TRPG General Chat

mxyzplk

12:14 AM

@DuckTapeAl Yes, he changed the user info on his account. The content is all still there however, just as "user2574."

Shalvenay

12:55 AM

hey there @nitsua60 and @DuckTapeAl

nitsua60

hiya

BESW

Yawp.

DuckTapeAl

1:10 AM

Hey.

Shalvenay

how're things going?

Adeptus

1:51 AM

My reputation:

10000 seems so close but so far

Shalvenay

not bad

Miniman

@Adeptus I would bounty the hell out of the Cheapskate Index if I could.

Adeptus

@Miniman Thanks :) I've referred to it in a couple of answers, but it's not something I can really "spotlight" on this site. Unless I did a self-answered question on what free content is available (though I think that'd be a duplicate of one of the others I answered)

Miniman

@Adeptus Yeah, it's definitely one of those things that really belongs in a blog - it's a shame they removed site blogs.

DuckTapeAl

What is the Cheapskate Index?

Adeptus

2:04 AM

I suppose I could do a personal blog somewhere... but that would require regular posts...

@DuckTapeAl An index of the free 5e PDFs

Miniman

2:34 AM

@Adeptus Would you mind editing that answer you just edited? While trying to look at its bounty (on mobile) I accidentally converted my upvote into a downvote, and it locked before I noticed.

Adeptus

3:04 AM

@Miniman OK, added a fullstop. (Bounty was from you, btw)

Miniman

@Adeptus Yeah, I saw. I'm honestly considering bountying it again.

trogdor

can you bounty the same thing twice?

Miniman

@trogdor MSE says yes.

trogdor

I mean the exact same person putting muliple bounties on the same thing

I mean,... I guess you can spend as much rep as you want

why should anyone stop you,....

I was just thinking for some reason that the specific action of putting multiple bounties on the same thing from specifically one user would be restricted

but I realize I have no reason I can think of why that would be the case

Adeptus

trogdor

3:14 AM

I think I played that,....

XD

and I mean, just because someone is hunting bounties doesn't mean you shouldn't post one

for one thing, they can't just grab it, the question poster has to accept the answer

I could tolerate the graphics on that game,... but the controls were not to my taste

XD

Adeptus

@trogdor No, the bounty-giver decides which answer to award it to. It doesn't have to be the accepted answer. (but yes, you can't "grab it", it has to be awarded)

Shalvenay

sidenote -- are there penguins in Faerun? :)

(or some similar flightless seabird)

Adeptus

I don't know if that is ever specified. Are they in the MM?

trogdor

@Adeptus ah ok I got that mixed up then

but then why would you need to bounty more than once?

or is that mainly if your bounty expired before any answer showed up that you wanted to award it to

I guess that is it, and I feel like I asked that question before XD

Miniman

@trogdor Or you regret not giving a bigger bounty to an answer you bountied in the past. Just purely hypothetically and not at all based on a real situation I am currently sort of in.

trogdor

3:28 AM

lol

that works too

Miniman

Actually, if you wanted to give a bounty > 500, too.

Shalvenay

@Adeptus not that I know of, but I only have MM1

trogdor

I am not against it if someone feels generous and grateful enough to give more rep to someone who answered a question they really wanted answered

seems like practically half the reason bounties exist

the other half more or less being incentiveising answers on a question

Magician

4:20 AM

Speaking of Atomic Robo SRD (slowpoke.jpg), does it look horrific on purpose, or is it just me?

Adeptus

@Magician I thought the same

Magician

It seems like CSS isn't working, or something.

Pixie

Heh. I doubt they purposely made it bad, but I do suspect that they purposely devoted few resources to it. It's about as basic as something can be and still be fairly readable.

trogdor

4:42 AM

that is pretty much just a wall of text

I don't know if it is broken or whoever made it just didn't care too much what it looked like

I do also doubt "on purpose" is a thing here XD

Pixie

Well, its stylesheet is accessible, so I don't think it's broken.

My guess is that they wanted to make the information available in a readable format but with no bells and whistles. SRDs exist for our convenience, often to make games more accessible and help them spread, but companies would still like to sell their PDFs and books too. Or they really are primarily meant for reference -- so you can ctrl+f that thing you want if you only have the book.

trogdor

I can see that

not wasting effort on something that isn't making you money, and in some cases could even lose you some sales

doppelgreener

You could download that and probably just replace the CSS with whatever you want - like Bootstrap's typography - and there you have a pretty looking document.

