genealogy of people living AD500-1600 soc.history.medieval Discussion of medieval history H2: Are there any FTP sites for *D&D? A: There is one official FTP site for the distribution of AD&D products, licensed by TSR. It is located at ftp.mpgn.com. Some of you may remember the old greyhawk.stanford.edu archive, which cut off all anonymous access early in 1994. Rob Miracle at MPGN took it upon himself to save as much of the greyhawk archive as possible, and that is what is at MPGN. Some of the greyhawk files infringed on TSR's copyright, and were removed (e.g. scans of Dragon articles), and others have since been removed at the request of individual authors who disagree with the policy MPGN installed as part of their license agreement with TSR which made them the sole "authorized" ftp site for *D&D material. MPGN has 60 simultaneous anonymous logins available, and only rarely are all of them in use, so there shouldn't ever be a problem getting in. If you want to see what files are in the MPGN archive, but don't wish to tie up any logins, there is a WWW site which has the index of the entire AD&D directory, and a few of the files available for your perusal, at . If fantasy art is more your thing, rather than *D&D-specific files, then be sure to check out grind.isca.uiowa.edu and wuarchive.wustl.edu/multimedia/images, as both have extensive selections of art files, quite a few of which are in the fantasy genre. Unfortunately, both of these sites are extremely busy; it's a good bet that you will not be able to get in between roughly 9am-9pm, Central Time (10-10, Eastern; 4pm-4am Greenwich). MPGN also has a few directories of artwork, mainly specific to the worlds of DragonLance (located at ftp.mpgn.com/Gaming/ADND/Worlds/DragonLance/.xvpics/) and SpellJammer (located at ftp.mpgn.com/Gaming/ADND/Worlds/SpellJammer/ ShipYard/). If sound files are your cup of tea, you may wish to look into MPGN's Ravenloft Sounds directory, conventiently located at ftp.mpgn.com/Gaming/ADND/Worlds/Ravenloft/RAVENLOFT.SOUNDS/ H3: What does ".zip" mean? And why can't I read these files I just downloaded? A: The .zip file extension means that the file has been compressed with some form of PKZip in order to save space in the archive and to keep up- and download times relatively short. You will need to unpack the file in order to read it properly. There are many compression systems besides PKZip, and this leads to the often bewildering maze of file extensions one must wade through on most ftp sites. Most ftp sites (including MPGN) have a directory dedicated to providing copies of the various packer/unpacker programs. Many will also automatically unpack certain formats of downloaded files as you download them if you simply leave off the file extension when you request the file. If your site does not already carry the program you need, either check for such a directory at the ftp site, or ask your local sysadmin for assistance. Some common file extensions: Extension File type Transfer as Then... (By using...) .arc Archive binary un-archive (ARC) .asc Text ascii read normally .au Unix Sound file binary player needed .bmp Graphic (bitmap) binary viewer needed .doc Word/WordPerfect file binary viewer needed .exe Executable file binary execute .gif Graphic binary viewer needed .gz GNUzip compressed file binary un-compress (gzip) .hqx Macintosh encoded file binary un-encode (BinHex) .jpg Graphic binary viewer needed .lzh LHarc archive binary un-archive (lharc) .mpg Video graphic file binary player needed .pdf Adobe/Acrobat file binary viewer needed .ps Adobe PostScript file binary viewer needed .sit Macintosh compressed binary un-compress (Stuffit) .tar Unix tape archive binary un-archive (tar) .tar.z \ Compressed Unix .taz > tape archive binary un-compress (gzip) .tgz / then un-archive (tar) .tif Graphic binary viewer needed .txt Text ascii read normally .uue Unix encoded file ascii un-encode (uudecode) .voc Soundblaster sound file binary player needed .wav Sound file binary player needed .z, .Z Unix compressed file binary un-compress (gzip/decompress) .zip Compressed file binary un-compress (pkzip/unzip) If you try to transfer a binary file as ASCII, all you end up with is garbage. If you try to transfer an ASCII file as binary, you can lose the line breaks, which means the entire file will transfer as one long line. Note that gzip, though it has the default file extension of .gz, additionally uses the extension .z; gzip will also handle any .Z files condensed with compress. To help clear up some of the confusion about using ftp, here is a section quoted from an FAQ posted on rgfd by (but, to my knowledge, not written by) Boudewijn Wayers. How to get files by ftp. ----------------------- FAQ lists cross-posted to news.answers and rec.answers can be gotten from rtfm.mit.edu (18.70.0.209), under /pub/usenet/news.answers or under /pub/usenet/more.specific.group.name. "Anonymous ftp" is just a way for files to be stored where anyone can retrieve them over the Net. For example, to retrieve the latest version of the Moria FAQ, do the following: ftp rtfm.mit.edu ==> connect to the site; a message follows anonymous ==> type this when it asks for your name ==> type your address as the password cd /pub/usenet ==> go to the directory you want to be cd rec.games.moria ==> one level down (no slash) dir ==> look at what's there get r.g.m_F_A_Q ==> get the file; case-sensitive quit ==> stop this mysterious thing If your ftp program complains that it doesn't know where the site you want to use is, type the numerical address instead of the sitename: ftp 18.70.0.209 ==> connect with numerical address If you don't have ftp access, send e-mail to mail-server@rtfm.mit.edu with the single word "help" in the body of the message. Getting binary files (executables, or any compressed files) is only slightly more difficult. You need to set binary mode inside ftp before you transfer the file. binary ==> set binary transfer mode ascii ==> set back to text transfer mode FAQs and spoiler lists are generally ASCII files; everything else is generally binary files. Generic help can be found in the FAQs of comp.binaries. for how to transfer, extract, and virus-check binary files (at rtfm.mit.edu). If you can't FTP from your site, use one of the following ftp-by-mail servers: ftpmail@decwrl.dec.com ftpmail@src.doc.ic.ac.uk ftpmail@cs.uow.edu.au ftpmail@grasp.insa-lyon.fr For complete instructions, send a message reading "help" to the server. If you don't know exactly what you're looking for, or exactly where it is, there are programs and servers that can help you. For more info, send e-mail to mail-server@rtfm.mit.edu with the body of the message reading send usenet/news.answers/finding-sources H4: Are there any WWW pages for *D&D? A: TSR has an official web page that is chiefly made up of AD&D material; they are working on expanding it further in many interesting ways. There are also a plethora of other, fan-maintained WWW sites related to *D&D or some specific facet thereof, as well as to role-playing games in general. Since listing every single *D&D-related web page would roughly double the size of this entire FAQ, what follows is a sampling of the many, many web pages out there which deal in some way with *D&D or may be of significant interest to a *D&D player. http://www.tsr.com/ TSR's Official Web Page http://www.webrpg.com/ WebRPG, with "gamers wanted" ads, artwork, chatrooms, fun surveys, game store, etc. http://beastie.cs.und.ac.za/~sefton/Realms/ Webpage of the Forgotten Realms mailing list http://crpp0001.uqtr.uquebec.ca/www_wanderer/rpg.html Everything you wanted to know about AD&D and more http://www.irony.com On-line dice roller programs, a virtual village, and more http://www.dragonsclaw.net/underdark/ Drizzit's Underdark: Drow, the Underdark, and a certain ranger... http://acm.org/~papay/dnd/tsr_prices_intro.html List of TSR products which have been auctioned in rec.games.frp.marketplace, with average prices compiled from data dating back up to three years http://www.ucc.gu.uwa.edu.au/~knight Mystara web page, and more http://attila.stevens-tech.edu/gamers/links.html Netbooks galore http://www.yahoo.com/Recreation/Games/Role_Playing_Games/ Yahoo's list of RPG-related web pages http://www.pbem.com/pbem-page.html PBEMs, PBEMs, and more PBEMs http://www.informatik.tu-muenchen.de/~peceny/spiele_e.html#Rollenspiele Michi's gaming page http://www.complang.tuwien.ac.at/alex/home.html.en Selected postings from rgfd, guides, house rules, helpful computer programs, and more http://www.stack.nl/~nushae/ Nushae S. Fahey's AD&D page at Stack http://www.omnigroup.com/People/surge/rpg.html Mbs upon Mbs of AD&D and RPG files http://www.upl.cs.wisc.edu/~woodelf/RPG/RPG.html Extensive list of RPG web pages, etc. http://www.cs.technion.ac.il/users/massi/ffp The Fellowship of the Flying Paladin http://www.execpc.com/~brontomn/fbsinfo.html The Fellowship of the Black Spot http://www.lysator.liu.se/~johol/rpg/rpg.html RPG-related files, etc. http://www.achilles.net:80/~fraserm/fates.html Fate's Fellowship archives & information http://www.multiline.com.au/~seanh/u_adnd.html Greyhawk information, and lots of links http://www.ecsel.psu.edu/~dshawley/DnD/mageria.html The world of Mageria http://www.miniworld.com/adnd Several random character/item/etc. generators, the Dragon/Polyhedron index, and some Mystara information http://www.informatik.tu-muenchen.de/~krings/roleplaying.html Spells, kits, and other miscellaneous info http://www.effierover.com/index.html Effie's Concordance of the D&D books http://www.mimgames.com/~legolas/ Legolas' page of AD&D links http://web.cs.ualberta.ca/~wade/HyperDnd/ Wade's Role-playing Games site; includes a full directory of ftp.mpgn.com, and a few files from there as well http://www.mag7.com/ Mag Force 7; featuring homepages of Margaret Weis (of Dragonlance fame), Don Perrin, Jeff Grubb, and others http://www.rpg.net/ RPGnet--reviews, campaign ads, links, files, art, etc. http://www.gygax.com/ Gary Gygax's homepage Other URLs which contain *D&D information: http://www.dem.csiro.au/~matthewt/personal.html http://www-zeus.desy.de/~hungbhy/rpg.html http://www.acc.umu.se/~stradh/ http://webhead.com/~sergio/games.html http://www.ed.ac.uk/~geas/ http://www.geocities.com/Area51/1966/ http://www.jyu.fi/~np/roleplaying.html http://worldmall.com/erf/lipo.htm http://www.id.iit.edu/~petemar1/www/adnd.html http://www.sfn.saskatoon.sk.ca/~aa499/dnd.htm http://www.hs.port.ac.uk/~alexw/adnd.html http://www.cs.bgu.ac.il/~capone/d-and-d.html http://spitfire.ausys.se/johan/cave/default.stm http://www.strath.ac.uk/Departments/EPRC/fr.html http://members.aol.com/jimvassila/ http://www.io.com/~tenzil/rpgs/adnd.html http://www.inrialpes.fr/movi/people/Lamiroy/PBEMS/introduction.html http://www.wirehub.nl/~quinon/add.htm http://www.bath.ac.uk/~su3blarp/ http://www.inforamp.net/~gthoms/ http://www.cyberhighway.net/~cajur/dm.html http://www.bart.nl/~bsassen/index.html http://omen.com.au/~gazbe/aegen/aegen.html http://www.rpi.edu/~payned/ http://www.mit.edu:8001/people/jerrod/home.html http://users.interconnect.net/indy/ http://home.sol.no/olear/ADnD.html http://rembrandt.uib.no/Dragonlands/ http://www.pazsaz.com/dundrag.html http://www.users.interport.net/~hwid/wod/wod.html http://www.geocities.com/TimesSquare/2937/ http://www2.spl.co.za/~lune/ http://www.ypn.com/topics/689.html http://www.webcom.com/~apcrypha/ http://www.pbm.com/~lindahl/pbm.html Other URLs of possible interest for shoppers: http://wwww.worldhouse.com/ The Worldhouse gaming store in Toronto, Canada has its own web page with ordering info, game info, and much more. http://www.dragontrove.com/ The Dragon's Trove on-line gaming store, which has a large selection of new and used RPG material for sale. http://www.titan-games.com/ Titan Games, selling new and used RPG material. http://www.sagesguild.com/ Sage's Guild, selling new and used RPG material. http://gamersguild.webrpg.com/ The Gamer's Guild store in Lake Geneva, Wisconsin, selling new and used RPG material. http://amazon.com/ Amazon.com, one of--if not the--largest on-line bookstore. http://futfan.com/ An on-line bookstore, specializing in SF, Fantasy, Mystery, & Horror. You can browse their catalog and place orders through their page. H5: Where can I upload this neat program I just wrote? A: If the program contains TSR trademarks (such as those listed at the beginning of this document), and/or extensive quotes taken from a TSR- published work (e.g. exactly copying the PH2 tables for a character- creation program), then the only ftp site to which it may be legally uploaded is ftp.mpgn.com. If the program contains neither trademarks, nor entire sections quoted from TSR books, then it can most likely be uploaded to your favorite ftp site, whatever that may be. Once you upload the file, please post a note to rec.games.frp.dnd explaining what the program does, and at what site people may find it. An alternative to ftp is making the program available via a WWW page. To do this, you must either have a personal page, or convince one of the existing *D&D WWW page keepers to include your program in their page. This latter course of action is not as difficult as it sounds, as people tend to be looking for new things to add. Once it gets added to a page, post a note to rec.games.frp.dnd listing what the program does and the URL of the page on which it may be found. If this doesn't seem like your cup of tea, you can try posting it to Usenet. If you decide to take this course of action, the correct group to post it to is alt.games.frp.dnd-util. Posting such programs to rec.games.frp.dnd is strongly discouraged. If you do not get alt.games.frp.dnd-util, ask your Usenet sysop to add it. If you do not get this newsgroup, and your sysop refuses to add it, then and only then should you try posting it to rec.games.frp.archives, which is a moderated newsgroup, so all postings are mailed to the moderator, who then decides if each message is worthy to be posted, so there is a chance that he will decide not to post your program. Once it gets posted, then post a note in rec.games.frp.dnd explaining what the program is supposed to do and in which newsgroup people may find it. The final course of action you can take is not to upload it at all, but rather to post a note to rec.games.frp.dnd that anyone interested in trying your program can send you e-mail and you can e-mail the program to the interested parties. No matter which of the above methods you use, there are certain protocols which should be followed. When done, your methods should be explained in a companion text file (if uploading to an ftp site or placing on a web page) and in any advertisements you post to Usenet. 1) Compress the program, both to save room on the ftp site/Web page/ Newsgroup/etc., and to cut down on download times. This is especially necessary if you post a program to Usenet. 2) If you post programs to Usenet, don't forget to convert the file to ASCII before you post it (uuencode [preferred by most], BinHex, MIME, etc.); otherwise, it will be unusable by most, if not all systems. 3) State the compression system used (pkzip, compress, lharc, tar, gzip, StuffIt, etc.) and the ASCII conversion program, if used; don't rely on people's ability to decipher file extension(s). 