"Obsessed with avocado toast, this self-centered generation will do anything for their next paycheck, including develop a highly dangerous AI that dooms the human race."
"Here are the 12 signs that your species may be doomed!"
Millennials are so used to sweeping statements that they just don't understand their value anymore. They don't remember when you had to wait three days for a sweeping statement to arrive, and you made it last a month.
We'd all go out on the porch and watch the statement man coming down main street on his wagon. The horse would nibble broad stereotypes right out of my hand.
@Randomorph btw in the middle of typing I almost change my position on warcaster because I almost thought that it failed the one creature target condition, but it looks good.
@BESW Hey, just letting you know -- typed rpg.stackexchange.com into my search bar in my browser (MS Edge), and got redirected twice to a pop-up/malware site (typical "dangerous XYZ discovered on your device, call this Windows support number and pay this to get it immediately removed" deal). Got great security, so it was rebuffed and I was sent back to my previous site. Finally go through to this site, obviously. Just wanted to let you know, though.
That's flattering, but I'm just an active user--and our elected moderators are exception handlers, not techs or devs. Problems with the site's infrastructure need to get kicked upstairs to our Benevolent Stack Overlords.
@SPavel Lmao, not quite. Essentially the "Machines" are replaced by the Quori in this case, who have obtained means of increasing their power enough to more or less rule all of Eberron.
@Alphaeus Don't have edge XD but my IE has a stock search bar, that weirdly has no search engine behind it, apparently? Is that the same for you too? or were you using a particular search engine?
@Alphaeus Key to Matrix lore is the fact that the Machines are ultimately benevolent, and believe that the Matrix is the best way to ensure happiness for the maximum number of humans, given that humanity is unwilling to accept Machine dominance of Earth
Seems like the Quori would rather just kill everyone
@Acts7Seven ah, going to be having some fun with that myself soon here in Nits' run through that. playing a local to the area, vs. some far-off explorer
I'm curious about teleporting. I've had previous discussions about it. And now another oddity
@Shalvenay awesome. Play either of the new background?
TELEPORTING TO CHU LT In the interest of time, Syndra is prepared to use a tele- port spell to transport herself and the heroes to Port Nyanzaru. If the characters agree, don't bother rolling to determine the spell's accuracy. Syndra knows the city's Harbor Ward well enough to arrive on target. She chooses an outdoor location near the docks as her destination.
"Don't bother rolling to determine accuracy"... does one normally roll accuracy on teleport?
@daze413 Edge will run through the search engine of your choice (in my case, bing) if you type a search. If you type a URL though it will just go straight to the website, no search engine required.
I guess that will be the first difference for our run -- we'll have at least one if not two party members abstaining from how the rest of the party gets to Chult ;)
@SPavel The Quori have had a shift in leadership and mentality a bit over the millennia in this setting, and have decided that rulership is much better than death. Not quite 100% Matrix in this case, but close enough.
@SPavel In this case, the Quori have sent all but the most monstrous races (as well as those that managed to escape their dominance) into a more or less "programmed" living -- they still live, but they only do the same tasks every day, much like The Truman Show. Matrix is the basic guideline, but we're toying with things a bit to be more viable in Eberron
well, he had competition on the fetch-quest in the form of two bandit-lasses, who tried to take up arms against him. the elfblooded one grabbed a naked longsword, while the human one drew a lightly concealed shortsword. After a few nicks and scratches, the paladin took a longsword crit (thrust through his left shoulder) in exchange for what basically amounted to a smite/searing smite combo on his own thrust into the elfblood bandit-lass....
blade went right through her heart, with the smite basically searing it into oblivion (thank you massive damage rules)
the other bandit lass proceeded to yield at swordpoint and then flee, leaving the paladin to finish the quest. however, the bandit lasses had friends and one of them wasn't to happy about his girl turning up dead by the paladin's sword, so the bandits chased the PC straight into the arms of the orc caravan
and then proceeded to attack the PC right in front of the orcs. not the brightest idea -- one thug got hang time from an orc scout's mount goring him after taking arrows, a second thug fled, and the third called the paladin out only to get cut down by him, and then was captured by the caravan
cue nightfall a bit later on. remember the bandit-lass from earlier? she sneaks into the camp, steals the artifact back, and is getting ready to shank the sleeping paladin when an orc boy spots the glint of her steel, grabs a nearby rolling pin, and comes after her xD
(the paladin blissfully sleeps through the ensuing commotion, but if he had awakened, talk about a minor quandary -- chivalry says to side with the girl being attacked by the Orc, but it seems like the circumstances say the Orc's probably actually the one on the defensive here?)
