ISSUE 379 | SEptEmbEr 2009 A Dungeons & Dragons® Roleplaying Game Supplement ® Contents Features 5 Player’s Handbook 3 debut: skill Powers By Mike Mearls and Robert J. Schwalb 16 A new mechanical piece from Player’s Handbook 3 is described here, exclusively on D&D Insider. Check out skill powers, new ways to augment your characters’ skill use. 16 The assassin: Heroic tier By Mike Mearls The assassin—and the shadow power source—are here! The class includes two builds, and the first installment will present the heroic tier and feats for the class. 28 The assassin: Paragon tier By Mike Mearls 28 The launch of the assassin continues into the paragon tier. New powers and new paragon paths show up in this installment. 35 The assassin: Epic tier By Mike Mearls The assassin class concludes with epic tier powers and a new epic destiny. 39 warden essentials By Tavis Allison and Eytan Bernstein If a cleric isn’t in your future, maybe a warden is more your style! Once more, new warden character basics, along with more mechanical support for your new or existing warden 39 hero. 5 49 49 cleric essentials COLUMNS By Logan Bonner Interested in playing a cleric? This article will get you well on your way with cleric fundamentals, character building advice, and a slew of new powers and feats for your cleric character. 4 editorial 58 FigHter: The great weaPon 74 Design & develoPment: classes By R&D Staff By Robert J. Schwalb The staff discusses the goals, strategies, and details If you’re playing a great-weapon fighter, this article of class design. is must-read material. With new powers, feats, and more, your great weapon fighter will be ready for 77 D&d alumni anything. By Bart Carroll and Steve Winter A look back at D&D through past editions. 68 adventurers oF tHe realms 81 RPGA rePort By Chris Tulach By Chris Tulach 58 More regions of the Realms are provided with unique The Living FR campaign is in full swing. Learn paragon paths, especially suited for your Forgotten more about how to get involved! Realms campaign. 89 AmPersand By Bill Slavicsek Bill discusses more of the changes in store for D&D in 2009. on tHe cover Illustration by Howard Luoni 68 Dungeons & Dragons, D&D, Forgotten realms, Eberron, Dungeon, Dragon, d20, d20 System, Wizards of the Coast, all other Wizards of the Coast product names, and their respective logos are trademarks of Wizards of the Coast, Inc., in the U.S.A. and other countries. this material is protected under the copyright laws of the United States of America. Any reproduction or unauthorized use of the material or artwork contained herein is prohibited without the express written permission of Wizards of the Coast, Inc. this product is a work of fiction. Any similarity to actual people, organizations, places, or events is purely coincidental. printed in the U.S.A. ©2008 Wizards of the Coast, Inc. No portion of this work may be reproduced in any form without written permission. For more Dungeons & Dragons articles, adventures, and information, visit www.wizards. com/dnd e ditorial 379 Dr ag on September 2009 Editor-in-Chief Chris Youngs The Future is Now Senior Art Director Jon Schindehette Web Specialist Chris Sims First and foremost, D&D has always been a game discuss the PCs’ goals and long-term aspirations as we Web Production bart Carroll, Steve Winter about people. Since the dawn of the Interwebs, the close in on the paragon tier. game has enjoyed a vocal, enthusiastic, opinionated, Getting feedback. I keep tabs on the new D&D Graphic Design Keven Smith and sometimes boisterous group of fans willing to Insider group on a daily basis. If you haven’t already Contributing Authors tavis Allison, Eytan bernstein, offer feedback on topics as wide-ranging as individual created a profile and you’re a subscriber, you should Logan bonner, bart Carroll, campaigns can be. From bulletin boards to blogs, come join up. We’re a subscribers-only group, and mike mearls, robert J. Schwalb, we’ve come a long way as a D&D community. we have plans in the works to take advantage of this bill Slavicsek, Chris tulach, Last week, Wizards of the Coast launched the group for community-focused news and announce- Steve Winter latest online community offering so far. From straight- ments. We also plan to start highlighting community Developers Stephen radney-macFarland, forward message boards, which had largely been member profiles or groups that are particularly inter- peter Schaefer, Stephen Schubert, the community experience on our site, we now offer esting or fun, and members of the