Instead of leaves, the gnarled black tree grew sharp, metallic slivers, ringing out like a thousand tiny bells in a constant trickle of wind. Stronger gusts often cause a razor or two to disconnect, falling lazily and slicing blades of grass in its descent. The accumulation of dismembered birds that lay by the tree in [...]
The shopkeeper looked at the leopard-spotted dog sitting outside his shop, and he found himself oddly compelled to leave his shop so he could pet the sad-looking animal. The dog sat there while he consoled it and asked it where its owner was. Suddenly, a sharp whistle sounded to his left, and the dog trotted [...]
Trebuchets are the dominant siege engine in parts of the world. They have advantages over many other weapons, including longer range, the ability to throw a variety of objects, easy maintenance, and variable power.
Trebuchets include a frame from which a long, unbalanced arm (virga) swings. The virga is attached to the frame by means of [...]
“The door was thick—made of stone, I think—but I could still hear it. Damn my soul, I could still bloody hear it.”
The priest sat in silence, casting a long frown over the ninth bowl of oatmeal the warrior had ignored this week.
“When it first touched my ears, it sounded like a barrel of rancid [...]
Though he’s too modest to brag about it himself, our Web Editor Scott Gable has launched a dual-edition set of Spirit Magic that I think is the most promising new company launch in ages.
Now I might be slightly biased, but if you’ve seen Gable’s writeups in Kobold Quarterly, you might not be surprised. This is [...]
There is always room for improvement. This is a basic fact known to trapsmiths. The only limits to improvement are time and money: usually clients only want “reasonable” protection or warding. Trapsmiths offer a plethora of reasonably priced enhancements to improve standard issue traps, making them something special and unique.
Many traps are that much more [...]
Kobold Quarterly has just been announced one of the first two recipients of a Gen Con Indy Marketing Fellowship!
To encourage and reward deeper engagement in marketing their presences at Gen Con, we are awarding marketing fellowships to carefully chosen companies that have submitted A+ level marketing plans demonstrating their preparation for attendance at Gen [...]
It’s that time of year… Happy GM’s Day! And there’s a sale…
Until the morning of Monday, March 8th, Open Design will be taking part in the annual GM’s Day Celebration Sale at DriveThruRPG. All Design Guides, Gazetteers, and issues of Kobold Quarterly are 25% OFF—that’s “1/4 off for the Fourth.”
Celebrate GM’s [...]
Insular to the point of xenophobia, the peacock spawn interact only sparingly with outsiders, trading for weapons or magical items, but always with disdain as if they believed themselves superior to other beings even in the face of their own often desperate tribulations within the Abyss.
Habitat & Society
Continually wandering, with no set layer to call [...]
When we launched the Kobold Quarterly Adopt-a-Soldier Holiday Contest, we heard some perspectives on gaming in the army from Ed Healy and in the navy from Rich Baker.
SrA Ian McGonigal, one of our two contest winners (along with civilian Jospeh Kramer), recently gave us some insight into gaming among those who slip the surly bonds [...]
Kobold Quarterly #12 has been out for over a month and there are still reviews steadily pouring in. Find out what the buzz is about.
(We were even able to fool those grumpy gnomes.)
Wow, that’s really a nice piece of writing; it’s all practical and no joke. This article alone is worth the [...]
Trapsmiths try very hard to impede, disable, and destroy intruders, but sometimes, trapsmiths wish that tomb robbers would just destroy themselves. The undead druid known as the “Thing at the Soul of the Mire” (see Kobold Quarterly #3) was one of the first to develop the painful lure trap: a trap where intruders cause their [...]
I’m happy to announce that Tales of the Old Margreve has reached the commissioning goal and is moving into design! The project has strong direction from the supremely talented design duo of Tim and Eileen Connors—and the raw horsepower of a hundred sharp and crafty GMs and designers, including RPG Superstar semi-finalist Jim Groves and [...]
Tim Connors and the patrons have already brainstormed more than 50 forest monsters for Tales of the Old Margreve, and they are winnowing the list to the best dozen or so for use in the adventures. Just as a sample of how these are not exactly typical forest denizens, here’s the smallest [...]
The first (of 5!) playtests is complete. Here’s what designer Tim Connors had to say (without spoilers!) on changes to the design introduced as a result of playtest feedback.
Added event-triggered flashbacks designed to encourage camaraderie between the otherwise opposed Viking and monk investigators.
Based pregens on Cthulhu Dark Ages to tweak/balance things like armor/weapons [...]
A manifestation of twisted freedom and self-devouring depravity taken to their most horrific ends, the Abyss contains virtually uncountable numbers of fiends, perhaps bordering upon the infinite. But while its labyrinthine depths swim, choked by its fecund natives, its resident demons are not the only creatures hungering for blood and slaughter for their own sake. [...]
Continuing from last week’s lesser curse with more than 40 new minor curses:
Loses all sense of hygiene
Loses all sense of modesty
Large warts (-1 charisma)
Acquires a rare, but harmless, skin disease (-1 charisma)
Drools constantly
Stutters constantly
Enlarged body part (e.g. ears, nose, chin, feet, hands)
Becomes a pathological liar [...]
The Tales of the Old Margreve continues to gather patrons very quickly, and the brainstorms are gathering both amazing spells and monsters—plus a certain amount of silly fun. Frankly, there are so many rich forest myths and legends here that we can afford to choose just the very best, and develop them for both playability [...]
Some trapsmiths believe in the tried and true “bigger is better” in trap design. However, some of the more offbeat trapsmiths prefer complexity in their designs.
Many of these traps comprise multiple smaller traps, and the CR of each is determined separately. Stages should be treated as separate traps (e.g. requiring separate Perception checks). If only [...]
In a clearing dominated by an enormous tree, a pair of large monkeys sat lazily on a branch until they noticed three men entering the clearing. They shrieked, and the men, seasoned warriors all, ignored the warning and approached the tree. The monkeys dropped to the ground and ran towards these new foes, who drew [...]
Once upon an average day in a bleak and all-to consistent village, there was a young girl helping her mother with chores.
“Because Pappy and the boys are out slaying those darn rats in the field for Mr. Hibbins, Mrs. Hibbins is rewarding us with some freshly churned butter. Sally, I need you to go and [...]
With a fling of spittle and a forbidden gesture of the hand, the victim receives a subtle and annoying minor curse. Effects vary and are not terribly debilitating, but the effect on the superstitious and those in the public eye can be devastating.
Everyone’s heard of “the gypsy curse” or the “evil eye.” Country folk have [...]
Some projects need time to grow slowly and flower into a display over months or years.
Tales of the Old Margreve is not one of them; it has rocketed along toward a full commission status faster than any other project to date. While the project is not yet at a green light status, it is now [...]
The best kind of trap is a trap that can hide in plain sight, perhaps even be on display:
Upon a blackwood table stands a glass cylinder with something inside. Two everburning torches set behind the cylinder cause the object contained in the cylinder to cast a long shadow across the room. The shadow twists and [...]
Bred to exterminate all sentient life in the natural world, nihilimentii were created as living weapons in the ancient cosmic war between the gods and the primordials. The psychic vibrations of intelligent creatures cause nihilimentii physical discomfort, driving them to a solitary existence. In fact, other creatures’ perceptions of the nihilimentii create painful psychic feedback [...]
Entangled is a condition that represents a creature dealing with something stuck or entwined around its limbs (if it has any) and body. An entangled creature takes a -2 penalty on attack rolls and a -4 penalty on Dexterity, can move at only half speed, and cannot charge or run. Sometimes, an entangled creature cannot [...]
As the Open Design experiment has expanded and won critical and publishing success, a few people have clearly shown just how great collaborative adventure design can be. Tim and Eileen Connors are right at the top of the list, and I’m happy to announce that Open Design is commissioning a project that they will lead: [...]
Wouldn’t it be great if your dice never fell off the table? What if every attack roll came with a sound effect, and your character’s damage, marks, and every other condition were all tracked for you? It would be the perfect gaming table, no?
Well, stop wishing because it exists and I saw it in person [...]
The taking of mortal lovers by succubi is a legend that many dwellers of the Material Plane are familiar with. Fleeting paramours by nature, succubi are fabled to seduce men and women only to achieve petty, shortsighted ends.
However, it is less known that some succubi take a single partner for extended periods. Those chosen for [...]
Every trapsmith knows that a trap is little more than a complicated piece of furniture or decoration until it springs to life and reminds people why no one comes down this way. That is why, over the years, many clever trapsmiths have found ways to bait their traps or even install traps into tempting targets [...]
As soon as you lay eyes on this ancient crone, images of the deaths of all those you’ve loved and lost flood your mind. In these visions, you see the crone’s withered hand repeatedly lash out with an elongated pair of terrible shears to sever the gleaming, silver threads rising from your loved ones’ heads. [...]
In many cities across the Great Desert, Selket’s cult festers. These are cults of humanoids who have been infiltrated by Selket-worshipping priests who poison their flock with their debased dogma. They promise Selket will protect and aid her followers in ways other gods cannot or will not. Priests target slums and other places of desperation, [...]
Anyone like winning stuff? Well if you do, head on over to the blog Dorkland. There just might be 3 free Open Design books in it for you.
The shifting desert sands mask weathered pyramids and ruined temples dedicated to fallen deities and demons best forgotten. Some are blessedly buried so deep beneath the dunes and so far within the recesses of our collective memory to be all but lost, perhaps never to be revived. Others, unfortunately, continue to poison mortals with their [...]
The derro are masters of ritual magic. Their mad insights and devious, malignant nature allow them to craft rituals unknown on the surface world. Derro rituals reflect the intellects behind their inventors and grant the ability to torture other creatures, lay better ambushes, and protect the approaches to their home caverns.
Clever or daring adventurers might [...]
Adapted from Scott Murray’s “Spiked Pits, Poisoned Arrows, and Healing Words” from Kobold Quarterly #12.
As discussed the previous article, traps can impede a party in more ways that just a poison arrow or a snare. Boon traps are generally magical devices that provide bonuses rather than penalties. They may not target adventurers intruding on their [...]
The ghastly humanoid cadaver jerks and shudders forward with shocking speed. Rotting skin flaps back from its grotesque carcass, uncovering insects scuttling over moldering sinew and gristle. Entrails dangling from its abdominal cavity writhe about, as if grasping at things unseen. The corpse screeches an open war razor along the floor as it comes, and [...]
In Kobold Quarterly #11, Marc Radle presented his new Pathfinder RPG base class, the spell-less ranger. Just as it sounds, this ranger variant strips the spellcasting abilities from the ranger while expanding on its other abilities.
Along with the new class, Marc also designed character sheet pages—usable with the standard ranger or the new spell-less ranger—that [...]
As one of the oldest races, dwarves are intimately familiar to experienced players. Even if you’ve never rolled a dwarf, you probably have a basic concept in mind when you think dwarf: a long beard, surly attitude, a love of hammers and axes, and a penchant for beer.
With the 4th edition introduction of the primal [...]
Discovered by noted man of science Dr. Belmont Breslin of Yornica, steel of spell refraction is an alloy formed from a naturally occurring ore with unusual properties. While it is an excellent conductor of vibration and sound—hence its use in superior musical instruments—steel of spell refraction is nonmagnetic and distorts arcane energy that washes over [...]
A small subset of the trapsmithing community looks at nature for inspiration. One of the early successes was the development of the box of brown mold.
Box of Brown Mold (CR 2)
Type mechanical; Search DC 22; Disable Device DC 16
Trigger touch (opening the box); Reset automatic
Effect 5-ft. cold aura (3d6 nonlethal cold damage)
Market Price 3,000 gp
The [...]
The thing appears to be a small lump of green or pale pink vegetable material with two thin stalks protruding from its central, ball-like mass. The surface of the ball is wrinkled and creased. Despite its appearance, it… it is irresistible…
Brainstalk Fungus (CR 2)
XP 600
N Tiny plant
Init -5; Senses blindsense 60 ft.; Perception +8
Aura psychic [...]
Over at The Core Mechanic blog, they’re busy wrangling the 375 nominations they received for inclusion in the Open Game Table anthology.
KQ.com has 8 articles nominated…
Kobold Quarterly #12 just released and the reviews are steadily pouring in. Find out what the buzz is about.
Your mom. She’s going to LOVE KQ#12. It’s not only because your Mom Loves Kobolds.
Moms are always on the lookout for wholesome, kid friendly games… James Jacobs where he recounts he experience at da Vinci Arts Middle [...]
Thanks to the support of gamers worldwide, over $50,000 is already destined for Doctors Without Borders and their efforts in Haiti and the Dominican Republic.
As many of you likely already know, DriveThruRPG’s servers took a huge hit, but really, it’s heartwarming to know that it’s because people are just anxious to help. Don’t worry, though, [...]
Brilliant and malevolent, rakshasas are nefarious outsiders who cherish power and cruelty above all else. In their far-ranging quest for pleasure and worship, rakshasas often pay little heed to the lives they destroy. One of the more indulgent of this race has left its mark on your family.
Class Skill Disguise
Bonus Spells alter self (3rd), detect [...]
<<zzztt>> Bow down before me, your <<crackle>> new master. I will lead us <<zap>> to victory over the lavamen! <<ZZZTT>>
Get… outta me… you tiny… electrical despot! Argh. The last thing I remember… Hey, back off sparky!
Now, while I’m here anyway, I am ecstatic to announce the winner of Open Design’s first ever King of the [...]