(in the end, the girl got beat up on a bit with a rolling pin, got the knife knocked from her hand in the process, and got thrown around a bit struggling with the Orcs that awoke to the commotion then was captured herself)
(I do want to ask the player how their char would have reacted to awakening into the middle of it all though)
@Shalvenay IMO the Pally should have taken the side of the orcs. They saved him, they took him in, and the lass was already determined to be the wrongdoer.
@Alphaeus yeah, that's kind of what I expect them to do -- it's not immediately obvious that the lass is the wrongdoer if you're waking up into the middle of the commotion though
@Shalvenay Good. Session full of puzzles, which meant a lot of "I get to lean back and listen to them struggle for 10 minutes" time. Low cognitive load, which was a nice easing back into the swing of things. (I'd not run this game last week.)
@nitsua60 nice. been working on my one-on-one thing with Korvin, should wrap that this weekend sometime. speaking of: when should I expect to hear from you about timing re: session 0?
@SmokeDetector wwwwwaitamomentbtw: what did Smokey just ID as an email in that answer? I can't find it :/
Because there might be a clear compound out there that might be easier to use than mixing up an MgSO4 + H2O solution everytime you wanna test some dice
If there is such a liquid it would be incredibly useful for determining so easily
Its in the nature of science to look for a better and better solution to things
In another question I probed the community to determine whether or not microwaves would alter a dies balance and got a sufficient amount of responses that really opened my mind to the concept of altering dice.
A productive person went a step further and that got me thinking:
Can different amou...
@Sandwich I think it would vary depending on exact material and construction. Are transparent, opaque, pearlescent, swirl, clear-with-sparkles all the same density? Across all brands?
Slightly round off the edges of one face of a d20. It will be less likely to stop on that face, but I suspect would not make enough difference to be noticed in a float test.
Fundamentally, you'll get completely different answers depending on whether you're working with machined or molded dice--and how cheaply they're molded, if so.
Round the edges of the 20-side, so it's less likely to land 20-down (so, 1 up?). Then flatten the opposite (1?) side. Shave equal amounts from both sides, should bias it without being noticed in a float test.
(might be noticed with a visual inspection, depending how aggressively you shave it)
Hrmm. I do not think this is system agnostic in the "You want solutions to the question that are not directly tied to a game's mechanics" sense: summing dice (instead of counting successes, or any of the other ways to measure a die's outcome) is system-specific, as is rolling all the same polyhedron at once.
@NautArch Simulacrum has the downside of being very expensive, and Spell Slots and HP are not recovered naturally. It usually best to Clone the Rogue or other Physical non-tank DPS type
Also don't discount 6th level spells. Picking up Heal, Disintegrate or Contingency are all pretty good
@Randomorph That's a good point. Money isn't as much of an issue. Just got a 10,000gp diamond that i could eventually sell in a town for ruby dust. That's enough for a lot of castings.
Disintegrate is a pretty neat idea, though.
THe problem with the non-tank DPS types is that i have to equip them. My character is basically built to work with no equipment (other than a spellcasting focus)
I just went through two major battles and received a total of 10HP damage
@NautArch Yeah ruby dust is something your DM might make relatively rare, depending on the DM, so just be aware of that. Disintegrate is better on Big things (since it's one shot done) than Crown of Stars. Crown of Stars is better if you can prepare, and might have to fight multiple enemies. Crown of Stars won't destroy all the target's gear either.
@Randomorph Prismatic Spray looks like fun. Doesn't quite do as much damage as disintegrate, but it can deal half damage on a success, which disintegrate doesn't.
