Tag Archives: Dungeons & Dragons

Battlemat Review

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Ever since I have been getting into Dungeons and Dragons I have been researching battlemat options. Battlemats can be used to help display combat aspects of a D&D game. Some people like to use them, and some don’t. I do like to use them.

mat3Since I have started researching battlemat options I have been very disappointed with the reviews I have see on other websites and blogs. There seems to be one cream of the crop option when it comes to battlemat choices for D&D gamers. That would be Dwarven Forge sets. (Check them out on youtube) But I do find the Dwarven Forge option a little price prohibitive for me.

mat4Now after Dwarven Forge, the choices for battlemats are a little less clear. A friend of mine got the Paizo GameMastery Flip-Mat which is a double sided laminated mat with 1 inch by 1 inch squares drawn on it. Because it is laminated you can use just about any kind of marker on it and wipe it off when your done playing. But this battlemat does come to you folded, and you can fold it away for easy storage when your not using it. However it dose not lay down very flat as a result. Which I do find annoying.

Another option (and the one I went with) is the Chessex Battlemat. This is a vinyl mat with an overlying black 1 inch square grid on it. It came with some short directions on how to keep it clean. It lays down flatter then the Paizo mat. But you do have to take a little bit better care of it. You only want to roll it up for storage as folding it will cause creases. You only want to use water based markers on it. Like the kind you would use on an over head projector. You also want to stay away from red and purple, and orange markers as the ink used in these colors to stain the mat.

mat7The Chessex Battlemat came with some short and simple care instructions with it which I have found helpful. They also shipped to me here in Juneau Alaska very well. Using good post office packaging and peanuts to unsure the product came to be undamaged.

I have used this battlemat a couple of times now and it has gone over really well. I am glad I chose it. These pictures don’t show it very well but after a few minutes the mat dose lay down flat.

To be continued…

Playing Dungeons and Dragons

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With all the Dungeons and Dragons talking I have been doing (not only on my blog but with my friends and co-workers) it’s not supprising that some of us would finally get a game started. For the last couple of weekens I have been part of group of friends playing Dungeons and Dragons 4th edition. I am not DMing this game. Just playing as a character. (A half-elf rouge actually) It’s been a lot of fun hanging out with friends, laughing, joking, and just have a good time in general. Some of us have never played D&D before, and some of us have.

Playing the game as a player character has really been helpful to me in answer questions about DMing. It’s helping me understand  how the game is played and how a good DM should act and tell a story.

Since I have been playing with this group for a coupld of weeks now, I have started filling notebooks with Drawings and notes for the game I will eventually lead. I can’t wait to get started but am also glad to have as much prep time as I do.

Here are some pictures from the game i have been involved with currently as a half-elf rouge.

To be continued…

Dungeons & Dragons: Mazes and Monsters

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Mazes and Monsters vhs coverI wrote in an older post that I learned about the movie “Mazes and Monsters“. It’s a 1982 movie about a group of college students and their interest in a fictitious role-playing game (RPG) of the same name staring Tom Hanks. The film was adapted from a novel of the same name by Rona Jaffe. Jaffe had based her 1981 novel on inaccurate newspaper stories about the disappearance of James Dallas Egbert III from Michigan State University in 1979.

Being into Dungeons and Dragons as much as I have been lately, I thought it would be fun to Netflix this movie and watch it. Well I did just that. I Netflix it, and watched it this last weekend.

Mazes and Monsters was not to bad. Actually, it was bad.  It is a low budget, 1982 movie. The source film they used for the DVD transfer was not the best. There times where the film looks faded and spotty. At one point in the movie there is a bug that crawls from the bottom of the screen, to the top. (How the hell does that happen? How dose that end up on the film?) But you know, for me, it was a fun and silly movie to watch. Because of that it was not to bad.

There are even a few scene that take place inside the World Trade Center.

To Be Continued…

Dungeons & Dragons: 4th Edition Books

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It finally came!!!

I made the plunge and picked up the Dungeons and Dragons Core Rulebook Gift Set, 4th Edition containing all three core rulebooks. I also picked up some D&D Miniatures. I have been spending so much time researching Dungeons & Dragons on the internet, and talking about it with friends that I feel confident that picking up these D&D books will not be a waist of time or money. I can’t wait to get starting on them.

The Dungeons & Dragons books, as well as the Miniatures, came very well packed from Amazon.com. ( As you can see below ) The miniatures are very well panted and came with their own mini game as well. So for the cost it’s a great value.

