Dragon Issue 308: June 2003


part 3/9


Dragon magic: Monte Cook hedges his bets by producing the magazine's second OGL article, thus ensuring he can use it's ideas again for Malhavoc publications. Smart move, since the idea of feats that open up particular types of magic to general casters was the big way he kept everyone from having access to everything in Arcana Evolved, after eliminating the distinction between arcane, divine and psionics. It also gives him an excuse to make these normally dragon-exclusive spells more powerful than normal ones of the same level, which might have gone unremarked last edition, but needs justifying now. So this is a 3e version of the Dragon Dweomers spells from issues 218, 230, 248 & 272. Surprisingly few of them are direct updatings of spells from the previous ones as well, which is pleasing for me to see, and speaks well of Monte's current creativity levels. Plus there's a case where an ability that was pure fiat last edition is turned into a properly codified spell. Yup, if you always wanted to teleport your entire mountain or castle home around the planes on a regular basis like Infyrana from Dragon Mountain, now you can at epic levels. (with the help of a few extend spell metamagics) This makes me happy, and the rest of the spells feel pretty dragon appropriate as well, with lots of lair based spells, some elemental blasting and enhancement, and buffs to your wings, scales, claws and general flexibility (and a justification as to how you can find them at the centre of dungeons they couldn't physically get out of ) This is a very strong article, and I'm glad it isn't just squirelled away into WotC's archives, and is free to be reused and expanded upon. Definitely a good way to kick off our features.


Heavy gear: While dragons have got a fair number of magical items aimed specifically for (or at) them in birthday issues, I can't actually find one that talks about mundane gear adapted for the draconic body form. So it looks like they have managed to find something new to talk about this issue. While dragons are generally quite comfortable going naked whatever the climate, they're still smart enough to recognise the value of bags and harnesses to carry stuff, enhancements for their natural weapons and armour, and all sorts of things that they might have trouble making with their huge awkward claws, but can easily pay or threaten humans into doing for them. As with the last article, many of the items are focussed at making their lair safer and better protected against adventurers, but some are handy if they should join an adventuring party and head out to enhance their fortune that way as well. This means that they are primarily DM focussed, but as with Monte's spells, less so than in previous editions. Giving PC's a concrete path to follow to access them, even if it is a challenging one, does seem very much the way to go at the moment.

Dragon Issue 308: June 2003


part 4/9


Dweomered dragon scales: The onslaught of dragon based crunchy stuff comes to an end with one that is primarily focussed at players. Dragon scales are one of the few magic item components you can extract from them while leaving them alive, so you can possibly get one by making a deal with them, or even sneaking into their lair and looking for any sheddings. Unsurprisingly, the powers they grant are heavily based on the type of dragon they come from, with one from each chromatic, metallic and lung species, plus 5 miscellaneous ones like shadow, deep and brown. I'm a bit irked by the lack of gem dragons, but the items are decent enough, if very formulaic, granting some of the resistances and spell-like abilities that the various dragons possessed. At least the various ways they're mounted for wearing shows some inventiveness. allowing you to have them in rings, shields, collars, hats, amulets, cufflinks, basically, at least one for each body slot if you were so inclined to buff yourself that way. And let's face it, there are far worse themes to pick for your character's powers, as this'll net you a broad range of resistances and not many weaknesses. So it looks like this year's presents have all fell into the high crunch, efficient, player-friendly and formulaic mould they're keen on at the moment. One or two like that is cool, but when it's every article, it gets very tedious indeed. Let's hope there's at least some variety in approach in the rest of the issue.


The ecology of the ironmaw: Skip contributes an ecology for the first time in well over a decade. Nice to see he's not completely consumed by fulfilling his regular duties. This is a fairly good example of the current ecological trends, although rather longer in it's descriptive section than the previous two, it's still entirely OOC, and focussed upon combat over the uses of the creature in general campaignery and interactions with other creatures. There's quite a bit of story potential in a plant from the abyss gradually taking over a prime material world through being nastier than the local fauna, and that could be better put across. Still, it is probably an improvement on last year's crop. Now, if they could get the frequency back as well. Are they not getting the submissions, or is this a deliberate decision to cut this kind of stuff out? Either way, this is one area 3rd ed is quite a bit worse than 2nd.


