TRPG General Chat

Oblivious Sage

12:03 AM

rules are here if you want to check it out: filedropper.com/rulescomplilation

BESW

Cool, thanks!

Lord_Gareth

12:45 AM

@ObliviousSage Especially given @BESW's addendum to my proposal I'm having difficulty understanding the relevance of your comment. The idea is to use this as a proof-of-concept for a contest and let other systems host their own.

A system-agnostic contest would be impossible

Oblivious Sage

i'd prefer to see a contest that either 1) supports multiple contests (propose a "specialization" and develop it as a race (including feat support) in 3.5 or 4e, as a type a la vampire/werewolf albeit simpler in oWoD or nWoD, as a type/template in Dresden Files, plus in one other system of your choice not already in this list) or 2) is system-specific but rewards people for asking good questions or having good answers for the system (like Arqade's recent AnswerSwarm contest)

Lord_Gareth

Then propose something. That's why there's a discussion going. @BrianBallsun-Stanton already tossed around a bunch of the ideas I've already proposed; the idea is to get input from the community and see if a contest can even be a thing we want

BESW

2) sounds like a good suggestion for the anniversary contest post.

Lord_Gareth

Also a good point

BESW

I'm not sure I can visualize 1), and I'd be very interested to see your proposal for it. Evaluating submissions in a cross-system contest without it becoming a system popularity contest is a stumbling block I haven't been able to think past.

Oblivious Sage

12:52 AM

Brian Ballsun-Stanton's suggestion for the anniversary contest already covers #2 fairly well IMHO

frankly, i'm dubious of #1 even though i just suggested

suggested it*

we're a Q&A site, not a "come up with cool stuff" site

Lord_Gareth

Then write that as an answer to the proposal

It's a legitimate stance

Though photography.stack does a contest already

So, ah

Yeah

BESW

@Lord_Gareth Cálmate.

@ObliviousSage It's a morale thing, a site cohesion device.

Lord_Gareth

Don't you speak your grammatically-correct, perfectly comprehensible Spanish at me! I find the fact that I understand you to be offensive!

[sees self out for horrible joke]

Oblivious Sage

i'm more impressed that he managed to get the accent on the "a"

BESW

The idea is to run up a little narrow-scope contest to see if anyone salutes, and if other people have ideas for improving it or want to propose contests for other systems, that'll happen organically.

If it fizzles, it fizzles. Your idea that it's inappropriate for the site is a good answer, because that's part of the dialogue that should really be out in the open.

Lord_Gareth

12:57 AM

Which is what I just said but with less irritation.

Incidentally, Jon Lajoie just became the only rapper I like. He's a parody rapper

BESW

@Lord_Gareth You need to edit in examples like that. The lack of them is why KRyan wasn't posting it yet.

@ObliviousSage [bow and a flourish]

Lord_Gareth

@BESW I was going to earlier and then homework

And right now school >.<

Speaking of

Class nao

BESW

Ta.

I do think "design stuff for me" sounds like deliberately missing the point, or at least not assuming good faith.

Oblivious Sage

@BESW: edited, for you

BESW

Aw, thanks. [grin] People will take your (very important) point more seriously if it's not buried under hyperbole. Don't set yourself up for straw man offenses; people will do that just fine for you.

Oblivious Sage

1:12 AM

but i like straw men

theyre so flammable

BESW

I know, and it's so shiny when they go up.

BESW

1:50 AM

@Lord_Gareth I do think you should consider putting together a "Why this is good for the site" memo.

BESW

3:11 AM

What's the effective bonus value of being able to roll 2d20 and taking the highest result, compared to rolling 1d20?

Brian Ballsun-Stanton

+5

4.8ish

Magician

depends on target number +5ish when target is 11

less if you move away

BESW

I'm comparing [two players rolling separately to achieve a task] to [one player rolling and the other providing a +2 bonus to the roll].

Magician

the dreaded Aid Another, eh

BESW

Aye.

If Aid Another is demonstrably worse than individual rolls, it becomes useless in most situations.

Magician

3:15 AM

i should actually go to work at some point. like now. back in an hour.

yes

BESW

Ta.

Magician

4:27 AM

Aid Another is full of stupid edge cases. I think "add +2 to the best result for each helper" would fix most problems, though. Because nothing's more annoying than having a helper roll 20 while main actor rolls 1.

BESW

That's actually an excellent choice; based on Brian's maths it would give roughly +7.

I'd probably drop it to +1 per helper unless only trained rolls can be used for the base.

Magician

that's assuming both actors are equally competent and aim for 11. which makes it almost guaranteed.

BESW

Why is 11 important? All numbers are equally likely to roll up, aren't they?

[I'm not a stats guy. Can you tell?]

Magician

let me see if i can find a link with graphs ;)

rolesrules.blogspot.com.au/2012/05/d-next-disadvantage.html

BESW

Hum.