Gamers want to help Haiti and the Dominican Republic in their hour of need, and DriveThruRPG is helping to make this happen with a giant pdf bundle filled to the brim with amazing content donated by a ton of RPG publishers.
With a simple donation of $20, every penny of which goes to Doctors Without Borders [...]
This is your last chance to vote for the King of the Monsters. Make sure your voice is heard, for tomorrow at noon (PST), the winner is crowned.
What kind of king do you want to rule, to hoard, to slay, to represent your general PC-harassing interests?
Tell us by voting in the forums.
As promised in Kobold Quarterly #12, here are more diseases to throw at unsuspecting adventurers.
Iron Rot (Level 3 Disease)
Rusted metal of all sorts, from old sword blades to discarded nails, carries iron rot. The victim’s joints slowly stiffen until movement of any kind, even speech, is impossible…
This creature looks like a large, emaciated jackal. Its blood-red skin stretches tight over its bones. Its eyes gleam with malevolent cunning, and blood drool drips from its fang-filled maw and fat, lolling tongue.
Blood jackals are vicious hunters and scavengers that creep across the desert at night in search of warm-blooded animals to feed upon. [...]
The blog Abstract XP calls Kobold Guide to Game Design from Open Design recommended reading.
And it is the writing style as much as the content that makes this publication work. It reads like a learned favourite uncle (Uncle Wolfgang in this case) has sat you down and spun you some home truths about writing fantasy [...]
Kobold Quarterly #12 just released and reviewers are already posting their comments. Find out what the buzz is about.
Telkari, Inevitable of Death… A corrupted marut inevitable and biomechanical plagues redolent of Hellraiser and Tetsuo: Bodyhammer. Awesome article…
The Holy Remix… Pathfinder Cleric Hacking! Like clerics of different deities being distinct from each other? You’ll love this. [...]
Kobold Army: ten-HUT! At ease!
We are happy to announce the Grand Prize winners for the Kobold Quarterly Adopt-a-Soldier Holiday Contest.
Before we do that, we’d
like to thank each and every person who participated by blogging, podcasting, twittering, and signing up for the program. If you’re in the military, we have a bunch of new gift subscriptions [...]
Here we are at the end of our first ever tournament to discover the King of the Monsters! Who will win, standing in glorious triumph before your accolades? Who will be left battered and bloodied, dreaming of vengeance? You, the fans, will now decide.
There are 10 finalists, each already a winner. The one that receives [...]
Kobold Quarterly #12 is now available.
KQ is proud to ring in the new year with a brand new issue. Time to warm yourself in front of a warm, crackling computer screen reading about the game you love. (And the print version has been released from its cage , too. It should be tearing up mailboxes [...]
Welcome to the King of the Monsters Contest finals: the zaglossus is finalist 10 of 10. These submissions are left almost entirely as they were received with the exception that all submissions have had minor alterations for proper spelling (not grammar), formatting, and the addition of an image. Let the fight commence!
______
This dusky quadrupedal creature [...]
Welcome to the King of the Monsters Contest finals: the wendigo is finalist 9 of 10. These submissions are left almost entirely as they were received with the exception that all submissions have had minor alterations for proper spelling (not grammar), formatting, and the addition of an image. Let the fight commence!
______
A far more horrific [...]
Need clarification on some mechanics in the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game? You’re in the right place. Take a seat with veteran game designer Skip Williams.
Not sure how a spell works? Curious why that monster does what it does? Trying to get your feats to play nicely together? Skip has the answer.
Post your new questions for Skip [...]
The dwarf cantons of the Iron Crags are so successful, one might be forgiven for believing subterranean life is easy, no harder than a surface dweller’s existence on the farm or in a city. Of course, dwarves are not solely an underground race—they cultivate the land and hunt and fish in the sunlit world—but most [...]
Welcome to the King of the Monsters Contest finals: the treacle is finalist 8 of 10. These submissions are left almost entirely as they were received with the exception that all submissions have had minor alterations for proper spelling (not grammar), formatting, and the addition of an image. Let the fight commence!
______
Nerves steeled against the [...]
Welcome to the King of the Monsters Contest finals: the spark is finalist 7 of 10. These submissions are left almost entirely as they were received with the exception that all submissions have had minor alterations for proper spelling (not grammar), formatting, and the addition of an image. Let the fight commence!
______
This large mote of [...]
Welcome to the King of the Monsters Contest finals: the polydoros kin is finalist 6 of 10. These submissions are left almost entirely as they were received with the exception that all submissions have had minor alterations for proper spelling (not grammar), formatting, and the addition of an image. Let the fight commence!
______
Quid non mortalia [...]
(This week’s column uses 3.5E rules. The next one, however, will be the first to use the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game rules.)
Spell descriptions contain a great deal of standardized nomenclature that helps explain what each spell does. The questions presented here involve a few of them.
Aiming a Spell
Aiming a spell involves choose exactly where a spell [...]
Thanks to everyone who entered the Adopt-a-Soldier Holiday Contest and to the many others who helped spread the word. Your efforts doubled the number of Adopt-a-Soldier sponsorships in less than a month—so if you’re in the military, there’s a Kobold Quarterly gift subscription waiting for you right now. Head over to the product page and [...]
Welcome to the King of the Monsters Contest finals: the hive ghoul is finalist 5 of 10. These submissions are left almost entirely as they were received with the exception that all submissions have had minor alterations for proper spelling (not grammar), formatting, and the addition of an image. Let the fight commence!
______
One bard laughed [...]
Welcome to the King of the Monsters Contest finals: the grievous wailer is finalist 4 of 10. These submissions are left almost entirely as they were received with the exception that all submissions have had minor alterations for proper spelling (not grammar), formatting, and the addition of an image. Let the fight commence!
______
Neither the crunching [...]
Welcome to the King of the Monsters Contest finals: the grave linnorm is finalist 3 of 10. These submissions are left almost entirely as they were received with the exception that all submissions have had minor alterations for proper spelling (not grammar), formatting, and the addition of an image. Let the fight commence!
______
Rising from the [...]
It was the evening before Christmas. Our home, decorated with a regal evergreen resplendent in ornamentation and with stockings that had been hung with ritual precision by the mouth of the fireplace, was deathly quiet. I could not sleep that night; it seemed as if the great yawning silence of the house pressed upon my [...]
Open Design Podcast has just announced the winner of Tony DiTerlizzi’s quickling sketch from the most recent podcast.
Congratulations Sean Holland, for this wonderful piece of art is now yours! Take good care of the little guy.
As this contest draws to its conclusion and the year wraps up, Open Design Podcast will be going on hiatus. [...]
Kobold Quarterly’s Adopt-a-Soldier program is open to all branches of the military: sailors, marines, airmen, and guardians are all eligible to receive free gift subscriptions from sponsors.
Sailors have relied on games to relieve the monotony of long voyages ever since oars first touched water. To get the scuttlebutt on gaming in the navy, we naturally [...]
Welcome to the King of the Monsters Contest finals: the echidna is finalist 2 of 10. These submissions are left almost entirely as they were received with the exception that all submissions have had minor alterations for proper spelling (not grammar), formatting, and the addition of an image. Let the fight commence!
______
From above the waist, [...]
Welcome to the King of the Monsters Contest finals: the afanc is finalist 1 of 10. These submissions are left almost entirely as they were received with the exception that all submissions have had minor alterations for proper spelling (not grammar), formatting, and the addition of an image. Let the fight commence!
______
Swimming over the placid [...]
The monster apocalypse is here. In just a few short sentences, you’ll discover the identities of the 10 finalists of KQ.com’s first ever King of the Monsters Contest. But first…
We would like to thank each and every one of you that sent an entry in. We couldn’t have done this without you.
The judging was not [...]
Kobold Guide to Game Design from Open Design just got called out as being one of the three best books to improve your game by The Core Mechanic.
Perhaps sometimes you don’t want to be tied to a computer? Perhaps you might prefer to sit fireside…
… books that roleplayers from all games can enjoy and improve [...]
Haven’t tried one of Open Design’s patronage projects and are curious? Already enjoy them but looking for some fun?
RevDM, on the Paizo boards, is doing a play-by-post of Halls of the Mountain King 4E.
It promises to be a dwarven airship full of fun and excitement.
Have you checked out ENWorld’s epic adventure path War of the Burning Sky? Perhaps, this is the perfect opportunity to discover what it’s all about.
ENWorld has created a 1.5 minute trailer with original music, voiceover, and artwork to promote the War of the Burning Sky Campaign Saga for D&D 4E and D&D 3.5E.
See it now [...]
Open Design’s own 4th Edition patronage project, Courts of the Shadow Fey, is all up in your stuff, stealing your babies and snorting your finest dreams. Because that’s just what fey do.
Fey Politics
The design for Courts of the Shadow Fey has a twist at its heart, like a lover’s betrayal. It begins with assassins, arcane [...]
The Adopt-a-Soldier Holiday Contest is still going strong! Civilians and service members are eligible to win some fantastic prizes. We’ve had quite a few civilians enter the contest so far but not a lot of military personnel. So if you’re in the service, this is a great time to sign up for the program—your odds [...]
Open Design’s very first Call of Cthulhu patronage project, The Red Eye of Azathoth, is shredding minds like you wouldn’t believe.
Mighty Azathoth Stirs
Azathoth, the blind idiot god, slumbering as he has for eons untold in the darkness between the stars, has been disturbed. Should he awaken and open just one of his uncaring red eyes, all [...]
Gaming blog RPG Blog II has just started their “The Best & Worst of Gaming 2009″ series. You only get one guess at who placed in the category Best Gaming Company.
Go check it out, and get the scoop on an entire year of the world of gaming’s ups and downs.
The life of an adventurer is one of unrelenting struggle and limitless sacrifice. To carry sword and symbol, without hesitation, into darkened labyrinths and abysmal grottoes betrays a resolve uncommon for mortals. Vicious monsters, lethal traps, insurmountable hazards—an adventurer must not waver in the face of such peril.
And yet, many do. Like the soldier who [...]
Trapsmiths constantly obsess about dismemberment and decapitation, always imagining better ways to cut into the flesh of interlopers. Two standard designs are the scything blade and wall blade trap.
Scything Blade Trap (CR 1)
Type mechanical; Search DC 21; Disable Device DC 20
Trigger location; Reset automatic
Effect atk +8 melee (1d8/×3)
Market Price 1,700 gp…
Wall Blade Trap (CR 1)
Type [...]
Brother Fandrus rubbed his eyes. Scribing books by candlelight took its toll. He stepped outside his cloister to get some fresh air. The sight greeting him when he returned made him gasp: a small dragon with waxy wings contentedly munching on the candle Brother Fandrus had been using. Even more remarkable, the room’s illumination had [...]
The From Shore to Sea patronage project is smack dab in the middle of its second phase with the brainstorming sessions of Sunken Empires going strong and patron submissions pouring in!
Right now, patrons are designing the creatures that lurk both above and below the waves and the bleached, ancient spires and sunken ruins of a [...]
We’re closing in on the end of Week 1 of our Adopt-A-Soldier Holiday Contest, which runs through December. Thanks to everyone who’s been helping to spread the word online! Remember, if you want your blog or Twitter posts to count as an entry for the contest, leave a comment on the original post so we [...]
(This is a continuation of yesterday’s Con Report, already in progress. Please, turn off your cell phones , and find a seat. Please, place your trash in the trash receptacles on your way out.)
Cubicle 7
Cubicle 7 (www.cubicle-7.com) were present, in force, running demos and substituting a little for Mongoose Publishing, who weren’t present. GM screens were [...]
Indiecon is a small, indie-game oriented convention in Hoburne Naish in Southern England. It’s held in a caravan/chalet holiday site, right on the coast, but before you get visions of sun, sea, sand, and sorcery, it’s held off season at the end of autumn when things tend to turn stormy and wet. So much so [...]
Every trapsmith loves poison, and poison loves trespassers. Standard poison delivery systems—part of every trapsmith’s portfolio—are the poison dart and poison needle traps.
How can something this simple be improved? With careful attention to detail and with massive overkill.
Poison Dart Trap (CR 1)
Type mechanical; Search DC 20; Disable Device DC 18
Trigger location; Reset manual
Effect atk +8 [...]
Our Adopt-a-Soldier sponsorship program has delivered Kobold Quarterly gift subscriptions to service members stationed all over the world and far from friends and family. We’ve gotten a lot of mail from them, telling us what a difference your support and generosity makes.
We’d like to really crank this program up with your help. So this month, [...]
Our illustrious leader, Editor-in-Chief extraordinaire, the Most Great High Kobold himself, our Master Mold, and all-around nice kobold, Wolfgang Baur has been announced Seattle PI’s Geek of the Week!
Please, join the rest of us kobolds in celebration.
(It’s just like we always told him, “You keep biting off those chicken heads, and you’re bound to get [...]
Hey GMs! Are you looking for that certain something to drive your power-hungry, dragon-slaying group just a bit wild? Well, look no further than Krazy Kirk’s House of Forgotten Horrors. We take all those baddies that have gone the way of THAC0 and shine ‘em up real nice for you. Your player’s won’t know what [...]
What are reviewers saying about Imperial Gazetteer, Open Design’s source for the legions of the dead in Zobeck for 4th Edition?
… 5/5 best value I’ve gotten for a while in 4E PDF products…
Read the full review at RPG Now.