Tactical Terrors: Skip contributes a second article in quick succession, a direct sequel to one from issue 288. Yup, here's 14 more encounter ideas wherin you combine multiple monsters that complement each other in interesting ways. Be it one riding the other, a group of minions and a leader, open attack and a stealthy counterpart, or just equal partners, there's a huge number of combinations you can try, see if the challenge level is more or less than the sum of it's parts. So like transformational prestige classes and transforming existing monsters into templates, this is an idea that shows a little bit of diminishing returns in it's return, but still has plenty of room for further expansions. The main way it's inferior to the previous one is the quantity, only 14 ideas compared to the original's 20, and the formatting, which has white writing on a bright red background, not the most legible combo. Still, the content is decent enough, it's just not surprising anymore. Now they've taken the idea and made it standard in ecology articles, it's no longer new and cool.

Dragon Issue 308: June 2003


part 5/9


Armed to the tentacle: Neither is this one by Skip's wife. Lest we forget, Illithids have got multiple specials in the magazine giving them more stuff, plus a full book last edition. They're literally THE oldest creation of the magazine that still gets regular screentime. As with the draconic equipment, there's quite a mix of stuff here. New magic items, and new creatures (which are also items, since illithids are quite into their symbiotic biotech. ) The symbionts make up the majority of this article, and are the most interesting part, attaching themselves to you in somewhat gross manner, and providing various benefits in exchange for ability damage as they live off your vital energies. Most are also intelligent, many far more so than humans, so they can provide you with an extra set of eyes and opinions if you're willing to put up with the loss of privacy as well as their stated benefits. It puts an interesting alternative spin to finding intelligent magical items. Plus the Guyver fans'll love it. So while not totally original, this is also a solid bit of crunchy material with some entertaining ideas contained within. I'm not sure why Skip & Penny have suddenly stepped up their rate of submissions, but I don't object to it at all.


Psions of the orient: The connection between psionics and martial arts of the more high-flying kind is pretty well established. So it makes perfect sense that someone would combine the two, creating psionic styles that grant you an extra ability if you take the right feats and powers. However, unlike mundane MA styles, they set things up so you can only pick one, and then you're stuck with it, even if you could theoretically buy all the feats for two or three by 20th level. So in practice they work more like wizard school specialisations, particularly the psionic warrior ones. That means you won't get to see many of these in your game unless you use them for the NPC's. So while this is a neat idea, it's fairly limited in it's application in most campaigns. Maybe if it was included in the 3.5 psionics revision it'd gain a little traction, but no suck luck. Guess it's another throwaway then.

Dragon Issue 308: June 2003


part 6/9


Arcane weather: Magical weather is probably one area that's underrepresented in D&D compared to real world superstition. Part of that is because like shapeshifting, you have a few high level spells that basically let you do everything, which gives spellcasters either no power over it at all, or ridiculous flexibility and huge amounts of tactical and strategic control over an area. There really should be more intermediate steps between alter the temperature a few degrees and snap your fingers for instant village destroying hurricane. Still, it seems Mike Mearls isn't in a flexibility cutting mood today, just an adding new whimsical stuff one, and applying the lessons we learned out in the planes to the prime material. In an area of high magic, all sorts of weird and wonderful weather can happen, from raining frogs, to mixing raw alignment energy with the weather. And while some may be beneficial to the PC's, it's more likely that they'll be a challenge to overcome, and figure out how to make them hurt any enemies more than you. Most of this is for DM's to play around with, but as with the dragon articles, there's feats and a prestige class that lets players counteract and play around with magical weather, which will be suitably game-changing at high level. As both an unfamiliar topic, and quite a fun implementation, this is a pretty cool article. A bit of overt fantastically like this reminds players that magic is an integral part of a fantasy world, not something slapped on top of real world physics.