Lord_Gareth

4:36 AM

@BESW I'm having a hard time understanding why hosting a contest for critique, peer-review, entertainment and sportsmanship needs to be necessary, but I have some free time tomorrow

I'll rip into that

BESW

@Lord_Gareth [/devilsadvocate] Because it's work for the mods, distracts from the site's focus, and the resources and energy of all involved could be better channeled into the unique services provided by SE rather than spending them on replicating something other sites already provide? [/enddevilsadvocate]

Just because something isn't bad doesn't mean that the resources dedicated to it couldn't be better used on another endeavor.

Lord_Gareth

[Satan incarnate] Brian volunteered. His soul is mine already. [/bwahahahaha]

BESW

Personally, I suspect that a properly formed contest might be good for site cohesion and morale, but I can't back that up.

You need to talk to other SE sites with similar programs and get their learning.

And there are definitely people who feel that something as abstract and unquantifiable as "cohesion" isn't worth the effort and resources.

Lord_Gareth

[Points at the corpse-strewn battlefields of the 3.X questions] I think we could use some cohesion.

Magician

There's no cohesion in 3.x discussions because there's no cohesion in 3.x ;).

Lord_Gareth

4:42 AM

Silence you!

>.>

BESW

@Lord_Gareth People like MartinSojka, who see any such contest as a form of Skinner box, are unlikely to be impressed with any social argument you might field.

Lord_Gareth

@BrianBallsun-Stanton So if I wanted to link a funny song with NSFW content (extreme vulgarity) would such a thing be okay as long as I tagged it as such?

@BESW - What the what box what now?

Brian Ballsun-Stanton

@Lord_Gareth No, thanks.

BESW

@Lord_Gareth Behavior modification through stimulus.

Brian Ballsun-Stanton

@Lord_Gareth Are you absolutely sure you want to state that?

Lord_Gareth

4:45 AM

@BrianBallsun-Stanton The bit where I claim to be Satan, the bit where I claim to own your soul, or the evil laughter?

BESW

@BrianBallsun-Stanton I think you mean, is he sure he wants it?

Brian Ballsun-Stanton

@Lord_Gareth Any of the above, really.

@BESW That begs the question of the first part.

BESW

@BrianBallsun-Stanton Yes, but it's more rhetorically ominous.

Lord_Gareth

@BrianBallsun-Stanton Well if my high school English career is anything to go by (to wit: I had to read every villain part aloud, including Satan in Paradise Lost) I'm already at least a third of the way there

Brian Ballsun-Stanton

@Lord_Gareth uh huh.

Whee, just formally named in a grant.

mind you, not as a PI, but..

BESW

4:48 AM

@BrianBallsun-Stanton Is this the Great and Terrible Grant of Exile?

Brian Ballsun-Stanton

ayep

BESW

Grats?

Brian Ballsun-Stanton

not really

being named as a non-administrative member means I've got responsibility for editing the thing...

... end of list?

BESW

That's a pretty darn big list already.

Bah. Why does every program I use need a different set of keystrokes to move from one file to the next?

I keep going to switch files and get the Cyan channel instead.

Novian

5:12 AM

theoretically if one could execute a move action and a full attack action in the same turn could one combine the soulknife's Bladewind and Knife to the soul abilities?

just looking at the long list of 3.5 classes i have never looked at.

and it struck me that there are ways to do that.

BESW

I'll let Medic handle my response.

Novian

stupid and cumberous ways but ways nonetheless.

I dont even know why soulknife is called a Psionic class, its barely psionic at all.

also Lurk is weird.

hmm my KRyan Sense went off. he isnt here. weird.

Martin Sojka

6:04 AM

@BESW Actually, just the "participate here for this swag!!!" part of it. If the list/description of the prices is longer and more prominent than the contest rules itself, it's an instant turn-off. :)

BESW

@MartinSojka Ah, I guess I didn't pick up on that, as I don't really see it in this proposal. Do you?

BESW

6:41 AM

Damnit, Netflix. You're taking all my guilty pleasure films off streaming. Now what am I supposed to have in the background while I work?

Martin Sojka

7:41 AM

I was wondering ... could a question about how to design a specific location (say, a haunted castle, an old ruined factory building where some squatters live now, or a crashed multi-generation spaceship) made to work in the format of this site?

BESW

Yes.

Try using this as a starting reference:

7

Q: Guards for a Raven Queen Temple

I have a party of four 3rd level adventurers. They will be breaking into a temple dedicated to the worship of the Raven Queen. There will be a ritual taking place in the sublevels of the temple. I am wanting the party to encounter some defensive constructs or mobs before they reach the ritual....

Narrow scope, context-specific, single element, known variables.

