I thought I'd give a shout out to Kobold Quarterly and Atomic Array, as I've got an article published (with companion free web content!) in this issue (#7! But you knew because you subscribe, right?) and Atomic Array will be reviewing it in their upcoming podcast.

I've said it before, and it bears repeating, Kobold Quarterly really is the spiritual successor to Dragon. It's printed, it's 3.5/OGL (although there is a smattering of 4E material and it looks like they might have found to sidestep the GSL!) and it rocks! This issue has official Pathfinder monsters, more monsters by Richard Pett, a gunpowder magic, and a hefty article on Dwarven Airships by yours truly. :)

While you're checking out KQ, consider subscribing to Atomic Array. They've got a rocking, polished podcast that covers some fantastic games and supplements like Colonial Gothic, 1000 Suns, and The Great City. They run a contest with each episode, handing out the swag they've just discussed and it's easy to sign up using your subscription of choice. (I liked the itunes option, personally.)

Check both of them out, you won't be disappointed!

-Ben.

Tags: KQ D&D 3.5 Podcast Dnd

Anybody considering subscribing to Kobold Quarterly should absolutely do so, or at least give it a look by buying a copy. It is a fantastic product. In a year it has gone from a labor of love , kind of  high-end fanzine, to a solid, high-production value magazine.

If you regretted the loss of Dungeon and Dragon, (and I do not consider the online web page a "replacement") then KQ is for you. I've been onboard since #1, and it has only gotten better with time. With an option to get print and pdf you can't go wrong-- I, for one, like to read my issue on the go or on the can, and you can't do that with a pdf.

The material's been great and it promises only to improve. Whether you play 3.X or 4E, the only question is "why haven't you subscribed?" Even material in a 3.X format converts easily enough to a 4E playstyle or it inspires. Do you really need more encouragement to get another source of material that's coming from a proven developer? (Former editor of Dragon, author of the recent Expedition to the Demonweb Pits)

http://www.koboldquarterly.com

-Ben.

Tags: KQ D&D Magazine

Oh Dragon, we lament your loss...

 But wait, did you know about Kobold Quarterly? 

Yes, there is a print magazine that still feeds your need for D&D material, and does it with style.

KQ just celebrated a first birthday and the issue gorgeously demonstrates that somethings get better with time. The cover art is quite pretty-- see if you can spot the easter egg hiding in the horde-- and the material inside has something for everyone.

 The topics include devil princesses, the ecology of the homonculus, giant monsters, tips on optimizing your monk and better using your action points, a pile of magical instruments, an article on improving your improvisation, new vermin, Skip Williams' rules column, book reviews, and an interview with the designers of 4E.

The magazine itself is perfect bound, a big step up from the initial staple-bound issues, and there's something to be said for having a physical magazine to read wherever the fancy strikes me. Weighing in at 68 to 70-some pages, it's not quite at the same pagecount as Dragon yet, but KQ seems to grow with each issue, so that's promising.

The articles are written by professionals, like Nicholas Logue of Pathfinder fame or editor Wolfgang Baur (he once edited a magazine known as _Dungeon_, maybe you read it?), and newcomers like Joshua Stevens-- though this is his second contribution after the article on the Gangs of Zobeck in KQ#4. Baur keeps the styles even and the material pertinent. There is an even balance between articles for the gamemaster and the player, but probably a little more for the GM. The art is solid and this is definitely no amateur effort.

 In particular, I've enjoyed the continuation of the ecology articles, having seen the Barghest, Cloaker, Derro, Homonculus, and Lich so far. The series on Princes of Hell does a good job of providing more epic powered foes and archvillians for a campaign that wants to play in the upper levels. Baur has written about new sorts of magic, new magic items, and new monsters-- he's filling a gap created with Dragon's disappearance and exacerbated by uncertainty 4E's launch has put in to the industry. KQ is giving you that shot of new material, and really, the downside right now is that he's only doing it on a quarterly basis.

