Category Archives: Spotlight

Dying Earth Spells for D&D

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Image from Wikipedia

TLDR: download spell PDF here: Dying Earth Spells for D&D.

John left a comment on my recent post about magic-users drawing my attention to a document he put together: Dying Earth Spells for D&D (original Scribd link). This is perhaps the best collection of spells I have seen. Here are some of the spells: The Howling Rune, The Manifold Effigies of Being, The Spell of Celeritous Relocalisation. There were enough entries that I assumed the document was just a list of spell names.

This free document contains 30 fantastically named spells per level (up to 6th, which God intended to be the highest level of magic-user spells). That is 180 spells, and every single one has a brief description.

Here’s one example:

Evard’s Frictionless Field
R: 1″D: 3 rounds + 1/levelAoE: 1″ squareSave: Special
Save vs. spell or slip and fall. If cast on item then save or drop immediately.

Even better, it is organized by level, not alphabet.

Thank you John for creating such a fantastic resource.

Alexandrian Hex Crawling

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Justin Alexander has been putting out some posts on hexcrawls. Here are some links:

They assume the 3E skill system, but are still interesting reads. For comparison, see my old wilderness movement costs post (which is really just a slightly simplified version of the B/X wilderness movement system).

In particular, his concept of “watch” seems like higher temporal resolution than I need. What I have been doing is one encounter check per day (with a die roll to determine time of day). This is pretty much as specified by the original Expert rulebook. There are also rules for discovering fixed features through exploring hexes rather than moving through them (like searching a room for secret doors in a dungeon). It is also possible to notice some fixed features without searching form them.

Justin also left this provocative comment on one of the posts:

If you find yourself starting to worry about where the PCs are “in the hex”, you’re doing it wrong.

I need to think about that more. Should the hex be an atomic measure of wilderness space? It has a pleasing absolutism to it. It does remove the idea of zooming hex levels, but perhaps that is unnecessary complexity anyways.

Two Monsters

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The blog Dungeons & Drawings has had several noteworthy monster illustration entries recently. First is the siege crab, which is:

[A] half-living tank, forged by the Kuo Toa (or any other evil sea-dwelling race, should you wish) by surgical and magical means. A live giant crab is taken and a chunk of its insides are taken out to create a small transportation area where its handlers can sit.

Then there is the elder brain, which is sort of like a cylon basestar for illithids, in function if not appearance:

The life of the mind flayer begins and ends in the tank of the Elder Brain. As little tadpoles, they’re placed in its tank, where it feeds off their psychic energy. Those who survive get to become fully formed mind flayers. At the end of an mind flayer’s life, the brain is removed from the creature’s head and placed in the tank, where it’s absorbed by their leader.

I believe both of these monsters were introduced in 3E and are official D&D monsters (though they were new to me). They are both great ideas. I have still never run a heavily aquatic scenario, and it’s something I would like to try at some point. I can imagine rather than tanks, what if the elder brains inhabited great airless flooded caverns and tunnels? This would necessitate descending into the watery depths to actually defeat an illithid colony; sort of like a fantasy Lovecraftian version of The Abyss.

Castle Greyhawk Elevation

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Both Grognardia and Stefan Poag recently mentioned WGR1 Greyhawk Ruins. Apparently this is one of those megadungeon publications that I had never heard of, and does not seem to be very highly thought of by Greyhawk fans (or some Grognardia commenters: exhibit 1, exhibit 2). The Amazon reviews, however, are uniformly positive (even the two star review criticizes it as “a location not an adventure,” which sounds like a compliment to me).

What was the point of this post? Oh yeah, while I was looking for images of the product (because I was not sure if it was a boxed set or something else; the answer is a paperback), I found this evocative elevation picture on the Wizards site:

Click to make larger (source)

The image can be found in this free gallery (cached here since it is freely available), and seems to be from some Third Edition take on Castle Greyhawk. I kind of just want to take that elevation and draw my own maps for it.

DCC Beta Rules

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The Dungeon Crawl Classics RPG Beta Rules are can be downloaded for free. I just saw this link over at Beyond the Pale Gate, but the scratchings on the PDF seems to indicate that it is from June 2011, so you very well might already have seen it. If you haven’t, you are in for a treat.

Even if you don’t have time to read the PDF right away (I certainly don’t), download it anyways just to skim through and look at the art. The many full-page Peter Mullen pieces are worth it alone. Not to mention the works by many other artists, including an excellent Erol Otus picture on page 44. The comics sprinkled throughout are also a nice touch.

Dwimmermount Preview

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For those of you with the ACKS PDF, check out the last page. You will find a dungeon level map and this text:

This map can be used in your campaign if you need to stock a dungeon or provide a handout for players who have unexpectedly found a map as part of a treasure hoard. Only the wisest – or those who have been visiting the Autarch website at www.autarch.co, and following James Malizewski’s updates at grognardia.blogspot.com — will recognize that this is also a preview of the legendary Dwimmermount, to be published using the Adventurer Conqueror King compatibility license through a partnership between Grognardia Games and Autarch.

I haven’t seen any mention about the publication of Dwimmermount using the Adventurer Conqueror King compatibility license. Google searches limited to grognardia.blogspot.com don’t turn up anything, so I don’t think I missed an announcement. You heard it here first! (Sort of.)

AD&D Reprint

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I’m sure you will read this elsewhere, but here I go anyways. Wizards of the Coast has announced that the core AD&D books will be reprinted in early 2012. New covers, original interior art, limited edition (unfortunately). The price looks to be in line with other standard hardcovers, which is nice. They are supporting the Gygax Memorial Fund with some of the proceeds.

Secret Santicore 2011 Compilation

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Jez over at Giblet Blizzard has completed the compilation of Secret Santicore 2011! It’s a free 10 MB PDF download, and has production values higher than many professionally produced publications. It’s fully illustrated as well. Minus the covers, there are 102 pages of content.

My regard should not be considered impartial, as my Weird Cult Generator is included.

Thanks also to Adam Watts, who provided my request, a wilderness stronghold generator on page 70 (I want more tools for wilderness stronghold creation based on my thoughts about power centers here).

Go, download, and thank Jez for his excellent work.