Pixie

Yeah. It's got distinct headings for sections and subsections, examples are distinct from rules text, and information that should be in tables is in tables. It's usable, which is all it really needs to be. Would be nice if prettier, of course. :P

doppelgreener

@trogdor that's probably not how evil hat or the atomic robo creators see it - they're all on record as finding free material good, including for themselves

Pixie

4:57 AM

@doppelgreener Yeah, to clarify, I don't think loss of sales is a motivator here.

trogdor

@doppelgreener well that isn't quite how I meant it

I am aware that they actually see making some free material as a boost in sales

but I also see why you wouldn't want to necessarily waste the time or effort to mess with the background when it is part of a free only thing like the above SRD

Pixie

It's also possible that this helped them to get it available as quickly as possible.

trogdor

all I mean is that it seems reasonable to me that they would in fact not need to make it look nice

it isn't the point of this particular thing

@Pixie this works as an explanation too

doppelgreener

yeah I agree there

Pixie

It is available under a pretty generous CC license as well, so perhaps someone will present it in a nicer format somewhere down the road.

trogdor

5:02 AM

my point was not supposed to come across as saying they are greedy, just that it is actually a practical option to not worry about looks for an SRD like this

for many reasons, I am sure, not just the ones I could think of by myself

Asteria

hullo all

Pixie

Hey!

Asteria

Hiya @Pixie, how are you

Pixie

@Asteria Alright. Trying to convince myself to make my way toward bed, but not convinced yet. :P You?

trogdor

hello

Asteria

5:11 AM

Wooorking. Wishing I had your 'should I sleep?' problem :P

@trogdor hey!

Pixie

Oh, I should sleep. The questions are "will I" and "can I." xD

I move departments tomorrow and I'm scared. ;___; But only slightly.

trogdor

yeah, I don't want that problem

I already have the one of waking up generally once a night, but I can usually get back to sleep after

Pixie

I'm also not sleeping in my own bed tonight, because my bed does not currently exist as such. :v

Asteria

@Pixie oh no fun. I hate sleeping in someone else bed. GL with the dep change tomorrow though ^_^

Magician

Don't you just hate it when your bed is trapped in a time paradox, having killed its own maker.

3

Pixie

5:14 AM

@Asteria Thanks!

@Magician I know. That poor carpenter.

trogdor

mm, I have moved once, and house sat places, I have found that I hate sleeping in a bed that isn't the one I normally sleep in

even if it is MY new one

Sejanus

Morning o/

trogdor

HA! morning is over in this place! :P

Asteria

@trogdor I tend to get up a lot at night too. And yup. New bed horrors

trogdor

good morning though

Sejanus

5:16 AM

I don't use your place's time ;)

Asteria

@Sejanus it's already 3pm here! Wake up sleepy head

Pixie

Morning, Sejanus.

It's... kiiinda morning here... 1 AM morning.

trogdor

@Asteria if it is also a new place,... then I have actual trouble sleeping (and those things seem to come at the same time for me, usually)

Sejanus

huh so many users today

;)

Pixie

In this much more boring reality, we're redoing the floor in my room and putting in a new bed. Will be a day or two more. Last night I slept in my sister's room (with my cats), but she's home tonight, so couch for me.

trogdor

5:16 AM

@Sejanus it was kinda slow earlier actually

Asteria

@trogdor New creaky houses are even worse. Is that the door rattling? or a murder breaking in?

trogdor

mm

Miniman

@Asteria "Why not both?"

2

Asteria

@Miniman "Oh hey man, your door is really noisy. Makes sneaking into this place hard. stab stab stab"

Pixie

The door rattles so hard it flies off the hinges, knocking the murderer out cold. The day is saved, but you have poltergeists. Should probably get that looked at.

trogdor

5:18 AM

@Asteria one place was definitely like that, but the noises were not from a new house, I think they were the outside dog and loud far away noises from neighbours

@Miniman this doesn't make me feel better, and in fact, I will be sitting two places in succession in the next two months XD

Asteria

@Pixie ♫ Caaaasper the friendly murdering poltergeist ♫

trogdor

so alllllllll new time for me to be paranoid

Adeptus

@Asteria I didn't realise you were in a timezone close to my own. (I tend to assume most Stack users are in the US, until shown otherwise)

Miniman

@Adeptus Guilty until proven innocent? :P

Pixie

@Asteria He only murders murderers, though. Must be edgy 90s revamp Casper.

