Roles, Rules, and Rolls has a really great Matrix of Precious Stones — complete with pictures! I don’t know about y’all, but my treasure hordes tend to be disproportionately filled with a half dozen or so “common suspects” of questionable interest. I’d much rather have the scepter of the mummy king topped with a fluted facet of snake skin jasper rather than generic emerald #191.

Roger’s post is also a great example of how you can find all kinds of gaming resources by just scrounging through your every day life (often with little or no effort required to alter it).

Tagline: I like it. Damn.

Awhile back I wrote a review of Heavy Gear’s Character Compendium. In that review I commented upon the fact that, as a general, rule I hated character compendiums, and that I generally found them to be wasted efforts.

I also commented upon the fact that Dream Pod 9 had defied the odds and produced, in Character Compendium 1, not only one the best character compendium I had ever read, but also one of the best supplements I had read.

Because I had recently been reviewing so many Heavy Gear products with almost unreserved praise, I jokingly commented at the end of this review that I had almost given up hope that I would find a bad Dream Pod 9 product in the form of a character compendium. However: “Maybe if I take a look at GM screens, the single largest excuse to waste cardboard the world has ever produced. Maybe…”

Well, I’ve finally taken a look at a GM screen… and I’ll be damned if I don’t love what the Pod has done here.

THE SCREEN

First things first: A screen comes with two components – the artwork on the player’s side and the reference material on the GM’s side.

For anyone familiar with Dream Pod 9’s previous work, it shouldn’t take brain surgery to figure out that the artwork they’ve produced here is stunning. It depicts a convoy of JAF ships – several disappearing off the edges of the screen, a Javelin-class missile cruiser on the left side, and the JSS Valiant screaming right out of the center panel. The convoy is surrounded by an exo-armor escort.

If you look at the artwork it is, as noted, fantastic and more than pleasing to the eye. On the other hand, the Pod has also selected a coloring scheme which allows your eye to easily slide past the depicted scene. Several screens I’ve seen are so gaudy that they distract and detract from the game session – this one can only add to the experience.

On the other side you have some reference tables: Roleplaying Game Tables on the left panel, Tactical Game Tables on the right panel, and Non-Player Characters on the center panel.

The roleplaying panel is unquestionably well done. They provide a threshold reference, attack and defense modifiers, movement speeds, as well as the tables of dealing with fires and electrical damage. They also include a master skill list, which is always useful for remembering which attribute goes with which skill. Finally they include the “Skill Improvement Costs” table, which is completely worthless. Character creation and/or advancement information does not need to go on a GM screen, because it does not need to be commonly referenced during gameplay.

The tactical game tables are quite suitable as well, but I have to question the inclusion of this panel at all. Even in a campaign with an integrated tactical campaign, I’m not commonly going to be sitting behind my GM screen while doing so. I would have been happy with a simple, separate cardstock reference sheet.

But my biggest beef with the inclusion of the tactical game tables is that there are several roleplaying tables which are, as a result, left off, which should have been included: Secondary Trait Formulas (I know what I said about character creation info, but the data on generating UD, AD, and wounding scores is useful info for improvised NPCs during combat); an equipment (or at least weapon) reference; atmosphere loss; rad contamination values; irradiation table. Why, for example, are the fire and electrical tables included, but not the radiation tables? And, quite frankly, weapon statistics are one of the primary things I need to reference during a game. The Pod should have seriously considered dropping the tactical tables, or included a fourth panel like the Storyteller screens.

The Non-Player Character panel was originally of questionable value to me, but I quickly realized it’s value: The archetypes are laid out in a table format which allows me not only to quickly reference them, but also to modify them in minor ways. This is incredibly useful when your players suddenly go off on a tangent and you find yourself with a need to improvise a bunch of NPCs very rapidly.

All in all, the screen is good, but not great, with some noticeable areas which are lacking.

THE BOOK

Where the product makes up for the flaws of the screen, however, is the book which comes with it — Gamemastering Made Easy. This is a bit of inversion over the laws of the natural universe as I have previously observed them: I always believed having the dorky little booklets included with GM screens be of high quality violated some galactic law. This, more than anything else is what usually kills my interest in GM screens – even if the screen was of mind-blowing quality, there’s no way it’s worth $15 or $20 in its own right (and the book never even justified why a tree was killed for its existence).

A lot of these little booklets purport to be “GM guides” of one variety or another, and this one is no exception. The difference lies entirely in the fact that reading through this book you are struck not only by the amount and depth of advice provided, but also its genuine usefulness. I’ve been GMing for a decade now, and there were still some approaches and techniques discussed in this text which took me by surprise.