 This is worth checking out. According to Wolfgang, KQ is being stocked by Alliance, so your FLGS should be able to order a copy-- I know I've seen one at my local shop, but I get mine in the mail, and it shows up in good shape. Yes, kobold's are scrappy, tough little mongrels, but even they need to eat. Feed the Kobold Overlord and pick up an issue. I can confidently say that I don't think you'll be disappointed.

-Ben. 

Tags: KQ DnD

Want to talk about game design? Come join us in the forum group, Light Brigade Social Club!

The latest topic? July is World Adventure Writing Month!

-Ben.

Tags: Adventure Design

So I follow a link to look at a chunk of text from the upcoming 4E DMG, and I'm greeted with this section on commerce:

"Even small villages give characters ready access to the gear they need to pursue their adventures. Provisions, tents and backpacks, and simple weapons are commonly available. Traveling merchants carry armor, military weapons, and more specialized gear. Most villages have inns that cater to travelers, where adventurers can get a hot meal and a bed, even if the quality leaves much to be desired. When characters stop in at a settlement to rest and restock their supplies, give them a bit of local flavor, such as the name of the inn where they spend the night, and move on with the adventure.

Even small villages rely heavily on trade with other settlements, including larger towns and cities. Merchants pass through regularly, selling necessities and luxuries to the villagers, and any good merchant has far-reaching contacts across the region. When characters have magic items to sell, a traveling merchant is in town—or will be soon—to take it off their hands. The same applies to exotic mundane goods as well: No one in the village makes silk rope or has much use for it, but merchants making their way between major cities carry it all the time.

Traveling merchants are also a great way to introduce adventure hooks to the characters as they conduct their business. Since they make their living traversing roads that are not as safe as they used to be, merchants hire competent guards to keep their goods safe. They also carry news from town to town, including reports of situations that cry out for adventurers to get involved.

These merchants can’t provide specialized services, however. When the characters are in need of a library or a dedicated sage, a trainer who can handle the griffon eggs they’ve found, or an architect to design their castle, they’re better off going to a large city than looking in a village. These services are less important in the economy of the game than magic items and other goods, so you shouldn’t feel as though you have to compromise your common sense for the sake of game play.

Of course, it’s natural for characters to travel far beyond their native villages as they pursue adventure. When they’re in the City of Brass, they should be able to buy even the most expensive magic items readily. If it doesn’t interfere with the flow of your game, it’s fine to expect that characters will travel to larger cities to do business as they reach higher levels and deal with larger sums of money."

I apologize for subjecting you to that, but we're going to pause here a moment and say, "What. The. Fuck?"

Let us not even touch upon the fact that towns now apparently encourage strange people who irritate terrible monsters to visit, enter their society heavily armed under their own authority, and show little concern for the townsfolks' general well-being unless there's a big purse involved.

No, what's more, merchants now carry all kinds of crap that 99% of their clients don't buy on the outside chance that they'll encounter these high-rolling fatcats in desperate need of their silk rope. You are shitting me, right? And these merchants pass between the "points of light" where all the terrible monsters live to bring these goods. Screw facing a beholder, you want to be afraid of the traveling merchant in 4E because if he's good enough to get a slow moving wagon full of loot and pulled by two thick and meaty meals from point to point, you had better be certain that he's one bad mother. Seriously. I have the feeling they're going to be hiring characters as guards just to ensure their own cloud of minions.

And towns rely heavily on each other, but don't have the sense to band together and clear the wilderness between them of terrible monsters. No, no, we'll just sit here and cut firewood to send to the next town... I sure hope they have sheep to send us.

But wait! Here's the kicker! If you need it, it will be in the next town. Need a newer, more powerful magic sword? Next town. Want that awesome new armor and shield combo? Next town. *brrrr-ring* Excuse me moment. *Brrrrr-ring*Brrrr-ring* Yes... 4E? Hey, Final Fantasy called, and they would like their equipment purchasing plan back.