D&D Insider group Chris Sims, rodney thompson individual profile pages, wikis, blogs, and more. Chat will certainly be frequent targets. is back (after not working for almost two years in the Getting feature requests. As I said, this new Editors Michele Carter, Jeremy Crawford, old system), and you can access a slew of options made system isn’t yet fully realized. (That’s why we’re call- miranda Horner popular on the most robust of social networking sites. ing it a beta release.) But we have so many plans for Cover Artist Howard Lyon Yes, the feature set is not complete. Given more this new feature of the site -- well, you’ll just have to time, we know lots of little fixes or changes we would keep checking back for updates. I’ll be sure to make Contributing Artists Eric belisle, Emrah Elmasli, Empty like to make. But we wanted our forums back online announcements on the D&D Insider group, and I room Studios, tyler Jacobson, James Kei mcClellan, William as quickly as possible, and we were immensely satis- know we’ll do the same on the D&D group as we get O’Connor, Eric L. Williams fied with the new system even if it does have room to more information from the community team. grow. What features would you like to see on the new Cartographers rob Lazzaretti, Sean macdonald If you haven’t checked out the new community yet, Wizards Community? What do you miss from the old Web Development mark A. Jindra you should. It really is something to see. Create a pro- forums that might not be there? What would you like file, check out the groups that are already there, and to be able to do with groups? What sort of informa- D&D Creative Manager Christopher perkins start thinking about how you can use this new system tion would you like to see posted on our official group Executive Producer, to improve your game. That’s where we’re headed, and pages? Send your feedback to dndinsider@wizards. D&D Insider Chris Champagne we need your feedback and suggestions to make this com. As always, we’d love to hear from you! Director of RPG R&D bill Slavicsek the best community site that we can. Do you know what else we’d like? To be your Some of the things we’ve been doing with the new site friends! It’s not as if we’re competing to sign up more Special Thanks so far: friends than everybody else, but this is the way for you richard baker, Greg bilsland, Logan bonner, michele Carter, Building groups for our individual campaigns. You to keep track of what we’re up to. So send those friend Jennifer Clarke Wilkes, Andy Collins, bruce r. Cordell, torah Cottrill, should check out Chris Perkins’s public Io’mandra requests to the D&D Insider team. Jeremy Crawford, mike Donais, rob Heinsoo, Nina Hess, peter Lee, campaign page if you’re looking for ideas to kick start mike mearls, Kim mohan, Cal moore, Stephen radney-macFarland, your own campaign group. Upload your maps, fill up peter Schaefer, Stephen Schubert, matthew Sernett, your calendar, invite your gaming group to join, and rodney thompson, rob Watkins, James Wyatt you’re off! I’ve been using my own group’s blog to post session synopses, and I’ll be using the forums soon to Skill Powers Design by Mike Mearls and Robert J. Schwalb Commentary by Mike Mearls, Peter Schaefer, and Robert J. Schwalb illustrations by Eric Belisle Welcome to another installment of the Player’s Hand- Commentary book 3 debut series! WHy SKILL PoWERS In previous months, you’ve seen the psion class mike mearls: Skill powers came about as a way to give and the githzerai race. This time, we explore a brand characters an additional way to specialize in a skill. The new concept for the game: the skill power. concept first came to me when I was playing a tiefling wizard with a 16 Charisma and training in Diplomacy Skill powers are utility powers that you qualify for and Bluff. It was fun serving as the party’s spokesmen, not based on your class, but by virtue of your training but that didn’t quite feel like enough. I wanted the option in a particular skill. They’re available to every charac- to do interesting things with my skills outside of the spe- ter in the game, whether you’re playing a fighter built cific scenes and roleplaying moments that came up. A skill power is a way for a player to make a skill important using only the Player’s Handbook or a genasi hybrid in whatever situation he wants. If you want your high invoker/wizard using content from a wide range of Diplomacy character to feel like a charismatic leader in resources. battle, just pick out a combat-useful Diplomacy power.