My Books On Smashwords Sale plus a Note on D&D

My ebook collection is available for the Smashwords 2025 End of Year Sale! Find your next favorite book this month at http://smashwords.com/sale and follow @smashwords for more promos like this! #EOYSale25 #ebook #sale #books2read #indiebooks (Also, “Drasmyr,” (https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/131156)  “Prism,” (https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/693400)  and “A Thinker’s Guide to Truth” (https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/1515694) are free for this sale!)

And, on a side note, Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

Plus, I had an interesting D&D session today. 5th edition. I’m playing a Drow Sorcerer. The party stomped some Fey creature that was up to no good in a town. It had possessed a female wizard and had summoned three other fey creatures as minions. Good fight. Good adventure. We’re now trying to figure what is wrong in another town, where everyone seems to be paranoid and distrustful of everyone else. We think it has something to do with the soap everyone is using. Curious. Good adventures, though.

New Site

We are still “The Wizard’s Inkwell,” but we’ve had an upgrade. This is no longer my personal blog about fantasy world building and fantasy fiction. Instead, as of 5/16/2025, I’m here to sell my writing skills to anyone in need of content or other kinds of writing.

I write blog posts, emails, newsletters, general ads (Facebook, etc…), YouTube scripts, landing pages, and other website copy. And no, I’m not limited to the fantasy genre. To date, I have worked on projects for website review companies, chiropractors, digital marketing companies, and more.

And I’m sure I can help you out!

12/9/2024 – ANNOUNCEMENT

Hi, all! Just making an announcement. I am closing this site down … sort of. To be more accurate, I am rebranding and reinventing it as a serious business endeavor to market my writing skills throughout Plattsburgh, NY; Burlington, VT; and the surrounding areas, as well as the Internet as a whole.

I mean, I’m marketing my writing skills. I don’t have to be local to write. I can do just fine operating remotely. I’m keeping the name of the site, though, because it still works and I happen to like it.

Going forward, I’m going to brand myself as an AI Translator. Basically, if someone gives me a piece of AI written copy, I will work my magic on it and make it sound more “human.” I will also offer human-written content and copy writing.

If you want to get a jump on my other potential clients, email me here: mryan_author  *** yahoo . There are no asterisks in my real email address, of course. But you should still be able to figure it out.

If you do email me for my services, put the subject in ALL CAPS – otherwise, I’ll probably lose it amid the piles of junk email I get every day.

A Dose of Realism and the Mighty Gnome

D & D, in all its manifestations, is a great game. It blends both strategy and skill with chance and luck. In my opinion, it is the apex of the whole concept of “game.” Chess, for example, is all strategy and control. There is no luck involved. At all. I think Go is another one of all strategy, no luck – but I’m not as versed in that game as I am in chess or D & D. I guess poker is kind of a blend between strategy and chance … anyway, I’m getting too, I don’t know, nerdy maybe. I just want to say that I think D & D and all other pen and paper RPG’s like it, are the apex of gaming. I don’t think humanity will ever invent another game like it/them.

But it has its shortcomings.

A Matter Of Odds

I’ve been playing 5th edition D&D for some time now. In two different campaigns. And, on several occasions, the same thing has happened which … strains belief. In both campaigns there are at least one really strong fighter type, and a tiny female gnome (I think there’s a gnome in both) who has maybe average strength.

Basically, I’m talking about the situation where the powerful mighty warrior with a Strength of around 20 tries to open a door or force a gate or what-have-you and fails the DC roll. Then the gnome comes along, a quarter the warrior’s size, and with a Strength around 10, maybe at most a 12, and she rolls and makes the DC check.

It’s silly. And fun. But it is ridiculously unrealistic. I’m not sure I would want to change the system because of it – because it’s just a fantasy game, and it is fun – if a little silly.

Linear Odds

Looking at the odds. Suppose it’s a DC 20 roll required. The warrior has a 20 strength and the gnome a 10. The warrior succeeds on a 15 or higher (or 25% of the time) and the gnome only on a 20 (5% of the time). The gnome’s chance of success is 1/5 that of the warrior’s.