Adeptus

5:22 AM

@Miniman Hey, they can't help it. Unless they migrated there - then they have no excuse!

trogdor

@Miniman I usually assume,... people are just not in my timezone.

Pixie

People often think I'm not in the US based on my weird hours, but I can't really blame them.

trogdor

to be fair, just about only people in Australia are in the same timezone as me, other than the rare other person who lives here and is also on the stack

Pixie

I'm gonna have to try to quit that since I'll be getting up at 8:30 every weekday... but see how well I'm doing so far. :v

Asteria

@Adeptus I'm with @trogdor , I just assume people are half way across the world (Mandatory 'Go Australia')

trogdor

5:25 AM

I am not in Australia, to be clear

I live on Guam, we just happen to either be in the same timezone or just one away from Australia

Magician

There's an unusually high concentration of Australians in this chat, that's true. Very suspicious.

trogdor

I think it might depend on the area, Australia is big enough that I wouldn't be surprised if it crosses two timezones

Asteria

I think we have like.....4

trogdor

ah

still not too surprising

Australia, again, is a pretty big place

it's "small" compared to some really really big places, but that isn't technically small by a general definition XD

Miniman

@trogdor To be fair, an overwhelming majority of the population of Australia is contained within one timezone. (Yours.)

trogdor

5:30 AM

yeah, but some people are not there

Asteria

@trogdor Apparently we have 5 puu.sh/ow4sZ/7c39e7aa1a.jpg

trogdor

I am aware most people are in the same timezone, but I don't want to exclude the other people

@Asteria huh, ok then, a lot more than I thought

still, I can't be too surprised

Adeptus

@Asteria (Depending on the time of year, this is only 3 different "times". It's only 5 during daylight saving, as the northern states don't observe DST)

Asteria

@Adeptus [cough] clearly knows lots about timezone and her country [cough]

Miniman

@Adeptus Having experienced full daylight at 9pm, this is definitely a smart move. It really messes you up.

trogdor

5:41 AM

I must admit not needing to know too much about time zones about all that many specific places

Adeptus

trogdor

it isn't an issue when I am not travelling, which I don't do too often

Adeptus

we're "small" population-wise, but not geographically

trogdor

though to be fair, having said that, I have been to a decent number of places

Miniman

@Adeptus To me, this reads "Stop thinking of New Zealand as small - it really isn't."

trogdor

5:43 AM

@Adeptus well, I was coming from the place of "north and south america are linked and sorta look like one thing, ditto with Europe, Africa, and at least parts of Asia

but yes, I was still saying Australia is pretty freaking big, Geographically speaking

Adeptus

@trogdor Fair enough

trogdor

as a single country, it is definitely huge, Geographically at least

Adeptus

@Miniman The UK/Ireland one reminds me that New South Wales is bigger than "old" Wales

trogdor

I think only Russia, the US, Canada, and China are bigger, but most other countries do pale in sheer size compared to Australia

maybe India too, now that I think of it

there are somewhere around a couple hundred countries out there, and most of them cannot boast of that general size XD

Miniman

@trogdor Apparently Brazil makes that list and India does not.

trogdor

5:47 AM

ah

forgot Brazil, that country is always bigger than I remember XD

Miniman

@trogdor It's a brazilian square km!

(Obviously, this joke only really works out loud.)

trogdor

I have no idea what that joke is supposed to be XD

I sincerely doubt they have a different measurement of km

Miniman

@trogdor million, billion, trillion, brazilian...

trogdor

ah ok

doppelgreener

Russia totally dominates everything as the biggest country in the world, but Australia and Canada and the USA are pretty close behind

Asteria

5:51 AM

Brazil sounds little though

trogdor

thank you for explaining the joke XD

Miniman

@trogdor I'm glad I didn't invent it :P

trogdor

@Asteria it does! they should change the name to BIGzill

doppelgreener

We're also a country and a continent and an island all in one.

Magician

@doppelgreener Both Russia and Australia are huge, but not usefully so. Vast sparsely populated areas.

trogdor

5:52 AM

@doppelgreener this is a pretty unique distinction

Miniman

@doppelgreener I like this little tidbit: "its Asian portion makes it the largest country in Asia, and its European portion [...] makes it the largest country in Europe"

trogdor

@Magician yeah, all the desert and frozen/not very green areas, respectively

Miniman

@Magician It's useful for boasting about how big it is!

