Battle Graph boards in use. Photo: Michael Harrison

Running battles in combat-centric role-playing games can be as painful as stepping on a caltrop. You’re either depending on the Gamemaster to keep the entire scene in his or her head, or you’re constantly drawing and erasing the map on a ratty piece of graph paper. I’ve seen groups use Lego minifigs, chess pieces and even jelly beans. While the DIY crowd can certainly save a buck or two and keep using confections, many gamers are seeking out more polished solutions. There are a host of battle map options, ranging in price from a few to a few hundred bucks. Over the next few weeks, I’ll look at the ways that tabletop RPGers have taken the battle map to the next level.

First up, Battle Graph Dry Erase Boards. These are the spiritual successor to a product no longer in production, called Tact-Tiles, which were solid plastic boards with a dry-erase coating on one side. Best of all, Tact-Tiles were modular and locked together to form a massive surface that could be used for large scale battles or dungeon crawls. Unfortunately, the company that made Tact-Tiles, BC Products, went out of business. Now you’re lucky if you can find Tact-Tiles on eBay, and when you do, be prepared to shell out upwards of $100 for a set.

Brian Davison, owner of Longtooth Games, saw the need for a replacement. Last spring, he released Battle Graph Dry Erase Boards to the gaming community, and there was much rejoicing. Unfortunately, before posting this review, I found out that Battle Graphs are no longer being manufactured. I wanted to get the word out on them, anyway, because they are a good product and there might be a way you can save them! Hit the jump to find out more.

Before their halt in production, Battle Graphs came four tiles to a $25 set. Unlike the solid plastic Tact-Tiles, Battle Graphs are made of a particle board material. One side is coated with a white dry erase surface. Each tile is 10″x10″ and is gridded with 10×10 squares. The grids are actually scored into the surface, which makes for a built-in ruler when drawing dungeon walls. Just be careful not to get any moisture on the scores, because it can seep under the dry erase surface and cause some nasty damage.

Because of the way the four tiles interlock, you’ll end up with a total of 19×20 squares per four tile set. The interlocking tabs and blanks will provide slightly more or less room, depending on their location.

We put Battle Graphs to the test during my weekly Dungeons & Dragons game. Typically we use a combination of D&D Dungeon Tiles, Paizo Flip-Mats, and dry erase battle mats. The modular nature of the Battle Graphs was helpful in maintaining a “fog of war” style reveal in the dungeon crawl. We did notice that some of the tiles didn’t lock together very tightly and the gap between them was larger than it needed to be, but it did mean that miniatures didn’t go flying whenever we had to shift the tiles around.

My group likes pretty pictures on our battlefield. Unless your GM is a better artist than I am–and excels in the medium of dry erase–you’re not likely to win any awards for realism. A blank battle mat does give the GM more control over the encounter, which can certainly make up for poor visual verisimilitude. Even if you do have to keep reminding the players that the oddly shaped blob is a bridge, not a gelatinous cube.

The tiles are durable and portable, which means you won’t feel guilty chucking them in your backpack on your way to your FLGS. In a half year of use and cleaning only with paper towels or dry erasers, the Battle Graph boards have no ghosting whatsoever. The white dry erase surface is high quality but the other side is unprotected. As in, not waterproof. And Mountain Dew is made of mostly water. So if someone spills their drink, the Battle Graph boards are just as vulnerable as your Player’s Handbook.

Unfortunately, Brian Davison has hit some issues with the production of the Battle Graphs. As stated on the website:

“We are currently unable to continue the manufacture of our Battlegraph Dry Erase Boards. We are continuing our efforts to find financial support to get things up and running. If you are an interested investor, I would love to talk with you.”

So if you’re interested in investing in a really cool game product, head on over to battlegraph.com and touch base with Brian. And for anyone else who wants to add a versatile piece of battle map technology to their game room, Battle Graph Dry Erase Boards gets the GeekDad Seal of Approval. Hit up eBay or wait ’til Longtooth gets back into action. If you get the chance to buy, I’d recommend picking up two sets, just so you can build a mega dungeon on the fly and utterly destroy amaze your players.