If it’s a DC 15, the warrior succeeds on a 10 or higher and the gnome a 15 or higher. Here the warrior’s chance of success is 50% and the gnome’s is 25%. The gnome’s chance of success is ½ that of the warrior’s.

Maybe it’s just me, but the idea that a big hulking warrior can try to shove a door open and fail only to have this itty-bitty gnome come up and push it open – just strikes me as totally unrealistic (in the world where dragons breathe fire and wizards casts real spells).

A Bell Curve

If I were going to make an adjustment (as I’ve suggested elsewhere), I might try using a bell curve instead of a linear curve (I think those are the right terms). Basically, rather than roll a single d20 for the Strength check, roll 2d10 and add them, instead. You have a 1 in 100 to get a 20, 3 in 100 to get a 19 or higher, and so on.

This would make the astonishing ridiculousness of the gnome’s feat of absurd luck/strength, whatever, significantly more difficult.

In case one where the DC is 20, the warrior succeeds on a 15 or higher. I think that’s still 25% – (nope, I think it’s 21%) although my math skills are not as trustworthy as they used to be. But the gnome’s chance is 1%. Big difference.

Hmmm. I did this by hand, so I could be wrong, but for the DC 15, the gnome has a 21% and the warrior has a 66%. Is that more realistic? I’m not sure. The gnome can still pull off the ridiculous feat, but it’s just more difficult for her. I might also consider a modification based on the size of the character. The gnome being size small whereas the warrior is size medium.

Conclusion

In the end, as it’s just a silly fantasy game anyway, it’s probably not worth changing. It would probably make the system unnecessarily complex, because there are definitely situations where you want the linear curve and flopping back and forth between the two could be problematic.

Anyway, those are my thoughts for this week. (I know, I missed a week. And a day. Oh well.)

UnNerfing Undead

I think I mentioned this in one of my posts on Transitioning from 2nd Edition to 5th. While I agree that the undead in 2nd Edition needed to be Nerfed in some fashion, I think 5th Edition just went too far down that road.

2nd Edition Undead

In 2nd edition, both vampires and spectres drained 2 full levels with every hit. That’s incredibly nasty, all the more so because even if you used magic to restore the levels, you’d still only get enough XP back to exceed the minimum required for the level by 1 point. So, suppose you had started the combat at 10th level, with 500 XP over the needed amount to gain 10th level. You get hit by a vampire and get drained to 8th level. After the vampire is killed, you go to a cleric, get restored, and you are returned to 10th level plus 1 measly XP point. You’re down 499 XP from the encounter. Not pleasant.

5th Edition Undead

Of course, now in 5th edition, nothing (that I’m aware of) drains levels anymore. Shadows drain strength – although only temporarily. All other undead (I’ve encountered) simply drain hit points and prevent you from healing before you take a long or short rest. The particular undead in question determines how many hit points are drained and which type of rest restores them.

I’m not particularly fond of the new system. I think I prefer it to the old system, but it’s just not sufficient. I want undead to be really formidable. The level draining was too much, though. And this is too little.

What Would I Do?

If it were up to me, I think I’d try to find a mean between the two. I mean, if you get pummeled by a vampire and then are just fine and back to normal the next day – it’s not really very troublesome. I mean, at this point, it’s almost like Shadows are one of the most fearsome undead because they drain Strength, albeit temporarily. But if you are engaged in hand-to-hand … that’s pretty darn troublesome.

Drain Constitution or some other Stat? That’s a bit too much like the Shadows, I think. You might be able to get away with it, but I don’t think you could ever use more than a single d4 for how many points are drained. That would just be too severe and too deadly too quickly.

Drain a point of Proficiency? That might work, except, again, you’d never want to do more than a single point per blow. Otherwise, they’re too powerful again. Plus, that would make all the undead the same.

Not sure. Go the route of petrification but with a Wisdom throw. Fail three in a row and you become the undead in question? Each failure also does some kind of damage? Hmmm. How about, you make a Wisdom saving throw with every successful hit, and when you fail as many as 3 + your Wisdom modifier (regardless of order), you become one of the undead?

