TRPG General Chat

Magician

3:10 AM

@BESW have you used ARRPG's Brainstorms much, beyond the test run we've had?

BESW

@Magician Yes, we probably use it every third or fourth session of that campaign.

Magician

Do you find it interferes with whatever underlying mystery you may have set up, if of course you do that? As in, do players often establish facts which contradict what they don't yet know to be true?

Of course, underlying mystery can be adjusted, or everything can be improved, or whatever, but that won't fit well the game I'm preparing for.

BESW

Most of the time I've been able to avoid having an underlying mystery in mind for the things we've brainstormed.

Our very first session, we brainstormed to discover how a scientist disappeared from a heavily secured lab. I had in mind the sort of place he'd turn up in later, but was unattached to the middle bits and my endgame was vague enough that it was very adaptable.

Turns out giant atomic-powered Canadian moles were hired by Russians to burrow in and kidnap him.

A while later Doppelgreener ran a session about infiltrating a cult enclave that was being run by a very peculiar computer intelligence. He prompted us to brainstorm the nature/origin of the computer.

Turns out, it wasn't a computer at all but the preserved brain of Charles Babbage, abandoned in a NASA bunker after he helped with their moon landing maths.

Over the summer we brainstormed to figure out what the unifying factors were between a series of apparently random portals through time and space, hoping that we'd learn something to help us shut them down.

Turns out, they're created by a peculiar combination of crystalline vibrations and electromagnetic fluctuations intersecting with leylines.

Knowing that we were able to change the frequency of the crystal vibrations and the portal closed.

Recently we brainstormed to discover the true nature of an ancient legend about the artefact a powerful being used to control an entire world.

Turns out, it was an AI in charge of the synthetic world's terraforming, weather control, teleportation, and other systems.

(With that last one, I'd been expecting them to decide it was a control room and I was going to spring an AI on them later. They cut me off at the pass and now we're on a mission to revive a dead/sleeping/malfunctioning? AI.)

Magician

3:31 AM

My issue is that Sunless Sea/Fallen London, which is what I'll be running next, is all about mysteries and vague hints. And my players wouldn't want to "make up" the answer to the mystery, or so it seems right now. They like the experience of uncovering the mystery I prepared. But I can still see utility in Brainstorming a solution to a scene. "Here's a weird problem, go deal so you can move on." My fear is that would still results in establishing contradicting facts.

BESW

Truly contradicting facts need to get pointed out as soon as they're suggested, and the player asked to revise them.

It's just part of the shared responsibility for coherent worldbuilding that Fate places on the group.

Magician

How would you handle that, if the contradiction is not something they yet know, without giving away the plot?

BESW

If a contradiction hasn't hit the table yet, then it's not a contradiction; instead it's a rock in the stream that the plot needs to adjust its flow to accommodate.

The brainstorming mechanic requires that the GM be ready to catch curveballs.

You might want to look into the Unwritten mechanic "Investigation."

Magician

I might! But I don't have Unwritten.

BESW

It's somewhat similar to Brainstorming (which Unwritten calls "Deducation") but it's designed to formalise the structure of players asking the GM to tell them about the GM's plot.

> An investigation is a sequence of actions that focus on the process of discovery. As the investigation progresses, your character will discover clues and ask questions in hopes of finding out more information about the situation in front of them.
Leading to the truth is a set of clues: sign-posts lead to information, and that information leads to the truth. You can think of it like a tree: the root of the tree is the truth, and it splits off into branches that end at leaves. The characters start with the leaves of the mystery. From there they follow the branches back to the source.

Magician

3:38 AM

That does sound promising.

BESW

It starts with no rolls, just "Because of who I am and what I know, what do I notice?"

You point at an aspect, skill, or stunt that indicates you'd pick up a basic clue about what's going on, and the GM agrees and tells you the clue.

Then everyone who wants to uses their actions to set up situations where they can ask more questions.

(There's a "discover" action for this.)

They ask more questions, which the GM will answer as appropriate.

William Mariager

Are there any arguments for/against rolling individually or as a group for multi-target effects? Like a damage roll for each target versus a single roll that affects all the same. Personally I prefer the single roll to speed up the game, but I could see multiple rolls being preferred to make it more likely that at least some targets will get hit with a higher value.

BESW

Then they use Create Advantage/Overcome/etc to change the situation so that they have something else to focus discover actions on, and repeat.

@WilliamMariager Context? What system, for starters?

And who's rolling against whom?

William Mariager

Lets say you're playing 3.5 and you're hurling a fireball at a group.

PCs against NPCs

BESW

Generally a group of NPCs is less important and shouldn't have as much "screen time" dedicated to them. In D&D "screen time" roughly equates to "number of times the dice get rolled."

Magician

3:44 AM

@BESW Am I understanding this correctly, that the Discover action is the one where you simply ask what you can make sense of because of an aspect in a situation? And all the other rolls are there to change the situation or create another aspect?

