What do you like about OGL, Conan, & REH's writing?

[flatscan]

Due to previous encounters with other posters on this board that have nothing good to say about OGL, Conan, or Robert E Howard's writing (which begs the question, what the hell are those posters doing on this board?) I'm opening this thread up as a positive option for any of these subjects.

First, OGL Conan has worked well for my gaming group and I. The "fluff" in the Mongoose books is near pitch-perfect if we ignore a couple of 2e regional books. Vincent Darlage has penned some great supplements that really breathe life into the dangerous regions in the Hyborian Age. I've been running my campaign in an episodic fashion, much like Howard wrote of Conan's wanderings. As such the PCs have been getting quite the tour of the Thurian continent. They started in Turan as mercenaries (Coming of Hanuman), had 3 adventures in Zamora (Black Stones of Kovag-re, Tower of the Elephant, Dark Dens of Iniquity), fled to Corinthia (Lurking Terror of Nahab), had several excursions in Nemedia (The Pit Where Mad Things Drum, Horror in Numalia), saved the kingdom of Ophir (adapted an old TSR Conan module based on Robert Jordan's Conan Triumphant), dealt with corrupt priests in Tarantia (Heretics of Tarantia) and are now pushing back the Pictish hordes (Defending the West).

The tactical combat options that OGL provide mean every encounter plays differently from those before it. Recently I ran an encounter in the Pictish Wilderness where the PCs path was blocked by the decaying corpse of a "dragon." The corpse blocked access to a rickety bridge that stretched across a gorge. The stench of the decaying beast resulted in Fortitude saves needed to be made whenever a PC got close to the dead creature. One of the PCs scaled the dead critter to get a view of what lay beyond. That's when the parasite attacked. Tentacles burst out of the decaying dragon and grabbed Xacksmith. It then attempted to hurl him over the side of the gorge, but the Hyrkanian made his Reflex save (stunningly so, he rolled a nat 20 and his mods are nothing to sneeze at) and managed to keep himself from tumbling over. The Cimmerian barbarian, Cuana scaled a tree and leapt to Xacksmith's side where the two warriors attempted to slay the beast. On the other side of the decaying dragon the Aesir barbarian Tullweim used his bardiche to clear the path to the parasite. The Stygian sorcerer Dhak fired arrows into it and the battle from their side was literally in the belly of a dead beast. We use a tactical map for our encounters and I've had a lot of success using e-adventure tiles as visual aids. They're cheaper than the maps WotC and Paizo make, plus I can open them up in Photoshop and really customize it to fit my encounter needs.

One of the things I absolutely love about the Conan game is the diversity of locales to adventure in. The melting pot of cultures and environments means the PCs are always encountering something new. They'd gotten bored with the Hyborian kingdoms so we moved the campaign to the Pictish wilderness. From there we'll likely move to the Western Ocean with some pirating adventures. At some point they'll be in Stygia and then the Black Kingdoms. The regional source books that are out for this game provide so much great detail of these exotic locales. One thing that helps me convey just how alien the cultures are to the PCs is music. I start every game session with a recap of what happened before with the opening music of Basil Poulderis' Conan the Barbarian score. The music from both the Age of Conan game as well as the Conan single-player video game and Conan the Dark Axe game have served me well. The Gladiator soundtrack has provided a couple of choice tracks to my game as well as the 300 score (I can forgive electric guitars in the middle of combat ). The God of War scores also work well for setting a mood in the Hyborian Age.

I don't really use miniatures in my game, preferring tokens as an easier, cheaper, and less time-consuming option. What I've done in the past is model my tokens after the ones that came in the Shadizar and Messantia boxed sets. I'll pull an image into Photoshop and add a circular frame around it. Then I'll print out a sheet of the tokens and use a 1" circular punch to cut the tokens out. I used to buy wooden circles from Hobby Lobby to mount the tokens onto but one of my players recently bought me some metal discs that are slimmer and have a better heft to them. Storage of these tokens is a snap. I've bought a bead box from Wal-mart and am able to fit all my critters into it so far.

Finally, there's the stories that drew me in in the first place. I'm not a fan of pastiches, preferring REH's compelling words to any others in the sword & sorcery genre. My all-time favorite is "Hour of the Dragon," though some recent design/layout work I've been doing has led me to place "Red Nails" higher in my appreciation of Conan stories. I really dig the growth we see of Conan as a character from his earliest adventures to his last. He starts of with none of the burdens of civilizations rules. A strong sword is all Conan thought he needed in the beginning, and he did pretty well with just that to start. But in stories like "Red Nails" he's faced with a creature that his sword can't cleave. He looks at his surroundings and Macgyver's up a spear that he laces with poison from the Apples of Derketo. I love it when the PCs in my game use this kind of thinking to defeat their opponents as well and reward them with Fate Points or extra XP when a clever solution is formulated.

