Dragon Issue 350: December 2006


part 6/6


Sage advice: How many ranks of tumble can I get when my multiclassed character reached 3rd level (6)

Can you delay a choice until later level (no. You can retrain now, though.)

How do you know if you can take 20 or not (Look at the criterea, masster. Itss all in the bookses. )

When you tumble, do you move at half speed for the whole move, or just the squares you're tumbling in (You can choose. Besst to be carefull. Ssilly acrobatics get you killed, collins collins.)

Does the armor check penalty for nonproficiency stack with the normal armor check penalty (No. Ssimpler that way.)

What qualifies as aware (not flat-footed. Ssimple.)

What's precision based damage (Hitting vital sspots. Ssneak attack, ssudden sstrike and sskirmissh. Lotss of sssssss's, yess.)


Class acts: Adventurers get Rogue Guide. Another of our clear-up sessions in which they pull together stuff from all over multiple books for our edification. Nothing very interesting here.

Arcane gets Beast Soulmelds. Three new Totemist soulmelds to choose, based off monsters from later monster manuals. Just the thing if you're feeling that sting, of not enough options to make the character you're wanting. The squicky brood keeper, the spectacular chaos roc, and the mischievously deadly gravorg. Which do you feel an affinity too?

Divine gets The Oversoul. An attempt to shoehorn a vaguely taoist monotheism into D&D worlds that are provably and actively pantheonistic. There could be a supreme god we're all part of. It just doesn't do anything. Ooooooh. Everybody's invited. Because it's all encompassing, you don't have to worry about losing your powers for doing something against it's tenets. Yes, yes. :waves hand: Very good dear. You just want to have your cake and eat it too godwise, don't you. You'll get your desire made standard come next edition.

Warriors get The Archers Art. 4 more feats to aid you in skewering things from a distance, plus a list of feats from their various sourcebooks, in another attempt to lure you into buying them. The more splatbooks you have, the more awesome characters you can create! Gotta collect em all!


Nodwick engages in corruption and graft in the name of dealing with icky people. Dork tower gives people what they really want for christmas. Zogonia fails to take a joke well. Order of the stick is well random, innit. Pass it on, mate.


Well, this year wasn't as dramatic a change as last year, but they still made a fair few tweaks to the formula as Erik pushed for more articles with setting material and joined-up thinking. Which makes it extra ironic that this issue moved the other way again a bit, showing he's pushing up against the limits of what the audience will accept in terms of rapid change. Oh well. 9 more months, and since they're getting rid of some more general columns for regular setting specific ones, there should be some more worthwhile material for lovers of any edition. Time to count down the last 3% of my journey, and round this off for good.

Dragon Issue 351: January 2007


part 1/6


87 (104) pages. (counting the big isle of dread map. ) Lord Soth retains all his decorum in the 3e update, unlike Strahd or the Lady of Pain. Welcome to the third and final campaign setting themed issue. There might be plenty more to say on all these worlds, but we won't be seeing much more of it in the magazine for a long time. So let's see if they can develop them a bit further, or if it'll be just another round of rules conversions.


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


In this issue:


Editorial: Having done two of these already, Erik has a good idea of the problems you face covering lots of different settings in one go. Principal amongst these is making them accessible, which isn't always possible or appropriate when you already have an existing campaign going. You can solve this by making them explicitly part of a larger multiverse with canon crossovers, but this creates it's own problems when it comes to maintaining theme, and forces the writers to be extra careful when it comes to cosmology and continuity. In the 90's they tried to tie everything together to boost sales, and look where that got them. Now they're keeping their active settings well apart, with Eberron not getting even a hint of crossover with their other worlds, and the others playing down what happened in the past. (especially with Dragonlance and Ravenloft unable to mention other worlds in their 3e incarnations due to their licensing terms. ) This is another thing a setting wonk like Erik doesn't agree with, so he's once again pushing for crossover and creating a transplanar framing device for this year's articles. This makes me squee in delight, and it's certainly been a long time since I could say that. Two years of working hard at this have made a genuine impact with the rest of the staff and freelancers, and this is the big payoff. His ambition once again continues to impress.


Scale Mail: The october issue gets it's usual praise, with two letters very happy with the overall result. They just want more flavour, and maybe a non D&D article every now and then. Is that such a hard request to grant?

The Realms prove similarly beloved, with the country profiles from recent issues also getting two letters of praise. Whether they'll keep doing them now along with the new Volo's Guides remains to be seen, but you won't have a chance to build up a serious jones for it anymore.

Dragon Issue 351: January 2007


part 2/6


First watch: Complete Scoundrel. Aka Complete Adventurer II, where Complete Mage was Complete Arcane II. Rehashalicious. Once again, they eschew the new core classes of the first wave for more mechanical experiments, including more attempts to mechanically support swashbuckling high action play. Not a bad idea, really.

Also out this month is Hidden Crypts. Another set of maps for you to have fun on, although not so much on the sample adventures. They can't hold your hand the whole time.

On the minis side, we have a gigantic (16 inch long) blue dragon to serve as an official rival to the 14 inch high red one. Truly a battle of the titans. If you want something a little less awkward, Todd McFarlaine is also producing a whole range of 6 inch dragon minis, which'll still tower over the average adventurer. Nice to see them bring a bit of scale back into battles. In addition, Mega Miniatures are releasing a set of minis tied in with the new Savage Tide adventure path. These can obviously be adapted to all sorts of campaigns featuring watery stuff.

In the D20 department, they're still favouring Green Ronin strongly, with the True20 Companion. If you find the 3 class system restrictive or are annoyed at the small number of powers spellcasters have, this'll sort you right out.