4) State the computer & system requirements (i.e. DOS, Windows, Macintosh System 7, ANSI-C source, etc.). H6: Is a complete index to Dragon Magazine available anywhere? A: An index of Dragon Magazine from #2-#236 and Polyhedron #45 through the end of its original run, compiled by Vince Gray , is available in an xref ASCII (KWIC) file via MPGN. It is updated annually, around the first of the year. An online lookup form--not yet updated with the most recent KWIC files--created by Scooby (Joseph DuBois) , is located on the World Wide Web at . H7: Is there a complete list of every *D&D product TSR has ever published? A: Yes, there is. Originally compiled by Anthony Brooks (nee Goth) it is now being kept up and updated by Gavin Bartell , and is available through MPGN, in the /Gaming/ADND/TSRGuides directory. It includes listings for every known release of every TSR *D&D product, from rulebooks to modules to box sets to mage stones, and everything, and I mean everything, in between, along with short descriptions of each. If, in looking through it, you discover that a certain item is not listed, feel free to drop a line to Gavin about it. H8: Where can I find a complete list of every monster TSR has published for *D&D? A: This list, which was up to date as of the beginning of 1996 and includes only 2nd ed. creatures, is maintained by Anthony Brooks (nee Goth) , when he finds the time to update it (5165 entries and rising at the last count). However, it is not currently found on any ftp sites or web pages. If you want a copy, and your mailer can handle very large messages, send Anthony a quick note requesting a copy. H9: Is there really an "AD&D Guide to Sex?" What other Guides are there? A: Yes there was, though it was not a TSR product (as one would infer from that name). Chiefly compiled by Reid Bluebaugh from submissions by many people on the Internet (collectively known as "The Guide Creator"), it has been revised to remove trademarks & copyrighted material belonging to TSR, as well as make it more applicable to more games than just AD&D; its proper name is now "The Complete RPG Guide to Unlawful Carnal Knowledge." At this time, no FTP site is publically known to contain any of the Complete Guides. Revised versions of these files, in which all of TSR's trademarks and any quotes from TSR's books have been removed, are slowly making their way onto the net, via rec.games.frp.archives and a web page, as the compiler finishes them. As none of them are really AD&D-specific now, they are all called "The Complete RPG Guide to..." or "The Fantasy Guide to..." Direct any questions about, as well as any requests for copies of the Guides to Reid Bluebaugh . On a side note, if you happen to find a copy of a '92 version of the Guide to Sex--or a copy of any of the guides which is dated before 1996--pass it by. There are much better, much more complete (some 200+ pages longer in a couple instances), and much more recent versions available. A partial list of Complete Guides is as follows; more are created as "the Guide Creator" thinks them up: Complete RPG Guide to Alcohol " " " " Hygiene " " " " Unlawful Carnal Knowledge (previously "Sex") " Fantasy " " Star Trek " " " " Technology " " " " Sanity " Highlander Guide Appendix 1: Complete RPG Guide to Drugs " 2: " " " " Dice Games " 3: " " " " Blue Ball Bowling " 4: " " " " Comedy " 5: " " " " Gruel H10: Where can I find the Net.*.Book? A: This type of file is not usually posted to rec.games.frp.dnd, and only occasionally sees light on rec.games.frp.archives. Rather, these files tend to be found on various ftp sites and WWW pages. There are many, many more netbooks out there than can ever possibly be listed here, so what follows is merely a sampler of the kinds of files you may find. Some examples of Net.Books are: Great Net.Book of Net.Books for use with AD&D Compiled by Joel Hahn Available via www to: http://www.enteract.com/~aardy/rpg/nb-index.html (Abridged version) Net.Plot.Book (Contains generic fantasy plot hooks) Originally compiled by Aaron Sher Afterwords compiled by Currently compiled by Alex Forst Available via ftp to: ftp.cs.pdx.edu\pub\frp\general\ net.plot.book.4.gz (gzipped; future releases will be here) Releases 1-3 are archived here as well. And via www to: http://www.complang.tuwien.ac.at/alex/Handbooks/ Most recent releases found here first or http://www.jyu.fi/~np/roleplaying.html Great.Net.Spellbook (Every homemade wizard spell the compiler found) Great.Net.Prayerbook (Ditto for priest spells) Orig. compiled by Boudewijn Wayers Currently compiled by Ezra Van Everbroeck For ftp info write to: Ezra Van Everbroeck Both available via www to: http://www.istari.org:44 Ultimate Spell Database (2800+ TSR spells' names & bare essentials) Compiled by Mark Middleton Available via ftp to: ftp.funet.fi\pub\doc\games\roleplay\systems\adnd\spells\ *.tab (tab-delimited text-only version) *.fm (FilemakerPro version) *.sea.hqx (Macintosh version) *.zip (Windows version) Net.Psionics.Handbook Net.Psionics.Handbook II Compiled by Charon [and possibly also ] Version 1 available via www to: http://www.hs.port.ac.uk/~alexw/adnd.html Version 2 available via www to: http://www.istari.org:44/books/olear/ADnD/NetBooks.html (Net.Psi II is available in Adobe .pdf format and Word 6.0 format) Tome of Vast Knowledge (database & generator of just about anything) Compiled by Douglas Webb Available via ftp to: ftp.mpgn.com/Gaming/AD&D/Programs/Tome_of_Vast_Knowledge/ vast112.zip (later releases may be available) Database Builder for the ToVK Compiled by Douglas Webb Available via ftp to: ftp.mpgn.com/Gaming/AD&D/Programs/Tome_of_Vast_Knowledge/ vbilt106.zip (later releases may be available) Net.Riddles.Book Compiled by Mark Manning Available via www to: http://web.cs.ualberta.ca/~wade/HyperDnd/ http://www.jyu.fi/~np/roleplaying.html Net.Traps.Book(s) (three different collections) Compiled by (book #1) James C Phillips Available ?? Compiled by (book #2) Michael Sloves Available via www to: http://www.jyu.fi/~np/roleplaying.html Compiled by (book #3) Jason Seeley Available via www to: http://www2.aros.net/~jseeley 101 Spells Not Worth Memorizing (and we mean it!) Available via www to: http://www.enteract.com/~aardy/rpg/101spells.html 101 Bard Songs (popular songs which typify certain classes/races) Available via www to: http://www.math.auth.gr/~bchr/humor/101_bards.txt 101 Things You Don't Want to Hear Your Apprentice Say (Ummm, Master?) Available via www to: http://www.complang.tuwien.ac.at/alex/rec.games.frp.dnd/101donts 101 Familiars You Would Have Been Better Off Without (Here, kitty...) Available via www to: http://www.complang.tuwien.ac.at/alex/rec.games.frp.dnd/101familiars 101 Uses for the DM's Screen Available via www to: http://www.complang.tuwien.ac.at/alex/rec.games.frp.dnd/ 101-Uses-DM-Screen Dark.Sun.Net.Handbook Forgotten Realms Notebook Great.Net.Book.of.Classes.and.Kits Net.Wizards.Handbook Net.Libram of Wild Magic Net.Monstrous.Manual Net.Book.of.Names Available via ftp to: ftp.mpgn.com/Gaming/AD&D/ Net.Libram of Wild Magic also available via www to: http://www.hs.port.ac.uk/~alexw/adnd.html Famous Last Words Available via www to: http://user.cs.tu-berlin.de/~rossi/flws.txt Net.Munchkin.Handbook Available via www to: http://www.omnigroup.com/People/surge/gaming/ Net.Book.of.Poisons Available via www to: http://www.complang.tuwien.ac.at/alex/Handbooks/ Net.Bard.Songs.Book (Goofy lyrics for songs only bards would sing) Compiled by: Jeff Gostin Versions 1 & 2 available via www to: http://k2.scl.cwru.edu/~static/rpg/info/songv1.html http://k2.scl.cwru.edu/~static/rpg/info/songv2.html Net.Monstrous.Compendium Compiled by: Robert Chrisitian Available via ftp to: ftp.mpgn.com/Gaming/AD&D/Archives/NetBooks/ Net_Monstrous_Compendium.Z (LaTeX only) Net.Forgotten.Realms.Book (Tome of the Forgotten Realms) Compiled by: Chris Archived ?? Net.Abyssal.Layers.Book Compiled by Tyrus Hellbane Available via ftp to: ftp.eskimo.com/u/b/berg/Netbooks/Compressed/ abyss.z or ftp.eskimo.com/u/b/berg/Netbooks/Pkzipped/ abyss.zip Tome of the Damned (A book of all things evil and/or undead) Compiled by Brennan Brooks Available via www to: http://www.sfn.saskatoon.sk.ca/~ab347/damn.zip Net.Fiction.Story (Latest version of the Net.Fiction Story) Compiled by: Available via www (or ftp) to: http://ftp.funet.fi/pub/doc/games/roleplay/stories/net.fiction.story There are many more Net.Books out there; MPGN has several, and several Web pages have many more. Check out MPGN and the Web sites listed in the answer to Question H4 before posting a request to rgfd. There is also a list which occasionally circulates around the ADND-L mailing list, and is infrequently posted to rgfm & rgfd, of current Net.Book projects, with short descriptions and contact addresses. H11: Are there any *D&D-related mailing lists? A: There are several *D&D-related mailing lists. A mailing list is similar to Usenet, with the main difference being that all messages are mailed directly to your account, instead of being stored on a remote News server. Some of these mailing lists can get quite high in volume at times, so you might want to think twice about subscribing to something that will quickly swamp your mailbox. One of the more popular *D&D-related mailing lists is ADND-L, which is very similar to rec.games.frp.dnd in direction and topics of discussion. A major difference between ADND-L and rgfd is that contributors are limited by common practice to two posts per day on ADND-L, both in order to cut down on the amount of mail received and to keep enough space on the listserver archives to maintain a six month backup. Anyone can look up and retrieve recent articles. To this end, many of those people who have a proclivity towards longer posts put a table of contents at the top of each message. Mailing Lists Listservs adnd-l@listserv.uta.edu *D&D discussion (digest possible) adnd-l@gitvm1.gatech.edu Alternate address for ADND-L (no digest) gmast-l@utcvm.utc.edu Game Masters interest group greytalk@mitvma.mit.edu Greyhawk qadim-l@knidos.cc.metu.edu.tr Al-Qadim ravenloft-l@oracle.wizards.com Ravenloft realms-l@oracle.wizards.com Forgotten Realms rpganews-l@oracle.wizards.com RPGA News (read only) Majordomos al-qadim@mpgn.com Al-Qadim birthright@mpgn.com Birthright dark-sun@mpgn.com Dark Sun dragonlance@mpgn.com Dragonlance greyhawk@mpgn.com Greyhawk mystara@mpgn.com Mystara planescape@mpgn.com Planescape ravenloft@mpgn.com Ravenloft spelljammer@mpgn.com Spelljammer Subscribing to a Mailing List Listservers: If you are interested in joining a listserv list, send a message to LISTSERV@ with "SUBSCRIBE " in the body (without the quotes). For example, to subscribe to the ADND-L mailing list, you would send mail to listserv@utarlvm1.uta.edu with the message SUBSCRIBE adnd-l Aardy R. DeVarque You will get a message in confirmation of your subscription, which also details some of the ways to use the listserv. When the time comes for you to send your first message out to the readers of the list, send it to the address listed above for the listserv, which, in the case of ADND-L, would be adnd-l@utsrlvm1.uta.edu To unsubscribe, send a message to LISTSERV@
with the message UNSUBSCRIBE adnd-l It does no good to send unsubscribe messages to the main list, you will just get laughed at. You have to send them to the listserver itself. Majordomos: Subscribing to a majordomo list is similar to the method for subscribing to listservs, except you sometimes include your e-mail address instead of a personal name. For example, to subscribe to a majordomo mailing list, you would normally send mail to majordomo@ with the message SUBSCRIBE joeshmoe@foo.bar.edu However, when subscribing to the mailing lists at MPGN, the server automatically finds your address from the mail headers. Therefore, you only need send mail to majordomo@mpgn.com with the message SUBSCRIBE Once again, you will receive a confirmation message with more details. For majordomos, as with listservs, do not send unsubscribe messages to the main list; send them to the majordomo, as you did to subscribe. Digest means that the list's messages are collated into a large message and then mailed to you, usually on a daily basis. This is useful to prevent your mailbox from being swamped with 200 messages per day, but does not save you anything in terms of disk space. People who only check their mail once a day or so and people who have to pay per message received usually prefer this method. Information on how to get the digest form of a list, if one is available, is usually included in the introductory material sent to you when you subscribe to the list. Listservs usually require you to send a special command message to the listserver, while majordomos usually require you to subscribe to a slightly different list name to begin with. The lists at MPGN all have digests available, by subscribing to -digest@mpgn.com instead of @mpgn.com. There are numerous other mailing lists which are dedicated to other RPGs, or which are more general; a complete list is regularly (if infrequently) posted by Alistair G. Lowe-Norris on most, if not all of the rec.games.frp.* newsgroups and gaming mailing lists. H12: Are there any other *D&D-related resources on the Internet? A: There are quite a few other resources on the 'net; including the rec.games.frp.* FAQ, IRC channels and chat rooms, and Internet provider-specific resources. If you are looking for more generalized information, or just information which is not *D&D-specific, a good place to check is the rec.games.frp.* FAQ, archived at both MPGN, in the /Gaming/ADND/FAQ/ directory, and rtfm.mit.edu, under the /pub/usenet/ directory. Those interested in web-based chat have to look no further than TSR's web page. TSR's chat area generally requires that you download and install special client software from http://www.ichat.com in order to properly access the chats. TSR has set up various chat areas, including two set aside specifically for on-line role-playing. The only other resource commonly available on the Internet which has not already been discussed is IRC, namely the chat areas #AD&D and #RPGA. There, you can have real-time conversations with other gaming enthusiasts about life, the universe, and role-playing. There are also several campaigns being run on IRC which are advertised on #AD&D; if you're interested, look there first. Simply /join #ad&d, then /msg noppa games to see a list of IRC campaigns. There is also a chat line called #rpg_inn, which is dedicated to running real-time free-form gaming. The #AD&D channel's homepage can be found at http://www.microage-tb.com/user/criley/main.htm; it has much of the information one might need to get into IRC and find the #AD&D folk. GEnie, Compuserve, and Delphi also have large discussion areas dedicated to AD&D. Check around in the Games Special Interest Groups and you'll find them. Unfortunately, if you do not have an account with one of these companies, you're out of luck; there is no way to get there from the rest of the 'net. ***End Part 6*** -- Aardy R. DeVarque Feudalism: Serf & Turf Rec.games.frp.dnd FAQ: http://www.enteract.com/~aardy/faq/rgfdfaq.html ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Path: news.tuwien.ac.at!aconews.univie.ac.at!newscore.univie.ac.at!uninett.no!news-feed.ifi.uio.no!newsfeed.berkeley.edu!newsfeed.enteract.com!news.enteract.com!not-for-mail From: aardy@enteract.NOJUNK.com (Aardy R. DeVarque) Newsgroups: rec.games.frp.dnd Subject: rec.games.frp.dnd FAQ: 7/9 -- Resources 2: Non-Internet Date: Mon, 01 Feb 1999 13:54:30 GMT Organization: Aardy's Aardvark Emporium Lines: 931 Message-ID: <36bbb193.46541173@news.enteract.