Hello future people

@JoshuaAslanSmith hey there

how're things going?

@Shalvenay I have arrived.I do apologise for my tardiness. It has been a busy week and a chaotic morning

@Ben YOUR APOLOGY WILL BE ACCEPTED IN BLOOD. PLEASE DISPENSE HERE:

@Ben ACCEPTED

Feeling slightly light headed

it was a big apology

it was a good thing you did that in the RPG.SE room

[casts HEAL!!!]

roll 10d6

roll 9d6

oh ha whoops.

9d6

you heal a below average amount but it's still a lot!

I am feeling better. Thankyou for that

You're welcome! I am a bit rusty at this but I am glad I still have the stuff.

;)

You on holidays yet?

Still a couple more weeks to go

Same. Looking forward to it though!

Me too. This'll be the first strictly-relaxation leave I've had from work this whole year.

@Ben hey there :) so...you want to do that character-on-character thing still?

Give me 5 minutes while I hang my second load of washing, then we can get into it :)

In the meantime, you ca level up Jherala to level 5, because my Fighter is at level 5

@Ben already done, although brb

back

Alright, so shall we move over to a more appropriate room?

@Shalvenay are you and Ben doing the pvp you mentioned?

@nitsua60 yup

@Shalvenay mind if i kibitz?

@nitsua60 hehe :) sure

Today on Things My Exalted Group Tried to Talk to Instead of Kill: parasitic hivemind wasps.

@Pixie :p depends on what those wasps are parasites of

@Shalvenay Humans. (We're trying to get them to be parasites of other things.)

heh

it sounds like a grey elf ranger could have way too much fun with them....:P

I was like, "I think by now [GM] knows we will try to talk to ANYTHING." He responded, "You expect too much of me. xD I was like, 'Bugs? I can probably get away with that.'"

(My character is also currently a raven, but she's able to magically communicate her point regardless of the form she's in, so confused onlookers were watching some random guy talking seriously to bugs they would normally burn on sight while a bird flies around him cawing and flapping and somehow totally enriching the conversation.)

@Shalvenay How's that? :o

@Pixie grey elves hate humans

Ahh.

Plot twist: the thing you convince them to be a parasite of instead come to have a word with you

Plot twist: since they're not longer parasites on humans, humans breed out of balance, destroying the world in a couple of generations.

@doppelgreener Cows or other cattle are the goal here, but given the setting..? NOT IMPOSSIBLE.

I've been running a campaign out of a book (Eyes of the Stone Thief for 13th Age) for the first time in a very long while. It's interesting, how it changes the way I approach encounters. I don't mind at all if PCs find a way to circumvent one, stomp all over it due to lucky rolls or great tactics, or just plain refuse to go that way. I can just turn to the next page, and there'll be more stuff to throw at them there.

@Pixie Plot twist: your party gets hunted by a posse of angry ranchers

@Magician Thankfully, Lunars mess with nature all the time and haven't completely broken it... yet. We would be the ones...

@Shalvenay Oh, that's not much of a plot twist at all. The caravan we're traveling with is basically just like "What."

Maybe on their next visit to the dungeon they'll face the same encounter. Maybe they won't, it's a huge book. Makes it easier to say "yes". Not that I wouldn't otherwise, but I'd feel disappointed if they refused to engage with an encounter I made. Or if they thought of a smart way to overcome it, I'd kick myself for not thinking of that first.

@Pixie :P

@Pixie the cows notice you are very good at talking to things, and come to you grumpily but nonverbally expressing expectations for similar arrangements to be made.

Heh. The other highlight of this session was my character getting an artifact she needed cheaply by steamrolling a trader at a chess-like game he thought he couldn't possibly lose. He botched his roll (no successes at all), I got five out of five successes.

@doppelgreener Skrull cows.

(She would have gotten the artifact either way, she just would have paid double and thrown in a free performance. But she walked away with her artifact and the dude's pride. :P)

@Pixie Nice one! :)

@Magician Oh wow, harsh backstory

@doppelgreener Yeah, the whole thing is one giant "oops".