Martin Sojka

My (slight) problem here is that for a game location, I need to consider at least three angles: Verisimilitude, to make sure the place makes sense in respect to both its stated history and current usage; Functionality, to make sure it isn't just a piece of scenery but actually limits some possibilities and allows others in some interesting (and if possible game-mechanically significant) ways; Inhabitation (or rather, ecosystem), ...

Brian Ballsun-Stanton

@MartinSojka so this is sounding like a fiction question

is this best answered on this stack?

Martin Sojka

... from rather mundane (like vicious little fleas transferring diseases), intelligent (the squatters) to ghosts and rogue AIs and whatnot.

That's the thing; the first one (Verisimilitude) should fit on Writers.SE as well if I understood it correctly; so could the third one (Inhabitation), in parts - though the goal here is to have an ecosystem which is in some ways interesting for an interactive environment, not one which makes for good non-interactive story.

The more I think about it, the more it seems like there's three different kinds of questions. :)

Brian Ballsun-Stanton

yeaap

is there an RPG specific question as part of all of that?

Martin Sojka

7:59 AM

The "Functionality" part of it, I think. What's to do with the location to make it more than a piece of scenery? Which game-mechanical elements to attach to it to fit its theme? I'm thinking of a checklist like "slanted and partially broken floors on the space ship make for bad footing, unless used with magnetic boots, which they are designed for; hand rails everywhere to help in zero-G can be used for climbing; ..." and so on.

Brian Ballsun-Stanton

@MartinSojka oookay. So when you have the space designed, ask that question here.

Martin Sojka

If only my design process wasn't all over the place in terms of which part of the location I'm working on ... :D Oh well, that's part of the motivation here, to bring a bit of structure into the whole mess. I can't improvise everything. ;)

Undreren

8:21 AM

I'm almost done reading through Apocalypse World now. Downloaded it the other day. I thought it was a nice idea, since my all-time favorite rpg, Dungeon World, is a hack on it.

So far I like it, but I'm not very fond of the sexual undertones in "adult rpg's" such as this.

I simply don't find it interesting

I don't see the "necessity" of adding "sex moves". Can anyone explain to me why they are even there? Is this something that was added to attract a mid-puberty audience?

Martin Sojka

What's the theme of the game?

Rob

@MartinSojka Take a few example walk throughs in your mind of the location, that should prep some questions that players are likely to ask.

Undreren

@MartinSojka Is this a response to my question?

Martin Sojka

@Rob That's the thing ... I'm looking more for a believable and interesting location, built from the ground up, else I'd be just improvising on the spot. Some things are easy for me (How does a medieval castle ruin look and work? Easy, I have several in the walking distance from my home), but others (How does a typical US household look like? A modern rural Chinese village?) ... less so.

@Undreren Well, kinda. Reading up on Apocalypse World now. Depending on the theme, sex might actually be an important element.

Rob

Believability stretches as far as your players are familiar with the genre ;)

Martin Sojka

8:36 AM

I don't necessarily know what my players are familiar with.

Undreren

@MartinSojka Well, it reads to my like a "surreal post-apocalyptic action survival" storytelling game

But all classes have a sex move that gives some sort of bonus

like the hardholder; every time he "gets some", the "reciever" gains gifts worth 1-barter, at no cost to the hardholder

Some of the sex moves grants mutual benefits, which I think is a little disturbing, since it encourages players to breed like frickin' bunnies

Martin Sojka

@Undreren Then I've got nothing. The "sex moves" seem as valid (or silly) as "eat moves" (bonus after you ate something), "dump moves" (bonus after you took a good dump), "sleep moves" (bonus after you got a good night's sleep) and moves for any other basic and necessary activities.

Undreren

I do not consider "sex" a necessary nor basic activity.

Martin Sojka

But maybe that's just a simulationist's point of view and it isn't valid for the type of game AW strives to be. :D

Undreren

At least not in RPG's

Martin Sojka

8:44 AM

@Undreren It's necessary for survival (of the species).

Undreren

true

But very few RPG's have actions tied down to "making your species survive" ;)

Martin Sojka

So basically, the bottom layer here.

Undreren

My wife is studying psycology

Markov's pyramid is generally perceived as an invalid theory

Martin Sojka

Maslow's

Undreren

My bad

Mix them up often because of Markov Chains ;)

Martin Sojka

8:48 AM

I figured as much. :)

Anyway, I don't care much of his ordering of the upper layer - or choice of a pyramid as the structure - but the basic needs at the bottom are pretty basic, if not necessarily of the same weight relative to each other.

Undreren

However, you are correct. In a post-apocalyptic world, the most common recreational activity might very well be "repopulating the planet".

Martin Sojka

This also means there should be a lot of kids around (... with lousy survival rates, potentially). Again, not necessarily the tone the game strives to have.

