Topic: Developer's Journal

[mocking bird]

Next article:  Ecology of the ulcer wolf.   yadda yadda yadda and remain completely silent while stalking their prey yadda yadda yadda...

You also seem to be using a variant on sense ambush - we run it as a passive skill acting as a penalty to your opponents ambush roll but I digress...

Nice idea for fate points.  I do a similar thing with alertness - have the party make some rolls ahead of time as they suddendly get paranoid when I ask them to make the roll.

[Defendi]

You know, I completely forgot I do that.  Or rather, I've been doing it so long that I forgot it wasn't canon.  You're right, though, that's a house rule.  The reason I do it is that I've learned the quickest way to create a bad feeling at a table is to have something bad happen to the players without them having any chance of saving themselves.  So basically, I always have players make a roll, and let NPC's skills set the difficulty instead of the other way around.  One of the SM playtests ended when one player killed every other character (he'd been replaced with a Jeronan clone).  They never got over the fact that they weren't allowed a sense ambush roll.  One player probably still holds that against me (but he's a nice guy, so it doesn't really effect much). 

[Defendi]

4/10/06

Wow.  A good week.
   Let?s start with production.  Last Sunday I finished the fourth episode (enough to play test--I don?t need complete text to run the adventure, just the descriptions, stats and enough notes that I know what?s going on).  So I started looking at deadlines.
   So far, I?ve been moving forward at a comfortable pace.  I know that art is my big bottleneck, as well as our fourth license, and so I haven?t rushed.  However Sunday I did an outline of the book by page count and came up with more than 200 pages.  I realized two things.  1) I have more than 90 pages left to do.  And 2) I need at least one more artist.  I tapped a new guy to flush out the concept art and he knows some people so we got the second one covered (although you all better buy the product, because the art slice of the pie is slicing thinner and thinner ), but for the first one. . . .
   Well, I did some math.  I need to have the first draft done of everything right around the end of this month.  That gives us about a month and a half to edit, then proof, then fold all the different stats into the different products and page make.  I have two weeks of screw-up time figured into that and one month on art, but that?s still cutting it close.
   So, to finish the 90-106 pages I need to finish by right around the end of the month (if I work my current schedule through my birthday, I finish on the 4th).  To hit that I need to do three pages a day.  I also need to be doing previews and journals during this time, and more important, giving final text of finished chapters to my editor so he can get a jump on it.  He?s volunteering, so I can?t let myself break him.
   Three pages.  That doesn?t seem like much until you realize that?s in the finished product.  The entry for Uzar?g, for instance, is more than two pages long and it only counts as one in the finished book.
   So, since my last journal, I?ve done twenty-four eateries in the Gazetteer.  I have two more.  Tonight, I should be in chapter six (I don?t have room for the info I have set aside for five in this book--I?ll save it for a later ?Big Book O? Belkan?th.?).  That?s probably 20k words in one week.  (Not counting the 9,720 of fiction I did as well).  I?ve done more, but not while I was working full-time.
   For the rest of the book, I probably have only ten to fifteen completely unwritten pages until Appendix 1.  Appendix 1 is the chapter on Ludremon, the country I?m detailing for an initial play area.  I have that slotted for 32 pages, the minimum size of one of our country sourcebooks.  What I?m saying that out of the remaining 82 pages, I?ve already written maybe half so I?ll have some easy days of heavy editing but little or no new writing.  Those will keep me sane.
   Now: developer angst.
   I promised I?d give you a look at the goings-on behind the scenes.  One thing that a game developer will rarely share with you is their fears that a product will suck.  It?s probably bad for business.  But I promised, so. . . .
   I was terrified that Act Two of the fourth ep. would be terrible.  I had this deep terror that it would be a terrible combination of Dragonlance 2 and Dragonlance 10.  In fact I told the other DM, who runs things between play tests, to be ready.  I thought there was a decent chance that after the first day of playing in Act Two it would be so bad that I?d have to toss the whole thing and start over.  So I tapped him to be ready to run this Saturday if this last weekend was that bad.
   Luckily, it wasn?t.
   In fact the most negative thing a player said was, ?It was frustrating, but fun.?  Since it?s supposed to be frustrating (that makes the payoff better if it?s done in moderation) I consider that a roaring success.  By the end of that session, people were figuring out was going on well enough to start building working theories on how to destroy the Ulcer.  They read this, so I won?t tell you if their right, but I will tell you they are exactly where they?re supposed to be, which is another small victory.
   And another interesting thing:  I thought the structure of the adventure was quite original.  One of the players pointed out that Robert Jordan did the same thing in one of his books.  I?m man enough to admit that my subconscious can steal ideas from other author?s.  I think the story is good even if the mechanic isn?t original (after all, what is?)
   We have a little less time this week and a little less than half of Act Two left.  We might finish, might not.  I think it will be close.
   Anyway, more next week.