@doppelgreener I've added in a walk-through to the sand question--if you've got feedback I'd be interested in hearing it

(i.e. a worked-out example of how to think about the contest)

Looks pretty good. Might want to pay some mind to how big & intimidatingly complex those bullet points look at first. I'd consider whether the example scenario should lead first as a "here's how I'd consider doing it, and I'll explain how I got there:"

good call--brb

@doppelgreener better?

@nitsua60 I'm going to make an edit you should treat as a suggestion.

@nitsua60 Edited

@doppelgreener I like it--cleared out some of the redundancy that'd accumulated, cleaned up very inconsistent voicing...

I'd phrased it as "hold on to that thought..." because I hadn't quite decided how to deal with it when I was writing that =)

i possess the magic power of REVISION!!

cantrip, effect increases with rep-tier?

@nitsua60 paragon class power, scales with level

Stray Dungeon Master seeking players...

What's up?

Tjming?

Wow...timing...I fail at mobile

Yo ho

@AncientSwordRage ...ho and a bottle of rum?

The correct response is 'ahoy'

But...rum?

Reading up on Victorian bookshops

@Miniman No alcohol for me thanks

No red rum here, please.

@BESW you strike me as a cryptic crossword solver

And/or a pop culture referent.

@BESW I think I recognised the reference, even if I couldn't place it

I'm actually not very good at most crosswords, because they insist on referencing things like sports.

Destroying room locks ends myth, that I love being captured. (9,8)

@BESW Bleh

And actually I've never encountered cryptic crosswords before. [reads about]

@AncientSwordRage Got any letters?

@Miniman I made this one up myself - sorry that wasn't clear.

@AncientSwordRage Is it Stockholm Syndrome?

@Miniman yeah

@AncientSwordRage Nice!

@Miniman did you get it from the straight or the cryptic bit?

@AncientSwordRage The anagram

@Miniman Yay

@AncientSwordRage Is your new username an angram, btw?

@Miniman yes, Of my Full name

@AncientSwordRage I thought it looked sort of anagram-ish.

Old Glevum makes for Ghostlier Rescue (14)

@AncientSwordRage The only thing I can come up with is Gloucestershire, but that's too many letters.

I'm awful at anagrams, actually.

Anything that involves letters over meaning is going to baffle me.

@Miniman I'm not good at counting

@AncientSwordRage Ah, phew. It fit so perfectly that I figured it had to be right.

I had to Google glevum though - way too historical for me.

@Miniman yeah, not sure how else to clue it

Launched a question on history.se if anyone is interested

@BESW this is a friend's but might be more up your street: Buried in wrong tomb! Big mistake! (5, 5)

Maybe, if I knew how cryptic crosswords work; I just found out about them an hour ago.

@BESW oh

@AncientSwordRage Ha, got it.

I mean, I picked up some of the general elements, but I don't know the formulas and cues.

Spoiler

@BESW the one I gave us a double straight. Just two definitions for the same word/phrase. No special cues.

Does that help?

Yeah.

I can see where the answers come from, sorta. But from my reading there's cues in the phrases that clue in which kind of formula is used each time.

@BESW Yep. For example, in "Destroying room locks ends myth, that I love being captured. (9,8)", the keyword "destroying" indicates an anagram.

The main types are anagrams, sound-based clues, double meanings, words hidden in other words, words hidden in initials, and constructed words.

But in the double straight you just need to think if all the alternative meanings for the two sentences and give the ones that overlap

Anyone on right now who DMs for D&D 5e?

I was pondering something

@To

@Tophandour It's usually pretty quiet here at the weekend

@Wibbs ah, ok

(and I know nothing about 5e :))

ah well

I'll still be here for a while in case someone happens to show up

just sitting around pondering 5e DMing stuff while working on some programming stuff

anything you can turn into a question to ask on the site?