Wired: Great price tag (when they were for sale). Modular, durable dry erase surface lets you create awesome “fog-of-war” encounters for various tactical RPGs. Scored grids make for easy and accurate line drawing.

Tired: Out-of-production. Unprotected bottom surface and scores are not Mtn Dew friendly. Blank white slate can be bad for art-challenged GMs.

(Full Disclosure: I received a free set of Battle Graph Dry Erase Boards.)

D&D publisher Wizards of the Coast has introduced a new game-playing program called D&D Encounters, located at neighborhood game stores.

Getting involved in D&D Encounters opens the door for players to mingle with other local gamers and participate in exclusive contests to earn prizes and swag to enhance their game store experience. It’s also a chance for players to experiment with a new character…or try DMing for the first time! With a full kit of materials provided, this is a great way to dive into being the Dungeon Master.

The first D&D Encounters mini-campaign takes place in the Forgotten Realms, with players exploring new areas of Undermountain, with their own characters, one they create at the store, or a pre-generated character provided with the kit.

With each successful battle, players will be rewarded with Renown Points redeemable for in-game rewards; as players progress through the campaign, they will earn Renown Points for completing encounters, finishing quests and engaging in other adventuring activities.

Signups begin February 8th with play kits arriving at games stores on March 10th. The first season of D&D Encounters, set in Forgotten Realms’ Undermountain superdungeon, runs March 17th through June 2nd.

To learn more visit dungeonsanddragons.com/dndencounters.

D&D publisher Wizards of the Coast has introduced a new game-playing program called D&D Encounters, located at neighborhood game stores.

Getting involved in D&D Encounters opens the door for players to mingle with other local gamers and participate in exclusive contests to earn prizes and swag to enhance their game store experience. It’s also a chance for players to experiment with a new character…or try DMing for the first time! With a full kit of materials provided, this is a great way to dive into being the Dungeon Master.

The first D&D Encounters mini-campaign takes place in the Forgotten Realms, with players exploring new areas of Undermountain, with their own characters, one they create at the store, or a pre-generated character provided with the kit.

With each successful battle, players will be rewarded with Renown Points redeemable for in-game rewards; as players progress through the campaign, they will earn Renown Points for completing encounters, finishing quests and engaging in other adventuring activities.

Signups begin February 8th with play kits arriving at games stores on March 10th. The first season of D&D Encounters, set in Forgotten Realms’ Undermountain superdungeon, runs March 17th through June 2nd.

To learn more visit dungeonsanddragons.com/dndencounters.

SurfaceScapes is a proof-of-concept designed and engineered by nine students at the Entertainment Technology Center (ETC) at Carnegie Mellon University. The software attempts to support normal role play by automating the calculations and animating the battles in a geographic space. Keeping with the D&D culture, the Dungeon Master pulls the strings on encounters with monsters and treasures from behind a protected screen … in this case, a networked laptop.

The project began as a student pitch to the CMU faculty last year, buoyed by a later meeting with Microsoft representatives at a conference. Since the release of the first video, feedback from geeks around the world has been positive. Individual D&D traditions range, making it difficult to please both those who want to feel the dice and those happy to let Surface help them out. The sometimes contradictory suggestions for new features have stimulated the design process.

Team members share their own varied perspective on the game, from a naive understanding to those who campaigned regularly for a couple decades. By lowering the barriers to play, more levels of participation can be supported. You don’t need to know the rules of D&D to use SurfaceScapes. Casual gamers can jump into battles as easily as the more dedicated adventurers. The magic moment for everyone, though, came during the first 20-minute game session.

“It was like, ‘Wow, we made this,’” teammate Michael Cole recalls.

Relax. Nothing ever happens at first level.

For GeekDads, playing a module or two on SurfaceScapes is half the fun. The other half would be using the technology as gateway drug to get the next generation of geeks to play, too.

