E’s Eberron Campaign, Session 2: 11/3/09

I had a plan.  It was a great plan.  It involved the most ingenious way to introduce our 5th PC into the party.  Ask Dante from StupidRanger - it’s just super awesome.  I spent all week planning it and putting all the details into my secret GM-only area of Obsidian Portal.

Then Tuesday morning rolled around and my 5th player contacted me to say he was really sick and wouldn’t be able to make it.  And of course, I hadn’t given any thought to what would happen without him.

So there I was, the very day of the game and now I had no plans.  I can’t run what I planned on running because the plot depended on the 5th PC being there.  It wasn’t as easy as just modding encounters – it was a roleplay-heavy session that just flat-out wouldn’t WORK without the 5th PC there.

Since the original four PCs were all going to attend and I had left them at the Ghallanda enclave, where they were supposed to be laying low and avoiding notice by the forces that had imprisoned them, I needed some sort of quest they could do in or near the enclave.

Why not a mini dungeon delve?

But wait… let’s back up…

I wanted to hear from my PCs what they were thinking while in the Ghallanda enclave that first night, immediately after their rescue.

On our campaign forum (yet another reason I love Obsidian Portal!), I posted an opportunity for bonus XP (25) for a short blurb about what their character was thinking about that night.  Here’s what they said:

Jelly, Half-Elf Cleric:

Why on earth would they have put me in such a high-security prison… slated to be executed??? As far as I know, I was just rounded up accidentally with nuisance rabble during a riot. Did they mistake me for someone else entirely? Some sort of ringleader? Did my paperwork get mixed up with some hardened criminal?

Why was I grouped with these other particular prisoners – and, moving on to subsequent events, why did someone think it important enough that we should all be rescued? Are we to undertake some sort of Very Important Mission? It seems that whoever got us out of there already has some pretty competent people at their disposal (Jes and – dang, what was that wunderkind pilot’s name? M-something-short?)

Well, I’m REALLY glad we were rescued. That cell was pretty bleak, and sealed up tighter than a duck’s ass. While I’m all up for a touch of danger in my life, being executed for crimes unknown was not the way I planned to go out! I’m a little worried we may have gotten out of the frying pan and into the fire – although I’m not sure there’s much worse than execution for no good reason. Well, okay, there’s definitely worse ways to go, but that’s one’s right down there.

All of us certainly owe our mysterious rescuer/s something – I hope it’s not a debt I’m going to have a problem repaying. It would suck to feel forced or blackmailed to do something that goes completely against my nature. I hope we don’t end up getting tangled up in politics that might make me enemies for life. Then again, thinking back to that jail cell, maybe I’ve already made some enemies for life – I just don’t know who or why!

Beatdown Machine, Warforged Fighter (aka DaveTheGame):

Beatdown Machine War Journal, Entry #1.0 Post-Awakening

Current status: Preparing for Unsleeping Watcher state in the special House Ghallanda Warforged privacy suite (known to meat-creatures as “the closet.”) Body has been repaired sufficiently by the squishy creature identified as “Jelly.” Once fought beside a Warforged with the designation Jelly, but that was only after being exposed to a battalion of flame-sorcerers.

I defeated 1 Chain Golem*, 8 guards, and 5 flyers. I could have defeated, if I had so chosen: 4 airship sailors, 1 airship captain, 1 wizardess designated Jes, 1 electric flesh-thing designated as Cyd, 1 semi-competent warrior designated Evan. Note to self: get extra crossbows installed at first opportunity.

Percentage chance for battle while with this group remains high, so I will continue to travel with them for now, confidant that I could destroy them if I chose. However, if the term “rusty” continues to be thrown around, I may have to sever limbs, as is proper procedure.

Must remember to follow-up Re: Last War ending.

End War Journal Entry.

*indicates something that I had not previously defeated.

Evan Macdowell, Human Rogue

Evan Macdowell’s Journal:

- I owe a favour to this Jes and her employer. The first job will be on the house.

- Why this group? Isn’t it too much of a coincidence that we were all to be put to death for an unknown reason by an unknown group? And on top of that, we were all housed in the same jailblock? Like we were being corralled together for a reason? Makes you wonder. I have to keep my eyes open. There is a small, though non-zero, chance of this Jes and her employer being our enemies. I should have time to investigate. They obviously need us for something.

- I don’t know what to make of this “Jes”. She can seemingly teleport at will, or at least that’s the hypothesis since she got through my, and presumably the other’s, magic cell barriers with that method. I should make note of her relationship with that Half-Elven airship captain. Might be useful information in the future.

- On “Jelly” and that quiet wizard “Cyd”, They seem mostly harmless, at least toward myself. I shouldn’t have to worry too much about them. Cyd looks like he has enough problems on his own, and Jelly seems kind of carefree.

- That Warforged, on the other hand, might be another story. I should keep my eye on him(it?). I have a bad feeling about him. Though, that just might be my unease about Warforged in general.

- What’s happened in the last 3-4 days? I wonder if our incarceration was to keep us from being involved in something during that timeframe. Why else keep us out all that time? Though, that might either have been a side effect of whatever drug or magic we were under, or it was the time to transport us from whatever town we were in to that prison complex. Still, the time period is quite suspicious. I shall inquire about this with the mysterious “employer”.

- As soon as their jobs run out, I will need to find out about this sorceress with my mother’s name. It can’t be her, but I need to be sure.

Cyd, the Genasi(?) Wizard did not opt to complete the optional XP for session 1. I leave it as an option so people don’t necessarily HAVE to do it if they don’t have time or any other reason.