Dork tower substitutes science for magic. Once again, nothing changes. Arthur C Clarke would be proud.


Fiction: Theadora's ladder by Thomas Harlan. Our third trip back to the time of the crusades, and we up the magic level quite substantially, introducing vampires, and an old woman who has enough blatant magical power to stand up to them in a direct battle. (complete with a bit of wire-fu) So this isn't so much power creep as a sudden leap in stakes ( in both senses ) and change in tone. It also ceases to be standalone, leaving a huge plot hook open for a follow-up story. It looks like this series is going to do what Fool Wolf and Orion have done and build up to something. Presuming it gets those future instalments anyway, which is always a gamble in this magazine. So I have very mixed feelings about this. It's nice to see stories with continuity again, but the sudden change in tone is a bit annoying, and the power escalation definitely so, since gritty low-magic stuff has been getting increasingly scarce around here. I hope he isn't going to wind up on the chopping block or finish with yet another save the world story which leaves nowhere to go but down afterwards.

Dragon Issue 308: June 2003


part 7/9


3.5 Update: The fighting classes didn't change hugely from 3.0 to 3.5. What changes they did make were pretty consistently done to deal with the problem of front-loading. Fighters are pretty much the same, but for expanded feat options, which still don't change the fact that the first 4-6 levels are the only ones you really want. Barbarians get better Rage that advances faster, once again offsetting but not removing the issue that many people were just taking one level and then going Ranger instead. And speaking of Rangers, they get expanded in nearly every way. Their HP is down a little. but they get more spells, more skills, more efficient[//i] skills, more combat styles, and those styles advance more gradually. Each is a small change, but put together they represent a pretty substantial upgrade. So pretty much all the changes are ones that grant greater power, at least on the surface. Of course, that won't stop complaints that they're still miles behind spellcasters in flexibility from piling up over the next 5 years, but what can you do? Completely changing the powers rules to fix it lost more people than it gained, and caused pathfinder to sometimes outsell 4e. In a .5 revision, they had even less leeway to change things. As with the spell nerfs, these little tweaks aren't exciting to read about, just irritating. The vast majority of people won't notice (apart from that fighters suck, which was obvious to nearly everyone. ) and those that were won't stop complaining because you've slapped a band-aid on it. I hate these no-win situations.


Silicon Sorcery: As they hinted in the letters page, they've finally got a little more epic material for us, a year on. Two prestige classes based on Morrowind: Tribunal. Both are about transcending your limitations and becoming a divine badass capable of nearly anything. But one tries to get there by sucking up to the gods, while the other believes that you make your own fate. Of course, in D&D, the one that fully progresses your clerical spellcasting as well as granting a load of extra abilities is probably going to win against the one that doesn't, at least until they gain the power to completely no-sell all connections to another plane or higher power. So essentially, it looks like the conflict here is proxies vs super-athar, and in the game you can choose to help either side. That's definitely a conflict that works well in D&D, where even if everyone accepts the gods exist, they don't always like them or want them watching and meddling with the world, and they aren't so omnipotent that you can't make a difference. I can definitely see players wanting to take either of these if they get to epic level, so this article is quite welcome, as with most of their current computer game choices.

Dragon Issue 308: June 2003


part 8/9


Dungeoncraft: Monte tackles the obvious topic in a column called Dungeoncraft. Building a dungeon! While the formatting is different, the advice here isn't too different to Ray's advice on this three years ago. The dungeon needs a reason to exist, both in and out of game, and it's design should stem logically from it's surrounding area, the creatures that live there, and the tools they had to build it with. The main difference is that while Ray was always working on a specific example while giving his advice, Monte isn't, which also means his advice is less decompressed, as he isn't looking to stretch a topic out over an entire year. Which will turn out to be more useful overall still remains up in the air, but we should get to the point faster this time, which means it'll also be more friendly to newcomers. Hopefully he'll still hit some points Ray didn't despite that, keeping this useful to me.