After some rather awkward financial problems, BESM 3rd edition actually gets released, courtesy of White Wolf. Course, they don't support it, and it sells out pretty quickly without getting reprinted, which is a damn shame. Curse you, economics! :shakes fist:

Speaking of economics killing RPG lines, Steve Jackson Games continues to concentrate on Munchkin over GURPS, with their latest release being Munchkin Cthulhu. Seems virtually every company has lovecraftian stuff in their repertoire these days. Let's hope at least some degree of parody remains in their delivery of it.

Several very different books this month. Drizzt gets a boxed set compilation of his graphic novels, and I suspect the Dragonlance Chronicles may do so in the near future. Margaret Weis games also go back to the 80's idea of choose your own adventure books, with Paths of Doom. Choose wisely, for most paths have you losing. And on a completely different note, Paizo release a pretty campaign journal.  I'd much rather keep that kind of thing on my laptop. It's just as portable, holds a lot more info, and it can be copied and edited far more easily.

Speaking of computer stuff, no shortage of that. D&D online is progressing in fits and spurts, trying to make itself into an essential part of your gaming experience. Keep trying, maybe you'll get there eventually. .pdf pad gives you another tool for facilitating your map design. And two computer games get the spotlight. God of war II, and Gods & heroes: Rome Rising. Two trips back to the BC era, to experience fantastical battles and mythological weirdness. In some ways, things have changed very little.


The world serpent inn: Sigil was not the first place filled with gates that you can use to get to nearly any plane. The World-Serpent Inn was originally detailed in OP1, in 1988, as a way of bridging the adventures in that anthology. If they want to encourage world-spanning games, why not reuse it? It's a classic example of neutral ground, with an indestructible proprietor, magically enforced antiviolence effects, and an infinite shifting maze of back rooms that ensures there's always a comfy room for you to sleep in, and a new gate to a different world to discover. This means it's packed with all sorts of weird creatures that would normally fight on sight, just trying to enjoy a drink, get some gossip and make deals. Some people become permanent residents, for like the Astral Plane, you don't age while here, and food is just a quick order away, and there's far worse places to spend eternity, especially if you're an exile from home and might still be hunted if you leave. So tone-wise, it's somewhere between Cheers and Casablanca, somewhere that'll probably never feel entirely like home, but can still become your local, and the framing device for a whole campaign's worth of adventures. Given the choice between here or Sigil, I know which seems more inviting and less likely to get me killed unexpectedly. A very good start to this issue indeed, that makes it very easy to get into whatever world you're playing in. I can't wait to see what they do with the various existing ones.

Dragon Issue 351: January 2007


part 3/6


Magic and intrigue in the high desert tribes: Al Qadim always was one of the most social campaign settings, successfully integrating things like haggling, storytelling and getting haircuts into your PC's adventures. Since the world-serpent inn already pushes you towards seeking social solutions to your problems within it's confines, it makes an excellent first choice for adventurers seeking new experiences and riches. So they set you down near an oasis that's in the middle of a regular trade route, where there'll always be a new set of people for you to make friends (or enemies) with. There's genies up to their usual mischief, a phoenix for you to hunt, and an undead tribe seeking deliverance from their accursed state. So they've given us a little scenario that's full of flavour, pointing out what's distinctive about playing here, and lets people sample the world using just the magazine for a little while before the DM has to go out and buy more stuff. If they can accomplish the same for all their other articles, this issue will be incredibly useful indeed.


Athas and the world serpent Inn: No-one wants to go to Athas unless they're looking for the very best psionics teachers, so it's no surprise that the gate to here is closed off in an obscure back room of the inn, and opens into a bit of desert in the middle of nowhere. If looking out at a featureless expanse doesn't put you off, you'll soon get a crash course in survival as you deal with escaped slaves, Athas's distinctly untrustworthy strain of elves, and traveling traders. So basically this gives you enough adventure hooks for a week or two of exploration before you'll have to get hold of the proper maps and books, and give the players more solid details about just what they've gotten themselves into. It also introduces a new psionic power, a new exotic weapon, and an alternate, simplified way of representing defiling and preserving magic under the 3e mechanics. It definitely does it's job in making you want more, and pointing out where it can be found. Will you survive long enough to get anything from it, or head back to more hospitable worlds after a few hours catching the rays?


Scavengers of Istar: Dragonlance's article is a little different, detailing not just a place and it's inhabitants, but a very specific adventure. Krynn has always had a fair amount of time travel, and so it's gate sends you to the city of Istar three days before the Cataclysm, trapped in an endless loop and unable to leave a la Majora's Mask unless you can find 5 special items to break the curse on a Kender who stole them a loooooong time ago. (in subjective time, and how he lost them again afterwards is not made clear.) Which is more than a little cheesy and somewhat railroady, but hey, that's definitely Krynn for you. So once again, this article does an excellent job at capturing the essence of a setting in a microcosm, giving us the stuff that you couldn't really do anywhere else. Plus the info it does give is mostly new, as we never had an adventure in Istar before, so it's also cool for long term players. What would time travellers from another era of Krynn make of adventurers from another world stuck in a time loop? I don't know, but it'd probably make for a very interesting story.


