THe ScrOLl | |
| The Official Newsletter of the Dedicated Oahu Gamers Society | |
| http://higamers.homeip.net/dogs/ | February 2001 |
Editor’s ColumnWell I have nothing new to report in the month of February. For myself, personally it was a slow month of gaming, despite having two games days this past month to play in. Unfortunately due to scheduling conflicts I was only able to attend a tiny portion of the slots, but hopefully the rest of you DOGS managed to get your gaming quota in. I’d also like to thank you all for bearing with us during the disorganization of the Jaycees Hobby fest. Special thanks to Jim Hurst for emergency DM-ing a couple of slots of Living City, for what I felt was a pretty tough module to run. As always, us officer-type people are looking for suggestions. What should be included in The Scroll? How do we improve club attendance and participation? What would you like to see played during those open gaming slots? Should we eliminate open gaming slots? Any helpful comments should be passed along to myself. Any harsh criticism should go directly to Rick. Upcoming EventsMarch 10-11: Geo Con at Hale Moku Rec Ctr.
Featured events will include: Future planned Con Dates are: Decathlon 2001 UpdateOkay, some of our DOGS members are not guild level RPGA members, which means that they have no idea what the Decathlon is. Like most decathlons, it is a ten-event competition between RPGA sanctioned clubs. This particular one runs the length of an entire year. In the decathlon for year 2000, DOGS-a club based out of a tiny hunk of lava in the middle of the pacific-placed fourth! Yes! Fourth place! I know what you’re thinking… “Fourth place doesn’t even earn us a stinking medal in the Olympics.” Just kidding guys. I for one think that we made a fairly impressive showing considering our geographical handicap. But to be honest I’d kind of like to be able to tell my children and grandchildren that once-just once-I was able to win a medal in a decathlon. I of course won’t tell them that it was a “Geek’s Decathlon” sponsored by some gamers in Washington, but oh well. Now if the rest of you are like me, then you just received your December/January issue of the Polyhedron in late February. Which gives a summary of the 2000 Decathlon to date, and also lists all the events that are scheduled for Decathlon 2001. Unfortunately, as Rick and I realized last night, the first event’s deadline has already passed. So we’re already off to a weak start for 2001. But that’s okay, let’s try to look forward and see if we can salvage a bronze medal out of this. Focusing on events that we still have a chance to score points in: Event #3: Participation in the Living Force™ campaign. The club who has the highest percentage of members who have played all 13 scenarios in the first year’s story arc will be the winner. So come on guys, let’s play some Living Force. Yes, I agree that the West End Games version of Star Wars was easier to play, more fun, and in general just a much better system. But it is extinct. Its fire has gone out of the universe and the d20 system is now the last of it’s kind. So give the new game a chance. Event #5: Create a Company of Adventurers. I’ll be putting this one together (deadline is March 31st), but I’ll be wanting any suggestions you have for really cool character ideas. Event #6: Write a Single Round Scenario. Rather than dump the responsibility for this onto a single member, I’d like to see this become a team effort. If anyone has any suggestions for plots, villains, weird stuff, etc… please contact one of the officers or just post it to the dogsmail yahoogroups list. Hopefully, we’ll be able to put together a team of writers. Also, it can be a scenario for any system used in the scenario program (of which there is a lot). Also remember that the RPGA will pay CASH MONEY for your scenario. The deadline for this is April 30; so the sooner we start the better. |
Event #7: Write a Multi-Round Scenario. Ummm… see my notes for Event #6. Just double or triple it though. Deadline is June 30. I’ll skip remaining events until a later Scroll since these are really the most pressing ones right now. Come on guys, let’s show the rest of the RPGA that DOGS rule, and Naughty Weasels, PM Players, and DWO drool! (Those are the three clubs who beat us in the 2000 Decathlon). 3E Quiz ScoreboardScott Hantsch: 1 Tyler Dodd: 2 Rest of DOGS: zero (bow your heads in shame!) Here’s the answer to last months quiz: A roll of 1-10 will result in a miss. A roll of 11-14 will hit Tordek A roll of 15 or higher will hit the gnoll. The max damage the ray can do to the troll is 6. The max damage the ray can do to Tordek is 3. Confused? Here’s the explanation: Mialee has a +2 to hit from Dexterity, and a +1 to hit from the feat Weapon Focus (ray spells), which Tyler pointed out to me that it is impossible for her to have at first level because it requires a +1 base attack bonus, but oh well. Unfortunately she’s firing into melee so she has a -4 penalty to hit, so her net attack roll is at -1. The gnoll in the Monster Manual has an AC listed at 17. However, since this is a ranged touch attack, he does not get his natural armor, armor, or shield bonus-reducing his AC to 10. He gains a +4 cover bonus because of Tordek (cover from a creature of the same size class is always considered 50% cover), so his effective AC is 14. Ergo, if Mialee rolls a 15 (at -1 to hit), she hits the gnoll. Looking at the cover rules, if Mialee misses her target by the amount of bonus the cover gives (+4), then she hits the cover instead, and if her attack roll is high enough to defeat Tordek’s AC, then he takes the damage instead. Tordek (like the gnoll) gets no bonus for his armor, shield, or the dodge feat (since he’s using it against the gnoll) so his AC is 8. What? Why 8? Because he charged into combat (-2 AC). So any roll of 11-14 hits and damages Tordek. Anything less than that misses both combatants, since even though a roll of 9 or 10 roll would hit Tordek normally, it does not fall into the range of “striking the cover instead of the intended target. Lastly, why is it possible for the ray of frost to do more damage to the gnoll than to Tordek? Because it is possible to score a critical hit against the gnoll, but not possible to score a critical hit against Tordek. Whew, that was a lot of words. If anyone has any questions on this scenario or thinks that I’ve made a mistake somewhere, well you’re wrong and I’m right. New QuizHere’s the scenario for this month. Unfortunately I opened my mouth at Oahu Con and asked a couple people about this one so some of you are going to have to disqualify yourselves from this month’s quiz. Tyler, I’ll already give you credit for figuring out the answer though. Riddle me this, DOGS: Matt the Mage walks through a dungeon passage and comes across a troll. After staring at each other blankly for a moment, Matt wins initiative and fires off a ray of frost spell and hits the troll for 68 points of damage!!! “How is this possible?” you ask? That’s for you to tell me. News of Ratik(From Living Greyhawk Journal, Vol 1, Number2)
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