So how about all you out there? What methods work best for your games? What REH stories get your creative juices flowing the most? How do you run your campaigns? Episodic or as a continual story ala "Trial of Blood"?

 

[zozotroll]

I am stealing 5 minutes off of work so this is short.

Conan makes no apologies for what he is. Nor does REH pretty up things . Of course this was before PC came along, but I dont believe he would have thought much of it.

i like feats. They give you a good way to avoid the cookie cutter PCs that you get in most level based games. I think the skill system needs a lot of work, but it is still usable, so better than many.

I like fate points. One of those simple things you "Why didnt I think of that" I have used luck points or hero points or whatever for 30 years. Fate points , particularly left for dead is a simply great idea.

 

[Demetrio]

I was pleasantly surprised how well d20 works for Conan (I'm not generally a d20 fan). We use a few house rules for combat (essentially to nerf 2hw and to make 2 weapon fighting rather less attractive than simply swinging a broadsword (or whatever) and not fussing about a shields or off hand weapons (neither of which make much of an appearence in Howard). But we've tweaked combat in every system we've played bar original RQ so it's not really an especial d20 failing.

Three of us play in an episodic campaign, taking turns to GM and dotting about in the characters' lives (we have the same characters done from levels 6-12 and choose the appropriate sheet). None have died yet, but if one does, the 'later' adventures in which he participated will be merely part of the character's myth, if you see what I mean. This works a lot better than any of us thought it would and it makes it easy for the GM to say, 'okay chaps, level 8 adventure tonight...' rather than him fretting about changing stats to suit character level, we pick the level to suit the adventure.

As for Howard's writing, I wouldn't describe him as a hack. He's not literary in the way of McEwan say, or Rushdie. But though he does use some of the devices of a hack (it's amazing how often Conan hacks a foe in half so his torso goes one way and legs another), the stories are a cut above hackwork (like the pastiches of Offut etc). Howard to me is more a storyteller in the MacDonald Fraser (Flashman series) or Patrick O'Brian mode (though he's not as technically good a writer as either). His stories might not have a deep message, or hidden meaning but to be honest that makes them much better stories than many literary novels. For many years Raymond Chandler was derided as a hack. In the past couple of decades he's become a literary figure. I don't personally think Howard's as good as Chandler (or even Hammet). But he's not that far behind. Very few of Howard's short stories are weak. I think his best Conan ones are Red Nails (though I don't like the 'dragon slaying' myself, because it's too A-Team/Mcgyver), Black Colossus (the battle scene, though quite short, has always stuck with me), and A Witch Shall Be Born. What slightly lets down some of the other tales is that the 'main love interest' is sometimes highly irritating in her character.

 

[PrinceYyrkoon]

I was pleasantly surprised how well d20 works for Conan (I'm not generally a d20 fan). We use a few house rules for combat (essentially to nerf 2hw and to make 2 weapon fighting rather less attractive than simply swinging a broadsword (or whatever) and not fussing about a shields or off hand weapons (neither of which make much of an appearence in Howard). But we've tweaked combat in every system we've played bar original RQ so it's not really an especial d20 failing.

Three of us play in an episodic campaign, taking turns to GM and dotting about in the characters' lives (we have the same characters done from levels 6-12 and choose the appropriate sheet). None have died yet, but if one does, the 'later' adventures in which he participated will be merely part of the character's myth, if you see what I mean. This works a lot better than any of us thought it would and it makes it easy for the GM to say, 'okay chaps, level 8 adventure tonight...' rather than him fretting about changing stats to suit character level, we pick the level to suit the adventure.

As for Howard's writing, I wouldn't describe him as a hack. He's not literary in the way of McEwan say, or Rushdie. But though he does use some of the devices of a hack (it's amazing how often Conan hacks a foe in half so his torso goes one way and legs another), the stories are a cut above hackwork (like that of Offut etc). Howard to me is more a storyteller in the MacDonald Fraser (Flashman series) or Patrick O'Brian mode (though he's not as technically good a writer as either). His stories might not have a deep message, or hidden meaning but to be honest that makes them much better stories than many literary novels. For many years Raymond Chandler was derided as a hack. In the past couple of decades he's become a literary figure. I don't personally think Howard's as good as Chandler (or even Hammet). But he's not that far behind.

