Mixed Signals

Straight-forward gaming

I picked up a copy of Spelljammer, the latest release from Wizards of the Coast, and I've spent the past couple of days reading over the three books in the boxed set. This is a quick cursory review of the new setting.

When Spelljammer was first announced, I was excited about it. I've already pla...

I've been reading through the Starfinder source book, Pact Worlds. It's a small book, but fits a lot of information into it, so I'm going to post about sections as I finish them.

In my initial read of the Aballon section, I expressed some dismay with the lack of explicit descriptions of the r...

Building a character in Shadowrun is a lot of fun. It's not quite the roller coaster that Traveler or Dead Earth are (for instance, you can't die during character creation in Shadowrun), but it's a detailed system in which you map out your character's life and education prior to running the shad...

I've been reading through the Starfinder source book, Pact Worlds. It's a small book, but fits a lot of information into it, so I'm going to post about sections as I finish them.

Akiton is the fourth planet planet from the Sun in the Golarian solar system, and I have vague memories of it appear...

I've been reading through the Starfinder source book, Pact Worlds. It's a small book, but fits a lot of information into it, so I'm going to post about sections as I finish them.

Golarian was the third planet from the Sun in its solar system, but it (and its moons, I guess) has gone missing.

A...

I believe I've reached a definitive conclusion about the organisational structure of most 5e books. I don't know what it is about the way 5e books are put together, but I have yet to find even one that entirely makes sense to me. This isn't a complaint I make lightly, because I see how much informat...

Years ago, Alderac Entertainment Group (AEG) published a few "splatbooks" for 3rd Edition D&D, and one of these books was titled Undead (with Mike Mearls as a credited writer). I've been reading it lately, because I play Pathfinder, which is essentially 3rd Edition with revisions, and I love pla...

I've been reading through the Starfinder source book, Pact Worlds. It's a small book, but fits a lot of information into it, so I'm going to post about sections as I finish them.

Castrovel, the second planet from the Sun in the Golarian solar system, was featured in a module of the Dead Suns...

Way back at the turn of the century, Wizards of the Coast decided to adopt open source methodology by developing the Open Game License (OGL). This marked not just the 3rd Edition of the game, but also the opening of the market for supplementary D&D material. After the 3rd Edition was released, there...

I've been reading through the Starfinder source book, Pact Worlds. It's a small book, but fits a lot of information into it, so I'm going to post about sections as I finish them.

Aballon is the first planet in Golarian's solar system, and it's home to a race of intelligent machines called anac...

I mostly play Pathfinder and 5e D&D, but if asked, I do also consider myself an AD&D 2nd edition player. In fact, emotionally I consider 2nd edition "my edition" because it for that edition I rolled my first characters (which I then never played, because my parents forbade it), and I read Dragonlanc...

Quick reference is invaluable during a D&D game. Even when you know the page numbern of important tables by heart, sometimes the book you need is in use by another player, or you're already elbows deep into 3 other books as it is, or you just don't have room on the table or your lap for another book...

Have you ever thought about how teleportation works? Because it's imaginary, we don't often wonder about the details. It's magic, and that's good enough. Usually. Unless, that is, you're playing a game relying on a series of logical connections to render a predictable and repeatable result. In real...

I've been reading through the Starfinder source book, Pact Worlds. It's a small book, but fits a lot of information into it, so I'm going to post about sections as I finish them.

Chapter 1 is titled The Worlds, and it covers each of the 14 significant bodies in the Pact World system. As with...

A few years ago, I purchased the Pact Worlds source book for the Starfinder RPG, and read a good portion of it on flight DL508 from Atlanta to San Diego. I know this because my boarding pass for that flight was used as a bookmark. I'd read enough of the book to give me a general idea on the sett...

I picked up the Anniversary Edition of Rise of the Runelords, the very first Pathfinder adventure path. This is my review of the fourth module, Fortress of the Stone Giants.

This is an exciting and brutal ending to an exciting adventure path. The plot is simple: get to the tippy-top of a mo...