Kids have not been heavy users of the prototype, but the few who have interacted with SurfaceScapes quickly adapted to the interface. They may have benefited from the streamlining of the calculation that can bog down the narrative, particularly for those not familiar with the game. Kids also respond well to the tactile interactions.

This is to be expected given the origins of Surface as an educational platform for children. The platform has four key capabilities that make it ideal for kids:

1. The size of the table (30 inches) invites many users to manipulate data simultaneously.
2. The massive multi-touch interactions handle many more geometries than other touch-screen devices.
3. Physical objects can become associated with on-screen data.
4. It encourages direct interaction, where people can grab at what they see without using an intermediary device, like a mouse or keyboard.

In short, Surface lets kids play together and grab lots of stuff.

Microsoft User Experience Director August de los Reyes recalls a conference where the 4-year-old child of a speaker was playing with the Water screen saver. It seemed so real, the kid paused to see if his hand was wet.

“Lots of adults are kids, too,” Reyes reminds us. “It never fails when people come in contact with Surface, they turn into 12-year-olds.”

In gaming theory, life’s a die, and then you bitch

Eric Havir, manager of digital communication for Surface, argues the buzz around the CMU project is more than the novelty of the technology. “SurfaceScapes is innovative in a number of ways. They found what’s appropriate for the use, and use the right tool for the right job.”

D&D is a group activity where people share focus on a common narrative and playing space, qualities that fit nicely with what Surface has to offer. When running campaigns, the DM has a cardboard shield to hide his master maps and character sheets. The design team addressed this by avoiding Surface and giving the DM a separate laptop. Even the object recognition capabilities fit the D&D culture, where players cherish their miniatures as extensions of their character personas.

“In retail or hospitals,” says Havir, “people are more likely to walk off with things.”

Future enhancements may include channels for private communication between the DM and individual players, possibly through iPhones. Part of the focus for this semester is to develop a level builder, to allow DMs to get beyond the original story set in a forest and a cave. “We don’t want to take away from the power of the Dungeon Master to create,” says former CMU team member Michael Lewis.

A fight to the death with a vampire has a few inherent problems

Before you rush out to update your holiday wish list, realize that several obstacles stand between you and your gadget-driven RPG experience.

For starters, Surface is not a mobile unit. You can’t pack it up with your miniatures and head out the door to meet your friends. Every physical move requires a couple people, some peripheral equipment, and recalibration when the table reaches its new destination. “It’s a lot of work to move,” admits programmer Michael Cole.

It is also a significant investment to acquire the device that can run SurfaceScapes. Most of Surface’s early adopters are retailers, hotels, and research institutions, such as CMU. A single unit runs upwards of $15,000, making it a bit more unobtainable than an iPhone or even the rumored Apple Tablet. This isn’t pizza money (unless you are buying 2,000 pies).

Finally, while there has been some interest by companies to turn it into a commercial product, SurfaceScapes remains an academic enterprise. Most of the team members are in their second year with plans to graduate, leaving the future of the project uncertain. The long-term value for the design students is the experience working with a new kind of interaction.

Perhaps the best way you can reap the benefits of the team’s hard work is to head to Pittsburgh and volunteer for a user test. So far, the game has been evaluated only by fellow students, friends, and a few guests visiting ETC. The SurfaceScapes team will also be at PAX East in Boston on March 26-28.

Many thanks to Richard Chen for arranging interviews with representatives from both Microsoft and CMU, and to August de los Reyes, Eric Havir, Dyala Kattan-Wright, Michael Cole, Bulut Karakaya, and Michael Lewis for taking time to talk with me about the project and the technology. Also, thanks to druidic.net for the great D&D quotes in the titles.

Want a taste of the award-winning D&D magazine that has the gnomes scowling? Between now and the end of January 2010, you can go to the KQ Store and use the coupon code KQ10Free to score a free copy of ENnie-Award-winning zine.

