Blog Archives
Vote on our next big site update!
We’re racking our brains trying to figure out which update to tackle next… They’re all important and we’re going to get to all of them, but we need to know which ones should be done sooner rather than later. What better way to get this choice information than from the minds and fingertips of our very own users!
So please, take a moment, to take the survey, won’t you?
New System Thursday, 1/28/2010
It’s that time of the week again, Adventurers! It’s Thursday and that means that we’re adding a new system to our list of over 100 supported table-top RPG game systems and settings. This week, it’s another twofer, as we’re adding Warhammer Fantasy 3E and Palladium Fantasy to the list!
Warhammer Fantasy 3E
From Fantasy Flight Games comes the third edition of an RPG classic.
A new age is beginning. The winds of magic blow strongly, and the Old World’s two moons shine brightly in the night sky. Storms appear out of nowhere, and the land is rife with conflict. From the north descend savage groups of chaos marauders, men dedicated to the four Ruinous Powers of Chaos. They are seen side by side with degenerate beastmen and profane daemons. Their raids are striking further and further south, yet they are only the scouting forces.Within, the lands of the Empire are besieged by Orcs and members of hidden cults. The Orcs delight in battle, and are laying waste to all they can find. The enemy within is rising up and striking vicious blows that mankind is unprepared to face. War is coming on all sides.
What side of the battle will you be on? What dark truths will you unwittingly bring to the peace-starved people of this wartorn world? Make a Warhammer Fantasy 3E campaign now!
Palladium Fantasy
Speaking of classics, from Palladium Books comes the excitement of Palladium Fantasy!
The Palladium World is one of epic fantasy. A world torn in conflict with the non-human barbaric races, creatures of magic and supernatural forces.
Non-Human playing characters provide a host of unusual creatures as regular characters. They include the feared changeling who can assume the shape and appearance of any humanoid. The giant races of troll, ogre and wolfen. The small and agile goblin, kobold, gnome and the mighty dwarf, as well as elf, human, and dozens of “optional” creatures found in both the Palladium RPG and Monsters & Animals.
The skill system embellishes characters with knowledge and abilities that make him or her more than a simple fighter or mage.
Combat is realistic, with strikes, parries, dodges and considerations for shields and armour. Yet it remains extremely quick and playable.
An Experience System in which characters are rewarded for acts of ingenuity, ideas, cunning, discretion, trickery and bravery. Not hack and slash.
Magic: Over 300 spells, plus elemental magic, circles, symbols and runes are yours to command. The most original forms of magic found only in the Palladium RPG are the Diabolist and Summoner. The Diabolist casts no spells, instead he uses the nearly forgotten magic of wards (mystic symbols) and circles of power. The Summoner too, is versed in the mystic arts of magic circle making, but his is a far more dangerous and often malevolent power, for he dares to summon and command creatures of magic.
The wizard, warlock, priest and other more traditional characters also break away from their more common game molds, with a vast array of spells and abilities that make them truly unique.
Come see why they call it the Rifts of the Fantasy RPG genre. Make a Palladium Fantasy campaign now!
Long Day at the Salt Mines
In case anyone is curious about what it’s like to run a website, I submit today’s adventures as evidence…
I awoke this morning to an inbox full of 500 errors. Apparently, sometime during the night something went bonkers on the server and now people were seeing errors whenever they tried to view their profile.
Some quick digging showed that it was related to an SQL query that pieces together the recent updates for your friends. I managed to fix the query, but the underlying problem was…nobody had any friends! Either OP had gone through a massive hate-fest where everyone unfriended each other in a mass exodus, or something was wrong. I knew it was going to be a rough morning. I called Ryan, and luckily he was available to help. So, we both got to work.
We quickly narrowed it down to two possibilities: a bug, or an intruder. The worst case scenario was that we had an intruder on the server who thought it was funny to unfriend everyone. This isn’t standard operating procedure for hackers, but who knows what goes through the minds of those jerkos. But, we take security seriously and decided we needed to be absolutely sure. So, while Ryan combed the code looking for a bug (the most likely scenario), I started looking through server access logs to see if our server had been compromised.
Surprisingly enough, someone had been trying to break in. More accurately, an automated brute force login script was running against one of our servers. We have a program to defend against this, but it had apparently crashed silently the day before. Someone had spent 24 hours trying to break in. I was 99% sure they didn’t succeed, but coupled with the data loss it was extra suspicious.
Luckily, while I was trying to gather more evidence, Ryan found the actual bug that caused the problem. We could breathe easy knowing no one had made it into the system. All our problems were due to my own incompetence. Still, while we were down in the guts, it made sense to tighten the security a little. Web security is a long scale with your grandma’s unprotected AOL account on one end, and your bank’s ultra-secure website at the other. We’re proud to place ourselves much closer to the bank than grandma. We use SSL to encrypt your login credentials, and we also use salted hashing to disguise your password in our database. So, even if someone did manage to break in and steal our database, they would never be able to get your password. (Note: This is why we can never send you your password: We don’t actually know it!) Plus, we try to keep our server very secure so a break-in is practically impossible.