The party awakens in the Ghallanda enclave…

The party meets with Jes at breakfast at Three Times Round, the Ghallanda enclave.   The dog’s head crest of Ghallanda hangs on the wall.  It’s a large, underground building, but the magical lighting is so effective that it’s as light and bright as any inn on the surface.

Lady Rose bustles around the tables and in and out of the kitchen, bringing plates of hot goose eggs and boar bacon to the tables and filling your glasses with fresh blended mango juice. A basket of fruits is in the center of the table and a loaf of freshly baked bread sits next to small bowls of preserves and butter.

Rose giggles at the fact that the party seems unaware of the fact that they’re in Xen’drik and then hints to Jelly that she’s never “had one” of a man quite like Cyd.  She seems friendly… very friendly.

Jes explains that the party needs to lay low for a week or two, just to throw off the investigators who are trying to find them and return them to the jail. Ren made it look like the airship was headed for Stormreach and made a turn after losing the flying archers, so hopefully they shook their captors, but you can never be too sure.  In the meantime, the fine folks who run Three Times Round could use some help.

Kaleb explains that there’s a cavern about a half day’s walk to the west that they know contains Khyber dragonshards.   Since dragonshards are worth a bit of money, he’d appreciate the party going there and bringing them back.  Jes volunteered the party’s services since it will be a dangerous mission and since Beatdown seems so keen on killing things, it only seems right to “feed” him what he wants.

Kaleb offers the party a Bag of Holding and says they can keep the bag and anything they find other than the Khyber shards.

Garrett will come with the party, but only to the cave’s entrance. Since he’s afraid of kobolds (and is VERY unhappy about his father spilling the beans to everyone), he won’t go into the cave. He knows the jungle well enough to keep the party from succumbing to the traveler’s curse. He’ll await their return to the surface, scout out a safe place to spend the night, and lead them back to the enclave the next day.

At the mouth of the cave, there are two black kobolds.  After being shot at by the sniper rogue and the wizard, they run back into the cave and the party runs into follow them before they summon reinforcements.  Two additional sentries arrive as well as a chief with a feather hat.

Beatdown finds himself surrounded by kobolds, utters his new catchphrase, “You have now entered Cleave-land!” and gets bloodied nearly every round (a consequence of being the only melee character – we have a wizard, a  laser cleric and a sniper rogue.  Thankfully our 5th PC is a barbarian, so Beatdown will be slightly less beat-up in the future!).

But the PCs persevere and defeat the kobolds.  Beatdown steals the feather hat and puts it on, looking quite ridiculous.

After a short rest, they press deeper into the cavern and enter the second room.  Evan the rogue notices tiny holes in the walls and has a very bad feeling that they may be part of a trap.  However, he can’ t seem to find a way to disable it.  It’s a poison dart trap and  it shoots  from both walls once per round.  Luckily the PCs take advantage of the stone columns in the room, using them as shields against the darts.  (Beatdown even chooses to fall prone after one attack to avoid being shot by the darts… again.)

We have a pretty impressive sniper rogue.  He can pretty much be across the universe and still shoot things with his crossbow.  Jelly is constantly cheerful, but a little wary about getting too close to the action.  She comments about how the encounter reminds her of the “good ol’ days” adventuring with her parents.

Another short rest and the party presses still deeper into the cavern where they come to a room with bones on the floor.  Evan sneaks in, but isn’t quite sneaky enough.   Vile necrotic energy blasts him and he’s firmly rooted to the ground as a dracolich emerges from the corner.

The bad news: It’s a Stoneborn Dracolich.

The good news: It doesn’t appear to be feeling well.  (Well, as much as an undead creature can feel “well.”)

I ran the level 11 dracolich with 1/2 hit points, minus 2 to all defenses, and weakened (1/2 damage).  It appears he’d seen much better days.  (Yes, I know that there are apparently better ways to nerf a monster.  I’m a n00b, so cut me some slack while I’m learnin’, k?)

Immobilizing the rogue was fun!!  I finally got to do stuff to him!  Mwah ha ha!  Even when the wizard cast his circle of dazed crappiness, the dracolich wasn’t that bothered.  He could still breathe on everyone and do his reaction bone shards attack and bite the warforged.

Jelly experimented with her Guardian of Faith, which she hadn’t yet summoned until that encounter.  What mini was handy?  Doctor Who.  Yeah, seriously, DaveTheGame uses a Doctor Who mini for his character in Bartoneus’ game, so it was just hanging around within reach.  Doctor Who wasn’t particularly effective in hitting the dracolich, but it was amusing having him in the battle!

The party finally defeats the dracolich and in the pile of bones in the corner of the lair, they find 5 small Khyber shards and one large one. In the pockets of some abandoned armor, they find coin purses with a total of 300 gp.  (Shush, I’m a fan of round numbers.)

They return to the cave entrance and find Garrett has uncovered a secret chamber near the mouth of the cave where the kobolds once slept. It’s not the most hospitable place, but it’s a safe place to rest for the night. While Garrett isn’t looking, Jelly and Evan find two Siberys shards and decide that since they aren’t Khyber shards, it’s only fair that they keep them.

The next morning, they walk back to Three Times Round. Seeing the entrance by daylight is very interesting. It’s so well hidden in the thick jungle that they didn’t even notice the door until Garrett points it out.

Garrett swings open the door and they walk down the entrance hall, past the enclave guards, and into the tavern area. Kaleb looks pleased to see them and rushes forward to thank them for a job well done. He brings them to the bar just as they are raising mugs of drinks to celebrate, Violet d’Ghallanda runs into the room screaming. “MURDER!! THERE’S BEEN A MURDER!”

…next session will be 11/17/09.