A fair appraisal, Demitrio. Maybe 'hack' was a bit too far. (This is for flatscan; I dont hate the OGL).

Ive run about 7 or 8 adventures so far. I do have an aim to convert to RQ, but it doesnt consume all of my waking hours. Ive gotten on pretty well with the OGL, but its early days, maybe the convolutions get more intense as the levels increase. So far, though, my players have seemed to enjoy it. They started off at the begining, 1st level, I dont like to start campaigns at higher levels. They began on the coast of the Black Kingdoms, in Zabhela, adventuring into the untracked interior, in search of some cyclopean ruins (I dont often used published adventures, though I do use them for inspiration).

Its good, I dont know whether the game system helps or hinders the feeling of constant damp in a jungle, the occasional calls of strange beasts, but its working. One guys gone mad with the isolation, another stepped on a poisonous thorn, his skin blackening, his tongue flaring up, he died a horrible death. Two down, three to go, and we havent even got to the ruins. The Hyborian Age is a pretty spectacular setting.

 

[Rodericus]

Greetings!

I really like OGL Conan, it´s a simple system and my players are all familiar with it, so we make the best of it timewise (since we don´t have much opportunities to gather and play on account of work and other responsibilities). For the same reasons, we play episodic, but with new characters after 2 or 3 adventures, which gives us the chance to play not only throughout all of the hyborian world (we still got to go East!) but with different classes, races and concepts.

In my gaming group we are all big REH and Conan fans so that helps a lot in setting mood and pacing of our adventures, so we usually go for all the stereotypical characters of REH and so far it´s been extremely fun.

All in all, I enjoy playing OGL Conan, it´s fast, it´s easy and it manages to keep a true REH spirit, without becoming just another "high fantasy" setting. Still, it all depends on how you play it, I suppose.

 

[flatscan]

We use a few house rules for combat (essentially to nerf 2hw and to make 2 weapon fighting rather less attractive than simply swinging a broadsword (or whatever) and not fussing about a shields or off hand weapons (neither of which make much of an appearence in Howard). But we've tweaked combat in every system we've played bar original RQ so it's not really an especial d20 failing.

I've seen many discussions about 2hw on this board but have never had a problem with them myself. Yes, they're powerful, as they should be, but they can't be used effectively in every situation. For example, I use the -2 to attack roll trick from D&D whenever a PC is using a 2hw in a confined space, like a narrow hallway. Also, they're a pain to have to sheathe, unsheathe if a PC is trying to scale a cliff while being pursued and the like. You can't 'bite sword' with a 2hw either. Keeping this in mind has mitigated the power of 2hw in my game. Currently the only PCs that roll with 'em are the Barbarians, go figure. :wink:

Three of us play in an episodic campaign, taking turns to GM and dotting about in the characters' lives (we have the same characters done from levels 6-12 and choose the appropriate sheet). None have died yet, but if one does, the 'later' adventures in which he participated will be merely part of the character's myth, if you see what I mean. This works a lot better than any of us thought it would and it makes it easy for the GM to say, 'okay chaps, level 8 adventure tonight...' rather than him fretting about changing stats to suit character level, we pick the level to suit the adventure.

That's a cool concept. I've played with the idea of running a campaign like that too but found the book-keeping to keep chronology and such too much work for me. Fate Points make it particularly tough to kill PCs anyhow (which it should be IMO). Have you house-ruled Fate Points at all? Recently, I added a rule to my game that a Fate Point could be used for 'Left for Dead' in response to a successful coup de grace on a PC. Fate had it that the villains sword was just slightly off mark by an inch. The PC still went to negative HP but after time and healing could be revived.

 

[flatscan]

I think the skill system needs a lot of work, but it is still usable, so better than many.

What specifically do you dislike about the skill system? Too many skills? Too few?

 

[Demetrio]

The main problem I have with d20 skills is that virtually every 4th level Thief will have 7 ranks in Hide and Sneak, Disarm Device, Open Locks, etc.

Whereas in most other systems two thiefy characters will likely have different strengths (they'll likely bothe be decent at most thiefy things, but one might be an expert lockpicker whilst the other one is far stealthier). One way round this is to abolish the level skill cap but to double the cost for ranks above 10. We've not done this, and to be fair it's not usually an issue for a normal 'party' where there will likely be one of each 'class' anyway. But being able to max out in lots of skills has always bothered me, and the artificial cap does a bit too.