Issue #10 features an interview with Paizo’s Jason Bulmahn, Ed Greenwood’s Dwarven Goddess, Ecology of the Hill Giant, John Wick’s unique (and slightly disturbing) take on Halflings, Secrets of the Halberd, Monte Cook’s Game Theories, Rampant Elf Lust, and more.

Surely you knew that today, January 16, is Appreciate a Dragon Day!

How does one tell a mythical creature we appreciate it? You could doodle a little sketch of a dragon and give it to Mom. Maybe you could play a dragon-centric RPG like D&D or Shadowrun, or wear an awesome Dragon Fire T-Shirt (pictured above) to a fancy dinner. You get the idea.

Photo: Ethan Gilsdorf

Author Ethan Gilsdorf, Globe Pequot Press and Froobi.com have teamed up to offer a special opportunity to win one of 10 free autographed copies of Gilsdorf’s critically-acclaimed book Fantasy Freaks and Gaming Geeks: An Epic Quest for Reality Among Role Players, Online Gamers, and Other Dwellers of Imaginary Realms.

As reviewed here on GeekDad, the book is an exploration and celebration of fantasy and gaming subcultures. While cleaning out his parents’ house, Ethan stumbles upon the Dungeons & Dragons paraphernalia of his youth (should sound familiar to anyone reading Ken’s Top 10 D&D Modules I Found in Storage posts). This starts him on a journey into all manner of escapist hobbies: live action role-playing, castle-building, MMORPGs, and Lord of the Rings fandom.

I had the chance to meet Ethan at last year’s DragonCon and we caught up a few weeks back for an email interview.

Check it out, as well as details on how to win a free copy of the book, after the jump.

Photo: Ethan Gilsdorf

GeekDad: You first started playing D&D when your mother suffered her brain aneurysm. What was it specifically about the game that drew you to it?

Ethan Gilsdorf: I think for me, on the surface, D&D offered escape–quite literally into another world, one not poisoned by the troubles of my home life and my disabled mother. But I think the appeal was also about more than that. I think to my geeky and introverted adolescent self, not being part of the “in” crowd (and few of us were), I felt about as powerful as a three-foot hobbit on a basketball team. The locker room was scarier than any dungeon. So I and my misfit, brainy friends needed something to do together that mimicked the camaraderie and fellowship that team sports denied me. D&D fulfilled that.

There was also another key reason: the adult world seemed arbitrary and at times scary. Topsy-turvy. So D&D helped give shape and order to a chaotic adolescence. I had learned that in the adult world, fate was chaotic and uncertain. Guidelines for success were arbitrary. Mothers could disappear and I was powerless to stop it or rescue her or heal her. In D&D, there were healing spells. And while I could not slay my mother (not that, consciously, I wanted to, but in many ways she was my foe), I could slay orcs and goblins and dragons and other evil forces–the ones with red glowing eyes and horned heads. Perhaps the game world reminded me that some conflicts could be black and white. D&D lets players be the hero, the paladin and the assassin and the healer. We get to try out other aspects of our personalities that, in “real life,” are denied to us. And I wanted to be tested and scared and go on adventures and take risks, but in a safe place. With D&D, at least there was a rule book and we knew what we needed to roll to hit and kill and escape death again and again.

The last reason? Because it felt good to do things I could not do in real life. To be a hero. To kill the dragon, or ride the purple worm. To shoot fireballs from my fingertips. Take that, jocks! Take that, prom queen! Ha!

GD: Was there ever any attempts by your mother or other powers-that-be to prevent you from playing the game (ridiculous and untrue associations with the occult, etc.)?

EG: Nope, remarkably, no one in my family ever questioned or challenged my D&D obsession. I think because I was so introverted and shy, the various parental figures in my life were simply pleased that I’d found a group of guys to hang with and stay out of trouble. Compared to getting girls pregnant or driving while drunk, D&D was harmless. My folks may not have understood the game, but they never worried we were summoning demons from the 7th plane of hell. After I came home after my weekly D&D night, they’d often ask, “So, how was the game? Who won?” I’d have to remind them, there was no winner or loser. There was just the endless story that would be continued next week.