Asteria

Best thing about Australia is going to a big city and watching the tourists. Most blend in well, but theres always a few that crack you up

trogdor

lol

tourists generally don't blend in here, except with each other to an extent

doppelgreener

5:57 AM

@Magician that's true. Australia's reasonably homogenous in its cultures, but we do have that enormous desert in the middle.

@Miniman Ha! That's pretty good

trogdor

we have a lot of tourism, mostly from about 3 or 4 main places

there are also people from outside of those places too, often enough, but not too many in comparison

Asteria

@trogdor we get a bit of it where I am, no where near as much as the city though. It's amusing to watching tourists giggle when people say 'mate' or 'thongs'

trogdor

@Asteria lol, I actually love listening to different accents

I am so glad I spent that time volunteering in the National Park here

doppelgreener

@Asteria maaaate

trogdor

and it was also hilarious when one of the people working there mixed up a Brittish guy with Australia

he was not amused

XD

Asteria

6:01 AM

@doppelgreener G'day

trogdor

to be slightly fair, you don't expect British people here nearly as much/often as Australian people

Asteria

@trogdor Brits and Aussies sound waaay different. I love british accents c:

Adeptus

@Asteria Some British accents sound similar to some Australian accents. I can see how people not familiar with one or the other might get them confused sometimes. Like American & Canadian accents - sometimes easy to tell apart, sometimes not.

Asteria

@Adeptus guess it depends where abouts from each place you're from too. Australian accents get waaay worse the closer you get to Queensland

doppelgreener

@Asteria as a Queenslander I resemble that remark

BESW

6:27 AM

Took a while to get used to, for sure.

doppelgreener

@BESW oh, our accents?

Aye.

Haha, cool

@Asteria I know they do, that is why it was hilarious

but it was also amusing because I could see the actual reason why the mistake was made

it isn't that we get no British people here, but if you were to predict someone was British or Australian just from the fact that they had visited here, you would pick Australian at least 9 times out of 10

@Adeptus yeah, my dad comes from Detroit, and he has mentioned that some people north of where he used to live sounded awfully Canadian even though they were American

that being said, I think most Australian aceents and Brittish accents are a little more distinguishable than that, they are countries seperated by a lot more space and water (also land, if you go in a straight line) after all

but yes, a similar principle, if taken to a lesser degree

as I understand it, British accents differ more wildly from each other than you might expect considering how small they are geographically

but I can more than understand why that one British guy was un-amused by the mistake

XD

doppelgreener

8:03 AM

@trogdor yeah, pack USA accent diversity into an island that small.

trogdor

yeah exactly

it was incredibly surprising when I first learned that there was basically a different accent for each, relatively small, area like that

doppelgreener

I'm not sure how they manage to keep them all intact really, though part of it has to do with social identity

trogdor

I think a lot of it is that actually

it's surprising how far just that one thing can go

XD

BESW

If you listen real carefully, you can sometimes tell the difference between Yigo, Santa Rita, and Malesso.

trogdor

8:19 AM

yeah, I was about to mention that

I am not personally good at that though

Magician

Would anyone so inclined please check out the draft of the first half of my conversion of Sunless Sea into Fate. The link will work for 4 hours.

The more different/interesting bits are saved for the second half, but it's already over 2k words, so.

BESW

[clicks to look at later tonight]

trogdor

@Magician hmm, so far you have picked something that we actually also did (I don't know if BESW or Greener already talked to you about how we are only going with 3 fate points right now instead of 5)

Magician

@trogdor Yeah, we'd discussed it :)

trogdor

ah ok

ha, I just got to the rat puns

Magician

8:41 AM

@trogdor That means you're already past the Seasoned Crew stunt. I'm very proud of that one.

trogdor

mk, I can't speak to how well it translates to Sunless Sea, I had barely heard of it before you started talking about it here, but it does look like it has been rather well translated from fate/ARRPG

@Magician yes XD

Magician

@trogdor Cool, thanks for reading.

trogdor

no problem, I have seen you working on this for a while even just here

least I can do is take a look at it

Magician

And that's appreciated :)

Now here's an interesting question. It makes sense to break this up into a couple of posts so as not to intimidate the reader. But does it make sense to post the first half a week or so before the second?

trogdor

do you normally post things a week apart?

Magician

8:48 AM

From a week to half a year, yes.

trogdor

also, I want to ask, does a character in this system also have 3 modes?