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: 207.229.149.73 Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Newsreader: Forte Agent 1.5/32.452 Xref: news.tuwien.ac.at rec.games.frp.dnd:364819 Archive-name: games/dnd/part7 Posting-frequency: monthly Last-modified: January 1999 URL: http://www.enteract.com/~aardy/faq/rgfdfaq.html REC.GAMES.FRP.DND FAQ Part 7 Resources 2: Non-Internet =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= * designates topics which have been updated. + designated topics which have been added. Non-Internet * I1: What magazine resources are there for *D&D? I2: What are some good books to read to get good ideas? I3: Where should I start looking in a library for more information? I4: What are some good fantasy movies to watch to get good ideas? I5: What is some good background or inspirational music for *D&D games? =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= Non-Internet I1: What non-electronic resources are there for *D&D ? A: TSR publishes two (aptly named) in-house magazines, Dungeon and Dragon, both commonly available at most stores where role-playing games are sold. Dragon concentrates more the role-playing industry, with news, reviews, and new rules and additions to various games, but especially *D&D. Dungeon includes new adventures and modules, usually for use with *D&D, but adventures for other games are often included as well. Here is a short list of subscription addresses for a few fantasy role-playing magazines (prices are subject to change): Alarums and Excursions Attn: Lee Gold 3965 Alla Road Los Angeles, CA 90066 Monthly, Postage + $2.00 per issue 310/306-7456 Dragon Magazine (US) TSR, Inc. P.O. Box 469086 Escondido, CA 92046 Monthly, $34.95/yr (US); $52.95/yr (Canada); US$57.95/yr (rest of world except Europe) Ph: 800/395-7760; Fax: 619/738-4805 Dragon Magazine (Europe) Subscriptions Dept. P.O. Box 504 Leicester, LE16 OAD Monthly, 34.95 pounds/yr (UK); 41.95 pounds/yr (rest of Europe) Ph: +44 (0) 858 410510 Dungeon Adventures (US) TSR, Inc. P.O. Box 469086 Escondido, CA 92046 Bimonthly, $19.95/yr (US); $24.95/yr (Canada); $42.95/yr (rest of world except Europe) Ph: 800/395-7760; Fax: 619/738-4805 Dungeon Adventures (UK) Subscriptions Dept. P.O. Box 504 Leicester, LE16 OAD Bimonthly, 19.95 pounds/yr (UK); 24.95 pounds/yr (rest of Europe) Ph: +44 (0) 858 410510 The Gamer 127 N. Madison St, Suite 202 Pasadena, CA 91101 818/795-8130 Bi-monthly, $15/yr; $25/yr Canada or Mexico; $40/yr elsewhere Pyramid P.O. Box 18957 Austin, TX 78760 Bi-monthly Silver Griffin Attn: Devlin Janax POB 1751 Saint Paul, MN 55101 Vortext Vortext Publishing 5506 Beaudry St #C EmeryVille CA 94608 USA Quarterly, US$2.75 per issue, $10 subs. (4 issues) White Wolf Magazine 4153 Indian Manor Drive Stone Mountain, GA 30083 Bi-monthly, $25/yr US, $40/yr Canada, $52/yr Overseas 404/292-1819; FAX: 404/292-9426 I2: What are some good books to read to get good ideas? A: An attempt to list every fantasy book would be suicide, plain and simple. However, what follows is a list of some of the books which Basic D&D was based upon*, as well as some others which are regarded as classics or particularly indicative of the genre. In general, if you find that a certain book or series listed here strikes your fancy, chances are that the author has written many, many more fantasy novels, as many of these authors are prolific in the extreme, and listing even the highlights of each would be a task in and of itself. Basis for D&D:*,** Anderson, Poul. _Three Hearts and Three Lions_; _The High Crusade_; _The Broken Sword_ Bellairs, John. _The Face in the Frost_ Burroughs, Edgar Rice. "Pellucidar" series; Mars series; Venus series Carter, Lin. "World's End" series de Camp, L. Sprague. _Lest Darkness Fall_; _Fallible Fiend_ de Camp, L. Sprague, and Fletcher Pratt. "Harold Shea" series; _Carnelian Cube_ Farmer, Philip Jose. "The World of the Tiers" series Fox, Gardner. "Kothar" series; "Kyrik" series Howard, Robert E. "Conan" series Lanier, Sterling. _Hiero's Journey_ Lieber, Fritz. "Fafhrd & Gray Mouser" series [a.k.a. "Lankhmar" series] Lovecraft, H.P. "Cthulhu" series Merritt, A. _Creep, Shadow, Creep_; Moon Pool_; Dwellers in the Mirage_ Moorcock, Michael. _Stormbringer, Stealer of Souls_; "Hawkmoon" series Offutt, Andrew J., ed. _Swords Against Darkness III_ Pratt, Fletcher. _Blue Star_ Saberhagen, Fred. _Changeling Earth_ St. Clair, Margaret. _The Shadow People_; _Sign of the Labrys_ Tolkien, J.R.R. _The Hobbit_; "Ring" trilogy Vance, Jack. _The Eyes of the Overworld_; _The Dying Earth_ Zelazny, Roger. _Jack of Shadows_; "Amber" series * This list is selected from a list found on p. 224 of the 1st ed. DMG ** According to the authors of the 1st ed. DMG, de Camp & Pratt, Robert E. Howard, Fritz Lieber, Jack Vance, H.P. Lovecraft, and A. Merritt had some of the most direct influences on the direction of the game, and the others had a lesser influence. Other reading: [Anonymous.] _Arabian Nights_ [Anonymous.] _Beowulf_ [Anonymous.] _The Song of Roland_ Alexander, Lloyd. _The Book of Three_ and the resultant series Anthony, Piers. "Xanth" series Anthony, Piers & Robert Kornwise. _Through the Ice_ Asprin, Robert. "Myth" series Asprin, Robert & Lynn Abbey, ed. "Thieves' World" series Babbitt, Lucy Lullyford. _The Oval Amulet_ Barber, Antonia. _Catkin_ Baum, L. Frank. "Oz" books Bradley, Marion Zimmer. _The Mists of Avalon_, "Darkover" books Bradley, Marion Zimmer, ed. _Swords & Sorceress_ series Brooks, Terry. "Shannara" series; "Magic Kingdom of Landover" series Brothers Grimm. _Grimm's Fairy Tales_ [unabridged preferred] Brust, Steven. "Jhereg" series Burkert, Nancy Ekholm. _Valentine and Orson_ Cherryh, C.J. "Sword of Knowledge" series; "Morgam" books Claremont, Chris & John Bolton. _The Black Dragon_ Cole, Allan & Chris Bunch. _The Far Kingdoms_ Constantine, Storm. _Sign for the Sacred_ Cook, Glen. "The Black Company" series, "Glittering Stone" trilogy Cook, Hugh. "Chronicles of an Age of Darkness" series Cook, Rick. _Wizard's Bane_, _Wizardry Compiled_, _Wizardry Cursed_ Cooper, Louise. "Time Master" trilogy, _Star Ascendant_ Crawford, Dan. _Rouse a Sleeping Cat_ Datlow, Ellen, et al., ed. _Year's Best Fantasy and Horror_ series De Angeli, Marguerite. _The Door in the Wall_ DeChancie, John & Martin H. Greenberg, eds. _Castle Fantastic_ DeLint, Charles. _Into the Green_, _Brian Froud's Faerielands: The Wild Wood_ Devers, Joe. "Lone Wolf" series ("Determine Your Destiny" books) Dickinson, Peter. _The Flight of Dragons_ Dickson, Gordon. _The Dragon & The George_ Donaldson, Stephen R. _Daughter of Regals & Other Tales_, "1st & 2nd Chronicles of Thomas Covenant the Unbeliever" trilogies Duncan, Dave. _The Hunters' Haunt_, "Man of His Word" series Eckert, Allan W. _The Dark Green Tunnel_, _The Wand_ Eddings, David. "Belgariad" series; "Mallorean" series; "Elenium" series Ende, Michael. _Die Unendliche Geschichte_ [Neverending Story] Estes, Rose. _The Children of the Dragon_ Evans, Linda. _Sleipnir_ Feist, Raymond. "The Riftwar Saga" series Feist, Raymond & Janny Wurst. "The Empire Trilogy" Foster, Alan Dean. "Spellsinger" series Foster, Hal. _Prince Valiant_ Forward, Eve. _Villians By Necessity_ Friedman, C.S. "Coldfire" trilogy Gemmell, David. "Drenai" tales; "Sipstrassi" tales Gilliam, Richard, et al., ed. _Grails_ series Goodkind, Terry. _Wizard's First Rule_ Grahame, Kenneth. _The Reluctant Dragon_ Gray, Elizabeth. _Adam of the Road_ Gygax, E. Gary. "Gord the Rogue" series Hambly, Barbara. "Darwath" trilogy Harrison, Harry. _Warriors of the Way_ Henderson, Jason. _The Iron Thane_ Hildick, E.W. _The Case of the Dragon in Distress_ Hobb, Robin. _Assassin's Apprentice_ Hodgell, P.C. "Godstalk" series Jacques, Brian. _Redwall_ series Jones, Diana Wynne, ed. _Fantasy Stories_ Jones, J.V. _The Baker's Boy_ Jones, Terry. (of Monty Python fame) _Nicobobinus_ Jordan, Robert. "Wheel of Time" series Kay, Guy Gavriel. _The Lions of Al-Rassan_ Kelly, Eric P. _Trumpeter of Krakow_ Kerr, Katharine. "Devery" series Knaak, Richard. "Dragon Realm" series Knight, Max E., ed. _Christian Morgenstern's Galgenlieder_ [Gallows Songs] Koller, Jackie French. _The Dragonling_, _A Dragonling in the Family_ Kurtz, Katherine. "Deryni" series Lackey, Mercedes. "Magic's Dream" series ________ & Josephine Sherman _Castle of Deception_ ("Bard's Tale") ________ & Ru Emerson. _Fortress of Frost & Fire_ ("Bard's Tale") ________ & Mark Shepherd. _Prison of Souls_ ("Bard's Tale") Lawhead, Stephen R. "Merlin"; "Taliesin"; "Arthur" Lewis, C.S. "Narnia" series Llywelyn, Morgan & Michael Scott. "The Arcana" (trilogy) McCaffrey, Anne. "Pern" series Modesitt, L.E., Jr. _The Magic of Recluse_ Moon, Elizabeth. _The Deed of Paksenarrion_ Morgenstern, S. (pseud. for William Goldman). _The Princess Bride_ Morris, William. _Well at the World's End_ Newman, Sharan. _Death Comes as Epiphany_, _The Devil's Door_, _The Wandering Arm_ Newton, Joe. (David C. Cook, publisher). _Tullus and the Vandals of the North_, _Tullus and the Ransom Gold_; (Chariot Books, publisher). _Tullus and the Dark City_, _Tullus and the Monsters of the Deep_ Niles, Douglas. "The Watershed" trilogy Niven, Larry. _The Magic Goes Away_ Norman, John. "Gor" series Paxson, Diana L. & Adrienne Martine-Barnes. "Chronicles of Fionn Mac Cumhal" series Peters, Ellis. "Brother Cadfael" series Pierce, Tamora. _"Song of the Lioness" series, "Immortals" series Piper, H. Beam. _Lord Kalvern of Otherwhen_ Prachett, Terry. "Discworld" series; _The Color of Magic_ Priess, Bryon, et al., eds. _The Ultimate Dragon_ Pyle, Howard. _Otto of the Silver Hand_ Rawn, Melanie. "Dragon Prince" trilogy, "Exiles" trilogy Reichert, Mickey Zucker. "The Last of the Renshai" trilogy; "Bifrost Guardians" series; "The Renshai Chronicles" series Roberson, Jennifer. "Chronicles of the Cheysuli" series Roberts, John Maddox. "StormLands" series, "Cingulum" series Rosenberg, Joel. "Guardians of the Flame" series Saberhagen, Fred. "Swords" series; "Lost Swords" series Shea, Michael. _Nifft the Lean_, _In Yana, the Touch of the Undying_ Sherman, Josepha, ed. _Orphans of the Night_ Sim, Dave. _Cerebus_ (1st collection) Skurzynski, Gloria. _The Minstrel in the Tower_ Smith, Clark Ashton. _The Boiling Point_, _Hyperborea_, _The Abominations of Yondo_, _Xiccarph_, _Tales of Science and Sorcery_, _Zothique_ Snyder, Zilpha Keatley. _The Changing Maze_ Stirling, S.M. & Holly Lisle, _The Rose Sea_ Swanwick, Michael. _The Iron Dragon's Daughter_ Turtledove, Harry. "Arhel" series Watt-Evans, Lawrence. "Lords of Dus" series Weber, David. _Oath of Swords_ Wein, Elizabeth E. _The Winter Prince_ Weis, Margaret, & Tracy Hickman. "Darksword" series; "Deathgate" series Wells, Martha. _Element of Fire_, _City of Bones_ Westall, Robert. _The Cats of Seroster_ White, T.H. _The Once and Future King_ Willey, Elizabeth. _A Sorcerer and a Gentleman_ Williams, Tad. "Memory, Sorrow and Thorn" trilogy Wrede, Patricia C. _Dealing with Dragons_, _Calling on Dragons_ Yolen, Jane, _Wren to the Rescue_, _Wren's Quest_ Zelazny, Roger & Thomas T. Thomas. _The Mask of Loki_ [Various.] (Any novel published by TSR) There is an excellent reference book available at (or accessible by) most libraries, with the self explanatory title _What Fantastic Fiction Do I Read Next?: A Reader's Guide To Fantasy, Horror, and Science Fiction_. It is quite sizable and, though not exhaustive nor error-free, it can be a great help by providing lists of novels similar to those you may be already familiar with, as well as brief summaries of many books with "fantastic" features. You may also want to look into the Recommended Fantasy Authors List, located at as well as the Speculative Fiction Authors Bibliography and the Authors list, located at and or the Alternative Authors list, which can be found at . To find out more about current and forthcoming books in the fantasy genre, here are a couple of publishers' web pages to look into: http://www.tor.com The official page for TOR Books, the SF/Fantasy imprint of Tom Doherty Associates. http://www.baen.com The official page for Baen Books, a SF/Fantasy publisher. http://www.randomhouse.com/delrey/ The official page for Del Rey Books, the SF/Fantasy imprint of Ballantine Books. http://www.bdd.com/forum/bddforum.cgi/scifi/ The official page for Spectra, the SF/Fantasy imprint of Bantam Books. There are many other, non-fiction books out there which tell the history of daily life in the Middle Ages; see the next question or ask your local librarian for more information. However, the following series pretty much sums up everything you ever wanted to know about medieval weapons, armor, and life. Oakeshott, R. Ewart. _The Archaeology of Weapons: Arms and Armor From Prehistory to the Age of Chivalry._ Woodbridge, Suffolk, UK; Rochester, NY: Boydell Press, 1994. ________. _A Knight and His Castle._ Chester Springs, PA: Dufour Editions, 1993; London, Beaver Books, 1976. ________. _The Sword in the Age of Chivalry._ Woodbridge, Suffolk, UK; Rochester, NY: Boydell Press, 1994. ________. _A Knight and His Armor._ Philadelphia: Dufour Editions, 1961; London, Lutterworth Press, 1961. ________. _A Knight and His Horse._ London: Lutterworth Press, 1962; Philadelphia, PA: Dufour Editions, 1964. ________. _A Knight in Battle._ London: Lutterworth Press, 1971. ________. _A Knight and His Weapons._ Philadelphia, PA: Dufour Editions, 1964; London: Lutterworth Press, 1966. If you are looking for information on mythological beasts, a decent series called _Monsters of Mythology_ was put out by Chelsea House Publishers in the mid-80's; each book detailed one monster. I3: Where should I start looking in a library for more information? A. What sections of your average library to look in to find reference material for a medieval setting: Dewey Library of Decimal Congress Subject 398.2 GR72-79 Folk tales, legends, fairy tales, tall tales PN683-687 " PN1341-1347 " 398.204* PJ*, PL*, " PQ*, PT* " 398.209* PA3285 Folk tales of a geographic area PN905-1008 " PT6200-6230 " PT9509-9542 " 398.4* GR81, GR500-615 Literature of folk tales, horror stories GR700-860 " 133.* BF1001-1999 Occult 016.2* Z7721-7865 Religion Z6876-6880 " 291.13 BL300-325 Mythology 940.1 CB351-355 Medieval history 623.441 U800-897 History of arms & armor (pre-firearms) 623.1 UG400-442 Fortifications 725.18 NA490-497 Military use of walls, gates, etc. 728.81-2 NA 7710-7786 Castles, palaces 355.009 U29-42 History of military science 723 NA 350-489 Medieval architecture 709.02 N5940-6311 Medieval art 321.14 JC101-126 Medieval government 909.07* D111-203 Medieval history CB351-355 " 340.55 K140-165 (Medieval) History of law 780.0902 ML170-190 Medieval music 759.02 ND140-146 Medieval painting 181 B121-163 Ancient (Medieval) Eastern philosophy 189 B720-765 Medieval Western philosophy 615.0902 RM44 Medieval medicine 615.50902 " 734 NB170-180 Medieval sculpture I4: What are some good fantasy movies to watch to get good ideas? A: As above, it would be suicidal to attempt to list every single fantasy movie ever made. However, what follows is a fairly good listing of the movies most indicative of the genre, as well as a number of turkeys which are fun to watch and get ideas from. Warning: Some of these movies are intended for children, some are definitely not intended for children, and a couple are almost guaranteed to rot your brain. I take no responsibility for any damage done to your sanity by watching some of these films. All of these are available on video. A: Animated The Adventures of Baron Munchausen (1989) The Adventures of Robin Hood (1938) Aladdin (1986, 1992A) Aladdin and His Magic Lamp (1968A, 1976) Aladdin and the Wonderful Lamp (1982) A Alakazam the Great (1961) A Alexander Nevsky (1938) Ali Baba and the Forth Thieves (1944) Amazons (1986) Archer: The Fugitive From the Empire (1981) Arkenstone Fantasy (1974) Army of Darkness (1993) Arslan Senki (pt. 1-4) (a.k.a. Heroic Legend of Arislan) (1991-93) A Ator the Fighting Eagle (1983) Barbarian Queen (1985) Barbarian Queen II (1992) Barbarians (1987) Baron Munchausen (1943) The Beastmaster (1982) Beauty and the Beast (1946, 1983, 1991A) Black Adder (1983) Black Adder II (1985) Black Arrow (1948, 1984) The Blade Master (a.k.a. Ator the Invincible) (1984) Bladestorm (1986) Braveheart (1995) Brothers Lionheart (1977) Cadfael (vol. 1-4) (1994-1996) Camelot (1967) Captain Sinbad (1963) Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe (1988) Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian (1988) Chronicles of Narnia: Voyage of the Dawn Treader (1989) Chronicles of Narnia: The Silver Chair (1990) Clash of the Titans (1981) Conan the Barbarian (1982) Conan the Destroyer (1984) A Connecticut Yankee (1931) A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court (1949, 1970A) The Court Jester (1956) Curse of the Undead: Yoma (1989) A The Dark Crystal (1983) Deathstalker (1984) Deathstalker II: Duel of the Titans (1987) Deathstalker III: The Warriors from Hell (1988) Deathstalker 4: Clash of the Titans (1991) Doctor Faustus (1968) Donkey Skin (1970) Dragon Half (pt. 1-2) (1993) A The Dragon Who Wasn't (Or Was He?) (1983) A Dragonheart (1996) Dragonslayer (1981) The Dungeonmaster (1985) El Cid (1961) Erik the Viking (1989) Excalibur (1981) Faerie Tale Theatre: Aladdin and His Wonderful Lamp (1984) Fantastic Planet (1973) A Faust (1926) Fire and Ice (1983) A First Knight (1995) The Flame and the Arrow (1950) Flesh + Blood (a.k.a. The Rose and the Sword) (1985) Flesh and Blood (1951) Flight of Dragons (1982) A Fury of Hercules (1962) Gate of Hell (1954) The Giants of Thessaly (1960) Gnomes (1980) A Gnomes Great Adventure (1987) A The Golden Voyage of Sinbad (1974) Goliath Against the Giants (1961) Gor (1988) The Greenstone (1985) Grendel, Grendel, Grendel (1982) A Hamlet (1948, 1990) Hawk and Castile (19??) Hawk of Castile (1964) Hawk the Slayer (1980) Hearts and Armor (1983) Heaven and Earth (1990) Henry V (1944, 1989) The Hidden Fortress (1958) Highlander (1986) The Hobbit (1978) A Hong Xiguan (a.k.a. The New Legend of Shaolin) (1994) The Iron Crown (1941) The Iron Mask (1929) Iron Warrior (1987) Ironmaster (1983) Ivanhoe (1952, 1982) Jabberwocky (1977) Jack the Giant Killer (1962) Jason and the Argonauts (1963) Kagemusha (1980) King Arthur, the Young Warlord (1975) King Lear (1971) Knights of the Round Table (1953) Kriemhilde's Revenge (1924) Krull (1983) Kull