Pregenerated Dwarves 1st Level

These 3 first level characters are dwarves, Megen, Shaw and Kalen. Click the link to download the PDF file. These characters are almost ready to go. In generating ability scores, I made sure the range was acceptable in both D&D and AD&D. To convert this character to straight AD&D, simply add or subtract the racial modifiers and class abilities.

The equipment and coins are not balanced for a first level character. It is safe to assume that each has prior adventurers in their background, perhaps even entering the Lion Castle from BSOLO and escaping before victory.

If there is a call for it in the comments, I will make DOCX and Google Doc file available as I have the PDFs. The reason I have not done this from the get go is that I created every character of a class in one document and print each page as a PDF.

Pregenerated Clerics 1st level

To start the list, I have created 3 first level characters, Kells, Rona and Iulio. Click the link to download the PDF file. These characters are almost ready to go. In generating ability scores, I made sure the range was acceptable in both D&D and AD&D. To convert this character to straight AD&D, simply add or subtract the racial modifiers, if any.

The equipment and coins are not balanced for a first level character. It is safe to assume that each has prior adventurers in their background, perhaps even entering the Lion Castle from BSOLO and escaping before victory.

If there is a call for it in the comments, I will make DOCX and Google Doc file available as I have the PDFs. The reason I have not done this from the get go is that I created every character of a class in one document and print each page as a PDF.

Pregenerated Characters

I have reworked the way that my tabs above function, clicking one results in a search on labels. This way, I can have my tabbed content appear as both a tab and a post. It avoids the mess of hard coding in the tabs and then forgetting to update.

For my pregenerated characters, I am using a simple form based on the character sheets in BSOLO - Ghost of Lion Castle.

I meant to have 3 characters for every class or race in D&D, AD&D and Unearthed Arcana. One of the character classes is the Swashbuckler, which is an D&D or AD&D specific character class. It is completely unlike the Swashbuckler that appears in AD&D 2.0. Additionally, some of these characters will have professional skills, which appear from my book called Zero to Hero: Uncommon Commoners. Finally, if you would look a retro characters sheet, I have one on DriveThruRPG for characters using Unearthed Arcana. All of these items are in the links to the right.

Campaign Kick Off

I am kicking off a new campaign on The Peninsula of Plenty. Before I detail any of the events of play, I want to cover some general background and house rules.

First, Elves, Half-Orcs, and Dwarves are not allowed as character classes at the start. Humans, Elves, Half-Orcs and Dwarves are at war and the players are starting in the Human Empire's Capital. Half-Orcs are clients of the Elves and both are aligned with the Dwarves against the Human Empire. Halflings are a problem in the human realms, as they are fleeing south, over the mountains. They are at best, politically unreliable.

Below is the racial preference table we are using, which is revised from the last posting of this chart.

Peninsula of Plenty - Racial Preference Table

Race	Dwarves	Elves	Gnomes	Gnolls	Half-Elves	Halfling	Half-Orc	Human	Kobold
Dwarves	Preferred	Neutral	Neutral	Apathy	Apathy	Goodwill	Preferred	Hatred	Hatred
Elves	Neutral	Preferred	Tolerated	Apathy	Apathy	Goodwill	Preferred	Apathy	Apathy
Gnomes	Goodwill	Goodwill	Preferred	Tolerated	Goodwill	Preferred	Preferred	Preferred	Goodwill
Gnolls	Apathy	Apathy	Tolerated	Tolerated	Apathy	Tolerated	Goodwill	Tolerated	Goodwill
Half-Elves	Goodwill	Apathy	Apathy	Goodwill	Preferred	Goodwill	Goodwill	Apathy	Apathy
Halfling	Goodwill	Preferred	Goodwill	Goodwill	Goodwill	Preferred	Tolerated	Hatred	Apathy
Half-Orc	Hatred	Preferred	Goodwill	Apathy	Apathy	Goodwill	Preferred	Neutral	Apathy
Human	Apathy	Hatred	Goodwill	Apathy	Hatred	Neutral	Neutral	Preferred	Apathy
Kobold	Tolerated	Tolerated	Goodwill	Neutral	Goodwill	Preferred	Goodwill	Preferred	Tolerated

As a consequence, virtually all player characters are human, although that was not the intent. I was expecting some half elves, gnomes, and kobolds. We are playing D&D, with an overlay of AD&D. It is possible to be a generic elf which is the straight D&D class, or to pick a class as per AD&D. Only one character did this, the magic user is a halfling.

Next, we are using my rules for the Swashbuckler character class and Uncommon Commoners.

I have two house rules regarding magic: Clerics get spells at 1st level and every Magic User can cast Read Magic once per day in addition to any other spells.

I have a couple house rules regarding combat: Anyone can use a shield to protect themselves, two handed. They can't cast or attack, except for a rough attempt at knocking someone back with the shield. It isn't a good idea if you are a magic user. This rule appears in Uncommon Commoners.

