Quote from: S'mon;1102858So, I got my EK yesterday. One adventure (set in the Forgotten Realms) involves two homosexual gnome 'kings' who are married to each other and co-rule in tandem, only one has gone mad and imprisoned the other.

Wondering if I can/should try to make this work, or ignore it. Making them brothers might make more sense. OTOH I have had gay male NPC relationships in my FR before, but only for humans, and I presented it as tolerated not socially sanctioned. I suppose I could go with Gnomes Are Into That Kinda Thing... but I'd like it make some kind of sense. I guess neither could be a hereditary monarch - they'd have to be elected together?

Maybe they were getting along fine until Monarch A's advisor (or maybe mother) got him to plan a marriage because he had to produce an heir and this drove Monarch B around the bend.

Quote from: Aglondir;1102990I've been thinking of buying the Essentials box. Is the Starter Set better?

Lots and lots of solid reviews have been awarded to the Starter Set Adventure.  It's a pretty solid level 1-5 adventure, featuring the Core 4 Classes.  It comes with 5 pregen characters, and some blank character sheets.  It includes a basic rules guide too; and a very basic set of cheap, lightweight dice.  No miniatures, or pawns.  Pretty much a Theater of the Mind game set.

Quote from: Aglondir;1102990I've been thinking of buying the Essentials box. Is the Starter Set better?

From all I've seen the starter is more holistic and pretty good. Essentials is the sequel. Kind of like Basic and Expert? But not? I plan to hunt for it at Target tomorrow.

Quote from: Razor 007;1102993Lots and lots of solid reviews have been awarded to the Starter Set Adventure.  It's a pretty solid level 1-5 adventure, featuring the Core 4 Classes.  It comes with 5 pregen characters, and some blank character sheets.  It includes a basic rules guide too; and a very basic set of cheap, lightweight dice.  No miniatures, or pawns.  Pretty much a Theater of the Mind game set.

I was disappointed in the 5E Starter Set. It's not particularly bad, but they have great possible material. It should really be a showcase of great stuff, and I felt it was only OK. It's a boxed set, but there are no components other than dice and character sheets. They didn't even provide any play aids -- like having separate sheets for maps or monster stats.

EDITED TO ADD: I don't know about the Essentials Kit. Other than this background bit in an adventure, how is it?

Quote from: Aglondir;1102990I've been thinking of buying the Essentials box. Is the Starter Set better?

Comparing the two I'd say the EK is better - it has full character generation rules in a 64 page book very reminiscent of Moldvay Basic. Unlike the SS it has enough magic items for a full campaign, and I think a greater variety of monsters. It has 128 pages - 64 + 64 - compared to SS 32 +64; and it has a bunch of nice cards for combat, initiative, conditions etc. Also very nice double sided poster map of the Phandalin region in 5 mile hexes.

Edit: Both have dice. The SS has pregens; the EK has printed blank PC sheets.

I think overall the best thing is to use both together as a single sandbox campaign. However unike the SS the EK has enough material to run a completely different campaign.

The EK also has a DM screen and more dice.

I suppose one good question is; will this be your first introduction to D & D 5E?

If so, the extra doodads in the Essentials Kit may prove to be tempting.  More dice, a thin flimsy DM screen, and 5 PC classes; as opposed to fewer dice, no DM screen, and 4 PC classes in the Starter Set.

Quote from: Morblot;1103011The EK also has a DM screen and more dice.

Oh yeah! I have packed the very nice screen in my GM's pack for 5e Red Hand of Doom today. It solves my problem with trying to find Conditions at the back of the PHB etc. Sadly it does not have the weapon & armour listings but it does have lodging, and the fiddly high jump rule I always forget.

It's a bit flimsy for keeping up on the table, but I won't be using it that way much anyway.

Quote from: Razor 007;1103013I suppose one good question is; will this be your first introduction to D & D 5E?

If so, the extra doodads in the Essentials Kit may prove to be tempting.  More dice, a thin flimsy DM screen, and 5 PC classes; as opposed to fewer dice, no DM screen, and 4 PC classes in the Starter Set.

I'd say brand new newbies may be better off with the SS pregens, but the EK is much better for long term play. Ideally get both. If you can afford only one get the EK; if you have GM'd before get the EK.