the Conqueror (1997) Labyrinth (1986) Ladyhawke (1985) Lancelot of the Lake (1974) The Land of Faraway (1987) The Last Unicorn (1982) A Legend (1986) Legend of Lyon: Flare, pt. 1-2 (199?) A The Legend of Suram Fortress (1985) The Lion in Winter (1968) The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe (1979) A Lord of the Rings (1978) A The Magic Flute (1973) The Magic Fountain (1961) The Magic Sword (1962) The Magic Voyage of Sinbad (1952, 1962) The Man In The Iron Mask (1939, 1977) Masters of the Universe (1987) Mazes and Monsters (1982) Men of Sherwood Forest (1957) Monty Python and the Holy Grail (1974) The Name of the Rose (1986) Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind (a.k.a. Warriors of the Wind) (1985) A The Navigator: A Medieval Odyssey (1989) Neverending Story (1984) Neverending Story II: The Next Chapter (1991) Neverending Story III (1994) Ninja Scroll (a.k.a. Jubei's Ninja Chronicles) (1993) A 1001 Arabian Nights (1959) A Outlaw of Gor (1987) Petronella (1985, 1990) The Phantom Toolbooth (1969) A Pippin (1981) Prince Valiant (1954) The Princess Bride (1987) Quest for the Mighty Sword (a.k.a. Ator, l'Invincible) (1990) Quest of the Delta Knights (1993) Ran (1985) Rashomon (1951) Record of the Lodoss War, pt. 1-13 (199?) A Red Sonja (1985) The Return of Jafar (1994) A The Return of Martin Guerre (1983) The Return of the King (1980) A RG Veda, pt. 1-10 (1991-96) A Robin and Marian (1976) Robin Hood (1922, 1973A, 1991) Robin Hood: Men in Tights (1993) Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves (1991) Roland the Mighty (1958) Rumik World: Fire Tripper (199?) A Samurai I: Musashi Miyamoto (1955) Samurai II: Duel at Ichioji Temple (1955) Samurai III: Duel at Ganryu Island (1956) Scaramouche (1952) Seven Magnificent Gladiators (1984) Seven Samurai (1954) The Seventh Seal (1956) Seventh Voyage of Sinbad (1958) Shogun Assassin (1980) Shogun's Ninja (1983) Siegfried (1924) Sinbad and the Eye of the Tiger (1977) A Sinbad of the Seven Seas (1989) Sinbad the Sailor (1947) Sleeping Beauty (1959A, 1983, 1989) Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937A, 1983) Son of Ali Baba (1952) Son of Sinbad (1955) Sorceress (1983, 1988) The Sword and the Dragon (1956) The Sword and the Sorcerer (1982) The Sword in the Stone (1963) A Sword of Doom (1967) Sword of Heaven (1981) Sword of Lancelot (1963) Sword of the Valiant (1983) The Thief of Baghdad (1920, 1924, 1940, 1961, 1978) A Thousand and One Nights (1945) The Three Musketeers (1933, 1948, 1974, 1994) Throne of Blood (1957) Time Bandits (1981) Viking Massacre (1965) The Vikings (1958) The Virgin Spring (1959) The War Lord (1965) Warlock (1991) The Warrior and the Sorceress (1984) Warriors (1955) Weathering Continent (1992) A Willow (1988) Windaria (1986/1992) A The Wind and the Lion (1975) Wizards (1977) A Wizards and Warriors (1983) Wizards of the Demon Sword (1991) Wizards of the Lost Kingdom (1985) Wizards of the Lost Kingdom II (1989) Xiao Ao Jiang Hu (a.k.a. Swordsman) (1990) Xiao Ao Jiang Hu Zhi Dong Fang Bu Bai (a.k.a. Swordsman II) (1991) Yojimbo (1961) Yotoden (pt. 1-3) (19??) A Zardoz (1973) You can use the Internet Movie Database at or the AllMovie Guide at if you wish to search for information on any of these movies, or for any movies not already listed here. I5: What is some good background or inspirational music for *D&D games? A: As with books and music, the total list of possible musical selections is vastly larger than will fit in this document. What follows is a selection of the most commonly-suggested answers to this question, as well as some other possibilities, included to round out the list. Note that, while fantasy movies or classical music would seem to be the "most appropriate" areas to look in, music can often cross "genre" boundaries in ways books or movies cannot; thus, while the following selections do include a significant number of suggestions culled from fantasy movies and classical composers, there are also a number of rock musicians, science fiction movies, and so forth represented. For the music purists among us, please note that I use "classical" here not as a technical musical term, but rather in the music-store sense of a catch-all term for medieval, renaissance, baroque, rococco, classical, romantic, modern classical, etc. music. For those albums which have not generally been recorded so frequently that endorsing one version over another would be difficult at best, and are not single-movie soundtracks, the publisher has been given (where known), to hopefully make it easier to find the album and know when one has found the right album. SOUNDTRACKS (From movies & TV; "instrumental" indicates an orchestral/ instrumental score, as opposed to the "rock songs featured in or inspired by" soundtrack for the same movie) 1492: Conquest of Paradise 2001: A Space Odyssey Alien Alien Resurrection Alien3 Aliens Army of Darkness Batman: Original Motion Picture Score (instrumental) Beastmaster Ben Hur Big Trouble in Little China The Bitter Suite: A Musical Odyssey (from Xena: Warrior Princess) Blade Runner Das Boot Bram Stoker's Dracula Braveheart Conan the Barbarian Conan the Destroyer The Crow Dances with Wolves Dark City The Dark Crystal Doctor Zhivago Dragonheart Due South Dune Edward Scissorhands Empire of the Sun The Empire Strikes Back Excalibur Fantasia Far and Away The Fifth Element First Knight The Four Musketeers The Fugitive Halloween 1-4 Halloween: The Curse of Michael Myers Hamlet (Ennio Morricone) Heavy Metal Heavy Metal: The Score (instrumental) Henry V Heroic Legend of Arislan Highlander I-III Hook Hunt for Red October Independence Day Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom Interview with the Vampire Jacob's Ladder John Carpenter's The Thing Jurassic Park Krull Kull the Conqueror Labyrinth Ladyhawke Last of the Mohicans Lawrence of Arabia Legend Legends of the Fall Lord of the Rings The Man in the Iron Mask Mary Shelley's Frankenstein Merlin More Music from Braveheart Mortal Kombat: Original Motion Picture Score (instrumental) The Name of the Rose Omen Out of Africa Patriot Games Raiders of the Lost Ark Record of the Lodoss War (1+ vols.) Return of the Jedi Rising Sun Rob Roy Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves The Rock Rocketeer Schindler's List The Shadow Silent Moebius Somewhere in Time Speed: Original Motion Picture Score (instrumental) Star Trek: The Motion Picture Star Trek: The Next Generation: The Best of Both Worlds Star Wars Stargate Superman The Ten Commandments Terminator 2 The Three Musketeers Titanic The Usual Suspects Vampire Hunter D Vampire Princess Miyu Waterworld Willow Xena: Warrior Princess Young Sherlock Holmes SOUNDTRACK COMPILATIONS _The Big Picture_, by the Cincinnati Pops (Telarc) _Chiller_, by the Cincinnati Pops (Telarc) _Fantastic Journey_, by the Cincinnati Pops (Telarc) _Fright Night_, by the Orlando Pops (Excelsior) _Great Fantasy Adventure Album_, by the Cincinnati Pops (Telarc) _Halloween: The Best of John Carpenter_ (Silva Screen Records America) _Music for a Darkened Theatre, vol 1-2_, by Danny Elfman (MCA) _Summon the Heroes_, by the Boston Pops (Sony) CLASSICAL COMPOSERS (Composers for whom one can generally pick up almost anything they have written for this use; some specific suggestions will follow) Johann Sebastian Bach Ludwig van Beethoven Hector Berlioz Bruckner Claude Debussy Franz Liszt Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart Carl Orff Nicolo Paganinni Arvo Part Camille Saint-Sae"ns Peter Tchaikovsky Richard Wagner Vangelis John Williams CLASSICAL--SHORTER (single, shorter pieces--not likely found by themselves as an album) J.S. Bach, "Toccata and Fugue in D minor" (BWV565) Ludwig van Beethoven, "Symphony No. 2 in D major, op. 36", "Symphony No. 5 in C Minor, op. 67", "Symphony No. 7 in A major, op. 92", "Symphony No. 9 in D Minor, op. 125" Aleksandr Borodin, "Polovetsian Dances", from Prince Igor Antonin Dvorak, "Symphony No. 7 in D minor, op. 70", "Symphony No. 8 in G Major, op. 88", "Symphony No. 9 in E Minor, op. 95" (New World Symphony) Charles Gounod "Funeral March of a Marionette" Edvard Grieg, "In the Hall of the Mountain King", from _Peer Gynt, Suite No. 1, op. 46_ Bernard Herrmann "Sleigh Ride", from _The Devil and Daniel Webster_ (movie) Gustav Holst, "Jupiter, the Bringer of Jollity", from _The Planets_; "Mars, the Bringer of War", from _The Planets_; "Saturn, the Bringer of Old Age", from _The Planets_ Aram Khachaturian, "Sabre Dance", from _Gayne_; "Symphony No. 2" (The Bell) Franz Liszt, "Les Preludes", "Totentanz" Gustav Mahler, "Symphony No. 2 in C Minor" (The Resurrection) Felix Mendelssohn-Bartholdy, "Symphony No. 4 in A major, op. 90" (Italian Symphony) Modest Mussorgsky, "Night on Bald Mountain", "Pictures at an Exhibition" Carl Orff, "O, Fortuna", from _Carmina Burana_ Gioacchino Rossini, "Overture to William Tell", "Overture to La Gazza Ladra" Camille Saint-Sae"ns, "Danse Macabre, op. 40", "Symphony No. 3 in C Minor, op. 78", "Carnival of the Animals", "Bacchanale", from _Samson and Delilah_ Franz Schubert, "Symphony in B Minor, D.759" (Unfinished Symphony) Jean Sibelius, "Finlandia" Richard Strauss, "Also Sprach Zarathustra" Igor Stravinsky, "Rite of Spring", "Firebird Suite" Franz von Supp'e, "Light Cavalry Overture" Peter Tchaikovsky, "1812 Overture", "Symphony No. 6 in B Minor, op. 74" (Pathetique Symphony), "Marche Slav" Richard Wagner, "Ride of the Valkyries", from _Der Ring Des Nibelungen_; "Entrance of the Gods into Valhalla", from _Der Ring Des Nibelungen_; "Siegfried's Funeral Music", from _Der Ring Des Nibelungen_; "Chorus of the Damned Sailors", from _Der Fliegende Hollander_ Ralph Vaughan Williams, "English Folk Song Suite" CLASSICAL--LONGER (Collections or long pieces--likely found by themselves as an album) Hector Berlioz, _Symphonie Fantastique, op. 14_ Diamanda Galas, _Masque of the Red Death_ (Mute Records) Edvard Grieg, _Peer Gynt_ Josef Haydn, _The London Symphonies_ (Philips; Sony) Gustav Holst, _The Planets_ Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, _Requiem in D Minor, K. 656_, _The Magic Flute_, _The Marriage of Figaro_ Carl Orff, _Carmina Burana_ Sergei Rachmaninoff, "Isle of the Dead, op. 29" Nikolay Rimsky-Korsakov, _Scheherazade, op. 35_ Peter Tchaikovsky, _Nutcracker Suite_ Richard Wagner, _Der Ring Des Nibelungen_ (pt. 1: _Rheingold_, pt. 2: _Siegfried_, pt. 3 _Die Walk"urie_, pt. 4: _G"otterdammerung_), _Tristan und Isolde_, _Lohengrin_, _Parsifal_, _Tannh"auser_ Antonio Vivaldi, _The Four Seasons_ CLASSICAL COMPILATIONS Benedictine Monks of Santo Domingo de Silos, _Chant I-II_ (Angel) _Best of the Boston Pops, vol. 1_ (Deutsche Grammophon) _Classical Thunder I-II_ (Time-Life) _Classics Go to the Movies, vol 1-4_ (LaserLight) _Classics from the Crypt_ (RCA Victor) _Extreme Classics_ (RCA Victor) _Fright Night: Music That Goes Bump in the Night_ (CBS) Led Zeppelin & London Philharmonic, _Kashmir: Symphonic Led Zeppelin_ (Point Music) _Masters of the Royal Chapel, Lisbon_, by A Capella Portuguesa (Hyperion) David Munrow and the Early Music Consort of London, _Music of the Gothic Era_ (Archiv Produktion); _Music of the Crusades_ (London) _Orchestral Spectaculars_, by the Cincinnati Pops (Telarc) Pink Floyd & London Philharmonic, _Us and Them: Symphonic Pink Floyd_ (Point Music) _Power Classics_ (RCA Victor) Thomas Tallis, _Choral and Organ Works_ (Chandos) Thomas Tallis, _The Complete Works, vol. 1-3_ (Signum) _Troubadour Songs and Medieval Lyrics_ (Hyperion) Vangelis, _Themes_ (Deutsche Grammophon) _Very Best of the Boston Pops_ (PolyGram) ROCK/POP/NEW AGE/FOLK/ETC. David Arkenstone, _Quest of the Dream Warrior: Kyla's Journey_ (Narada) Baltimore Consort, _The Art of the Bawdy Song_ (Dorian Recordings) Bel Canto, _Shimmering, Warm and Bright_ (Dali Records) The Chieftans, _The Celtic Harp_ (BMG) Clannad, _Legend_ (RCA Victor) Glenn Danzig, _Black Aria_ (Plan 9/Caroline) Ray Lynch, _Deep Breakfast_ (Music West) Deep Forest, _Deep Forest I-III_ (Epic) Capercaillie, _Delirium_ Enigma, _MCMXC a.D._ (Virgin) Brian Eno, _Ambient 4 On Land_ (Editions EG), _Apollo: Atmospheres and Soundtracks_ Enya, _Shepherd Moons_ (Reprise), _Watermark_ (Geffen) Matt Fink, _Music of the Vampires_ (K-Tel) Robert Fripp, _1999 Soundscapes_ (3 vols.) (Discipline), _Bridge Between_ (Discipline) Robert Fripp and Brian Eno, _The Essential Fripp and Eno_ (Plan 9/Caroline) Peter Gabriel, _Passion: Music For The Last Temptation of Christ_ (Geffen), _Passion Sources_ Hawkwind, _The Chronicle of the Black Sword_ (Gopaco) Kodo, _Kodo_ (Sony) Jean-Michel Jarre, _Waiting for Cousteau_, _Rendez-vous_ (Polydor) Jethro Tull, "Sonds from the Wood" Manowar, _Kings of Metal_ (Atlantic), _Secrets of Steel_ (Geffen?) Loreena McKennitt, _To Drive the Cold Winter Away_ (Quinlan Road) Metallica, _Master of Puppets_ (Elektra) Nine Inch Nails, _The Downward Spiral_ (Interscope), _Broken_ (Interscope) Pink Floyd, _Animals_ (Columbia), _Meddle_ (Capitol), _Relics_ (Capitol) Satyricon, _Nemesis Divina_ (Century Media) _The Sounds of Demons & Dementia_ (Bainbridge Records) Tangerine Dream, _Canyon Dreams_ (Miramar), _Tyranny of Beauty_ (Miramar) Bill Whelan _Riverdance: Music from the Show_ (Celtic Heartbeat/Atlantic) Yes, _The Yes Album_ (Atlantic), _Fragile_ (Atlantic), _Symphonic Music of Yes_ (BMG), _Tales From Topographic Oceans_ (Atlantic) ROCK/POP/NEW AGE/FOLK/ETC. SPECIFIC SONGS Black Sabbath, "The Mob Rules", "Fairies Wear Boots" Blue Oyster Cult, "Black Blade", "Veteran of the Psychic Wars" Depeche Mode, "Pimpf", "Fpmip" Enya, "Orinoco Flow", "Cursum Perficio", "Pax Deorum" Robert Fripp, "Threnody for Souls in Torment" Metallica, "Welcome Home (Sanitarium)" Pink Floyd, "One of These Days", "Dogs", "Careful With That Axe, Eugene", "Signs of Life", "Run Like Hell" Queen, "Who Wants to Live Forever" GAME SOUNDTRACKS Alien Logic (SSI) Castlevania IV Cutthroat Island Final Fantasy 2-6 Final Fantasy Mystic Quest Neverhood Chronicles (DreamWorks) Red Steel (TSR) Quake (id) Savage Baronies (TSR) Sword Coast (TSR) WarCraft II: Tides of Darkness (Blizzard) ***End Part 7*** -- Aardy R. DeVarque Feudalism: Serf & Turf Rec.games.frp.dnd FAQ: http://www.enteract.com/~aardy/faq/rgfdfaq.html ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Path: news.tuwien.ac.at!aconews.univie.ac.at!newscore.univie.ac.at!skynet.be!209.98.98.32.MISMATCH!chippy.visi.com!news-out.visi.com!newsfeed.enteract.com!news.enteract.com!not-for-mail From: aardy@enteract.NOJUNK.com (Aardy R. DeVarque) Newsgroups: rec.games.frp.dnd Subject: rec.games.frp.dnd FAQ: 8/9 -- Gamespeak 1: Players Date: Mon, 01 Feb 1999 13:54:39 GMT Organization: Aardy's Aardvark Emporium Lines: 504 Message-ID: <36bcb198.46545870@news.enteract.