Undreren

Yeah. In fact, the game states there is a profound lack of children

I don't know if the Psychic Maelstrom has rendered a lot of people sterile

I want to play the game, though

It seems great

I like how they handle damage, and how you time events with the count down clocks

It's a great post-apocalypse themed sandbox game

Anyone up for playing some Dungeon World via Google Hangouts at some point in the future? :)

BESW

11:38 AM

@MartinSojka Ah, yeah. It's a process that I've spent a lot of thought on, and really it comes down to "noodle around a lot, play to your strengths, then rip out everything you can't make related to the campaign at least tangentially."

@Rob Hoi.

Martin Sojka

12:09 PM

@BESW It's kinda hard to change things as based on a campaign when you don't have one - not even an adventure, just a point of interest the PCs might or might not approach some indeterminate time in the future, depending on how the decide to deal with their problems and goals.

BESW

@MartinSojka Heh, that's where I usually start.

I build elaborate worlds for the party to roll through like wrecking balls.

(Makes my transition to FATE GMing kinda rough, though.)

BESW

12:31 PM

Hmm. I need a Net-Nanny style whitelist program.

wax eagle

@BESW we use barracuda here, and it's....not horrible?

BESW

It's for personal use; I need to set up my dad's computer so that he can watch hulu but can't do much else.

(His judgement is going, and letting him roam free on the Internet is an increasingly bad idea.)

wax eagle

@BESW ah...hmm chrome has a whitelist extension you could try

BESW

Hrm. Windows 7's parental controls don't do what I want, but they do provide a "restrict programs that can be launched" feature.

wax eagle

firefox also has a whitelist extension. checking IE now

BESW

12:37 PM

Could I use that to prevent IE launching without having Windows freak out like it does if you delete it?

wax eagle

@BESW on windows 7? probably

previous editions of windows? likely total freakout

BESW

I have very limited experience with Win7; just using it to teach programs at my job.

wax eagle

@BESW it's a solid entry to the market

BESW

I haven't used Windows as a main operating system since XP and Win2k were the hot stuff.

wax eagle

@BESW had it work for several years now, I like it a lot.

(but I also like Windows 8 so my opinion might be untrustworthy)

no whitelist extension for IE :(

BESW

12:41 PM

....the first Chrome whitelist extension I found works on the assumption that the person is too dumb to figure out how to disable extensions.

I'm afraid this is going to be a pattern.

wax eagle

@BESW yes, i would assume that this would be the case across the board :(

BESW

I need something a bit more robust. My dad's not stupid about computers, when his brain's in gear.

Martin Sojka

@waxeagle What about IE's kiosk mode ?

wax eagle

@MartinSojka hard to get out of, not user friendly

BESW

He's from the "computers are like tinker toys" era, and is used to having an open tower with the guts sprawled across various surfaces.

But now he's at the point where he can't always tell if something's dangerous to click on, or legit.

wax eagle

12:43 PM

@MartinSojka and I don't think it locks to a single website

BESW

...and yet on most days he can reformat a drive through the BIOS and reinstall the OS from the ground up.

Brains are weird.

Martin Sojka

@waxeagle Not directly, no. It disables the location bar though (if I remember correctly) and you can pre-set everything you don't want anyone to use into the "everything's restricted" security zone to be sure no scripts or similar are executed (no clue if you can prevent page loading though).

BESW

...is it petty of me to automatically dislike any security-program site that requires cookies and/or scripts to be marginally functional?

wax eagle

@MartinSojka also not sure it's supported in IE 8/9

@BESW definitely

checking on windows 7 parental controls web filtering. It exists, just not sure how to make ti work

BESW

windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows7/… doesn't mention it.

Martin Sojka

12:47 PM

@waxeagle I just tested it in IE 8, and it works. You just have full screen IE mode without any bars, not even location bar. You can end it with Alt+F4 obviously.

wax eagle

@BESW grr it was in vista, but not 7 :(

windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows7/…

BESW

On an entirely different note, I chuckled at this but I don't think any of my friends would get the reference.

wax eagle

they moved it to windows live essentials

Martin Sojka

Well, dropping a small script to execute "iexplore -k hulu.com" on startup should be fine. Make it an auto-restart service if you want to be extra annoying. :)

BESW

mmm. The goal is to create a system my dad can use for Hulu/Netflix type stuff, and has relatively full non-Internet-related functionality, but which he can't hack around to get into the Internet.

Martin Sojka

12:54 PM

...

BESW

The new computer won't have a disc drive, just USB ports, so that'll limit his ability to just boot off an install disk.

Martin Sojka

You probably want a configurable router then. :)

Install disks work just fine off USB drives.

BESW

@MartinSojka This is where I start raging about my ISP and how abysmally stupid they are.

wax eagle

@BESW hard drive? or just live boot every time?