We’ve got a little something for everybody. Pick up your own copy of Imperial Gazetteer.
Some gamers prefer to play using miniatures, but cost can be prohibitive. Not even hardcore collectors have every miniature they need. Including multiples, it’s easy to buy 800 miniatures at a cost of thousands of dollars and still not own the exact minis for every occasion.
There is, however, a way to own almost every miniature [...]
A new Open Design Podcast is now available, and there’s a special prize in this one. You could win a sketch by the amazing artist Tony DiTerlizzi: he’s drawn a quickling (pictured right) exclusively for Open Design Podcast and one lucky fan. Just listen to the episode for the instructions, and the original artwork could [...]
I remember the last season my family ever farmed.
That cloud—dirty crimson in color, like dried blood—drifted down the foothills like dust blown from the cover of an old book. Every crop it touched withered. The maize hardened and peeled, the berries soured, and the potatoes rotted before we could pull them from the dirt.
The [...]
For the second show in a row, Kobold Quarterly #11 graced the top 10 list of RPG Countdown. The kobolds in the mines couldn’t be happier, and we even gave them a 2 minute break to celebrate. (Time’s up; back to work!)
Make sure to tune in to each bi-weekly episode of RPG Countdown to hear [...]
Just enough time left to squeak it in under the wire, but the end is looming. Very soon, the gate closes and the judging can begin. Please, join us in celebrating the King of the Monsters Contest. Get your submission in now.
All you have to do is design your monster. The submission must…
Be sent to [...]
There’s an Open Design PDF sale Monday, November 30. Come check it out and save some cash!
All of the Kobold Quarterly and Open Design PDFs are 10% off at DriveThruRPG and RPGNow.
Did you miss an issue of KQ? Are you looking for gift ideas? Are you just curious to see what’s inside the gazetteers [...]
Once, there was a long drought. All the creeks and springs dried up. The leaves on the trees turned brown and brittle. The animals were very thirsty.
Faced with a common problem, all the animals gathered to figure out a solution. After much discussion, they decided that what they needed was a well. All the animals [...]
Cowardice has a devastating effect not only on a character’s personal reputation but, also, on group morale. Successfully using a cowardly feat or skill imposes a -2 circumstance penalty to all Intimidate, Bluff, and Diplomacy checks made by you and your allies against any enemy who witnessed your cowardly action. The enemy, on the other [...]
With a mighty creak, the doors swing inward, and you find yourself at the castle’s topmost level, its roof open to the stormy sky. In a moment, you take in the scene: shelf after shelf of severed limbs and bottled organs, four great posts of steel and brass crackling with unnatural power, a hulking body [...]
Knockers try to be benevolent, but sometimes, things just don’t go their way, and they need to take action. Not blessed with great strength, the knockers have, like their kobold cousins, turned to defense, and they have an astonishing array of traps and techniques handed down from generation to generation. Some clans and individual families [...]
Water is essential to life. It nourishes plants, it slakes thirst…
But it also smothers with its icy embrace and boils flesh from bones. Never underestimate water.
One of the first water themed traps you’ll come across is the classic water-filled room.
Water-Filled Room Trap (CR 4)
Type mechanical; Search DC 17; Disable Device DC 23
Trigger location; Reset automatic
Effect [...]
This is the story of how Vaszi outran Death.
Owing to the magic boots that he had stolen from a witch and to his steel-trap memory, Vaszi acquired the job of messenger. He ran from town to town, and at each stop, he repeated all the news he heard in his travels.
One day, Vaszi learned of [...]
By sweet Chautauqua’s flow’ry banks
We love to sing and play,
But should we spy a foeman’s ranks,
We’d proudly run away!
—H. P. Lovecraft, “Pacifist War Song—1917″
There comes a time in all heroes’ lives when they must make the ultimate sacrifice and perish while saving their adventuring companions, their true loves, and sometimes even the very universe. But [...]
What are reviewers saying about Iron Gazetteer, Open Design’s source for the dwarves of Zobeck in 4th Edition?
… the authors clearly made sure that the majority of the material can be used in almost any 4e campaign world.
… really eye-catching was one of the ten paragon paths… the gearforged… in which the once living character [...]
This haggard-looking book bears a nondescript jacket of sturdy leather, the pages between filled with austerely elegant elven script. It appears to be a combat manual passed from a powerful elven mage-warrior to her much younger niece, an aspiring sorceress. Among the strict and detailed mandates that concern diet and training regime, there are several [...]
What are reviewers saying about the latest issue of Kobold Quarterly?
… Not only does it have great art to capture your attention, but the content covers everything from vampires to the myth of the Philosopher’s Stone and far beyond.
… The issue starts off with “A Broken Mind“… I love the idea of merging in sanity [...]
Notable for the soft humming it emits, a magnet stone is a polarized black mineral that has been handy to alchemists, invaluable to city defense planners, and lethal to countless adventurers. While it occurs naturally in veins beneath the mountains of the realm, magnet stones are most often encountered as jagged, obelisk-shaped stalagmites that form [...]
Behold the King of the Monsters Contest, the greatest and most glorious contest Kobold Quarterly has ever offered. It’s easy to become King of the Monsters: you design a monster and submit it for fame and prizes.
Here’s how it works: To enter the contest, your monster submission must…
Where’s the love for NPCs? Well, Ennie-award-winning designer Ben McFarland decided to offer his help with his article on incorporating John Wick’s new take on halflings from Kobold Quarterly #10, “Haffuns: Seeming Servants.” He presents several ideas for incorporating them into your own campaign.
Dismissed as unimportant, as if that’s what the “N” and “P” [...]
The hunter carried his prize, a clutch of tiny eggs, through the woods. The wind picked up around him as he walked, and he noted it had a particular bite. Wondering how the temperature could have dropped so quickly, the hunter absently felt his neck. His hand came away slick with blood. Then he felt [...]
As the third project in a series of public updates on Open Design’s current batch of patronage projects, KQ.com presents Courts of the Shadow Fey, Open Design’s 4th Edition project.
Duelists and Team Players
Back in the days when I was working at TSR in Lake Geneva, I played a wide range of lunchtime board games with the [...]
As the second project in a series of public updates on Open Design’s current batch of patronage projects, KQ.com presents The Red Eye of Azathoth, Open Design’s first Call of Cthulhu project.
The Harbinger Star Nears
The Red Eye of Azathoth project is now in full swing. The first adventure (of five) in this [...]
To celebrate this Veteran’s Day, please consider supporting one of our many troops with a subscription to Kobold Quarterly through our Adopt-A-Soldier program.
We currently have a backlog of soldiers who would love to receive your sponsership. Help send a message of appreciation and spread the joy of gaming by connecting to a soldier today.
Kobold Quarterly [...]
For those curious about Open Design’s current batch of patronage projects, KQ.com is releasing a series of public updates to track their progress. First of these, the Open Design/Paizo Publishing joint project From Shore to Sea, is in high gear.
Into the Waves
Over the last 2 months, patrons have worked closely with author Brandon Hodge to [...]
What does Critical Hits think about the latest issue of Kobold Quarterly?
… the whole interior of the publication that screams nostalgia while providing tons of new content for our favorite systems.
… interesting ideas for you to use in your games, even the system specific articles come with so much written material in addition to the [...]
Art by Marc Radle
Mass is a wonderful thing. Sometimes, even a glancing blow from something massive like a boulder, tree trunk, or swinging block of stone is enough to send a victim flying through the air. Armor offers little resistance against these massive impacts.
Swinging Block Trap (CR 1)
Type mechanical; Search DC 20; Disable Device DC [...]
Art by Hugo Solis
A crimson drake relishes death and destruction. If this killer can’t surprise its prey, it exploits its similarities to a pseudodragon to fool the unwary. The drake is indistinguishable from its cousin at a distance. Once a victim gets close enough to notice scales the color of dried blood and the murderous [...]
Do not adjust your computers. We control the feed.
In addition to my continuing role as Assistant Editor on Kobold Quarterly, I’ve taken over as the Mighty Web Editor for KQ.com. With more than a week of trial-by-fire complete, I can finally take a breath to fill you all in.
Hopefully, you’ve enjoyed our recent web-support of [...]
Kobold Quarterly Bonus Material!
Here it is! The second and final installment of the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game version of the article “A Broken Mind” from Kobold Quarterly #11.
The original article details new rules for introducing sanity and mental disorders to your 4th Edition game. So now, you can break minds no matter the edition because edition [...]
Come hear the tale of the mountain! Of stone and of dirt. Of gold and of iron. Of family and of drink. The Iron Gazetteer has come!
The Iron Gazetteer is the 4th Edition sourcebook that details the dwarves and their mountain cantons.
Fighting, mining, smithing, drinking. Who would argue against the simple life? But secrets run [...]
Art by Cory Trego-Erdner
Kobold Quarterly Bonus Material!
Kobold Quarterly #11 (on sale now) offers rules for using madness and sanity, in the article “A Broken Mind,” for 4th Edition. However, fear not 3rd Edition fans, for right here and absolutely free are the the same rules built for Pathfinder Roleplaying Game! Why break bones, when minds [...]
The reviews keep pouring in. And what are reviewers saying about the latest issue of Kobold Quarterly?
… I couldn’t be more pleased with this magazine. It’s been quite a while since I’ve gotten this many ideas out of a gaming mag. Please excuse me while I go subscribe and look up back issues.
Read the [...]
Kobold Quarterly Bonus Material!
You may already own Kobold Quarterly #11, but you’re not done getting additional content for it! Today, to accompany his “Howling Werebeasts” article on lycanthropes, the inestimable John Ling presents a brand-new prestige class. Werewolves, your days are numbered, for the hunter of the cursed is on your trail!
Gald moved through the [...]
Mycolids are sentient mushroom folks that live in the dark alongside the ghouls and their sprawling empire. You will find some mycolids detailed within the Imperial Gazetteer… but here’s a few extra to up the excitement.
The pale brown puff of spores caught us unaware, and soon, we were fighting amongst ourselves, mad with rage and [...]
Despite the vagaries of illness and uncertain guests, the Open Design Podcast has delivered another fine — and free! — show. Regular John Wick delivers his Wicked Fantasy segment with style, and yours hosts are me, Rone Barton, and Ed Healy.
Our lead guest this time out is design innovator and legend Robin Laws (of [...]
Fearsome creatures caught between life and death, trapped in that twilight hour by their own hand or by an unceasing desire for retribution against those who wronged them, ghosts are a classic staple of many horror and fantasy campaigns. Beyond their terrifying wails and incorporeality, many ghosts can hold more than a few surprises for [...]
Kobold Quarterly now has its very own official Facebook fanpage! Stop by and become a fan today.
There will be special announcements and promotions exclusive to the fanpage, and in fact, there’s one there right now for those considering a subscription to Kobold Quarterly. You’ll have to move fast, though, because once the candy runs out [...]
Don’t be afraid to think outside of the box for adventures with predominantly mad monsters, particularly in their relationships with the PCs.
Spellcasting, for example, offers you an option to introduce variations on standard events, and the variation on scrying below is offered as one such example. Others possible spells that may rip the thin tissue [...]
From beneath the murky waters it creeps ever closer to you, its unsuspecting victim. In mere seconds and with surprisingly little splash, it snags you and draws you beneath the surface. You have no time to react, and suddenly, you’re struggling for breath beneath it’s iron grasp. How long can you hold your breath? A [...]
If there is one thing you can say for certain about aberrations, they are all different. They are defined by their strange, twisting natures. Nowhere else can you find such diversity—even between related individuals. The perversity of their form and function knows no bounds.
Aberrant, Perverted [General]
This sickening monstrosity is an affront to the world around [...]
Fast and furious, terror birds run down prey with single-minded intensity, shredding and devouring warm flesh with seeming enthusiasm. These large, flightless predatory birds are often apex predators in primeval forests and grasslands. With formidable beaks and talons, both massive and razor sharp, these birds easily disembowel creatures with a single swipe.
Terror Bird Lore
Nature DC [...]
And just what are reviewers saying about the latest issue of Kobold Quarterly?
That was awesome!
They have fright rules for 4E, which is very Call of Cthulhu’esque… If your characters are plane hopping and you want to introduce them to some really [messed]-up [stuff], it’s perfect… I may introduce those rules [in our own [...]
Occasionally aberrations mate with other races to observe the outcome or to carry out bizarre and inhuman experiments to learn or simply amuse themselves. This template is the result of this terrible act.
New Monster: Stricken Aberrant [template]
It had once been a dragon—that much was certain. Its bone white flanks towered above us like an ice [...]
That’s right, folks, Skip Williams will now be answering Pathfinder Roleplaying Game questions in his regular column Ask the Kobold!
Is there some aspect of the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game you’re a little fuzzy about? Did you just switch over from 3.5E and just aren’t sure how something translates? Do you just want to try to stump [...]
There’s something down there.
The waters around the sunken and forgotten City of the Nadir pollute everything that comes too close and taint all that enter its twisted ruins. Occasionally, parts of the mad city rise to the surface for a night, a month, or even a lifetime of man.
Spawned in the City of the Nadir [...]
The face, if face was the correct word, was ashen. This was no earthly creature but a thing from somewhere wrong. And as the waterspout engulfed the ship, the creature before me bowed obsequiously to its tentacled master, now rising from the boiling ocean.
This, then, was merely the slave. I began to sob as [...]
You’re gonna want the lights on for this. The Imperial Gazetteer is here! You won’t ever be the same. (And don’t think death will save you.)