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: 207.229.149.73 Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Newsreader: Forte Agent 1.5/32.452 Xref: news.tuwien.ac.at rec.games.frp.dnd:364820 Archive-name: games/dnd/part8 Posting-frequency: monthly Last-modified: January 1999 URL: http://www.enteract.com/~aardy/faq/rgfdfaq.html REC.GAMES.FRP.DND FAQ Part 8 Gamespeak 1: For Player's Eyes =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= For Player's Eyes J1: What books do I need in order to play? J2: Does the weapon proficiency "Ambidexterity" give me extra attacks? J3: Is the use of poison automatically an evil act? J4: What about slitting throats? Anything else? J5: Are all orcs inherently evil? What about orc babies? J6: Can mages wear armor? J7: I don't like the spell memorization system for clerics & wizards... J8: What does "Lawful/Neutral/Chaotic Good/Neutral/Evil" really indicate? J9: Is alignment really necessary? J10: What is a morning star? J11: But medieval combat wasn't anything like the way it is in *D&D! =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= For Player's Eyes J1: What books do I need in order to play? A: Technically, as a player, you need absolutely nothing. Nada. Zilch. A pencil, paper, and dice certainly are useful, but can easily be borrowed; rules can be explained by the DM or more experienced players. However, it is usually move convenient to have a personal copy of the rules for easy perusal in and outside of the gaming sessions. To this end, it is advisable to get the Players Handbook (preferably the same edition which the group is playing). The Complete Handbook for your character's class and/or race may be a welcome addition, as may the Player's Option books, but they are not absolutely necessary. Beyond that, it is just personal preferences. Nothing else is truly needed, despite what the promotional material TSR puts out may say; however, most people like having a little more than just the PH by their side when they play. J2: Does the weapon proficiency "Ambidexterity" give me extra attacks? A: No, it certainly does not. By itself, Ambidexterity merely eliminates the "off-hand" penalty for using a weapon in your left hand if you are right-handed or vice-versa. By the same token, it allows characters to do tasks equally well with either hand, so that if one hand is lost, the other can easily take up the slack. It is when this is combined with other abilities that things get confusing. Here is a handy-dandy little chart to aid in fathoming the mysteries of the interaction of ambidexterity with other abilities: to-hit penalty normal ambidextrous main/off-hand main/off-hand Fighting w/ one weapon 0 -2 0 0 Fighting w/ two weapons* -2 -4 -2 -2 Fighting w/ Two-weapon Style spec. 0 -2 0 0 * The penalty for using two weapons is modified by the character's Reaction Adjustment, based on DEX; however, the penalty can never be lowered beyond 0 by either this modifier or ambidexterity (i.e., the DEX Reaction Adjustment may only lessen the effects of the penalty, not grant any plusses to hit). Any other modifiers work as usual. Ambidexterity does not grant extra attacks per round, but fighting with one weapon in each hand, whether or not a character is specialized in that style, does. The limit is that the one wielded in the off-hand (if a character is ambidextrous, he chooses an "off" hand, but has no penalties for using that hand, and can switch in which hand he uses which weapon) must be smaller in size/weight than the one wielded in the main hand, except when both hands wield daggers. This does not necessarily mean it must be in a smaller size class, but that it must be smaller in length and/or weight, which makes for good use of the length/weight charts in the Equipment section of the Players Handbook. The length requirement is eliminated when a fighter specializes in the Two-Weapon Style, thus allowing the fighter to wield a long sword in each hand. In the Complete Fighters Handbook, one weapon proficiency nets the character Two-Weapon Style, which removes the negative modifiers for using two weapons and also removes the length requirement. In Skills & Powers and Combat & Tactics, one character point nets the character Two-Weapon Style, but only gives the ability to fight well with two weapons; it does not remove the length difference requirement. A second character point must be spent in order to weild two weapons longer than a dagger and of equal length. Here's a chart to explain the attacks per round of someone fighting with two weapons: 1 weapon 2 weapons | 2 weapons Att/rnd Character level Att/rnd Att/rnd | main off-hand Fighter 1-6/all other classes 1/1 2/1 | 1/1 1/1 Fighter 7-12, 1-6 specialized* 3/2 5/2 | 3/2 1/1 Fighter 13+, 7-12 specialized 2/1 3/1 | 2/1 1/1 Fighter 13+ specialized 5/2 7/2 | 5/2 1/1 * "Specialized" refers to whether or not a fighter has specialized in the weapon being used in his main hand, not to "Two-Weapon Style specialization" Neither the Ambidexterity proficiency nor Two Weapon Style specialization have any effect on the number of attacks per round. As the table shows, the number of attacks per round for the main weapon does not change when a second weapon is picked up; the second weapon only gets one attack per round, regardless of character level. For example, a character who normally has 3/2 att/rnd gets one attack during the first round and two attacks during the second round, alternating each round (the lower number of attacks always occurs during odd-numbered rounds). This character then picks up a second weapon. Technically, the character now gets 5/2 att/rnd, but it breaks down to one attack with the main weapon and one with the off-hand weapon in the first round, and two attacks with the main weapon and one with the off-hand weapon in the second round, alternating each round. A DM may allow ambidextrous characters to switch which hand is the "main" hand and which is the "off" hand during combat so that it is possible to change which weapon gets more attacks in a sequence, but it is likely this will be allowed only when an attack sequence has ended--at the end of any round for 2/1 or 3/1 attacks per round; at the end of any even-numbered rounds for 3/2 or 5/2 attacks per round. For those of you crying "munchkin!" to all of this, there is a simple limiting factor: a fighter, for example, only has four starting weapon proficiencies (modified by intelligence via number of languages). The weapon of choice is one, specialization in that weapon is one, ambidexterity is one, and two-weapon style is one, taking up all four of the initial slots; if one is using the expanded weapon proficiency rules in Combat & Tactics, this combination requires five proficiencies (two-weapon style is split so that it takes an extra proficiency to use weapons of equal size). In Skills & Powers, this combination requires all eight of a fighter's initial weapon proficiency character points (two each for weapon proficiency, weapon specialization, two-weapon style specialization, and use of weapons of equal size) and four of the average fighter's eight initial nonweapon character points (for ambidexterity). This quickly turns the character into a Johnny One-Note. If there are any other weapons he wishes to use without penalties, he'll have to use any extra language slots from intelligence or left over racial or class character points, which takes away slots from potential non-weapon proficiencies. Without those extra NWP's, the character will be extremely limited in what he can do besides just fight. Alternatively, the character can go with only the single weapon proficiency and gain those extra NWP's; if he then finds himself in a situation where he cannot use his weapon of choice, he will not be very helpful to a group unless the player does some good roleplaying. Skills & Powers also introduces some DM-enforceable drawbacks which may be used to gain more character points and round out the character; these drawbacks then serve to counteract the power this combination can grant and tone down the character to average levels overall. J3: Is the use of poison automatically an evil act? A: If depends on how the DM rules. Some DM's feel that use of poison is an inherently evil act, and its use by a character causes an alignment switch. Others feel that, while it is not a particularly good act, it is not particularly evil, either, and can be used with caution. Still others feel that poison is just a weapon, as is any other, and thus may be used by any and all characters with impunity. There are equally persuasive arguments for any of these positions, and it is really best left to individual DM's. Here to help with the decision are three of the various points of view. Poison is a cowardly way out of a situation. It is best left to those who wish to skulk in the shadows and strike from afar. It is also good for those people who like to make sure their enemies suffer horrible agonies before dying. Since poison is essentially a tool for cowardly bullies and torturers, it is a proper tool of those of evil alignment. Everyone else should stay as far from it as possible. The use of poison is not inherently evil, but, by the same token, is not inherently good either. Thus people who wish to stay pure should avoid its use, but any others don't have to worry much about how they accomplish an end. Poison is a weapon, just like any other. Thus it can be used like any other weapon, whether to strike down otherwise-unreachable fiends, or to put an end to the overwhelming righteousness of a paladin, or to have a political superior suddenly leave his position vacant for the taking. Poison may be used in much the same way as a sword, but has less of a chance of maiming and is thus possibly more humane! In any case, poison is just the tool--it is the heart behind the action which determines one's good or evil nature. J4: What about slitting throats? Anything else? A: Once again, this is really a decision for individual DM's. However, there are hardly any situations where slitting a throat could be considered a good act. In most cases, it requires having an otherwise helpless victim, one which good characters should be trying to reform or turn over to the proper authorities for suitable punishment. Killing someone in cold blood, regardless of their past actions, is an action which any character should seriously think twice about. Killing in the heat of battle is one thing, but in cold blood (and especially if premeditated) is something else altogether. A character who consistently does this sort of thing should do some serious introspection on his outlook on life and consider an alignment change to something more suitable. Nevertheless, there are a few situations where slitting a throat might be a necessity. Mercy killing is one, as the onset of death is quick. Dealing with guards who would otherwise raise an alarm is another, but more questionable one. In either case, if the action does not haunt the character for a long while, then it is quite possible that the character is a closet sociopath, and therefore is not actually of his stated alignment. J5: Are all orcs inherently evil? What about orc babies? A: The "inherently evil" question, this is best left to individual DM's. Some campaigns work best with definitive divisions between black and white, much like many old westerns. The good guys are always heroically good, and the bad guys are always detestably and thoroughly evil and corrupt. In these games, all orcs are evil, regardless of age, period. However, some campaigns thrive on shades of grey, where the line between good and evil isn't always obvious. In these games, orcs might be misunderstood, might have some good tribes falsly accused of wrongdoing by nearby townspeople, or might have a wide range of alignments, but with a higher percentage of evil alignments just as a high percentage of elves are usually seen to be of good alignments but not all elves are good. The question of orc babies is a tough ethical question, and is a curve which many DM's like to throw at their players. After a party sacks an orcish camp and completely annihilates the entire adult male population, they are left with the women and children. If they kill them, they are denying that orcs have any chance at all at redemption, regardless of whether or not the orc in question is a newborn. If they do not kill the orcs, then the party is leaving behind a future horde of orcs who may want revenge for the slaughter of their fathers--and almost definitely will thirst for revenge if the DM has ruled that all orcs are naturally and automatically evil beings. This is a perennial problem which each character must sort out on their own. However, it is much easier for evil characters to make a decision than neutral, and somewhat easier for neutral than good; but knowing this does not make the decision simpler. One question which good characters should weigh in their minds: is it better for me to not kill in cold blood, or for the potential for future difficulties be taken care of while the solution is easily accomplished? J6: Can mages wear armor? A: This question has been endlessly debated. First of all, if he is not casting spells, any mage can wear any armor he wants to, unless the armor in question is magic and only wearable by warriors, but that's a different story. Whether or not he gets an AC bonus from that armor is also another matter altogether. The question arises when a mage attempts to cast spells while wearing armor. For a more in-depth survey of the rules, potential reasoning behind the rules, some house rules, and some possible ramifications of those house rules, see the Mages and Armor treatise at . In brief, while the core rulebooks state that wizards may not wear armor while casting spells, many players do not like this rule, both because lack of armor gets many a mage killed and because they can't think of a logical in-game reason behind the no armor while casting rule that doesn't also have some major negative or illogical ramifications (e.g. if it is because it is too constrictive, so is heavy winter clothing and that has no penalties; if metal disrupts the magical energies, then wrapping all captured mages with chains becomes standard and mages could have problems casting while standing on a metal grate, etc.; if it's because wizards aren't trained in wearing armor, then fighter/wizards belie the rule, since they have been trained in wearing armor). Here are several possible quick solutions to this situation: 1) Create an elven fighter/mage who wears elven chainmail, as that is a method by which a mage can wear armor and cast spells at the same time under the core rules. 2) Any and all bulky clothing hinders casting. A mage wearing anything heavier than what one would wear on an average autumn day cannot cast spells. Mages who, for some reason, are smothering beneath something along the lines of a large pile of cloth, several bodies, a trapper/lurker, etc. also cannot cast spells. 3) If non-magical iron or steel encircles a mage and is in very close proximity to the mage, the mage is incapable of casting spells. Anything from handcuffs up to full plate armor has this effect, as would a chain wrapped once around the mage. However, being placed in a metal coffin or standing on/below a one ton block of iron would not have any problem casting spells. 4) All mages may wear any armor, with no penalties, whatsoever. 5) No mage may wear chain mail or better armor, due to the interference of the metal with magical energies. 6) All mages may wear any armor, but doing so incurs a possible chance of failure. The wizard must roll percentile dice to see if the spell successfully goes off. The roll must be equal to or under 50% plus twice the armor's armor class. For example, a mage in chain mail must roll (50+(2x5))=60% or lower each time he casts a spell to see if the spell was successful. If the roll is not successful, the spell fizzles. For armors with negative AC, either the AC is doubled and subtracted from 50 to find the target number, or, since anything better than 0 is enhanced armor anyway, just use 50% as the target number. 7) All mages may wear any armor, but wearing any mass of metal causes the mage to check to see if a wild surge occurs every time he casts a spell, due to the interference of the metal with the magical energies. 8) Fighter-mage dual- or multi-classed characters may cast spells in armor, as they have learned to move in armor and their training has taught them how to make the necessary gestures to cast spells. 9) Elvish chain can be worn by any wizard without penalizing spell- casting at all. This may be due to either the mail's comfortability allowing easy movement or its inherent magical nature not disrupting magical energies. 10) Mages may wear any armor, but certain rules apply. A mage in armor may only defend himself or flee, period. No spellcasting, no attacking, etc.; doing so results in a loss of xp for that playing period. Also, if the armor is magical, the armor's magic does not work if it is specifically intended for some other class. 