BESW

@MartinSojka If he had an install disk on a USB drive, that'd be relephant. All his boot disks are CDs.

@waxeagle Hard drive. It's an Asus eeeBox.

wax eagle

12:56 PM

@BESW gotcha.

Martin Sojka

@BESW Those are cute. My dad got one from me too, so he can play online games, talk on Skype with friends and watch porn without messing up other's computers.

BESW

My mother loved her tiny little EEE laptop (back when they only sold them with the Linux OS), but it died a sad death: something on the motherboard stopped being able to register battery life, and none of the techs we could get it to here or in the mainland had any idea what to do with an EEE.

They'd look like we'd asked a body shop to reupholster a couch.

The really sad thing is, tinkering with his Frankenputer tower is one of the only manually dextrous, intellectually stimulating things my dad does these days.

But it's reached the point where it's just not reasonable for him to be online, and Frankenputer is dying a slow, lingering death, so we're taking the opportunity to give him a closed-case computer and install controls on it.

(He now thinks browser-based services that evaluate your hardware or do a virus scan on your system are safe, so long as you use the ones that have their own web pages. "Because that way if someone hacks their site, they'll know quickly.")

wax eagle

@BESW disabling IE solves half the problem right there :P

active X has way way way too much power

BESW

@waxeagle Heh.

He likes firefox.

wax eagle

@BESW cool. Check out those windows live essentials extension of parental controls, I think that might be the solution, it's got web filtering

BESW

1:06 PM

What's the protection on the controls themselves?

'cause that seems to be the sticking point for most of the services I've seen.

wax eagle

@BESW that one would be integrated into the windows parental controls settings, so probably a password to get admin rights

BESW

I mean, idiot-proofing something is only useful until they build a better idiot, but building a control system that only works on the ignorant is an unfortunately common blunder.

wax eagle

@BESW I don't get that impression here, (though it's still an MS product so...)

BESW

Like I said, I haven't used Windows for a long time.

But I do teach the newer versions of MS Word. [spite]

wax eagle

@BESW blech word. I haven't used it for a personal document in ages, and I don't do much document composition for work.

BESW

1:12 PM

@waxeagle I have it because my clients give me document layouts using it.

wax eagle

@BESW makes sense

BESW

@waxeagle No. I once got a piece that used combinations of auto-formatted tabs, manual tabs, manual tab stop, and spaces to control the white space on each line.

wax eagle

@BESW head. desk. and I don't even know layout :P

BESW

I dunno, maybe they hid whitespace code in it and I didn't notice?

wax eagle

@BESW you mean bf?

BESW

1:19 PM

@waxeagle Mebbee.

Aether

As I understand, Whitespace uses the same syntax as BF, but using spaces and tabs instead of + and -.

BESW

At least most of them are just giving me the content in Word, and I can do my own work in InDesign. I've only ever had one client who needed me to do the entire layout in Word from start to finish.

If anyone ever wants me to do that again...

wax eagle

@Aether gotcha, forgot that bf and whitespace were different :)

BESW

1:51 PM

@MartinSojka If you ever want to talk out your worldbuilding, I've been known to provide a sounding board and input.

Martin Sojka

@BESW Mostly, I'm thinking about how to utilise this site to both help me and provide useful content for others with similar goals.

BESW

@MartinSojka I assume you've seen Hobbs' question

25

Q: What are the key considerations to creating compelling environments?

An area I am close to revealing to my players was barren rock, until I realised adding a few kinds of plants and some crystal spires (which have very good reason to be there) took the location from dull to intriguing in the space of half an hour. It occurs to me that adding plants and (possibly)...

world-building

Martin Sojka

@BESW That and a few more here. Alas, my idea sets for a lower if more practical (I hope) goal: A series of useful things to consider when all you start with is a few keywords ("haunted castle", "factory ruin, squatters", "huge crashed spaceship") and your goal is to have a location with some three to ten pages worth of relevant details.

BESW

Ah, now that is a phrasing I could chew on.

I'm actually working on something like that for my FATE campaign: to replace my usual detailed worldbuilding, I want a selection of questions I can ask my players in the middle of the session when we get a new location or NPC, so they can flesh it out instead of me having it prepped beforehand.

Martin Sojka

So ... "How do I create a haunted castle?" kind of question, then "How do I create a factory ruin with squatters?", ...

BESW

2:06 PM

No, don't phrase it like that.

Too specific.

The really valuable thing is if such things can be distilled and generalized.

Martin Sojka

Ok, maybe more of "What belongs in a haunted castle?", then. :D

BESW

Who built it? Why is it in this location? What was its original purpose?

These are questions that will apply to nearly any setting location (generalized) but focus your thinking into specific channels.

Martin Sojka

The generalised part is here that you can apply it to any kind of setting (or game rules set) by just deciding which of the info doesn't matter and skipping that one.