GD: When you decided you had grown out of D&D, did you replace it with other “fringe” hobbies, or did you make a specific effort to avoid geekier pastimes?

EG: I had other hobbies for sure, but they weren’t really on the fringe. I was a filmmaker, and radio DJ, and a poet and writer, so I went to movies, collected records, and amassed a collection of books (mostly poetry). Is poetry on the fringe? I suppose so. Is collecting LPs an entry to a world of specialized knowledge and trivia, like D&D? I think so. We all want to be masters of some field or be experts at something. But yes, I certainly made a point of embracing less socially “risky” activities when I went off to college. I remember wanting cool friends and to learn to drink beer and get laid and just be normal. But my geeky, fantasy-driven past was inside me, and kept haunting me.

GD: Was it because you were ashamed of your past?

EG: I was to a certain extent ashamed of my D&D and Tolkien obsession. I remember being at college and the local Society for Creative Anachronism group came to campus to recruit college kids and give sword-fighting demos. I tried it out once or twice, but I remember not feeling like I fit in anymore. I was an odd realization because in a way, the SCA was my people. But I shunned them and said to myself I was too cool to dress in medieval garb and spar in the quad. I wanted to sit on a ratty couch and drink beer and wear my vintage football jacket, and do so ironically. I was too into being ironic by then to embrace the SCA or any other serious, geeky “escapist” pursuit.

GD: What about now? Do you feel that you no longer need escapism, or do you think you’ve just replaced your passion for D&D with something else?

EG: I do think that the place I go when I “escape” has changed, but like all of us, I do need escape. I’m not sure my need for escape is any less. It’s just been transmogrified into something else. I think I’ve always believed that the 20th and, recently, the 21st centuries were not for me. I am afflicted by “medieval moments.” I will be walking in the woods and the modern world will fall away, and I will forget my Gore-Tex and my cell phone and I will be in some other era. Sometimes another place. I will pretend or actually see elves, orcs, beasts. It’s that out-of-time-and-space sensation that I’m seeking, like a woman in my book, Elyse, who sought that fleeting “magic moment” when, at an SCA event, she felt like she had shaken off the weight of the present day to travel to another era in history. The medieval castle project called Guédelon that I visit in another chapter, where workers are dressed in period tunics and are building a castle using only medieval tools and technology, offers another kind of very tempting escape–to leave the modern world of cubicles and white collar work and immerse oneself in hard, physical labor borne of another era. I really wanted to spend a few weeks there chiseling rocks and mixing mortar.

Photo: Ethan Gilsdorf

GD: It was when you discovered a trunk full of your old role-playing gear that you began to reevaluate the nature of fantasy and gaming. This discovery essentially spurred you on your “quest” to write the book. What was in that box? How did you feel when you opened it up?

EG: That box was filled with all my old D&D gear–just as I (and my childhood friend JP, who taught me the game) had left it 20 years before. My old brown shopping bag-covered Dungeon Master’s Guide and Monster Manual, a gray felt bag of dice, and 3-ring binders of rules and character sheets, unused pads of graph and hex paper, and lots and lots of maps of dungeons and worlds. There were also other RPGs like Gamma World and Boot Hill.

How did I feel? Excited. Thrilled. Eager to play again. Then, a wave of warning: fear, apprehension, concern I’d get sucked back in. D&D had always occupied an ambivalent place in my life. I loved the game but it was a reminder of the geeky stammering shy boy I had tried to shed.

GD: One guy plays World of Warcraft religiously. Another plays fantasy football and watches sports on TV. Are these two guys more similar than they think? How does one’s choice of escapism, whether acceptable by societal norms, affect its nature? Is one more “healthy” than another one just because it’s more mainstream?