My Awesome PCs

I gave my players 150 XP for coming up with a basic backstory for their character.  This helps me get an idea of what the characters are motivated by, their outlook on life and adventuring, and other little nuggets that will hopefully enable me to make the game more awesome.

But this post isn’t about me!

Here are my PCs.   This post will be updated as the game gains or loses PCs in the future.  (The game is open to guest players, so we’ll have some recurring guest stars as things go on…)

As a reminder, PCs started at level 5 because I wanted them to have some sort of history – something they might be known for in the world (whether they realize it or not).  They also had to end their story with being arrested and dragged off to prison.

Marthana “Jelly” Gellantara, Half-Elf Cleric

21 yrs old. wavy brown hair, fair skin, average build

Although most half-elves come from a long line of half-elves before them, Jelly does not consider herself one of the Khoravar. Rather, she is a child of two cultures, that of her human cleric mother, and her elf rogue father – not to mention a hodgepodge of others encountered in her life. Her parents met as adventurers, not fighting for any particular side in the Last War, but hiring themselves out for smaller assignments, and foraging among the fresh ruins and wilderness areas for items of value. Their traveling companions were a disaffected Warforged, a gnome sorceror, and a human ranger.

When Jelly was born, her parents settled down briefly in the Eldeen Reaches, but their old companions kept coming around, and they could not suppress their wanderlust for long. By the time Jelly was five or six, they’d gone on the road again, choosing, perhaps, less dangerous jobs than they might have in the past, but still satisfying their itch for adventure. Jelly followed in her mother’s footsteps, training with her as a cleric. This allowed her to stay at the back of the fray, while still lending a hand.

At the age of 18 she decided she needed to strike out on her own. A life of adventure was all she had known, and she decided to take it up, with all it’s excitement and endless variation.

The peripatetic life has made Jelly friendly and outgoing, easily connecting with new people she meets. She’s willing to give people the benefit of the doubt in a general sense, but she has also learned to trust her instincts about a situation, and since she’s had unusually more experience than your average 21 year old, her instincts are nothing to sneeze at. She’s upbeat to a fault, always looking for the positive side of a situation, stubbornly optimistic, though not naive.

Entering a city in her travels recently she found her self accidentally engulfed in mob of protesters. When law enforcement came to quell the riot, she was unfortunately rounded up with much of the crowd and hauled off in a paddy wagon.

Evan Macdowell, Human Rogue

Description:

• Normal sized human male around 20 years of age.
• Fair skinned, though tanned.
• Athletic build.
• Shoulder length black hair.

Personality

• An honest(to a fault), polite, and mostly jovial man when not working.
• Completely serious when working a job.
• Hates failing a job and tries to perform the job to the letter. Nothing more, Nothing less.
• Will take almost any job if the pay is good enough.

Backstory: “Orphaned during the Last War at a young age, Evan spent his childhood years without memories of his parents. He was raised in an orphanage for war orphans, and was eventually sold into slavery. Escaping from slavery in his mid-teens, he began working as a sellsword of sorts with a particular talent for long ranged sniping. Taking on jobs as simple as monster hunting to more complex jobs as high level assassinations., Evan has earned his way into adulthood. Recently, Evan has begun hearing rumors of a high level sorceress by the name of Evangeline MacDowell operating in the metropolis of Sharn. There was only two things that Evan knows about his mother: 1) She was a sorceress, and 2) Her name was Evangeline.

On his way to Sharn to investigate these rumors, Evan is arrested and jailed. Though never told exactly why he was jailed, Evan assumes it has to do with any number of political assassinations he has committed during the war. He’ll just bide his time until he is released or can put his escape skills into play.

Motivation: Not much drives Evan other than his need to perfect his craft, getting paid, and recently, to find out if his mother is somehow still alive.

Cyd, Genasi (?) Wizard

A young Stormsoul Genasi, Cyd possesses purple skin, a head covered by silver crystal spikes where most humanoids would have hair, and silver energy lines running across his skin in place of blood vessels. He is slightly larger and more muscular than a typical human male, and posses considerable physical strength. However, his mental prowess is even more impressive, as he has a mind ideally suited for wizardry.

Cyd is a man on the run. His earliest memories are from a short few years ago when he was imprisoned in the Towers of Arcanix, a subject of experimentation by the members of the Arcane Congress. He does not know wether he lost earlier memories, or if he did not exist before his time in the Towers of Arcanix. As there are no others like him in Eberron, Cyd has speculated that he could be a human endowed with elemental powers, a creature from another world, or a life created from scratch by the Arcane Congress.

In any case, the wizards of the Arcane Congress had a special interest in him. In addition to performing magical experiments on him, they began to teach him wizardry. Despite the reassurances of the wizards that they had his best interests in mind, Cyd did not want to be a prisoner. A year ago he was able to escape, and has been on the run ever since, convinced that the Arcane Congress is pursuing him, hoping to capture him and take him back to the Towers of Arcanix.

A few days ago, in a strange town, he was arrested. Cyd is not sure why he has been jailed, but he hopes it is just because of his suspicious appearance, and not the hand of the Arcane Congress at work.

Beatdown Machine, Warforged Fighter

…more to come!

I’ve got a friend who is smart and successful (making really good money), but who can’t seem to make relationships last, largely because he keeps dating people who don’t really share his interests.

He’s a geek, and more of a geek than he realizes at times. I really think your service is perfect for him; unfortunately we’re not such close friends that I can just say “hey, you should check this site out.” Any suggestions on how to point him to your service?