*sigh*

No commentary in there about scaling things appropriately for the region, or turning the acquisition of a particular item into a quest, or even the initial information gathering for an item into a quest. No, no... just pack up the gear and make for New LostHavenburgton and Smacky, the jolly angry dwarf blacksmith and his sidekick Tankard the one-eyed-human innkeeper with the buxom daughter hauling ales will have what you need.

And when you sell magic items, you'll get a fifth of their value...and expect to pay extra for what you want! Oh, bartering? No, no bartering for items. We will continue to screw you in the name of wealth balance. It becomes apparent to me that no one over at WotC has run at a table with players who believe that everything is treasure, and your dungeon is about to become their base of operations, once they've stripped it for scrap.

My concerns about 4E continue to mount. I still have no books in front of me, but the things I'm seeing about challenges, and treasure, and the heavy focus on combat is really making me regret the $84 I spent on preordering. That could have been three Ars Magica supplements that I know won't suck.

*heavy sigh* Oh, mindless smashing. Is there anything you can't ruin?

-Ben.

you can read the whole excerpt here: http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/ex/20080514a&pf=true

Tags: D&D 4E Game Design

I'd mentioned Open Design's 4E project, but forgot to post about the 3.5 projects that are also currently open for patronage.

The first is:

"Tales of Zobeck, the Clockwork City

The Tales of Zobeck anthology is in some ways similar to the Six Arabian Nights project, in that it would feature at least 6 and maybe as many as 10 short adventures, playable in one or two nights and for a variety of levels.

Depending on how long people are willing to wait, I could write all of these, and I'd love the adventures to be fairly open work, shared with the patrons. If people want a shorter turnaround (say, September), the adventures could include some familiar names, such Jeff Grubb, Clay Fleischer, Zeb Cook, Joshua Stevens, Nicolas Logue, Tim Connors, James Jacobs, plus at least one or two new authors drawn from the senior patron ranks. This portion of the commission would be a limited edition.

In addition, this project would include a 30,000 word city summary/sourcebook by me, Wolfgang Baur. This material is half-written and it is a bit of an oddball, since I'm kind of overprotective of the setting bible/writeups. I'd want to complete this first, then share it with senior patrons and other designers, rather than sharing a lot of it in the Open Design style. This would cover most of the crucial locations in the city, the use of kobold PCs and the Kobold ghetto, a quick overview of history and pantheon, and a bit of clockwork magic.

This sourcebook is NOT a Ptolus-length treatment of the city, but it is enough that the shared world can truly be shared. Some version of the sourcebook would be made available to the broader public, a bit like the Player's Guides for the Paizo adventure paths.

...

Tales of Zobeck offers a combined MINIMUM length of about 80,000 words (about ~128 pages), plus eight design essays on NPCs, culture jamming, creating PC races, or whatever topics the senior patrons request. Senior patrons may pitch Tales of their own, and patrons who donate $100 will receive a signed print copy of the final book."

The second is:

Court of the Shadow Fey
The party visits the Plane of Shadow and becomes embroiled in dueling, attempted assassinations, and infiltration of the Queen's bedchamber to defeat the Queen of Night and Magic and her Moonlit King. This builds on some themes first brought up in Castle Shadowcrag). In the grand finale, the party defeats the Queen and her Moonlit King, and then must flee the wrath and wreckage of the shadow plane, scarred somehow by the price of the high magic they invoked. The adventure includes at least a half-dozen Shadow plane locations, a new type of badass fey, as well as riddle and trickery encounters, lots of stealth and social skills, and a major dueling scene versus a shadow fey master of the blade or a shadow fey sorcerer.

About third of this is planar journeying, such as visiting the Sun God for help. Other encounters involve disguises and court politics around figures such as the Blind Seer and the Black Prince, and the last third of it requires fighting the unique monstrosities that lie just behind every shadow, from the Snake-Godling of Eternal Darkness to the Black Crone and the million-footed Lord of Roaches. Layers of dark fey nastiness present the party with some tough trade-offs ("Should we really be bargaining with this twisted servant of evil?").