Irongate - City of stairs: Greyhawk has a fair few portals to other worlds, but unfortunately far too many of them are of the lower-planar variety, so people hopping in and out the world-serpent inn have to keep a low profile. Fortunately, the gate is underground, in another inn owned by a dwarf who's quite happy to deal with the extra clientele it sends his way. Once again, they pick a location that feels like a microcosm of the setting. Irongate is a bastion of freedom in a war-torn land, heavily guarded both on the surface and underground, because you never know what horrors might invade. Fortunately, they also have rich mines with magical metal in them that ensure they can manufacture badass weapons and armor even when besieged. This article is slightly less user-friendly than the previous ones, but I think that's because they assume greater familiarity with the setting. It still has some neat adventure hooks for both old and new players.

Dragon Issue 351: January 2007


part 4/6


Cham Fau and the white tiger monastary: Since asians in fantasy campaigns are stereotyped as being more spiritually enlightened and in touch with the universe, this is one place where the locals know about the World-Serpent Inn. They aren't particularly friendly to anyone coming out though, having dealt with more than a few Oni making trouble from that source. This is made more troublesome by the fact that the area around is regulated by a strict bureaucracy that'll be a real pain to navigate without the proper ID and papers, especially if you don't speak the language. So while the dangers here may not be as obviously lethal as Athas, or as idiosyncratic and intractable as Krynn, you will not have an easy time as blundering gajin, and your challenges will be social as often as physical. Still, if you want monk training, there are few better places to go, and plenty of monsters to slay and magical items to find. You just have to try to comport yourself with humility and learn to communicate properly if you want to stick around safely.


The Gatetown of Ecstasy: Since Planescape is constantly engaging in cross-universe shenanigans, especially Sigil and the Outlands gate-towns, this is another place that's fully aware of the world-serpent inn and ready to welcome anyone arriving through it. Ecstasy can always do with a few more mixed-alignment residents to make sure it doesn't slip into Elysium. It only got a 2 page profile in the primer to the outlands, so they can give all the old info and more without it feeling redundant as well. The map is in full colour and more detailed, there's more named NPC's, and they add a bunch of rumours and adventure hooks which are equally applicable whatever edition you're playing under. It's a good vacation spot, and you shouldn't have too much trouble getting back if you stay here a while, but there's also enough challenges that more fighty sorts won't feel like third wheels. Whether you're a clueless berk or an old hand at planewalking, there's something nice for you here.


The shadows of Sithicus: Now here's an article that entirely justifies it's place in the magazine, unlike the creature catalogs that had Ravenloft monsters that had already been printed for 3e. The White Wolf Ravenloft books couldn't mention Lord Soth by name, and so had to engage in awkward circumlocutions in their coverage of Sithicus. Here, they can just go for it, and that more than excuses adding another relatively easy way to escape Ravenloft to canon. Welcome to the only Ravenloft domain apart from Darkon with a significant demihuman population. With Soth gone, it's now ruled by a psychotic dwarf werebadger who's set up a concentration camp, and has no qualms about arbitrarily throwing anyone challenging him in it. Of course being Ravenloft, he's not really in control, having to contend with both the true darklord in the shadows, and her pervasive manipulation and guilt trips, and The Blessed Knight, a heroic reflection manifested from Lord Soth's memories, which wanders the land doing knight-erranty things and providing a ray of hope to the population. (that just makes the terror all the more horrible when shit does hit the fan) So Ravenloft being compartmentalised into lots of little pieces, each with their own distinct brand of horror makes this an easy job for the writers, able to focus on one place and not worry about PC's wandering beyond it's bounds. You can run, but you can't escape unless you play it smart.


The ecology of the isle of dread: And now for something a little different. Most ecologies here simply examine one creature in relative isolation. But the whole point of an ecology in the real world is that there is a food chain and whole complicated web of interactions between species, and if you affect one you have knock-on effects on everything else. While this doesn't go quite that far, it does cover a wide range of the islands inhabitants. That old standby from the original adventure of the Loco weed consuming berserk anklyosaur is revisited, with a new pathos. (never thought I'd say that. ) Best of all, it's nearly all IC fiction again, for the first time in ages (april fool article notwithstanding.) I think I can definitely say now that I prefer it when the ecologies interact with the creature, showing as well as telling, giving a sense of genuine danger, and not revealing everything as incontrovertible fact. So this manages to be both a cool bit of writing in it's own right, and a double nostalgia kick. Two thumbs up.

Dragon Issue 351: January 2007


part 5/6


Savage tidings: We follow on directly from the last article, with some more talk on the creatures of the island, this time with a greater emphasis on mechanics. You could get hold of a whole range of new animal companions and familiars from the savage environment, which is definitely the kind of thing that would appeal to PC's. In addition, they continue to pay great attention to the question of how to introduce new characters to the adventure. You could recruit from the natives, or you if you're not the racist type, you could have lizardman, Aranea, or Phanaton PC's. (although probably not both of these last two at once. ) With stats for phanatons as well, this is definitely turning up the heat and hitting those nostalgia buttons. They're showing plenty of respect for the original setting, while applying subsequent developments in game technology to it that bring plenty of new perspectives. I very much approve.


Volo's guide: As part of their desire to focus more on campaign settings, it's no surprise that their still active ones get a new column. After a 6 year absence, Volo returns, as irritating as ever. 15 real years and considerably more in game, you'd think he'd have had a bit of character growth, (or at least leveling up) but no, he's as  irritating and self-aggrandising as ever. Interestingly, Ed seems to have backed off from his old prolific contributions, (after all, he's currently busy trying to make another campaign setting out in D20 land) and is only writing the foreword for this column. That is interesting to note.

But enough context. Lets see if the stuff within is any good. In sharp contrast to the old stuff in this column, but fitting with their current policy, there's a lot more crunch than there used to be, and a tighter focus on material that's immediately useful to players and DM's. With the topic this issue being magical thrones, this instantly feels like one of his old articles full of themed magical items. And that definitely deserves a little yaying.