I admit, I have continued to spend money on D & D 5E; to get the things I like in the current edition.

But I'm not going to blindly spend money on D & D, as though I owe it to WOTC.  I will buy what I like, and  pass on what I don't like.  It's no different than shopping for groceries.  I don't have to buy what I don't like.

Quote from: jhkim;1103007EDITED TO ADD: I don't know about the Essentials Kit. Other than this background bit in an adventure, how is it?

The adventure looks a lot like the one in the SS, maybe a bit better presentation.

Everything else is great; the rule book & accessories are great. The cards are too flimsy - edges ripped when I separated them - but look very useful and come with a fold-out cardboard box to store them. The Sidekicks rules & sample Sidekick NPCs look a lot of fun for smaller groups. Albeit the art on their handout cards does make them look like whey-faced 2019 Seattle-ites; reminiscent of mid '90s TSR art where the NPCs all look like corn-fed Lake Geneva-ites.

So far my impression is the EK is just as fantastic as I hoped, Gay Gnomes or Gnot.

Quote from: mAcular Chaotic;1102937I don't really see what the big deal is about having a gay couple or whatever in a game. They're not driving it down your throat, right? It's just part of the game. How is it different than them being elves or something?

It doesn't make sense to say it wasn't historically that way because this is Forgotten Realms, not Medieval Europe. It's already high fantasy af.

And if you don't like it in your game just say they're brothers, like was suggested.

I think it would be more interesting to reflect some pseudo-historical context. Nobility was hereditary (and iirc FR has this element as well), so two gay kings would be essentially a termination of the bloodline, potentially, with the need for heirs to come from close relatives. The two kings could have marriages of convenience while secretly seeking their actual relationship with one another, embroiling estranged an unhappy wives and "required by tradition and station" children caught in the mix. So much more interesting to add these elements in, reflecting what likely has happened in the historical past, but in a reasonably safer fantasy realm for exploration of the story ideas.

Someone might have written a quest idea involving two "rulers" and leave the details to the individual DMs, but maybe that's not inclusive enough for 2019.

Quote from: mAcular Chaotic;1102937I don't really see what the big deal is about having a gay couple or whatever in a game. They're not driving it down your throat, right? It's just part of the game. How is it different than them being elves or something?

It doesn't make sense to say it wasn't historically that way because this is Forgotten Realms, not Medieval Europe. It's already high fantasy af.

And if you don't like it in your game just say they're brothers, like was suggested.

Gamers vary in how high they want their fantasy. Personally, I despise the Forgotten Realms setting and change any adventure set there. I know the modern tastes tend towards 21st century middle-class North American social norms with magic-tech, swords, and superpowers. I prefer a game more grounded in medieval norms - basically Game of Thrones but much more weird and dangerous.

To me, social values and conventions are a product of environment, just as technology is. Putting 21st century social values in a technologically pre-modern game world feels as out of place to me as including smart-phones, Uber, and Skip the Dishes. It destroys any illusion that this is a genuine and coherent setting.

Quote from: JeremyR;1102961To me, this acting like homosexuality never existed in history before now is silly.

Lots of kings and queens were gay (or bisexual). They still married the opposite sex because the point was to have children, uniting political dynasties.  This actually gave rise to a lot of court politics, and male kings would often take male lovers and give them more and more power/wealth, which pissed off the rest of the country.

Certainly not what I'm doing. Everything you say is true. But pretending that a king in a hereditary feudal system could openly defy the convention of having children - and would want to put his dynasty at risk by not producing an heir - is what's silly. Or at least so incongruous that I'll change it for my game. Not because "ew, there's gayness in this adventure," but because "wtf, that doesn't make any sense."

There were some threads in this forum before dealing with presentism. Basically running a D&D setting as if it was a modern-day renaissance fair. To which I tend to say "boo", but it's not that hard to adjust to your own table. If I was running the adventure I'd just make one of the rulers female unless there's a reason why they absolutely both have to be male. I believe there have been a few times when a queen has ruled co-equally to some degree with her king. They both can have secret lovers on the side of whatever gender they like if you want, and it wouldn't be presentism.

Now that I think about it I'm going to guess (I haven't read the material) that one of the kings is really a "trans king", but since the progressive line would be "trans kings are kings" WOTC just labeled them both as just kings. Presentism to the nth degree.