d20 Advanced

It seems that dismembering trolls with security cameras running is an idea that would qualify as "epic-bad". See, when I take a ride down to visit my girlfriend, I often wind up invited to a Shadowrun game that one of her friends, the voice of the delightful Triple M of Spriggs fame, runs on Saturday afternoons. We'd been hired to break a political prisoner out of a Chinese prison built from the remains of the Three Gorges Dam, and our investigations led us to discover that the lawyer who had represented the political prisoner had been assassinated by a pair of troll thugs. Well, we decided it would be a brilliant idea to send our team's resident sociopaths (my girlfriend's human gun-bunny, my troll enforcer, and a human who loves explosives too much for his own good) to “interrogate” these trolls. It actually went pretty well too. The explosive expert pretended to be drunk and lured the trolls over (away from their orc buddies) by yelling, “Hey, Stumpy: where's your bridge?” to the trolls (a serious insult indeed; my troll recommended he go to sensitivity training afterwards).

So the trolls and a few orcs came running around the corner, right into my troll's monofilament sword, the gun-bunny's favorite heavy pistol, and a face full of flashbang. The gun-bunny knee-capped the first troll, and I wanted to try the same with my troll (cutting his leg off at the knee seemed like fun). However, “accuracy” wasn't my strongest suit, and my odds of hitting dropped by about 40% for trying such a thing. So I settled for just taking a regular attack.

Unfortunately (for both us and for the other troll), the number of dice that a troll with 9 Strength and a mono filament sword rolls for damage in 4th Edition Shadowrun is more than a lot by a bunch. Instead of just downing the troll, I sort of wound up bisecting him. We were content to have one thug to interrogate, until it became clear that he'd been memory wiped and a tiny grenade went off in his brain, rendering our entire investigation useless.

And then it was on the news that we'd been involved with the murder of two trolls. And then a few of our own team members set us up to meet an informant and then called the police to raid the meeting on us. And then the explosives expert lobbed a high-explosive grenade at a guy carrying a shoulder-mounted rocket launcher. And then everything exploded.

When the smoke cleared, the gun-bunny and the explosives expert had successfully fled, my troll was playing at Scarface to keep the attention of the police off of the other two, and the sniper we'd positioned to cover us in case things got caught by a police helicopter. When we ended the session, 25% of the team was going to jail, another 25% of the team was out for revenge against the 25% of the team that had set them up, and the last 25% of the team was shopping around for a new apartment with walk-in closets.

There are two take-home lessons from this little experience:

A good GM knows how to come up with an interesting adventure, but a great GM knows how to throw his own plans out the window when his players' schemes are even more dastardly.
If you come up with something that you're sure is 100% escape-proof, your players are 99% likely to find a way to escape.

Oh, and expect a big announcement about the future of d20 Advanced Adventure Roleplaying Game later this week.