The book opens with a general overview of what GMing entails. This takes about three pages and discusses the basic tools of the GM trade; what defines the job; how to balance the GM’s roles as referee, opponent, and god; game balance; impartiality; and a few tips on good recordkeeping. The book then goes on to detail how GM’s need to interact with players (highlights being how to find players and various types of players). Move along to the player characters (how to design them, how to fit them into a campaign, how to make a campaign fit the characters, how to motivate them, and some other stuff). Notable in this section are the suggestions for the pre-designed “character story”, which provides a rough guideline of where a character is where he’s going in dramatic terms. Also, the guidelines on how to construct an effective death scene for a PC is interesting.

Progressing along quite naturally we encounter NPCs, which provides the GM with tips on how to improvise NPCs on the run, as well as how to use NPCs effectively (with additional guidelines for effective playing of villains).

Then we come to a section on the rules, where the philosophy for following (and breaking) the rules is discussed, along with improvisation.

The GM is then treated to a discussion of plots and subplots (including how to make an exciting concept, how to incorporate effective subplots, coming up with ideas). One nice feature here are the “plot movers” – a two page list of things such as “assassins” and “beat the clock” which can be used by the GM to, well, move the plot.

Guidelines for fumbles are detailed (for a number of various common activities), combat is given an overview (including useful tactics, different types of combat scenes you can use, and how to use combat effectively in a campaign).

In my review of the Jovian Chronicles rulebook I mentioned that there were several different options for using the tactical system, depending on the level of detail, accuracy, and complexity you were looking for. Another one is added here in the form of the “Dramatic Tactical System”, which does a really great job of providing an effective map-less tactical option.

We then proceed into the world section – techniques for describing the world, dramatic settings, etc. Finally, we get several pages of work and reference sheets. These include an event tracking sheet, a campaign checklist, a PC personality worksheet, a quick character generation reference, a quick mechanical design reference sheet, a reference for perks and flaws, and a system design quick reference sheet. Most notable among these references, however, are the “Planetary Ephemerides” for 2210-2212 – these provide the distances between all of the major planets for those three years and, naturally, are a very good resource for any roleplaying campaign. Extreme kudos for Dream Pod 9 for including them.

In short, the book provides a broad range of tools which you can use as you want and totally at your discretion. Its advice is solid and useful. Its utility is constant. This isn’t throwaway fluff – it’s a seriously useful addition to you Jovian Chronicles campaign.

The package is marred with a few flaws:

First, never recycle cover art. There is a lot of original artwork in this book, but for some reason one or two of their images are recycled from the covers of other Jovian Chronicles supplements. The problem with this is that the covers are memorable because, well, they’re covers. TSR used to do this from time to time and it never worked. If you must recycle a piece of artwork, use one from a book’s interior.

Second, never repeat text from the core rulebook in a supplement. It is completely gratuitous. They only do this in one short passage on pg. 19, but I found it incredibly annoying. It was, admittedly, natural to re-cover the same ground found in the core rulebook (because they were about to expand on the ideas found there), but they could have rephrased the passage.

Finally, they had a couple of incongruous comments regarding method acting – one was negative (in describing people who go over the top in their roleplaying to the detriment of the game as “method actors”) and one was positive (in referring, if I recall correctly, to roleplaying as basically being a derivative of method acting). Neither is quite correct (although the negative is certainly farther off the mark than the positive). If you must use technical terms (which “method acting” is), make sure you’re using them correctly.

CONCLUSION

I can’t say that this is quite worth the $20 the Pod wants for it (I’d be happier in the $15-18 range), but I will offer a suggestion that you track down a copy – particularly if you’re someone who typically likes GM screens more than myself. The book alone is a valuable, repeatably usable, resource that you should definitely take a look at if you get a chance.

Style: 5
Substance: 4

Author: Jean Carrieres, Marc A. Vezina, Philippe R. Boulle
Company/Publisher: Dream Pod 9
Cost: $19.95
Page Count: 50
ISBN: 1-896776-35-3

Originally Posted: 1999/08/24

As I mentioned in commentary on my review of the Heavy Gear: Character Compendium, my opinion of character compendiums have not improved over the last thirteen years, but my opinion of properly executed GM screens is much higher. (Unfortunately, most GM screens are still fairly horrid in their execution.)

At the time I was writing this review, I was going through a rather horrid educational experience in which a theatrical curriculum supposedly featuring “Stanislavski technique” (from which “Method acting” is derived) was actually teaching something significantly different. It didn’t make much difference to me (who had previously trained in actual Stanislavski technique and even taught workshops on it), but I was watching the theatrical equivalent of a bunch of kids being taught Creation “Science” before being sent off to college to be rudely awoken when they discover that they have been miseducated. As a a result, I was extremely sensitive to acting terminology being misused. I have not revisited this book recently, but I rather suspect that my reaction to its discussion of Method acting is almost certainly disproportionate.