Thoughts? Suggestions?

Conclusion

I’m just not sure. I really think it should be changed, but I’m not sure what it should be changed into. That Wisdom saving throw thing has some promise, but I think it still needs a little tweaking. Until next time … ta-ta.

The Rogue’s Critical Hit

I almost addressed this in the post about House Rules, but changed my mind at the last second. I decided that it was weighty enough to earn a post in its own right. I want to look at the Rogue’s sneak attack in the light of critical hits. In the game I play now, the DM has ruled that when a Rogue makes a critical hit (a natural 20 to hit) when making a Sneak Attack, he/she only gets a single extra die. So, if the Rogue gets a 1d6 from their weapon, and say 5d6 from their Sneak Attack, for a total of 6d6, the Rogue only gets a single additional 1d6 roll if they make a critical hit.

I have mixed feelings about this.

On the one hand, I get that doubling all the dice, that is, going from 6d6 to 12d6 would be really devastating, and probably not the best idea. However, I just think a single 1d6 is just insufficient. I kind of have that feeling with respect to all critical hits (by other classes and other creatures as well). A crit just leads to a single additional unmodified die of base damage. If your weapon gives 1d8, a crit gives a 2nd unmodified 1d8. Maybe it’s because I always roll crappy, but I just wish crits had a little more punch.

The Super-Crits I discussed in the House Rules might solve this problem, but I’m not sure.

But going back to the Rogue, though, if the character is high enough level to do 10d6 Sneak Attack damage, the extra d6 is almost not noticeable. Maybe 1d6 plus 1 per Sneak Attack die? So, you’d get 1d6 base damage, plus 10d6 Sneak Attack damage, plus 1d6+10 critical damage? Hmmm…. I just came up with that off the top of my head, and I think I like it. It gives a little extra punch, but not too, too much.

Or, there is the Super-Crit method. Or combine them? That would make Super-Crits really deadly, but Super-Crits are really rare.

Conclusion

Well, those are my thoughts on the junction between Critical Hits and the Rogue’s Sneak Attack. Of course, I’m always kind of biased toward maximizing damage inflicted. It’s just too much fun to heap on piles and piles of damage. Woo hoo!

House Rules for 5th Edition D & D

I’ve been playing 5th Edition D & D now for several years. I think I’ve finally adjusted to the system. I wrote four posts prior in which I examined some of the things I like about the system, some of the things I don’t like about the system, and a few things that I’m still up in the air about. In light of all that, I’m going to now discuss a few candidates for potential “house rules.” Of course, I haven’t DMed in 5th edition yet, so I’m not quite sure if these rules will pass the bar or not. But I feel like voicing them nonetheless.

Enhanced Magic Resistance

I mentioned previously that I did not like how the new Magic Resistance works. It, basically, just gives creatures with magic resistance a greater likelihood of making their saving throw. I guess that’s fine to an extent – in the end the dice rolling is all about doing damage and not doing damage – but I think I had a thought to throw in here.

Obviously, when it comes to special effects – like for hold or whatever spells – a successful save neutralizes the spell. But my understanding is that for damage, magic resistance simply means a greater chance of making the saving throw and having the damage halved (I may have that wrong-must look into). I think I’d prefer it to work like other forms of resistance where damage is halved automatically and halved again if the save is made (or am I confused there?).

A Super Critical Hit

I’m also a fan of super criticals. Basically, an optional rule from 2nd edition was that a natural 20 to hit didn’t necessarily mean an automatic doubling of damage. A natural 20 meant that you get to roll again, and, if you hit again, you get double damage. But there’s a special perk. If you get another natural 20, you can roll yet again and if you hit again, you’ll get triple damage. And so on. This leaves the possibility of a super-crit where you roll a series of natural 20’s and wind up rolling huge amounts of dice for damage. It, theoretically, could go on forever (not that it actually ever would) but it gets progressively harder with ever d20 roll. For the math-happy, the first d20 has a 1 in 20 chance of being rolled. The second, a 1 in 400 chance. The third, a 1 in 8000. The fourth, a 1 in 160,000. And so on. In my experience, I think I’ve only seen a single case where a player rolled three natural 20s in a row. But, with Super Crits, it is possible for Bard the Archer to take down Smaug the Dragon with a single well-placed shot.

