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|| DRAGONQUEST Newsletter 2003
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|| Volume 8 / Number 1
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The DQ Newsletter is for discussions of the DragonQuest role-
playing game. The key addresses you need to know are:
Rodger Thorm (Editor, Article Submissions, Etc.)
dqn@earthlink.net
All articles are copyrighted property of their respective
authors. Reproducing or republishing an article, in whole
or in part, in any other forum requires permission of the
author or the moderator.
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C O N T E N T S [v8/n01]
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Editorial -- New Content
Letters
Dragon Magazine Articles, Intro -- Rodger Thorm
The versatile Magician -- Jon Mattson
The thrill of the hunt -- Paul Montgomery Crabaugh
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EDITORIAL: The Dragon Articles
=================================================================
This volume of the DragonQuest Newsletter is going to contain the
text versions of all of the remaining Dragon magazine articles for
DragonQuest.
After this series, the DQN is going to adjust to a new focus. We
will roll out the new changes in 2004 with the first issue of
Volume IX.
Rodger Thorm
DQN Editor
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DRAGON MAGAZINE ARTICLES, INTRO
-- Rodger Thorm
=================================================================
In the early- to mid-1980s, when DragonQuest was still present and
viable, there was enough interest in it that Dragon magazine ran
several articles on the game. These articles addressed different
aspects of DQ and suggested some additional rules that were though to
be missing from the original rulebook. Some of these included rules
for swimming (two different articles), hunting, and learning magic.
The authors were not part of the SPI team (although they may have been
playtesters), and their articles all seem somewhat at odds with SPI's
style. Nonetheless, some good material is present, even if it needs
further modification to be used in a DQ campaign.
An anonymous contributor recently made .PDF files of all nine Dragon
magazine articles available. These files are now posted as individual
articles in the Files section of the DQN-list group
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/dqn-list/files/
as well as in a single .ZIP file containing all nine .PDFs which is in
the Files section of the DQ-rules group
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/dq-rules/files/documents/DQDragonArchive.zip
The nine articles are:
Travel & threads for DragonQuest
The versatile Magician
The thrill of the hunt
Enhancing the enchanter
The warrior alternative
Learn magic by the month
Going up and getting wet
Getting in over your head
For a fuller background
These articles are also being converted into plain text files by a few
other dedicated members of the DQ community. These articles will be
included as a regular part of the DragonQuest Newsletter for the next
nine issues (starting with this one) to make the files accessible to
as many people as possible. As soon as we have the entire set of text
files ready, those will be made available as well.
Thanks to the following individuals for their help in collecting and
preparing these articles for the Newsletter: the anonymous contributor
for supplying the .PDF articles; John Rauchert, John Kahane, and
Steven Wiles for text conversion and proofreading.
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THE VERSATILE MAGICIAN
-- Jon Mattson
=================================================================
(originally appeared in Dragon Magazine Vol. VI, No. 7 pg. 24)
The versatile magician
New skill for DragonQuest
by Jon Mattson
The Magician in DragonQuest is a jack-of-all-trades in the
field of magic. As such, he has a much greater variety of spells
than the average adept of a specific college, but he never
achieves the great power with each spell that a true wizard
does. He can, of course, use all three types of minor magic (see
Case 4.2).
A Magician must have a Magic Aptitude rating which is at
least average (15). He is considered to be Neutrally aligned to
all colleges of magic, and he will never be accepted into any of
these colleges.
Aside from the exceptions noted below, a Magician is subject
to all of the restrictions of any other spellcaster. A Magician can
never achieve a rank of above 5 with any spell except Detect
Aura; thus, he will never know more spells (other than Detect
Aura) than are indicated by his Magic Aptitude score (see Case
34.6). He may increase his rank with rituals and talent magic
normally, however.
1. A Magician gains several basic rituals and spells at
rank 0.
At rank 0, a Magician is able to use the four basic rituals of
magic; i.e., the Ritual Spells of Preparation, Purification, Investment,
and Warding (see Case 32). In addition, he is able to
learn one General Knowledge Counterspell of any college
(again, the exact spell is his choice). Both of these spells are at
rank 1 and may be increased through normal experience point
expenditure.