The play's the thing: Penny gives her perspective on a proper player-DM relationship, which unsurprisingly differs from Robin's one. Wheras he wants a negotiated social contract where everyone gets a say in how the game turns out, Penny wants you to suck up to the DM (for they have the power of life and death over you), buy snacks to reward them for their effort, and don't backtalk their rulings. I think this may be wishful thinking on her part, since she was an RPGA coordinator for years, and therefore had to put up with all the worst rules disputes and player-DM conflicts with added bureaucracy for dessert. I can see why that would lead to a degree of cynicism about player's ability to decide things sensibly for themselves and a wish that they'd just learn and follow the rules, listen to the DM and do what they say. So this article feels decidedly regressive in contrast with the advice from last year, and behind the humour is a genuine belief that the DM should be the boss of the group socially, not just in game. Which again, is a necessary attitude when involved in organised play, but not so much when you're just a group of friends meeting up at someone's house. Can't say I'm very keen on this one then, especially when contrasted with some other advice we've got over the years. It's very much the worst kind of old school.

Dragon Issue 308: June 2003


part 9/9


Sage advice: Do you need two hands to reload a hand crossbow (Yes. Common sense, folks. The only way you could reload a crossbow one-handed is if you had something else to hold it still.)

Can sonic attacks hurt deaf people (Yes. You get vibbrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrated to death.  )

Can you hold throwing weapons in your off hand to reduce reloading times (yes)

Can you scoop up several weapons as a free action. (no. That'll take you a full round, even with quick draw.)

Can you flank someone with a reach weapon. How about a ranged weapon (Yes, no. )

Can you flank someone while invisible. (No. You may get sneak attack bonuses, but you're not splitting their attention, so you don't help anyone else get them. How selfish of you. )

Can a member of the order of the bow provide flanking bonuses with their shots (no, nor can they make attacks of opportunity with them.)

Can you regain concentration on a spell after it's broken (no)

If someone has spell resistance, spell turning, and a rod of absorption, what order do you check them in (SR first, then you choose. If one takes effect, you can't use the others.)

Can you use a Karma bead and a periapt of wisdom (No. Same item slot. Magical interference go fzzzzzt.)

Can heightened spells overcome globes of invulnerability and rakshasa SR (yes. That'll teach 'em, the smug backward-handed tosspots.)

Can you use heighten spell with improved counterspell (Yes indeed. )

Can you still get your full dex modifier against touch attacks when wearing heavy armor (No. Take the blows like a man. )

What protects you from touch attacks (Recycled question. You come to The Sage with stupid questions like this? Begone!)

What type of AC bonus do bracers of armor give you (Armor, like they say. Another person for the basic remedial reading classes.)

What's the difference between a touch attack and an incorporeal touch attack. (One lands on you, the other goes right through you. If it's incorporeal, it ignores cover, but is specially affected by force effects.)

Does concealment prevent you from using sneak attack (Yes. Even 25% will throw you off your stroke. )

What happens if you attack two grappling creatures (By RAW, you hit the one you wanted. You are free to houserule this. )

What happens if the attacker fails his grapple check mid grapple (Nothing, not applicable)

Can a sun blade inflict critical hits on undead. Does this mean you can sneak attack them using it. (No. You misunderstand the nature of it's extra damage. )

Can you sneak attack while charging. Does this double the sneak attack damage as well (yes, no. Twinkery only goes so far. )


Nodwick uses the dread art of powerpoint to explain dragons to us. If ever there was a medium that will ensure you don't remember it, this is it. What's new decides the evil thing has gotten old, and pushes the reset button. But they still have a lot of explaining to do.