Higher Level Spell Slots

I’m not sure if this is ever addressed in the rules, but I don’t like how some spells can use higher level slots to cast them, but other spells don’t. I prefer a more regular approach where every spell can be cast with a higher-level slot.

For example, going by the spell description, a magic missile can be cast with a first level slot and produce three missiles. It can also be cast with a second level slot and produce four missiles. And so on, up to 9th level where it produces 11 missiles.

Detect Magic, on the other hand, can only be cast with a 1st level slot. If you have a 2nd level or 3rd level slot available, but no 1st level slot, and you have Detect Magic prepared, you cannot cast it (except by Ritual – which isn’t relevant here). If it were me, I’d allow you to burn a higher-level slot, but if there is no special effect listed for higher-level slots in the spell description, it simply has the same effect as what it would have at the base level. In other words, you could cast a Detect Magic with a 4th level slot, but it would simply be indistinguishable from a Detect Magic cast with a 1st level slot. This allows for certain emergency uses, because most of the time, you won’t want to waste higher-level slots without some payout.

Conclusion

Anyway, those are some of my thoughts on certain house rules. If I ever get around to DMing a game or two, I may try them out. Until then … nada.

The High Adventures of the Youths of Yesteryear

This is kind of a different kind of post. I just want to hearken back to the gaming adventures I had so long ago … when I was really young. I think I got into D & D in like fourth grade. I think it started because in that year we had a new student join our class at our relatively small Catholic grade school. We became friends and we sat together on the bus fairly frequently. And whenever we sat together he would tell me about the D & D adventures he went on. He had an older brother. They had D & D modules… and everything. And I loved all his adventure stories.

But, of course, fourth grade is what nine years old or somewhere around there? One’s grasp of “reality” and the way things should work isn’t always quite so accurate. For example, let us just consider …

Stonebiting Arrows

These actually make an appearance in 2nd edition, somewhere, I think. These are the arrows that can be fired at stone and penetrate deep enough and are strong enough to support weight. Maybe they were a real thing, but not the way me and my friends used them when we first started playing. First off, there were no “special” stonebiting arrows. As far as we were concerned, all arrows were stonebiting arrows. If I recall, the “real” stonebiting arrows had a special kind of metal tip specifically designed to penetrate deeply into stone. But we overlooked that detail. We could use a normal bow with normal arrows, tie a rope onto the end of the arrow, and shoot the arrow right into a stone wall or ceiling or what-have-you. And then, we would set about …

Swinging Over Lava

Yes, there would be a pool of lava or a river of lava passing through the center of a room in some ancient dungeon somewhere. Never mind the ridiculous levels of heat that would be there, we could tackle any obstacle. How? We tie a regular old rope to an arrow and shoot it into the ceiling right above the pool/river of lava. Then we’d just swing across – Pythagoras and his silly theorem be d***ed.

The Wings of the Purple Dragon

In one of my many exploits into the ridiculous as a DM, I pitted a powerful, yet hapless, player character against a Purple Dragon. I think it was 1st edition days, and I was playing a D & D variant system of my own devising (obviously incomplete nearly by definition) and I had been recently reading in a Dragon Magazine about how to make dragons more formidable or something like that. I seem to recall that the article suggested something like adding additional attacks. At the time, dragons were limited to a claw/claw/bit routine or a breath weapon. The article suggested adding a wing buffet and tail slash.

My problem, at the time, was that I don’t think I understood what the term “buffet” meant. What was I, like ten, maybe? I don’t know. All I knew was that it involved the dragon flapping its wings. Anyway, a friend of mine was playing a powerful character and ran up against a Purple Dragon. I think was inspired by the D & D cartoon episode where Tiamat made a wind with her wings that blew Venger through a magic portal or something. Anyway, being the reality-challenged DM that I was, the Purple Dragon flapped its wings from like a 100 feet away and did some ridiculous amount of damage to the character. Like 50 or 60 hit points or something stupid like that. Hey, I was like 10. That’s my excuse.