[Tyra]

Yeah, it was frustrating, but really that was fun.  What I liked the most is when we'd have no clue what to do and get stuck.  It made for some comical roleplaying as the characters feel that sense of cluelessness to the situation.  By the time we accidently stumbled on the answer, everyone was about half nuts.   

[Xennex]

  For some members of the playtest, half way nuts is a very short trip.  I personally l luuuuved the game. I'm not going to give away anything, I promise. I love this sort of change of pace personally. It's a great adventure.

[GerikGnome]

Why do I feel like you're talking about me?  :'(

[Defendi]

Maybe because you are the only player in playtest history to advocate killing every living thing in an ulcer to clear it. 

[Tyra]

Though, towards then end there Tyra was getting such a migraine that the Gnome probably could have talked her into it.  LOL

[Defendi]

4/17/06

Hey, all.  Great week.  Let?s get to the update.
   I found a new concept artist, I probably mentioned that, and he?s given me some good work on armor, which is a happy thing.  So far we hadn?t been able to produce armor concepts that quite satisfied.  Now, some people are going to think our armor looks like D&D concepts, and it does in the fact that it doesn?t look like historical armor designs.  Anything that goes in a different direction is probably going to be labeled as looking like D&D.  I thought about that a lot in the very beginning, and I decided that I?d rather not look like historical armor and risk people drawing the other conclusion.  Our architecture is probably going to look enough like historical Europe that I want something more interesting in armor and fashions.
   Speaking of fashions, he?s working on those too.  I haven?t seen any of that, though.  I?ll either be able to use it or I won?t, so I?m not worrying about it.  It will come in sometime early this week and I?ll throw it into an Artist?s Bible in time for them to start work on real illustrating.
   Let?s get all the art stuff out of the way.  I?ve put together my art list for the main product and it?s big.  I?ve doled it out two the two artists and I have three pages of art left.  Since that?s three out of thirteen, it?s not a terrible loss, but I might have to flush out the book with some clip art.  I have one more lead on an artist, but he just got married so he isn?t answering e-mails.  If anyone knows an artist that?s willing to work for royalties, let me know and point me somewhere I can see their art.  Since this is an e-publishing startup, working for royalties is the same as working for peanuts, but it?s a credit and I?m giving ads to the artists like someone suggested on the forums (thanks for that).  I?m already established as a game designer, so I?m looking to build other people?s careers at this point.  And make some money of course.  The couple of years I wrote full time were wonderful.
   Where was I?
   Writing!
   I?m ahead of deadline.  This week I finished chapter 4, skipped chapter 5 (I?m not putting it in the first book . . . no room).  Then I wrote chapter 6 (power groups).  Then I wrote chapter 7 (Religion).  Of course I had a lot of text already, so chunks were rewriting, not new text, but at times that made it harder.  For instance, I had 17 pages of material for chapter 7.  I needed to do three pages of that a day to hit deadline, but I had a lot of writing of new material in the beginning.  I didn?t know what the final page count was going to be, so I had to stick to my three pages a day out of the 17 to know I was going to hit deadline.  At the beginning, that meant one day where I had to do 9 pages, just because I had so much new material to write that I was covering very little of the existing text.  I might have said this before, but professional writing is about being draconian to yourself on deadlines.  I?m always two weeks late.  I know that.  I tell my publishers that and I plan accordingly and I?m always actually on deadline.  Anyway, hitting deadline is about realizing you have to hit 9 pages in one day and still doing it.  I?d be willing to say that 90% of all people fail as game designers because they can?t hit a deadline.  I?ve lost a lot of cowriters to that, even among established designers.
   What was the point of all that?  Oh yeah.  I?m one day ahead of deadline.  That gives me a day to completely screw up (which is nice to have) or, if I can keep the lead, I finish the day before my birthday and don?t have to work on that day.
   So what do I have Left?  Here it is with projected page lengths:
   Chapter 8?People. 5 pages (I want 15 but I can?t have it.)  This will be a chapter on life in a feudal structure, mostly.  Because of size constraints it will probably be mostly dispelling myths and recommending the Gies books for further reading.
   Chapter 9--Legendary People and Places.  0 pages.  I just don?t have room.  One of the biggest complaints about PDFs are they are too long (and I?m looking at 200 pages in the first product as is).
   Chapter 10?Miscellaneous.  5 pages.  That?s just where I want it.  I cover things like metals, and Ulcers and some big magic items (like the Fell Hammer.)
   Appendix 1?Ludremon.  32 pages.  Here we outline a country for the characters to adventure in while they wait for more sourcebooks.  While I have enough info in Chapter 4 to adventure around the world, as a GM I personally like to had one really well-designed area.  Some might have figured that out about me, especially if they?ve looked at my ghost writing work.  Basically, this chapter is a bonus sourcebook.