What other sorts of encounters would you like to see? What stealth or political elements might you want or NOT want? And what makes a trip to the Shadow Plane memorable?

Minimum length of about 50,000 words (about ~72 pages). Everyone who has participated in the past knows by now that every project I write in this format seems to run over... Court of the Shadow Fey also includes FOUR design essays on the Fey, planar adventures, social encounters, stealth, or other topics as chosen by the senior patrons.

All senior patrons will have the option of contributing a Courtier or Servant of the Queen as part of the NPC roster for the Court."

Both projects are for 3.5 Dungeons and Dragons and if you sign on now, you can have a voice about that adventure's development.

"How?"

Step 0: You'll need a livejournal account and some money.
Step 1: Login to Livejournal, and go look at the Open Design page...link above.
Step 2: Review the premise and decide if you want to join as a Contributer, Patron or
Senior Patron.

"But how do I help develop it?"

By signing on at any amount, you'll get the pdf of the adventure and access to the Print-on-Demand mechanic through Lulu.

By signing on at least the Patron level ($30), you'll get to vote in polls, make some suggestions and participate in the discussion throughout development with other Patrons and the Author-- Wolfgang Baur. You might know him from _Expedition to the Demonweb Pits_ or his stint as the editor for _Dungeon._ That's a lot more input than you'll get in just about every other game company's adventures...

"Is it any good?"

I've gotten the chance to develop NPCs and playtest material, look at the manuscript ahead of time, comment on art and maps, and get some good ideas from the design essays. Like I'd said before, I've participated in the last 3 of these projects and bought the last 4. It's good quality material and the access to the designer combined with the opportunity to make your voice heard throughout the development process is pure gold. I've yet to hear a complaint about this shop and have nothing but good experiences with it so far.

It's well worth the money and the time, come check it out!

-Ben.

Tags: Adventure D&D Design Steampunk Fey 3.5 Clockwork Shadow

Over at Open Design, Wolfgang Baur is soliciting patrons for what could feasibly be the first third party 4E adventure you will see on the market, and if you sign on now, you can have a voice about that adventure's development.

"How?"

Step 0: You'll need a livejournal account and some money.
Step 1: Login to Livejournal, and go look at the Open Design page...link above.
Step 2: Review the premise and decide if you want to join as a Contributer, Patron or Senior Patron.

"But how do I help develop it?"

By signing on at any amount, you'll get the pdf of the adventure and access to the Print-on-Demand mechanic through Lulu.

By signing on at least the Patron level ($30), you'll get to vote in polls, make some suggestions and participate in the discussion throughout development with other Patrons and the Author-- Wolfgang Baur. You might know him from _Expedition to the Demonweb Pits_ or his stint as the editor for _Dungeon._ That's a lot more input than you'll get in just about every other game company's adventures...

Donate $100 or more? You'll get access to a playtest at GenCon and will receive a print version autographed by the author.

"Is it any good?"

I've participated in the last three projects, picked up the one back project I got access to and signed on for both this project and the next upcoming 3.5 project. I've gotten the chance to develop NPCs and playtest material, look at the manuscript ahead of time and comment on art and maps. This is interactive and participatory...you will get back what you put into the project.

Combine all this with the fact that it is supplemented by three or four design essays-- from the guy who used to write "Dungeoncraft"-- and you've got a great value.

Besides, everyone is going to have read _Keep on the Shadowfell_. This is your opportunity to have something fantastic from a developer with a proven track record and add your own opinion to the final product that only a few hundred people will own.

Who wouldn't love that?

-Ben.

Tags: 4E D&D Adventure

For anyone considering, or already signed up for it, GenCon's events open for purchase on Sunday, April 20th, at 1pm EST.