11) Create a mage character using the system outlined in the Skills & Powers or Spells & Magic books. The price is to not have access to some spell schools, but a mage willing to go through the trouble of accustoming himself to regularly wearing armor should be willing to put up with the sacrifice. J7: I don't like the spell memorization system for clerics & wizards... A: Take a number and get in line. There are a seemingly endless list of solutions to this "problem." The ideas differ for clerics and wizards, though. For priests, the solution is simple. Have the character pray for miracles, and let the DM decide which spells the cleric gets that day. Level doesn't matter, and the deity is seen to be more omniscient if it can provide in advance the spells which are most likely to be needed. For mages, there have been several good solutions posited. One is to do away with the memorization time. Another is to use some sort of mana point system. A third is to let the mage cast any spell in his grimoire, without memorizing it first, but with a chance of spell failure. There are an infinite number of variations on these and other themes. Rewriting the entire spell system is a task not fit for an FAQ, but it is not too difficult to construct your own based on the rough ideas above, or to just take a system from some other game and transplant it into your campaign. J8: What does "Lawful/Neutral/Chaotic Good/Neutral/Evil" really indicate? A: Good/Neutral/Evil should be fairly obvious, but Lawful/Neutral/Chaotic is often trickier to pin down. The easiest way to remember it is that Law is more concerned with the letter of the law than with the people. Chaos can be anti-law, but it can also merely not require set rules of conduct. The PH contains a good description of each of the nine alignment's typical mindsets, but that is just the tip of the iceberg. There are so many variations on each alignment that it is very difficult for any two people to agree on even the vaguest definitions. However, if in need of a standard, use the PH stereotypes. J9: Is alignment really necessary? A: For many people, no. For just as many others, yes. Alignment itself is not meant as a straitjacket, but as a tool for playing the character. There are as many different ways of playing a LG character as there are LG characters, so the argument that the alignment system stifles creativity doesn't hold water. However, there are just as many characters who don't fit any alignment whatsoever, and should not have an arbitrary label forced on them. Whether or not to use alignments is a question for the entire group to decide, and not one that should be handed down from above. J10: What is a morning star? A: This is a perennial question both here and on rec.games.frp.misc. There are essentially three schools of thought on the matter: 1) A morning star is an elongated mace 2) A morning star is a spiked ball, no matter what it's attached to 3) A morning star is a special type of flail, or "chain-mace" According to TSR's Arms & Equipment Guide, p. 82, the AD&D morning star is #1 above. This is borne out by the arrangement of the Tight Groups on p. 59 of the CFH and the description of the weapon on p. 140 of C&T. (Note that this is true for 1st edition AD&D as well, as evidenced by the description of bugbears on p. 12 of the MM and the illustration of Hruggek on p. 105 of DDG.) Sources that support this description: _Encyclopedia Britannica_, 11th-14th eds. _Oxford English Dictionary_, 2nd ed. (20 v.) Ashdown, C.H. _European Arms and Armour_ Bull, Stephen. _An Historical Guide to Arms & Armor_ Stone, G.C. _A Glossary of the Decoration and Use of Arms and Armor_ Tarassuk, L. & Claude Blair. _The Complete Encyclopedia of Arms & Weapons_, Description #3 appears to have come into use in the early to mid-19th century. Many sources that use this interpretation can be apparently traced back to a German treatise on medieval weaponry written around 1850. The section on morning stars was based on an English work written around 1830, and seems to suffer from a number of mistranslations, as that page has a number of incongruities and contradictions. Description #2 is a recent effort, constructed in an attempt to reconcile the first and third interpretations. If you wish to use descriptions #2 or #3 in your games, that is your decision, and is something that many people have done over the years. It may not follow the rulebooks, nor necessarily history itself, but on your own campaign world, you can declare that the grass is purple and the sky is chartreuse, if it works for your world. Just be sure to label this as the way things are done IYC when discussing the weapon on the newsgroup in order to avoid flames. For handy reference, here are brief descriptions of the various weapons of the affected types (flail and club): Flail-like: Flail, Threshing: An agricultural device, from which the rest of these weapons are derived, consisting of a wooden handle, or "helve", attached via a rope, leather thong, or chain to a short, thick wooden club, called a "swingle" or a "swiple/swipple". They were used for threshing corn or grain, and were found on almost every farm. Flail, Horseman's: A variation of the threshing flail; it is usually iron shod or solid iron, almost always uses a chain rather than rope or leather, and the swingle is often spike-studded or replaced with a spiked iron ball. Historically, these were lumped together with the footman's flail under the general name "military flail". Occasionally, these are referred to by historians as "chain-maces", (especially when the swingle was flanged rather than spiked), which only serves to heighten the confusion. Flail, Footman's: This type of flail is much larger than either the threshing or horseman's flails. It is a two-handed weapon, and replaces the chain with a single hinge (or two half-links, serving the same purpose but not requiring that the weapon be held exactly right for the swingle to swing properly). Historically, these were lumped together with the horseman's flail under the generic term "military flail". Nunchaku: An oriental descendant of the threshing flail; the helve and swingle were of equal length, consisted of wood, iron shod wood, or iron, and were linked by a short length of chain. Three-piece rod: Possibly a variant type of nunchaku, consisting of three short wooden pieces linked by chain or rope, whereas the nunchaku had only two pieces. Club-like: Club: It's, well, a club. Anything from a tree branch to a large bone to an iron rod to a finely crafted work of art. It is found in nearly infinite variations in nearly every, if not every, culture. Mace, Horseman's: A short weapon consisting of a haft with a large head. The head was usually flanged, but many featured spikes, solid balls, or anything else that did the job. Historically speaking, this was simply called a mace. Mace, Footman's: Larger than a horseman's mace, yet smaller than a morning star, this was otherwise identical to a horseman's mace. Morning star: A large mace, usually 4-5 feet long. The head was not usually flanged; rather it consisted of a ball, oval, or cylinder which was almost always studded with spikes. It also usually had a larger spike pointing straight up. Historically, the German term for this weapon, "Morgenstern" (also "Morgen Sterne" or "Morgenstierne"), was used most often. Holy Water Sprinkler: This is a type of morning star, invariably with a cylindrical spiked head. The name is an ironic reference to a small device used in the Roman Church, which was dipped in holy water, and then flicked at a crowd, sprinkling droplets of water over them; the weapon is used in a similar manner, but with a larger arc (and with more deadly intentions). A particularly interesting later version of this weapon, also called "Henry VII's Walking Stick", had four pistol barrels in the head, though it was apparently prone to misfire. This weapon is also often called a "holy water sprinkle". Godentag: This is another source of confusion, apparently based on varying local usage. The French godentag was identical to the German morgenstern (and with similar ironic meanings: "good day" vs. "morning star"). This is the sense in which the weapon is used in AD&D, as mentioned on p. 140 of C&T, under "morning star". However, the Flemish godentag was a type of halberd, in the classic axe-pike-pick form. Both types of godentags are also referred to as "godendag". J11: But medieval combat wasn't anything like the way it is in *D&D! A: You're right! Congratulations, kid; you win the kewpie doll. The combat system in *D&D is a gross simplification of real combat, designed to streamline the process of determining the outcome of such a situation. Many arguments about the reality of such-and-such a weapon's speed, damage, use, size, etc. are often seen on rec.games.frp.dnd, usually based on personal observations and/or on SCA tournaments. One thing to keep in mind is that this is just a game; it is not real life. It is not meant to be extremely realistic. There are other, more detailed combat systems out there in other games, several of which take hours to determine one simple combat. The best thing to do, in any case, is find a system which the group prefers to use and stick with that. If the group doesn't feel like taking the time to learn a new system, then the current one still works just fine for thousands of players, especially with a few house rules to customize it to the specific campaign. ***End Part 8*** -- Aardy R. DeVarque Feudalism: Serf & Turf Rec.games.frp.dnd FAQ: http://www.enteract.com/~aardy/faq/rgfdfaq.html ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Path: news.tuwien.ac.at!aconews.univie.ac.at!newscore.univie.ac.at!uninett.no!news-feed.ifi.uio.no!newsfeed.berkeley.edu!newsfeed.enteract.com!news.enteract.com!not-for-mail From: aardy@enteract.NOJUNK.com (Aardy R. DeVarque) Newsgroups: rec.games.frp.dnd Subject: rec.games.frp.dnd FAQ: 9/9 -- Gamespeak 2: For DM's Eyes Date: Mon, 01 Feb 1999 13:54:44 GMT Organization: Aardy's Aardvark Emporium Lines: 836 Message-ID: <36bdb19d.46550379@news.enteract.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: 207.229.149.73 Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Newsreader: Forte Agent 1.5/32.452 Xref: news.tuwien.ac.at rec.games.frp.dnd:364821 Archive-name: games/dnd/part9 Posting-frequency: monthly Last-modified: January 1999 URL: http://www.enteract.com/~aardy/faq/rgfdfaq.html REC.GAMES.FRP.DND FAQ Part 9 Gamespeak 2: For DM's Eyes =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= * designates topics which have been updated. + designated topics which have been added. For DM's Eyes K1: What books do I need in order to be a DM? K2: Which TSR campaign world should I use? K3: Stoneskin seems too unbalancing. What can I do? K4: What can I do about Bladesinging elves? K5: What can I do to prevent psionics from really unbalancing a game? K6: How do you deal with critical hits? A) Determination of criticals B) Resolution of criticals K7: What can I do to make crossbows as useful as normal bows? K8: How much do coins weigh? K9: What can I do to make the hit point system more true to life? K10: The energy drain power of greater undead sucks. What can I do? K11: Where else can I look for info about being a Dungeon Master? =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= For DM's Eyes K1: What books do I need in order to be a DM? A: Unlike players, for whom it is possible to play with just pencil and paper, a DM generally (with some exceptions) needs a bit more in the way of rulebooks. The minimum needed by most people to DM a satisfying *D&D game is: the DMG, the PH, and either the Monstrous Manual or the Monstrous Compendium 1-2. These three references are the core of the game; everything else just adds window dressing. K2: Which TSR campaign world should I use? A: Well, if you don't have the time, or don't wish to take the time and energy to create your own world, TSR has come out with a plethora of choices of worlds for you to campaign in. Here is a brief description of each. Forgotten Realms: The Core Realms: The main section of the Realms is intended to be a generic *D&D world. It has many similarities to medieval Earth. It also has enormous cities, many countries with foreign flavors, hordes of NPC's, and more room to maneuver than you'll ever need. There are also wild magic and dead magic zones, where magic can surge in power (and unpredictability) or not work at all. There are also a lot of supplements out for the core Realms, and a lot more on the way. Al-Qadim: This setting is located far to the south of the core Realms, but can easily be placed on any campaign world. It encompasses the genre of the Arabian Nights, with djinn, magic lamps, Sinbad-like sailors, emirs, and the ever-present Hand of Fate. It is intended that players in Al-Qadim use Al-Qadim characters, but it is possible to take "normal" characters into the Al-Qadim setting. Kara-Tur: This setting is located far to the southeast of the core Realms, but like Al-Qadim, may be transported anywhere. It is an "oriental" setting, with much of the flavor of ancient China, Japan, and Mongolia. There are martial arts, intrigue, highly civilized areas, family honor, and wild horse-folk. It is intended for use with oriental characters, but "normal" characters can easily be worked in. Maztica: This setting is located far to the west of the core realms and, unlike the previous settings, can only be reached via a long sea voyage. It is meant to represent the Americas during the time of the Spanish conquistadors. While it is possible to play a "conqueror" from the core realms, it is intended that native characters be created. This setting has its own unique magic variant, which not only changes the way priests and wizards operate, but many warriors as well. Dragonlance: The world of Krynn is fairly well-known, through the series of novels and modules which started it. Gold has little or no value there, as the world is on a steel standard. Clerics are relatively unheard of as well, because the main focus for the world is the ongoing battle between the deities Takhisis and Paladine; other "normal" deities have been pretty much forgotten. In addition, as the name might suggest, dragons are more active here than elsewhere, as they are strongly polarized on the Takhisis-Paladine battle. There are also several time periods to adventure in; the time of the War of the Lance is only one. Dragonlance: Fifth Age takes place long after the War of the Lance, and uses a completely different game system instead of AD&D. Spelljammer: In a nutshell, Spelljammer is *D&D in outer space, but in more of the swashbuckler pirate genre than a hard science fiction one. Many of the typical *D&D races of characters and villains are present, but many behave very differently from any you may have met before. In addition, Spelljammer may include adventuring on many of the other published game worlds, as spelljammers visit almost all of them from time to time. Ravenloft: Ravenloft is a world of gothic horror. It is located in the Demiplane of Dread, and fairly reeks of evil. Many who go there are corrupted and never return. Some new mechanics are fear and horror checks. A failed fear check involves running in abject terror. A failed horror check, well, lets just not talk about that right now. The mists of Ravenloft often gather up unwary travelers and take them to the demiplane, from whence half the fun is trying to find an exit which supposedly doesn't even exist. Masque of the Red Death: This setting is based on Ravenloft, but with a twist; it is set in the equivalent of the Victorian-era--but in a world where magic has existed since the very dawn of time. There is a much higher technology level than most *D&D worlds, and like Ravenloft, terror is everywhere, now aided by the after-effects of the Industrial Revolution. Every time a character casts a spell, that character is drawn a step closer to the "Red Death," a powerful force of evil in this world. However, "Masque..." is technically a separate game from *D&D which happens to use the Ravenloft rules. Therefore it is not intended to be a place that "normal" *D&D characters visit. Not that that will stop many DM's from having them do so anyway... Dark Sun: Athas is a metal-poor desert world, which by itself makes life quite a challenge. Add to that the fact that almost everyone on the planet has some degree of psionic ability, and you get a pretty lethal world. Also, clerics are different from usual, in that they are either templars who are granted spells by their sorcerer-kings or clerics who gain spells by worshipping the elements around them. Mages, too, are changed; all magic is powered directly by the life force of the world around them, which tends to be a detriment to the continued existence of any plants and animals in the area. Greyhawk: Greyhawk is the first widely-known campaign world. Flip through the PH or DMG--most of the "name" spells and magic items originated in Greyhawk. Until recently, the world was essentially a general, multi- fantasy-genre world, similar in that way to the Forgotten Realms, but with its own very distinct flavor. Recent supplements, however, have turned the world into a war-torn pile of smoking rubble, where basic survival is much more difficult than before the wars. Most Greyhawk players set their campaigns long before the wars. Since most of the modules published before