   Appendix 2?Character Creation and Sourcebooks. 5 pages.  Maybe.  This basically deals with all the information that wasn?t included in Chapter 2 (Races).  Essentially, this chapter is all about me answering questions like, ?Can I use Fire and Ice in this world??  (The answer is yes.)  Really, the big deal here is dealing with issues like playing a Mentalist.  Mind reading can?t determine a person?s guilt or innocence, and so I have to talk about the implications of that so people can decide for themselves whether to warn away players from the profession.
   Hmm.  What else.  Oh, yes, the play test.
   Picture this.  A field of waving grass.  Seven bad guys are charging you (I?m keeping it vague to avoid spoilers).  The rogue has decided that he doesn?t have enough space to hide for the ambush, so he?s going to attack.  GerikGnome, reading his intention, screams in horror, ?Go to ground, man!  They only get a prone bonus if you fail your hide!?
   It was a good play test day.  Exhausting, though, and all because of one fight.  It was actually a nice anatomy lesson on how things can go wrong in a battle.  Again with the vague.  There?s a mechanic in this battle of the fourth adventure that will keep most characters out of a battle until they throw off a certain restriction.  That vague enough for you?  We have 6 characters plus the healer and a street urchin NPC.  The encounter was set up so they are fighting an equal number of foes.  The urchin don?t count.  So that?s seven bad guys.
   First round: GerikGnome throws a ball attack and realizes that he can?t practically score a high enough critical to hurt the bad guys (they aren?t medium-sized).  The three tanks charge up and hold off all seven bad guys long enough for the others to bring in their own brand of pointy death.  Unfortunately, the Bard and the Rogue can?t throw off that restriction I told you about.  So the tanks weather the first round of attacks and are blasted by stun and other critical effects.  Bad.
   Second Round.  GerikGnome spectacularly fails a SCSM and blasts himself out of the combat.  The healer manages to get the main tank back up, cause she?d gone down.  The bard and the rogue still can?t get into play, and this is the point in combat where the Rogue usually drops one bad guy from an ambush, freeing up one of the tanks to switch from tanking to killing.  This starts the cascade where one tank can kill their remaining bad guy and flank a bad guy on another tank and this is the beginning of the end of the combat.
   But it doesn?t happen.
   Third round.  The Healer manages to get GerikGnome back into play.  GerikGnome fumbles another SCSM.  I can?t remember the results, but I believe he just lost the spell and the pp.
   Still no bard and no rogue.
   The tanks are blasted to near death.  We?ve already spent two fate points.  GerikGnome is asking politely about whether he has to spend another when the party wipes.  Effectively, these guys are fighting two to one odds with creatures only slightly lower level than them.  They can?t get their assets into play.
   Round four.  The rogue manages to get rid of his restriction and lose himself in the trees (or the livestock, I can?t remember).  GerikGnome casts his spell and rolls a natural 66.  The players are weeping openly now.  I roll randomly to determine what spell he accidently casts.  Now I can?t tell you what spell it was without a spoiler, but it was 18th level and the table says I can ignore range restrictions.  I decided that was enough of a precedent that the spell went off, even though he?d normally have to roll open-ended to cast it (hey, it?s an unusual success after all).  Still, it might not have gotten past the bad guy?s RR but GerikGnome rolls a 99 base attack.  Bam.  One shot kill.
   At this point, by the way, they?d done 33 damage to one bad guy and taken a couple hundred themselves.
   That was the watershed event.  The Bard managed to get into play the same round and controlling songed a bad guy.  Now there were five bad guys fighting four tanks.  The Rogue killed one the next round and after that it all came around.
   But by the end of the play test, I was exhausted.
   The funny thing is, when everything was going wrong, they were all telling me the fight was too hard.  I had to remind them they?d had pretty much the exact same fight the week before.  They?d just gotten all their assets into play in that fight.  It was challenging, but I don?t think it occurred to anyone they might lose.
   Anyway.  Act Two of the adventure has location- and event-based encounters.  They have two locations left and two events left, and then they are in Act Three.  I suspect Act Two will take the first hour of play this weekend.  Then there are some things to do in Act Three, but they should move through that with a purpose.
   I quizzed GerikGnome down on what he thought was going on in the adventure?s mystery, and there are only two things he missed.  One he missed because one character decided to charge a conversation before listening to hear if there was anything important to be learned.  The other they had the week before, but they?d abandoned the theory in favor of another.  It becomes obvious in the next event, so I?m not worried.  The mystery aspect is nicely in hand.  The next event might be harder if they haven?t gotten it all by then, but it shouldn?t be a problem.
   Anyway.  Everything?s good.  If all the art comes in on time we?ll hit deadline (there is a possibility our fourth mystery system version might come out later than the other books, their license has a longer approval period).
   If one of you recommends an artist to me, he might end up batting clean-up.
   Anyway.  Until next week.  I?ll post a preview tomorrow.  I might do a concept art preview next week if I have all the art nicely in hand.