The Bow Turned Club

And here’s one more. Remember my friend and his D & D stories? I remember him telling me one about an adventure he was on where he was on this wild island type of thing. The party was being attacked by a pack of wild dogs. With only an unstrung bow at his side, he was forced to use the bow as club. As luck would have it, the bow broke from the blow.

So, in my not-so-creative fashion, I DMed a character (the same player as the Purple Dragon fiasco, although perhaps not the same character) and ran him through the exact same scenario. The player was on a wilderness island, he was being attacked by wild dogs, and I think he was about to attack one of them with his sword or something – and I, as the DM, said “No, attack it with your bow.” He gave me a puzzled look, but then did as I suggested. And the bow broke. Lord, I have had some silly and ridiculous DMing exploits in my day.

Conclusion

Well, that’s just a glimpse of the silliness that D & D can lead to in the hands of a reality-challenged DM like myself. It was great fun. And, as one of my friends to this day says, it was all in the spirit of “high adventure.” So, it’s all good.

Transitioning from 2nd Edition to 5th (Part III – continued)

Well, it’s my fourth post on this topic, so I think it’s about time to wrap things up. I’ve got a handful of other things that I have mixed feelings about with respect to switching over from 2nd Edition D&D to 5th.

More Items I’m Unsure Of

Expending Hit Dice

In 5th Edition, characters who take a short rest can earn back lost hit points by “expending hit dice.” When I started playing 5th edition, I found this whole concept a little weird. But, now I’ve gotten used to this. I’m almost inclined to say that it may actually belong in the section where I discussed changes I liked. Although maybe I would have put it in the long rest as opposed to the short rest. Or something similar. I think it is a very good kernel for an idea that could be used in a realistic manner. But … too much realism can spoil a game like D&D. So, after due consideration, I’m going to give this one a single thumb up. It’s not bad. It’s a little weird. But I’m starting to like it.

The Single List of Spells (Magic vs. Prayers)

I mentioned this above when I talked about psionics. When I first started 5th edition, I raised an eyebrow at this, but saw some advantages to doing spells this way. However, the longer I play, unlike most of these other things, the less I like the fact that magic, prayers, and psionics have all been merged for all intents and purposes. Basically, because on their face, the three things just seem to be clearly different animals.

If it were up to me, I would use kind of 2nd edition rules, but swap cleric “spells” with magic spells, so that cleric spells went up to 9th level while magic only went to 7th. And psionics? I’d have no issue putting that at 5th level. Like I said, clerical magic is supposed to come from the gods, so I think it should be more powerful than any human-based magic. And psionics …. if it weren’t for mindflayers and a couple of other really cool creatures, I might do away with them entirely. Or, perhaps, limit their use only to certain creatures (the aforementioned mindflayers, plus some demons and devils). They just don’t seem fantasy-based.

Nerfing of Special Attacks (Undead Drain, Poison, Petrification, Dragon Breath)

I always had a problem with certain special attacks in 2nd edition. I never liked the energy drain from undead, because it was just too devastating. As a result, for many years, I wouldn’t, as a DM, use undead in the D&D system.

I shared a similar hesitancy in using poison, petrification, and similar all-or-nothing effects like disintegrate, or death ray, or what-have-you. I also had some issues with dragon breath, but not as much.

I think 5th edition tried to solve this problem – which I think is good – but I just think they nerfed things too much. Poison is just another kind of damage type, so there is very little that is special about it. Then there’s the undead drain. I think it has been nerfed too much. So far, all it’s done to my characters is prevent them from healing for a few hours or a day or so. Which is a far cry from losing a level or two.

They got really close with petrification, though. It’s a multi-saving throw thing now. If you fail the first time, you are restrained, but you don’t turn to stone unless you fail a total of three or something. The problem is, though, that now it’s too hard to actually be petrified. I mean, I don’t think it’s happened to any of my characters yet – and I’ve been playing for a couple years now.