- Friend Needs You

E answers:

Dear Friend,

Dating can be a very touchy subject.  I know this because I get the occasional hate mail or forum thread started about how horrible I am.  (And the more popular the site gets, the more of these things I see.  In foreign languages, even!  On a side note, I learned that in German, saying something is “salted” means it’s overpriced.)  While these things can hurt sometime, it’s always good to hear the public’s reactions to my business model.

Anyway!

You claim that your buddy needs me and he just doesn’t realize it yet.  You don’t want to link him to the site because you’re afraid he’s going to take it the wrong way and get super offended, perhaps jeopardizing your friendship.  Seems like a bit of a pickle?

No biggie – I have the solution for you.

You may notice that we write about a lot of other things here at Geek’s Dream Girl.  We have posts about D&D, sci-fi, geek movies & TV shows, 80s nostalgia, gaming conventions… all sorts of wonderful geeky things.   Heck, there was even that one time J wrote Star Trek / Outback Steakhouse fanfic.

Many of our clients say that they first came to Geek’s Dream Girl for the articles and eventually came around to the idea of becoming a client.  We’re certainly not an impulse buy!  (And we don’t expect to be!)

Why not point him to some of our more popular posts?  Check the sidebar for the Best of Geek Life and Best of Geek Love.   Use the search box in the toolbar to find other topics that might interest him and link him to those posts.

Get him hooked on reading us for other reasons and let him come to his own conclusions about his dating life.  Hopefully, he’ll come around.  (Most of ‘em do!  We’re awesome and cute and irresistible!  And modest, totally modest.)

Good luck!  You’re a great friend!

With the holiday being on a Saturday and the extra hour from the time change, Halloween this year was set up perfectly for maximum awesomeness.

Indeed, it would appear that everyone had such a great time that no one had any scary stories to share!  (Or maybe it took a few days to recover from the festivities).

Whatever the reason, the awesome people at AvatarArt have graciously agreed to give a free copy of Adventure Art to every person who shared their costume with us (that didn’t have a copy already), in addition to our randomly chosen Twitterer!

The six winners are:

1. Oz
2. Angille
3. Dice_Girl
4. Graham
5. Aaron
6. Twitter Winner:  @alterus
   

Congrats!  If you’re a winner, please shoot E an email (using the same email address you comment with so we know it’s you!).

It was a blast checking out the costumes that were submitted, and I’m glad I didn’t have to choose.

How do you feel about our kinder, gentler approach?  Should we have been mean and stuck to our guns, refusing to award the story prizes since there weren’t enough entries for a competition?  Or is it totally cool that the folks at AvatarArt helped everyone be a winner?  If you didn’t enter, what held you back?

Feel free to let us know!

In sf and fantasy, “ice worlds” are a natural place to go – an extreme version of our own toughest weather, all year, spread over an entire planet.  Whether it’s Julian May’s Denali or George Lucas’ Hoth, the elements prove just as much of a challenge as the forces of evil.

In video games, ice worlds were usually visually some of my favorites, but some of the most antagonzing in terms of gameplay – especially those darn Mario games.  My favorite frozen world, even with slippery ice, goes to Adventure Island II for NES – the ice world was a welcome change from the rest of the tropical dino climate.

What I want to know, however, is about your favorite wintery worlds in movies, literature or video games.  It doesn’t have to be an entire planet – it could even be a mountain.  And it doesn’t even have to be sf or fantasy.  Let’s make some cocoa, sit by the glow of the monitor and welcome winter by celebrating the iciest places we can think of!

My girlfriend and I would like to experiment in a non-traditional relationship.  What sort of venues/advice do you have for geeks like us?

Sincerely,

Looking to Fill a Big Bed

Dear Big Bed,

Aren’t you glad E hired me to answer all these fun questions?!  I’m the new girl in town and my sole purpose – other than occasionally geeking out about Hello Kitty! -  is to answer all the questions about intimate relationships.  I have been around the world in more ways than one and I promise I’m well qualified to address any sort of adult dating/sexually-natured questions that could come my way, so ask away!

Going back to your question, I would like to point out first that there are two types of relationships you and your girlfriend are considering.  The both of you should make sure to be very clear which one you’re looking to experiment with first.  Although both have the multiple partner concept in common they are vastly different in approach and execution!  In my experience, many people mistake a polyamorous relationship for a polygamous relationship.

• polygamy < po·lyg·a·my > -  marriage in which a spouse of either sex may have more than one mate at the same time
• polyamorous < poly·am·ory > - the state or practice of having more than one open romantic relationship at a time

There are some basic do’s and don’ts much like in a more traditional monogamous relationship.  We should all know these before experimenting with any sort of multi-partnered relationships.

Trust and honesty are always important, whether you’re looking at one mate or ten.  DON’T lie, conveniently misplace the truth or somehow twist the panes of glass around to reflect only the pure and innocent white parts of a lie.  DO be considerate of your mate(s) because in the end, your duet is going to come out a bit one-sided if you can’t learn to SHARE the microphone.  Relationships can be practical, we just have a tendency to make them more complicated than they should be.  I always remember, whether it is just myself or if there are others sharing Herr Groß* with me, everything has boundaries.

• Realize it is not because you are not enough, rather, it is because there is so much love to be shared with you that you are in the bed too.
• Remember that if you can’t trust someone to do something with you, then you definitely can’t trust them to do it behind your back!  In other words, if you do it, do it.  If you don’t know you want to, then you’ve already got something to think about.
• Talk about it!  Both of you should agree on a general set of rules.  Stick to the rules but more importantly, keep in mind that you may have to make some revisions, and that’s to be expected.  We can’t all know exactly what to expect the first time we get behind the wheel.