BESW

I don't think you can ask for "features of a haunted castle" without it being an open-ended list question.

Martin Sojka

So, it's a castle, so it needs nearby food sources, some reason to be there (guarding a trade route, territory control usually), someone powerful and known has to have built it so their banners and symbols should still be visible somewhere, and their history researchable if any civilisation is left in the area. It could potentially have some damage from sieges, and one such is a good choice for the reason of the haunting.

... and so on.

It has a keep, some kind of water source (possibly dried up by now), cellar(s), stables, ...

And yes, the result is a list of things which you need to think about for building that location as well as how those fit together.

BESW

2:12 PM

And the list has no clear end.

Martin Sojka

Thus ... not sure if I can make it work in the format of this site.

BESW

I can talk about the filled double-wall architecture providing ample scope for hidden passages, the use of right-rising spiral staircases to block invaders' sword arms...

And since it's a haunted castle, we get all the Scooby Doo tropes to talk about.

Novian

Hallways for wacky chase scenes.

Hallways with weird physics

Martin Sojka

It's helpful to have a checklist, even for things known. It's even more helpful when I try to design something I have only the vaguest idea about. How would a Midwestern town/settlement of about 1000 to 3000 people in the USA look like? I know what they look like over here in Europe ... but I have the feeling just copy & pasting them over will look silly at best.

BESW

Billowing tattered curtains, improbable cobwebs, unexpectedly oiled suits of armor...

@MartinSojka I getcha. How about asking for references to such lists?

Novian

2:22 PM

a mayor or butler who is most decidedly at fault

Martin Sojka

@BESW That would make the answers (likely) less wordy and list-like, but would have the downside of not concentrating the knowledge on this site. Well, aside from references to printed material which you can't just copy here verbatim anyway, like AD&D's World Builder's Guidebook or Rolemaster's Castles & Ruins. :D

BESW

I don't know of any other way to ask the question in a site-appropriate manner. Maybe make this a meta question?

Martin Sojka

Still thinking about it. I dislike asking too detailed and narrowly-scoped questions (like "Why does a ghost of a small peasant girl haunt the castle?"), because at some point they tend to miss the "big picture" I like to keep in mind at all times. Like the "Guards for a Raven Queen Temple" question linked earlier - magical construct and summons need someone to construct and summon them; human guards need a place they come from, families (or something replacing them) and supply and logistics.

Casters will have to be present if they are part of the cult; or they can be found and drilled for intel if they were just doing work for hire. Supply chains can be broken or manipulated; family members used against the guards. And so on.

BESW

2:43 PM

Unfortunately, D&D magic negates just about all of that.

Guards are teleported in from their homes hundreds of miles away, or kept in magical stasis until intruders are detected by the permanent magic spells cast by someone long dead.

D&D magic basically turns logistics into an exercise in creative abuse of power.

Martin Sojka

I prefer to go rather system-agnostic and low-key, so I can use nearly the same location for Ars Magica, GURPS: Middle Ages and 7th Sea. :)

BESW

Supply chains are trumped by wands of conjure food and drink.

@MartinSojka Well, that opens the listyness of the question up even more.

I'd love to see answers to a question like yours, and it's the kind of thing I'd blog about if I were a bloggy person.

But I'm failing miserably at imagining a suitable frame to make it siteworthy.

KRyan

what's the question?

BESW

45 mins ago, by Martin Sojka

@BESW That and a few more here. Alas, my idea sets for a lower if more practical (I hope) goal: A series of useful things to consider when all you start with is a few keywords ("haunted castle", "factory ruin, squatters", "huge crashed spaceship") and your goal is to have a location with some three to ten pages worth of relevant details.

He wants to ask a set of questions that basically boil down to "What should I consider when worldbuilding an X?"

@MartinSojka tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/HauntedCastle

KRyan

ah

Martin Sojka

2:52 PM

Problem is, I want locations, not stories. Stories happen when the PCs do something. :)

BESW

Yes, but RPG locations need to be built for stories.

So looking at stories and back-engineering is a valuable pastime for RPG worldbuilders.

Martin Sojka

sigh

Maybe I'll start small. Let's see.

BESW

And don't try the spaceship example. That'll run the gamut from Lexx to the TARDIS, with stops at the Death Star and a goa'uld mother ship.

Martin Sojka

No, by "small" I mean "from the bottom up"; concentrating on details of the location. :D

BESW

Usually I start with the kind of experience I want the place to enable, or a person/group that defines the place--or is defined by it.

Then I spin out from there until I have a lot of possibly-contradictory material, and hack away whatever can't or shouldn't fit.

Anyway, bed now.

MadMAxJr

3:11 PM

Ever hit that point with a game where you realize you might have to kill the current story to prevent the party from eating itself alive, resulting in no more group?