[Tyra]

The only thing I have to say, is I honestly thought we were going to lose that one battle.  Tyra was done for with one more hit....even with my high stun manuvering I just was out for too many rounds.  Dalen was right behind in the hurtin' catagory.  I'm just glad it turned when it did.  One or two more rounds and the two big tanks would have been out of it.  (Next time Rogue, no na na na nana on the baddies.....just throw off your restriction and get to work you lazy thief.  )

But, your right, it wasn't the fight itself was that hard, its that we were in a buttkicking contest and only had one leg.

[Xennex]

  It was the livestock. A wolf amongst the flock as it were.
I am really enjoying this Act. It's frustrating, and sometimes very close to a TPK, but that's half the fun. (You know it's bad, though, when I start asking His Emminance Defendi if my next character can be an enchanter, or magster). Also, my nananana to the big evils was also partially due to the same Sudifed induced hazy that inspired the "I have figured it out!! It was Prof. Plum, in the library with a rope!!!!" and thought that it was friggin' hillarious!
It's also funny when I'm running a D&D game, the player makes a crit, and I start wondering what the crit table for a bastard sword would be. 

[mocking bird]

Maybe because you are the only player in playtest history to advocate killing every living thing in an ulcer to clear it. 

Kill them all, God knows his own.
Simon de Monfort (allegedly) during the Albigensian Crusade before burning a church with hundred of people (Cathars & Catholics) inside.

Sounds like an interesting group.  Nice to know we aren't the only ones to have such combats.

[Xennex]

Darn you, Bob! Your Pavolvian Experiment works too well!!!  I am sick at home, listening to my recooperation music, Enigma "Modern Crusades" starts playing... and I suddenly find myself wondering when Elspeth's player is going to start recapping the last gaming session so we can start gabbing and "get to work". 
Oh... and if Xennex wasn't having so much fun killing demons he'd be more supportive of Gerrick's "Sherman in Atlanta" policy. 

Sneak Attack.....Haley you have initiative...Oh...Sneak Attack!

[Defendi]

4/24/06

   All right.  I?ve fallen back to deadline.
   So I?ve lost my extra day and I MIGHT have to work on my birthday, but I don?t intend to.  I should be able to make up the difference tomorrow.
   Here?s where I am.  I?ve finished the entire proper of the main book.  I?m in the appendices, in the first appendix in fact.  The only thing is that the first appendix is a bonus sourcebook, the one on Ludremon.  This is scheduled for 32 pages because that?s the minimum I?ve set myself for a sourcebook or an adventure, but I EXPECT to go over.  So if I?m going to make deadline, I?ve set myself a goal of four pages a day for this section.  48 pages seems like the length I?m likely to hit.
   So I was about a page short yesterday when my boss relieved me from work.  I should have been able to make it up, but I met tonight with my HERO System guru to stat tweaking.  Out of me, my business partner, and this play tester, I think I come in 3rd in HERO expertise.  This is despite the fact that this campaign setting started as a HERO campaign I ran not long after 5th edition released, and for more than a year (two maybe?  I don?t remember).
   I think I just leaked the name of our fourth system.