RPGA events for Living Forgotten Realms still are not posted, and I'd advise you to keep a close eye out for those events if you intended on giving the new communal campaign a try-- last year, Living Greyhawk events were sold out within minutes of opening. Most of the gaming events are around $4, seminars vary, and it is far, far better to have a ticket for an event than to show up with generic tickets-- and generics can always be returned for their face value.

There's still lots of time. Save 25$ a paycheck for the next 8 payperiods, and you'll have 200$ for August 1st. That will cover a Con badge, a chunk of floorspace in a room with 6ish other attendees, and about three 4$ events on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday; that still allows a lot of time for the dealer room and just taking in the whole experience. Driving out there and hunter/gathering your food are left as exercises for the reader. ;)

-Ben.

Tags: Gencon

Just to let people in the area know, The Schenectady Wargamer's Association is holding their monthly game day this Saturday, April 12th from 11am to 10+pm, in three slots. There will be boardgames, D&D, Conan, Miniatures Wargaming, and a games swapmeet! There will be at least three tables set up by folks with gaming materials for trade/sale...it's like a garage sale where everything is treasure.

You can find the detailed page here, with game descriptions. From personal experience, I can tell you that Ben Ossenfort's Conan game is a kick in the pants.

From the page:

"As usual, this Game-a-thon will be held at the Studio of Bridge and Games, in Schenectady, NY. If you need directions, you can click here, or send an email to: mailto:directions@swa-gaming.org An automatic reply will immediately be sent to you with detailed directions.

The number at the Studio is: (518) 346-3773"

There is a fee to play, $4 for one session, or $6 for two, but the facilities are nice and there are a few nearby places for both acquiring food or having it delivered. They do have a microwave onsite.

Check it out if you've got nothing planned for this weekend, like UBCon in Buffalo...it should be a good time.

-Ben.

Tags: SWA Game Day NY

Now I'm not usually one for a mmorpg, a massively multiplayer online role playing game, but I had to take notice of urbandead.com. This is a low-tech game of limited turns and interestingly enough... no random monsters! Every zombie you see, every person you find to eat, is another player!

Set in the fictional town of Malton, Urban Dead allows you to choose from three different military classes, three different civilian classes, two scientific, and of course, life as a zombie! Skills and levels are built up through a number of ways-- healing people, tagging buildings with spraypaint, and, of course attacking and killing zombies or people. The skillsets grow as you gain experience, and you can be sure (due to a 50 move limit per day) that it will take you a couple of days to get even that first new skill.

Buildings can be barricaded so that survivors can hide out from the zombies. Zombies can smash barricades to get inside at the tasty meatsnacks inside. Some players even choose to act as zombie spies-- telling hordes which buildings have people hiding inside, or helping damage barricades, or as player killers-- hunting survivors because they can.

Everyone begins with 50 hit points. People can heal from drinking a beer or being healed by first aid kit. Zombies don't heal until they've reached 0 hit points and spend 5 moves to stand up, fully healed. Weapons available to survivors are fists, crowbars, fireaxes, pistols, shotguns, and flare guns-- though the truism from the Zombie Survivor's Handbook rings true here, if slightly modified: "Fire axes never need reloading."

Go take a look. There's a full wiki detailing the town and a large supporting community that has grown up around the game in the three+ years the game has been up. If you're looking for some good fun that's sure to have limit on the addiction you can suffer, urbandead.com is the game for you. Besides, where else can you brawl with zombies?

-Ben.

On a sidenote, for those who prefer fantasy, Kingdom of Loathing is a mocking look at old school muds and has a similar mechanic.

Tags: Zombies Mmorpg

I'm punching through what is supposed to be the climatic encounter for the APL16 table at the Principality of Ulek's final interactive. What's an interactive, you ask? What the heck is APL?

APL stands for Average Party Level; it's the measure of difficulty used by the RPGA to scale an adventure for groups from level 1 to level 16. 