The Dungeons & Dragons Core Rulebook Gift Set came in very nice, durable slipcase. All the books are hard cover. After flipping through them a few times these books do feel like they could take a beating and not fall apart on you.

To be continued…

Dungeons & Dragons: Looking For Advice

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Having read the “Dungeons and Dragons Fourth Edition RPG Starter Set” a few times now my mind is filled with questions about the game. But the over all question I have is How dose this all work? I wanted to start finding people here in Juneau with D&D experience that I could ask my questions.

One of the first places I tried was a used books store in down town Juneau called Rainy Retreat Books. There I met a very nice gentleman by the name of Royce Metz. He and I got into a long talk about Dungeons & Dragons. He did his best to explain to me the differences of Dungeons and Dragons 3.0, 3.5, 2.0, 2.5, and 4.0. He gave me some great advice about playing the roll of the Dungeon Master.

Dragon Lance Chronicles Volume 1: Dragons of Autumn Twilight 1984He also suggested the first three books from the DragonLance Chronicles to read. That the books would give me some good ideas for adventures and quests. So for a few bucks I picked them up.

I also went looking online for advice. I figured that I could not be the only person online blogging about the journey to learn Dungeons & Dragons. But after many Google searches I came back with two links I think are worth mentioning at the moment.

The first one is from Wizards of the Cost. They are the current publisher of the Dungeons & Dragons books. They have a pod cast section on their website. In particular they have a pod cast with the guys from Penny Arcade and Player Vs. Player playing Dungeons and Dragons that can be found here. I have found this so helpful! You can listen to them play D&D 4th edition, and get a real good feel of the game mechanics and how everything works together! I think this is one of the most helpful things I have found.

The second link I found is for a website called Newbie DM. This is a guy who blogs about Dungeon Mastering and the tips and tricks he has found that works best for him. For me it’s been an interesting read learning how this DM runs his games and the tools he finds useful for himself and his group of adventurers.

I still continued to look around for people to talk to who have had experience playing the game. I even spoke with my older brother Reza, about this on the phone. I asked him if he had ever played Dungeons & Dragons. To my astonishment he had when he was a high school junior in Vancouver Washington. (My older brother is just as much of a geek as I am!)  Aside from needing the three core rulebooks, he told me a story about D&D. That back when I was much younger and we all used to live in Gridley Kansas, he had heard that a kid from near by Greenwood county, had killed himself. That one night while he was playing Dungeons & Dragons with some friends, his character had been banished to the Netherworld. This kid felt that the only way he could save his character from the Netherworld was to kill himself so he could go in after him. As my brother was telling me this story, I told him that I recalled hearing a version of it from my past. I might have even over heard Reza talking about this story with his friends or with our parents.

Mazes and Monsters vhs coverI can’t help but wonder if the story my brother and I heard was somehow related to the story of James Dallas Egbert III and what is refered to as the Steam tunnel incident. The steam tunnel incident is a set of urban myths wherein players enacting live action role-playing games perish. Mazes and Monsters is a 1981 novel based on inaccurate newspaper stories about the disappearance of James Dallas Egbert III from Michigan State University in 1979. A 1982, made for T.V. movie called Mazes and Monsters (staring Tom Hanks) was based on the book. Just for fun I have added the movie to my Netflix Que.

To Be Continued…

Dungeons & Dragons: A Brief History

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In my continuing quest to learn how to play Dungeons & Dragons, I have also been learning a lot about the games history. The game D&D stems from European war fair. A system was developed in the eighteenth century to simulate battle field scenarios. Figures represented troop movements and dice represented random elements in the battle. This was called War Game.

About one hundred years later, writer H.G. Wells published a simplified version of War Game for use of toy solders which he called “Little Wars“. Clubs for “Little Wars” started all around the world. Eventually Gary Gygax was part of one of these clubs, and he along with Dave Arneson took the game Idea and created what we know today to be Dungeons & Dragons.

To Be Continued…

Dungeons & Dragons: Is The Quick-Start Guide Any Help?

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As I wrote earlier I picked up the “Dungeons & Dragons Fourth Edition RPG Starter Set” from my local book store here in Juneau Alaska. I spent the next several days reading the material that it came with. The first book in the starter set is called the “4th Edition Quick-Start Rules”. This has information on the game mechanics, as well as the game rules. It also comes with five ready made characters so you can start adventuring. To someone like me who is new to the game of D&D, this was all very intimidating to read. But I got through it.