And so we come to the end of the 3.0 era. It definitely went by way faster than 2e, and while it started off with a little more freedom and variety than the years preceding it, it fell into a tightly bounded pattern faster, and became more formulaic and serious by the end than the late 90's ever was. Still, at least it maintained tighter quality control through the whole thing than previous editions ever managed. But even if they are high quality, too many things that are too similar will just get boring, and that was definitely a problem this issue. With any luck the edition shift'll result in at least a brief loosening of the submission guidelines while they figure the new rules out. But I strongly suspect any window of opportunity will be even briefer than last time, since it's only a small revision. Let's see if they can learn how to manage both quality and variety at any point.

Dragon Issue 309: July 2003


part 1/9


86 (116) pages. So we've reached the 3.5 revision. We only had half the warning time we did with the full edition change, which seems appropriate. No great stylistic change here though. Wayne Reynolds is still producing dubiously proportioned characters with a ridiculous number of belts going Raar. Or maybe WAAAAAAUUUUGGGHHH!!!!, which is the theme of the issue. Not just any war mind you, war against the Githyanki in particular. That's a pretty unique topic, that obviously no-one else can cover. (gith are Product Identity, after all ) With any luck, this changeover might be genuinely special. On we march then, keeping up discipline despite spotty morale in the ground troops.  


Scan Quality: Good, indexed, ad-free scan.


In this issue:


Wyrms turn: In the real world, war is something the average person is increasingly detached from these days, with even soldiers able to do a lot of their work through supersonic aircraft or drones that removes a lot of the risk. Of course, the other side is still looking at a decades long cleanup process, as the messes in Iraq and Afganistan have shown all too well over the past decade. Of course, being detached from the reality of war just means we can enjoy it in our escapism all the more, without worrying about triggering someone's PTSD. And really, it is probably better for us to at least explore these ideas rather than pretending the world is a clean happy shiny place all the time. That way we won't be surprised when it all goes to shit, even if the full details don't hit you until you experience them.

Dragon Issue 309: July 2003


part 2/9


Scale Mail: We start off with a letter wishing the new spells in issue 304 would appear in the new corebook. Sorry. They might still show up in a supplement though. More than a few will.

The problem of monster CR's is brought up, particularly ones with templates. Yup, results in play can vary widely based on party composition, tactics and terrain. This is never going to be an exact science, despite serious efforts by some designers to push it into shape.

The readers continue to be in a critical mood, with someone deeply annoyed at Gary's love of adversarial play. Sssh. He secretly wants them to win, but don't let them know that or they'll get overconfident.

And we finish with a letter pointing out that one of Mearl's power plays from 307 uses an inaccurate interpretation of the rules. I am shocked that there is gambling in this establishment. Truly shocked, I tell you.


3.5 Update: Time to get into these changes big time, get them over and done with. Nerfs to spell durations I already know about. I'd rather fix them by upping the component cost than cutting the duration and effectiveness, but I can quite understand why they went down this route. The skill revisions, on the other hand, I have no problem with. Folding overly narrow skills into other ones, and generally reducing restrictions on who can take what definitely feels like a good change to me. Similarly, the minor changes to weapons, armor, and racial abilities, with the possible exception of gnomes losing their illusion speciality are all good. Giving classes better high level abilities is a definite good idea, even if it doesn't really catch the nonspellcasters up with good ol' CoDzilla. So looking through this, I'm surprised how many of these changes make perfect sense and were adopted without complaint, with only a few of them going the wrong way for my preferences. Guess it's a case of taking for granted what works and blowing the things that don't out of proportion. In any case, this leaves me feeling far happier than most of the teasers did, after being reminded of the little changes that just made things smoother. It's those ones that resulted in 3.5 mostly superseding 3.0, to the point where it's even harder to find a specifically 3.0 game than a 2e one these days, (but you can get the books really cheap) while 3.5 and pathfinder both have strong playerbases devoted to them. There are benefits to a playtester base of millions, you just need to make sure you filter out the noise correctly.

