We are Experiencing Technical Difficulties

So sorry, the wiki still isn't up.  I'm informed that "unsettling" occurred during the move; there are service people working on the issue presently.

In other news, I'm afraid I've removed 26 names from having access to my higher path blog.  To all such persons, I thank you gratefully for all that you've donated in the past; I have written on that blog since 2022, but as I'll be putting the continuing series there, the time has come to clean house.  If I have accidentally removed anyone that shouldn't have been removed, then please write me immediately at patreon, here in the comments, or on my email at alexiss1@telus.net, tell me the correct name of your account on patreon and I'll get that repaired.

A Move

The 17th post of this series that I've been writing, which is well over 16,000 words thus far, has been posted on The Higher Path.  I'm going to continue posting this series there, not here.  Access to the Higher Path can be obtained through my Patreon page.

I assume that some here have been enjoying it; and that most, not seeing it appear on some RSS feed, will just assume I'm not writing it any more.  But I assure the reader that I am.  

Redirect

For those able to visit, I've put up a new post on my Higher Path blog, the first in more than seven months.

What You've Missed in July

Here's a list of subject I wrote for The Higher Path and Authentic Adventures Inc. during the month of July 2020, that you haven't seen for want of a $3 or a $10 donation, towards my Patreon.  These posts are all a thousand words or more in length.

The Higher Path ($3/month)

Happy D&D: relating a video by Ian Danskin and the way that DMs and Players approach the game the way they approach life, and why there are many things that can go wrong in a game.  Investigations pursue the questions, why do we DM?  And why kill our own campaigns and get the players we deserve?

Why Rules Exist: an essay about the practical aspects of rules rather than philosophical, applied directly to why equipment lists demand rules to understand how equipment is used.  Some time is given to the simplification of equipment and why this creates less meaty games.

Why Experience is Vodka: a discussion of how game experience creates patterns of behaviour that are addictive to players, and how overfeeding that addiction is a bad thing.  Includes a detailed breakdown of different ways to grant experience, for combat, cleverness, participation and the choice of not using it at all, with pros and cons to each approach.

Nine Flaws: deconstructing what goes wrong in a campaign, relating to the failure of following procedures and dismissing the necessities of complications, making good rules and communicating those rules to players.

Combat and Honesty: not a discussion of screens and fudging, but a discussion of why OSR combat was broken from the very beginning and why all the changes that have been made to that system have utterly ignored the fatal flaw: it is boring.  Finishes with why gamesmanship for fun is a self-destructive process.

Effectively Playable: describes the precision in which rules are made in other games and how precision is so utterly lacking in D&D ~ and how that has wrought the process of constant necessary redesigns for the last 47 years.

The Road to the Last Word: a confession that rule-writing is the most boring sort of preparation that a DM can embark upon, and why it is absolutely essential.

What Makes Good Players: how D&D changes the DM's real life personality and character, and how that change, conveyed to players, creates a better gaming experience through education, permissiveness and responsibility.

Point-maps: an argument for why a DM should master the ability to make and consistently run a point-map before moving onto more complicated mapping and setting design.  Point-maps aren't the end goal and they're not really a solution, but they're workable and they can act as a stepping stone.

Mnemonic: an approach towards the essentials of seeing how the world works behind the mapped curtain.  Encourages the DM to see past what can be meaningfully designed on paper and into the very heart of world-active comprehension.

That's How You Get to Carnegie Hall: defines the difficulty of progressing through the creative process when we feel concern for how others will view and comment upon our work.  Offers constructive but time-consuming exercises to help learn the difference between bad writing and good writing.

Memories & Creations:  draws together numerous threads from earlier discussions about mapmaking, creativity and the enabling of players who have as much right to create points on a map as the DM, though this is something they must do without godlike powers.

Authentic Adventures Inc. ($10 a month)

If I haven't made it clear, these are notes on original adventure module creations and how to run them, not stories about a specific party moving through an adventure.

Dziwa: describes a dangerous journey across a desert to the town of Dziwa, introducing a description of the Mozabian Goat peoples.  The challenge is to behave appropriately in a dangerous foreign country, or else face severe consequences and possible death if they fail to both trust the natives and act politely.

Beyond Dziwa: to gain more information about their quest for the Ruby Cloak, the opportunity to speak to the dead requires a journey to a desert tomb, which will be found to be infested with giant wasps.  The complications and difficult invasion of the nest is followed by a fairly generous reward by the clerical guide for the party's success.