2. At rank 1, a Magician gains the Talent Magic spell,
Detect Aura.
This is the same spell that members of the College of Naming
Incantations receive (see Case 39.3). It is the one spell that a
Magician can increase beyond rank of 5, and he automatically
has rank of 1 with it to start with.
3. A Magician gains additional spells as he increases in
rank.
For each rank above 0, the Magician gains one General
Knowledge spell or one General or Special Knowledge Counterspell
of his choice from any college he wishes. He may not
learn additional rituals in this manner. If he is of rank 6 or
higher, he may instead choose a Special Knowledge spell of
any college he wishes, subject to the following restrictions:
A Magician may never possess more Special Knowledge
spells (including Counterspells) than General Knowledge spells.
A Magician may never learn Special Knowledge spells of a
college which is oppositely aligned to any from which he has
already learned other Special Knowledge spells. For purposes
of this determination, the following colleges are considered to
be oppositely aligned (in addition to those listed in case 34.1):
Air Magics and Earth Magics; Fire Magics and Water Magics;
Celestial Star Mages and Celestial Dark Mages.
These additional spells may be increased in rank through
normal experience point expenditure, but can never be in-creased
beyond rank of 5 (see Case 87.4).
4. A Magician must spend (100 x rank) Silver Pennies
per year on miscellaneous material components for spell
research.
Failure to do this decreases the Magician's rank with all spells
by two until the fee is paid. Also, if the Magician acquires new
spells (increases his own rank), he will have to learn them
normally (taking a number of weeks equal to the ordinal
number of the spell) instead of getting them automatically.
Note: A Magician who is also an Alchemist or an Astrologer
may add 10% of the experience he uses to increase his
rank into one of these two classes for free, if he progresses
in the Magician skill and the other skill simultaneously (up to
two skills may be practiced at once; see Case 87.5).
Experience Point Cost Chart
Magician skill
Rank Pts.
0 1000
1 500
2 1000
3 1500
4 2000
5 3000
6 4000
7 5000
8 7000
9 10000
10 15000 � And each additional rank beyond 10th
Additional note on magic weapons
Using the Ritual of Investment, adepts in DragonQuest are
able to form certain "charged" magic items such as rings and
wands. However, the only way to create a weapon which strikes
more effectively in combat due to its magical nature is by using
a Ritual of Enchantment, which is only available to members of
the College of Ensorcelments and Enchantments. If the rules
suggested below are used, any adept (or Magician, if the first
part of this article is employed) can create magical weapons
using the Ritual of Investment.
An adept may create a weapon which is temporarily magical
by performing the Ritual of Investment on it normally, but
casting no spell into it. Instead, he expends two fatigue points
for each "plus 1" the weapon will have. Each such plus adds 3%
to the base chance of hitting, effectively increasing the wielder's
rank with the weapon by 1, and adding one to the damage done
if a hit is scored. Thus, a sword plus 3 would add 9% to the
chance of hitting and do an extra 3 points of damage when it
scored a hit. A weapon can never be given more plusses than
the adept's rank with the Ritual. Such a weapon will have a
number of charges equal to the adept's rank with the Ritual of
Investment (see Case 32.3), and each successful hit on an
opponent expends one charge. Anyone can use the weapon's
magical properties once it is enchanted in this manner, but
when it has expended all charges, it will revert back to a normal
weapon.
A weapon can be made permanently magical by following the
above procedure but expending one Magic Aptitude point per
"plus" instead of two fatigue points. These specific MA points
are lost permanently, since the adept is pouring his very life
energy into the enchantment, but they may be regained
through normal experience point expenditure. A permanent
magical weapon has no charges, of course, and expends none,
but it can only be enchanted up to an amount equal to one-half
of the adept's rank with the Ritual of Investment, rounded
down; i.e., an adept with rank of 5 in the Ritual of Investment
could only enchant a plus 1 weapon or plus 2 weapon
permanently.