Dragon Issue 309: July 2003


part 3/9


A brief history of war: Not too surprisingly, our themed material starts off with a system-free, historically focussed warm-up to ease us in. It's an ugly business, and one that has changed a good deal over the years, but the basic rules remain the same. The pitched battles between armies are actually one of the smallest parts of the process. Far more important is applying your force to the enemy's weak points, and keeping control of supply chains, communication between units, and information about the enemy. Really, it's rather funny that over the editions, D&D became more focussed on building the game around those "fair" fights, and less on the dangers of exploring, logistics of having the right equipment vs encumbrance limits, and killing things you can't beat in a fair fight by clever use of terrain and magic. So like the ASoI&F special, this gives us a wider perspective than their usual bits of crunch, and reminds us exactly how humans got to be on top of the food chain. It wasn't by head-on battles, that's for sure. This isn't a spectacular beginning, but it does prepare you for the idea that the gloves are going to come off  if you go down this path. Will your sadistic inventiveness be greater than your enemy's? If it's a full team of players vs one DM, I'll wager they can still manage it, even if they are working with substantially fewer resources. Let's hope they can keep it fun despite being horribly unfair.

Dragon Issue 309: July 2003


part 4/9


Bestiary: Our timeline of violence continues along the bottom of the page, while a whole bunch of little sidebars fill us in on the changes 3.5 has made.  Swarm subtype monsters! Yay!  Bonus HP for constructs. A somewhat kludgy solution, but needed. Craft Construct feat. Yawn. Sickened condition. Ok then. Clear delineation  of bonus feats. Probably a wise idea. And oversimplifying & regimenting the monster size/space/reach rules. Boo. Probably more good changes than bad, but certainly not all perfect. Let's see about the monsters.

Crawling Slaughters are giant undead spiders. They smell vile, and they can still produce web fluid, curiously enough. Someone's been to the same school of battlefield control as Exalted's deathlords and the twat who wanted to put giant spiders in Superman, but had to settle for putting one in Wild Wild West.

Death Hurlers are dirty great animated siege towers with the ability to shoot up to 6 times a round if someone's got the ammo. Another one build to plough through the battlefield, spreading mass devastation as they go and crushing enemies underfoot.

Golem Swarms take a different tack to mass combat, showing that lots of little men can be a real pain to fight as well. This shows off their new material type based DR system, which is another thing that would come to be a bit of a pain. Oh well, it's only DR5, you can blow through that with two-handed power attack.

Guardian steeds also do exactly what they say on the tin. They bond obsessively with someone and stay with them until death. They have magic powers that also protect their rider too. Useful but dull.

Wardrakes are relatively small, dumb dragons, maybe a bit larger than Greater Drakes, that are also perfect for riding on. They have a sonic based breath weapon that wrecks equipment as well as hurts, so a good strafe over enemy lines'll do what it ought to.  

Well, that wasn't a bad collection of monsters, but they sure do have terrible names.  Looks like the people who will give things purely descriptive faux-badass names like hulking hurler and foulspawn destroyer have started working here now. There should be room for some more derision at their lack of imagination by the time this is over.

Dragon Issue 309: July 2003


part 5/9


Shut up and roll!: Most of the regular columns are off for the issue, so this little article is the only bit of general roleplaying advice. And yeah, the title is completely accurate. It's all advice aimed at speeding along combat. Learn the rules, memorise your character's stats, work out what you're going to do before your turn, and then declare it and roll it right away when your go comes around. Faffing is the bane of exciting action, particularly in large groups. Some of these ideas are very familiar, like not allowing takebacks, and instituting a timer that causes them to lose their action if they can't make their mind up in a couple of minutes or so. Others, such as rolling your attack and damage dice simultaneously (making sure you know which colour is which) and annotating your character sheet so you remember what all your powers do are newer, and mean this one is good even for experienced players. While not directly connected to the theme of the issue, it is advice that becomes increasingly important as battles get larger scale, so it does feel very relevant. If you can't keep discipline and focus amongst a group of half a dozen people around a table, you've got no hope of managing an army.