If you haven’t gotten very far into the lifestyle, you may also be wondering where to start.  The local flea market seems as likely a place to find a playmate as the neighborhood bar.  Chances are, you’ve probably already found the typical and well advertised websites such as AdultFriendFinder, SwingLifeStyles, PlayfulSwingers and many others.

The truth is, there is no difference between finding a date when you’re single vs finding a date when you’re a couple.  Not everything works for everybody and you just have to try it out.  Some sites are designed for people who are all about hooking up while other sites are more for social networking with like-minded people.  In general, you’re going to find all sorts of people everywhere you go so pick somewhere that seems comfortable to you and your girlfriend, perhaps even a local club in town!

Happy Dating!

-y

*For those of you who are inquisitive and wish to know, Herr Groß (obviously not his real name) is the object of my affection, my little piece of heaven, my prince in shining armor and yes, guys, he’s a very, very lucky man!

A quick review (skip the italics if you want to get right to the signs and classes!):

Your Sun sign is really a lot like your D&D character’s class. Take the Wizard, for instance. You’ve got four implements to choose from and some of those implements, like the Orb and the Tome, have different variants. Between your choice of implement, powers, skills, feats and gear, rarely are two Wizards going to be identical!

Still, telling someone that you play a Wizard gives them a sense of what your character can do as well as his or her strengths and weaknesses. So it is with your Sun sign. It would be silly to think that any two Librans or any two Scorpios are going to be exactly the same. We are all some mixture of the Signs, with 10 or more planets describing various aspects of our personalities and lives. However, knowing that someone is a Libra or a Scorpio can give you a basic concept of what this person is about and how you might interact with them.

“Well Ryven” you say, “if Sun signs are so much like D&D classes, why don’t you tell me which class is like which sign?” Your wish is my command! Over the course of the next few articles, I’ll be matching up classes with signs so that the next time you open up a dating profile and see a zodiac sign staring you in the face, you can make your Arcana check with a +2 competence bonus and see how that personality base might be showing itself to you in the rest of the profile.

Cancer

Each sign in astrology has a ruling planet, and to understand Cancer, you really need to understand its ruler, the Moon. The Moon is constantly changing, cycling back and forth from New to Full and all the stages in-between. Its orbit is roughly 28 days, which is also the standard cycle of human fertility so it is associated with family, children and the innocent. Yet for all its changing, we only ever see the one side of the Moon so it is also tenacious. Cancer takes all of these ideas – constant change, cycles, protection of the weak and flat-out stubbornness – and combines them into a rich, emotional whole. The best thing about Cancer is her heart and flexibility.

Many will argue that the Cleric is the most Cancerian class with its whole healing theme. That was probably true for previous editions but as far as I’m concerned, only the 4th Edition Swordmage captures Cancer in its entirety, especially the Shielding Swordmage.

The Swordmage has the unique ability to throw down its mark – the Aegis – on one enemy and then change its mind and go harass someone else. If she has the Aegis of Assault or Ensnarement, there’s a nice visual cycling element of the Swordmage and her mark coming together and moving apart over and over again. If she has the Aegis of Shielding, then she channels the more protective aspect of Cancer, flat out denying damage that her marked foe deals. The Swordmage has a unique power – the Unicorn’s Touch – that allows her to heal HP without healing surges, a rare ability for a non-Leader class. Throw in the intimate sword-master relationship of Arcane Bond and you have a class that appeals to Cancer on all levels.

The Paladin is another alternative to the Cancerian that likes to protect and heal, whereas the Cosmic Soul Sorcerer and the Vestige Pact Warlock provide variability and change for the Cancerian that likes to be on the move. As a D&D character, Cancer is versatile and ever-changing.

Scorpio

Along with Virgo, Scorpio is the other maligned or often misunderstood sign. Demonized, oversexualized and shrouded in mystery, telling someone “I’m a Scorpio” will provoke some sort of reaction in all but the most stalwart skeptics. Where her opposing sign Taurus is about security and sitting tight, Scorpio chooses a target or goal and then goes after it with a single-mindedness that not even Aries can match.

She isn’t Virgo; she doesn’t want to analyze or master. She isn’t Aries; she’s not trying to dominate or control. Scorpio’s intention is to give herself over to her quarry and fully experience it in order to be empowered by it. This is why Scorpio is often associated with illicit sex, substance abuse and other similar socially undesirable things. She’s not evil or immoral. She simply wants to find the depths and limits of some sort of experience or phenomena. Less risque Scorpios may lose themselves in research, spending long hours alone in search of some obscure fact or pursuing some theory. For this reason, people with strong Scorpionic tendencies make good doctors. On the other hand, do not expect a Scorpio with a grudge to forgive you anytime soon. For her, it’s all or nothing. The best things about Scorpio are her willingness to get to the absolute root of an issue and seemingly inexhaustible energy toward a topic of interest.

Like Gemini, Scorpio once had trouble finding a base class to call home. In 4th Edition, she has a few choices available that let her express herself though most of them carry a sort of anti-hero quality to them. Interestingly enough, Scorpio finds itself almost always playing Strikers whereas every other sign has at least two roles it can find interesting. First off, she can be the Batman Retribution Avenger, a class who chooses a single enemy and then piles extra damage onto that enemy every time she is hit. She can also follow that enemy almost anywhere using the right collection of powers. Another option is to play a Darkspiral Warlock, a Striker whose aura increases after each kill and can later fire off the aura to deal extreme damage.

The DDI-only Assassin class can appeal to Scorpio as well, again because there is a mechanic to bide time and build up against a single enemy who is then dispatched in a powerful and intense manner. Scorpio is the quiet one on the field at first, seemingly helpless or at least not carrying her own weight until the right combination of factors occurs, resulting in every other character in the party suddenly feeling very inadequate.