If a magic user or cleric is has a weapon skill due to a professional background, they can replace one weapons with that profession's weapon. For clerics who are also chefs, they can use knives, but generally don't in combat. If a magic user has a skill that allows for a different weapon, say a hammer because they are a mason, they can use that instead of a staff, dagger or dart. These rules also appear in Uncommon Commoners.

Some rule sets state that once a person has been downed, they can be revived by another player. The mechanism for this in my campaigns are either a prayer to Saint Elam or a vial of Elamium. This is a reference to anesthesiologist, James Elam, who performed experimental mouth to mouth resuscitation here in Buffalo, NY at Roswell Park. It's an anachronism owning to my hometown.

There is the expectation that a lot of combat will do subduing damage, but the players can do as they wish. If NPCs are doing this, I will not announce it, but will describe it. This circles back to the Swashbuckler class which engages in this type of combat all the time. Swashbucklers are very far from fighters or thieves. They tend to kill only by a run-through attack after offering a chance to escape. It doesn't work on animals, because they can't be disarmed. 

The first session was pretty eventful and I will detail that in another post.

Nerd Cred, 1970's Edition

Muffit. Like Boxey, he only had
a single scene in the re imagined series

Do you know what was hot in the 1970's? Hook Latch.

Do you know what else was hot in the 1970's? Battlestar Galactica.

The only thing that would make this more nerdy would be if I had one that had Lorne Greene, Richard Hatch and Dirk Benedict all shooting a thumbs up.

I might not have been born this way, but boy did my mom plan it this way.

New Add to the Blogroll - THAC0

Ryan and Jarad are fellow bloggers both on Facebook and BlogSpot.com. They write for THAC0 RPG about D&D. I'd tell you all about their recent posts with new character classes, but I went all the way back to the beginning, to the time Ryan wrote: I think I might have broken my AD&D party.

Since the demise of Google+, I have been enjoying the universe of blogs. THAC0 RPG is no exception. Other recent adds are Ten Foot Polemic and 3 Toadstools. I'm on Blogger.com, but Blogspot seems pretty hot.

I have to do something about my blogroll to make it stand out, but while you are there, check out Old School RPG Planet. It's the best blogroll for RPGs around.

5 Below Fusion Speaker - BT Fusion Spk - Lights on, will connect, no sound

My wife picked up a cheap Bluetooth Speaker at 5 Below. It was $5.00. She used it once and it stopped working. It wouldn't even turn off. I looked it up and there was no manufacturer listed and the product does not seem to have a product code.

There appears to be a reset hole between the USB plug and the power switch. It didn't work, probably because there is no switch there. I was going to toss it in the trash, but the lights were still on and it would connect to my phone. Annoying.

So, I cracked it open. There are two screws on the bottom. I wanted to test the switch or disconnect the battery. No dice on the switch and the battery is soldered on. Figuring the product was done for anyway, I crossed the connections where the battery connects to the circuit board.

Just like they said in Ghostbusters, crossing things is bad. This could cause a fire or a board killing short. YOU ARE RESPONSIBLE FOR YOUR OWN ATTEMPTS, do not blame me if this starts a fire or destroys you or the device. 

Crossing the circuit immediately switched off the speaker. I reassembled it and tried the power switch. It worked. The device connected to my phone and I was good to go.

Silly to spend this much effort on a Five Dollar product, but it worked. Save yourself some time and do not remove the two screws holding the board to the chassis.

New Product Launch - Swashbuckler Character Class for D&D and AD&D

I rarely create new character classes for my campaigns, but I felt I needed a different sort of character for seaborne adventures. The Swashbuckler character class was born.

This pamphlet was intended to add flavor to any campaign without creating overpowering skills or mechanics. Very often, new classes are game breaking and I have sought to avoid this.

Initially, the plan was to create one section for Basic D&D and another for AD&D. Since the Swashbuckler does not require extraordinary abilities, nor to they have level dependent skills, I was able to combine the two.

It had occurred to me to give the Swashbuckler some of the skills of thieves, paladins, monks and acrobats but these characters are not the type to engage in professional level skills. They are more charismatic enablers, they don’t develop useful professional skills, they capitalize on other people’s skills.

I would encourage DMs and players to play towards the humorous aspects of Errol Flynn shenanigans. Many times, this style of play revolves around the needed belief in success rather than the actual outcome. Swashbuckling success features going to Plan B, then C and D and so on.

This product contains two files, the character class description suitable for D&D and AD&D, plus a set of 6 pre-generated characters. This product would work well with both my AD&D Character Sheet and the book Zero to Hero: Uncommon Commoners. 

Click here to purchase from DriveThruRPG, for a suggested price of $0.99 or PWYW.

Mid-Month Tek Report

In the middle of last month, I implemented Google Analytics. The news isn't surprising, but it ain't so good. I can see that I will fail to reach my goals in the middle of the month, which is even worse.

When you use Blogger, you can see your page views in the stats tab. Looking at that today, I have 3,867 pageviews. When I compare to Google Analytics, I have 480. That isn't so hot. But it isn't terribly surprising. Why are they so different?

No idea. I don't care, I just want useful data.