Idk, probably not

I can't think of how we would decide what the best answer would be

so it's probably not site-appropriate

was just going to ask how people prefer to use passive perception

in 5e passive perception is your perception check that's used when the DM wants to check your perception in secret or to save time if the party is in a situation where they want to roll it a lot

but as the DM I happen to know everyone's passive, so it's tempting to just make traps that have a DC of 1 higher than their highest so that they don't just see traps passively all the time

But I'd hate that as a player, so I don't do it

so basically it boils down to me asking the party to roll all the time so I hardly use passive perception except in the event of hidden monsters that rolled to hide

But yeah, there's probably a bunch of options that would work equally well, so there's not a way to identify a best answer

@Tophandour Aren't you supposed to follow some guidelines about the DCs for traps?

The DCs to find them? Basically just if I want it to be easy, difficult, hard, or very hard to find them

but I'm just conflicted about making every fifth trap or so very hard to find because I know that the party won't passively find it

I don't know my way around D&D adventure design and play styles

but if you can derive that stuff from a model about why the traps are there

(if that makes sense in the system)

then that will (a) inform you about the difficulties and (b) be clues for the party to actively check for traps when they really expect a very hidden one to be there.

For a while they've just been coming across a bunch of traps that are within their passive perception threshold so they spot all of them pretty easily. It makes sense for the types of places that they've been exploring. Either everything is very old and broken or the people making the traps didn't have access to exceptional skill or technology

I just make it a challenge to figure out how to disarm the traps and making the skill check to disarm pretty difficult

So they know that traps are about, so if they go somewhere which looks quite pristine and well-kept, they should expect traps to be there, as well, but better-hidden?

Right

I suspect that the first time that they come across a trap that they couldn't passively detect, they would revert into "Check everything all the time" mode and roll for it constantly

which is fine, but at that point it's basically a decision of "Do I want Passive Perception to be widely or narrowly applicable this session?"

Is there no downside to checking everything all the time?

Just takes more time and some people are invested in their passive perception

Used to be WAY worse

I had a player that put feats and stuff into getting a good Passive Perception and Passive Investigation

and she'd FLIP OUT if someone else found something first or if I asked for rolls a lot

That's kind of awful. I'm used to systems where checking for everything all the time has serious downsides, so people don't do it.

we don't play with her anymore :p

Well, the main downside is that I narrate actively checking as taking up more time

and they need to specify what and where they're checking

So, what are they there for, except for slowing down player progress, then?

so if they roll a 10 + 8 and say that they're searching the floor for traps, they can still totally miss a trap built into the ceiling

(Assuming it's not for the GOTCHA! moments)

if it was a 20+8 I might be nice and say that they noticed something on the floor that hinted at something on the ceiling

What's what there for? Actively searching with perception?

No, traps.

Oh

presenting a challenge and draining player resources throughout the adventuring day

going into a fight fresh tends to make them obliterate almost anything

What resources do they drain when looking for them? Do you track time well enough for it to make a difference?

so it's good to drain them with traps or ambushes every now and then so that when they get to something that's meant to be a real challenge they're rationing equipment rather than just going full blast

Oh, they don't drain anything while looking

but if they don't look and get hit it'll drain potions and spell slots, etc.

In my book, that's bad.

There's no tradeoff.

There is a strong strategy of “check everything everywhere all the time”.

And the only effect of a trap is “oh, I should have checked that, as well, next time…”

I mean, I can be more creative with traps sometimes. Charm some PC and convince them that something absurd is real, teleport somebody away from the party, etc

But that's all just when the trap hits.