The art of D&D: The timeline returns, managing to cover the era between 1.500,1,000 BC, which reminds us just how much things changed back then, even though it's easy to think of it all as just generic pre-civilisation history. Similarly, the advice is very much a continuation of the introduction's tone, applying the advice of Sun Tzu to your roleplaying campaigns (as last seen way back in issue 154) Know yourself, know your enemy, and make sure they play to your tune rather than the other way round. Master your emotions while exploiting their's. Strike fast and beat them before they've even finished planning. Make sure you don't win the battle but lose anyway because it costs you too much. Once again, this is very much a reality check, cutting through the crap of CR's and game balance and making things all feel very ruthless, while not denying the value of human emotion either. (he specifically calls out how stupid brooding loner badasses are, and that they'll be first on the chopping block even if they are more competent than any of your regular soldiers, because they don't have any support structure. ) It highlights how Rangers and Rogues actually have more useful skillsets than Fighters for larger scale wars, so it's not completely system-free, but it is easily applied to any game. Hopefully this means that as with the 3.0 changeover, there'll be more system-free stuff over the next few months as the freelancers catch up as well. This issue continues to build up steam. Will it be unstoppable by the time it hits the enemy?

Dragon Issue 309: July 2003


part 6/9


Unleash arcane armageddon: After seeing quite a few spells nerfed in scope and duration in this edition change, it's quite pleasing that they immediately bring back mass combat magic a la Birthright. War Spells are only slightly higher level than their normal equivalent, but they have substantially higher costs and casting times, and in return have their scope multiplied by a good few orders of magnitude. That means you won't be able to cast them in the middle of a round-by-round combat without guards, but you might well be able to use one to short-circuit an entire encounter if you get the drop on an enemy. We get 21 examples, most of them based upon a specific spell. Unsurprisingly, the direct damage dealing ones are the least impressive, being a mere doubling of effect radius, while the tactical buffs like mass magical weapons or blur are considerably more magnified in their impact. And even mass undead animation can't compete with the hordes you could raise in previous editions. Which means this is still written with an eye for game balance, and making sure the spellcasters are boosts to armies, not complete replacements. You won't be rivalling what 2e spellcasters with the Tome of Magic could do any time soon. That means that while this is a good article on it's own merits, it still makes me a little sad for the magic of old, and feel that something has been lost since then. I guess it fits with many actual settings where elder wizards had lost spells that you can't match now. Oh well, that's the price you pay for a little more game balance.

Dragon Issue 309: July 2003


part 7/9


The Ecology of the Hobgoblin: Funnily enough, the timeline picks up pace at the point, taking us from 400BC to 1,200AD. It still skips centuries at a time, showing that the modern acceleration of technological advancement has yet to arrive. I wonder how far they'll take it. The ecology also takes things further than usual, with a 9 page article including plenty of elements that'll be used in other supplements this edition. They already differentiated hobgoblins from orcs not just with an extra hit point, but also a far greater degree of military organisation. Now they expand on the psychology behind that expansionist territoriality, and how it leads to them being the lynchpin of goblinoid hordes, even though bugbears and ogres are bigger and stronger. This also means that the creature combos are particularly good this instalment. If they were a little better at the social thing, and weren't forced to stay moving due to their carnivorous tastes, they could have a much better civilisation than they do. Hell, they did pull it off for a while in Eberron. Basically, they get a lot more respect in 3.5, and here's where it starts. It's good to have enemies you respect, even if I still can't really say I'm afraid of them.


