Recommended Reading: The Silmarillion...

While not one of my favorite books by J.R.R Tolkien, I have long admired the significance of his posthumously published work The Silmarillion. Most other nerds do not share my reverence of this particular book, considering it a somewhat disjointed very difficult read. In fact, many of my Tolkien-loving friends have never finished it.

I consider that a dirty shame.

What is it?

The Silmarillion is essentially a collection of myths, legends, and histories of Middle Earth. This includes, but is not focused on, the Third Age of Middle Earth which contains the Lord of the Rings stories that everyone loves.

This work is considered by most to reflect the main body of Tolkien's unfinished works. He started writing the stories that would eventually become this work in 1914, and continued revising and expanding them all throughout his life. At one point, he heavily desired that The Silmarillion be released alongside the Lord of the Rings stories but his publisher wasn't biting.

Why you should care.

There are five main sections of The Silmarillion, and you can find out more about their contents courtesy of a very well crafted Wikipedia article on the topic. One of my favorite sections is the first, which mirrors an allegorical retelling of the creation story regarding Middle Earth and its races.

As the book progresses, its tone shifts first to myths and histories of the elves and we are given a wonderful love story, "Of Beren and Lúthien". I will not do the story the injustice of being summarized by my clumsy hand, but suffice it to say if you want depth of characters and a lesson in epic storyline construction you really can start there and be completely satisfied.

I could go on and on about how excellent aspects of this text is, but that would take a long time and my hands would be numb from typing. Anyone who delights in world-building would benefit from the depth and grandeur that Tolkien (and his son, who edited The Silmarillion) gives Middle Earth beyond what most people are familiar with.

It is a shining example of how being passionate about world-building does not have to involve every last detail you ever conceived of in every storyline. If Tolkien had included 1/5 of the characters that he speaks about in The Silmarillion in The Lord of the Rings stories, it would've been fifteen volumes and nobody would've ever heard about it because the first person to start reading it wouldn't be done yet. It takes a light touch to color a small portion of your landscape correctly with the right characters, and Tolkien gives a master's course in doing this in The Lord of the Rings.

In addition to the world-building aspect, you also get some excellent character archetypes from the tales contained in its 365 pages. The aforementioned Beren and Lúthien are great examples, as are Fëanor and his line, who created the magical jewels called Silmarils that the collection is named after. The passion, motivation, and depth of these characters are excellent examples of how good character development can be in a short space. Taking a few of these stories, reading them, and reflecting on how you can build characters as dynamic as these would be an excellent exercise to prepare you for your next campaign, whether writing one or playing in one.

This article is clearly biased.

This week, I was able to add a first edition / first printing of this book to my collection and I consider it a true prize. It doesn't trouble me at all that many of my Tolkien-nerd friends don't apprecaite it. I do, and that's the important part!

Better Character Development courtesy of Bruce Willis...

Tonight I had the distinct pleasure of re-watching one of my favorite sci-fi movies: The Fifth Element. Stupid Ranger and I had the wonderful opportunity of introducing someone to this film for the first time (they loved it) and it was fun to watch someone experience it.

Great examples of developed characters

Without going into ultra-nerdly levels of detail, one of the aspects about this movie that I truly enjoy is the depth of the characters. Watching it this time around, I tried to identify some of the standard D&D related classes for the characters and how the interesting ways that they were being written relative to that role.

Take Korben Dallas (Bruce Willis) for example. He is clearly a seasoned yet retired fighter, who reluctantly breaks the rules when given the proper motivation in Leeloo. I believe he plays a very convincing chaotic good character, willing to break the rules that he feels are unjust in order to serve the common (and ultimately his own) good.

The star of the show is clearly Leeloo herself (Milla Jovovich). Aside from awesome orange hair and a propensity for being topless (and bottomless, see Resident Evil for details), she is my gold standard for actual depth in an action-based character. As the Supreme Being, she is physically very strong and able to absorb information at an amazing rate, but this is tempered by her vulnerability and empathy that she feels for the human condition. Throughout this movie you see how her physical strength and her mental prowess continually get betrayed by her desire to find goodness in humanity. You even get a great example of D&D style language learning ability, as seen when she learns English while Dallas is boarding the flight. I don't think I've seen the likes of that anywhere else!

Learn from examples like these!

There are two real lessons here. Player characters should take the opportunity to watch your favorite films and examine the journey that your favorite characters take throughout. Think about this as it relates to the decisions that you make as you roleplay your character. Do your best to filter out (or use sparingly) concepts that are schticky, unless you intend to temper them with actual character growth (or your DM is running an irreverent campaign on purpose).