Regarding the episodic campaign, it really is episodic. So the only extra book-keeping is the need for seven character sheets (one for each level). The beauty of a level based system is that it makes this kind of thing dead easy.

 

[flatscan]

The main problem I have with d20 skills is that virtually every 4th level Thief will have 7 ranks in Hide and Sneak, Disarm Device, Open Locks, etc.

But that's ultimately up to the player. Thieves get one of the widest net of skills to choose from. He doesn't have to go all out with particularly thiefy skills if he's got another concept he wants to play with. + Conan encourages multi-classing. A Borderer/Thief is not going to devote all his skills to Disable Device or Open Locks for example.

 

[Demetrio]

Yes. But the fact is that the level cap is an artificial restriction and does mean that characters of the same level specialising in the same skill (and many skills will be chosen as necessary by more than one character) will have the same ranks (and quite likely the same total skill bonus).

Multiclassing makes a wee bit of a difference, but to be honest I think not that much for the most common skills which most characters take (Spot, Listen, Sneak etc)

 

[ferrinwulf]

The thing I like about OGl is the mix and match from other products. for instance good drinking rules in Tornaments and fairs, torn asunder for crital hits and called shots and Pathfinder for great revsions of 3.5 such as Combat manouvers bonus rolls grapple is now an oppossed d20 roll, a good fighter class to use instead of soldier and a good skills revison, gets rid of the multiple bonus at level 1 (you get a bonus of +3 for if you put points in a class skill instead) and the total number of ranks is = your level.

 

[flatscan]

The thing I like about OGl is the mix and match from other products. for instance good drinking rules in Tornaments and fairs, torn asunder for crital hits and called shots and Pathfinder for great revsions of 3.5 such as Combat manouvers bonus rolls grapple is now an oppossed d20 roll, a good fighter class to use instead of soldier and a good skills revison, gets rid of the multiple bonus at level 1 (you get a bonus of +3 for if you put points in a class skill instead) and the total number of ranks is = your level.

Yeah, that's something that's made my life as a Conan GM MUCH easier. I myself have made use of Sword & Sorcery's Creature Collections I & II as well as the d20 Call of Cthulhu book which has great d20 versions of classic Mythos critters which fit right in the Hyborian Age.

 

[zozotroll]

To few skills. And of course, not enough skill points to go with them. If you have ever seen Rolemaster, you get the idea. If not, 4 pages of skills. That is perhaps to many, but what to cut can be a problem. I only had 1 person take surfing, but 3 took poetic improvisation. I would not have thought anybody would.

Nordhiemers should be able to ski. Some of the Islanedrs may have developed surfing. And so on.

The thing is, many of those skills will not be used that often, yet the offer the chance to add little personel quirks. Right now you are hard pressed to cover basic adventurer skills.

I dont think the current skill set is what is best for the game, but what could be fit on one sheet.

 

[Azgulor]

THE OGL

I’ve been playing RPGs for over 20 years – yeah, I’m a grognard. I’ve been a junkie of fantasy and science fiction for even longer. Like many, D&D was my introduction to RPGs – and I was hooked almost immediately. However, it wasn’t long before myself and my players began scratching our heads at some of D&D’s idiosyncrasies. As 2e rolled along, TSR amplified those issues into jarring annoying items that detracted from the enjoyment of the game. It caused me explore and play a wide and diverse range of games during the next 2 decades but it resulted in my dropping D&D as the “engine of choice”.

OGL ended the quest for the “best” RPG/game engine for me and my players. Rather than learn a new RPG from the ground up, OGL – through the work of 3rd-party publishers, gave me the toolkit that allowed me to customize my games/campaigns to my, and more importantly, my players’ tastes. I don’t like writing rules – I want to focus on playing or GM-craft (adventures, NPCs, settings). So rather than “taking the programming language and writing the code” (like GURPS, e.g.), I had a toolkit comprised of plug-n-play components.

While WotC focused on D&D and D&Disms with their continuing & new idiosyncrasies (X-mas tree effect, I’m looking at you), the OGL allowed folks like Mongoose, Green Ronin, Paizo, and others to develop new rules to tweak campaigns, cleave closer to mythology, or adapt the OGL for licensed properties.

With the OGL, I didn’t have to play in a fantasy world defined by WotC. I could game in a fantasy world defined by me. Did I do it prior to the OGL? Yes, but I had to do a lot more of the heavy lifting. The OGL liberated me from that.