New martial arts styles: Our timeline reaches 1,500 before giving up, as renaissance technology moves away from what most people consider D&D. People put guns in, but it never really seems to catch on. On the other hand, martial arts stays resolutely in despite a small vocal minority trying to keep things eurocentric, and mastering them taking more effort than most prestige classes with fewer effects on your character. As with the changes to skills in 3.5, they've improved on this here, but by a pretty minuscule amount, giving the styles multiple tiers of mastery that mean you get a new benefit every 4-5 feats rather than just right at the end. So this is not only interesting as another load of new crunch, but also in their attempts to make overall design more balanced. And of course the bits where they power up the warriors are more welcome than the nerfs to spellcasters. If only they'd brought back things like gaining armies and castles as default, warriors wouldn't fall so far behind at higher level. And then this war special would feel even more ... martial.

Dragon Issue 309: July 2003


part 8/9


Campaign components: In any normal issue, the themed section would have run out by now, and they'd be filling up the rest with generic material that could go anywhere, and is probably stored up well in advance in a slush pile. This time, however, is very different. All this talk of war in general has been leading up to a 32 page epic on what might happen if the githyanki tried to take over a planet. Since they're relatively unified for an evil race, and can travel the planes with ease, this seems quite achievable. They more than have the numbers, and there's no cosmic rules keeping them at bay like with fiends. Only the fact that it's a big multiverse out there keeps the odds of it happening to you low. Be afraid.

While they have abandoned genericness at this point, they're still putting a lot of effort into making this modular, with advice for using it in both active campaigns. Unsurprisingly, the first thing the lich-queen will do if invading the forgotten realms is kill or magically imprison Elminster, the Simbul, etc etc, giving PC's a genuine chance to become the big damn heroes. Similarly, in Greyhawk, Iuz'll be first target of a clever scheme to shatter his power base, as she wants to conquer good and evil alike. In your campaign, who knows. In any case, it also underscores that they're using the lessons from the earlier articles. It's not some ravening horde pouring through an extraplanar gate, killing and looting everything in it's path. It's a planned assault with scouts sent beforehand to get information on the lay of the land, recruit the local red dragons into service and use their intimate knowledge of the world's history, and even when it is time for the big showy displays of power, they're in exactly the right places and times to cause maximum devastation, and force the countries to move their troops in ways that leave them vulnerable for the next move. In short, they're playing like highly intelligent and magically capable creatures who's primary powers are mobility ones, and are led by an immortal epic level spellcaster who has planned quite a few steps ahead before starting this.

After setting up the premise, and the ways you can tweak it, the rest of this article is broken up into plot ideas for low, mid, and high level characters, ensuring that this really can become a full campaign spanning 20+ levels, or start out as something else before morphing into extraplanar invasion sometime in the middle. Each tier has plenty of statblocks for example enemy groups, including the full mix of githyanki knights, warlocks, gish and special forces. Ultimately, it ends with the premise that they figure out how to take the fight to the enemy, and kill the lich-queen, which breaks their spirit and ends the ability to gate en masse everywhere. (ahh, the perils of never letting your underlings get anywhere near you in level) However, that isn't detailed here, but in a tie-in with Dungeon. (which I note is having it's 100th issue this month, and is celebrating with a 180 page monstrosity that tops even Dragon Issue 200) And since when I check there's a 44 page adventure, and 35 page player's guide to Githyanki in there, I'm left feeling that this feature, as cool and spectacular as it is, is really primarily theirs, and Dragon is the secondary partner in this epic co-ordinated tie-in. That takes my overall opinion of this from stunning to absolutely gobsmacking. One of the largest features ever that isn't spread across multiple issues, and it's still the SMALLER part of the special? Wow. This might top even the 9 hells stuff. What I've seen so far definitely gets a 10/10 for both effort and execution. I really really wish I was reviewing the other half, and this increases my desire to hunt down the remaining issues of Polyhedron, and do a second pass through the other D&D periodicals when I finish Dragon. This definitely cements that Dungeon is now an equal partner rather than just a little brother to them, and I hope I will be able to report just as positively on the other 2/3rds of this epic adventure sometime in the distant future.