   Not that it?s much of a leak.  It?s all over the website now.  I just know that a lot of you don?t check the website.  Why would you, I post everything on the forums first.
   Anyway, that?s the other news.  I signed the contracts to the final system on Friday.
   What else?
   The play test.  We didn?t finish.  I thought we would but two things conspired a bit.  The dinner was about an hour late (that?s one battle there) and we took longer to get started than normal (another half battle).  You see, one of the players from the beginning of the play test came visiting, but he currently lives only as a life-kept toe in the pouch GerikGnome.  He was killed by one of the Ulcer effects in ep 3 (though more because he was leaving than anything else).  So he was there with his girlfriend and that meant we had nine PCs acting every round.  There?s probably another battle lost right there, which would likely have gotten us to the end.
   Quote of the night?  GerikGnome again, a pyromaniac: ?What do you mean?  I LOVE trees.  They?re the bringer of fire!?
   GerikGnome is actually the bringer of fire, but don?t tell his character that.  He might get ideas.
   I probably lost another half battle to resurrecting the toe.  I can?t say how.  It would involve spoilers.
   It was a good session, though.  They had the final reveal of the story, shouted in a frustrated voice that brought the entire room to silence.  A good reaction.  I think this is the best adventure yet (and I really like number one).  I?m not sure they ever figured out who the real bad guy was.  I mentioned it in passing, but I?m not sure anyone heard.  They lost that bit of knowledge charging the fight a session ago.  I guess they must know, but we really lost the impact of it.  Still, as I harp on in my adventures, the story should bow to the characters not the other way around (most of the time, at least).
   Oh, and Xennex broke his magic sword.  Now he just has the two +20 nonmagical short swords I let him buy during the festival in the Elven-Dwarven Alliance.  I don?t think he?s as happy with those, though.  The Dwarves thought that any short swords they made would be for Elven women, so the swords came with knit cozies covered in puppies.  And they are named Love and Marriage.
   So they have something like three encounters left, then denouement, which should be brief.  Only two of those encounters are fights, but one of them is BIG, so we?ll probably not be swimming in free time at the end of the session Saturday.
   So.
   I found out that I don?t need final art to get approval on the products.  So I?ll probably get the main book into HERO Games about the middle of May.  That?s late for the June deadline (about two weeks short) but they tell me that they can often do better than 60 days.  I hope to turn in completely finished products to ICE at the end of May.  So everything?s still on track.
   Oh, and I worked out new deadlines, one that gets a final product done 90 days early for HERO Games.  By that schedule I?m between 117 and 87 days behind.  So I?ll need to hop right into the next book when I?m done (maybe a week off for editing and pagemaking).  I figure I can catch up in 4 books.  Then if you guys buy enough copies (and tell all your friends and bug the people at your local stores) I might eventually be able to quit my job and go to a monthly schedule.  If I do that, we?re looking at falling thirty days behind again.
   No one has entered the house rules contest yet.  That means your chances of winning are quite good.  Submit soon and submit often.