Martin Sojka

Rocks fall. Everybody wakes up from coma three weeks later. Just in time for their commanding officers to congratulate them on a job well done and hand them their well-deserved medals.

mxyzplk

3:43 PM

@MartinSojka Yeah closed that one for too localized - discussing more here and maybe a meta Q might help determine how best to address this need.

Martin Sojka

@mxyzplk: You know, we have a lot of question which have no correct answer. :)

wax eagle

@MartinSojka honestly, that's a question about writing fiction as much as it is about RPG.

Martin Sojka

We have a rule for system-recommendation in place, which basically states only to write down answers which you can back up by personal experience. Could the inclusion of such a clause help to make the question generate better answers?

@waxeagle Well ... that's why I made sure to include game-related stuff as a major part of the question. The goal is still to create a location - without a priori assuming anything about how the protagonists will deal with it, just with enough details for the GM to be able to handle most simple questions and have a solid and logical framework to build upon where the need for improvisation arises.

wax eagle

@MartinSojka I don't think so. You've got two problems. The first is a lack of specificity. You're asking for pure speculation on the motivations of a ghost, something that's not necessarily answerable (even with a subjective bent, because nearly anything is a right answer). The second is in my opinion a lack of a direct connection to RPG play. I understand that world building is an important part, but tbh, this question could be asked on a site for short story writers with one change.

@MartinSojka in that case, the question is in fact too specific. The question here would ask for the techniques for doing that instead of the specifics of the situation. does that make sense?

Martin Sojka

4:02 PM

@waxeagle I'm not sure. It's the specifics which I'm after, after all - specifics and details which I (and anyone else) can quickly reference whenever I want to create a castle haunted by a small peasant girl. Specifics - a multitude of them - which usually takes a lot of time to think about and write down to make sure they make sense in the context.

See as an example this question:

13

Q: Why would I hire you?

I'm designing a D&D 4E campaign (set in the Forgotten Realms) for my local gaming society, which may or may not spill out into bigger things, rpg.se has given me too many ideas! I want the party to be hired by a noble house or government agency (in Faerun) to investigate the new continent 'Retu...

gm-techniques system-agnostic faerun

We have here, similarly, a situation and the need for an explanation how this came to be which makes sense.

Zachiel

I suppose most of D&D hooks start with someone hiring heroes. A ghost in a castle is too game-specific to me

However, system-agnostic clashes with faerun

Martin Sojka

@Zachiel I'm not sure how that's "game-specific"; haunted castles (and houses) are a staple of fairy tales and modern fantasy.

Zachiel

but haunted castles in faerun are a D&D thing

or you don't need the answer to talk about faerun, so you don't need the faerun tag

Martin Sojka

My question doesn't have that tag. :)

1

Q: Why does the ghost of a small peasant girl haunt the castle?

There's your typical fantasy or medieval castle, complete with some lord or lady owning it, his or her castellan to deal with the daily business needs while they are busy doing their lordly and ladylike things, an assortment of servants and guards, the local sage, castle wizard and/or priest to d...

system-agnostic world-building

Zachiel

4:18 PM

oh sorry. I meant hired heroes in faerun are a D&D thing

and it's not you you but an impersonal you rferred to pureferret's post

Martin Sojka

Given that none of the answers mention Faerun or the D&D rule set in more than passing, I think the question doesn't need the tag either.

wax eagle

@MartinSojka that question was controversial. rpg.stackexchange.com/questions/11327/…

Phil

Gah that new sci-fi question is frustrating

It's already got a million and five comments and the number is still going up

Martin Sojka

@waxeagle I'm more concerned with being useful and working within the framework of the site; or the absence thereof.

wax eagle

@Phil yeah, there are no requirements, vtc

Phil

4:27 PM

Imo, there simply isn't enough in the question for a sys-rec to be able to sensibly answer it

wax eagle

@Phil we need to get you that last 150 rep

Novian

hmm been looking at some 3.5 classes and found factotum. and it is far from faultless.

Phil

What frustrates me the most is that people are still trying to answer it, sometimes people with silly high rep who really should know better

wax eagle

@Phil one of those people will answer anything

Phil

@waxeagle Heh, well I don't know the other users on the site well enough to be able to comment on that :op

My problem with getting rep is that my knowledge is very narrow, having only really played Savage Worlds to any great extent. It means I can answer those questions, but I usually go to the official forums if I have anything to ask.

wax eagle

4:30 PM

@Phil ask them here and there

Phil

@waxeagle Hmm.....never really thought of that. For some reason it doesn't quite feel right

wax eagle

@Phil ask the questino in both places. if you get a good answer over there, come back here and post a good answer based on what you learned (giving credit to answer there obviously)

@MartinSojka so narrow your requirements. Why does it matter why the ghost is there? What mechanical effect will the motivations have? tell us why it matters

and be specific to gaming

Martin Sojka

Speaking of questions I'd rather have asked elsewhere, it seems we don't have enough experts on Faerun to answer even such seemingly simple as my previous one ...

