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If you've played a fantasy-themed role-playing game (RPG) chances are it owes something to Dungeons & Dragons – the dice-rolling pen-and-paper game that started it all. Dungeons & Dragons Tiny Adventures, an officially-licensed product from Wizards of the Coast, brings the Dungeons & Dragons experience to Facebook.
As much as I love RPGs, they can certainly demand a big time commitment from the player. That's part of what makes Tiny Adventures unique. Similar to Ikariam, the virtual world that we talked about last week, all you have to do with Tiny Adventures is set the adventure in motion, and the rest of it plays out automatically in 10-minute chunks whether you're at the computer screen or not. You can check back at any time to see how your character is faring, and use special items to boost your chances of finishing the adventure, such as a healing potion if your hero has lost some hit points.
You'll start by choosing a character. This process proved to be slightly disappointing in that instead of getting to create a character from scratch, you instead have to choose from 8 pre-created templates, such as Human Male Cleric, Halfling Rogue Male, Elf Ranger Female, and so on. There are only two female characters and six male.
Once you've settled on a character, it's time to get out and make a name for yourself by doing heroic things. I decided to take Kornylius, my Dragonborn Fighter, on a quest called Cutthroats of Crawling Bog, where my task was to put a stop to the bandits that were attacking merchants on the High Road.
Every character has attributes like strength, dexterity, intelligence and wisdom that will help them get through encounters. When Kornylius encountered a patch of wet sand, for example, the scenario required wisdom of 9. I only rolled a 3, which caused me to foolishly try to walk right through the patch and end up stuck in quicksand.
If you're successful in your encounters you can early gold, experience points to level up your character, and more powerful weapons and armor to equip. If you aren't successful you'll earn less experience points and may even lose hit points if your character loses a fight. If you run out of hit points you'll fall unconscious and the adventure ends early so you can go home and rest.
Here's where the social aspect of Tiny Adventures comes in. If any of your Facebook Friends have added the game as well, you can look at their characters' profiles and see what quest they're currently working on and check out the loot they've got. You can send also another character a "Buff" – a status boost that makes them stronger temporarily, and if your friends' characters fall unconscious, you'll receive a notification and can opt to heal them.
If you don't have time to sink your teeth into a full-on game of Dungeons & Dragons (or any of the hundreds of role-playing games that the series inspired), then Dungeons & Dragons Tiny Adventures is a neat little substitute. Click here to check out the application – note: you'll need a free Facebook social networking account to play the game.