The OGL gave me a gaming library beyond what I could have anticipated or conceived. Thank you, WotC for the OGL and the 3rd edition of D&D. Thank you, Mongoose and other 3PPs, for expanding the OGL universe, doing the heavy lifting, and giving me the best RPG toolkit I could have hoped to have.

If not for the OGL, my D&D 3e books would have been a curiosity to read. I'll play a 3.x game of D&D if that's my only option. I'll jump at the chance to run/play an OGL game.

 

[Azgulor]

The Conan RPG

The Conan RPG showed me that the d20 engine could be used for classic swords-n-sorcery and not just D&D (which I consider to be high fantasy). It also made me intensely interested in Conan and Hyboria through the writings of REH. (Previously, my only knowledge of Conan came from some Robert Jordan novels and the Arnold movies.) The things I like:

1. Archetypical classes. I could pick just about any character from my favorite fantasy novels, movies, etc. and identify them with a Conan character class or multi-class combo. I’d also learned by this point, that although point-buy systems allowed for total customization, it required more time, thought, and analysis than my group was willing to suffer. I’d also learned by this time that rules-light games didn’t allow for enough customization of characters – too many were too alike each other. Unlike D&D, where every new magic source justified a character class – Conan paid homage to the differences in warrior tropes. PC-worthy Noble (and later Temptress) classes pushed it over the top.

2. Combat enhancements: Parry & Defense scores, Armor as DR, Combat Maneuvers, HP caps. All great stuff. I’ve got a group of heavy role-players but nothing blows off steam and gets the high-fives going around the table like blood-drenched, ass-kicking combat.

3. Classic Swords-n-sorcery. Magic that’s corrupting, dark, mysterious. Magic items that aren’t technology replacements. Focus on skill versus equipment. High living rules.

4. 2e Fate Points. The original fate points were good, but 2e’s “obtain player input for Fate Point foreshadowing” was fantastic. Yeah, I can (and have countless times) asked “What kind of adventures/stories do you like?” and I’ll get some vague suggestions. By linking it to their character with an in-game benefit: some RPG gold I’d been mining to get for years.

5. Source material TLC. By keeping to REH canon in the core rulebook, highlighting where going afield into pastiche sources, and ongoing author input on Mongoose’s forums, it’s easy to see Mongoose’s love and respect for the source material. Special kudos to Vincent Darlage, one of the greatest living sages of Hyborian info. He’s become one of the poster children of RPG awesomeness in my eyes. If that makes me sound like a rabid fanboy to some (and you know who you are) that’s cool with me.

6. Quality support. One of the best-supported RPG lines – ever. Long may it remain so. Oh, and I want my Thief’s Companion and my CROM-DAMNED HYBORIAN EMPIRES!!!! Pretty please?

7. Codes of Honor. Better than alignments while achieving similar results.

8. OGL Compatibility. I love me a good Conan campaign. I also like Thieves’ World. And Game of Thrones. So I also run a campaign using the Conan rules as the core foundation with selected classes and mechanics from Thieves’ World to run a game in the Kingdoms of Kalamar setting. And I can cherry pick from any OGL source I want and while I may need to do some tweaking, I’m not writing rules from scratch.

 

[Azgulor]

REH’s Writing

I hadn’t read REH prior to buying the Conan RPG. Boy, was I missing out!!!

1. Rollicking swords-n-sorcery goodness. High adventure, nightmarish villains, they’ve got it all.

2. Unlike the popular portrayal of Conan, he develops as a character. He’s not depicted as perfect, sometimes he’s a savage mercenary, sometimes his barbaric world view is a source of nobility, and sometimes he’s a tragic figure that’s never truly satisfied. Much more complex than I ever understood him to be.

3. Multiculturalism as it is, not some PC-version of it. We see the cultures of Hyboria through the eyes of Conan – good and bad. Slavery, violence, bigotry, religious strife. No I’m not advocating bigotry. Unlike most modern fantasy that imposes 20th-21st century morality on a medieval setting, Hyboria is not politically correct. It seems all the more complex, dangerous, and realistic for the lack of it. Apparently, REH wasn't the only one to think the approach was a good one. Some guy with the initials GRRM seems to be having some success with it as well.

4. Most stories are about surviving in a savage world rather than saving the world from “insert name of all-powerful big bad evil”. Yet Conan and the other characters don’t seem any less heroic for the lack of high fantasy tropes.

