My refamiliarization with AD&D continues. As explained previously, the 3.5 campaign that I’m running for my family is going well, and they’re having fun. I haven’t hit them with anything truly sinister yet, with only a couple of divine/DM interventions needed thus far to avoid complete disaster.

But I’m still somewhat nonplussed with the 3.5 system. It’s incredibly complex and some of the details just don’t feel right to me, even with my house rules applied. I’m ignoring some of more intricate details for now, at least until I can get my arms around them. I’m also not really interested in investing in the 4E stuff, given what I’ve read about it.

Anyway, the Pathfinder RPG looks very intriguing to me. It’s NOT a completely new game, and looks to be a very nice 3rd-party take at a revamp of AD&D 3.5 (even though they’re very careful not to say D&D or mention WoTC). I took a quick read through some of their stuff, and it’s very interesting and well done, and is getting rave reviews. I might pick up the core books just to read through them more and pick up some useful details – even then, the characters are only 4th level right now, so if it makes sense, I might just do a conversion if applicable. PCGen is supporting the Pathfinder rules now, too, which is a huge plus.

Anyone out there have any suggestions or comments on Pathfinder?

Even though we’ve added a few more activities to our family’s already-full weekly agenda (Fencing lessons on Monday nights, regular weekend hikes, etc.), we’ve been pretty successful at keeping our burgeoning AD&D campaign going. Rebecca and Jacob have been joined by Mary Lou and my brother Jon almost every week for the past couple of months, and have progressed nicely in their character development.

It’s been pretty fun for me as well: despite the unwieldiness of the v3.5 system, I’ve been able to craft some memorable (I hope!) encounters and NPCs for them to interact with, and the world around them is really starting to take shape. As I mentioned in a previous post, I’m using the Forgotten Realms as a base world, but the lands for this campaign are set in a distant location – I’ll connect everything at some point.

The characters so far:

• Feanora: Half-Elf 4th level longsword-wielding Cleric of Corellon Larethian – Masterwork Longsword, Chain Mail – Rebecca
• Calinar: Half-Elf 4th level dual-wielding Ranger (major dps here!) – Masterwork Longsword, +1 Short Sword – Jacob
• Mantis: Human 3rd level Monk/1st level Sorceress – Quarterstaff – Mary Lou
• Fareis: Wood Elf 4th level Rogue with a haunted past – Dagger +2 (quest item), Padded Leather +1 – Jon

I’ve found some really good resources to assist me on our ‘adventure’ nights. Encounter locations are designed either by hand using Adobe Illustrator or Photoshop, or using a Map-Making Tile tool. The latter tool was a bit expensive and limited for what you get ($30) but it does allow for quick assembly of most necessary locations. I take the resulting PDF’s and modify them in Photoshop.

I bought Campaign Cartographer 3 along with the City Designer 3, but find the system very confusing and clumsy. I’m spending some time getting used to it, but it’s a tough haul. What I’d really like is an automatic town map generator, where I can specify walls, ports, gates, population, etc. and have the base map prepared for me. There are some freeware takes at this, but you’d think that a commercial product would incorporate that functionality instead of forcing you to start from scratch for every design.

I’m using PCGen for character maintenance. This tool also has its quirks, but I think some computer-based character creation system is a must for v3.5. The d20 SRD site is a must-have for in-play documentation. I keep the books handy, but have thankfully never had to refer to them during play.

Finally, as the pièce de résistance, I’ve taken an old projector and hung it on the ceiling, pointed towards a table. Real-time dungeon exploration is handled via ‘erasing’ a fog layer on top of the map in Photoshop. This is also nice in that I can swap out locations quicky and display previously prepared graphics of monsters. I started by printing tiles and using an old collection of dungeon pieces, but this was very limiting in a couple of ways. The projector-method, while it has its weaknesses, is a much more manageable solution. All the players have to do is move their miniatures on the map, and roll their dice.

Speaking of dice, I’ve been very surprised at the lack of good gaming supply stores around here. There are a bunch of R/C or model stores, but only one store in the area (The Whiz on Route 9) has any sort of selection at all. I suppose it’s understandable that the world of pen & paper gaming has been overrun by computer games and MMORPG’s, but wonder if a well-stocked specialty store couldn’t do well.

Jacob and Rebecca have both been doing great in their respective Scout organizations.

In Cub Scouts, Jacob has continued to progress  (and, more importantly, have fun!) in his first year, and will be getting his Wolf badge in February. The Pinewood Derby at the DCU is coming up later this month, and we’re in the midst of designing FOUR cars, which has been a lot of fun, but a lot of work too. We’ll see how we fare, but I think we’ll do well.

In Girl Scouts, Rebecca has also been having lots of fun and has engaged in lots of cool activities. Her troop won first prize for their “Gingerbread House” design over the holidays, and hearing her and her friends caroling was a blast!

We’re working on Amanda’s reading, and hope she’ll be able to start her own scouting fun later this year – we’ll see!

Anyway, as the title mentions, I’ve introduced the older two to D&D. I grew up with AD&D (2nd edition), and thought that given their propensity for reading fiction (mostly fantasy) and playing computer games, they’d be intrigued. I researched the current offerings from Wizards of the Coast and decided against going with the new 4th edition rules, because it seems to have marginalized the differences between the various classes. Instead, I went with 3.5, which has a huge amount of support on the web, is still pretty current and popular, and last but not least, the books are still available for purchase!

But let me tell you this: transitioning from 2nd Ed. to 3.5 Ed. has been pretty hard for me – it’s MUCH more complex than I remember, with Skills and Feats, and a level of minutiae in the rules that I suppose is necessary for competitive play at conventions and such, but in my opinion suck the fun out of the game itself. As I related to some of my friends at work, today’s computer interpretations of D&D obviously don’t have the feel and “spirit” of a pen+paper D&D game, but I think that with the later editions, the Wizards of the Coast have tried to emulate computer games themselves, with pen+paper versions of MMORPGs.