Dungeon Masters can learn by watching the broader character interations and the story as it unfolds. Learn to engineer moments to let your characters explore their flaws or vulnerabilities, or get deeply engaged in what is happening on their own terms.

Take special care to allow your story to unfold in as many ways and across as many venues as needed. The Fifth Element covered many different sets and scenarios to get the level of depth and opulence to the futuristic world in which it was set, and in this depth comes opporunities for your characters to branch out and grow.

Finally, don't be afraid to sprinkle in some colorful characters or fun action scenes to spice things up. The Fifth Element wouldn't be what it is without Ruby Rhod (Chris Tucker) or that deaf guy that ended up throwing Dallas billiard balls when he needed a gun!

Taking The Mists Seriously For A Change

As many of you may have guessed by this point, I have an overactive imagination. I have always been this way, and it is a great asset to me in my daily life. I'm very rarely really bored because usually if left idle my brain just does whatever the hell it feels like and leaves me to sort out the pieces. (It's more fun than it sounds.) As a kid, I daydreamed quite a bit too. However, there was a real nasty side of being a kid with a powerful imagination. I was the kid who wouldn't go near the basement at night, especially with the lights out. I was convinced there were monsters under the bed, in the closet, behind most doors, and generally anywhere I wasn't looking right then. Very frequently, I was not a big fan of bedtime -- I can't even count the number of times I found myself screaming for Mom and Dad. Sometimes I knew what I was afraid of, but the really bad ones were when I woke up and I was scared out of my mind and I really didn't know why.

I can't honestly say I still don't get the willies walking through my house in the dark in the middle of the night. Our house is built into the side of a hill, and we've got a long dark hallway that ends in two underground rooms. And at night, if there's no lights on, you can't see a damn thing. And almost every time I pass it, I can't help but look just in case. Sometimes I'll look at a window and think I see movement or be expecting some monster to mash its face up against the glass suddenly. And the thing that's been creeping me out recently is when I go in to check on my baby son in the middle of the night, I'll open the door and cringe expecting to find some horrible thing hunched over his cradle looking at him.

Now, don't get me wrong. I'm a grown man and I can make my will save and fear check vs imaginary monsters. But it's just that nameless fear, the momentary chill up the spine, and the realization that holy shit that would really be creepy that really make things interesting. When this happens, for a brief moment, I'm a helpless little kid again and there's nothing that can save me short of a light switch or Mom and Dad.

Let Them Scare Themselves

The feeling I just described is how horror works in my mind. I watched an ungodly amount of "horror" movies as a teenager, but just some random guy hacking up sorority girls doesn't scare me. Some gruesome beast shown in HD with blood and slime and pus everywhere is fun to look at, but not scary. What is scary, then? Well, the problem isn't so much in the subject matter so much as it is the presentation. If the same monster is talked about in hushed voices by the locals lest the beast hear us and the protagonists of the story run across a grisly scene of the monster's doing, that's a good start. That plants a few seeds in a person's mind about what this thing is and how the hell it could have done that even though they possibly don't even have the slightest idea what it really is. Or, even better, what if they realize they could be next? Then they're looking around every corner and staying awake nights and just as soon as they drop their guard.... well, you know. That's way scarier.

The point is, it's scarier when it's not spelled out for everyone. As a DM, you don't have to say "a troglodyte approaches" or Tell the players about the seemingly unstoppable hulking figure lumbering toward them, with scaly dull mottled skin, evil red eyes, and a tail that indicates nothing human this way comes. For that matter, nothing says you can't just make it dark where the PC's are. That Light spell of theirs isn't going to illuminate a dungeon like the inside of a Wal-Mart. Be vague. When you do give up details, give up the scary details if you can. Whatever the player thinks is happening is probably a lot worse than what's actually happening, and when the lights finally shine on the beast only to show it was just an emaciated kobold they just killed, they feel awful silly. At least, up until the bushes rustle behind them.