@Tophandour Ask a question where you set out the problem and ask for solutions to fix it. There may well be multiple possible answers, but that is often the case with questions on the site

Make it problem focused

but yeah, the time downside for rolling for trap checks constantly is that some dungeons have time pressure on them or there are wandering monsters, etc. Something to make them feel like they shouldn't stay in one place for too long so they have to balance speed with carefulness

@Wibbs I guess I could try it out, but I don't feel confident that I won't get hammered with downvotes and then get the question closed :p

Do you have a guideline for how often you check for wondering monsters depending on how often they check for traps?

is it a problem if you do? A closed question is just to give you a chance to edit it before poor answers come in

well, I mean I'm not confident that I can formulate it in a way that isn't just unacceptable for the site

Gonna try though, I'll see how it goes

Try putting it here first?

That worked for me the few times I wasn't sure.

@Anaphory That's a good idea

I was thinking something like

Hmm.... trying to get the right question so that it will be answered right

Yeah, it can be hard

(waits with baited breath)

I'm just checking the site to see if something similar has already been answered

ah, sensible

don't remember anything like it for 5e though

was thinking something like "How can I balance passive perception with requiring rolls?" but I'm not sure that that gets to the heart of it.

also not very clear by the title

what is the actual problem you are having?

I'm aware of my party's maximum passive perception so I'm tempted to make every fifth trap or so higher than their passive perception just so that they don't always detect every trap (unless they take the time to roll for it)

@Tophandour Ha, that's kind of the question I'm asking you, if you read “Balance” as “What's the trade-off”?

'A a GM, what is the best way of using passive perception and active perception when there are traps that PCs might spot?'

?

Then explain in more detail why you are unsure

@Anaphory yeah, but I kind of know the answer to that. Rolling takes more time and they need to be specific, passive perception is 10+ a modifier so tends to be pretty successful and happens without them doing anything

Except that trade-off is in no way balanced, thus the question.

Sorry, messed up an edit - 'A a GM, what is the best way of using passive perception and active perception when there are traps that PCs might spot?'

@Anaphory downside to passive perception is since it's a calculated value, they won't detect things that they could have got if they rolled

@Wibbs I'm always paranoid on this site that questions that contain "best way" could be considered too broad or just not appropriate for this format

because there's no provable way of one approach being superior or something like that

But the downside for active perception as far as you describe is only player session time, which is rarely a downside at all.

unless I ask for it good-subjectively I guess

(Apart from that it's boring, which is why passive perception got intoduced, i presume)

@Anaphory oh, also takes up more in-game time. They are actively walking slower and looking carefully

#

But if that's of no consequence, it's no downside.

@Tophandour that is key

explain why the split between passive and active is causing you problems, then ask others if they have proven ways of solving those problems

@Wibbs so I'd have to put something in like "How have you handled this problem and how did it work out for you?"

exactly

Ok, I'll try that out

So you want to incentivise occasional active perception, without dis-incentivizing passive perception too much.

can't guarantee it won't be closed, but it's a question I'd ask :)

@Anaphory I tend to throw something into a dungeon so that time matters. The party also just strongly dislikes rolling for every single room

That's good.

@Tophandour Do mention it in your question!

Lol, the site just detected that I had "best way" in my title and said that it was likely that my question would be closed :p

So, back to thinking about how to put it?

“How do I make sure that both active and passive perception stay relevant”?

Ah! That feels closer to what I'm asking for

I don't want to punish players that invested in passive perception but I also don't want to make active perception totally pointless

That's why I proped so much ;-)

I feel like I could now mostly build your question out of your text snippets here in chat.

:p please don't though

haha

@Tophandour “If you are worried I would steal it from you, I could just go and post it in your name instead, just enter your account details including your password and bank details on this totally not dubious website here: …”

:P

off to bed - good luck with the question :)

@Wibbs thanks, good night!

Good night! (Assuming you are not on a night shift or something…)

@Anaphory nah, I totally trust you. Hey, did you know that if you type your password into the chat box it shows up as all stars? See? ********* </sarcasm>

:p

Question posted

Now let's see how well I understand what questions are relevant for this site :P

Anyway, I'm about to be off to a party

so see you guys later

@Tophandour Looks good!

@Anaphory thanks!