The bloodbone throne of Uruth is made of skulls, and can unleash various forms of foulness on the people around the person seated. Perfect evil overlord equipment, in other words. Muahahahahaha!

The Shining thrones of Splendarrmornn have divination and protection effects for those sitting on them, and in a pinch you can merge with them and walk around, becoming a half-golem asskicker. Once again that seems custom designed to make for a neat looking battle scene. I approve.

The Soaring throne of the Witch-Queen was made by our old friend Laeral and transforms into a gryphon for you to ride, along with the other standard defensive and offensive effects. So not only can you kick ass, you've also got a decent chance of getting away while not losing your stuff if things go south. And it can stay active long enough to be useful for adventurers too. Dungeoncrawl in style with your own mobile magical throne. Hee.


Dragonmarks: Eberron finally gets it's own regular column as well. Not that it's going to get that many outings, considering we've less than a year to go, but they don't know that yet, do they. They're just trying to give proper coverage to all the D&D worlds, active and dead. So here's some alternate abilities for Dragonmarked sorcerers. A feat, and three new variant classes that provide closer integration between the rules and setting. A perfectly valid little article in the same kind of vein as the Class Acts, only concentrating on a particular setting. Which means they have a little more freedom to write specific fluff to go with it. Nothing spectacular, but they are keeping up their strong editorial direction. Let's hope they don't wind up putting filler into it to make up the page count and satisfy contractual obligations too often.

Dragon Issue 351: January 2007


part 6/6


Sage advice: What does surprise casting mean by must stay in melee (Must be adjacent, yess. Or maybe 10' with reach weapon. )

Can a duskblade use arcane channeling through ranged touches (no)

Is a duskblades channelling discharged if they miss (Andy is afraid sometimes it iss. Not ass good as regular spellses, collins collins)

How does arcane channeling interact with spells that allow multiple touches (You can only make one. Not very good at all, iss it.)

If you use arcane channelling as a full attack action, can you affect the same creature more than once (no)

If you apply a metamagic feat to a channeled spell, will it apply to each successful attack (no)

How can a duskblade cast spells without failure chances if their hands are both full (Bucklers don't count as an item, you can do somatic components with that hand, yess)

Does instant daze prevent a creature from attacking you (yess)

Can you use acrobatic strike against more than one creature in a single round (yess, but its tricky to get into the situation.  You'll need to specialisse to ssurvive it)
Can you use adaptive flanker and a spiked chain to flank someone on your own (no)

Does arcane thesis reduce the spell level by one per metamagic feat, or just one overall (Just one, Andy iss afraid, masster. )

Does deadeye shot trigger on a particular ally's strike, or any of them (Any of them. Lots of friends good, yess? )

Can you hit someone with fiery ki defense with a reach weapon without being burned (no. Nassty power sstill burnssess. )

Does mad foam rager work before or after the effect it's delaying (before. It interrupts the action, whatever it is)

Does mad foam rager let you delay a saving throw (no)

Does weapon mastery stack with weapon specialization (Yess. Very good at fighting, masster.)

Can you take both types of damage mastery for a weapon that does more than one. Would they stack (yes, no)

Does a spear count as a ranged or melee weapon for mastery (Both. Again, only one at a time though.)

Does weapon supremacy require melee or ranged weapon mastery (Whichever is right for the weapon you're becoming ssupreme in.)

If you have telling blow and would get to sneak attack anyway, do you get the bonus twice (no)

Does everyone have to belong to the same team to get teamwork benefits (No. Not everyone getsess along, preciouss. )  


Class acts: Adventurers get Historical Ninjas. They are getting a lot of attention around here. Why them, rather than samurai or any of the other oriental classes? In any case, first we get advice on making your ninja more "historically accurate", and then we get some more ki powers. Bit schizophrenic, that.

Arcane gets Arcane Focus. Why should psions have all the rechargeable resource managementy fun. Take these feats and your wizard will be able to pull similar tricks. Just the thing for if you're expecting to do lots of out of combat casting and want to enhance all your spells.

Divine gets The Cleric Guide. Yawn yawn yawn, rules clarification for the dumb. Are they going to do this for every class? Seems likely.

Warriors get The Clockwork Disciple. Putting cyberpunk into your D&D, courtesy of ancient fallen civilisations. :rolleyes: Perfect for the forgotten realms, and either of the worlds Blackmoor used to be in. Like soulmelds, they balance these by making them use up magic item slots. It also includes a new monk class feature that lets them take apart mechanical creatures with great prejudice. Not a hugely surprising trope, really.


Nodwick meets death again. This time he adopts the form most suited to the universe he's working in, rather than that silly old skeleton. Dork tower make new years resolutions. They'll never keep them, etc, etc.  Zogonia discovers how to get into a dark elf's pants. The amount of pain involved really really isn't worth it. Order of the stick need censoring.


As an issue that picks an interesting theme, does something different with it, and maintains it all the way through, this is easily the most ambitious one since the Incursion issue, and it maintains even higher average quality in it's individual articles than that one. So I have absolutely no reservations in saying this issue is awesome. Unless they can come up with a whole brace of even better issues in the next 8 months, this'll definitely be in my final top 10 list. Let's see if the next issue is straight back to formula.

Dragon Issue 352: February 2007


part 1/6


86 (108) pages. From tons of previously covered settings, to a D&D take on a new one. This time it's China Mieville who gets the privilege of a full themed issue devoted to his works. Since he's an author who strays a fair distance from standard D&D fantasy, particularly in terms of tone and political stance, I'm definitely interested in seeing how they'll handle this one. Let's see how he compares to Robert Jordan, George Martin or Terry Brooks in treatment.