Google Analytics is a more sophisticated product, so I am running with their numbers as a guide to goals for a couple of good reasons.

First, I can see reader behavior. 480 pageviews can be converted to session, the activities that one person does when visiting. I can see people hopscotch through my site as they read. One of the things I am very happy about is that I can see drops, the point at which people stop reading my blog. When I run down this path, I can see that a tiny percentage of users hop through 11 pages per session. That speaks to the depth of interest by the reader. It's not everyone, but a small subset. I cannot tell you how pleased I am to see that some people enjoy what I do to the 11 degree.

I had a goal of 3000 readers as of last month. I will not make that goal according to Analytics. So, let's change that. I wish to have 750 readers for August and maintain that 11 page reading cycle.

For the next few months, I will posting Blogger stats along side Analytics stats to get a feel of what is happening.

As always, I hope this information is useful to you and that you also enjoy the website.

All the right things, in three parts. Item three.

Back in 1996, I had no idea what I was supposed to be doing. The whole world was one big crazy snarl and I couldn’t figure any of it out.

One day, a coworker handed me a simple wooden puzzle. She got it from a vending machine and once it was dissembled, she could not get it back together.

It was so simple, I don’t know how she didn’t see the answer. I reassembled it and she pulled it apart as we talked. That little puzzle was passed back and forth between us, a dozen time or more as we talked.

It was so simple. Hold these pieces gently, like so, and the last piece tied it together. Pass it back, she pulled that piece and the whole thing came apart again.

23 years later, 18 of them married and it all works exactly as it did all those years ago. Kitty takes it apart and I put it together as we talk. I pull it apart and Kitty puts back together as we talk.

I have no idea where that little wooden puzzle went, but it works just the same.

On the Same Wavelength

Yes, I wear this cologne

This week, I have been thinking about villains. Personally, I love human or demi-human type villains. People that aren't going to turn into a snake, demon or dragon, because they are worse that any of those things. I also love making the villain equal or lower level than the PCs because the players never think to look down.

Of being on the same wavelength, a new podcast was introduced this week: Adventure Design Sessions. It's hosted by Tim Shorts of Gothridge Manor. This week's guest is Joe The Lawyer. You can follow them on MeWe. ADS can be found on Spotify, Anchor and all the great podcasting networks.

Since I am plugging things, why not plug my cologne company? My favorite colognes appear often on my blog, usually for the bottle styling but also for the great, sometimes witty names. My favorites are Villain, Perversion and Whitechapel. My wife wears Bitches Love Unicorns, Eat Me and Cheshire Cat. Check out Black Phoenix Alchemy Lab.

(This is not a sponsored ad, I just love all of these products.)

Eulogy of Perception

When turned 11 or 12, my little sister gave me a hamster for my birthday. Over the years, he had a dozen different names. The last one was "Herman Vermin", from a very warped comic book I can't recall the name of.

I never got into the crazy cage thing, he lived in a glass tank his whole life. But I held him every night. I'd sit reading this or that comic book, while the hamster scurried around. He was really well behaved and hardly chewed the corners of the comics.

On a long holiday weekend, Herman started acting funny. Slow, tired. He wasn't looking good. All of my friends and family were away. I didn't have anyone to ask for advice. I took him to the vet. It was the first time I had ever taken a pet to the veterinarian. It was hard.

The guy asked what the problem was and I told him that Herman looked sick.

He examined Herman and said: "It's old age. They don't live so long. I think it's time for you to say goodbye."

I really didn't want to say goodbye. I held him for a long time before going to bed. On my wall was a picture of me and Herman back on my birthday, when I first got him. Compared to that picture of 11 or 12 year old me and Herman, he looked paler, thinner and smaller. I fell asleep, lights on staring at that picture, reflecting on the past and how much that little guy meant to me.

And in the morning, he was gone. He passed while I slept. I was mad and confused. How could I not have been there for him when he had been there for me over all the years.

I buried him in the yard behind my apartment.

Frustrated by loneliness, I called my sister in Toronto. I told her what happened, expecting a sympathetic ear.

"So, ah... Are Mom and Dad still in California?" she asked.
"Yeah." I said.
"And Doug?"
"Alabama for Reserves," I said.
"Hmm. Mark and Ryan?"
"Looking for a college. Visiting family," I said.

I was getting mad. Really mad. She gave me this hamster, when was she going to say "I'm sorry for your loss"? I had this damn thing for all these years. And now he was gone and I was all alone. I was in my own apartment, alone. Really, really alone for the first time in my life.

I felt emptiness filling up with fire.

"I'm sorry, Phil," she said.

Finally!

"I'm so sorry. I hate to tell you this but hamsters only live about 18 months. Two years tops." She paused, and I felt my world sinking.

"Mom, Dad, me... all of your friends... we've been replacing that hamster every couple of years for over a decade. He died a long time ago. I'm sorry. But for someone who is so smart, you aren't very observant." 

"What the f..." I stammered.

"Hey, I'm your sister. It's what I'm here for. You're welcome."

Click.