You can never really know what biases a reviewer is bringing them (either consciously or unconsciously). All you can really hope is that they have done their job in providing an adequate factual platform for their opinions that you are also free to draw opinions of your own.

For an explanation of where these reviews came from and why you can no longer find them at RPGNet, click here.

I’m pleased to announce that we’ve finished the conversion process necessary to make the 3.5 adventures and supplements from Dream Machine Productions available in print from DrivethruRPG:

The City Supplements — Dweredell, Aerie, and Anyoc — all feature a complete fantasy city: A full-page map. Gazetteer. Organizations. Characters. Adventure Seeds. They developed out of a campaign that featured a lot of overland travel: I could see my players eyes light up whenever they reached a new city and I could whip out a full map for it. I figure that other GMs might like some city supplements that could be easily slotted into their campaigns.

Rule Supplement 1: Mounted Combat was originally meant to be the first of several supplements that would have provided advanced sub-systems that could be plugged into your game. Then the 4E/PF shift happened and that plan got short-circuited. In this case, though, you’ve still got a great book featuring rules for flying mounts, mounts of unusual size, intelligent mounts, multiple riders, riding platforms, cavalry maneuvers, warpacks, contest jousting, and a lot more.

Spells of Light and Darkness is a hyper-specialized supplement featuring 50+ spells themed around magical light and darkness. There’s some really cool stuff in here and this book has seen a ton of use at my own gaming table.

Mini-Adventure 1: The Complex of Zombies is a mini-dungeon: You can slot it into a larger complex or run it solo. One of the primary goals of this adventure was to create a zombie variant that would actually strike fear into the hearts of your players. And, according to all reports (including those from my own gaming table), it’s been a huge success. I’d recommend grabbing it just for the bloodwights, even if you ignore everything else about it. (Here’s a tale from the table featuring the events of this mini-adventure.)

Mini-Adventure 2: The Black Mist is a completely different type of adventure scenario. This is more of a “mega-event” which can either become the focus of an urban campaign or serve as a horrific backdrop for the other adventures that are happening at the same time. The short version is that a magical plague has visited the city: How does the city react? How do the PCs react? If you’re looking for something plug-and-play, this isn’t it. If you’re looking for something enigmatic and strange and terrible and epic… this’ll be right up your alley.

(click for PDF)

The final version of this sheet has been released! Grab it from over here!

I kickstarted Numenera because I’m fairly certain that Monte Cook’s RPG products have been directly responsible for more hours of high-quality gaming at my table over the past decade and a half than any author. (Or possibly all other authors combined.) But my interest in it was mild: I had a lot of other games I wanted to run and play. I had a lot of other books I needed to read.

But GenCon turned my mild interest in Numenera into a real passion: I saw the book for the first time and it was gorgeous. Then I got lucky and was able to use generic tickets to get into the tiny tournament. In the tournament I got even luckier and my table was both filled with fantastic players and GMed by the talented Shanna Germain (who is also a supporting author for the book). The combination of gorgeous books and amazing gaming experience got me to drop another $120 on the special edition of the game (despite the fact that I had the $60 version of the book that I had kickstarted in the mail). When I got home, I ordered the XP Deck and Cypher Cards. (The former might seem like a gimmick, but it’s so goddamn slick in actual play that they were basically destined to get my money once I saw it in action.)

Long story short, I’m planning to be running Numenera sooner rather than later. And that meant that I needed to prep one of my system cheat sheets for it. Like the other cheat sheets, these are designed to summarize all the rules for the game — from basic action resolution to advanced combat options. I’ve found that it’s a great way to get a grip on a new system and, of course, it’s also a valuable resource at the game table for both the GM and the players. (For more information on the methods I use for prepping these sheets, click here.)

IT’S ALSO A GM SCREEN!

If you’re familiar with my other cheat sheets, you may notice that the Numenera sheets are formatted for landscape printing instead of portrait printing. This is because I’ve designed these sheets to be inserted into a modular, four-panel, landscape-oriented GM screen. (Just like the one backers of the Numenera kickstarter were able to buy as an add-on. And which you can buy here.) I’m not including graphics for the front of the screen, but if you buy the Numenera GM Screen PDF you’ll be totally golden.

WHAT’S NOT INCLUDED

These cheat sheets are not designed to be a quick start packet: They’re designed to be a comprehensive reference for someone who has read the rulebook and will probably prove woefully inadequate if you try to learn the game from them. (On the other hand, they can definitely assist experienced players who are teaching the game to new players.)