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


In this issue:


Editorial: Like George R. R. Martin, it turns out Mr Mieville is also a gamer. And like George, while he has taken some influence from D&D, his novels also intentionally subvert a fair few D&D conventions, often with some sly humour in the process. Just as Tolkien was inspired by ancient mythology, but his stories turned out quite differently, people inspired by him produced works that were in some ways imperfect imitations, and in other reactions against what they saw as flaws in his writing. The tendency of humans to engage in this kind of dramatic generational shift is probably one of the reasons for our success, as it ensures we're always trying new things and expanding into places we haven't done before, and if some of them turn out to be mistakes, oh well, we have a high enough breeding rate and diversity to recover from them, which you can't say about creatures that evolved on one little island that get outcompeted to death as soon as rats arrive. So basically, this editorial points out that there's always going to be something coming along to shake up a stagnant scene, and expecting things to stay the same forever is foolish. So seek it out, don't wait for it to beat down your door. Your life will almost definitely turn out more interesting that way.


Scale Mail: Our first letter is another one from someone annoyed they're putting so much setting material in these days. As usual, Erik knows you can't please them all, so you've just got to alternate things from issue to issue to keep people from giving up on the magazine entirely.

The other two, on the other hand, are from people very keen to see regular campaign material return to the magazine. Both the Realms and Eberron have quite healthy fanbases who will lap that stuff up. The question is if doing little articles every month will get boring faster than bigger occasional ones that aren't bound so tightly to format. I certainly have my suspicions on that front after a couple of years of Class Acts.

Dragon Issue 352: February 2007


part 2/6


First watch: The environmentbook series proves that like the classbook one, it's stretching rather to think of things to do, with Dungeonscape. It's not as if we haven't had quite few books of dungeonering. Still, this one is co-written by Rich Burlew, so it might have some cool ideas and twists in it. Any opinions?

Eberron gets Secrets of Sarlona. Another entire continent, this one full of psionicists, martial artists, and other weird powers of various stripes. Eberron is a big world, and if you stretch out all the elements enough, then it looks less like a kitchen sink.

They also release another generic adventure. Barrow of the Forgotten King is the start of a trilogy. Been a while since I've seen one of those here. In the 90's you couldn't move for them. Another sign of the changing face of the hobby.

Minis Official and unofficial pour forth from company's bounteous hands. D&D's latest minis set focusses on the undead. Always a solid choice, especially now templates mean nearly anything can be made undead easily. There's also a bunch of official LotR figurines coming out, although they look like they're more for display than actual battles. If you want something a little more off the wall, there's John Kovalic's My Little Cthulhu. Another brain-breaking idea that makes the elder gods ever less scary in the long run. They really are losing all their impact lately.

Out in D20 land, Goodman games advance their nostalgia timeline to the late 90's and release a CD compilation of their early modules. Okey Dokey then. What will they recycle next?

Our other RPG release is also a very familiar face. Lankhmar has been bought out by Mongoose, which is releasing it under the Runequest system. Will that be a better fit for the books than D&D? Actually, it probably is. Wonder why WotC decided to stop holding on to this one. It's not as if it isn't still pretty popular and influential.

Several very geek appropriate DVD's picked on this time. The last Unicorn gets a special 25th anniversary rerelease, presumably with commentary, and the other special features common to DVDs these days. There's also two more geek specific movies, Gamers, and Geekin' (which works even better as a composite title) One seeks to break the world record for number of hours played, while the other just wants to keep their group together in the face of the dread s e x. It is a silly business. Let's not go there.

Computer games this month include LotR online, and Lair. An MMORPG drawing on the motherlode of fantasy books, and another dragon fighting sim. Both have pretty good visuals, showing how far things have come in the magazine's lifespan. Just watch out for the grinding, which can be as tedious as ever.

They promote the comic projects of Boom Studios. Two sets of Cthulhu mythos stories. And a warhammer comic, Damnation Crusade drawn by Yoshitaka Amano, and foreworded by Neil Gaiman. Once again, they know what they like, and cover what they know. I think we can be pretty sure of the writer's major tastes and influences by now.

And finally, we have some rather interesting news. White Wolf has been bought out by CCP. While not quite as dramatic as the TSR/WotC/Hasbro buyout events, this is still going to have a substantial impact on the face of gaming in a few years, as WW's RPG output drops, while many of their writers move to other departments. Sigh. More foreshadowing of the future here.

Dragon Issue 352: February 2007


part 3/6


Runagate rampant: We start off the themed section with a fairly short interview of China. Like George R. R. Martin, it turns out D&D was not his favourite RPG. However, while Martin's poison of choice was GURPS, Mieville's is BRP, with Call of Cthulhu as a favourite. And good god does it show in his creature design, which is one of the most interesting parts of his worldbuilding. Working biology up, and then thinking about how various intelligent creatures would fit into a mixed species society with their differing biological needs and drives produces fascinating results. It's certainly a step away from humans with pointy ears, and all the better for it. So this article gives me a pretty good idea of his writing priorities, and I only wish it was longer, as he has plenty of interesting thoughts on how to reflect society in his books. Oh well, onto the game material.