Horror campaigns aren't easy to pull off, and it's not difficult to see why in most cases. Our group is going to start a Ravenloft campaign here in the next couple weeks (run by our friend/evil specialist/minister and soon-to-be contributor Katherine and her husband Carson), and I can't honestly say I'm not worried that we're not going to take it seriously enough to be effective (at least without some severe beatings). You can't force a beer-and-pretzels (or in our case sugar-and-caffiene) group to be scared. I've personally borne witness to the grisly death of a well-made Cthulhu campaign run by our poor friend Kanati (due in no small part to me playing a psychic rugby player and speaking in a Scottish accent the whole time). It's also hard to take a bunch of hardcore power gamers who have the monster manual memorized and have them be scared of most things you put in front of them. Matter of fact, if you do succeed in making a monster vague and scary, these players are probably going to feel helpless and get pissed off. Horrible things happening to a power gamer's character aren't roleplaying devices, they're "nerfs" to be avoided. For instance, a curse on a wizard PC's hands that makes them slowly get gnarled and blackened and useless is a great storytelling tool and an impetus for the PC's to get their job done to save him. To a power gamer, you're giving him penalties to spellcasting (for no good reason damn you!). You're going to get a giant bushel of analysis and strategy, a lot of frustrated, and not a whole lot of scared. Our group has both of these in spades, and I've been doing a lot of thinking about how we can have fun in such a horror-intense setting.

Hip To Be Scared?

My best guess is that a good place to start would be to make sure everybody's on the same page as to what we're looking for out of the campaign. That means I don't make any psychics that talk and act like Shrek with a Magnum .45 pistol. That means that Stupid Ranger has to occasionally suspend her natural ability to produce a rule that saves everyone at the last second. It means that everybody needs to let go of the numbers and the dice and to listen to the slow, dark things happening to and around them and to think holy shit that would really be creepy.

If we can do that, I think we'll have ourselves a successful horror campaign. I'm dying to hear any input our readers can offer us on the topic before the campaign kicks off. Help us scare the crap out of ourselves!

Playing the Races in 4E

I think there's a lot of good in 4E, but there is no denying there's a lot of change. One of the first areas in the PHB where we can see that change is in the races. There's the introduction of several new classes, as well as changes to the existing, familiar classes.

Dragonborn

Definitely different. The Dragonborn race is one of the new races in 4E, which by now is not news to you. Dante recently likened them to Klingons, which really isn't too far off the mark. One of the things that struck me is that their sense of honor is so strong that they treat their adversaries with courtesy and respect. There's something very poetic about that level of nobility, and that will make a great character trait to highlight as a player.

Dwarf

Familiar but slightly changed. I felt that the description focused a great deal on the Dwarven affinity to stone, more than I remember from the previous edition. But what hasn't changed the Dwarven loyalty; a friend is a friend, and it is an honor to fight beside a friend, no matter how dire the situation. This gives you a great character progression to follow. In the beginning, you're merely acquaintences; as you adventure together, you discover the worth of your comrades and are proud to fight with them.

Eladrin

Because I don't think it was necessary for the Eladrin/Elf split, I've decided that it's just easier to think of the Eladrin as an entirely new race. All that aside, perhaps one of the best descriptors of the Eladrin is "detached." They are very much separate from the rest of the world around them. The "detached" persona is nothing new to me as a player, having recently played Ari along similar lines (because with Batloaf around, it was just easier and gave Ari reasonably deniability when he did crazy things). I would warn that this can be very difficult to overcome as you adventure; if you are playing an Eladrin, I would recommend softening your aloof nature as you spend more time with your comrades.

Elf

Elves in 4E sound a lot like tree-hugging hippies, but I say this as kindly as possible, knowing that I'm planning to play one soon. They are very closely tied to the woodlands and are very passionate in that the emotions they feel, they feel deeply. Try playing your Elf with particular attention to the emotion reactions they might feel; this is a significant part of their personality.

Half-Elf

Not much really changed with the Half-Elves, but I think we see a lonely side to their existance in this edition. Not quite fitting in with the Humans, not quite fitting in with the Elves, Half-Elves enjoy surrounding themselves with friends, possible to alleviate some of the loneliness they feel from not really belonging anywhere. Your Half-Elf will likely be open-minded to newcomers she meets, eager to learn something new from her new-found friend.

We'll take a look at the rest of the races in the next installment!

Five Ways I Know I'm Not an Elf...

I took some of my first vacation time over the past week, and I had the dubious honor of spending most of that week in the yard tending to tasks that had been neglected for Far Too Long.

Therefore, I present to you the five ways I know I'm not an elf:

1. I hate being outdoors on my vacation!!
2. I desperately hate bugs. It is pretty satisfying hitting a water beetle with a shovel though.
3. I find it difficult to revere the root system of a tree or bush. The symbolism of its tenacity does not endear me to it when my hands are blistered and cut from removing said trees or bushes.
4. The tapestry of obscenities I wove while removing said bushes and trees alone probably precludes me from inclusion in the elven race.
5. I got horrifyingly sunburned on my first day outside. When was the last time you saw a sunburned elf that didn't have glue-on plastic ears at GenCon?