The cheat sheets also don’t include what I refer to as “character option chunks” (for reasons discussed here). So you won’t find types, descriptors, or focuses here.

You also won’t find most of the optional rules for the game. I may add those later, but not yet. (The exception are the rules for modifying abilities; I suspect they’re going to be too useful not to have handy.)

HOW I USE THEM

I generally keep a copy of my system cheat sheets behind my GM screen for quick reference and I also place a half dozen copies in the center of the table for the players to grab as needed. The information included is meant to be as comprehensive as possible; although rulebooks are also available, my goal is to minimize the amount of time people spend referencing the rulebook: Finding something in 4 pages of cheat sheet is a much faster process than paging through a 400 page rulebook. And, once you’ve found it, processing the streamlined information on the cheat sheet will (hopefully) also be quicker.

THIS IS A FIRST DRAFT. And the sheets have not yet seen the heat of playtest. It’s likely that I’ve forgotten to include something vital, so please let me know if you find yourself constantly wanting a piece of information that the sheets aren’t giving you.

The organization of information onto each page of the cheat sheet should, hopefully, be fairly intuitive. The actual sequencing of pages is mostly arbitrary.

Page 1: For Numenera, the difficulty terrible is the heart of everything. Once you understand that, the special rolls, GM intrusion, and the concept of advantage/disadvantage 90% of the rest of the system actually becomes irrelevant. This page is likely to become irrelevant quickly. You’ll note that I included both types of GM intrusion and examples of GM intrusion: This is unusual for my cheat sheets, but so much of Numenera is designed to empower strong, flexible rulings by the GM that providing this kind of idea fodder feels right to me.

Page 2: The core of the combat mechanics. If you’re teaching new players the game, you really only need to walk them through these first two pages.

Page 3: The rest of the game’s mechanics all fit snugly onto one page. The one thing I wish I’d been able to include here are the optional rules for trading damage to achieve specific special effects.

Page 4: This page is necessary to provide a truly comprehensive cheat sheet of the rules as found in the core rulebook, but I’ll admit I’m somewhat baffled by the combat modifiers. The core of the system boils down to: “If something helps you, apply advantage. If it hinders you, apply disadvantage.” In the rulebook, these modifiers are not presented in the form of a table, but instead chew up pages and pages of material which all boils down basically to, “This thing helps you, so it applies advantage.” repeated over and over again with slight variations.

PLAY NUMENERA

That’s pretty much all there is to it. Y’all should grab a copy of Numenera and start playing ASAP. It has the official “I Had a Ton of Fun Playing That” seal of approval.

Roger the GS over at Roles, Rules, & Rolls posted some interesting thoughts regarding the use of the techniques I described in Xandering the Dungeon in small, one-shot scenarios. This, in turn, prompted me to ruminate on the application of xandering techniques on small scales.

Xandering isn’t a cure-all. But, in my experience, it does scale to almost any size and it’s almost always useful to at least consider xandering as a potential tool even if you ultimately decide against it. (I might even go so far as to say that you should default to it unless you have a really good reason not to. In no small part because, as I mentioned in the original essay, this is actually the way the real world works 99 times out of 100.)

To demonstrate what I mean about using xandering techniques at any scale, let me give you an example at an extremely small scale to emphasize the point: A two-room “dungeon” that I just got done designing for an Eclipse Phase scenario.

The “dungeon” in this case is actually a warehouse: The first room is a small security office. The second room is the big warehouse floor itself. Since it’s only two rooms, there’s really no way that we could apply xandering techniques, right?

(Spoilers: That’s a rhetorical question.)

Let’s take a look at a few xandering techniques:

First, multiple entrances: Skylight(s) on the roof of the warehouse. The loading dock. A door leading into the security office. (From a tactical standpoint, this is infinitely more interesting than just having a single door leading into the building.)

Second, multiple paths: Rather than just having one connector between the security office and the warehouse, what if we include several? There’s the door. A ladder leading to a trapdoor in the roof that gives you access to the skylights. Let’s toss in a trapdoor leading to a crawlspace that’s used for electrical wiring; it’ll let you pop up right in the middle of the warehouse (or maybe in multiple places). (If that crawlspace is actually a tunnel that leads over to the exterior generator we could also add that as yet another entrance to the complex.)

That crawlspace would also qualify as a secret or unusual path (another of our xandering techniques).

This obviously isn’t the only way to design a warehouse. (It might even be overkill.) But it does demonstrate how you can use xandering techniques even on the tiniest scales can organically create interesting tactical and strategic choices.

Back to Xandering the Dungeon