The Imperial Gazetteer is the 4th Edition sourcebook that details the principalities of Morgau and Doresh and the Empire of the Ghouls.
On the surface, who can hope to withstand the [...]
And just what are reviewers saying about the latest issue of Kobold Quarterly?
I’d always thought of KQ as Dragon’s little sister… Well, I just got my hands on a review copy of KQ #11, and let me tell you something: little sister’s all grown up, and she’s looking pretty hot.
…Great artwork and interesting content, the [...]
Common in places touched by the cold grasp of shadow, shadowcreep ice is an unnatural substance that freezes in areas of darkness and melts when exposed to light. Rumored to have first dripped from the stalactites of a grotto inhabited by an undead primordial, this hazard has claimed the lives of numberless adventurers who had [...]
(Illustration by Marc Radle)
Bone-crushing boulders chasing frightened adventurers: a classic scene, usable in any campaign. The rolling rock trap is designed to enable that classic scene.
Rolling Rock Trap (CR 1)
Type mechanical; Search DC 20; Disable Device DC 22
Trigger location; Reset manual
Effect Atk +10 melee (2d6)
Market Price 1,400 gp
“I will become you!”
Prerequisite Doppelganger
While all doppelgangers are accomplished shapeshifters, some take the art of shapeshifting to new levels. These doppelgangers are able to impersonate not just the physical form of another creature, but also some aspects of their personality, experience, and knowledge, becoming in essence the very creature they are copying. Because of their [...]
Some of you may be familiar with the time-honored tradition of “going to 11.” KQ is right there with its latest issue, because Kobold Quarterly #11 is loaded with things that go right up to the edge, and then one more.
Don’t believe me? Here’s a sampling of the just-a-little-more philosophy at work:
1) An awesome [...]
Novelist and game designer Jeff LaSala is perhaps best known for his Dungeon Crawl Classics: The Transmuter’s Last Touch and his Eberron novel, The Darkwood Mask. Both of these, it is important to note, involve kobolds. Lots and lots of kobolds. In fact, it is safe to say that Jeff LaSala is a bona fide [...]
Kevin Ross is back. Miskatonic River Press is back. With a Call of Cthulhu license from Chaosium, Cthulhu is once again dreaming, and all across the world, investigators are being scared witless.
A veteran horror RPG writer, Ross has contributed to over 30 products, for companies such as Chaosium, Pagan Publishing, and Miskatonic River Press. However, [...]
Ok, I was away for a convention, and then there was launching the Courts of Shadow Fey, and shipping some Gazetteer goodness, and there’s a magazine around here somewhere that needs tending.
I swear a new framistan is on order, and we’ll have a full slate of posts and mayhem for you next week, folks. A [...]
Why should evil overlords have all the fun? Sometimes it needs to be about the minion! Ennie-award-winning designer Ben McFarland continues a new five-part series by taking a look at Richard Pett’s piece from Kobold Quarterly #10, “Ecology of the Hill Giant.” He offers a way to turn this monster into the signature foot soldier [...]
A quick interview on how to write better adventures and then how to run them most effectively, with Brandon Hodge and yours truly over at Roleplayingtips.com. We blather a bit about how to plan an adventure, how to spice up an encounter, the most useful design tools, and related topics.
From the very beginning of the order, the Servants have been preparing for the end of the world, putting contingencies into place in the event that the 5 blackest rites mentioned in the Codex of the Harbinger Star ever come to pass. Several nearly complete reproductions of the Codex exist in the Servants’ vaults for [...]
The newest Open Design Podcast, a discussion about game design and game mastery, brings us a slate of expert guests, including:
* ‘Ask the Kobold’ with Skip Williams
* ‘Wicked Fantasy’ with John Wick
* Green Ronin publisher Chris Pramas
* Open Design stalwart Joshua Stevens
* Operatic madman Nicolas Logue
We talk about game design and game mastery, including [...]
Part One : A History of Service
For over 3,000 years, they have waited patiently in the shadows, acting swiftly and silently when needed to thwart man’s destruction at the hands of unknowable horrors. They are the Servants of Man, a clandestine order zealously obsessed with preventing occult forces from bringing about the enslavement or extinction [...]
What are the differences between touch, ranged touch, and incorporeal touch attacks? What ability modifier applies to each of these attacks?
All these attacks have one thing in common, the target’s armor, natural armor, and shield modifiers can’t defeat the attack (though incorporeal touch attacks provide some special cases). Enhancement bonuses that increase armor, natural armor, [...]
Yesterday we featured the Reapervast, a sentient solo controller construct. It’s brutally tough to defeat in combat — so here’s a few options other than the straight smash-and-smash-some-more.
Are you excited about the reapervast but want to give your players more ways to deal with it? Does your group look down their collective noses at the [...]
Steel grates on steel as a steady hissing steam clouds your vision. Through the haze you see a gigantic mechanical beast surge forward.
The reapervast is the ultimate invention of Beret Tinglefoot, but alas, the gnome’s ambition outstripped his skill. While Tinglefoot learned to graft souls into clockwork machinery, the inventor did not realize the [...]
The 2d6 Feet in a Random Direction podcast gave glowing reviews to KQ and Open Design in their latest installment, Episode 46.
The show is a project of Brian Isikoff and Chris Hanranhan, an owner of the Endgame store in Oakland CA.The whole show is worth listening to, though if you are mostly interested in [...]
How would do you adjudicate an unhallow spell when is has a silence spell added to it and the caster chooses to make evil creatures immune? My guess was that creatures save once when entering, and that the spell goes away when they leave, but they need to save again when they enter again.
I [...]
As part of the Open Design projects that I design, I generally write a set of essays. Some of these have been collected (with contributors from others) into the Kobold Guide to Game Design series.
For Courts of the Shadow Fey, I have a set of topics chosen ahead of time, though I’m open to [...]
Goblins favor the ambush, because then, for a brief moment in time, goblins have the upper hand. A successful ambush is the stuff of legend among goblins, and with each recounting the tale becomes taller and pride fills the scrawny chests of the surviving goblins. Pride in one’s work is a rare and precious thing [...]
Every kingdom has its royal guards: stoic souls with vigilant eyes, strength of arm, and unmatched loyalty. The Courts of the Shadow Fey are no different. That final quality — loyalty — has forced the black-hearted nobles of the court to seek guardians from unorthodox sources.
Knowing no living shadow fey could be trusted to set [...]
Our t-shirt contest was a modest success, with a dozen entries from around the world showing gamers and KQ readers in all their finery. There’s many we remember fondly: the clockwork automaton, the drow, the dragon eating a hapless gamer at GenCon. Alas, it came down to two entries: a KQ reader and a maiden [...]
The great minds at Critical Hits have interviewed Joshua Stevens, the KQ regular and Open Design leader of The Red Eye of Azathoth project.
It’s a quick interview that covers Josh’s inspiration (hint: a bar napkin may have been involved), why Open Design projects have been so successful, and likely patron contributions to the project. [...]
I tell ya, boys, we’ve fished up and down this coast for years and never seen anything like ‘em. We’d found what was left of Ol’ Patch and his crew — washed up on the shore there, all picked apart to bones and gristle. It was bad enough seeing ‘em like that, and worse when [...]
We’re happy to say the official Paizo adventure From Shore to Sea and the related Sunken Empires sourcebook have met their commission, and the design is moving forward.
It’s still possible to sign up as a patron; if you do, you’ll see the first round of feedback from Paizo editors today.
Beret quickly hobbled down the pebbled path, unwilling to stop and look back for even a moment. Behind him, and behind the closed iron doors to his toy forge, he heard a cacophony of whirring, whining, and grinding, the sounds of the Reapervast. His finest creation was thinking for itself now, and it was not [...]
Sometimes you’ve got to end it all before you can get started. Ennie-winning Tales of Zobeck contributor Ben McFarland starts a new five-part series by taking a look at Michael Kortes’ piece from Kobold Quarterly #10, “Back and Better than Ever.” He offers a way to integrate the article’s death feats into the beginning of [...]
Open Design has agreed to design an official adventure for the Paizo campaign setting of Golarion. The adventure will be called From Shore to Sea and will describe an ancient set of ruins off the Cheliax coast.
The project’s lead designer is Brandon Hodge, whose work on Halls of the Mountain King and strong pitch [...]
In honor of Kobold Quarterly’s landmark 10th issue, here is a list reflecting on the best things about this fine magazine.
10. It’s like 10,000 spoons when you need 10,000 spoons.
9. If not for his KQ editorial duties, Wolfgang Baur would be free to walk the Earth.
8. The Ecology articles give you insight into the home [...]
I can’t believe it’s been a month, but GenCon always plays havoc with a sense of time. The latest and greatest Open Design Podcast is now available for your listening pleasure.
In addition to regulars Skip Williams and Monte Cook, yours truly and co-hosts Ed Healy and Rone Barton discuss the recent crop of ENnie Awards. [...]
One of the biggest and best RPG bloggers, Uncle Bear, recently took a look at the Dwarves of the Ironcrags book. It seems to have hit the mark:
As I was scribbling in my purple dragonskin notebook, rejecting and crossing off ideas almost as quickly as I can come up with them, Wolfgang Baur [...]
Every good trapsmith knows about the three C’s: Cheap, Crude and Cruel. Every wise trapsmith knows that goblins excel at designing traps based on the three C’s and as a result, many retain the services of a goblin as a servant or assistant. Neighbors may complain, but consulting a goblin’s expertise is usually worthwhile, as [...]
This well muscled dragon has fine scales the color of overripe lemons and strangely luminous green eyes. Its wings are short and seem barely capable of lifting it off the ground and its body is stocky and lacks the grace of its draconic brothers, yet its claws are razor sharp and its mouth is filled [...]
I wasn’t sure how the release of Tales of Zobeck to the wider public would go over. If this review is anything to judge by, though, it was the right move.
Let me just say that this is one well-deserved [Silver ENnie] award, and this ebook should go to the top of your list of purchases. [...]
To date, Open Design has been about competition between competing proposals, pitting projects and editions against one another. In an effort to accommodate everyone, we even completely redesigned Halls of the Mountain King in two editions.
While that project was huge, we’re not pursuing that approach again. We’re learning from the experience and doing something [...]
Nothing is quite so important to a trapsmith as novelty and invention in design. For in their war against trespassers, new tricks tip the balance of power in the trapsmith’s favor. This is why some trapsmiths favor the art of alchemy: in the alchemical world, innovation takes place at an extraordinary speed, providing new tools [...]
Had I not paused, I would have crushed its skull, thinking it to be a kobold. It was a kobold, and yet it was not – no kobold smokes a pipe, wears blue breeches, and carries a spyglass.
And no kobold would ever quote poetry. Or would it? And would I ever be able to hack [...]
Never let it be said that Kobolds never win! We are very pleased to announce that Kobold Quarterly has won the Silver ENnie Award for Best Website. Much to our surprise and delight.
We tried to swipe the Gold, but that went to our honorable friends at Obsidian Portal (and deservedly so). The competition was very [...]
Lay worshipers and priests of Ninkash spend much time brewing ale. Every drop of the ale they make, which has had prayers to the matron goddess of dwarven wine and beer chanted over it during the brewing, is “holy ale.” But certain ales are infused with the magic spells of the Vaer, the priests of [...]
Why in the world is the shadow walk spell 6th level when teleport is 5th level? Is seems to me that shadow walk’s travel limit of 50 miles/level is less useful that teleport’s 100 miles/level. Besides, teleport is instantaneous travel, whereas shadow walk can eat up hours of game time. Why shouldn’t shadow walk be [...]
The Origins Award nominated Kobold Guide to Game Design gets a writeup over at the WIRED blogs. Here’s what they’re saying:
So, you want to break into RPG writing? Or maybe you just want to write better adventures for your players. Could be you aren’t a roleplayer and just love the worldbuilding aspect of writing fiction. [...]
Maps do much more than tell us where we are or how to get where we’re going. Maps tell us about the world they depict and the cartographer who created them.
As RPG cartographer Jonathan Roberts says, “A good map should be functional. The primary purpose of any map is to be clear [...]
Is it possible to learn enough about a location through a scrying spell so you can teleport there? The combination of scrying and teleporting seems very potent and capable of breaking an adventure. Is there a way to limit this combination of spells without cutting them off completely?
First and foremost, trapsmiths are engineers, and not every project concerns itself with the destruction of intruders. Waste disposal is a daily concern for most dungeons and once collecting and carting it away becomes cost inefficient. Trapsmiths are contracted to deal with the problem — and sometimes they make the solution a bit of a [...]
At KQ, we don’t just care about great fantasy gaming in the Kobolds & Dragons tradition. No, we also care about style, fashion, and celebrity gossip killer traps.
Ok ok, our fashion sense sucks, but we sometimes like to wear cool t-shirts. And now we have one! The KQ t-shirt will robe you in sartorial splendor. [...]
They were once the province of the corrupt aristocracy, running down escaped slaves and tracking prey in hunting expeditions. Those days are gone, but the clockwork hounds still tick and hunt. The Praetors of Zobeck seized them during the revolt that established the Free City, and now, they operate only on the command of the [...]
Game designer Hank Woon, Jr. got his start with Demonblade, a 15,000-word adventure that appeared in Dungeon 97. The best part of Demonblade for Woon was that he got to include a new prestige class, the Keshen Blademaster, who hail from the land of Kesh and are fierce enough when encountered alone. And [...]
