Café de Nuit

Gentleman wrote:Forgive me, the reasoning behind my earlier comments was that I was just so stoked about the Fraternity Unleashed article, and that somebody had finally got around to statting up Drusilla. Plus, I always get a little excited when a new QTR issue comes out.

In hindsight, Quoth X really seems to be one of the weaker issues. But, it has Drusilla which is a high point, in my opinion. I simply can't get enough of deranged, Cockney vampiresses!

I plead guilty to writing up the stats for Drusilla. Her background was heavily edited in review as it may have approached a few copyright issues and I no longer have the original. It was lost to a virus on my pc, I salvaged many things from it but that was lost forever

She was fun to write though

Wiccy of the Fraternity wrote:I no longer have the original. It was lost to a virus on my pc, I salvaged many things from it but that was lost forever

That can be rectified...

Jason of the Fraternity wrote:That can be rectified...

Yep thanks again for sending it to me

Seeing as there are less than three weeks before submissions are due for the next issue, I figured that I might as well post some of my reviews on this thread. Sorry about the short length of most of the feedback, folks, but time didn't permit me to detail everything out. If you have questions, please ask and I'll elaborate as best as I can. Cheers!


Report of Fihyrs: By far my favorite article in this issue of Quoth the Raven, I have to give David a big hand for writing an excellent article. First, the overall style was wonderful (although the doctor/biologist in me likes the first-person ecology lecture style). Second, he took a rather uninspired monster and adapted it for the Ravenloft setting. Third, the mixture of story and game statistics meshed well into an easy-to-read article. Kudos!

Things that Go Bump: Another excellent article for this issue, and I feel that this is one of the best written articles from Uri Barak so far (i.e. definitely see the refinement of writing skills in this article). The template is helpful to DMs needing to quickly create a bogeyman, and the examples provide some interesting options. The only thing that I did not like about this article was the Elf Knight, which did not have the same touch that the Dirty Thing and Basket Case had.

Tales from the Fireside: A very good article that provided a great amount of detail to each of the frightening fey within it. However, I felt that a more concise version of the tales would have been more appropriate. While the writing was good, I felt that I needed to wade through a fair amount of fat to get to the meat of the material.

Scearidd: I liked the concept of the scearidd, although I am not sure if I would ever actually use one in my campaign. The idea of having a small child indirectly cause bad things to happen to people could be promising, especially with Hide & Seek being out in the theaters…

Return to Arlington Farm: This was a good article, but I really didn’t find much more impressive than the original version that was written a couple years ago. Some nice touches to updating it, though. I did find this to be a good article to fit the issue but not the theme (i.e. my players escape the evil fey in Tepest to wind up on Arlington Farm…?).

Dread Leprechauns: I loved this article, and it would rank as second only to David’s Report on Fihyrs. Shameful as it may be, I have to admit that my old college buddies and I loved watching the Leprechaun movies (despite how bad they are), and I really liked the Stephen’s dark and twisted version of the green men. Kudos!

On the Road: An interesting take on the gypsy core class, and I am impressed to see some of the thoughts and layout of it. I liked the concept of the gypsy class from Domains of Dread, although I never really liked the mechanics of it. I think that this article presents a decent 3.5 version of the class. However, I did notice that no spell list was provided… Was this an oversight or did I miss this somewhere?

A Most Frightful Excerpt: I have to give a lot of praise to Staton for his artwork in this article. With the exception of a couple of the pictures, I was extremely impressed with the caliber and detail of the art. I was less than impressed, however, with some of the descriptions that went along with the pictures. A more detailed side bar or story with each picture would have added a lot (despite a picture being worth a thousand words), and this lack of detail left me questioning why this should be an article versus an art gallery. Despite this, I stand by my earlier statement of this being great artwork and well worth looking through.