5. The grandeur of the Hyborian Age. The sense of history, conflict between civilization and barbarism, the cultural and national differences all blend into one satisfying whole. From a birds-eye view is it a hodge-podge? Yup, just like our own world. When I read a story set in Aquilonia, Zamoria, or Stygia – I can discern the cultural differences and the exotic seems even more so because of it.

6. When I read Conan, I just don’t envision adventures and campaigns for fantasy, I see how to incorporate pulp and horror influences into my game --- without thinking I have to switch games/genres in order to do so.


So yeah, I’m a fan. Do I care if a Literature professor rails against the lack of social commentary, symbolism, or satire? Not one damn bit. Last time I checked, books filled with those things are still on the library shelves, longing for the next time they’ll be assigned-reading in some class – ‘cause that might be the only time they’re ever checked out. I’ll read Howard over Hemmingway or Steinbeck any damn day and twice on Sunday.

 

[flatscan]

Good stuff Azgulor.

Any of you guys have preferred methods while prepping or running a game? Do you use music or visuals or other stimuli to set a mood? Any interesting house rules?

 

[zozotroll]

Just got done with a game.

What I try to do, is figure out what the party will do next. And cover perhaps 2-3 alternates, if I think they may not go in one direction. Then I work out what encounters are likely to occur, figure out combat stats for all of them, as you never know when PCs are going to attack somebody completely harmless. Then I dig out minis for all the encounters.

Then gather up any terrain that fits the area they are in. By then there is usual an idea or two that has trickled into my head, so I go back and rework as needed.

Finaly, I go over any rules I am not that sure of. Right now, that includes most of them. Not that I dont know 3.5, but that there are a number of differences that can trip you if you dont keep up. The guy I am playing with was a Scribe for WoTC, so he always knows the rules better than me anyway, but I try to not embarass myself to much.

When I am wargaming, I try to play period appropriate music.

Does it show that I was a miniature wargamer before there where such things as RPGs? Over 30+ years, I have collected a lot of minis. And terrain as well.

 

[Demetrio]

On Howard's writing:

I have heard it said that he has a lyric quality. Frankly, I have little idea what that means, or if he does. But I notice that Howard, unlike say Maddox, is not afraid of long, rolling, descriptive sentences in action scenes (or in fact anywhere). I think this is possibly a key difference in style between Howard and the pastiche writers. Certainly neither Offut nor Maddox use long sentences much. And they avoid alliteration and other devices that Howard actively embraces. I think that's partly why their pastiches seem to me to lack soul, even though their plots are not as bad as some.

But also Conan in Howard is a man alone. He makes friends, certainly. But the pastiche writers often dwell a little too much on the friendships (in the sense of male comrades in arms, the women are a bit different)whereas Howard just takes them as read. And in Howard, Conan relies only on wizards and women, or 'neutral parties' (like when he's taken from the cross) to get himself out of fixes (as far as I recall). Never on comrades in arms. Both Offut and Maddox break that 'rule'.

 

[flatscan]

What I try to do, is figure out what the party will do next. And cover perhaps 2-3 alternates, if I think they may not go in one direction. Then I work out what encounters are likely to occur, figure out combat stats for all of them, as you never know when PCs are going to attack somebody completely harmless. Then I dig out minis for all the encounters.

Then gather up any terrain that fits the area they are in. By then there is usual an idea or two that has trickled into my head, so I go back and rework as needed.

That sounds like a lot of work. :shock:

Do you find yourself using encounters that weren't used in different situations down the line? Do you end up re-statting nPeeps?

Finaly, I go over any rules I am not that sure of. Right now, that includes most of them. Not that I dont know 3.5, but that there are a number of differences that can trip you if you dont keep up. The guy I am playing with was a Scribe for WoTC, so he always knows the rules better than me anyway, but I try to not embarass myself to much.

Yeah, I let the player's be the rules scholars for their characters abilities, skills, and feats. I have a fairly good knowledge of the generalities of every class, but it's just easier to place that bit of rules mastery on the player's shoulders. That way I can focus on the dirty tricks the nPeeps will use. :twisted:

Does it show that I was a miniature wargamer before there where such things as RPGs? Over 30+ years, I have collected a lot of minis. And terrain as well.

That's awesome. One of my players is an old-school gamer that has hundreds of painted minis. Me, I never had the patience for it. Here's hoping that Conan skirmish game Strom mentioned in another forum comes pre-painted.