[Xennex]

 :'( ::Whimper... whine... whimper... whine::  It broke. My pretty pretty sword of demon killing broke.  Now I've got these two very nice swords, not magical, but they're very nice.  First demon that laughes at them gets the snicky-snick head chopping that I did to that one other thing (that I dare not mention for fear of spoiling and having the Wrath of Bob decend upon me )!!
I think I know who the bad guy is. This has been a great adventure, though. A little frustrating at time, though. I personally had a "Hello, Mr. Fancy Pants..." moment, though, where I had a few ephianies about this Act. With all the things the group has been through, each ending seems like you could actually end the story there if you had to. I love the fact that each adventure is always a challange. I am sure that there will be those that enjoy the twists and turns as much as I do. Oh... to bring back the playtest character that was currently a toe in the gnome's pouch... it made my head hurt. There are somethings best not know to mortal minds.... 

[Tyra]

At least the actual fights went smoother this time.  Now that I've learned to properly tank.  It was so nice to end combat with the loss of only a few HPs and no critical damage.     All in all, even with the confusion, definitely a very fun night. 

[Defendi]

4/30/06

Done and done!
   Five minutes ago I finished the first draft of the main manuscript.  Four days ahead of schedule.  Woo hoo!  Do the happy dance.  Do the happy dance.
   I plugged that into what my deadlines should be and I?m only 83 days behind on documents.  I picked up three days or so.  So I?m happy.  I?m going to take five minutes to breath then begin all the stuff I?ve been putting off while hammering out this document.  It?s huge.  I?ll need to cut a good bit or no one will sit at a computer long enough to read it, but it?s done.  I expect to have the entire thing in my editor?s hands by the end of a week.
   Then I just have to finish my deadline lists, get back on artist wrangling, find one more illustrator, get all the different system notes together, plot episode five, get the store online, finish business registration stuff, and probably do a few more things I?m forgetting.  Then I can start writing the play test for episode five and the product for episode two.  Hopefully in the next day or two.  But those are different deadlines.  Hopefully all the variety of stuff exploding at once will recharge my brain.  At least I?m not doing any more English sounding last names.  Those were driving me crazy there at the end.
   In case I haven?t mentioned it, Ludremon, being our default country also speaks our default language.  So words that actually mean something in their language are translated into English.  After naming hundreds of people for the city write ups (most of them just in character lists) I?m pretty sick of people named things Like Kelaney Smith, Hil Tailor, and Gelgany Gelganson.
   Oh, I should mention, since I?m about to bury my editor in terrible, terrible word count, there won?t be any previews involving, well editing, for the next two weeks or so.  I have one he already did.  Then I?ll probably do one on concept art.  Then, with artist approval, I might do one on prelim thumbnail art.  Hopefully by then, a preview on the Ludremonian people will 1) be a nice change, and 2) already be edited since he?ll be done with the document.  We?ll see.  He?s not being paid much so I can?t break him.  Now if we make a lot of sales, I can throw him a bonus, so everyone buy five downloads each.  It will still be less than many WotC books.  Remember your players need copies.  And your family members.  And your pets could use copies too.
   Okay, enough shilling.