An interactive is an adventure intended to be run once at a convention with the opportunity for the players to have a direct impact on the outcome of the regional campaign. In this case, it's the closing act of the Living Greyhawk campaign for the Principality, so there's some pressure to make sure that what happens is high octane rock and roll smash and grab craziness with a hearty dose of fantastic adventure and the opportunity to save it all from the DastardlySlaveLordsOfThePomarj. And so, that brings us to my current work and the issues I'm finding in designing it.

There are a number of pitfalls to avoid when writing at APL16. There are certain things that must happen, or battles are going to be a cakewalk and the players are going to go home feeling cheated. Let's take a look at them, since I can't very well give away the particulars of the monsters that are in the vat, brewing...

First, you need to provide sufficient threat. There seems to be no bigger wet blanket than feeling like you just had four hours of your life stolen and all you got was this crappy adventure record.

Second, you need that threat to not simply be overwhelming. No one enjoys it when the writer stuffs in whatever he can find into whatever situation he can justify and proceeds to absolutely pulp the players with no chance of survival.

Third, it needs to be an interesting setting, goal, and implementation.

"Ummm, Ben," you'll say, "That's what every serious encounter ought to be..."

And I'll tell you that you're right...but the issues are magnified at the higher level for a number of reasons-- your players are more experienced, more tactically oriented. They wouldn't have gotten to this point if they weren't driven roleplayers intent on getting as much play time as possible with this character and keeping that character alive. The other major issue that accompanies designing for a shared campaign is that you cannot tailor the encounter to a particular party composition. In a home game, you know that Larry has the ranger, Jamie brings the social bard, Geoff has the wizard-artillery, Chris has the sneaksy rogue and Brian has the paladin with a blind eye. You can gauge that group's power and tactics much easier because you helped get them where they are, you know what magic they have, what they will do when faced with particular situations.

This writing doesn't allow for any of that, because you have to design for AnyTable(TM), not considering that a Radiant Servant might obliterate the undead, that a Church Inquisitor might obviate the illusionary feint, that a Occult Slayer might reflect back a disintegrate, that a druid is going to  stomp past your obstacles like foodie at a donut tasting contest. So you're forced into a generalist tactic; you need to write the encounter so that it doesn't matter what your foe faces at the convention table, he can put up a decent brawl. Generally, that means finding some aspect of the game and exploiting it as best you can.

Why?

Because. Because this is the varsity squad you're writing for, the combat is going to last 5 minutes or an hour and a half and drag the table into the lunch break between slots. The goal is almost to have the second occur, but without the table chomping at the bit to leave; instead you want them foaming for the next round, engaged, driving for the enemy's action, trying to exploit whatever he can to gain the advantage. And that's the crux of it all...

You have to find a universially tough yet balanced encounter that will provide sufficient challenge and not become an exercise in Total Party Kill, or a "TPK," as it is also known. It's a black art, one where I can only say that no amount of good design will counteract a GM who hasn't properly read the material. I've written groups of invisible Barghest assassins who dimension door to their targets and silent cast true strike before they make combined death attacks on party members. I've created encounters with fiendish purple worms that would knock you into the air so that they get an attack of opportunity on you as you fall past them. I've set up a murder of half-dragon ogres intent on burninating parties; and all of it sabotaged by the GM at the table who decided to run it differently-- either through lack of prep or just failed reading comprehension. They were tough encounters that should have been very memorable, and instead the players were robbed of the experience. You can never account for the GM who gets your material, and so that means that your implementation and tactics have to be clean, elegant, tight and preferrably covering the first five to six rounds of combat because, again, if the battle's gone longer than that, the players have a real problem, and the GM is going to have a situation that should run itself by then.

What does that leave us with? This:

When you design for the high level, you need to make sure the encounter is...

1. Appropriately tough...probably an EL of APL+3 but more likely +4. Be willing to put it at 4.5 because of environment but closer to +4 because of preparation time provided to the characters.

