WTF AltSpaceVR?

So, I've been meaning to write about this for a few months now... About 6 months ago, there was a social media stir around this new "D&D virtual reality" tool called AltspaceVR.

To sum up, the players (using VR head sets) gather in a Second Life-esque virtual room to play D&D... on a flat surface... with dungeon tiles.

I need a VR headset for this?!?

Seriously, WTF?!?

Tyrants of the Underdark (Origins Preview)

At Oigins last week, I got the opportunity to try out a few games that are debuting this summer/fall. One of them was Tyrants of the Underdark, a deck-building board game scheduled for release on July 12 at $75 (Amazon currently places the release date on July 28). The game was designed by Peter Lee, Rodney Thompson, Andrew Veen and produced by Gale Force 9. Peter Lee and Rodney Thompson were also designers on Lords of Waterdeep.

Origins 2016 Post Game Report

The Eagle has landed.

My wife and I were fortunate enough to attend Origins 2016 in Columbus, OH this past weekend. It was the first time in over 5 years having a vacation without kids (Thank you, Grandma Diane, Papa Frankie and Great Aunt Donna!). To say that the weekend was hotly anticipated would be an understatement... and our expectations were almost entirely met!

Origins did have a registration snafu on Wednesday due to some down computers (people always blame the computers), but we were lucky enough to miss all of that. By Thursday morning, the Registration and Pre-Registration (Will Call) lines were not terribly long and we got our badges and tickets in 15 minutes, tops. They did. however, have a snafu with printing the coupon books, so many of the vendor booth SWAG was not available to a great majority of attendees. That was a pretty bad screw up. I mean, when you pay $55 just to get in the door (no games included), you expect to get some SWAG... or at least a coupon to buy some SWAG at a discount.

I won't bore you with a blow-by-blow, but will hit some of the highlights.

D&D 5e: Giants and Monsters

Wizards of the Coast announced two new books for the fall (and miniatures to go with them).

Storm King's Thunder is the new adventure path coming, revisiting the classic Against the Giants style story line.

It will be interesting to see how different the plot will be from the old G-series modules, and I'm looking forward to browsing this book to see how they handle the plot.

I haven't actually purchased any of the other adventure paths. I was curious about Princes of the Apocalypse but one of my players was already running that in a different group so I passed it by. Curse of Strahd also looks pretty good but I'm not looking to run a horror game at the moment... So Storm King's Thunder is really the first adventure to give me some sense of excited anticipation.

The second announcement was about Volo's Guide to Monsters.

To me, this is an even more intriguing announcement.There is a lot of speculation about this particular offering. From what we can tell from the official announcement, it will add some fluff about iconic monsters already present in the Monster Manual, as well as re-introduce a number of others that have not had 5th Edition stat conversions as of yet.

What makes this book intriguing is that it appears it may borrow ideas from Monster Vault: Threats to the Nentir Vale.

During 4th Edition, Wizards second Monster Vault book took existing iconic monsters, and created "monster groups"... Basically, variants that differ from the typical iconic monster's stat block a bit to provide variety. As an example, you might get new stats for an Orc queen, a war chief, a shaman, Half Ogre and Half Troll variants, etc... Or an NPC faction with stat blocks for the different kinds of faction members (such as the Iron Circle, or Dythan's Legion), or even a special monster NPC, like Calastryx, a red dragon with 3 heads.

Threats to the Nentir Vale was one of the best books ever produced by Wizards of the Coast in that it wasn't just another Monster Manual. Each group entry had a backstory and campaign hooks that could be dropped right into your game as a named NPC or faction. Even though it was set in the Nentir Vale, the hooks were generic enough that any home game could use what was in the book with little modification.

I don't know for certain the Volo book will take a similar approach, but it would be excellent to have a similar book created for 5th Edition with campaign hooks and background fluff. It would be preferable if it were not limited to the Sword Coast, but expanded to other parts of the Realms. Better yet, it would hopefully be generic enough to use in any home game.

Will it present details on more monstrous PC races? Will it add Feats, Backgrounds or other player options?  Hard to say. I actually like that Wizards has stayed away from creating too many player options that can be abused. Splat books almost always created unnecessary power creep in prior editions.