the arrival of Forgotten Realms and DragonLance are actually set in Greyhawk, there is a wealth of information out there for gaming purposes. Planescape: This is basically the 2nd ed. revamp of the Manual of the Planes, but it is much more than that, as well. This setting is designed for entire campaigns run on the planes themselves, with all the interesting beings that may involve. Characters may belong to any of a number of factions, which interact in a similar way to secret societies in Paranoia. Adventures are typically set in Sigil, an enormous city in the neutral center of the planes, and involve visits to one or more of the other planes. It also comes with its own lingo, so if you hear the occasional "cutter" (someone in the know) or "berk" (someone not in the know) comments on the newsgroup, you'll know where they're from. Mystara: Mystara is the world which used to be the setting of Basic D&D, now altered to fit the AD&D rules. Like the Realms and Greyhawk, it is a general high fantasy world with an individual flair. It is unique from the other worlds in that several of its supplements also came with audio CD's for sound effects and storytelling. The Red Steel and Savage Coast lines are also part of the world of Mystara Council of Wyrms: Ever wanted to have a dragon PC? Well, now's your chance. This campaign setting is located on a remote group of islands where dragons and half-dragons reign supreme, and the other races are minor players. Birthright: In this setting, the players are characters of noble birth. They must deal with intrigue, spying, wars, the occasional adventure, and succession to the throne. Special powerful magic spells whose power is drawn from the land one controls as well as the possibility of magical traits caused by royal bloodlines are also thrown into the mix. It seems to be a mix of "normal" *D&D, tabletop miniature wargaming, and Diplomacy. K3: Stoneskin seems too unbalancing. What can I do? A: If the DM thoroughly reads the spell description, and uses a bit of imagination, the spell is actually quite balanced, as there are many ways to damage and/or quickly remove layers of protection from a character with stoneskin. Some examples: Damage: any magical (i.e. spell) attack, such as *Fireball*, *Lightning Bolt*, or *Magic Missile*, drowning, noxious gas, being buried alive, psionics, and *Pick of Earth Parting*. Many of these also remove layers of protection; especially notable on this regard are *Magic Missile* and *Melf's Minute Meteors*, which have the possibility of removing multiple layers of protection per spell casting. No damage, but still affect the character with stoneskin: lasso, net, mancatcher, and bolas. Once the character is tied up, netted, or otherwise occupied, he is nowhere near as much of a problem. Quickly remove layers: unarmed combat, burning, darts & other missile weapons with high ROF's, contact poison, acid, overbearing, multiple attackers, multiple attacks, missed attacks. Missed attacks do indeed remove layers of protection, as per the spell description's use of the words "regardless of attack rolls" instead of "successful attacks." Many people also include handfuls of thrown pebbles, with each pebble removing one layer, but this is better left up to individual DM's, as it has good potential of getting obnoxious. However, if the spell still seems to unbalance your campaign, there are many things you can do to tone it down a bit, any one of which should be sufficient for your purposes. 1) be doubly sure to follow the spell description where it states that repeated castings of this spell on the same individual are not cumulative. 2) be sure to follow the official errata for the spell, which is also the way the spell is described in the High-Level Campaigns book, which changed the duration to 24 hours or until the requisite number of attacks is reached, whichever comes first. 3) make it Range: caster 4) designate it as a specialist Transmuters-only spell. 5) use the 1st ed. version of the spell (from UA); it is dispelled after one attack or attack sequence. 6) have the caster's skin change to the color of stone so that it is painfully obvious that he is wearing a stoneskin. 7) Ban it altogether. 8) enforce the material components option for this spell; diamond dust is going to be very hard to come by at best, and may often be completely unavailable. Even if it is available, it will be extremely expensive, anywhere around 200 gp-1000 gp per casting is possible. Also, the mage in question becomes a good target for pickpockets if it gets around that the mage in question carries a bag of diamonds, albeit in dust form. 9) have every NPC mage wearing it as well. K4: What can I do about Bladesinging elves? A: Simple. Bladesinger is a kit. Kits are optional. Put your foot down and decide that bladesingers are an optional rule you do not wish to follow. In fact, the entire Complete Book of Elves is optional, so you may allow or disallow any portion of it. Of course, you could just grin and bear it, or you could pull a DM fiat and have some jealous dwarven god instantly strike dead every bladesinging elf that appears and hope that the players catch your subtle hints. If you actually go ahead and allow the Bladesinger, but later regret it, here are some tips to remember: 1) Enemies can use ranged weapons, including spells, before the Bladesinger can close. 2) Undead and other creatures with special touch attacks or area effects (such as a dragon's *fear* aura) make good opponents, as the Bladesinger must get within weapon range to combat them. 3) Many creatures have corrosive effects on weaponry, such as oozes, puddings, slimes, and rust monsters; after all, what is a bladesinger without a blade? However, be careful in using these tips, as repeated use of these techniques may lead to anger on the part of players who feel the DM is making life harder for their characters than for the rest of the party. K5: What can I do to prevent psionics from really unbalancing a game? A: Be doubly sure to have easy access to the Complete Psionics Handbook. Read it through completely, and have any players who wish to play psionicist characters do the same. You may also want to look for The Will & the Way, a Dark Sun supplement that expanded greatly upon the basics of the Psionics Handbook. Many people agree that, when followed correctly, these psionics rules are neither impractical nor imbalancing. (And, with a little work, they can work for 1st edition games as well.) Here are a few things you should do to keep a campaign with psionicists a happy one: 1) Many psionic powers seem incredibly powerful, e.g. Disintegrate. However, the automatic failure on a natural '20' offsets this nicely. No matter how earth-shattering the power of the psionicist becomes, there's still a chance of the power backfiring and affecting the psionicist himself instead. A recent Sage Advice explained that the '20' rule is always in effect, even if the character has a power score above '20'; if a natural '20' is rolled, some sort of backfire occurs. 2) If the constant 5% chance for backfire, regardless of level, seems to be a bit strict, remember that it does work to balance the innate power of some of the psionic abilities in much the same way that aging effects and exotic spell components balance out the innate power of wizards. 3) Remember that many of the "most powerful" psionics effects grant saving throws to the victims. This definitely helps prevent psionics from becoming too out-of-control in a campaign. If you still think psionicists can still get too powerful, there are a couple of things you can try to attempt to prevent this. 1) If you feel that a flat 5% chance for backfire, regardless of level, is too rough, especially for higher-level psionicists using powers they have had for a long time, feel free to improvise and down- (or even up-!) play the results of a backfire, depending on what works in the situation at hand. 2) Give saving throws whenever you feel it necessary, even for powers that don't normally allow saves. 3) Using the d10+weapon speed individual initiative system (or even just the plain d10 for each side system) allows for a good chance that a psionicist's concentration is lost due to sudden blood loss thus disrupting whatever power he was trying to use. 4) Scrap the system of granting a spectacular result on a Power Score roll. This tends to make players unhappy unless you also scrap the backfire on a '20' roll, but can work. Of course, scrapping both systems can work just as well in some campaigns. K6: How do you deal with criticals? A: There are almost as many different ways of determining and resolving criticals as there are players. Here is a selection of various methods, in no particular order, gleaned from various postings on rec.games.frp.dnd. A) Determination of criticals 1) Backing a Critical: If a natural '20' is rolled, roll again. If the second number would have hit, then the '20' is considered a critical hit. If the second roll was too low, then the first was only a normal hit. Also, if a natural '1' is rolled, roll again. If the second roll is high enough to hit the creature, then the roll is considered a normal miss. If the second was too low to hit the creature, then the '1' is considered a critical miss. VARIANTS: Optionally, if you rule that critical hits result in double damage, if the second roll is also a '20' then roll a third time. If the third roll was sufficient to hit the creature, then the original '20' is a critical and the damage is tripled. Continue the pattern as long as you wish. Also optionally, for certain powerful creatures, lower the reroll number so that, for example, rolling a natural '19' or better requires a second roll. If the second roll is good enough to hit, treat as above. If you use option 1A and the second roll is, for example, a '19' or better, then the critical does triple damage, and so on. 2) Always Hits: If a natural '20' is rolled, then that attack automatically succeeds, and damage is rolled normally. If a natural '1' is rolled, that attack automatically misses. No special critical damage is awarded in either case. VARIANT: A natural '20' always hits, with normal damage, and a natural '1' always misses. However, in either case, roll again. If the second roll is identical to the first, then it is a critical. If not, then ignore the second roll. 3) Extra Attack: If a natural '20' is rolled, the character gets an immediate extra attack with that weapon, no matter what kind of weapon, save those such as heavy crossbows that take more than one round to use. 4) Straight 20: If a natural '20' is rolled, and a '20' was not the minimum number needed to hit, then it is a critical. If a natural '1' is rolled, it is a critical. 5) Over the Top: If a 20 is rolled, roll again and add the two results together. If the combined total is greater than the minimum needed to hit by 10 or more, then it's a critical. If a 1 is rolled, roll again and subtract. If the combined total is 10 or more less than what is needed to hit, then it's a critical. VARIANTS: If a natural '20' is rolled, roll again and add the result to '19;' the same end result as above is needed to hit. I.e., if a character needs a '22' to hit, the character must roll a natural '20,' followed by a minimum roll of '3.' A total of 10 higher than the minimum needed to hit still results in a critical hit. If a natural '20' is rolled, roll again and add the new result to '19.' If the second roll is also a '20,' roll again. If the third roll is a natural '20,' then it is considered a critical hit. Combat & Tactics optional rule: If a natural '18' or higher is rolled and the to-hit number, after any bonuses, is 5 or more than the minimum needed to hit, then it is a critical hit. B) Resolution of criticals In all cases that result in a critical hit or miss, they can be resolved by any of the following: 1) Chartbuster: Use your favorite chart; Best of Dragon V and Combat & Tactics are good places to look. 2) Double Damage I: Double the damage on critical hits and damage yourself on critical misses. VARIANT: Combat & Tactics optional rule: Double the rolled damage, and do any other multipliers necessary (such as for charging or backstabbing), then add any damage bonuses. 3) Double Damage II: When a natural '20' is rolled, roll damage twice; i.e., if damage die is 1d8, roll 2d8. 4) Double Damage III: A roll of natural '20' always hits, and damage is rolled normally. However, if a character rolls the maximum damage (i.e. '6' on a d6), no matter if it was a to-hit roll of natural '20' or not, roll damage again, but subtract 2 from the second roll; negative numbers are equal to '0.' If the maximum is rolled again, roll again and subtract 2 from the third roll. Keep going until the highest number on the damage die doesn't come up. 5) Full Damage: Do full weapon damage on critical hits and full damage to yourself on critical misses 6) Random Multiplier: On a roll of natural 20, the player rolls damage, adding any bonuses he might have. He then rolls a d6, multiplying the damage done by the result. 7) Dexterity Check: If a natural one is rolled on an attack roll, roll a DEX check at half DEX (or a number the DM assigns in the case of a monster). If the check is made the attack simply misses. If it fails a fumble occurs, and any remaining attacks for that round are lost. In addition, every opponent who is in melee with the character who fumbled and/or any opponent who is aiming a missile or hurled weapon at this person gets an immediate free attack at +4 to hit, due to the poor character leaving himself wide open. 8) Lose an Attack: On a roll of a 1, the attacker fumbles and misses out on 1 attack. This means that a fighter with multiple attacks or someone with more than one weapon loses the next attack that round, and someone with only one attack per round may not attack during the next round. 9) D10 Method: Roll 1d10. If the result is 1-8, then the weapon does its maximum damage. If the result is 9-10, the weapon does double damage. 10) On a roll of natural '1,' you lose your weapon. 11) If a natural '20' is rolled, the attacker rolls again. If the second roll is higher than the attacker's level/HD, then it is a normal hit. If the second roll is lower than the attacker's level/HD, then the defender rolls. If this roll is lower than the defender's level/HD, then the hit does maximum damage. If this roll is higher than the defender's level/HD, then roll on your favorite critical hit chart for the results. 12) Free attack: If a natural '20' is rolled, damage is resolved normally. However, the character immediately gets a free attack, unless a natural '20' was required to hit in the first place. If a natural '20' is rolled on the free attack, then the character gets another free attack, and so on. 13) When resolving crits where another dice roll indicates whether extra damage is done, STR bonuses, magical weapon bonuses, etc. are added after the "extra" damage has been added to the rolled damage. 14) On a roll of natural '1,' the attacker must make a DEX check at -1 to -4, depending on the situation, or drop the weapon and lose initiative for the next round. If the DEX check is made, the character simply loses initiative for the next round. 15) any combination of any part of 1-14. K7: What can I do to make crossbows as useful as normal bows? A: If you wish to change the damage value of crossbows, here is a suggestion, averaged and smoothed out from many responses to the issue, and relatively balanced with respect to other weapons: S/M L Hand 1d4 1d4-1 Light 1d6+1 1d8+1 Medium 1d8+1 1d10+1 Heavy 1d10+1 2d6+1 The Combat & Tactics book of optional rules deals with this situation in a similar manner; the hand crossbow is 1d3/1d2, the light crossbow is the same as is listed here, there is no medium crossbow listed, and the heavy crossbow is the same as is listed under medium here. It also adds the pellet crossbow, which fires a pellet which does 1d4/1d4. If you wish to change the entire way crossbows are handled, here are a few suggestions to mix and match: 1) Make longbows 2 proficiencies to learn and 1 to specialize. 2) Change the nonproficient penalty by +1 for crossbows and -1 for long bows. Thus the to hit penalties for bows become: Warrior Wizard Priest/Rogue Longbow -3 -6 -4 Short bow -2 -5 -3 Crossbow -1 -4 -2 3) Make all crossbows +1 to hit, due to ease of use. 4) When resolving a hit with a crossbow, treat all armors with an AC of 4 or less as if they were AC 5 (add any magic bonuses after doing this). This can also be used for longbows. 