Month: January 2014

The Crusaders: There ain’t no sanity clause

“Sanatorium?” says Amiri the Barbarian, gesturing with her tankard, “Huh, you city-folk put way too much store by sanity. A bit of madness is good for you!”

Seelah the Paladin straightens her back. “Clarity of mind and purpose is how things get done!” she insists, “It is how civilizations are built! If we do not…”

Lini the Druid snorts mead out of her nose.

Seelah looks at her, finger frozen in mid-air. Is that a smirk on Sajan the Monk’s stony face?

Amiri laughs, “Sorry, Seel. You’re way too easy!”

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30 Years

Seelah the Paladin, one of the ‘Iconic’ characters from the Pathfinder universe.

I used to play Advanced Dungeons & Dragons in 1978, now I have Pathfinder which came out in 2009.

There are 30 years between these rulesets. It is still pretty much the same game, but I love the ‘Iconic’ characters they created for the Pathfinder universe. They use these Iconics in all the illustrations in the rulebooks and in the card game and they all look really cool, especially Seelah the Paladin. Here she is standing off against a giant worm of some kind.

But, for me, the archetypal Paladin will always be this old full page illustration from the 1978 Advanced Dungeons & Dragons Players Handbook, ‘A Paladin in Hell’:

A Paladin in Hell, from the 1978 AD&D Player’s Handbook

There are 30 years between these illustrations, but the old black & white better captures the feel of a holy avenger battling against insurmountable odds.

Later this year: Skulls and Shackles

Paizo have the next adventure path for the Pathfinder Adventure Card Game scheduled for August, when the current Rise of the Runelords series finishes. It is Skulls and Shackles, a piratey adventure for a new set of characters, including Swashbuckler, Oracle and Gunslinger.

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I got the Pathfinder RPG

I just got the Pathfinder RPG Core Rulebook, and the Rise of the Runelords Anniversary Edition adventure path.

The Core Rulebook is a whopping 570 pages of roleplaying goodness. It has the gorgeous Wayne Reynolds art for the character classes (he did quite a lot of Magic cards, too) and has all the rules and background for the Pathfinder version of D&D 3.5.

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Nualia defeated again

I resumed my original PACG party’s adventures and took them through the final two scenarios in the Burnt Offerings adventure.

The party is Valeros the Fighter, Seoni the Sorceress, Kyra the Cleric, and Merisiel the Rogue.

They were making their way down into the catacombs below the mountain in the final scenario, Thistletop Delve, and had cleared out five locations before finding Nualia the evil priestess in her Throne Room as the last card of the last location.

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A History of Dungeons & Dragons

I started playing D&D back in the mists of time with the boxed basic set in 1978. I remember my friend DMing an adventure where my first level character faced a 15th level purple worm in the second room.

I still have (most of) that set, along with the three Advanced D&D rulebooks that came shortly after. I played AD&D from 1978 through to 1987, interspersed with other rpgs.

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The Actress and the Astronomer

Azathoth really cannot sleep. It is up to Lola Hayes the actress and Norman Withers the astronomer to keep him from waking.

As if battling Azathoth isn’t enough, Lola has to chase a team of evil cultist explorers from expedition to expedition as they try to discover all the Secrets of the Past and destroy the world. She follows them from Antarctica to Tunguska to the Pyramids, always one step behind. Finally she gets ahead and beats them to the Heart of Africa.

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