@Magician ah XD

Magician

@trogdor Yeah. It'd be a big departure from ARRPG that I'd have mentioned otherwise.

trogdor

are you afraid a week is too fast or too slow?

@Magician ah ok

Magician

Well, if a stranger stumbles upon the first post and goes "huh, that's neat", would they care enough to try and find the second half a week later? I mean, I'll post both wherever appropriate, but...

trogdor

well, what about making a link to the second one when you make it and putting it in the first?

I mean, that doesn't really address ALL of it, but if someone is really looking for the second post they could look there

heck, you could add that you will be putting a link in when the second one is done?

Magician

8:54 AM

Yeah, I do plan to link them, and that's what "coming next" part is for.

trogdor

if you feel like you could reasonably finish the second part faster without stressing yourself over the rush that is fine, but you shouldn't do it otherwise

I mean, regular readers of the blog are going to know you usually only post about that fast anyway,... there is only so much you can do for people who just stumble on it

eimyr

Yo

BESW

"Follow my blog for the exciting conclusion, probably some time in 2016!"

eimyr

Wow. 4 days, no one missed me.

trogdor

hello

welcome back

XD

eimyr

9:02 AM

Too late now. leaves in a huff

trogdor

aww

Anaphory

@eimyr I though of pinging you a few times. But I didn't know what for.

@Magician So punny :-D

eimyr

I'm on workolidays. @besw but I'm getting to run Mage surely after I get back!

Anaphory

@Magician The Cook stunts are similarly well-done, although not as punny.

And now I'm there

trogdor

well, the one is a slightly more subtle one, except it also then gets pointed and laughed at XD

only slightly more subtle

Magician

9:20 AM

What can I say, cannibalism is a Thing in Sunless Sea.

Speaking of, away for dinner.

BESW

@eimyr Don't call me Shirley.

Anaphory

@BESW I think in SRD-Atomic Robo, all players have the same number of Stunt Slots and the same Refresh. So it's not an individual player choosing a balance between stunts and refresh, it's the same number for the whole group.

eimyr

"Shortly". Autocorrect ~~sucks~~ rules puny human

BESW

I think what they're saying, actually, is that players should have Refresh = 1 + max # of stunts you'd like each PC to have, and no free stunt slots, but a stunt slot cap.

Anaphory

Either I'm misunderstanding what you mean or I think differently.

BESW

9:31 AM

We're talking about the second bullet point, right?

Anaphory

yep

But in general, I think they say “Every character has the same number of fate points they get at the beginning of a session. Call that the effective refresh. In addition, they have a number of stunt slots. These two numbers don't affect each other.”

BESW

Umm.

> Make refresh inversely proportional to the number of stunt slots the PC has, from one to five. For example, if the PCs have five stunt slots, their effective refresh is 1. If they have two stunt slots, their effective refresh is 4.

"Inversely proportional." That literally says the two numbers affect each other.

Anaphory

For the group, yes, but not for the individual character.

BESW

Ah, I see how you're reading it. [stares at]

Anaphory

Which is where the confusion comes from, and which is why their statement that it's not buying stunts with refresh is true.

BESW

9:51 AM

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[Powell's Tabletop Day 4/30](http://www.powells.com/tabletop-2016 "Powell's City of Books hosts its fourth annual International TableTop Day");
[Unknown Armies 3e](https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/atlasgames/unknown-armies-third-edition-roleplaying-game "A new edition of the occult tabletop game about broken and obsessed people risking everything to change the world.");

Anaphory

10:06 AM

@BESW Does my answer explain it sufficiently? I'm thinking about adding an example.

But I don't know if an example for comparing apples and bags of oranges is a good thing, or just adds more confusion.

BESW

I'm gonna have to read it later.

Joninean

2:25 PM

And here I am, waiting, hoping anyone has heard of the thing I asked about. I figure this is rather common.

@eimyr You may feel special again. Welcome back, apparantly!

BESW

8:07 PM

**Cool RPG stuff:** [Bundle of Holding](http://bundleofholding.com "buy RPGs cheap in bulk, support charities & indie designers!");
[Powell's Tabletop Day](http://www.powells.com/tabletop-2016 "Powell's City of Books hosts its fourth annual International TableTop Day");
[Unknown Armies 3e](https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/atlasgames/unknown-armies-third-edition-roleplaying-game "A new edition of the occult tabletop game about broken and obsessed people risking everything to change the world.");