I do like a lot of stuff I’m seeing with 3.5: clerics (anyone) can use swords, or attempt to use weapons they aren’t trained in, with a commensurate penalty to its effectiveness and their abilities. The same goes for armor. The move from THAC0 to AC10 takes a bit of getting used to, but definitely makes a lot of sense. I was already using miniatures and maps as an aid, so the move towards almost requiring miniatures for battle was welcome.

I’ve decided on a couple of “kid-friendly” rule variants, in addition to my traditional house-rules:

• At any point in the game, they can ask me what I think their characters should do. I have them roll a d20, and if they get a high roll, I’ll give them excellent advice specifically related to their character’s abilities with a small bonus to their roll if they choose to take it (ex. cast a “light” spell at the Orc Leader’s eyes). On lower rolls, I still give them good advice, but it’ll probably be basic stuff (keep attacking the orc with your weapon). Skills and Feats, if they need to be personally activated, are part of this, too – if their characters COULD do it, they DO do it (if that makes sense).
• Spell Casters don’t need to memorize spells. The whole “Sorcerer” thing is new to me, so I guess I’m taking some of the skills of the Sorcerer and giving them to my kids’ wizards and clerics.
• Stuff like searching for treasure is automatic – I had to do this because they just don’t think of it (I suppose this is a good thing, though!)
• XP and Treasure are, right now, double or triple what they’d normally be.
• I have a very loose interpretation of the game’s rules – I’m allowing clerics to heal at a distance, for example, and am not worrying too much about carrying weight or encumbrance.

I had a bit of trouble explaining to Jacob that he couldn’t ‘make a suggestion’ to his sister if her character was in another room, and couldn’t hear him. He also struggled a bit with the fact that “I jump from behind the wall, leap onto the table, do a flip over the leader’s head, knock his sword from his hands with my weapon” was not going to be as successful as “I jump out and attack the nearest monster.” He’s slowly getting the hang of it, though!

The most fun we’ve had so far is with character interactions – which is as it should be. They’ve also had a lot of fun with expanding upon their characters’ histories.

The campaign is set in the Forgotten Realms, but in a remote part of it – simply because I haven’t had a chance to familiarize myself with the setting or its countries!

Even though there are plenty of ways to get software illegally, I actually buy games that I and my kids will play. I think it’s important to support the developers, so that they have a reason to continue creating great software.

Anyway, my son and I downloaded a trial version of cool new driving game last night (Burnout Paradise from Criterion Games) and were immediately blown away. GREAT GAME. The trial is basically the full game that’s limited to 30 minutes. While I think this may be too short for some of their customers, it’s at least much better than the crippled “demo’s” some other companies supply, IF they supply a demo at all.

So: great game, and I want to buy it. I have heard horror stories about EA before, but figured I’d give their online store a shot anyway. They happily accepted my credit card, and sent me an mail immediately urging me to create an on-line persona. The only problem is, they didn’t send me a key – which is why I was on the site in the first place. It’s now a full hour since I clicked the order button, and I STILL DON’T HAVE MY FREAKING KEY, and it seems impossible to feret out a screen using their system where I’d go to get it.

I’ll be attempting to cancel the order, and will use Download2Drive instead (I love these guys, and am annoyed with myself I didn’t use them first off). I’m resisting the urge to just download it via uTorrent – but I’d have it by now if I did.

But how the heck does EA expect to stay in business if getting their software is so darn hard? It’s 2009 – processing credit cards on-line has been figured out….

My kids have been huge fans of the Star Wars Lego games since they came out. In addition to "the car game" (Trackmania) and the occasional session of Tomb Raider, they’re staples of my kids’ computer time. So, when Indiana Jones Lego was announced, I pre-ordered it, and installed it the day it arrived.

With a single (but very notable) exception, the game is great. The problem is with the controller selection.. if you’re used to the Star Wars games, the secondary characters can be activated or deactivated as desired with the "F2" button. The problem in the Indy version is that if you use the keyboard at all, it assumes, very incorrectly, that you want to use the keyboard for character control, and deactivates your gamepad. VERY annoying. There seems to be no way to "lock" your controller selection from game to game, either. I have no idea why LucasArts and Traveller’s Tales implemented it this way, and hope a future patch corrects it.

Anyway though, the graphics are fantastic and quite noticably better than the Star Wars versions: surface reflections are very well done. I also like the attention to detail in all the characters and their movements. The cut scenes are pretty comical and spot-on with what you’d expect in a Lego game. The "skills" of each character type are pretty good too (although Willie’s "scream" is a tad over the top and annoying). The Bazooka wielder does have a tendancy to blow himself up.

Some of the missions are much harder than I would have expected for this type of kids’ game, and the developers rely much more on twitch gameplay than they did in the previous games. I can’t say I’m a huge fan of this: in several of the missions, getting the last "treasure chest" relies solely on reaction time, and if you miss it, there’s no recourse other than playing the entire mission over again. This is definitely not a fatal flaw, but having to play a mission 4 or 5 times just to get the timing right on a 3 second sequence is pretty annoying.

Still, there’s enough content here to keep me and the kids busy for awhile… at least until Lego Batman comes out. I like what the Lego folks are doing with this franchise, and hope they keep it up, although I still maintain that if Eidos were to take the technology behind Tomb Raider, and create a kid-oriented (non-violent, exploration-focused) game, they’d have an industry-changing winner.

I’m still not going to watch the Indy movies with my kids, though – not until they’re 10+.