We updated some of our security procedures and put in place some practices we’d been meaning to do for a while. The end result is that we spent about 6 hours each making tweaks and adjustments and you, the user, will probably never see any difference. That thought always depresses me a little, but I’d rather it be like this than have to send out a massive email explaining that we were sloppy and someone stole or deleted all your data.
Finally, as I’m writing all this (11:30 PM, Eastern), Ryan is restoring all the deleted friend data. We keep offsite backups of all your data, just for cases like this. Being prepared for a worst case scenario is part of our strategy.
Not exactly an average day: Responding to lots of “It’s broken!” emails (which are very helpful, by the way, so keep sending them), sifting through server logs looking for the boogey man, fixing bugs, tightening security, and finally restoring data. I’ll probably get to bed around 12:45 tonight after verifying that everything is running smoothly. Things are usually quieter, but we’ve had days that were crazier.
I hope you enjoyed this glance behind the curtain. We love working on OP, and that’s why we’re here banging away on it late into the night. I just hope everyone out there loves using it as much as we love working on it.
Swords & Wizardry Interview
Last week while researching Mythmere Games’ Swords & Wizardry game system, we had a unique opportunity to interview the system’s primary creator, Matt Finch, as well as the creator of the Swords & Wizardry Quick Start book, Michael Shorten. Give the interview a read and then if you like, you can make a Swords & Wizardry campaign right now! Let’s get right into it.
OBSIDIAN PORTAL: Is Swords & Wizardry your idea?
MATT: Yes.
MICHAEL (On the subject of the Quick Start book): Yes, it was. It was inspired by some things I was reading on the Internet and hearing from people – that Game Refereeing an old school game was hard, and that it was difficult for someone to play, as well as a desire to have a book that could be used to demo how much fun old school gaming can be.
OBSIDIAN PORTAL: Who all has worked on it?
MATT: A huge number of people too numerous to name individually. Rob Ragas and Verhaden worked on layout, Chad Thorson and Jeff Preston are the two artists with the most illustrations in the books. Pete Mullen’s cover art pretty much electrified the whole old-school community. As (Michael) mentioned, the credits are:
Contributors: Marv Breig, Jason Cone, Allen T.
Grohe, Jr., and Jerry Mapes
Cover Art: Pete Mullen
Editing: James Maliszewski, Rob Ragas, and Jesse Rothacher
Interior Art: Edward M. Kann, Pete Mullen, Jeff Preston, Michael
Shorten, and Chad Thorson
Layout: Rob Ragas (first printing) and Jesse Rothacher (second printing)
Additional proofreading and suggestions: Jim Bobb, Eric Norred, and
the Swords & Wizardry forum
With special thanks to: The Knights and Knaves Alehouse
Keep in mind, too, that there are two versions of S&W – the Core Rules (includes OD&D supplements like Greyhawk, Blackmoor, Eldritch Wizardry, etc), and the WhiteBox version which replicates the pre-supplement version of OD&D – there are some rules that were changed in the supplements. Lots of people assisted with the WhiteBox version as well.
MICHAEL (On the subject of the Quick Start book): I was the primary author, although I had help from all of the crew in the Three Headed Monster gaming cooperative (http://thmgames.blogspot.com/). The cover was done by award-winning Mark Allen, the rear cover was by Paul (bliss_infinite) Fini of IndieOnlyComics and the interior art was donated by John Adams of Brave Halfling Publishing.
OBSIDIAN PORTAL: Where did you get the notion to make it?
MATT: I’d already done a similar project, OSRIC, for First Edition. Many players of the original edition wanted to see it covered, especially since the books for 0e now cost about $200 for a set, and the pdfs cannot be obtained legally.
MICHAEL (On the subject of the Quick Start book): There were certain iconic modules back in the day, B1 In Search of the Unknown and B2 The Keep on the Borderlands, that had a great deal of guidance and gameplay assistance. Most of the retroclones were already rules-light, but I thought it would be very helpful to have a book to help people new to old school gaming and Swords & Wizardry. It would also be nice to have something that could be used to teach beginners how to play RPGs.
OBSIDIAN PORTAL: In what ways is S&W different from DnD?
MATT: From 0e, very little is different – they are designed to be playable even when some players are using one book and some using the other. The major differences are for legal reasons; the largest of these are that S&W uses a single saving throw category (instead of having different categories of saving throws) and has a different way of assigning bonuses to xp based on attribute scores. Now, if you’re asking how it differs from 4e D&D … there’s virtually nothing in common other than the basic concepts.
MICHAEL (On the subject of the Quick Start book):
Well, Swords & Wizardry is a “retroclone” of the original 1974 Dungeons & Dragons plus some of the mechanics and rules from the first supplement Greyhawk. A retroclone is meant to be as close to the original, but the designer may introduce differences.
S&W is very close to OD&D, with the big exception of a single Saving Throw value (versus multiple saving throw types from OD&D) and the concept of Ascending Armor Class (where higher is better, OD&D had Descending AC, where lower is better). The rules are laid out in a more logical fashion and better organized. S&W tends to focus on the “dungeoneering” aspect where OD&D had a bit more about wilderness adventuring and stronghold building.
