Monday, May 30, 2016

Mobicon 2016 Was a Success!

So its been a few months (more like 5) since I have updated my my page so I figured after the events this weekend it would be a good time!  My weekend was spent in Mobile, Alabama at Mobicon running some D&D AL and hanging out with some amazing people!

The folks over at Mobicon reached out to me a few months ago about coordinating some DM's and getting Adventurers League into the convention.  We ended up with three DM's, myself included, and ran 6-7 games from this seasons Curse of Strahd narrative.  This seasons story line takes place in the cursed land of Barovia which is ruled by the "evil" Strahd Von Zarovich which traps the party in the Demiplane of Dread until they find a way out.  I had a wonderful time leading the party through the many twist and turns as they slowly realized that the land is plagued by many forms of evil including ghost, trolls, vampires and much, much worse.  While playing D&D is nice from time to time, I have always loved being a DM.  Being able to tell a story and see the players reactions as their favorite NPCs die, or a girl who was murdered while holding the hand of her loved one at the alter, this makes it worth it!  Two days, many deaths, and dark gifts later, the party managed stop the summoning of a great evil... Or so they think.  I look forward to running AL next year at Mobicon and meeting more great people.  Oh, I even managed to snag me a 1st edition Monster Manual during a charity auction before I left :D

But the good times did not stop there.  One of the main things that Mobicon focuses on is Cosplay.  I saw some amazing costumes from all ranges of things including TV shows, video games, comic books, and more.  The amount of time people put into this amazes me.  I love the dedication they put into their craft to make sure every little detail is covered and nothing is missed. Mobicon was also visited by the Quest-Con Adventuring Team who was out promoting the convention next year that takes place on October 20-22, 2017 in Mobile, Alabama.  Quest-Con is a multi-genre convention that will focus on gaming and cosplay.  I wish I would had more time during the convention to get out and take more pictures of the different outfits but such is the life of a DM.  Despite the sleepless night, the trek through downtown Mobile to get some early morning snacks at McDonalds, and the new game of seeing how many floors your full elevator stops at before you get to the bottom, I would say the weekend was a success!

Thursday, January 14, 2016

New Changes Coming Next Season for the Adventurers League!

Well folks I just got out of my LC meeting going over all the new changes to the Adventurers League and I am excited to see where this next season takes us!  See below for the talking point notes I took and feel free to ask any questions!


  • All AL content moving to DM Guild. Rage of Demons will stay on the site rest of the seasons, after that it will have to be purchased.
  • Conventions will still get packages for free.
  • Epics are not included in the DM Guild.
  • 5Chen fair still at conventions.
  • WoTC prefer that individual DM buy adventures for store.
  • Player created content will not be AL legal, maybe classes or races in the future.
  • Store play can be still reported as usual under a new single D&D AL event.
  • Stores will have launch events in place of encounters, cut down story encounters are gone. 
  • Encounter style kits are going away. Player kits will be made available on the DM Guild site. Organizer kits are going to be digital.
  • Organizers are not allowed to purchase adventures and then hand them out.
  • Certs (might) be store or convention special, unsure. Certs are hoping to go print on demand but it is up in the air right now.
  • Store still gets WPN perks for reporting.
  • The role of LCs right now. Unsure right now but they are not going anywhere. Still going to help them get setup and running adventures.
  • Stores can now charge for AL if they wish to recoup cost of buying adventure.
  • Season 4 will be a tight knit story. Season 4 starts at level 1.
  • Stories will be tied to main adventure that is released
  • More DM rewards since they are now having to buy adventures. Increase to 25% as baseline plus achievements.
  • PDFs will now be able to be updated and corrected.
  • Season bundle or sub for adventures are not available at this time.
  • Reporting is still only available to the stores and conventions.
  • Coordinators will still be involved in play testing.
  • It is unsure if stores will be able to sell PDFs.
  • If you already own the PDFs you do not need to purchase them to run them again.
  • Epics will not be available for purchase, ever.
  • Premier cons will get the adventures for free.
  • Admins can put their adventures on the DM Guild site... but they wont :(
  • Players can use anything D&D related (Forgotten Realms), with the exception of art they do not own, to create adventures to submit to the DM Guild.
  • Prices for official AL adventures on DM Guild site are fixed.