Final Thoughts

Outside of what appears in the official announcements, we don't have much information about what we might be getting, so all of this is just rampant speculation. However, I'm hopeful that Wizards is learning what has worked well in 5th Edition (as well as prior editions) and keeps improving their products using lessons learned from the past. 

Hero Forge Miniatures Review: A Massive Improvement

UPDATE 08/20: View my latest Hero Forge miniatures review here: 

http://ragingowlbear.blogspot.com/2020/08/hero-forge-custom-miniatures-review-2020.html

UPDATE 01//18: A lower cost "Plastic" option is now available which I have reviewed here.

Too Long; Didn't Read Summary:  So, you probably just want to know, "How much better is the new Premium Plastic offering?"  In a word, immensely better. OK, that's technically two words. The new plastic offering from Shapeways means that the Hero Forge Gray Plastic miniatures are an order of magnitude more durable than the Ultra Detail figures from before. The detail of the Premium Plastic is also significantly better in my estimation than Ultra Detail was. In summary, buy Premium Plastic. Avoid Ultra Detail [Note: Ultra Detail is no longer offered].

The Bronze figurine works well as a
showpiece. Detail is very good.

Introduction

A little over a year ago, I came down hard on Hero Forge miniatures (rightfully so). I had ordered 2 "Ultra Detail" miniatures ($50) as a gift for my wife and myself... a gnome and half orc. After receiving the figures, I immediately noted issues with the detail. While the detail was not considered a show stopper, the fragility of the figures absolutely was. The Ultra Detail printing process creates a very stiff and brittle plastic which breaks under even the most minor pressure. My gnome's sword blade broke off during light handling while painting, and later a drop of a few inches fractured the ankles separating the base from the figure. Both breaks could be re-glued, but it illustrated that the figures would not be durable enough for play.

Fast forward a year later, Hero Forge contacted me to try out their new "Gray Plastic" material as well as their metal offerings, Steel and Bronze, to see how they compare. They have also added some new items and features to their figure creation software, I will touch upon those later as I know everyone wants to know about the new plastic.

Full Disclosure: Hero Forge provided me vouchers to print 3 miniatures for the purpose of evaluation. There were no strings attached to provide a positive review. I hope I have provided an unbiased view of the results.

State of the Blog 2016: 200K and counting

Beaky -- the new official unofficial mascot of Raging Owlbear

So 2016 has been a bit of a hard year for the blog. It'll be June tomorrow and I will have only posted 16 articles for the entire year so far... Life can sometimes be demanding in ways that kill my ability (or sometimes desire) to post frequently...

And yet, my page views are as high as ever.

I can't entirely explain this phenomena, except to say that, of the articles I have posted this year, a couple have been very well received and reshared (a good page view driver over the long term), a couple have been controversial (a good page view driver, but only over the short term) and a couple have spiked for reasons that just can't be explained other than "the interwebs are weird". I also have been lucky in that there are a few older articles that consistently drive decent numbers every day due to D&D related web searches, and I think that may be the one key thing that keeps my blog relevant.

RPGs for Kids: My Little Pony miniatures

Miniatures month continues and this week and I'm talking about My Little Pony.

I wasn't intending to talk about My Little Pony, but my daughter (who is right in the target demographic) picked out My Little Pony: My Busy Books with a gift card from grandma when we were at Barnes & Noble the other day. It just so happens that it is a perfect fit for an MLP-based RPG.

Why is it so good for RPGs? Because along with the book, comes a  four scene play mat with 12 pony figurines. Not only that. but the figures are in roughly the same scale as 28 -30 mm D&D-size miniatures... all that for only ten bucks!

The play mats are a nice background to set the scene for your little role-player, but it appears the figures alone may only cost FIVE BUCKS! While I can't 100% confirm, it appears the set of 12 My Little Pony miniatures on Amazon is the same set of figures that comes with the book for half the price. UPDATE: Don't bother ordering these from a Chinese seller for $5. They are mostly scams and the package will never arrive. Stick with a Prime seller.