Bas-lag Gazetteer: As that's what the books focus on, they decide to give us lots of information on New Crobuzon, while leaving the world surrounding it fairly sketchy. Like Eberron, while it may have been a medieval fantasy world at some point, people have not stayed still, and both technology and magic have developed substantially over the years. With a full 18 pages, they can go into a fair amount of detail on both geography and history, with a map, coverage of individual neighbourhoods, (Perdito Street Station is right at the centre, unsurprisingly. ) and lots of named NPC's. It's a grimy place, full of pollution, organised crime, and neighbourhoods of various nonhuman races. It doesn't seem like a very pleasant place to live, but it is an excellent place for adventures, with tons of obvious external problems and social issues for a would-be hero to tackle. Even without reading the books, this gives me more than enough info to get started, just like the overview of the Known World in the front of the isle of dread. So it seems they've chosen well, covering a world which isn't like any of the existing D&D worlds, but has enough similarities to be smoothly converted ruleswise, and isn't so small as to only support a single story. And since he's pretty popular right now, it shouldn't be too hard to find people who want to play here.


People of Bas-lag: We've already found out a fair bit about the nonhuman races of Bas-lag, and how they fit into the setting. Now let's see what they look like mechanically. With one +0, two +1 and one +2 LA, they're fairly suitable for PC's, but haven't been nerfed to make them more D&D-friendly. That seems promising.

Cactacae are cactus-people, unsurprisingly. They're big, solid, sleep standing up, have the usual plant type immunities and can tolerate extremes of heat and dryness. They lack fine manual dexterity though, which gives them good reason to trade with the softer fleshies. One would make an excellent tank for your party as long as you aren't being pressed up against them in confined spaces.

Khepri are highly gender dimorphous cockroach people with sentient human-sized females and little mindless males. They live in hives, and are obviously completely matriarchal with the males treated as being good for one thing only. Gee, that's an obvious bit of social commentary. Still, darkvision and resistance to gaze and mind-affecting attacks seem handy enough.

Remade are people turned into half-machines, usually as punishment for some kind of crime. Even if they manage to win their freedom, they can face a lifetime of prejudice and struggling to get a proper job. Like Warforged, their precise capabilities are incredibly flexible, but they have some pretty substantial problems along with their benefits. Well, when you're treated as a literal machine, they only care about you doing the job. And if you break, oh well. There's always more troublemakers, even if you have to pass new laws to make the innocent guilty.

Vodyanoi are squat frog-people who can comfortably live in or out of water. With the ability to jump superhumanly and speak to aquatic creatures, they make perfect sailors and dockworkers, but are also pretty damn good spellcasters when they put their minds to it. So each of these has more than enough distinct flavor to keep them from being a one-note species where everyone feels the same. Any of them could replace D&D's regular elves or hobbits quite nicely.

Dragon Issue 352: February 2007


part 4/6


Monsters of Bas-lag: And now we have the more bizarre creatures. Actually, many of them seem quite PC-appropriate too, but with monster HD and higher LA adjustments, you'll have to play at higher level to include them in a party. As usual, it all depends on how much of a challenge you want as a DM, and if everyone being a special snowflake annoys you or not.

Anophelii are another heavily gender-dimorphous race that struggle to maintain a civilisation because of it. Like real world mosquitos, the females drink blood ravenously while the males are mostly vegetarians, and since the females are also far stronger and more aggressive, you have to tread carefully if you don't want to become their next meal. Understandably, they've been driven almost to extinction and confined to a single island. Maybe with a little more evolution they'll be able to create a functional society again in the future.

Garuda are freedom obsessed bird-people who soar over the coasts and deserts. They can be both deadly hunters, and just about fit into mixed species cities, although they have to deal with some discrimination. Just need to find a job that doesn't involve lots of time spent indoors at a desk, as like most other bird-people they can get claustrophobic.

Grindylow are enormous-jawed eel people who can also float slowly through the air, and like to capture people for magical experiments. They're more than scary enough to have myths grow up around them, since very few people escape if they venture into their territory.

Handlingers are basically detached hands that fuse with people and take over their bodies, eventually killing them. The right-handed ones are more physically powerful, but the left-handed ones are the bosses. They put a particularly interesting spin on an invasion of the body-snatchers scenario. If you see one scuttling around, stomp it pronto and inspect your family for any odd lumps under their clothes.

Scabmettlers are almost human, but have blood that clots almost instantaneously into incredibly hard scabs when cut. They can use this to create incredibly intricate and effective body art, and even tools, but have to regulate their diet carefully to keep their blood from clotting while still inside and killing them. This leads them to be stoic and patient, and very disciplined warriors, for those who don't take good care of themselves get weeded out pretty quickly. Another good example of how a small change in capability can massively affect both individual personalities and a society.

Slakemoths are dream-eating monstrosities that can grow to horse size, yet still squeeze into your house through tiny gaps. With hypnotic wings and considerable physical power, they take very specialised equipment to hunt involving mirrored helmets on your head and powerful ranged weaponry. Perfect X-files material.

Weavers are giant spiders from another universe that can predict the future and manipulate the threads of fate to exercise scary amounts of control over it. This perspective obviously makes them very hard to understand and communicate with from a human PoV, and trying to negotiate with one is a dicey business. Just like any oracle then.  

Wyrmen are your basic little flying gremlin thingies, scooting around, serving as (unreliable) messengers, and generally being vulgar and mischievous. Some fantasy creatures don't need all that adaption to fit in here. So not all the ideas in here are original, but most have more than enough good spin to be interesting and distinctive in flavour.