Tweggurt: describes the dangers of entering the town of Tweggurt, which is not denied to outsiders but is presently under the control of bandits who have seized and plundered the city, and now remain at the behest of the bandit queen Zegida.  To reach an important clue, however, the party would have to pass through the environs of Tweggurt, which will almost certainly get them arrested; how they deal with the arrest and how forthcoming they are creates both opportunities and hazards.

On to Wed Souf: escaping from Tweggurt, a party travels along the Wadi Rir towards Wed Souf, only to experience a desert downpour.  This brings the desert alives, creates circumstances by which the players will have to circumvent the appearance of many large animals who will congregate upon watering holes.  The players arrive a Wed Souf to find that a vast lake has formed near the town on account of the rain.

Aflu Lake: after many scenes in the dry desert, the party finds themselves crossing a pure-and-glorious freshwater lake created by the recent rainfall.  They encounter giant waterbeetles and iron feathered stymphalian birds, or merely pass them by, depending upon the DM's personal whims, in order to reach a monastery surrounded by water.  There they learn of the Ruby Cloak's probably location in the town of Mandel.

Mandel: at last, the end of the adventure, wrapping up the last questions and compelling the players to think out of the box in order to finally obtain the Ruby Cloak from the desert elements.  This leaves the players with a dilemma: do they keep the Cloak, which has vast power but not especially for the players, or do they hand the item over to the Taureg people in order to obtain great wealth and prestige?

Introducing Saithden: introducing a new adventure, in which a party stumbles across a deserted platform in the wilds of eastern Romania that hints of a huge treasure that was accumulated and hidden nine centuries before by the King of the Avars.  The hook includes details surrounding how to patiently introduce adventures patiently and not as a "you-must-do-it-now" demand.

Pierre LeBousqat: the players meet a key NPC in discovering the location of the treasure and what Saithden is, learning that the King who took the treasure lays sleeping under a mountain, and that he is probably possessed of a crown that brings immortality to the wearer.  The scene offers a pleasant role-playing opportunity for players who like to seek knowledge.

The Guardian of Rodna Tower: the players are asked to defeat an undead being to force it to yield information about where the mountain of Saithden is, so that they may go there and plunder it.  Introducing Khasparr a fighter-lich of great power, who will give in only if he is met repeatedly in single combat; failure to do so will mean the party cannot continue to pursue the quest for a full year.

All of this is available for the price it costs to obtain access to Authentic Adventures Inc.  If you like the posts I'm writing on Tao of D&D, these posts behind the pay wall are less frivolous, designed to help you successfully world build your campaign.  They are filled with inspiration and new concepts that you need to be a better and more progressive DM.

Please support me on Patreon every month.

What You've Missed in June

Here's a list of subject I wrote for The Higher Path and Authentic Adventures Inc. during the month of June 2020, that you haven't seen for want of a $3 or a $10 donation, towards my Patreon.  These posts are all a thousand words or more in length.

The Higher Path ($3/month)

Worldbuilding:  three posts detailing considerations that world builders can take ideas from regarding general science, mathematics, chemistry, geology, medicine and engineering, along with other factors worth examination.

The Setting's Life: examining ways to give the game setting a life of its own, providing depth to the game world experience and adjusting oneself as a DM to see through the eyes of NPCs and monsters.

All Europe, All the Time: a post challenging the Eurocentric view in mapmaking, discussing the drawbacks of Middle Earth, Greyhawk, Faerun and Eberron.

The Field Guide to Bad D&D: beginning a series on problem solving and deconstruction in DM-designed settings, discussing the drawbacks with assigning blame, the "bad apple theory," common fallacies and presumptions about game design, the presence of real skill where it comes to playing D&D and habits that drive us to all out embrace ideals that don't work.

The Sharp and Blunt Ends: an examination into why the DM feels pressured by players and the Internet as well to assume attitudes and techniques that ignore the DM's personal experience and potential success.

Why'd You Have to Go and Make Things So Complicated:  discussing the strategies of simplification vs. complex rule-making in D&D, and the effects each has on the attitudes of players and the manner in which they approach the game.

Understanding the Importance of Procedure: nearly what it says right on the tin, with techniques and tactics I employ to ensure that DMs maintain player focus, game momentum and player awareness of the game's rules.