La Petite Valacha: I felt that this was a good article, although it seemed somewhat out of place. I realize that this article was meant to be part of the Ste. Ronges gazetteer, but it seems to be cut short in areas. Overall, this remains a good addition for anyone looking at fleshing out their city.

besides the opening article, i enjoyed the artwork in "A Most Frighttful Exceprt". Some were in color, but my favorites were in black and white which left it to my imagination ( and thus, i became more involved in the creation of the image) to fill in color schemes. i noticed a number of kanji/chinese characters. could translations be provided in some kind of appendix or endnote section of the article?

Tales from the Fireside was also interesting. The format was engaging and reminded me of the additional anecdotes for GazI. The grey-box entries, however, were inconsistent. The Singing Maid was clearly a ghost but the other entries left some room for individual campaign varience. It might be advisable in the future to pick one or the other and stick with it.

Official On The Road article errata: The lack of spell list and note to one was a small oversight on my part, one of those things you think you have added, but haven't. Oops! Gypsies use the Sorcerer spell lists.

Another note on Tales From the Fireside, the subtitle was meant to be Frightening Foes, another thing I forgot to change when I scrapped the original article I was writing before Tales From the Fireseide became what it was. The article also had a mishap in editing, I was never sent the revised edition of the article, so my error filled submission got put in int its stead.

I am glad to see I got a vote in this issue, even if it was for what I felt was the weakest of my articles, but it is still good

Wiccy of the Fraternity wrote:Gypsies use the Sorcerer spell lists.

So the gypsy class doesn't have any restrictions to arcane spell selection then (i.e., not confined to only divination spells)? I would have thought that you would have limited them to certain schools such as abjuration, illusion, enchantment, and divination.

I agree with Joel. The article about Feyrs is my favorite, as I can use it most effectively. Also I like that type of writting as Gotten said.

Also I have to say that I always enjoy the introduction of the QtR! Great work there!

Jason of the Fraternity wrote:So the gypsy class doesn't have any restrictions to arcane spell selection then (i.e., not confined to only divination spells)? I would have thought that you would have limited them to certain schools such as abjuration, illusion, enchantment, and divination.

I think that sounds better, lol.

Official On The Road article errata REDUX: The lack of spell list and note to one was a small oversight on my part, one of those things you think you have added, but haven't. Oops! Gypsies have access to the schools of abjuration, illusion, enchantment, and divination.

alhoon wrote:I agree with Joel.

A side note, it's Jason who wrote that post. Funily, in the last months, I've been mis-credited a few times on these boards to good ideas in fact written by my fellow FoS

Joël

Joël of the Fraternity wrote:A side note, it's Jason who wrote that post. Funily, in the last months, I've been mis-credited a few times on these boards to good ideas in fact written by my fellow FoS

Joël

It's because that you are secretly the boss of us all and whip us mercilessly if we actually try to claim credit for anything, even if they are our ideas to begin with lol

Wiccy of the Fraternity wrote:I think that sounds better, lol.

Glad to be of some help, Wiccy!

Joël of the Fraternity wrote:Funily, in the last months, I've been mis-credited a few times on these boards to good ideas in fact written by my fellow FoS

Fortunately, you have been credited with the good ideas written by others. It will be an unfortunately day when the angry mob with torches shows up at your door for those other things that we've been working on...

Jason of the Fraternity wrote:

Joël of the Fraternity wrote:Funily, in the last months, I've been mis-credited a few times on these boards to good ideas in fact written by my fellow FoS

Fortunately, you have been credited with the good ideas written by others. It will be an unfortunately day when the angry mob with torches shows up at your door for those other things that we've been working on...

Please don't divulge the secrets of my conspiracy of conquest via blackmail and chemo-hypnotic candied lingerie before I go to the post office.
Core-conquerors are unappreciative of loose lips, and I have yet to finish repairing the damage and set-backs to my plans caused by the premature leakage of Scs's love of "My Little Ponies."

Wiccy of the Fraternity wrote:It's because that you are secretly the boss of us all and whip us mercilessly if we actually try to claim credit for anything, even if they are our ideas to begin with lol

Its true - Joel beats us with phonebooks when we post out of turn.

[Socko]: "I heard that! I'm telling on you"

Oh no, I'm going to get the albatross for sure.