BESW

So if the targets being affected are nameless NPCs, I'm going to go for the efficient choice.

William Mariager

Yeah, that's my logic as well.

Just curious if there's any reason not to. :)

I guess there's a very dramatic effect if you roll max damage on all targets. :P

That's unlikely to happen if you roll individually.

BESW

> The discover action is how a character (and thus a player) learns about the world around them. They may be examining a building, digging through dusty tomes, or talking to people in the know. A successful discover action gives the player a chance to ask the GM a specific number of questions dependent on the outcome.

@WilliamMariager There are two arguments I'm aware of. "Variance begets verisimilitude" and "Rolling lots of dice is fun."

They're both quite opinion-based and it's up to your group to decide if they agree with those statements.

William Mariager

Right. Just a random thought anyway. My group seems content with how we're doing it currently. :)

BESW

@Magician So, yes. You use Discover to ask questions, and other actions to manipulate the situation to justify using various kinds of skills with the Discover action, or to justify asking new questions.

Magician

3:52 AM

Seems like I ought to get Unwritten, then. Unfortunately, DTRPG appears to be down right now.

BESW

It's also got complementary skills like Engineering, Experiment, Research, and Surveying.

Magician

Are those standard skills in Unwritten?

BESW

Yes.

The skills are:

Athletics, Craft, Deceive, Empathy, Engineering, Experiment, Finesse, Intrusion, Medicine, Notice, Provoke, Rapport, Research, Stealth, Surveying, Survival, Will.

Magician

4:07 AM

Does it use modes like ARRPG?

BESW

Mmm, no. It uses the more typical "one skill is +4, two are +3," and so on.

And for aspects it's got the high concept, and four journey aspects, which are drawn from topics like "something you desire above all else," "a belief you hold dear," "an issue you have never resolved" and "a world you have visited which affected you deeply."

Magician

Some of those categories fit Sunless Sea really well. Damn, looks like I'll have to brew up an unholy mix of ARRPG and Unwritten.

BESW

Yes, well, Unwritten is a game about exploring a universe of nigh-infinite weirdness potential from an underground hub city colonised by disparate peoples with conflicting goals.

Magician

Do you remember how much Unwritten costs?

BESW

I got it from a Bundle.

BESW

5:54 AM

I am currently role-playing an intelligent toad NPC that communicates through charades and interpretive dance. #dnd

Tweeted by ksonney on December 29, 2015 at 2:35 AM

trogdor

lol

Shalvenay

6:15 AM

@BESW reminds me of the time I entertained a wolverine with levels in Rogue :)

BESW

8:57 AM

@doppelgreener Check out my Doctor.

trogdor

I guess that must be Legend of Korra Katara

BESW

Well, yeah. I went for best-healer-in-the-world Katara.

trogdor

I only say it that way because I never watched Korra

heck, I didn't technically watch Airbender in its entirety or in order either

I just saw a lot of it out of order

but at least I did watch it

BESW

9:12 AM

I'm reaching the point where my YT reaction lines can have a conversation.

trogdor

lol

almost does seem like it yeah

BESW

"There's a simple explanation for that."

"There is logic in what he says."

"I have no response to that."

doppelgreener

@BESW Heck yes!!

Good choice of Katara.

trogdor

basically I only knew because I assumed it

I may also have seen clips of her?,.. but even then I don't think I actually had it confirmed it was definitely her

doppelgreener

All the clips of an old waterbender with hair-loopies is her.

trogdor

9:21 AM

mk

well that makes sense

I,... am not sure too many other water tribe people had those?

not zero other than her, but it seemed kinda uncommon

or maybe they just didn't show as many water benders as you would think

BESW

In the real world when someone becomes famous, their hairstyle gets copied by thousands of people. In the cartoon world when someone becomes famous, the entire world retroactively removes all evidence that anyone else wore, wears, or will wear their hair that way.

When in Cartoon Rome, don't wear your hair the same as any named character.

trogdor

lol

trogdor

11:42 AM

you know,.. I just remembered that I actually brought Dr Light back only to technically not be playing him because of playing a character who is pretending to be him

if our game was a show this would rapidly be turning into an in joke about how one of the main characters doesn't really get screen time anymore even though he is supposed to be pretty important XD

BESW

Wait, you mean it's not a joke about that?

trogdor

well, maybe it is

but see, I just re- realized this now

it's really weird, cause I had no plans for any of this to happen

I did the thing where he first got lost in time in the spur of the moment

then when he gets replaced by someone pretending to be him, it was at least technically your plan first

even if I did warm up to it later and decide it should be what would happen

I am just more amused than I deserve to be at a joke that should be getting kinda old, I guess XD

trogdor

12:36 PM

and of course, when I earlier played other characters, it was not intended to shove him into the sidelines forever like it seemed to do

William Mariager

I'm surprised that I can't find a question dealing with hiding animated/created undeads when traveling in 3.5/PF. They're bound to raise some eyebrows, depending on the setting, if they simple walk along with the party.

