Friday, September 3, 2010

Philosophical Reading

I just stumbled across a blog called "Points of Light: Mostly for D&D games". As the name says, it's mostly about D&D, which I don't play a lot of. It's also got a lot of "Edition Wars" related posts (he really likes 4th and hates Pathfinder), which are of limited interest to me. Every single paragraph has at least one "fucking" which seems a bit excessive.

But stepping past those complaints, as I read over his articles, I can't help but acknowledge that:
a) it's largely a fun read, with plenty of juicy rants and bitter humor,
and
b) I absolutely agree with his philosophy (and play style) every single time they come up. I found myself nodding yes as I read his posts about game balance, pacing, character niche, "noob traps", why requiring deep system mastery is a poor design choice, and what sorts of things really do provide a challenge to the players and what other mechanics claim to do so but actually are just unfair or annoying. I kept thinking that these were posts I would have written, if I engaged in more D&D, cussing, and sarcasm.

Overall, a fun site worth a read if you have any interest in recent D&D editions. I highly recommend starting with his snarky sarcastic review of what makes 3rd Ed "great".

1 comment:

rbbergstrom said...

I seem to be having problems with blogspot. My post from early Thursday has vanished, and the links from this post aren't even registering as links anymore. Very frustrating.