Kobold Quarterly 10 is making a lot of people’s lists, all of a sudden. It made it onto the RPG Countdown (a podcast covering the most popular items over at RPGNow).
It’s #6 on the Paizo bestselling games list, and it’s also #6 on the DriveThruRPG list of Hottest Small Press.
Yeah, we’re small press all right. [...]
Ralf Schemmann is a designer for ProFantasy Software Limited. Currently, he works on “styles” for Campaign Cartographer. He is also a web designer and freelance cartographer with a love for classical fantasy campaign maps.
“The guidelines I use are generally very loose, since maps vary so wildly,” said Schemmann. “The most important [...]
Steven D. Russell has written for E. N. Publishing, Bastion Press and Expeditious Press, among others. He’s worked on Monsters Evolved, Verrik Evolved and The Rituals of Choice Adventure Path. These days he focuses on being the Lord Protector of Rite Publishing.
Like many designers, Russell is first and foremost a player of games.
“I really [...]
When the sun’s rays shone through the airshaft and struck the corridor’s murals, the Maruvian caste-nobles ended their long vigil and touched the door of their father’s tomb, whispering their final farewells. The caste-nobles gathered where the corridor led out, patiently waiting for the Lifesinger priest to appear. When he finally arrived, he struck his [...]
Possibly the most awesome KQ10 review we will blurb all week comes from super-powered funnyman Wyatt Salazar over at The Spirits of Eden blog.
The Spirits of Eden: Kobold Quarterly #10 gave me some good times. We laughed together, we cried together, we wondered whether the Haffun racial power was really sexual innuendo. Do I regret [...]
Here, then, is the source of the screams. A giant that has been stripped and burned, pierced and flayed until there is nothing left but a mass of weeping sores upon sores, cankers, and wounds. This suffering monstrosity stares at you with sad, lidless eyes and snorts through the hole where its nose once jutted. [...]
So the first set of reviews was pretty good, we’re doing it again. And starting with RPG blogging legend Uncle Bear (named one of the Top 100 Geeks to Watch on Twitter by WIRED magazine).
Uncle Bear: I would use this in my own game, and I’d go out of my way to find a way [...]
As kobolds, we are used to losing. We suffer, we perish in vast numbers, it is the way of the world.
But we live in hope. That is, we believe that it would be very very very very very nice to win. Just once. Ok, maybe twice.
And so we draw your attention to the ENnies Awards. [...]
Open Design 003: Kobold Quarterly 10
Chaos and Creativity edition
Welcome to the Open Design Podcast, a discussion about game design and game mastery with hosts Wolfgang Baur, Ed Healy and Rone Barton.
Regular Features:
* ‘Ask the Kobold’ with Skip Williams
* ‘Game Theories’ with Monte Cook
John Wick created Legend of the Five Rings and 7th Sea for Alderac [...]
Anyone who has gamed with me for any length of time knows I’m a bit of a dwarf-o-phile. They’re my favorite PC race, even moreso than kobolds. So it is with great pleasure that I present to you the release of the second Open Design gazetteer, Dwarves of the Ironcrags.
The book is packed with dwarven [...]
We asked a few bloggers to give us their opinions on KQ10, and boy did they ever! This was a bit of an experiment; you never know what people will say when you get out the portfolio or send out the gaming magazine and oh-so-innocently ask “So, what do you think?”.
Here’s seven short takes on [...]
The big 1-0! Double digits! Kobold has gone into the decile universe!
Kobold Quarterly hits the big Roman numeral X with our Summer issue, which features so much good stuff that Qeeg and Jiro just about had a hernia carrying all those boxes to the store:
* A Sneak Preview of the [...]
Greg Stolze has worked on games for White Wolf, Atlas Games and Arc Dream Publishing, among others. He’s a game designer with a love of streamlined rules and good storytelling.
Stolze, in the words of James Lowder, editor of the Origins award-winning Hobby Games: The 100 Best, has been “a key player in several of the [...]
Rushing water is as deadly as fire, and can carry away the largest ogre in a moment. The Passage of Devouring Waters is an elaborate defense that uses the power of water to augment a larger structure with a deadly surprise. If things go as planned, your party may never crawl into a villain’s lair [...]
We’re very happy to report that Open Design has been nominated for five ENnie Awards this year, including:
Best Writing (Kobold Quarterly)
Best Aid or Accessory (Kobold Quarterly)
Best Electronic Book (Blood of the Gorgon)
Best Electronic Book (Tales of Zobeck)
Best Web Site (Kobold Quarterly)
As always, the competition looks fierce, but that’s all to the good: great games [...]
Like many gamers, I first “met” Joseph Goodman, the owner of Goodman Games, through a Dungeon Crawl Classics module. For me, it was DCC #17: Legacy of the Savage Kings by Harley Stroh, which like all DDCs, begins with:
Remember the good old days, when adventures were underground, NPCs were there to be killed, and [...]
Steve Kenson is a geek—a professional geek. He’ll proudly tell you as much. Case in point: not only did he write three novels about his first Shadowrun character, he also named his company, Talon Studio, after him.
Kenson has worked on games and sourcebooks for White Wolf, Wizards of the Coast, and Steve Jackson [...]
There is something unsettling about this leather satchel; how the leather has retained its hairs, how the hasp seems to be almost gripped by its leather sheath, and most of all the fleshy color of the leather, with blemishes and moles upon its pasty surface…
Some say that the word ‘safe’ is a misnomer, that a [...]
This huge monster’s long sinuous scaled body slithers through dark forests. Vast wings the color of midnight rise from its back, and four wavy black horns sprout from its evil serpentine head; its wings can fold back entirely flush with its long body.
The kulshedra’s scales are burnt greenish-orange in hue and its eyes glow [...]
It turns out that kobolds are bi-lingual. I don’t mean they have forked tongues (though they do), but rather that KoboldQuarterly.com has quietly and stealthily been posting some articles in translation.
The translation work has been done by José Montero, and we can’t thank him enough. Here’s the four articles currently available, due to his [...]
So I’ve been reading the Pathfinder RPG for a while, and there are a few things about it I absolutely love. One of them was the fact that halflings get Abyssal as a default language. The little buggers have always seemed sort of suspicious to me, frankly. Not as dour as a dwarf, not as [...]
If you’ve played Dungeons & Dragons at all in the last decade, you’ve probably run into Bruce R. Cordell’s work. And if you’ve used his gaming books or run his adventures, you’ve probably noticed that there seems to be some larger—some epic—arc connecting it all.
If you’ve ever met him at a con or online, [...]
What happens to your spells if the ability score that governs them is somehow reduced? Do you lose any spells? If your spellcasting ability is reduced to 0 or less do you lose all your spellcasting ability?
Some of these questions are easy to answer, and some are trickier. Let’s start with the easy answers:
The 3E/OGL release of Halls of the Mountain King has gone to the patrons who supported this project; these patrons both contributed to and funded its creation.
The resulting 175-page saga takes characters from 8th to 12th level as they fight a range of foes in the abandoned halls of a major dwarven holding: everything [...]
Ultimately, a traps’ function is one of protection. Many things deserve protection; it all depends on the perspective of the traps’ buyer. The altar and its various ceremonial and sacred items are cherished by clerics, and thus they often build the hand of god trap in their temples.
Hand of God Trap
“From the temples’ ceiling, statues [...]
Flying across the arid steppe is a monstrous draconic beast with bat-like wings, a scaled body and legs, and the head of a mangy wolf with a thick goat-like beard. Its scales are a uniform light brown, while its wolf head is dark brown with gleaming red eyes. The dragon-wolf flexes its vicious claws and [...]
The Kobold Diplomats have spoken: The augurs are good; the planets have aligned.
Kobold Quarterly is ready to kick things up a notch.
For the past two years, you, our readers, have stepped up to the plate for us time and time again. You were with us when we were black and white and barely 50 pages. [...]
Magic defeats magic. This simple rule explains why trapsmiths refrain from using it in their designs. If any wizard’s apprentice can detect the trap, what is the point of using it? For instance…
Burning Hands Trap
CR 3; magic device; proximity trigger (alarm); automatic reset; spell effect (burning hands, 5th-level wizard, 5d4 fire, DC 11 Reflex save [...]
The creature galloped across the outcrops and lurched before us. It was a great beast akin to some sort of huge ram or shire horse with a single great horn erupting from its head. It stood for a moment, as though considering its next move, and then, with a snort, it lowered its head and [...]
When you cast a spell as a swift action (maybe because the spell has a casting time of a swift action) can you also cast as spell as a standard action the same round? What happens if I cast a spell as a swift action while an enemy threatens me? And what if I then [...]
Clang! The grate slams to the floor, sealing the exit — and alerting every monster in hearing distance….
Most traps are active defenses, contesting every foot of the dungeon. However, a passive defense can be a valuable deterrent as well. Two entry-level passive traps are the portcullis and the razor-wire trap, which we’ll re-design this week.
Portcullis [...]
Sean Macdonald never intended to become a freelance RPG cartographer. An internet programmer by trade, he got into RPG cartography through his work as a website designer. He started his freelance cartography career in 2003 mapping the Dragonlance Campaign Setting.
Three years later he won a gold ENnie for Tasslehoff’s Map Pouch: War of [...]
The box looks like a fat, heavily pregnant woman with fangs instead of teeth. Her copious belly contains a rather grotesque image of an infant with three heads, each with an open mouth like a key-hole.
No ordinary receptacle will do for treasure in the Land of Gothic Horror.
The infuriating Ustalav Doll Casket is not one [...]
“Ye weren’t there.” Günter’s hand shook as he reached for the tankard. “They donna care what they hit. Donna care who’s in the way, cacklin’ as they fire. Cacklin’…” He gulped at the drink, spilling down his chin, then wiped foam from his braided whiskers with the back of his scarred and puckered hand.
“Ye understand, [...]
The toad, frog and newt are classic choices for a transmuting mage with an itchy casting finger and a prepared polymorph any object. However, sometimes your foe deserves something more creative or stylish. Below is a list of forms that will add some memorable panache to the proceedings.
d% Result (Duration)
1. A 120-foot-long trading carrack (1 hour)
2. A [...]
With RPG titles like Classic Horrors Revisited (forthcoming from Paizo), Seven Days to the Grave (Paizo), and Cage of Delirium (Goodman Games), F. Wesley Schneider’s work clearly runs toward the dark.
Indeed, Schneider’s writing and his tastes are downright diabolical.
“In RPG terms, I’ve always been way more interested in devils than in other fiends,” Schneider said. [...]
Welcome back to Behind the Spells, the series that provides a historical background, secret effects, and related material to classic spells of the world’s most famous fantasy roleplaying game. This 11th installment concludes our series of Behind the Spells; we hope you’ve enjoyed the series. As always, the rules (presented after the “Spell Secret” header) [...]
Every good trapsmith knows about the three C’s: Cheap, Crude and Cruel. The correct application of the three C’s while designing a trap gets you the desired result when the PCs have to decide whether they want to risk pushing on for “just one more room.”
And nothing is as cheap as a hole in [...]
“Come in the water,” the lady whispered. “I’m so lonely.” Stephan glanced around the campsite. He’d been on watch a few hours and had a few more hours to go, yet. Old Yoric and Bernard were sleeping, dead to the world.
“Come in the water,” the lady whispered. “I’m so cold.” She was beautiful—pale as the [...]
The first review of the Open Design podcast is in, from Emerson’s Bookshelf.
If you are just joining us, the previous installments of Greenweek are available: Part I, Part II, and Part III.
On average, Ed Greenwood completes three novels, nine short stories, and a variety of other projects each year, including articles, introductions, essays, and gaming products. Fortunately for his fans, he writes quickly and often. The [...]
Greenweek continues with part III of our interview with Mr. Greenwood. If you missed part I or part II, it’s easy to get caught up!
In Ed Greenwood’s The Sword Never Sleeps, the final novel of the Knights of Myth Drannor trilogy, characters rush through a series of confrontations, resolving chases and conflicts established earlier in [...]
What qualifies as “dropping” an opponent when you’re using Cleave feat? For instance, if I use the Knock-down feat and successfully trip my opponent, does that count? [More...]
Did you miss Part I of our Greenweek interview series? It’s easy to get caught up!
In the opening scene of Ed Greenwood’s
Dark Lord, the protagonist Rod Everlar awakes to a bloody winged female warrior named Taeauna falling onto his bed. Everlar is scared and confused, Taeauna begs for mercy, and the reader is hooked.
This is [...]
Early in Ed Greenwood’s novel Elminster: the Making of a Mage, the ragged knight Helm gives young Elminster a sword and encourages him on his journey. As the smiling boy heads off, the knight wrestles with his own ambivalence, thinking, “The first duty of a knight is to make the realm shine in the [...]
Fear.
Fear is a trapsmith’s ally, as nothing deters tomb robbers better than seeing a valued comrade perish in the most gruesome way possible. A trapsmith asks intruders a simple question: “Is this carnage a price you are willing to pay, to progress further?” If the trapsmith is good at his job, he will only [...]
Art by Philippe Semeria
With broad shoulders and thick, nearly translucent ivory fur, this powerfully muscled ape-man sports savage claws and wicked black teeth; dried gore stains its chin a rusty brown. A small cyclone of ice and snow swirls around its feet, and it leaves no tracks in its wake. Fiercely cold air surrounds it, [...]