Pisces

At last, we come to Pisces. Dreamy, quiet and shy, Pisces isn’t really ever quite here. Pisces lives somewhere else – in the beyond – and her interests are things unseen. Pisces has the unique and enviable ability to see past the obvious to the deeper and greater realities of things. Thus she might be a person of incredible personal faith, a fountain of lost mystical knowledge, claim to have paranormal abilities, or simply believe that the world is ruled by a shadow government intent on subtle enslavement and population control. As you can guess, Pisces is both very much immune to and yet susceptible to illusions. It can be hard to tell whether she’s really on to something or just delusional. Because of the richer and more complicated world Pisces lives in, she tends to be more passive, allowing forces much bigger and more powerful than her to do their thing. Pisces’ job is seer, oracle or prophet, alerting people to the subtle movements of the world and helping them find their own gifts. The best things about Pisces are her keen perception and endless compassion.

Pisces is the ultimate D&D support character. She wants to be as far back from the fighting as she can, buffing and healing her friends as they do the dirty work. She also probably has a solid Perception and Insight, allowing her to be the eyes and ears of the party when they are engaged in a stressful situation. This puts Pisces neatly into the Cleric class, particularly the pacifist healer or ‘laser’ cleric builds. In 4th Edition, she can still contribute to attacking the enemies more than in previous iterations, but she may not care about that much anyway. Hit points, saving throws and defensive boosts are her bread and butter. When the encounter is over, she is satisfied knowing her friends couldn’t have done it without her.

More aggressive Pisceans might also look at classes that can sneak around well and trick enemies, such as the Rogue, Assassin and possibly Illusionist Wizard. Generally, though, Pisces is the stereotypical squishy in the back ranks, providing support while staying out of the way as much as possible.

About Today’s Guest Writer: Ryven Cedrylle is an astrologer, a gamer, a devoted husband, and a Christian.  Visit him at Christian Astrology.

One of the most unattractive things about a dating profile (besides the usual red flags) is the stench of one that’s been neglected and left to rot.

A lot of people assume that you can just write a dating profile (or hire someone to write your dating profile for you) and just leave it be for ever and ever, amen.

That’s not exactly true.

If you want your dating profile to smell fresh and clean and attractive, you’ll want to keep it updated at least once a season to reflect what’s going on in your life and world.

A Seasonal Example

John loves to waterski.  He’s been doing it since he was a little kid growing up on a lake in Florida.  But now he lives in the north and waterskiing isn’t something he can do year-round.

If John wants to keep his profile smelling fresh and clean, he’s got four options that he can plug into his dating profile depending on the season:

1. Summer: I’m out on the lake as often as possible these days.  Nothing beats the sensation of flying across the water on my skis or board.
2. Fall: I’m a little bummed that soon the weather will be too cool for waterskiing.  Most of my summer was spent on the lake and I’m going to miss it.
3. Winter: I’ve been trying to satiate my hunger for waterskiing by learning how to downhill ski.  It’s fun, but it’s just not the same.  Are you looking forward to Spring as much as I am?
4. Spring: I’m pretty pumped about the weather warming up so quickly this year.  Really, really hoping I can break out my waterskis soon!

How much cooler and more ALIVE is his profile now that the folks reading it can see that he’s updated it recently?  It also shows that he’s passionate and excited about something – even if it is waiting for winter to be over, already!

Think About It

What can you freshen up in your profile?

• An outdoor activity you enjoy that season
• A convention or meetup you’re attending or just attended
• A movie you’re looking forward to seeing / just saw
• A book you just read
• A current political issue you feel strongly about (WARNING: Only do this if you’re prepared to deal with people who don’t agree with you. Politics are a dangerous subject.)
• A concert you’re looking forward to attending / just attended

It’s pretty easy to think up little ways to freshen up your profile.  It only takes a few minutes of your time and the results are more than worth it.

Don’t Forget!

We have two Halloween specials going on right now!  Don’t let them pass you by:

• Win a magazine of awesome monster art, courtesy of AvatarArt.com
• Get 25% off any Geek’s Dream Girl service with code HALLOWEEN (Want ideas on how to freshen up?  Get the Plastic d20 Package and we’ll have you smelling GREAT in no time.)

Now, the last time I DMed, it was a very short-lived game, with 3 PCs, and from a pre-made module.  So the idea of getting behind the screen again and writing my own campaign was a bit intimidating.

I have to admit… it’s very convenient to have the guy who invented the Eberron campaign setting as a client!  I’m not bugging Keith Baker too much, but it’s good to get burning questions answered straight from the horse’s mouth.

Setup For the Campaign

• PCs begin at level 5.   I wanted them to have some sort of history before the campaign started – a reason or two why they might be known.
• PCs back stories must end in them being arrested.  It was up to the player to speculate on the reasons behind their arrest.

Goals For Session One

• PCs wake up in a mysterious prison with the bare minimum necessary for survival.  It needs to be very clear that the magic in the jail makes escape by their own means impossible.
• Jes, an elf female, rescues the PCs from the prison.  They don’t have to trust her, but going with her is definitely a better idea than sitting around in jail.
• Have PCs worried about their ability to escape alive, and then freaked out more when the airship that rescues them is shot, breaking a strut.
• Make it a fight for your life kind of situation and have the possibility of a PC being left behind.

The PCs

• Beatdown Machine, Warforged Fighter
• Marthana “Jelly” Gellantara, Half-Elf Cleric
• Cyd, Genasi (? – he’s not really sure what he is) Wizard
• Evan MacDowell, Human Rogue

Adventure Summary

(This is going to be a bit short since I was focusing more on running the game than taking notes.  I should get better at it as things move along.)

