@Ethan but yeah. so you asked what I was researching. A technique to create "born digital" archaeology, integrated analysis, and archival grade repositories.
There are some things I want to do with my life, I want to go to a concert, maybe get in a relationship, learn some formal logic and set theory and combinatorics
On the other hand, RPGs, table top RPGs (the kind we play here) are ... quite a good way of passing the time, and learning patterns of social interaction.
And in terms of making your summer less boring, I'm sure we can help you to find some play by post games (ones that fit your interests) and help out with rules questions.
@BrianBallsun-Stanton Its ok, I will probably study up on some logic and set theory I am finding interest in combinatorics, so I think these will be helpful tools
@Ethan Well, there are some fascinating discussions going on right now on the nature of aging, and the rate of average time-till-death growing. It's decently close to one second per second...
I would like to get a girlfriend or somthing, I here relationships can be enjoyable experiences, although I worry I would have to sacrifice large portions of time from doing other things I enjoy doing
I can discuss Mazlow's hierarchy of needs, I can go into various ethical systems or ways of calculating maximal utility, I can emulate (from the surface anyway) a number of philosophers who could make various and sundry arguments...
So if I was asked, "what should I do with my life?" I'd point at those. While there are other philosophies than Rationality, I suspect that it would most appeal to you.
Since you're a cali native, I would say read the sequences, get involved in that community, and celebrate pure maths.
For future reference, this is a public chat that gets logged by Google's search engine, and we have people with lots of different ages/locations/opinions, so we try to keep things relatively upright here.
I have a player who wants to take Spirit evocation, as an idea, but neither of us are sure practically on what sort of spells it would let him evoke.
What does Spirit Magic let my player's character do? Are there examples?
We're playing a very investigative game, and both combat and non-combat ...
I don't know exactly what they meant by "dress like a dude" but this could equally have been written yesterday (by someone with an old fashioned use of language).
(well, with the "despise religion" thing possibly being an exaggeration)
"Dude is an old term, recognized by multiple generations although potentially with slightly different meanings.[2] From the 1870s to the 1960s, dude primarily meant a person who dressed in an extremely fashion-forward manner (a dandy) or a citified person who was visiting a rural location but stuck out (a city slicker). "
We initially got together to play D&D4, and we go back to it occasionally. Had a good Shadowrun4 campaign and a fun but short Champions6 stint. I talked them into trying Fiasco a couple times, but only about 2/3 of them like it, and one or two hate it.
One guy seems to like doing off-beat, wacky, character-driven stuff. I think he's the easiest sell for Fate. (There's another gal who is similar, but she hasn't played with us in ages.)
That's Alan. I haven't played RPGs with Tony yet, just board games, and all I know about him is that he runs a Seven Seas campaign and has a raunchy sense of humor.
I don't have a good feel for Danhiel either. He's really easy-going though and would probably go along with whatever the group decides.
Tarisa is a very, very casual player. She often watches instead of actually playing. In Shadowrun, she was very happy playing a physical adept modeled loosely after Hit Girl from Kick-Ass. We'd basically get her attention when it was her turn, and then she would cut bad guys into little pieces.
Mike is the tough sell. He likes games with lots of moving parts and crunch. As a GM, he's at the extreme end of the tactical, GM vs players end of the spectrum. He only likes games with clear objectives and victory conditions. He thinks a strategy game isn't worth playing if it takes less than a couple hours to finish.
But he's a reasonable team player, and he will also go along with group consensus if they want to try it. We can occasionally talk him into playing party games like Cards Against Humanity where the points don't matter, but he doesn't enjoy it.
@BESW I have found that most RPG newbies like kicking ass and taking names, especially new female players. Dunno whether my experience is actually typical, but that's typical for me.
The vast majority of female newbies in particular have either gone for “I kill it to death with a big sword and a little magic” or “I turn into a bear and kill it to death”
Most RPGs teach you that casual violence is the best solution to all your in-game problems. This is so well established a part of the vast majority of RPGs that there are entire satire RPGs like Greg Costikyan's Violence and John Tynes' Power Kill dedicated to showcasing the issue. In most RPGs, ...
I have objected to the use of the term "cretin" at rpg.stackechange.com and my objections have been arbitrarily dismissed. Two site moderators (mxyzplk and AceCalhoun) have endorsed the use of the term. Mxyzplk claimed that "there is no Official StackExchange Policy" and added a derogatory Commen...
@BESW I don't tend to distinguish female players as a group, partly because of my experiences. Lots of folks stereotype them as being all about the social elements of the game, but I've found them to be at least as murderous as the boys.
If you hand them a character sheet that contains at best a half-dozen social skills, and the entire rest of the two-plus-page sheet is about combat, "fight things" is what they'll do.
And unless the GM is really actively working to change it, killing things is the best and most efficient means of ending a threat: the GM is encouraged through the DMG and the narrative source material to make any enemy allowed to live into a recurring threat.
@BraddSzonye What kind of problem solving, though? From what I've seen, it's always been about "you and the problem, in a cave, far from anyone who would care."
The three basic elements of old-school D&D are: killing things and taking their stuff (heavy rules), solving puzzles (looser rules), and role-playing (doesn't need rules) – note, that's how I interpret the game design, not how I think RPGs should work.
When they started introducing rules for role-playing challenges, they were often useless because so many people had bought into the idea that you don't use rules for that, you use your judgment and role-playing skill.
Mhm. That's what I mean about discouraging other gamestyles: the further you get from murderhoboism, the less the rules support it. Which means that not being a murderhobo means not doing the things you spent time and effort designing your character to be good at, and equipping him for as he levels up.
So it often came down to: If you can convince the GM of something, you get a bonus that makes the skill trivial. If you can't, you get a penalty that makes it pointless.
I would agree that it discourages game styles for some people
But there's a spectrum of styles, and at the opposite end are folks who think it's the most important part of the game, but that you shouldn't use mechanics for it.
I spent about eight years trying to un-murderhobo D&D 3.5, and the extent that it worked was the extent to which my players were willing to not play D&D with D&D characters. We had to ignore and often actively alter the rules.
IE, D&D does provide rules for, say, social interaction. But hinging the king's favor on a single d20 roll is not a good rule if you want social interaction to be a major part of the game.
@BraddSzonye I'd argue that's because games like D&D have really BAD mechanics for it.
I have a player who wants to take Spirit evocation, as an idea, but neither of us are sure practically on what sort of spells it would let him evoke.
What does Spirit Magic let my player's character do? Are there examples?
We're playing a very investigative game, and both combat and non-combat ...