-JK



8-18-08	You may have noticed that the links to buy the d20 Advanced Adventure Roleplaying Game have been, well, dead since early last week. It seems as though the company that runs (among other sites) RPGNow and DriveThruRPG had a nasty database error that deleted everything for the beginning of August (which, if you'll remember, is how long d20^ has even existed for). I'm currently working with the gentelment at OneBookShelf to get everything back in order. But in good news, Jim at Dragon Avenue continues to be uncommonly awesome. We're currently piggy-backing on his forums, and I'll make sure to keep everyone updated there. -JK	New Features Fantasy Heroes _______________ Now available!
8-8-08	And at long last, d20 Advanced Adventure Roleplaying Game is available from RPGNow and DriveThruRPG. To celebrate, you can be the first to check out three free archetypes for your fantasy games. Check out our new feature, Fantasy Heroes. -JK
8-5-08	Oh my God, it's finally done. Yes, I know. Big shock: d20 Advanced is finally done and ready for release. This Friday, August 8, d20 Advanced Adventure Roleplaying Game will be available from RPGNow. I’d like to thank everyone from Dragon Avenue who helped, the fellows at Heritage Comics HSQ for help wrangling art for the book, the play-testers who put up with an unfinished system and constant tweaks from me, and Jim for hosting this site. -JK
5-6-08	It looks like my undergrad finally realized I graduated. I'd hoped they would, since they gave me a diploma and all, and I'm in medical school at the moment. Unfortunately, they also deleted my computer account, so no more web-hosting from my old school. Le'sigh. So for now, I'll post a few of the things I lost in the process here for folks to get access to again. The first is my good ol' d20 Advanced Signature banner, for all you forum-dwellers out there: I'll get more up as I can. For now... more neuroscience. -JK
4-29-08	It looks like all my good karma is finally paying off. Potentially big news pending on a dead-tree version of d20 Advanced might be coming soon. Keep an eye on this site for details when I have them. -JK
4-18-08	My first blog post on my favorite features in d20 Advanced is up now. You can read the entry here. -JK
4-17-08	Jackelope Crossing Games Says "Thank You" to the fine folks at the Dragon Avenue Forums who have helped to make d20 Advanced possible. To thank everyone for their hard work in helping to make the game a reality, Jackelope Crossing Games is going offer copies of d20 Advanced at the reduced price of $5.00 before the book is available from other online vendors. For details, see this thread on Dragon Avenue. This offer will only be available for a limited time. Also in d20 Advanced news today, expect to see several new entries in my designer blog this week about some of my personal favorite features of the game. -JK
4-14-08	It seems that dismembering trolls with security cameras running is an idea that would qualify as "epic-bad". See, when I take a ride down to visit my girlfriend, I often wind up invited to a Shadowrun game that one of her friends, the voice of the delightful Triple M of Spriggs fame, runs on Saturday afternoons. We'd been hired to break a political prisoner out of a Chinese prison built from the remains of the Three Gorges Dam, and our investigations led us to discover that the lawyer who had represented the political prisoner had been assassinated by a pair of troll thugs. Well, we decided it would be a brilliant idea to send our team's resident sociopaths (my girlfriend's human gun-bunny, my troll enforcer, and a human who loves explosives too much for his own good) to “interrogate” these trolls. It actually went pretty well too. The explosive expert pretended to be drunk and lured the trolls over (away from their orc buddies) by yelling, “Hey, Stumpy: where's your bridge?” to the trolls (a serious insult indeed; my troll recommended he go to sensitivity training afterwards). So the trolls and a few orcs came running around the corner, right into my troll's monofilament sword, the gun-bunny's favorite heavy pistol, and a face full of flashbang. The gun-bunny knee-capped the first troll, and I wanted to try the same with my troll (cutting his leg off at the knee seemed like fun). However, “accuracy” wasn't my strongest suit, and my odds of hitting dropped by about 40% for trying such a thing. So I settled for just taking a regular attack. Unfortunately (for both us and for the other troll), the number of dice that a troll with 9 Strength and a mono filament sword rolls for damage in 4th Edition Shadowrun is more than a lot by a bunch. Instead of just downing the troll, I sort of wound up bisecting him. We were content to have one thug to interrogate, until it became clear that he'd been memory wiped and a tiny grenade went off in his brain, rendering our entire investigation useless. And then it was on the news that we'd been involved with the murder of two trolls. And then a few of our own team members set us up to meet an informant and then called the police to raid the meeting on us. And then the explosives expert lobbed a high-explosive grenade at a guy carrying a shoulder-mounted rocket launcher. And then everything exploded. When the smoke cleared, the gun-bunny and the explosives expert had successfully fled, my troll was playing at Scarface to keep the attention of the police off of the other two, and the sniper we'd positioned to cover us in case things got caught by a police helicopter. When we ended the session, 25% of the team was going to jail, another 25% of the team was out for revenge against the 25% of the team that had set them up, and the last 25% of the team was shopping around for a new apartment with walk-in closets. There are two take-home lessons from this little experience: A good GM knows how to come up with an interesting adventure, but a great GM knows how to throw his own plans out the window when his players' schemes are even more dastardly. If you come up with something that you're sure is 100% escape-proof, your players are 99% likely to find a way to escape. Oh, and expect a big announcement about the future of d20 Advanced Adventure Roleplaying Game later this week. -JK

2-13-08	I Love the Smell of HTML in the Morning. It smells like victory. After a few weeks of fiddling around with the layout, I think I've finally found one that works for the site. Maybe. Hopefully. Things are a little sparse at the moment, but we're getting there. The rules wiki is almost complete, and I'm planning on getting the blogs up in the near future. And hey, because I'm a nice guy, take a peek at the front and back cover of the upcoming d20 Advanced Adventure Roleplaying Game. -JK