Dragon Issue 352: February 2007


part 5/6


The ecology of the Yrthak: A fairly obscure monster here. One of the new edition's creations, they're a creature I've never actually seen used. But they are fairly interesting creatures, so bringing new light to them is just what the magazine should be doing. They do a cutaway diagram to show how this odd looking creatures' sensory organs work, which is something we saw in the very first ecology, but surprisingly few after that, and go into plenty of detail about their physiology in the text as well. So while not quite as old skool as last month's ecology, this is another quirky and intriguing one full of potential plot hooks and bits to exploit. The new statblock applies the kaiju template to the creature, which I find amusingly appropriate.  A well above average entry in the series.


Savage tidings: Having made our way to the isle of dread, it looks like they're opening up the sandbox again, giving you another chance to wander around, see the sights, make friends and enemies, and amass those all-important XP. We get plenty more info on the various Olman tribes, including roleplaying advice, martial arts, weapons, tribal traits, and affiliations. Very definite temptations for you to generate new characters while here, even if you didn't lose any in the last adventure's trials. Much of this stuff is system free, and can be back-converted into the original adventure, giving it greater depth as well. They really are organising this very well, keeping it accessible as the adventure develops, giving you plenty of choices of how to accomplish your big objective, and making full use of the various cool mechanical bits introduced in recent 3.5 supplements. They have learned from their previous efforts, and are taking care to hit buttons that please all  of their intended demographics. This really is going very well. Lets hope they have the rest of the adventure planned out in advance properly to keep this momentum going.


Volo's guide: Last month they effectively gave us a Bazaar of the Bizarre entry. This time, its a FR specific bestiary that they cram in this column. What's the bet a few new spells are just around the corner. The Realms already has enough undead variants to fill an entire monstrous compendium on it's own, but new ones keep showing up. Often as not, they're just variants on an already busy niche. It's enough to keep a necrologist running all round the world trying to keep up.

Charnel Custodians are another angry guardian. Forming a body out of grave-earth and bones, they can suck you under, and reform if you destroy their body. Fortunately, like most undead, they're homebodies, so steer clear of their haunt and you don't have to worry. The fluff is pretty meh, but they do have quite interesting combat abilities.

Inquisitors are torturers in the pinhead mould. Mutilated beyond human endurance,
they relish inflicting the same kind of pain on others, be it to get information out of you, turn you into some other form of necrosurgical abomination, or just for the fun of it. Losing in a fight to them is very much a fate worse than death.

Skuz are another undead variant formed by dying horribly. In this case, it's from being sucked into a swamp and slowly drowned. Their abilities should come as no surprise. Another one that tries to suck you under and turn you into one of them, thus creating the potential for exponential population expansions. Again, a fun fight, but not too surprising conceptually.


Dragonmarks: Warforged. One of Eberron's more distinctive features, as they have some very concrete features and are strongly tied into the setting. And of course, the more something differs from reality, the more they need to define it to make it accessible. So a little more roleplaying and mechanical advice rarely goes amiss. This month, they go about it in curiously old skool style, providing us with a series of random tables for generating a random warforged's appearance. Golems can have a lot of variation in shape and adornments, and this ought to help you break writers block. I'm vaguely surprised and approve. We also have some more modern crunch, in two new components and an affiliation. Pacifist robots? Next thing you know your knife'll ask if it can be a vegetarian, and only be used to cut plants and inorganic stuff. Yeah, looks like both ends of this article have managed to please me. Pretty strong showing. What will they tackle next? Shifters? The railroad tracks? Something that doesn't get talked about in the forums? Lets hope I can still be surprised after all this time.

Dragon Issue 352: February 2007


part 6/6


Sage advice: Andy iss giving geraldine a bath. Mussnt't be stinky around books. Gloop, gloop. Micess are funny in the water.

Do monster special abilities increase as they advance in HD (Only if the desscription says they do. Sssome Ssscale better than otherss)

When you advance a spellcasting creature, what happens to its spells (ssame ass any other featuress. Ssometimes, if they take the right class level, it sstacks with their innate powerss)

How much XP and wealth should a 4th level succubus wizard have (ssame ass any 16th level character. )

Can an animal increase it's int as it advances. Does this change it's type to magical beast (Andy ssays no. We don't want pessky animalss getting above their sstation)

Are warhorses trained in armour (Makes ssense.)

Do all tieflings, aasimars and genasai automatically have martial weapon proficiency (Yess. Makes getting into ssome prestige classes much eassier, collins collins. We hatses when they become abjurant champions without multiclassing, collins collins)

Do lawful good solars gain the lawful subtype as well(no)

Can celestial and fiendish animals speak (A bit, yess. Enough to beg for mercy, yess precious.)

How long does a beheaded troll live (It regrowss it's head, sso the point iss moot)
Can a troll reattach it's head (Not without a little hellp)

If you kill a troll with fire but there are still intact parts of it's body, do they regenerate (no. Funny metaphysicsss sstrike again)

Can a vampire create vampire animals (Not norrmaly. Don't tell Sstrahd, though.)

How do you work out EL in a group of mixed CR creatures. (Lotss of adding. Itss besst to fudge)

How should you judge EL when playing with a group bigger or smaller than standard (Be careful. Itss all too eassy to kill them, particularly in a ssmall group, where they're missing a role)

Do your HP remain unaltered when wildshaped, regardless of what effects you have on you (no)


Class acts: Adventurers get Criminal Specialists. This works similarly to speciality wizards. You focus in a bunch of skills appropriate to one larcenous role, are forbidden 2 others, and gain an additional benefit as a result. Very cool little bit of extrapolation here. Now, will they do similar variants for all the other classes too, and drive the idea into the ground?

Arcane gets sorcerers guide, this months helping of collated and rehashed filler. I shall pay no more attention to this.