Welcome back for the second part of our SKR interview, in which we finally learn the secret of lobsteak and of Paizo’s success. Also, he explains how and when he’ll be playing 4E!
If you missed Part 1, it’s easy to catch up.
Jones: You have been involved in developing games both before and after the advent [...]
Sean K. Reynolds is the developer on Paizo’s PATHFINDER roleplaying game, but he didn’t start his career there. It took him a while to land at Paizo Publishing.
In 1995, Sean left his job at a video game company to become the online content coordinator for TSR. When Wizards of the Coast bought out TSR a [...]
Attempting a grapple is a special attack that takes place of a regular attack. So, if you gain multiple attacks in a round, and you fail at your first grapple attempt, you can try again, etc. until you run out of attacks, right?
Does this mean I can convert any of my regular attacks to a [...]
Focus, intent, misdirection, quality versus quantity: these are all concepts a good trapsmith plays with to achieve his goal. Indeed, a great trapsmith does more than set a trap; he asks a question of intruders: “Is this a price you are willing to pay, to progress further?”
This week the author of the astonishing “Traps of [...]
The hill moved, which of course is ridiculous. Then I heard deep breathing and the crash of the willow coppice as the creatures—for there were two—came into view. The ychen bannog of legend: longhaired oxen the size of churches, flanks steaming in the morning mist from a night’s toil while crows danced about their horns. [...]
By day, Dario Nardi is a lecturer at the University of California Los Angeles, where he teaches classes in “artificial intelligences and robotics, personality and organizational behavior, modeling and simulation of complex systems, and undergraduate curriculum design.” He uses computer models, group simulations, and he encourages students to pursue their own interests in their [...]
I need a little clarification for gaze attacks; it seems that those attacks are always functioning. For example, a character who begins a turn within range of a creature with a gaze attack must make the appropriate saving throw.
However, a creature with a gaze attack also can take an action to force another save [...]
Welcome back to Behind the Spells, the series that provides a historical background, secret effects, and related material to classic spells of the world’s most famous fantasy roleplaying game. The rules (presented after the “Spell Secret” header) are compatible with any 3.5/OGL fantasy game, and the background weaves the spell into the lore of the [...]
…Sturmgar kicked in the door, and strode into the hall, greatsword drawn. Sir Norrick and the rest of the Company of the Wyvern filed in behind him, weapons and spells at the ready. The officers of the Iron Legion were in the midst of their evening meal. At the head of the table, General Sidion [...]
Scarrport: City of Secrets is a supplement from Reality Deviant Publications that offers a “campaign cutout”, a single city that can easily be dropped into any campaign setting. For me, Scarrport was love at first sight.
In addition to a city full of plot hooks, inventive monsters, and and even new equipment, it also had [...]
Tired of hearing about triple-templated messes? Here’s the last template you’ll ever need.
[More...]
As the lead designer for the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game (PFRPG), Jason Bulmahn has one job: produce a game that is true to the feel of 3.5e, but that offers “a better play experience.” And the word among the members of his design team is that Bulmahn has outdone himself.
“Jason’s been working 24–7 on the [...]
The rules say a Tiny creature can move into or through a Medium creature’s space. Can it end its movement in that space? Can the Medium creature do anything about it?
A Tiny creature can indeed move into or through a square another creature occupies, friend or foe. The other creature doesn’t have to be Medium [...]
In an effort to better understand the Open Design patrons and readers, the kobolds have put together a survey. Please let us know what you think!
Click Here to take survey
The Halls of the Mountain King project is taking its new monsters from OGL to 4E this month, and so we figured we’d show you a re-designed version of the 3E/OGL Crag Drake that was featured here back in February.
Stone made predatory beast, these creature prowl cavern tunnels and mineshafts as jaguars would stalk through [...]
We’ve been giving away dice at a steady clip (ok, ok, they’re disappearing faster than I thought), and we’re down to the last 100-some sets. This is by far the biggest promotion we’ve ever done, literally thousands of dollars of dice shipped to subscribers.
Take advantage of it today just by subscribing to either the [...]
Welcome back to Behind the Spells, the series that provides a historical background, secret effects, and related material to classic spells of the world’s most famous fantasy roleplaying game. The rules (presented after the “Spell Secret” header) are compatible with any 3.5/OGL fantasy game, and the background weaves the spell into the lore of the [...]
Yes ladies and gents, Kobold Ecologies has been unleashed up on the world. Lord have mercy, it’s a monster!
This book collects every ecology from every issue of Kobold Quarterly to date, updates them and revises them, and then ADDS MORE Ecologies. It’s an Ecology sandwich.
And those new ones are not just any additional ecologies, the [...]
Quicksilver oozes are a freakish combination of alchemical reagents and magical energy, born from laboratory experiments gone awry. Their shape is completely malleable, but when at rest a quicksilver ooze most closely resembles a pool of liquid silver. The ooze is rarely at rest, however, as it searches the world for its lone source of [...]
Wolfgang Baur, Scott Gable, Matthew Hanson, and other KQ authors and notables speak about the magazine and trade some quips on Atomic Array about KQ#9. You can listen to the show right here.
As part of that episode, we announce the creation of the Open Design Podcast, which launches on May 28. You won’t believe the [...]
Lots of attention for KQ#9, including reviews and expanded 4E rules for the kitsune.
Lots of reviews hitting right now, as the print edition has gone to the newsstands.
* RPGAggression: The Rudis Review
* Game Cryer: Review by Chris Perrin
* Allgeektout: Unleash Your Inner Fox: [...]
I love surprises, especially ones like this: the KOBOLD Guide to Game Design, Volume 1, has been nominated for an ORIGINS Award. As this comes out of left field, I am especially delighted.
Details on the Origins Award site. Wow! If you haven’t read it yet, what’s stopping you?
There’s a quick review of the new issue over on ENWorld. I think it is especially on track with this key quote:
[Monte Cook's column and the interviews] especially help cement KQ’s position as a gaming magazine, rather than an OGL or 4E publication.
We are working to make Kobold Quarterly as broadly useful to all D&D [...]
The guys at Q-workshop love designing dice, making dice, and spreading dice across the globe. Seriously. These guys love everything about dice.
Patryk Strzelewicz, owner and founder of Q-workshop, started the company in Poland five years ago while he was still in high school. A local market grew to a national market and [...]
Designer Greg Stolze, known for his Ransom Model and Unknown Armies among many other credits, has kindly made himself available to the KQ diplomats.
What questions would you like to put to the redoubtable Mr. Stolze? He promises to spill all!
Post your question right here, or on the Forum, as you prefer.
Kobold Quarterly #9 is in the Top 10 from the RPG Countdown! This is the first time KQ has ever cracked the bestseller list at RPGNow, and I’m guessing the disappearance of the WotC PDFs might have helped, but I am delighted regardless. Their loss, KQ’s gain and all that. We climb another rung up [...]
The 4th Edition D&D work for Halls of the Mountain King is well underway, and here’s some of the recent progress:
the brainstorming for the Gazetteer brought a lot of new and old ideas to the forefront. I have an outline.
the level range has been set at 8 to 10 or 8 to 11 (the finale [...]
The creature rose from the ruins of the church roof it had just crushed in spite. It was huge – a gangling hairy thing, with sharp nails and claws, its face a skirmish of eyes and bristle and teeth cowering beneath three curved horns.
‘Dost thou see this big body of mine? Roared the buggane.
Oh, we [...]
Aeryn “Blackdirge” Rudel used to be known mostly for creating gruesome and challenging RPG monsters. And some folks might think of him as the editor-in-chief of Goodman Games’ new 4E-only RPG magazine, Level Up, our worthy competition.
Not me, though. For I have faced one of his half-dragon turtles and lived—barely—to tell about it.
The [...]
The kitsune are a PC race for 4th Edition D&D in Kobold Quarterly #9 — but they’re also available as a 3rd Edition/OGL PC race right here. Because free is good.
In myths and legends, the kitsune are shapeshifters with their own racial items, incantations, and their own innate magic. What makes these tricksters tick? A [...]
The Halls of the Mountain King patron project has begun its 4E design phase! This week’s discussion will set the level range and begin the discussion on creatures and NPCs.
Frankly, I’m looking forward to seeing what ports over neatly from the existing story and setting, and what requires a prybar and a mallet to [...]
The foes appear to be tall, well toned humans with flecks of living crystal in their skin. The warriors are clad in scale and wield cruel flails. Behind them stands a lightly armored woman. Though not as physically imposing, you can tell from the glint in her eyes that she is far more dangerous than [...]
The response to the free dice giveaway has started very strong! Almost 100 sets of the 500 we have are gone, and we expect more orders to pile up while Wolfgang is away at NorWesCon this weekend.
Kobold Quarterly is spending April giving away hundreds of sets of free Q-Workshop dice to new subscribers, and [...]
In the spirit that the best way to remember a man is to celebrate his life, here is a slightly abridged version of the interview that appears in Kobold Quarterly #9. This interview is also available in a Spanish translation by José Montero.
Before Greyhawk, there was Blackmoor. Before the Dungeon Master, there was the [...]
You know, Kobold Quarterly isn’t meant to be timely. We publish infrequently. We don’t really keep up with the industry hotness or aim to match a publisher’s release cycle. But sometimes we stumble into timeliness, much against our will.
Kobold Quarterly issue #9 is a bittersweet case in point. The issue has great articles, from [...]
Want dice? Kobold Quarterly’s got them and we’re literally giving them away!
Kobold Quarterly is ready to give something back to every new subscriber: we are giving away hundreds of sets of free Q-Workshop dice. These aren’t just any dice, either – they are Pathfinder, Call of Cthulhu, Elven, Runic and other dice sets that retail [...]
“What should have been a bustling mining village stood abandoned in the early morning mist. A cabin door flapped open and shut, and we stepped cautiously inside, our weapons drawn. A noise drew my eyes upward, but it was too late. Four gold rushers had wedged themselves in the rafters, and dropped upon us. [...]
Are you missing a few kobolds? Would you like to save some money and have a complete collection?
Well, you can answer yes to both and save some dough with the Kobold Quarterly bundles!
We got a reader request and jumped right to it. Our minions have compiled issues #1 to #4 and issues #5 to [...]
Welcome back to Behind the Spells, the series that provides a historical background, secret effects, and related material to classic spells of the world’s most famous fantasy roleplaying game. The rules (presented after the “Spell Secret” header) are compatible with any 3.5/OGL fantasy game, and the background weaves the spell into the lore of the [...]
Progress on the current Open Design project has been outstanding; 2/3 of the OGL design is complete and in playtesting, with the remainder due to hit playtest in the next week or two. We’re on track for a late June or early July release of the 3rd Edition version, and we’ll be starting the re-design [...]
A viscous blob of turgid pulsing fluid, this ooze is composed of the vilest bodily secretions suspended within a thin gelatinous sack. The ooze changes in color and density as it moves, trailing an odious stench and wet smoking slime.
Secretion oozes are fell creations of lost sorcery, terrible experiments gone awry or diabolical sacrifices [...]
Say I cast the simulacrum spell on a succubus (for, you know, science). The spell description says that my simulacrum would have only one-half of the real creature’s levels or hit dice (and the appropriate hit points, feats, skill ranks, and special abilities for a creature of that level or hit dice). My question is, [...]
“They had not moved all day – standing like silent gargoyles along the gables and ridges of the townhouses.
A thousand black crows, but crows with distinctly humanoid twists in their vile faces – a cheek here, an ear there, wide eyes all too humanoid in their appearance. Some birds seemed unable to keep all these [...]
No one can deny the destructive qualities of fire, but sometimes a designer of traps wants something insidious, something unexpected: the unrelenting force of water. [More...]
After judging hundreds of submissions and going through five rounds of critique and voting, the RPG Superstar contest is down to the wire. There are four contenders remaining:
Dragonrest Isle by Kevin Carter
Denying the Boiling Beast by Matthew Stinson
Realm of the Fellnight Queen by Neil Spicer
Last Ride of the Mammoth Lords by Eric Bailey
Each of [...]
The heroes stood outside the cave, water dripping down from the pine branches all around. The forest was only slightly better illuminated than the cave. A voice echoed from the stones and the darkness.
“Rise up, spirits of the dead, rise up and speak to old Alkasha!” Groaning voices answered the wavering command, groans of bitter [...]
KQ did a little contest with Atomic Array to find the Most Humiliating Game Night story. The winner is anonymous and his voice disguised, but damn it’s funny.
[Audio clip: view full post to listen]
The release of the second “Core” Player’s Handbook for 4th Edition Dungeons & Dragons is a major event for the system, as it finally completes what some players wanted from the start: rules for the gnome as PC race, plus rules for the bard, druid, barbarian, and other core classes missing from the initial [...]
Welcome back to Behind the Spells, the series that provides a historical background, secret effects, and related material to classic spells of the world’s most famous fantasy roleplaying game. The rules (presented after the “Spell Secret” header) are compatible with any 3.5/OGL fantasy game, and the background weaves the spell into the lore of the [...]
Some designers make me say “I wish I’d thought of that.” Monte Cook is right at the top of the list.
His most recent project shows why. The Dungeon-A-Day premise is simple: a massive dungeon with sections published on the web, offering up meaty new encounters and bonus material every weekday.
Ed Bourelle is the cartographer, [...]