EG: This is an issue I write about this in my book. I think both fantasy football and fantasy games are very similar. Whether on the level of hobby or interest or obsession, they are comparable. Both involve stats and numbers, mastery of tactics and strategy, and a willingness to slog through lower levels/”the regular season” to reach level 80/the “championship.” And let’s face it: football is a war game.

Personally, I think they are both equally healthy, and both equally susceptible to addiction or “taking the game too far.” The difference is in the double standard that society places on these two activities. WoW is seen as a pointless “fantasy” world, full of frivolity, or conversely, brutal violence. Football (whether real or imaginary) is part of the cultural thread of our country. Playing football, like the army, teaches brotherhood and toughness and teamwork and hard work and discipline. I think online communities can create the same social networks, but because WoW and its ilk are “games” and not “sports,” the culture applies a double standard.

It’s unfortunate, but I think it’s gradually changing–it’s changed a lot since I was a kid in the 1980s. Generations who game now are bringing widespread acceptability to gaming, and I think the fact that there are sports games for the home console means that playing a video game, in general, will be increasingly seen as a legitimate way to waste one’s leisure time.

Oops. Did I say, “waste”? I meant, “spend”

GD: Is the popularity of the fantasy genre a result of any particular aspect of western culture? Is it because we haven’t been shipped off to war like our fathers, or because it’s hard to feel heroic while sitting in a cubicle?

EG: That’s an interesting idea–that fantasy heroics exist because we haven’t ourselves experienced war. Although Tolkien and C.S. Lewis both fought in World War I and lost many of their comrades, they turned to fantasy I think as a way to explore good and evil and other great themes (loyalty, love, sacrifice, fellowship, fighting the good fight, etc). The other problem with that idea is that a lot of war veterans and those currently serving in Iraq play a lot of fantasy games–from D&D to WoW.

I think a few other reasons explain the rise of fantasy. The world has become a more complicated place. Imaginary worlds offer tempting other possibilities where we might feel more welcome, or be more proficient or successful. We also lack rites of passage or other ways for people to feel heroic, to do great deeds and to fulfill their desires to pick up a sword or axe and solve problems in a primal way. Games, fantasy, science fiction, comic books allow folks to experience this, if only vicariously.

Daniel Gauthier as Frodo, walking with the Middle-earth contingent in the Dragon*Con parade. (Photo: Dave Nelson)

Grand troubles we want to unravel–like good versus evil–seem only solvable in our imaginations. Outside the movie theater, the real terrorists slip through our fingers, but in our imaginations, and on the movie screens, we can take revenge and win and kill the evil forces. Vanquishing the “bad guys” seems do-able in a fantasy world because all the villains raspy voices, glowing red eyes, and blood-stained helmets. We all know reality offers no such sharp divisions. But these hero stories played out in games, books, movies, and even kids’ schoolyard antics involve villains, heroes, and monsters for good reason: so we can face and overcome our fears in a good-guy, bad-guy, clear-cut world. Delving into these black-and-white worlds can also make our own conflicts, personal or political, seem more manageable. Fantasy’s apocalyptic, end-of-civilization scenarios, by comparison, make our troubles seem simpler.

GD: Have you returned the the fold, as it were? Do you consider yourself a geek today? If so, what character would you play in a D&D campaign?

EG: I consider myself a geek for sure. But while I used to be a hardcore Dungeons & Dragons player (maybe addict?), nowadays I seem more attracted to fantasy movies and books than gaming. Perhaps it’s because I don’t have the time to immerse myself in role-playing games, or I just haven’t connected with a group of friends who also like to game. I’d say in general, I tend towards “escaping” into a fantasy realm like Tolkien’s Middle-earth more so than playing Xbox or World of Warcraft. Besides, I never had all that good hand-eye coordination.

At the moment, I’d say my nerdly ways are being fulfilled vicariously by interacting with others. One of the joys of being on tour and traveling across the US, is meeting so many other fantasy freaks and gaming geeks. I’ve spoken to so many folks who are dying to share their stories of how they got into gaming or what role fantasy plays in their lives.