2. Interesting and engaging, it should be more than mooks on a battlefield; it needs to be an original and memorable event.

3. Clean and elegant, not overcomplicated because that just increases the chance a GM will run it wrong. 

Combine in equal parts and season with flavor text to taste...it's something that's definitely going to take time. Hell, I've been at this seriously for the last two years and I'm still making it a project of many days. In the end though, when you've lovingly crafted that beautifully ugly brawltastic confrontation, you'll grin with malicious glee knowing that when the players sit down to try their hand at it, everyone is going to enjoy it.

-Ben. 

Tags: D&D Design RPGA

So, Thursday will become, at least on a biweekly basis, beer review night. While I am certainly not the Ben McFarland of British beer reviewing fame, I would like to think that my vast experience consuming beers while living on a desert island and then residing in two fairly microbrew heavy regions will qualify me to give you some form of review that I will do everything in my power to ensure does not suck. I won't be rating these beers-- I've come to the point where I really don't think I could have a terrible beer, they're all fairly decent, but should that happen, I'll let you know.

And without further ado, we will push into things. The first beer we're going to look at tonight is the Lake Placid Craft Brewing "Ubu Ale." The brewery is just off the main strip in Lake Placid and the staff is very friendly. Pouring it into the glass, it has a rich, dark color-- one I'd call a nut brown, but the bottle describes as  dark garnet. The head is an amber brown and very bubbly, with a very smoky taste. It has a very hoppy aroma, but not overpowering. The first taste was very porter-y and a little smoky, but that faded and one could definitely tell this was an ale. It was smooth, with a hint of chocolate and no real aftertaste. There was no precipitate in the bottle and the whole thing went down easy. If you like Newcastle, you will love Ubu.

Next is Left Hand Canyon Brewery's "Deep Cover Brown Ale." I used to drink the products of this fine brewery all the time in college, as they're in Longmont, Colorado, and I was attending CU Boulder. The six pack came with a red-left-hand-sticker, which was a fun little reminder of the wierd stuff people will do out west sometimes. If you get the chance, the brewery itself is in town and had a good menu, but that was about 5 years ago, so things could have changed. The Deep Cover was a lighter brown, more like leather or barely stained wood than the deeper brown of the Ubu. The head on this beer was very light and bubbly with a sweet taste. It had a light, sweet aroma in the glass. It tasted very smooth, with no aftertaste and a warm, caramel flavor. There was just a hint of sediment in the bottle, enough to remind me that this is a microbrew, but not enough to have me chewing.

Third is the Pennsylvania Brewing Company's Penn Weizen, a wheat beer. This beer poured into the glass with a beautiful light golden color that became slightly opaque with precipitate as it filtered down.
It had a very light, almost sweet head that was very very bubbly. It had a very subtle, crisp scent-- and really that characterized the beer more than anything; it was crisp, even with the bottle fermentation and precipitate. It was very light, smooth and crisp. This was the sort of beer you could put down three or four pints and only realize it when your darts game begins to suffer. I'm usually not a fan of wheat beers because they come in too hoppy, but this one doesn't have that fault.

Finally, we have the Bischoff Brewery's Doppel Bock. This poured a deeper amber, almost cherry color with a lighter brown head of sweet, fine bubbles. This beer had almost no aroma to me, what was there was overwhelmed by the "beer" smell of the alcohol-- it had a higher content of about 7.5%. The taste was very smooth, velvety; again, it was nearly a pure "beer" flavor that was overwhelmed with the presence of the alcohol. I split this bottle with a friend who likes Doppel Bocks, and he thought the higher alcohol content took away from the overall flavor. I'd almost recommend this beer for later on in the evening, when you've already got a little bit of a buzz and would like to keep it without having to increase your number of pints.

So, that's the four for this go around. We'll see if I do it again in one week or two, and if it's going to be two beers or four. I suppose it depends on how long this Beer of the Month gift runs. ;)

-Ben.

Tags: Beer