As Zubana trekked across the desert, a great sandstorm came upon her suddenly, forcing her to take shelter in a dry wadi. When she emerged, she was a greeted by an ornate tent, which had not been there before. She saw nomads going about their daily business and heard the bleat of fat-tailed sheep grazing [...]
Exactly how much “curse” does a clay golem’s cursed wound really have? The creature description says the damage the golem deals doesn’t heal naturally and that anyone casting a conjuration (healing) spell on the injured character must make a DC 26 caster level check to actually heal the injury. Can a remove curse spell remove [...]
Theseus faced many obstacles on his way to Athens to claim his birthright. Less than a day’s travel from the great city, the young hero felt confident. Yet darkness was coming, and Theseus looked for a place to spend the night. To his surprise, in the valley ahead there was a large manor house with [...]
The KOBOLD Guides continue to attract reviews and attention, and the most recent review at RPG Resource was this one from Megan Roberts at RPG Resource that hit the net yesterday.
I’m hard at work on Volume 3, of course, though I don’t expect it to be complete until GenCon. If you have a topic you’d [...]
Hrothagar the Iron Hearted is a dwarf barbarian to his core. A bald head ends in a three-prong beard. His left hand easily holds a drinking horn while his left holds his rune-marked axe behind his head. His broad belt, studded with more runes, a belt pouch, and a sack. Another belt pouch is [...]
The folks at the Grand OGL Wiki are doing reviews these days, including 4th Edition reviews. This review of Wrath of the River King by Sean Holland caught my eye.
While I admit that I have not looked at all of the 4th edition adventure available, this strikes me as the single best one I have [...]
Welcome back to Behind the Spells, the series that provides a historical background, secret effects, and related material to classic spells of the world’s most famous fantasy roleplaying game. The rules (presented after the “Spell Secret” header) are compatible with any 3.5/OGL fantasy game, and the background weaves the spell into the lore of the [...]
The final installment of the Rules of D&D Economics, starting with advice about banking…
Rule 41) Banks are for stupid people – everyone knows that if you give them your money and then they loan it out, you won’t be able to use it any more! DUH! Keep your money ON you!
Rule 42) A rich, unhealthy [...]
A lonely figure appears from out of the mists; a small frightened child wearing a faded smock and carrying a shepherd’s crook. The child has pasty white skin, bulging blue veins, and eyes that are little more than cadaverous black hollows. Trailing behind her is a writhing parade of horror-stricken shades, their ghostly bodies pulled [...]
Rule 31. Arch Wizard Miltonous Freidmanicus first coined the phrase “Trickle Down Economics” to describe his theory of economics which should control inflation and thus ensure a properly functioning sustainable growth curve. The cornerstone of his philosophy is never taxing adventurers. An untaxed adventurer is a motivated adventurer and willing to continue to grow his [...]
Welcome back to Behind the Spells, the series that provides a historical background, secret effects, and related material for classic spells from the world’s most famous fantasy roleplaying game. The rules (presented after the “Spell Secret” header) are compatible with any 3.5/OGL fantasy game, and the background weaves the spell into the lore of the [...]
“A curse upon that gold,” growled the dwarf. “May it bring nothing but woe to whoever claims it. May honor find no home within their breast, and may a hateful knife find their unsuspecting back. May brother turn against brother, may friend battle friend. May he who keeps it become a monstrous beast and never [...]
Stone made predatory beast, this creature prowls cavern tunnels and mineshafts as a jaguar would stalk through a jungle. Its powerful limbs end in jagged metallic claws and chipped stone teeth fill its powerful jaws. Rocky protrusions mark its durable hide and a serpentine tail lashes wickedly behind the beast.
Crag drakes are the one dragon [...]
We’re so shy and modest here that we sometimes forget when people talk about us. But they do!
The latest installment of the Atomic Array podcast is all about KQ#8, with interviews with Wolfgang Baur, Joshua Stevens, and Tim Connors. There’s some behind-the-scenes stories and a few laughs.
Give it a listen, won’t you?
I’m happy to report that we’ve already seen a massive amount of design work, pitches, and discussion for the Halls of the Mountain King project. The dwarves of the Golden Citadel have taken on a history, great dangers threaten them, and I daresay we have a theme, a start at the overall plot arc, and [...]
Darien, GA (WKQ News): State police today arrested a man on the Altamaha River for driving under the influence. The driver’s fishing boat flipped during a dangerous one craft incident. Both the driver and his passenger received only minor injuries. “We are determined to crack down on irresponsible operators who insist on driving while intoxicated,” [...]
Yes, our series on D&D Economics continues, this time stepping into the economics of the dark side. Well, more than usual.
Rule 21: No one is above avarice. Think of the best, most selfless person you know: that guy will pull hunks of melted copper off of the corpses of orphans if he thinks it might [...]
Tarry Town, NY (WKQ News): Local farmers report a series of odd events, as a man on horseback gallops through their fields each night. Local police believe the rider to be a single prankster. “Whoever this is,” said Sheriff’s Deputy Mark Andrews, “he should know that we do not find his actions funny. He’s causing [...]
Last week’s Friday Funny on Everything I Know about Economics, I Learned from D&D was popular enough that we’ve asked Clinton and Greg for more… And they went shopping.
Rule 11: Everyone you will ever meet will charge you for every service they will ever do for you, with the exception of your friends, who will [...]
Sometimes cool things just appear in the inbox. Witness this meta-amazing origami kobold by Joseph Wu. He has folded a kobold.
I love that, and there’s a small Flickr set with more detail. That is all.
Okay, not quite all. Sometimes other cool things appear in your mailbox; that is, KQ issue #8 has been released. [...]
Welcome back to Behind the Spells, the series that provides a historical background, secret effects, and related material to classic spells of the world’s most famous fantasy roleplaying game. The rules (presented after the “Spell Secret” header) are compatible with any 3.5/OGL fantasy game, and the background weaves the spell into lore of the [...]
Baltimore, MD (WKQ News): Gang activity in the Saint Agnes neighborhood continues to vex authorities. The latest initiation rite is especially troubling for those serving the city’s youth: Gang members dare young people to spend the night in a local cemetery, only to strangle them during the night. Experts are hampered in their investigations [...]
My thanks to everyone who has donated to support this project!
Halls of the Mountain King has met the commission bar as an OGL project, and will be written as an adventure for levels 8 to 10, with more than 40 encounters. Congratulations to all the patrons who voiced their support for this edition of [...]
These are the Rules of Fantasy Economics:
Rule 1: Everyone has roughly the exact same amount of money and/or property as everyone else of his or her respective experience-point total. Except at character creation, obviously, where some people totally get the shaft, which sucks … but “being poor” and “staying poor” are two very different things.
Only [...]
The 2007 Special Edition Elmore Angel is part of the Elmore Masterwork series, produced by Dark Sword Miniatures. It is a piece of Larry Elmore’s iconic artwork (reproduced here) transformed into a 28mm figurine by Jeff Grace, an industry notable himself.
The angel comes in three pieces, a body and a separate pair of wings. [...]
We're rather fond of the Kobold Guide to Design, Volume 2, here at Kobold Quarterly. But we don't want you to just take our word for it, so we asked the fine folks over at the RPGBlogger Network if they'd read and give us their opinions.
With only limited cajoling, they consented and tackled (portions [...]
Beware the leaves of the fall in Shervage Wood, for beneath them hides the Wyrm, a thing of decay and rot, a slinking beast with two heads – one at either end. You may pass it by, thinking it nothing more than a fallen tree, yet it is alive, and hungry. Sheep and ponies are [...]
After several attempts at putting together a commission for the next Open Design, I’ve got to admit to a certain degree of confusion as a publisher. While some folks were excited by the content of the adventures being considered on the KQ Forum, many of the questions boil down to “What edition will you be [...]
Welcome back to Behind the Spells, the series that provides a historical background, secret effects, and related material to one of the classic spells of the world’s most famous fantasy roleplaying game. The rules (presented after the “Spell Secret” header) are compatible with any 3.5/OGL fantasy game while the background incorporates the spell into [...]
Bursting into the chamber, your triumphant shout of “I have you now, villain!” dies in a surprised gasp. This room is a mass of turning cogs, swinging pendulums, and immense gears. Your enemy laughs, ducking behind a giant spring and into an obscuring burst of steam. “Foolish heroes,” he says. “I told you that my [...]
Louisville, KY (WKQ News): Earlier today, four teenagers fell to their deaths at the Norfolk Southern Railway trestle. One survivor suffered multiple fractures and is in guarded condition at Ten Broeck Hospital. He told authorities that the teens, all recent high school graduates, had been visiting legendary sites including the New Jersey Pine Barrens and [...]
Here’s a slightly longer audio interview bit in which Mr. Salvatore talks about his early development as a fantasy writer, leading up to his working with the Realms. Everyone breaks into the business in their own way.
[Audio clip: view full post to listen]
And with that, I think we’ve run the course of audio snippets with [...]
The players in one of my groups are very much enamored with spontaneous spellcasting, to the degree that the druid and the cleric have both taken the various spontaneous divine casting feats.
They ran up against of the limitations of that build in a recent play session. A lamia cast blindness/deafness on the party wizard [...]
T’was the night before Christmas and throughout the guildhouse, no thief was stirring, not even the king mouse….
In the second year urchins’ dormitory, the children gathered within a fortress of pillows and blankets and discussed the imminent heist. “He enslaves elves,” someone whispered. “I heard he’s an Eladrin,” claimed another, “that’s how he gets [...]
Woolpit, Suffolk, England (WKQ News): As they do every year, people in this small Suffolk County community celebrated the harvest, including re-telling tales of the Green Children. This year’s festival, however, took a decided turn for the bizarre, as two green-hued children appeared at the mouth of the flint mines in the area. Residents at [...]
Here’s a 10 by 10 Foot Toon from KQ cartoonist-in-residence.
KQ wishes good gaming to all!
Scibor’s line of 28 mm fantasy dwarves have the feel of stout chess pieces. They lord over the game table like a rook, a brick wall ready to halt anything thrown at them. The Bromor Hunter is no exception. If this dwarf, with his multi-barreled rifle propped over one shoulder, is a [...]
Can the harm spell kill the target on a failed save? The text of the spell says the deals half damage if target makes a successful save, but it cannot reduce the target’s hit points to less than one.
I’ve always read it so that the clause “but it cannot reduce the target’s hit points [...]
Behind the Spells: Magic Aura is the second in a series of releases produced for Kobold Quarterly by Tricky Owlbear Publishing, Inc. For those unfamiliar with the series, “Behind the Spells” provides a historical background, secret effects, and related material to one of the classic spells of the world’s most famous fantasy roleplaying [...]
Tequila, Jalisco, Mexico (WKQ News): For the fifth time this month, a child was found drowned in Lake Chapala. There are no witnesses to the terrible accident, which officials believe occurred sometime overnight. Officials tell WKQ News that there are no signs of foul play and they’re likely to rule this as yet another terrible [...]
County Durham, England (WKQ News): In the rainy north of England, cryptozoologists and big game hunters alike are gripped with frenzied excitement. The cause? Reports of a giant worm-like creature once more haunting the River Wear. Alongside the reporters, photographers, and gawpers are representatives of the Bishop of Sockburn who arrived armed with a traditional [...]
R.A. Salvatore tells us how the epic FR matchup would pan out. In his view.
[Audio clip: view full post to listen]
We await a response from Ed Greenwood.
The first KOBOLD Guide to Game Design was a sleeper hit, compiling advice from Wolfgang Baur, Ed Greenwood, and Nicolas Logue on how to think about different genres, how to improve your game as a DM, how to make a setting come alive, and how to use design compression to strengthen your work.
And the [...]
It’s a huge setting to fit into such a little book. As part of the Tales of Zobeck patronage project, I wrote the first sourcebook to describe the Free City of Zobeck, a mercantile city easy to drop onto a river in any campaign. The Gazetteer takes a deep look at the two of the [...]
Doors, rooms and corridors need not be the only trapped things in an adventure. Likewise, curses need not be the only dangerous thing attached to items. Traps have their place here as well.
The following items can find their way into PC’s possession in the usual ways. An evil merchant agent of the primary villain [...]
… in those days there flew from the plains of Hell a shadow of brimstone’s smoke, borne fast and silent as the hawk by 10,000 burning wings; in secret places it wove dark spells, and spoke beautiful lies, and spread terrible poison. The shadow befuddled the wisest of sages, struck dead the strongest of warriors [...]
Behind the Spells: Color Spray is the first in a series produced for the Kobold Quarterly by Tricky Owlbear Publishing. For those unfamiliar with the series, “Behind the Spells” provides a historical background, secret effects, and related material to one of the classic spells of the world’s most famous fantasy roleplaying game. The rules are [...]
Canberra, Australian Capital Territory (WKQ News): A tourist today was admitted to Canberra Hospital with severe injuries to his head and back. Officials report that the tourist, whose name is being withheld pending notification of his family, was attacked while exploring the outback. They suspect the animal in the attack was a dingo, and completely [...]
R.A. Salvatore can get a laugh out of any topic, even the edition wars and the end of Drizzt’s saga. Give his take on those a listen.
[Audio clip: view full post to listen]
Got a favorite Salvatore book? Got a Friday Funny of your own? Tell us in the Forums.
Skip Williams is one of the designers of 3rd Edition Dungeons & Dragons. He’s also a regular columnist for Kobold Quarterly. As long as you send in your questions, we’ll keep running the column here for free. But if you don’t ask the kobold, don’t expect a reply!