@Adam Prismatic Spray suffers from the LOLRANDOM factor, in that you can't predict it's value, and usually it's a lot less than just upscaling a fireball or something
@NautArch Teleport is also a really solid Magical Secret if no one else in your party has it or Teleport Circle
Or Plane Shift if you're playing more multiplanar rather than global
Oh wait.. What.. Bards can get Teleport? Maaaan. Bards were given way too much
I really don't think the "lolrandom" factor is necessarily a factor at all. Each beam except for the last one does the same 10d6 damage, it just does it in a different types. Different types isn't really lolrandom when resistance isn't a factor. Which it could be, I know. Plus, it just seems more fun that way. Upscaling a fireball is boring. but that's just me.
I really hate how I have to write a full paragraph about how I disagree, but yet see somebody else's point. But that's neither here nor there.
@Adam If resistance isn't a factor, just upscale a Cone of Cold or Fireball and deal more damage roughly 90% of the time. If it is, you don't want to roll the dice on if your 7th level slot will do anything or not.
@NautArch I'm aware they are amazing. I think WotC went a little overboard on everything they gave them, tbh
Full Casters with many amazing spells, plus they can poach anyone's list. Oh also have Rogue's thing of expertise, and decent HP, light armour, and a ton of other side abilities too.
@NautArch I mean, their Heal is as good as anyone else's except a Life Cleric. Their Fireball is as good as anyone else's except an Evoker or (Red/Gold) Dragon Sorcerer. Expertise is no better or worse on the Rogue or the Bard.
@NautArch To be fair, that's exactly the class's idea. Remember they started as fighter 5, then before 8 MC into thief, then before 9 MC into druid.... (PHB1e app.II)
@Randomorph but they don't have the spell utility of a wizard, they have to invest in heal options (rather than combat, control or RP) in order to be equal to cleric, and while they can compete with a rogue in terms of expertise and skills, they can't in damage output with sneak attack.
I say all that, but I do agree that my bard is freaking amazing. It's hard to put him down because he's squirrely and his toolkit is pretty big. Of the original characters when the campaign started at I think level 3, I'm the only one left.
@NautArch Drop a Disintegrate then. Throw some fireballs. Suddenly the Rogue is Jealous. As to the Wizard thing, sure you have every spell, but you have approximately 20-24 spells known. That's more than enough to get some of the best ones with the widest utility.. Like Polymorph.
@NautArch You can cast it twice a day, using your 6th and 7th level slots. Or use Crown of Stars instead to do 4d12 7 times (roughly the same as 8d6 7 times)
The rogue has to sneak attack a lot to match that damage. Then there's AoE which the rogue plain can't do. Then you can turn and heal the Rogue. Or resurrect him.
@Randomorph I'm pretty min-maxed, but I choose when to step back a lot. But there are times when I just don't have the right tool for the situation (very rare, though.)
@Randomorph I didn't actually mean it in a literal sense. I really like them, but I don't think you can say that they are unequivocally that much stronger than most other classes.
@Randomorph I feel that this is simply not true though.
@Rubiksmoose well it's not in terms of action economy. But in terms of skills and "necessary" abilities like healing, control, dps, covered... Yeah they kind of can.
The one spot they aren't the greatest at is Tanking, and Sustained DPS.. But with Cantrips they can do alright at it
@Rubiksmoose except so can Wizards.. But they can make up for it the exact same way, using powerful AoE, control, or single target nukes
@Rubiksmoose if you're running dozens of encounters per day, then yeah, the Full casters will struggle, but otherwise they can make up for lack of sustain with raw burst
@Randomorph I mean, I guess I'm saying that my bard has never seemed to be the most powerful class at my table. They are good, but I've never seen them be good to the point of invalidating other classes.
@Rubiksmoose I think most people don't play them aggressively that way, but my issue is they have the ability to step on (nearly) everyone's toes, and a good number of toes at the same time, with no real drawbacks.
@Randomorph The drawback to being versatile is that you can spread yourself too thin. If a bard doesn't focus they can easily be worse at everything than any other focused class
@Rubiksmoose yeah, but they can still focus on 1-2 spell types (eg healing and control), meanwhile have the best full caster hp pool (tied with clerics), armour, lots of skills plus expertise, and built in support abilities with Bardic Inspiration, Song of Rest etc.. Oh and the skills you didn't take? You get Jack of All Trades.
In another question I probed the community to determine whether or not microwaves would alter a dies balance and got a sufficient amount of responses that really opened my mind to the concept of altering dice.
A productive person went a step further and that got me thinking:
Can different amou...
