Hero Spotlight #7: The Savage

Not all heroes are shiny, happy civilized people that live in idyllic villages, or metropolitan cities.  Sometimes a hero is what you least expect, and in the tradition of Tarzan and Conan, today we take a look at none other than the Savage.  Savages are heroes that may not necessarily know or care about law or civilized manner, but possess an innate goodness in them that brands them as heroes in their own right.  Free from the limitations of having to fear the repercussions of the law (even if often only due to sheer ignorance,) the Savage cuts straight to the heart of evil and delivers a primal brand of justice.

Hero Spotlight #6: The Penitent

Some people have a lot to make up for, and it’s their efforts to set things right that make them into remarkable characters on their own right.  The strength earned from regret is a powerful motivation and makes for an intriguing and mature character concept.  Whether it’s starting over, or trying to undo something he was responsible for The Penitent is a goldmine of plot hooks and concepts fit for any game.

Hero Spotlight #5: The Specialist

If there’s one thing about players, it’s that they always prefer to have a Unique and Beautiful Snowflake, a character that stands out from the norm by being exceptional somehow.  Nowhere is this more pronounced therefore than in The Specialist.  As indicated by the archetype’s name, The Specialist is a character made to excel at a given (and assumed to be significant) field, and therefore is invaluable when it comes to their field of expertise.

That being said The Specialist is an example of niche protection at its finest.  By isolating a given subset of actions and making that your top priority you outstrip your peers and get to revel in it whenever the situation you’re optimized for comes up and the spotlight’s on you.

Hero Spotlight #4: The Wingman

Continuing with our Hero Spotlight, let’s take a moment to bring notice to the unsung heroes of any adventuring party… the Wingman.  The Wingman is the guy who watches your back, warns you of danger, and makes sure the rest of the team gets the job done, even if he gets none of the glory.  Needless to say every party can benefit from a Wingman.

Hero Spotlight #3: The Lone Wolf

If there’s a heroic archetype that everyone at one point or another has wanted to play, it would be the Lone Wolf.  Popularized by far too many examples of fiction everywhere, the badass, brooding, ultra-competent archetype is also another candidate for cliche.  Compounded with the problem that inconsiderate versions of the Lone Wolf pop up in nearly every gaming group at one point or another and you can see just why GMs usually scrutinize these concepts very closely.

Unforseen Delays & Another Week without a Game

Another week, another game that didn’t push through.

This week’s game was called on a host of things, from one player not feeling up to it, to the venue (a local Starbucks) suddenly full of shrieking harridans that descended upon the tables next to ours and raising an unholy racket of fangirl squeeing and talk about some asian actor.

Needless to say it was not the kind of atmosphere for running nWoD.

Hero Spotlight #2: The Veteran

In stark contrast to the Farmboy, the Veteran represents the aged hero, the one who has experienced the world for what it is, through experiences both joyful and tragic.  While lots of characters in RPGs are built as having had prior experience or adventures, few of these concepts actually carry the hallmarks of a Veteran.

The Veteran makes for a compelling character as his struggles is unique in the sense that not only does he have to contend with external conflict in the form of monsters and villains, but he also must contend with his own limitations, as age slowly erodes his abilities.  His achievements of the past have eclipsed his current capabilities, and he can no longer deny that he truly is over the hill.

Hero Spotlight #1: The Farmboy

As a counterpoint to the Villain Spotlight, I’ve been asked to start a new series to focus on heroic archetypes.  Since this is a heroic feature, I’ve decided to step away from the GM POV, and into the Player POV, as most of the protagonists in an RPG will be composed of player characters.

Luke Skywalker, Rand al’Thor, Parn, Belgarion, Clark Kent… what do they have in common?  They all started off as simple village youths. The simple Farmboy who grows up to be a hero is such a basic Archetype, that it’s skirting cliche in literature, but it never really sees the kind of action that it technically should in gaming.

In the first article for the Hero Spotlight, we’ll deal with the Farmboy Archetype and just how it can be used by players to create their own characters.

Tabletop RPG Tropes & Lexicon (Warning: Very Long)

Dirty Yasuki requested for this over in the “What would you like to see here” post and the idea kind of stuck to my head so I’m giving this one a spin.  That said, this is going to be a work in progress, that I’ll be updating now and then with new tropes and terms as I come up with them, or as people submit them to me.  To that end I’ll also be opening up a page on the site so that people will have easy access to it for future viewing.

So… on to the entries!

4E DND Play Report I – Illyria, Magitech Setting

Hi there, Rick here.  Pointy asked if I could do a little report on how things are going in the campaign.  So here goes.

CHARACTER CREATION SESSION

My Illyria Magitech Campaign has been running for three sessions… so I suppose I’ll divide the report into three parts.  During the first session, the group and I held a character creation session.

Illyria was primarily a setting hugely based in Final Fantasy Magitech, Alexandre Dumas, and Elizabethan Europe – so to maintain the theme, I had to make sure everyone was on the same page. We had a few problems, with regards to character concepts… which include such crazy concepts like the purple elf and a mass-murdering demon worshipper.  I had to say no immediately.