OBSIDIAN PORTAL: Is this your first venture into creating game systems?
MATT: Other than OSRIC, yes.
MICHAEL (On the subject of the Quick Start book): It was my first published venture yes. I had never designed anything for a specific audience. I’ve tinkered with other game systems and made changes, but this was more “from scratch” in taking S&W and spinning it down to it’s bare essence and creating and adventure that could teach as well as be fun.
OBSIDIAN PORTAL: What do you want players and DMs to get out of your system?
MATT: Fun, of course! And a chance to play the oldest version of the game without shelling out $200+ for the books or using illegal pdfs.
MICHAEL (On the subject of the Quick Start book): I hope they get to have the same fun that I have when I play Swords & Wizardry. It’s a wide open, “imagine the hell out of it” game and in the chargen and dungeon, I try to foster that approach. I also hope that GMs get a sense of how they can manage the game, make rulings and still have fun without feeling like they are bound by rules or mechanics.
OBSIDIAN PORTAL: Looking back on the creative process, what things would you have done differently?
MATT: I’m pretty happy with how it has all turned out. We have gotten fantastic artwork and lots of fan support. Lots of people have heard about the game, we’re in distribution to brick-and-mortar game stores … it’s all good.
MICHAEL (On the subject of the Quick Start book): I don’t think there’s anything I would have done differently – aside maybe try to make a buck or two more! The Quick Start was downloaded over 1,500 times from July through December of 2009.
OBSIDIAN PORTAL: What aspect of your system are you the most proud of?
MATT: I can’t take credit for the system. That’s Gary Gygax, not me.
MICHAEL (On the subject of the Quick Start book): I think the impact that it’s had. I know that a very popular 4e blogger (ChattyDM) had a great time running the Quick Start and getting the feel and joy of an original D&D style game. I’ve heard from people who have introduced their kids to RPGs using it and have heard from people who have used it as a springboard to learning Swords & Wizardry. That’s really cool and humbling. To me, sharing the love and knowing that people are having fun from something I wrote is just the best karma I could have hoped for.
NPC and Character changes: An Update
So we’ve completed our first major round of changes when it comes to NPC and Character creation/management. Here’s some information handed to me from those on high.
Note: These changes are currently in the works, but are not completed yet. This is a warning of things to come (very soon).
Characters belong in Campaigns
The essential concept behind the changes is that characters will now belong to campaigns. Just like wiki pages or adventure log posts, it will be impossible to create a character that is not part of a campaign. It should have been like that from the beginning, but we live and learn.
Some people are in the habit of creating their characters, keeping them secret, and then adding them to campaigns. We feel that this is the wrong way to do it, and now we’ve corrected the system so new characters can be added and kept hidden in a much better way. From now on, when creating a hidden character, mark the character as GM only during creation. When you’re ready to reveal your character or NPC to your players, edit the character and clear the checkbox for GM only.
The place to create your characters has changed somewhat, and now lives on the “Characters” tab (formerly the NPC Tracker). Just look for the “Create New Character” button there and you’ll have no problem getting started.
We’re still working out the logistics of this, but the “NPC Tracker” tab is now just “Characters”. Soon we’ll be changing the layout and display so it shows both PCs and NPCs, and also makes it much easier to quickly review the details of each character. Think “quick rollover to get a teaser” or something along those lines.
In the future, we hope to make it even easier so that it’s possible to quickly add an NPC right in the middle of writing a wiki page. But, that’s an update for another day.
Nothing is deleted
Even though we’re not allowing new characters to be created separate from a campaign; existing characters in that state will be left untouched. So they’ll still be available and such. But, we would encourage people to try and move their characters into a campaign. 6 months from today, any character’s that haven’t been moved into a campaign will be deleted.
Visibility inherits from campaign
We’re getting rid of the public and visible attributes from characters. It was always confusing. Now, characters will inherit the visibility of their parent campaign. So, if the campaign is private, then all the characters are private. Note! This does not affect their gm-only status. A gm-only character is always private. So, essentially, characters in a private campaign are hidden from everyone except the campaign members. A gm-only character is hidden from everyone except the GM. This may cause some of your hidden characters to become visible. To counter this, assign them to a campaign and mark them as gm-only.
Existing items are affected
On the backend, characters and items are actually very closely related in the system, so all these changes relate to items as well. Now that characters are integral parts of a campaign, items are as well. For the time being, it may be impossible to create new items until we can figure out a good place to fit them in. We’re definitely open to suggestions here!
There will be blood…er bugs
We’re doing our best to make sure everything is good to go, but there will be bugs that slip through. People may find that links to characters are broken, or that they cannot edit a character they own, or other strange things like that. If any of this happens to you, and you need some assistance with your issue, email us at [email protected]. Include a link to the character (or the broken link) and a description of what is going wrong, and we’ll get right on it!
Your world should be rich with life, intrigue, and possibility. So what are you waiting for? Go out there and make some new characters!