9

Q: What's an appropriate gift for a Faerûnian Dwarven girl?

I have a rough idea what I could give a Human or Elven girl to improve their opinion of me - flowers work pretty well in most cases, maybe one of those crystal flowers for a Drow, though with them an "exotic" (from a Drow's point of view) rose might work even better. However, I'm at a loss what w...

roleplaying faerun

... which is kinda sad, since the player that wanted to play that Dwarf died in December.

Novian

a gift for a faerunian dwarf girl?

hmm.

wax eagle

@MartinSojka :( sad to hear that.

Novian

4:36 PM

as with any female of any race it merely depends on the individual. Dwarf women can like just about anything from chocolate to finely crafted wooden statues.

Martin Sojka

@waxeagle It matters because I don't know what the PCs will do if they decide to investigate or deal with the ghost. It's the same why I like to have town maps of the towns the PCs are likely to visit; I don't know what they want to do there, so having that framework helps.

Novian

though dwarves as a whole are predisposed tword alcohol

@MartinSojka sad indeed.

Martin Sojka

@Novian I was hoping there would be an actual official statement (or at least a quote from a book) about courting rituals of the dwarves, given the amount of material produced for the setting.

Novian

@MartinSojka Not to my knowledge.

wax eagle

@MartinSojka ok, so let's talk general case. What's a good question for developing a map for a town? "Where do I place temples in a town?" maybe, but again, why does that matter. "What kind of quest givers should be in a town?" any one you want. "how do I develop a profile of a town leader?" still not sure

how do we develop a good question, that specific enough to meet your needs, but general enough to be useful to someone else who happens by?

that's a good meta question right there

Zachiel

4:41 PM

@Novian the problem with Factotum being?

Martin Sojka

@waxeagle Town map? For example, "Which industry you'd find in an about 13th-century European town of 2000 or so inhabitants located on a major trading river?"

The Oracle

1

Q: What to do with questions that will have a different answer each year?

There are some questions on good tablet/smartphone apps/sites/resources for GMing and playing. They are, unfortunately, years old, and I am sure that there have been and will be new releases and updates that improve on the current crop and provide new options for GMs and players of different syst...

discussion

1

Q: Are RPG tool support questions on topic?

I'm keen to use RPGwithme.com and it seems to require a character import from HeroLab or similar. Would questions on how to use tools like this be on-topic?

discussion on-topic

Zachiel

@MartinSojka ask history.se

wax eagle

@MartinSojka we have some of those, and they're awful I'd like to see them all closed as OT.

Martin Sojka

@Zachiel Thus why I added magics and fantasy and a ghost into the equation.

@waxeagle Questions like this is where I spend more than 90% of my time preparing scenarios for my games. How are they OT?

wax eagle

4:45 PM

@MartinSojka becuase they aren't typically directly related to the game and game play. The question to ask is, what specific information will an expert in RPGs be able to provide that an expert in history cannot? In the case of that example, the answer is "very little"

Zachiel

@waxeagle Just like the influence of halflings in Silverymoon's economy.

Martin Sojka

@waxeagle Oh, that's easy. An expert in RPGs can provide an insight into how to incorporate those elements into the game and how to model the influence of external, unpredictable agents (the PCs) on the situation.

wax eagle

@MartinSojka right, but you're not asking that.

Martin Sojka

@waxeagle I do. Probably not clearly enough. :)

wax eagle

do the historical research first then ask how the incorporation into the game works.

say, I've got a town of 2000 folks, I know it has xy and z in it. What external agents would be at play when my world looks like A, B or C. What external influences should be at play that I haven't thought of etc.

so in your ghost question, figure out the motivations of the ghost, and then ask about the game effects/consequences of the specific motivation.

Martin Sojka

4:51 PM

It would be, in the case of the industries, the question of how much it would cost - in terms of an average monthly wage - to buy yourself influence, which restrictions would the guilds typically pose to such, and so on.

wax eagle

@MartinSojka aren't those heavily dependent on your specific setting though?

Martin Sojka

@waxeagle Most settings I saw still require tanners to be located somewhere where they don't stink up the whole town, mills to be situated in a secure distance from any other building for fear of explosions, have detailed info about who is allowed to run banks and issue loans, and are generally leaning heavily on real or romanticised history.

wax eagle

@MartinSojka yes. the problem is determining where history ends and we take over. It's a grey area.

btw there is an extensive background on this topic: meta.rpg.stackexchange.com/q/1604/1084

Martin Sojka

@waxeagle Wouldn't the question be even more localised if I supplied the motivation of the ghost as well?

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