Greece Is Safe Once Again (and news about another short story!)
As the first Sunday of the month, today was Mythic Greece day, and I had a lovely time in the company of heroes. This was my first attempt at presenting one of the well known heroes of the Trojan War as a child (we're just enough before the Trojan war that these characters are all around, but are youths and young teens). I'm finding myself fonder of Odysseus as an eleven-year-old than I was of him in The Odyssey, but I suspect that's because I'm trying to make him likable to the players (since they'll be traveling with him starting next session, if all goes well).
This was my first attempt at running a 4e session without any combat, and I was roundly thwarted. The players wanted combat, and the 4e rules are really designed so that combat is an important focal point of any adventure. The skill challenges are great, and we had a lot of good role play--but all the cool stuff the PCs can do really revolves around their combat stats. I'm honestly not sure how I feel about this. Combat is certainly imperative to this type of adventure game, and I pretty much like the 4e rules that have been created for it. But I also like adventures where combat can be avoided, evaded, talked around, or otherwise handled--or at least those in which combat is neither a major focus nor necessary to the plot. That said, as a 4e player (my main 4e PC at this point is a fighter), I know I'd be disappointed if there was no fighting in a module, simply because that's really what my character is good at.
That said, it took me all of five minutes to piece together a combat encounter that was not only appropriate in challenge and to the plot, but was also exactly the right amount of xp to get four of the players to 2nd level. I think that's really a great strength of 4e: the speed at which impromptu encounters can be created.
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In other, completely different news, a short story I wrote awhile ago for a Dark Quest anthology, Crown Tales, edited by dqg_neal, is up for order online. I got this gig through Empty Room Studios, and while I didn't work directly with the Dark Quest editors, I definitely enjoyed having the chance to play in their world. Their material is very rich, and they're playing with some really neat religious concepts--which I made heavy use of in my short story, "Choosing Fate." The anthology also features fiction by Mark Adams and Daniel Tyler Gooden, ERS compatriots of mine. (Mark worked on Steampunk Musha's most recent incarnation, and Daniel is a Baeg Tobar writer.) If you enjoy short fantasy fiction, go ahead and peek over at the sale page and give it a look. :)
This was my first attempt at running a 4e session without any combat, and I was roundly thwarted. The players wanted combat, and the 4e rules are really designed so that combat is an important focal point of any adventure. The skill challenges are great, and we had a lot of good role play--but all the cool stuff the PCs can do really revolves around their combat stats. I'm honestly not sure how I feel about this. Combat is certainly imperative to this type of adventure game, and I pretty much like the 4e rules that have been created for it. But I also like adventures where combat can be avoided, evaded, talked around, or otherwise handled--or at least those in which combat is neither a major focus nor necessary to the plot. That said, as a 4e player (my main 4e PC at this point is a fighter), I know I'd be disappointed if there was no fighting in a module, simply because that's really what my character is good at.
That said, it took me all of five minutes to piece together a combat encounter that was not only appropriate in challenge and to the plot, but was also exactly the right amount of xp to get four of the players to 2nd level. I think that's really a great strength of 4e: the speed at which impromptu encounters can be created.
--
In other, completely different news, a short story I wrote awhile ago for a Dark Quest anthology, Crown Tales, edited by dqg_neal, is up for order online. I got this gig through Empty Room Studios, and while I didn't work directly with the Dark Quest editors, I definitely enjoyed having the chance to play in their world. Their material is very rich, and they're playing with some really neat religious concepts--which I made heavy use of in my short story, "Choosing Fate." The anthology also features fiction by Mark Adams and Daniel Tyler Gooden, ERS compatriots of mine. (Mark worked on Steampunk Musha's most recent incarnation, and Daniel is a Baeg Tobar writer.) If you enjoy short fantasy fiction, go ahead and peek over at the sale page and give it a look. :)