BESW

Full armour?

Seems pretty simple.

William Mariager

12:52 PM

I guess that could work. :P

BESW

See also "my leprous friend with the speech impediment is on pilgrimage to pray for healing."

"Hnrrrr."
"He offers to pray for whatever horrible malady has afflicted your own face."

Ilmari Karonen

1:44 PM

@WilliamMariager Bag of Holding?

Aaron

3:17 PM

@BESW kickstarter.com/projects/1557256029/…

Joshua Aslan Smith

3:39 PM

oh man oh man there is a new SE I did not know about, life = win

Shalvenay

hey there @JoshuaAslanSmith

Joshua Aslan Smith

@aaron will probably be great for PF, I am super leery of any product cross developed fro PF and 4e/5e of D&D while 5e is much closer to PF than 4e is, its still wildly different enough that I find designers make it for PF and then import it into D&D with the exact same sensibilities that dont work

in D&D

@Shalvenay herro

Shalvenay

@JoshuaAslanSmith yeah. PF/3.5e works, PF/later editions probably won't :P

Aaron

It says it is making them completely separate but that is just want it said.

Shalvenay

@JoshuaAslanSmith how have things been going?

Aaron

3:43 PM

Might not be what happens

Miniman

@JoshuaAslanSmith Not sure if sarcasm...[squints]. Oh well, I might sound like an idiot but I'll say it anyway - Code Review has been around for a long time, it just got new art.

Joshua Aslan Smith

@aaron this is just biased by my experience with other 3rd party made for PF and current D&D edition products.

@Miniman @Miniman as in new to me

Miniman

@JoshuaAslanSmith Ah, right. I haven't used it but it seems like it could be super handy.

Joshua Aslan Smith

I haven had a coding problem that I needed eyeballs on in about a year and a half though and back then I asked on Stackoverflow and it got answered without being closed as off topic so I have to assume that it didnt exist back then

right, like I just wrote up this question because I beleive my code is working as intended but I just wanna be sure it doesnt let anything in it shouldnt

0

Q: Regex statement to only validate strings with a set first 3 alphabet characters followed by 7 integers

In short I am trying to create a regular expression that only allows strings that have IVP as the first 3 characters followed by any 7 integers. For example IVP1234567 is a valid string. This is the expression I have written to test it: (IVP)\d{7}(?=\D|$) Will this work successfully?

c# regex

though already getting shfirft in my first comment lol, I have tested it but Im new to regular expressions and want to make sure something I haven thought off isnt going to pass

Miniman

@JoshuaAslanSmith Well, it doesn't parse html, and a regex that doesn't parse html is just not good enough.

Shalvenay

3:51 PM

@Miniman pft.

Joshua Aslan Smith

@Miniman its going to go into a bespoke c# program accessing strings from a sql database table

eimyr

7:23 PM

Anyone would like to comment on a worldbuilding reality check? chat.stackexchange.com/transcript/message/26484778#26484778

Aaron

I don't see anything that would shoot it down. Perhaps issues with online addiction even more due to directly interfacing?

Kinda reminds me of the original idea for the Matrix

Joshua Aslan Smith

@eimyr I am responding

eimyr

7:39 PM

@Aaron I never knew what the original Matrix idea was

Aaron

@eimyr So the idea they went with was harvesting the electricity from the brain. The original idea was they used the human brains as processors to run the matrix.

They thought that idea was too advanced for the common person though and they wouldn't understand so they went with the electricity thing.

eimyr

Yeah, that's pretty much what I imagined.

only the Matrix is not there to control humanity, but instead market demand for large computational tasks

Aidenn

8:13 PM

@eimyr I like it; it is analogous to the popular cyberpunk trope of majority wage-slaves, who are socially accepted but have no real power, and groups of rebellious unwanted people who are outside of the system (presumably with an oligarchy on top that is reaping the rewards of using other people's brain power).

BESW

9:59 PM

I'm sorry, but do people still think The Matrix was an original idea?

It was a fun film, but its elements were as patchwork appropriated from other sources as Lord of the Rings or Equilibrium.

trogdor

10:10 PM

I liked it,... but even as a kid I had already seen other movies where people were stuck in computer/video game worlds

for example

@BESW anyway, I think what he meant was that the first idea the movies had that was discarded before they were finished, was the use of the brain for processing power

not that it was an origional idea from the matrix

that it was the first one they had before they moved on

that's what it looks like he is saying from what I can tell

the word "original" does have multiple uses

or at least 2 different ones

BESW

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nitsua60

11:07 PM

@BESW nice edits in meta

BESW

Mmm. For myself, I've learnt the hard way that a message is more palatable (and less confusing!) when I phrase it in terms of "I" and "we" rather than in "you" and "they."

2

I still usually write in "you" forms on the first draft, but then I try to re-phrase it to become less accusatory and more reflective.

nitsua60

11:58 PM

Yeah, some of these things are a good lesson in the value of being nice vs. the vale of being right.

Transcript for