   One of my artists came through gangbusters this week.  I asked for thumbails of a third of his art list (by the amount of work it would take him not a simple piece count).   When he sent me a thumbnail of the cover, I thought that this was all I?d receive this week.  Then he barraged me with maybe a third or half of his art list on top of that.  I thought he was going to be the one that was hard to get things out of due to stuff going on in his life.  I was DEAD wrong.
   The other one definitely has stuff going on in his life.  I still need to touch base with him and find out what?s going on.  He seems pretty professional though, so I?m not worried.
   That still leaves me about three pages of art shy.  I might e-mail Brian tomorrow and ask if he wants more art.  This is the huge page count product, so after this things calm down.  6-9 pages total, including maps.  Probably 6 pages spread between the two.  Plus a product or two down the road we can add in reuse pieces as they fit.
   Don?t get me wrong, the thumbnails weren?t perfect, but I think 99% of the time it was my fault.  Things like me not mentioning the Five Prophets were five different races.  That?s why we do thumbnails first.
   We finished Ep 4 of the play test Saturday.  I learned one thing, try not to do the last three encounters of an adventure all on their own.  We had our big Ah-ha! moment the week before so we lost it?s momentum carrying them into the end.  Plus, the last monster needs to be tougher.  Despite the party being seemingly convinced the fight was unbeatable (which is good) it only took them about two rounds to win.  Actually, the problem might be a simple scaling issue.  They had seven people in that fight and the thing just ran out of hits.  Everything else seemed perfectly balanced, it just died before it could really start wooping butt.  I might just put a note in there about increasing hits for larger parties.
   We started playing with elemental corruption ideas after the game . . . nothing to do with the adventure, but they know I wrote half of Fire and Ice.  I?m thinking about incorporating that somehow into the next episode.  Some elemental corruption and some elemental items might be fun.  I?ll see if I can work it in.
   Okay.  This is probably as long a break as I can take.  Don?t forget to enter the house rules contest.

[Xennex]

You know, there's nothing like being the "scout" character in a group... being the one to turn the corner (with no magical weapons) and see the Big Bad, spin to warn the group, and get tossed around like the attorney in Jurassic Park (Okay, it wasn't that bad... but it was pretty close).  I agree, though, Bob. It needs a little scaling. We did whop it a little too good. Of course, the casting of a certain spell by a certain little Gnome that almost killed our Hot Bard who ended up SAVING OUR BUTTS (Thank the Hot Bard for the 2 round kill)!!!!! It could have been really messy. 
This playtest made me realize that wildly flaying my (non-magical) weapons to get baddies away from me is really what a rogue should do when he doesn't get a chance to.... ANSAI!!!!  SNEAK ATTACK!!!! (Bet you weren't expecting that, huh?) 
I'm a little confused, though, about one thing from the play test, though.  If we had let our homicidal Gnome Belkar... errr... Gerrick... do his thing... would we have gotten through the adventure that much sooner?  I doubt it myself, personally, but the fact that the Gnome may of stumbled onto the solution just on dumb anti-social tendencies (other than dumb luck) kinda scares me.
Oh... and before I close this little post.
ANSAI!!!!  SNEAK ATTACK!!!!! (Bet you were REALLY not expecting that, huh?)

[GerikGnome]

Of course slaughtering every living thing in an Ulcer is going to clear it faster than being selective in death-dealing.  It just happens to have moral problems associated with it.

At least, that's what I'm told.

[Defendi]

No, Xennex, that would have been bad.  It also would have made the adventure harder.