Divine gets Aztec Mythos I. What, they haven't put these guys in 3rd ed already, when they were one of the pantheons detailed in the OD&D and 1st ed AD&D books? Shocking. This month, we get writeups for the big two, Quetzacoatl and Tezcatlipoca. It seems pretty likely more are coming shortly.

Warriors get the Burning Gauntlet Sisterhood. An exclusive guild of women warriors dedicated to eradicating slavery? Go go cliche city. Still it gives them the chance to use the affiliation rules here for the first time. That's worthy of some credit.


Nodwick is spoiled for adventure hooks. Dork tower invokes the Lake Geneva conventions to protect their PC's. Zogonia accidentally invokes a demon. What are the odds of that. Order of the stick are skewered by their own metagame.


Once again, this issue is pretty sweet, boosting my hopes that the magazine will go out on a high, with plenty of references to things that happened all along their timeline. It's nice to see them not only aware of their past again, but actively seeking opportunities to reference it. At this point it'll never all tie together into one big picture, but by building on existing things, they can do stuff that they couldn't with disconnected articles of pure mechanics. Lucky 7 and counting? On we go then.

Dragon Issue 353: March 2007


part 1/6


77 (100) pages. WTF head-neck disconnect?! Am I going to have to do this every single time Wayne Reynolds gets on the cover? Still baffled by his continuing employment. Plus I know Succubi like it rough, but that tail and those talons would put a serious crimp in lots of human sexual positions. Oh well, I suppose that's what shapeshifting is for. Anyway, time for another relatively quick return to a theme, this time the Planes. (last done in issue 321, less than 3 years ago.) Since they also repeated the elemental theme in really short order just a few months ago, I'm pleased they're getting lots of submissions on the topic, but irritated they can't divide them up into more specialised themes that'd let them do greater depth without repeating themselves. Let's see what weird other worlds we're venturing too this time around.


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


In this issue:


Editorial: Erik doesn't talk about the issue's contents here, instead going into detail on just how much playing D&D has varied from group to group. Which I suppose is a somewhat related topic, as it shows just how much diversity there is within our own world, and just how much the same things can be perceived differently by different people. You don't need to venture to different universes to have mind-blowing revelations or meet people with bizarre and alien worldviews. Hell, one person can act in quite different ways depending on the social environment and who they're talking too. One person's mortal enemy is another one's loving father. Well worth taking into account, next time you think you have to turn things up to 11 to alleviate boredom, check to see if a smaller shift will be just as effective, and leave you with more room to maneuver later. Then you can spend more time and energy on other things.


Scale Mail seems to be getting shorter and shorter. Is it going to go the same way as the forums. Since it didn't survive the transition to the electronic magazine, I'm guessing the number of physical letters they get is pretty tiny these days. All four of them are praise for issue 351, showing once again that the audience really do appreciate the campaign classics issues even more than the april ones. I am once again baffled why WotC scrapped them. The only real niggle is the lack of scales on the maps. They would make them more usable, it has to be said. Apart from the Kender one, which you really don't want to use anyway, but will have to if you want to get out of groundhog day.

Dragon Issue 353: March 2007


part 2/6


First watch: Another sign of an edition filling up is the Magic item Compendium. Like the spell one, this collects tons of stuff from books all over the range, but is still only one book compared to the 4 of last edition. Still, they've put more effort into categorizing them according to power and use than last time. Hopefully that'll let you incorporate weird bits and pieces without it becoming unbalancing.

Meanwhile, the Realms hint at the big setting changes that'll get us from this edition to the next around here. Cormyr: The tearing of the Weave. It's been a while since we had big metaplot modules like this. Prepare to lose your entire damn magic system, bitches. Good luck figuring out the new one. If you need some help, talk to the Krynn guys. They had to put up with this crap a decade ago, they should still know the methodology.

Speaking of Dragonlance, they're still getting more graphic novels of the original series. Soon, this will draw to a close, and they'll have to move on to the second trilogy, or find yet another format to redo things in. What ones haven't they done yet?

Also on the comic front is another pretty prestigious property. The Dark Tower gets adapted, revealing new details of Roland's young life in the process. We already know the ending to this, but the fun is in the journey, so why not make it a bit richer. Zogonia gets a compilation, which isn't surprising given how long it's been going.  Rich Burlew lends his support to Erfworld. Will it become as long-running and popular as his own works? And we see a reprint of Mike Mignola's old Lankhmar comics. Now that is interesting to note.

D20 support sees one straight product, and one amusingly skewed one. Privateer Press release the Monsternomicon II. More creatures presented with a little more world connection than generic ones, and an IC narrator. And Xcrawl: Dungeonbattle Brooklyn. D&D dungeoncrawl as reality show. Awesome idea. I'd quite like to play in a game like that.

Our new D&D minis set arrives, so they promote it again. I think I'll skip this one. Somewhat more interesting is that Toy Design Studios are doing something similar to Wolfgang Baur, constructing figures, and allowing people to vote at various stages of the design process. I wonder who else is doing cool projects like this.

Our boardgame this month is a reprint of Talisman. I remember when we saw the original release of this advertised in the magazine. Once again, nice to see them keeping track of history and making callbacks.

Looks like we're starting another extended piece of promotion as well, for the next D&D computer game. D&D tactics for the PSP. Even portable systems are capable of some pretty decent stuff by now. And the networking abilities are pretty good. Put your team together, and get delving.

And finally, there's Robin Law's 40 years of Gen Con, which sounds pretty self explanatory. It's older than the hobby, and may outlast it as well. Lots of stuff has happened here, and they want your photos, particularly of the old years. What crazy stories will people contribute?