The starter set also includes a “Dungeon Master’s Book” which contains rules for the person who will be taking on the roll of Dungeon Master. A Dungeon Master is the game organizer and participant in charge of creating the details and challenges of a given adventure. The Dungeon Master describes to the other players what they see and hear. Also included in the starter-set is a pre made adventures and pre made Monsters. Between these two books you can play a game of Dungeons & Dragons. However, with just my first read threw of the information I don’t think I could run a game. Not yet anyway.

Reading these books has caused my mind to exploded with questions! I have learned a lot about D&D after reading these quick-start books, but I was still left with unanswered questions. The game has such endless possibilities. I am already thinking about picking up the Three Core Rulebooks. I want to learn how to build my own character and monsters. I want to be the Dungeon Master in a game and come up with my own adventures.

But first I need to take a deep breath and re-read the these quick-start books a couple of times. I just really need to get down and absorb the information some more.

Dungeons & Dragons Roleplaying Game Starter Set

Tokens

This starter-set also came with character and monster tokens as well as 3 sheets of double sided D&D Dungeon Tiles that can be used to adventure with. The included Dungeon Master’s book has a sample adventure using these tokens and tiles. But one thing is clear, the game can be played without tiles, or tokens, or even miniatures. All you really need is some Pencils and paper.

This starter-set is not with out a complaint however. The box it came in really is shitty. By shitty I mean flimsy and week. It really feels like it can fall apart any moment.

To be continued…

Dungeons & Dragons: Is It Worth The Cost?

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I went looking online for the three core rulebooks that are required to play the game of Dungeons & Dragons. The Player’s Handbook, The Dungeon Master’s Guide, and the Monster Manual. Amazon shows the Dungeons and Dragons Core Rulebook Gift Set, 4th Edition containing all three core rulebooks for just over sixty six dollars.

Now sixty six dollars is not a whole lot of money really. But it was enough for me to take a step back and ask myself, “Are you really going to play this game all that much? It’s almost the same price of a video game!”

Dungeons & Dragons Roleplaying Game Starter Set

Dungeons & Dragons Roleplaying Game Starter Set

Some time passed with me looking off and on at the rulebooks on the Amazon website. Then one day I took brake from work and headed over to the local book store here in Juneau to see what they had in the way of Dungeons & Dragons. It was not long after that, I found myself staring down at a bin of multi colored dice, dice bags, playing cards for games like Magic The Gathering. I finally came across the Dungeons & Dragons section. The D&D section was on a book shelf on the bottom rack, near the back of the store. It was clear from the way the book shelf was arranged that they normally have more Dungeons & Dragons books available. But as it stood they did not have one rulebook that I could find. The upside to this in my thinking, was that Juneau was home to more Dungeons & Dragons players then I was currently aware of. This opened the possibility of a local community of information that I might be able to tap into.

Dungeons & Dragons Roleplaying Game Starter SetAs I stood up to got ready to leave the D&D section of the book store my eyes caught site of a blue box. I bent back down to pick it up and found it to be the “Dungeons & Dragons Fourth Edition RPG Starter Set“. My eyes widened as I read that the starter set contained “Everything you need to start playing now!”.

  • Over 50 full-color character and monster tokens
  • 3 sheets of double sided D&D Dungeon Tiles
  • 16-page 4th Edition Quick-Start Rules
  • 64-Page Dungeon Master’s Book
  • 6 dice

Dungeons & Dragons Roleplaying Game Starter SetTo say the least I was stoked to find this! And for seventeen bucks I picked it up. I figured if the starter set could help me get a grip on how the game is played, then I would for sure know if investing nearly seventy bucks into the three core rulebooks would be worth it for me or not.

To Be Continued…

Dungeons & Dragons: The Learning Quest Continues

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So some time has passed since my first Dungeons & Dragons post. Since then I have been doing some more research online. I have learned that their have been several versions of the game have been released since 1974. The current version of Dungeons and Dragons is Version 4.0. It’s supposed to be a lot easier for newcomers to the game to grasp. In my case, I take that as very positive news. It was also encouraging to find that I am not the only one learning how to play the game. Gabe from Penny Arcade has also been taking steps to learn how run a D&D game as you can read on the Penny Arcade blog.

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To Be Continued…