Note that weapons can be given additional "charged" magical
spells in the usual manner, even if they are already enchanted
as described above. Thus, it is possible to have, say, a plus 2
(permanent) sword with a Spell of Creating Starsword (4
charges) in it. Also note that weapons can still be enchanted
normally with a Ritual of Enchantment; these suggestions do
not change that, they merely expand upon it.
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THE THRILL OF THE HUNT
-- Paul Montgomery Crabaugh
=================================================================
(originally appeared in Dragon Magazine October 1983, pg. 84-86)
The thrill of the hunt
Dragonquest rules for finding 'fresh' food
by Paul Montgomery Crabaugh
A curious feature -- or lack of feature -- in most fantasy
role-playing games is the apparent necessity for players in the
wilderness to carry every gram of food they might need on an
expedition. The idea of hunting and gathering food seems completely
beyond the characters; but unless a random encounter turns up
something edible, a shortfall of rations is potentially catastrophic
-- and even then, who would want to hunt for food in an environment
where the only game consists of creatures important enough and
formidable enough to put on an encounter chart? Mammoth-hunting might
have been a way for some early humans to make a living, but many more
of them made an even better dying at it.
Being determined to correct this oversight, and running the
DragonQuest game more than others at the moment, I devised hunting
rules for parties in the wilds. A new skill -- Hunting (are you
surprised?) -- turned out to be necessary. Hunting skill is the
ability to locate and dispatch from this mortal coil various small,
lovable, furry animals who are tasty, as well as to locate edible
trees and reasonably unpolluted water. The experience costs for the
skill are:
Level 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
Cost 0 200 50 100 150 200 300 400 500 750 1000
The way it works is that each day, one or more members of the party
is/are designated as the hunters for the day. (Don't everybody queue
up at once.) The catch is that each hunter is assumed to operate
independently during the day (small game is frightened away by large
parties), and so encountered creatures may ambush individual hunters
rather than the main party, there being an even chance for each
"detachment," including the main body, to be the target of a random
encounter.
The hunter spends a certain number of hours each day hunting. The
party is slowed to that extent (unless they don't mind losing whomever
is doing the hunting -- but he can't bring the food back to
camp if he doesn't know where the camp is). It is possible to spend
"zero" hours hunting and still catch something; this represents making
the best traveling time possible while still checking out potential
targets along the way -- and getting lucky.
At the end of the day, add up the modifiers from the following
chart, add the roll of 1d10, divide by 10, and subtract 1. The result,
rounded off to the nearest whole number, is the number of
person-ration-days obtained by the day's hunting efforts.
Fresh food can be kept for up to three days before it becomes
inedible. The number of party members this food will feed is a
function, to some extent, of who and what those members are. A giant
consumes 3 human-sized rations per day, and even the smallest of the
humanoids in the group consumes at least one ration a day.
Condition Modifier
Armed with a missile weapon Rank with the weapon
Perception Perception
Ranger skill (all types) Rank
Ranger in correct terrain 2 � Rank
Per hour of hunting +2
In desert (or other waste) -20
In forest/swamp +10
(or other life-dense)
Hunting skill 5 � Rank
Finding water is easier than finding food, for several reasons, not
the least of which is the self-fulfilling prophecy that it simply is
easier to find. Water doesn't hide; sources of water are much larger
than the typical game animal; and one source will suffice for the
entire party to slake its thirst. Searching for water occurs during
the same time as normal hunting. Use the table above to determine some
of the appropriate modifiers, but don't use the desert and
forest/swamp modifiers or the missile-weapon modifier. For the effects
of varying terrain on the chance of finding water, use the modifiers
below:
Terrain Modifier
Mapped source of water in this hex +90
Forest +30
Desert -30
Swamp -10
Other +15
The resulting number (using the same process described above for
hunting) is the percentage chance of finding a water source during the
day.
Good eating, and remember: The bears are using the same rules.
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### End of DragonQuest Newsletter v8/n01 -- 2003
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