If I were to run a gestalt character [...]
Some spellcasters spend their lives spurning the ground and its heavy tread, but a few look to non-arcane means to overcome the limits of earth like the Templeforge Skycaster. Fusing the arts of engineering and magic, they take to the skies and seldom return to earth. Their magic is as large as the heavens, and [...]
Tiveden, Sweden (WKQ News Europe): We’re here in Tiveden National Park to report on a sudden spate of hunting accidents plaguing the area. Game is scarce, but accidents and avalanches are more than plentiful. Some people claim that ‘troll women’ haunt these forests, driving off game and sabotaging hunters. Local legends tell of handsome girls [...]
We ran an adventure back in Dungeon that had a scene with a lot of shocker lizards running amok in a wizard’s lab, and I just got seized with the urge to draw a bunch of them. I suspect that this little shocker lizard has some sort of unpleasant potion miscibility going on for drinking [...]
Skip Williams is one of the designers of 3rd Edition Dungeons & Dragons. He’s also a regular columnist for Kobold Quarterly. As long as you send in your questions, we’ll keep running the column here for free. But if you don’t ask the kobold, don’t expect a reply!
I encountered an odd thing recently. A DM [...]
Most traps aim to kill or maim, overlooking the importance of capturing victims intact. Fur traders use mantraps to protect their investments, but not many creatures intent on protecting their stronghold do the same. Typical traps and snares used for game must be modified to catch larger and more intelligent humanoid victims because — especially [...]
Grandmother’s Bay, Saskatchewan, Canada (WKQ News): A rash of murders in this Cree community has folks wondering just what law enforcement plans to do about the problem. While some folks think the tribal elders should turn matters over to the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, many believe this tribal matter should remain under the jurisprudence of [...]
The KQ Forum has been pretty lively lately, and I wanted to promote this particular brainstorm because it’s just a lot of fun. Nothing says D&D more than a dragon’s breath weapon, so here are 100 different ways to tweak that iconic moment. [More...]
Popular with woodland protectors, intelligent forest-dwelling monsters and guerrilla fighters, the whip trap is easy to set up. While the name may summon ideas of a leather whip striking out at the PCs, it is actually derived from the whip-like action of the shaft released by a trip wire and launching into the victims with [...]
In ancient days when man was young, Angha soared on desert winds. Blocking out the sun as she passed with feathers like copper fire, she engendered fear and awe in the primitive civilizations of man and quickly became an object of worship. Though never asking for their exaltation, a rare and fleeting sense of obligation [...]
The man behind the dark elf Drizzt Do’Urden is quite a funnyman. Much more so than his famous character’s grim tales might lead you to believe.
As evidence, we offer this audio bit of kobold diplomacy called the “Wubba Wubba Story”, as told by the man himself.
[Audio clip: view full post to listen]
A true classic [...]
Wrath of the River King is heading into final draft form, and heading to the editor soon. I have to say that, like with any new edition of D&D, the learning curve has been interesting; things that look good in theory haven’t always panned out in playtest.
But fortunately, a lot of playtesters and patron eyeballs [...]
Skip Williams is one of the designers of 3rd Edition Dungeons & Dragons. He’s also a regular columnist for Kobold Quarterly. We ran out of room in the upcoming issue for his Ask the Kobold column, so we’re running those questions here on the site, together with Skip’s insights on game design decisions. Enjoy!
QUESTION: How [...]
Ready to host a horror night? Well, invite your friends over, pop in your scariest DVD, turn off the sound, turn on all of the lights, put the baseball game on the radio, and prepare to… thoroughly underwhelm them.
Without the proper mood, this tragic fate can befall your horror adventure too. [...]
Whitechapel, London, England (WKQ News) For the fourth time in the last two months, a prostitute working in Whitechapel became the victim of gruesome murder. The woman – identified as Maryanne Smithson – was found dead in an alley behind Durwood Street. An anonymous source from the medical examiner’s office tells WKQ News that the [...]
On what we hope will be a continuing feature, here’s the first of our Friday Funnies. This one comes to us courtesy of Ed Greenwood, who is asked to contribute a game design to his peers in the library sciences…
This story is paraphrased (I can’t recall all of her exact words), but true enough, I’m [...]
If you’ve already read the Dwarven Guide to Airships in the current issue, you know what’s coming: a Web freebie! Yes, we ran out of room in this issue, so a few of the smaller-class airships are presented here, the Drake, the Dragonfly, and the Damselfly.
Templeforge Cloud-Drake
Tonnage 15 (45 without liftgas)
Size 90 ft. [...]
Yes, it seems like just yesterweek I was coming back from GenCon and collapsing in a heap at the Ye Old Kobold Mines. And then just like that, it’s already Fall and here’s the issue to prove it. Where did the quarter go?
The issue features two major new elements. The Monster Mayhem section features [...]
Warning: This review contains spoilers.
Book info: Soft cover, 48 pages
Publisher: Goodman Games
Author: Harley Stroh with Aeryn Rudel
Gameplay: D&D 4E, 5 PCs of 1st level
Crunch: new evil race, three new monsters, three new magic items
Dragora’s Dungeon is a four part, high fantasy adventure full [...]
The blackened mass of dead flesh and charred bone standing before you was human . . . once. The reek of burnt sinew, scorched flesh and smoking hair hangs heavy about the thing’s lank frame, nauseating those who inhale its stench. A patchwork of immolated flesh, the color of greasy tar, hangs over its decaying [...]
If you are passionate about the gaming hobby: feed your passion with gaming podcasts.
How often do you game? Twice a week? Once? One a month? When you find those few short hours just do not satisfy scratch your gaming itch, you probably do other stuff – make characters, [...]
If you don’t know who Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman are, … well, I’m not sure why you’re here at Kobold World Central. They’re the creative duo behind the Dragonlance novels, and they kindly consented to an interview with Jeremy Jones in this audio segment.
[Audio clip: view full post to listen]
They discuss humor, character origins, [...]
Skip Williams is one of the designers of 3rd Edition Dungeons & Dragons. He’s also a regular columnist for Kobold Quarterly. We ran out of room in the upcoming issue for his Ask the Kobold column, so we’re running those questions here on the site, together with Skip’s insights on game design decisions. Enjoy!
QUESTION: I’m [...]
Not all traps are deadly, some are just insidious. The kobolds of Zobeck have long since grown weary of manlings stealing away their carefully mined silver. To discourage the big folk, a consortium of devious kobolds versed in clockworks and alchemy recently created a substance called “Silverlust” to trap their silver troves with, an alchemical [...]
Etowah, TN (WKQ News): Investigators from the Tennessee State Police are investigating yet another brutal murder in the isolated area known to local youth as Lover’s Lane. As in the previous three cases over past two months, the woman was stabbed once in the abdomen, while the male was gruesomely skinned alive. Police aren’t releasing [...]
Ladies and gentlemen, the cover to the Tales of Zobeck Gazetteer.
Given that this Open Design project is packed with the details of the clockwork city and related adventures featuring devils, plagues, and yes, clockwork foes, I couldn’t be happier. The artist is Malcolm McClinton, and if you stick around, you will more from him. [...]
London, UK (WKQ – London News): The investigation of the vicious attacks on Samantha Grey, 27, and Catherine Hulme, 32, last week in Greenwich has taken a strange turn. Their mysterious assailant, dubbed the “Leaping Man,” is now believed to be re-enacting the Spring-Heel Jack mystery of the 1800s.
In related news, Professor Robert Enthel [...]
Sicklerville, NJ (WKQ News): Farmers in this Camden County town are growing more concerned by the day. They say their livestock – cows, pigs, and horses mostly – are being attacked in the evening. Few animals have survived the attacks, and the deaths have been especially grisly. New Jersey Game and Wildlife officials are on [...]
Nicolas Logue designed the recent Open Design project, Blood of the Gorgon, a dark and thrill-packed adventure that recently shipped to its patrons. Here he offers some lessons learned and some final reflections on the Open Design process:
Gaming is not necessarily an art, but its close enough. The way it differs from painting or [...]
Detroit, MI (WKQ News): The severe storms have left the Detroit metro area. Over the past 24 hours, Detroit has suffered intense thunderstorms, with wind gusts up to 80 miles per hour felling trees and utility poles throughout the region. A spokesman for DTE Energy reports it could be a week before power is completely [...]
Harley Stroh mostly writes adventures—good old, down and dirty dungeon crawls reminiscent of the AD&D modules of yesteryear. His scenarios feature vengeful rat kings, bat-riding goblins, and twisted, giggling evil gnomes who worship the eldritch crystal that deformed them.
In a Stroh adventure, there are plenty of new monsters, exotic magic items, and more [...]
James Jacobs is the editor-in-chief of Paizo Publishing’s Pathfinder line. Over the years, he has worked as the associate and later the managing editor of Dungeon magazine. He’s been the developer, lead designer, the guy who adds material here and there, and even the cartographer on projects for Bastion [...]
Matt Forbeck has been working full-time in the gaming industry for almost two decades. His CV reads like a hardcore gamer’s none-too-modest Christmas wish list. A freelancer for most of his career, he has worked, in some capacity or other, for everyone from Atari to Wizards of the Coast, from Games Workshop to [...]
Because there’s a million gaming sites and blogs and podcasts, I’ll just mention a few I like. KQ contributor Jonathan Drain offered up the 7 Habits of A Successful Dungeon Master recently, which I like because it’s short and yet it’s clear he knows where the DM pitfalls are. Definitely worth a look, even for [...]
Yes, despite various life-threatening adventures, Kobold Quarterly has reached its first anniversary with the release of issue #5!
This issue is a great one (though I may be biased), because it includes:
An Exclusive 4th Edition Interview:
Clearly we’ve lost our minds, but we’re giving away free issues with new subscriptions. For the rest of May, new subscribers get an extra freebie. All new PDF or print+PDF subscriptions until June 1 get 5 issues for the price of 4.
There’s no codes to enter, no weird requirements. Take advantage today in [...]
If the current commission were for just a 3E project or just a 4E project, it would already be funded; patrons have supported the work and there’s lots of interest. In a perfect world, I would be merrily writing up the outline and taking the first couple of rounds of polls, brainstorming, and feedback by [...]
Sure, kobolds hate gnomes. But not ALL gnomes.
In particular, we like Gnome Stew. While the meat dish is delectable, it’s more than that. Gnome Stew is a new game mastering blog written by GMs, and it s founded by Martin Ralya, the same mad genius who brought you Treasure Tables.
Like Kobold Quarterly, Gnome Stew [...]
You may have noticed that Kobold Quarterly is the official magazine of Open Design. Many of you will already know what this means, but you may not know that the Open Design projects are now open for discussion in their own subsection of the Kobold Quarterly boards. Since right now is the commissioning period for [...]
Just a note to say that you can vote for what Zobeck article will appear next in Kobold Quarterly, and make your own suggestions, in this thread.
The last couple months have been good times for KQ, with one important exception. Subscriptions are up. I’m seeing great articles from freelancers, full of fire and vinegar. And not least, KQ is a semi-finalist for the Origins Award.
The bad news is (more)
Wolfgang Baur’s Kobold Quarterly magazine and Highmoon Media Productions have teamed up to produce and release a special edition in Highmoon’s Domains of Adventure line, the Havenmine Gauntlet, written by WereCabbage Adam Daigle, with art by James Keegan.
Back in the day, long ages past, when Open Design was founded (better known as 2006), I had a problem. And that problem was this: How would I keep patrons entertained while I waited to see if gamers would chip in to fund the project? I mean, I wanted them coming back to the Open [...]
The fourth Open Design commission, Six Arabian Nights, has been completed and has shipped to its more than 101 patrons. Initial reactions from the readers include “What a beautifully rendered collection” to “Absolutely amazing” to just plain “Wow”. To put it another way, one patrons says it will “definitely be one of the more prized [...]
You’re a bloody fool Cane.”
Conversations within the Severed Ram came to an abrupt halt. I became the center of attention and felt the color rise in my cheeks, as someone stifled a laugh in the tap-room.
Kobold-in-Chief, Wolfgang Baur, has been invited to be the guest of honor at Wordsmith Hall. Don’t be alarmed, loyal minions, thinking you won’t be able to attend. Wordsmith Hall is not located in a real-life town; it’s a location in Second Life.
One of the adventures in Six Arabian Nights, the current Open Design project, is called “The Sand Pirates,” and it features a fantastic half-efreet pirate captain and his crew, cursed monstrosities beneath the dunes, and a few other twists and turns. As a preview, check out the free download of Captain Asad Al Nar, the Lion of Fire, containing stats, tactics, and stunning art!
Blood of the Gorgon is a 50,000+ word dark urban adventure in which the heroes brave terrors without and within. Written by Nicolas Logue and developed by Wolfgang Baur, this patron-driven project includes daily posts and discussion, five design essays discussing horror, mystery adventures, storytelling, and other topic. It also offers playtest opportunities and up-close Q&A of the design choices made for the adventure.
When an editor writes back and tells you that your storyline is terrible, it’s usually a good sign that your writing is progressing well. Seem strange? Well, it could be worse. That editor…
This lich’s tale expands on the material of the “Ecology of the Lich,” published in Kobold Quarterly #3.
I’ve gotten this question a LOT over the last few months, with various gamers asking what condition my edition is in. All I’ve been able to say is that I don’t know until I hear more from WotC. Well, we’ve heard…