Then there’s the dragon breath. It consists of a heck of a lot of dice. Which is probably fine, but I always want something special with my dragons. Not sure what, though.

Armor Class

Another thing I’m iffy about is the way they’ve done Armor Class. Not the direction of the numbers, mind you. Increasing difficulty to hit with increasing the AC is far more intuitive than the decreasing version. I’d rather be dealing with an AC of 30 than an AC of -10. It’s easier to understand.

I’m not sure, though, about the mechanics of the newer system. It seems a lot harder to get really good ACs, and also, a lot harder to hit really good ACs. That might actually be an improvement, but I’m still digesting it. I remember in 2nd edition, getting really good negative ACs wasn’t too difficult. I mean, I had a 17th level wizard with something like a -7 AC or something stupid at one point. And dragons frequently had -10s and yet, the warriors in the group could still hit them with relative ease. I think in 2nd edition, THACO (to hit AC 0) was just out of control. Maybe 5th edition has fixed that problem.

However, I don’t like how a 20th level Wizard will have the same proficiency bonus as a 20th level fighter when it comes to combat. Granted, the fighter will likely have a much higher strength and probably a better magical weapon or two – I just feel that sans equipment and stats, the fighter should be able to hit more difficult ACs than a wizard.

But I’m not quite sure how to implement that.

Conclusion

Okay. Well, that finishes my brief sojourn into my transition from 2nd Edition D&D to 5th Edition D&D. Hope you found some value in it. It was basically four posts. Anyway, until next week, ‘ta-ta’.

Transitioning from 2nd Edition to 5th Edition (Part III)

And for the next post regarding 5th edition D&D and transitioning from 2nd, I’m going to discuss things I have mixed feelings about. Sometimes … they seem okay. Other times, I’m just not sure. But again, the more I play, the more used to it I get.

Things I Have Mixed Feelings About

Increasing Stats

I have a couple issues with how they did stats. I like the idea that you can increase stats – in fact, I’ve developed systems with that feature years before 5th edition ever existed (and I think my method was actually better – but we’re not getting into that today). What I don’t like is how much you can increase the stat: a full two points.  Going from 16 to 18 in a single level is a huge jump. But I guess, in the context of the whole system, it works and I’m getting used to it.

What I’m not getting used to are the stat increases that don’t give any reward. Namely, the odd numbered stats. For all intents and purposes, an 18 Strength is pretty much the same thing as a 19 Strength. Back in 2nd edition, there were real concrete gaming differences between any two stats that differed – excepting, of course, the “normal” stats (9-11) and individual percentile quantities for Strengths over 18. Of course, that required more note-keeping, as each stat had its own table delineating the effects it had on whatever aspect of game play was pertinent at the time. Anyway, I just really think there should be some advantage of a 19 Strength over an 18 Strength. Without such, why not just have stats ranging from 1 to 10 instead of 1 to 20?

Bonus Dice To Rolls

Another thing I get mixed feelings over is the practice of adding dice rolls instead of set bonuses. In 2nd edition, for example, I think a bless spell gave you a +1 bonus or something, whereas in 5th edition, it gives you a +1d4. It adds variability, but I find it a little odd. However,. I am acclimating to it, and it doesn’t bother me as much as when I first started playing.

Rest (Types and Effects)

Another thing I have mixed feelings about is how resting is handled. I like that there are such things as short rests in addition to long rests. I just find long rests a bit too powerful and unrealistic. If I get really injured in a battle in real life, a single night of rest isn’t going to fix me up much. At least in 2nd edition, the clerics regained their spells in the morning and you could heal that way – which seems a little more “realistic” for lack of a better word. Now, you don’t have to do squat. Just sit there and instantly regenerate all your hit points in a single night. It certainly make some aspects of the game easier to deal with. I mean, game flow is definitely improved. Still, it strikes me as odd.

Conclusion

Well, those are three aspects of the game I’m up in the air about. I have four more, but those will wait until next week. Until then, ta-ta.