As for my dream character, I think it would have be a brooding, half-elf ranger. Or a battle-scarred dwarf fighter. I’ve always been drawn to the characters who lurk in the shadows, and are connected to nature and the earth, or prefer the darkness of the underground. I always found those lawful good paladin types too straight-laced and Boy Scout-like. Probably too much like me.

Thanks again to Ethan Gilsdorf, for his excellent travel memoir and for taking the time to talk geeky with me.

If you want to read his book, hit up Froobi.com to enter to win a free signed copy. The contest is open until 1/13/2010.

Visit the Fantasy Freaks and Gaming Geeks website for more information.

Image: NCsoft

Chances are you’ve already heard of Aion. Released back in September, it was touted as the biggest massively multiplayer online game launch of the year. At nearly 450,000 preorders, it started off a little rocky (what MMO doesn’t?) and publisher NCsoft had to employ a 16,000-player ban-fest back in November. With upgrades to the game’s already-stunning graphics engine slated for 2010, Aion is a strong contender as MMO-of-choice under the tree this holiday season.

I sat down (via email) with David Noonan, content writer for Aion, and chatted about the game. Dave is no stranger to fantasy games, having worked for Wizards of the Coast designing two editions of Dungeons & Dragons. He talks about Aion’s story, how it stacks up against that other elephant-in-the-MMO-room, and the future of story-driven computer games.

GeekDad: First, can you tell us a little about the game world and its history?

Dave: Aion takes place in the world of Atreia—a world where the people live on the interior surface of the sphere (like a science-fiction Dyson sphere) and there’s a tower running from pole to pole where the god, Aion, lives.

Some of Aion’s earliest creations, the dragonlike Balaur, rebelled against their creator. That long war ended with the Tower of Eternity exploding and the world splitting in half at the equator. Now two factions, the Elyos and the Asmodians, inhabit their own hemispheres, and they blame each other for the tower’s destruction. And the wreckage floating in the middle of the world is the Abyss, a high-level mega-zone where the two factions fight each other and the Balaur that caused the trouble in the first place.

David Noonan, Writer for Aion. Photo: David Noonan

GeekDad: Aion is a big deal in Asia, but Eastern MMOs are traditionally very different from Western MMOs. When it came to the “culturalization” process, how did you go about reworking the game for its new audience? How were certain tropes converted, and were there any memorable quests that just couldn’t make the transition?

Dave: We actually took a light touch with specific Asian-themed plot elements; they’re fun, and I think a lot of players want a sort of mélange—I often told our writers to shoot for a Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon feel.

We spent more time trying to satisfy the Western desire for game and narrative aspects that probably don’t rise to the level of full-on tropes. For example, I think Western audiences (speaking broadly here) want their quests to have explicit roots in what’s happening in the game world, and they expect the NPC questgiver to directly or indirectly explain why the PC must do the job rather than the NPC himself. It’s a matter of providing answers to the “If this is so important, how come you don’t do it?” question.

We were also cognizant of the desire for payoff—to have a plot thread resolved somehow. You can resolve it in a pleasing or troubling way, and you can even leave it as a cliffhanger (something that an MMO can get away with that other genres can’t). But you can’t just let it peter out with no consequence.

GeekDad: When World of Warcraft was released, there was a built-in playerbase already familiar with the heroes and villains of Azeroth. Without that advantage in your arsenal, how did you go about introducing the VIP NPCs from Atreia in a way that endeared them to players?

Dave: I think most games—Aion included—have a naturally instructive quality. In other words, if you want to teach anything, a game of some sort is pretty good sugar to help the medicine go down, and a game can show you how the discrete parts of whatever you’re learning fit together. So we deliver a lot of lore in the course of gameplay. As you run around fighting, questing, and exploring, you learn about the people and places as you go.