Robur's Choice: a breakdown of why some players act badly and attack the game system instead of investing themselves into actual game play, asking the question, "Why did Robur the Thief set the bar on fire?"

Authentic Adventures Inc. ($10 a month)

Common Threads: explaining the importance of maintaining common themes and ideas in a game adventure, while laying out the structure of the adventure I'm writing on the blog, The Ruby Cloak.  Introduces my D&D race of Tauregs (npcs) based loosely off existing Earth clans crossed with Star Wars tusken raiders.

Events in Mraier: adventure notes on the caravan outpost of Mraier, located in the semi-desert north edge of the Sahara, featuring clues to the location of the Ruby Cloak, colored by encounters with a feral lion and the presence of dangerous bandits.

Cedrata Part I: describes the journey from Mraier to the deep desert trading town of Wargla, where the Cedrata ruins are encountered along way that serve as a potential side quest, one that does offer additional information about the location of the cloak.  Discusses how to run situations where a secret entrance would be irrational, due to the area being known and well searched for hundreds of years.  Includes the first half of the Cedrata mini-dungeon.

Cedrata Part II: completes Cedrata, introducing an unexpected "big bad" and potential for the party to increase their magic and make a big leap to an adventure that would be otherwise hard to reach.

Wargla Part I: a double-sized post introducing the town of Wargla, persons of importance that serve as contacts for the party, the solving of a puzzle piece in the location of the cloak, knowledge about a hidden order, the White Brotherhood, the obtaining of a map to Wargla's underground aqueduct system and set up for the 14-point underground lair of the hidden order.

Wargla Part II: a map of the lair and its first eight points of interest, featuring a battle with monks and pursuits taking place through several locations.

Wargla Part III: an advanced map of the lair and a set up for getting the party trapped in the lair between a high level npc and a rhinocerous version of the minotaur, a Cernnoth.  Plenty of potential roleplaying between the npc managing the lair and the party.

Wargla Last: how to get the party out of a spot where they've completely gotten themselves locked inside, with a combination of fighting monsters, piecing together a concealed exit and a mystery, and getting at least some treasure.

All of this is available for the price it costs to obtain access to Authentic Adventures Inc.  If you like the posts I'm writing on Tao of D&D, these posts behind the pay wall are less frivolous, designed to help you successfully world build your campaign.  They are filled with inspiration and new concepts that you need to be a better and more progressive DM.

Please support me on Patreon every month.

What You've Missed

Here is a list of posts that I wrote for The Higher Path during the month of May 2020, that you have not seen for want of a $3 donation, either to my sidebar or to my Patreon.

Finding D&D in the Dark:  the announcement of an allegorical, fictional book embracing the philosophy of D&D through the eyes of players over several sessions, on three levels.  The book presents the players in light of their day-to-day lives, the choices they make while gaming and the fictional player characters they create.  A 6,000 word preview is included.

Mentoring:  a proposal to approach worldbuilding through the blog as a structured, step-by-step process and examination, with an eye to supplying all the knowledge a DM needs to structure the function and behaviour of their game world.  A discussion follows on what the game setting is meant to accomplish.

Foil: an examination of the setting As the adventure, rather than merely a background.  I discuss freeing the game structure from the idea that things "end," while grasping the world being run as something "familiar," like your home, and related to the adventuring spirit you had in your childhood.

Being Bad: discussing the emotional temptation of breaking the usual moral rules of society as a good thing in D&D, and how it exists as a means to motivate the party to action.

And There Was ...: discussing the twin proposals of building a world from the top down or building it from the top up, suggesting that neither is very satisfactory and proposing a better, more practical solution.

Getting Started: a philosophical and practical discussion of a proposed setting's "weirdness" and "specificity," and the dangers presented by each.  Followed by the necessity of the world's structure being one that is designed for usefulness rather than novelty, as this will serve the players better.

Worldbuilding Aspects I: the beginning of a series that outlines the many aspects of the game setting, from the perspective of a DM being aware of how knowledge can produce adventuring opportunities while deepening and expanding the setting's scope.   This post discusses philosophy, religion and history.

Worldbuilding Aspects II: this post discusses geography, linguistics, literature, the arts and sociology.

Worldbuilding Aspects III: this post discusses economics and politics.

Worldbuilding Aspects IV: this post discusses education, communications and general science.

The next post in the series will be published on June 1st.

These, and many more posts, are available for a simple $3 donation.  The price of a cup of coffee.