Opening Scene:

After your arrest, you succumbed to a magical sleep.  It was a restful sleep, probably the best rest you’ve gotten in a long time.  It’s amazing how the body relaxes when the mind is shut down.  You each awaken in a cell.  It’s about ten feet by ten feet and carved into stone.  It smells wet and moldy with a slight stench of burning hair.  Your cell contains a small cot, a chamber pot and oddly enough, just inside the bars, encased in what appears to be glass, are your weapons, armor, supplies, and gold pieces.  You are wearing a simple prison shift and a metallic ID bracelet engraved with your name and a date.

The PCs explore their cells and discover a few things:

• Any noise they make in the cell seems to bounce off the bars and back at them.  They can hear the guards, but the guards can’t hear them and they can’t hear other prisoners (if there are any).
• Sticking your hand outside the bars causes a burn that seems to be linked to the bracelet.  The bracelet is tight and does not break.
• The glass case containing their stuff has a plaque with the words “A glimpse of your life that once was. Enjoy.” The glass is unbreakable, despite Beatdown’s attempt to smash it with the chamber pot.
• The bracelet had a date on it that was definitely after their arrest date, but only Evan appeared sure of how many days had passed.  (Smart question!! He asked how much beard growth he had.)

Dinner Time:

You hear a bell ring and hear a slight whirring noise from down the hall.  A human guard, rather portly and dressed in hide armor, appears in front of your cell, pushing a hovering metal cart that is held aloft by a tiny whirling elemental.  He pulls a small green stone from his pocket and waves it in front of the door before putting it back in his pocket.

Arcane-trained people: You feel a break in the energy field that kept you from being heard outside of your cell.

He pulls a bowl of gruel from the cart and slides it through a conveniently bowl-sized hole in the cell door before stepping back to the wall and reaching back in his pocket for the stone to reseal the Silence field on the cell.

The PCs:

• Talk to the guard and quickly realize he doesn’t know anything.  This is just a job, it’s what he does for money to support his family, he doesn’t know or care who runs the place so long as he gets his money.
• Jelly doesn’t talk to the guard.  She just watches as he slides the bowl of gruel in and reseals the spell with the green stone.
• Beatdown tries to throw his chamber pot at the guard, but it’s too wide to fit through the bars.  It’s okay, warforged don’t eat anyway.
• Cyd is sure the prison is run by the Arcane Congress, but the guard’s confused expression makes it clear this isn’t the case (or at least the guard doesn’t know anything about it).
• Evan hides in the shadows of his cell and the guard walks by, assuming the cell is empty.

Rescue Scene:

The lanterns dim and the chatter of the guards is replaced by the slow pacing of boots as the night guard paces your hall.  Soon, even that stops and you hear the sound of heavy snoring from the end of the hall.

While a couple of the PCs are too busy banging chamber pots or pondering what they’re going to do to notice… a couple hear the snoring stop and the sound of an ample body rolling to the ground.

The action begins with Jelly’s cell:

Standing in front of your cell is a hooded female figure dressed all in black.  As she turns her head to face you, you notice she has elven features.  Just as suddenly as she appears, she teleports through the bars and into your cell.  What do you do?

Jelly waves!

“My name is Jes – one s.  I’m here to rescue you, and several others, and move you to safety.  What I need from you is utter silence and to follow my directions to the letter.  Do you understand?”

Jes pulls a small stone from her pocket, touches it to the glass case containing your armor, and the glass swings open to allow you access to your things.  “Quickly,” she says, “Get dressed.  They can’t hear you until I move you outside the bars.”  She taps the stone to the bracelet and it falls to the ground with a clink.

• Jelly follows the directions, Jes puts an arm around her waist, and teleports them both outside the bars. She then moves to each of the other PCs’ cells.
• Beatdown is skeptical and wants to know if he goes with her if he’ll get to kill things. Jes assures him that he’ll be able to kill things.
• Cyd intrigues Jes. They told her he’d look… different… but she didn’t think he’d be this interesting. She walks around him and checks out his weird elemental humanoid from all angles.  He’s concerned that she’s from the Arcane Congress and taking him back there.  She says that she can’t prove she’s NOT from the Arcane Congress, but that date on his bracelet means he’ll be executed tomorrow.  He’ll just have to trust her for now.
• Evan chooses not to hide from Jes and she laments the fact that she has to deliver him to her employer rather than hire him to work with her.  She’s heard much about his assassination skills.

Jes leads you down the hallway and you realize, you were the only people on this hallway.  You move up the stairs and on to the roof of a building that appears to be carved into a mountain.  Water surrounds the building.  It’s pitch black out and the only light comes from the rooftop lights.  Some shipping boxes are on the roof and a green circle is painted on the floor in the center.

Jes points to the sky and you see in the distance a burning circle of fire, an airship, quickly approaching.   She explains that now you just need to wait for Ren to arrive.  He’s the youngest and best airship pilot in House Lyrandar and if anyone can pull off an escape like this, it’s him.  He won’t be able to hover, but the PCs can grab the rope ladder and climb up into the ship.  Jes stands in the center of the circle, raises her arms in the air, and shoots up a beam of light to guide Ren in.

The PCs aren’t alone on the roof.   But they all roll poorly, and it appears that the airship is far more interesting than the fact that stirring in the corner is a chain golem.

The original plan was for the golem to be pretty hard, but level 12 for 4 level 5 PCs seemed a little crazy, so after talking it over with Dante from StupidRanger, I decided to nerf the golem a little bit.