That said, I rebel against the premise of the question a bit. Aion intentionally avoids activist NPCs, and the metaplot is much further in the background. There’s no equivalent to Arthas, Thrall, and Jaina in Aion, and we like it that way. The NPCs are there to serve the player story, not the other way around. Our VIPs are the PCs. (And that’s handy, because NPCs rarely play MMORPGs.)

GeekDad: Could you explain the difference between the Campaign and Standard Quests?

Dave: It’s basically a question of degree. The campaign quests have bigger plot implications and bigger rewards, so the UI calls them out separately. It’s basically a big “don’t miss this one!” sign. Structurally, there isn’t much difference between the yellow-arrow quests and the blue-arrow quests.

GeekDad: Everyone’s excited about Aion’s flight system. Tell us a little about the flight system and how it affects game play and questing.

Image: NCsoft

Dave: You gain wings at level 10—four hours of gameplay, give or take. You can immediately fly in a few places in the world, and you can glide—sometimes for quite a distance—anywhere you’ve got altitude and open space. (I think base-jumping is one of Aion’s more fascinating games-within-a-game.)

When you reach level 25 and go to the Abyss for the first time, you see flight in its full, unfettered glory. This sounds kind of spacey, but battling in all three axes (x, y, and z) does cool things to your brain, especially in a PvP environment.

GeekDad: What are the crafting opportunities in Aion?

Dave: The game launches with six crafts, all fed by the same gathering skill, including staples you’d expect like weaponsmithing, alchemy, and cooking. You can level all of them simultaneously, and you get XP both for gathering and for actually making stuff.

More broadly, player-created items carry a lot of weight—they’re among the best-in-slot items.

GeekDad: What are Stigma stones?

Dave: In terms of gameplay, it’s useful to think of them as “equippable abilities”—attacks and powers that you have, but other members of your class don’t necessarily have. Coming up with the right mix of Stigma stones is a key character-building exercise for high-level PCs.

And in the lore of the world, Stigma stones are a fragment of a long-gone Daevas soul. Daevas are generally immortal; it takes something like the destruction of the Tower of Eternity or death at the extreme fringes of existence to render a Daeva irrevocably dead. The Stigma stone is a coalescence of that Daeva’s soul—a bit of consciousness that teaches you a long-lost technique you couldn’t learn on your own.

GeekDad: As a well-respected game designer, do you have any ideas on how you’d like the MMORPG genre to evolve? I used to play text-based MMOs back in the day and I have a long-held fantasy that one day a company will create a game that offers the in-depth, character-driven roleplaying experiences that I once had on MUDs and MUSHes. Should I stop holding my breath?

Dave: I wouldn’t hold my breath—instead I’d get to work finding the community within an MMO that can provide the in-depth, character-driven experience you crave. I think that with each passing year, MMOs are providing a player experience that stretches closer and closer to what a MUD or a tabletop RPG provides. Those character-driven communities are out there, and just as with a tabletop or MUD experience, they draw their strength from the consensual acceptance of the community, not from the gameplay mechanics. Put another way, you can take a trip far down the rabbit-hole of character immersion if you’ve got witnesses (friends, in other words) along to validate and support that experience. It’s no more or less inherently immersive than rolling dice in your basement or writing something great for a MUD.

When I look to the horizon for the next set of waves, I’m thinking more about how MMOs can provide the Dungeon Master experience—how they can satisfy the latent “content creator” within all of us. Put as simply as possible, how can an MMO help me make up a cool adventure for my friends? That strikes me as a tricky beast to tame, but given time and smart minds, I’m sure we’ll get there soon. That’s what I’m holding my breath for.

I’d like to thank Dave Noonan for taking time to chat with GeekDad.

Aion retails for around $50 and currently, anyone who buys Aion at one of the retailers listed below will get bonus in-game items. With the “Aion Holiday Ascension Pack”, you can pimp out your winged hero’s armor with special dyes. Check ‘em out:

Image: NCsoft

And, of course, 30- and 60-day subscriptions are great stocking stuffers for the fantasy fan in your life.