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.