I had originally thought about it being really hard for the PCs to hit and having Jes help out, but then decided it wouldn’t be much fun if they couldn’t feel useful in their own escape.  Jes got to hold up the “bat signal” until Ren was almost close enough to drop the rope ladder, giving the PCs updates as Ren’s airship got closer and closer.

The golem was a bit overnerfed and died sooner than I’d hoped.  But that’s okay, because the alarms went off and eight guards showed up, four of which came out of a secret door that nobody had noticed.   About halfway through the battle with the guards, Ren drops the rope ladder which begins to slide across the roof.

Jelly, unfortunately, is horrible with ladders.  In fact, it took Beatdown Machine picking her up and attaching her to the ladder before she managed to get off the roof at all.  Luckily, a burst of adrenaline came in and she scurried the rest of the way up.

Our rogue, Evan, climbed halfway up the ladder and shot crossbow bolts at the guards from up above.  In true wizard fashion, Cyd set a bunch of guards on fire.  But the cool move of the encounter goes to Beatdown, who grabbed the bottom of the ladder and rode it past a guard, slicing him to the ground as he flew by.  Jes hopped on the ladder last, jumping off the side of the building and swinging in the air, cape billowing behind her.  (She’s a bit of a showoff.)

On the airship, the party meets the captain, Ren d’Lyrandar, a young half-elf with a babyface.  Jelly figures he can’t be older than 17.  He and Jes embrace and appear to know each other quite well.  (Romantic? Who knows?)  But the happy reunion is interrupted by the sound of a cannon firing, and a ball of force hits the airship, cracking one of the struts.

The ship bucks and many of its passengers fall to the deck.   Ren runs back to take back control from his co-pilot and Jes stands at the center of the deck, telling the PCs to protect her while she casts a ritual to repair the broken strut.

… and protect her they’ll have to do, because five archers on soarsleds arrive on the scene, shooting at the PCs and Jes.  (This is modeled on the encounter in the back of the Eberron Campaign Guide.)  Three members of the ship’s crew come up to man the light ballistas.

While Jes was fired on by the archers, she didn’t get hit (which kinda bummed me out!).  The unstable elemental still shook the boat, knocking people over.   But the PCs and crew fought on and finally took down all of the archers, sending them toppling into the ocean.  (Beatdown shoved the one who was on deck off the edge, just to be sure he was gone for good.)

Cyd, of course, went with the fireball method when one of the archers landed on the deck of the airship.

Jes finished the ritual and collapsed to the ground, exhausted.  Ren came back out and helped her back to his cabin to rest for the rest of the ride, leaving the PCs alone to wonder about the whole jailbreak situation.

The airship eventually comes to a stop and Jes and the PCs go down the ladder and into the Ghallanda enclave.  It is very, very early in the morning and they all go directly to their rooms to rest.  They can figure things out in the morning.

“She’s taking advantage of geeks!”

I even had one guy take it a step further and say that I was taking advantage of people with autism-spectrum disorders.

*blink*

Yeah, I know.

But I’m not here to defend myself – I’ve done that before.  I know who I am – a geek – and I know what’s in my heart – the desire to help other geeks find love using my writing skills and experience in the online dating world.  If you want to question my motives, knock yourself out.  But check out my service pages and you’ll see testimonials from all my happy clients.

Which leads me to my Exhibit A for what Taking Advantage of Geeks looks like:

http://www.geekmatchmaking.com

Go on, check it out.  (Not linking directly to prevent their angry mobs from seeing the traffic from here and coming to visit.)

Write Geek Enough, and It’s Now Geek Dating!

Other than the word “geek” plastered all over the page and one shitty JPG of a laptop with love glasses, there’s nothing about this site that says it’s made by geeks for geeks.  In fact, it looks an awful lot like a bunch of other shitty dating sites, but with some “creative” copy written by a $3/hr freelance copywriter from India.

The Fine Print Says It All

Now, do me a favor and scroll to the bottom of the page and look at the footer.  You’ll see a line that says “Powered by World Dating Partners.”  Anybody know what that means?

It’s known as a white label site, which means that as the dating site owner, all you need to do is customize your site and put it out there, and EVERYTHING ELSE gets taken care of by your company, in this case World Dating Partners.  To be clear, this means the site comes pre-stocked with profiles from other white label sites.   To be extra clear, the people you find on the site may not have signed up for geek dating at all.

To see what white label looks like in action, compare:

http://www.geekmatchmaking.com/static/stories/feedback.do

http://www.dating.com/static/stories/feedback.do

http://www.makefriendsfast.net/static/stories/feedback.do

http://www.australian.summer-romance.com/static/stories/feedback.do

Success Stories?

Also, if you Google the “success stories” you’ll notice they show up on multiple sites, sometimes with small details changed, but often not.

But hey, why wait for legitimate success stories that you’ll never get?  Why not just use the same success stories that every other white label site uses and tweak them to work for geeks?

Sad.

Dater Beware!

How can you tell a legitimate geek dating site?

• It looks like it’s run by geeks.
• It’s not powered by a white label company.
• The members have geeky profiles.
• The success stories don’t show up on other sites.  (Google is your friend!)
• You ask around and hear good things about it from other geeks.

Where Can A Geek Date?

Want a geek specific dating site?

My #1 geek dating site (other than my own, which is a bit different!) is definitely SoulGeek.com.  Up to nearly 19,000 members, SoulGeek is a site run BY geeks FOR geeks.

Check out my interview with founder Dino Andrade, J’s interview with Soulgeek spokesman Richard Hatch of Battlestar Gallactica, or follow Soulgeek on Twitter.  They’re great people who run a great niche dating site.