5) When resolving a hit with a crossbow, treat all armors as if they were three slots worse, to a maximum of AC 10. This can also be used with longbows. 6) Give all crossbows and long bows relative strength values; use the Strength to hit and damage bonuses when using the bow. For longbows, the strength value is also the minimum strength needed to draw the string. For all bows, use the respective damage dice listed in the PH. 7) Use the optional rule for weapon type vs. armor type from the PH and treat all crossbow quarrels & longbow arrows as "piercing" weapons; remember that the number is a bonus to hit only, not a bonus to damage as well. 8) When using the damage dice listed in the PH, treat crossbows as arquebuses for the method of determining damage; i.e. if the maximum damage is rolled, roll again and add the results. Keep doing this until a lower number is rolled. This method may be used for any missile weapon that does not involve direct muscular effort, i.e. crossbows, ballistae, and atlatls could work this way, but short and long bows, and hurled weapons would not. 9) Use the optional armor penetration rule for light and heavy crossbows from the Combat & Tactics book, which worsens the AC of an armored opponent by 2 at medium range and by 5 at short range. K8: How much do coins weigh? A: In first edition AD&D, ten coins weighed one pound, regardless of what metal the coins are made of. In second edition AD&D, fifty coins weigh one pound, regardless of what metal the coins are made of (DMG2, p. 134; DMG2R, p. 181). This should result in coins of different sizes, with copper pieces being much larger than gold pieces due to the weight difference between the two metals, but there is no mention of any such distinction in the rules. Historically speaking, coins of different denominations were of varying weights and sizes--making an accurate scale a merchant's best friend--and you may wish to introduce this detail into your campaigns, as well as naming the different denominations something other than "gold pieces" and "copper pieces", in order to add more local flavor. K9: What can I do to make the hit point system more true to life? A: The AD&D system intentionally simplifies combat as much as possible. See the previous Section for details and suggestions for combat in general. If you are concerned about a higher level character's good chances of surviving an attack by a mob while wearing nothing but a loin cloth and while tied to a stake, or surviving at ground zero of a thermonuclear explosion, read on. The hit point system works as is, if you keep a couple of things in mind when dealing with characters with hit points to spare. 1) Overbearing: As outlined in the PH & DMG, overbearing is an excellent way for a group of low or 0-level characters to incapacitate a tougher opponent (such as a high level PC who can take a blow or four from any normal weapon and ignore it). Once incapacitated (pinned to the ground by sheer weight of bodies), the victim can be knocked out, tied up, gravely injured, or even killed with much less difficulty than normal, as there is a +4 to hit bonus for prone characters. Even a high level fighter will think twice about trying to take on a group of people single- handed after suffering such an ignominious defeat; his high number of hit points will do him no good. 2) Entanglement: Some weapons are excellent for entangling a character's limbs, thus preventing normal actions, or even resulting in a fall. Chains, ropes/lassos, and nets are good examples of this. The Combat & Tactics book outlines the "Pull/Trip" maneuver, which is one method of achieving this; it also describes the game effects of several "non-standard" weapons (like chains & lassos). Since these attacks do not have much direct effect on hit points, a high number of hit points will not be nearly as important as in one-on-one combat. Also, if a victim is completely entangled and tied down, the DM may rule that that counts as "held", and thus all attacks automatically succeed. 3) Sap: A sap is both a maneuver and a specific weapon; both are described in the Combat & Tactics book. When using the weapon, or anything similar (like the flat side of a sword), one makes a called shot to the head, with -4 penalty for a called shot (an additional -4 if the victim is wearing a helm). If the attack is successful, there is a 5% chance per point of damage done (40% maximum) that the victim is knocked out for 3d10 rounds. Due to the to hit penalties, this is best attempted in conjunction with one of the above situations, as then there are bonuses to counter the called shot penalty, as well as the opportunity for more than one character to attempt a sap per turn, increasing the possibility that a knockout is achieved. Once knocked out, the victim is considered "sleeping", and all further attacks automatically succeed. 4) Missile attacks: An attack by a single bowman may not faze a character with a lot of hit points much, but a group of longbowmen or crossbowmen at medium range, or in sniper positions, will cause any intelligent character to fear for his life. If enough arrows are fired into a given area in a single round, chances are that some of them will hit. If this continues for multiple rounds (which is a good bet if there is any sort of range between the bowmen & the character, or in the case of snipers), any character, no matter how many hit points they started out with, will not feel so hot. Crossbows have the additional bonus of being able to punch through armor, according to the optional Combat & Tactics rules. This is one of the quicker ways to reduce hit points. 4) Be sure to watch out for situations that may result in automatic or near-automatic hits. The above are some examples of this; there very well may be others. 5) Memorize the combat bonuses table, and apply them judiciously. Many otherwise "intolerable" situations would be helped if the PC had a greater chance of being hit. 6) Intelligent opponents: Be sure to play opponents intelligently, unless the situation dictates otherwise. Villagers should know that going toe-to-toe with a grizzled war veteran is not a smart move, and thus will take actions accordingly if they wish to attack him. Mob actions, sniper fire, and deadfalls are all examples of tactics 0-level characters can use. Creatures or characters fighting on their home turf should know exactly where to stage pitched battles and when to flee to a more favorable combat arena. Higher ground and staircases are prime examples of this. 7) Fudge: Either keep track of all hit points yourself, or retroactively add on to or subtract from opponents' hit point totals, and thus make battles last as long or as short as seems appropriate. If you are keeping track of all hit points, then players don't get cocky from knowing that they have enough hit points to grin and bear an attack. 8) Remember that any character who receives 50 or more points of damage from a single attack and survives must immediately make a saving throw vs. death or die from the sudden, intense shock. However, if you decide that the system simply does not work for you as is, there are a number of options you might try. 1) Assign a certain percentage of the character's hit points to the torso, head, and each limb. Then use hit location rules. This works best with no increase or slow increase in character hit points. It also increases the effectiveness of called shots. 2) Whatever a character rolls for hit points for 1st level are that character's "body points"; all others gained through normal advancement are "fatigue points". Certain types of attacks & certain spells automatically affect only the body points; otherwise, the fatigue points are affected first. When all fatigue points have been lost, the character loses consciousness; when all body points are lost, the character dies. 3) As for #2, but rather than having certain attacks target the body points, one body point is lost for every (Level) points of damage taken. The rest is subtracted from the fatigue points. 4) Don't give increases in hit points for level advancement. 5) Reduce the hit point increase for level advancement, giving characters an extra hit die at every other level or every third level. 6) Hit points are rolled as normal. All hit points up to the character's CON are "body points" and the rest are "skill points." Damage will be taken from the skill points first, unless the to-hit roll was 5 or more than needed or a saving throw is missed by 5 or more, in which case the damage is split evenly between the skill points and the body points. Skill points are recovered at (character's level/day); body points are recovered at (CON bonus+1/day, maximum of 3) starting the day after all skill points have been recovered. 7) Change the hit dice used for each class, for example, reducing all classes by one die, with mages getting 1d3. 8) Give damage bonuses or even multipliers for some situations, such as those listed in the PH & DMG as giving to hit bonuses. Possibly even give damage bonuses or multipliers to some weapons, such as bows or crossbows used at point-blank range. 9) Reduce the availability and/or effectiveness of healing magics, so that when a character gets hurt, he won't be immediately up to full strength for the next encounter, and may start thinking twice about head-on combat. Lasting injuries (scars, wounds that refuse to heal, and the like) are also good ways of keeping characters humble. 10) Critical hits: If you are concerned about characters with a lot of hit points shrugging off combat as too easy, start using a critical hit system. Most include ways for even 0-level characters to do significant amounts of damage with one good hit. Those systems that have location-specific results will increase the effectiveness of called shots, and increase the chance of a character losing the use of his sword arm, for example. Smart characters will think twice before charging into combat. 11) Make characters who lose more than half of their hit points in a single round roll for system shock, losing consciousness if they fail. 12) Any combination of the above. A warning for options 1 through 5: if you take one of these options, you will most likely have to rewrite the damage dice for weapons table as well as the damage done by certain spells, such as fireball, which could then kill every character every time, regardless of whether or not a save was made. K10: The energy drain power of greater undead sucks. What can I do? A: You bet it does. That's part of the problem, you see. In any case, the chief out-of-game reason that is ascribed to this ability is so that there are some creatures out there that characters will fear, and rightly so, each and every time such creatures are encountered. Also, just as hit points are a measure of health, levels are a measure of the soul's vitality or some such ephemeral quality. As in normal combat, 0-level characters won't last nearly as long on the average as high-level characters will. The chief in-game explanation is that the touch of an evil creature with such close ties to the Negative Material Plane has a profound effect on a character; in much the same way that a character in a campy horror film gets permanently white hair and stutters and shakes uncontrollably after a ghostly encounter, a *D&D fighter has his confidence shaken by feeling the touch of death and the loss of soul energy that goes with it and so can't fight quite as well, a wizard can't quite keep his thoughts straight enough to cast higher level spells, a priest has lost some confidence in his deity so that some spells just won't work, a thief's hands shake when performing certain activities, and anyone so affected is generally unable to perform at their past level of achievement, even to the point of 'unlearning' many things, due to the severing of pathways in the mind by the momentary connection to the Negative Material Plane. Also, all affected characters lose some of the vitality & energy they once enjoyed, so they don't quite move as fast or as well, are somewhat more susceptible to disease, and can't take nearly as much damage before blacking out. With time and experience, confidence and composure can be regained; however, it is not uncommon for such experiences to deeply scar a character, possibly even to the point of giving up their previous life and becoming a hermit or the town lunatic or mystic. An alternate (or parallel) in-game explanation is that level- draining undead have strong ties to the Negative Material Plane, and are essentially negatively-charged objects, and void of life. Living beings' souls are charged with the positive power of life; gaining experience increases the positive charge. When something with a positive charge comes in contact with the undead being by being struck by the undead creature, part of the positive flows into the void of the negative, leaving the positively-charged being with a lower charge than before (fewer levels), and partially filling the void in the undead (so it can "feed" on the energy gained). Any knowledge that was gained with the energy that is drained is also lost. Further experience or magic can be employed to recharge the character and relearn abilities; otherwise, the energy level will remain at the current level. Lower-level characters have lower starting levels of positive energy, and so can be drained faster than characters with higher levels of energy. However, many players believe that these lines of reasoning do not make sufficient sense; these people wish to find some other way of expressing the effect that strong undead should have on characters. If you are one of these people, here are some quick suggestions (note that in all cases with alternatives to level drain, *Restoration* automatically reverses all effects): 1) Drain stats rather than levels. CON is usually the best choice, but STR & DEX are close seconds. Different types of undead may drain different stats. 2) Drain hit points, which then don't heal as normal. Either make the hp drain is permanent, or increase the time for natural healing by a factor of 10. 3) Give the character a curse, which changes from undead to undead. Vampires might bestow a lesser form of vampirism, wights a taste for human flesh, spectres a case of magical gangrene, and so on. 4) Age the character, the number of years depending on the type of undead encountered. 5) Have energy drain affect hit points and saving throws as per normal, but not THAC0, proficiencies, and spells. If hit points are regained over time rather than with magic, subtract one from each roll for more hit points until the previous level of experience has been regained. 6) Keep track of hit point gains for each level, and subtract the number that was initially gained (including CON bonuses) for the particular level that was lost. 7) Have the character make a system shock roll or a save vs. paralyzation. If the roll is failed, the character loses a level. 8) Make the drain only temporary. Lost levels are regained at a certain rate, such as (xp lost divided by 6) per month, or one level per one month of compete bed rest. 9) Have all skills return automatically, without need for training again, and give bonuses to any rolls to relearn spells. 10) Alter the non-corporeal undead, such as wraiths and spectres, so that instead of draining levels, they can ignore armor; all opponents are treated as AC 10 plus any DEX adjustments. Magical armor adds only its plus to this number. Thus, a character with a 15 DEX wearing *plate +1* would be treated as having an AC of 8 when facing a spectre. K11: Where else can I look for info about being a Dungeon Master? A: There is a very interesting FAQ about DMing, complete with tips, tricks, and things to do & not do, with something for any level of experience as a DM. Written by lucifer (No, not that one), it can be found at: http://www.mit.edu:8001/people/jerrod/dnd/dmfaq/Welcome.html It is also infrequently posted to rec.games.frp.dnd. If you can't get a copy through one of those means, you can write to and request one from lucifer directly without worrying overly much about a lien on your soul. ***End Part 9*** ***End FAQ*** -- Aardy R. DeVarque Feudalism: Serf & Turf Rec.games.frp.dnd FAQ: http://www.enteract.com/~aardy/faq/rgfdfaq.html