TRPG General Chat

trogdor

00:16

it is for me

I have the day off

:P

nitsua60

00:29

@trogdor Nice. Any fun plans?

trogdor

yard work

my dad makes the plans around here :/

still, I have time off from actual work, and mowing the lawn isn't too bad, nor does it take exceptionally long

actually, I could be meeting up with @BESW and another friend later

Ben

00:46

@nits you were looking for "Is this balanced" metas a couple of days ago... yeah?

This question made me think that perhaps there should be a bit more to those types of questions - like perhaps a reason why they believe it isn't balanced? Because it's not very useful to just have a "Is this balanced? - Yes." post

nitsua60

01:11

@Ben yeah. I was trying to remember if we'd put together any guidance on them.

Shalvenay

hey there @nitsua60

nitsua60

The thing is that there's a class that are perfectly easy to answer and, to my mind, are good to have around: those answerable by "no-ho-hoooo! Here're the six reasons why!" Because that sort helps teach how one can think about those things--what are the reasonable comparisons, what are the implications of changing things the way the OP did.

But then the whole class of "eh, maybe?" seem really hard to pin down: what makes a good vs. bad Q, what exactly do we really get out of good answers...?

@Shalvenay hiya

Shalvenay

how're things going?

nitsua60

@V2Blast I've gone ahead and rolled back that edit--I'm going to post something on meta about it in a moment.

@Shalvenay Good--v2 just reminded me of something I'd been meaning to post but had forgotten.

The Oracle

01:54

1

Q: Should we be adding DNDBeyond links to old posts?

DNDBeyond is Wizards of the Coast's official 5e digital support site/tool. It contains a rules compendium, monster listings, spell and item descriptions, and space for homebrew spells/items/races/feats/&c. Many old(er) dnd-5e questions do not link to DNDBeyond, as it didn't exist at the time. We...

The Oracle

03:34

0

Q: Downvoting first questions - can we be more welcoming?

I feel as though I've seen a lot of new-member questions that are (not that surprisingly) less than amazing, and therefore get close votes. I think that's pretty logical, and usually the close votes are accompanied by well written, friendly and constructive comments welcoming the new user and hel...

discussion reputation down-votes

SmokeDetector

[ SmokeDetector | MS ] Bad keyword with email in answer, email in answer, potentially bad keyword in answer: Can sequester be used to get nearly unlimited duration spell effects? by smith alves on rpg.SE (@doppelgreener)

Ben

04:44

@TheOracle Had a bit of a ramble there

The Oracle

11:20

0

Q: How should I ask about my D&D 5e Homebrew being balanced?

We've had a number of D&D 5e homebrew questions that present a piece of homebrew (a race, a class, etc) and ask if it is balanced. Some get closed as too broad or primarily opinion-based, others are readily accepted and get answered. If I needed to ask about whether my homebrew thingy is balance...

support homebrew dnd-5e

Anaphory

13:09

Off to a convention in NW Germany -- I'm going to facilitate Lovecraftesque on Sunday because friends were enthusiastic about it, and the list of games already on offer looks promising for most slots.

kviiri

I'd love to try Lovecraftesque at some point

Anaphory

(Apart from the first one, which has only trad stuff in there, like The Dark Eye, D&D 5, Midgard, and Savage Worlds. I might just use it to hang out and catch up with people instead.)

kviiri

I think Ropecon is next week, but I'm already tied up elsewhere

3

Anaphory

Well phrased.

Rubiksmoose

@NautArch do you know of any cases where DnDB's wording diverges from text (aside from errata)?

NautArch

13:14

@Rubiksmoose I have not seen it, but I also haven't really been checking.

kviiri

@Anaphory Hah, and completely accidental too x)

Rubiksmoose

@NautArch So, this meta is claiming that there are differences, but I have not noticed any. Or at least if there were some I had forgotten.

I'm actually wondering if it should be closed as unclear until examples/evidence is provided.

kviiri

Rope is short for "roolipeli" which means "role-playing game". And it's of course been verbed into ropettaa which means to play them :)

Rubiksmoose

As an extensive user of both text and online, I think I would be aware if there were issues.

Anaphory

@kviiri I checked Wikipedia and read that :) The Cons I go to are much smaller.

kviiri

13:17

(obligatory SMBC regarding "verbed")

NautArch

@Rubiksmoose Yeah, i think @nitsua60 may be making an assumption that's incorrect and used as a basis. It may be correct, but until there's evidence, I don't think we can move forward with it.

Rubiksmoose

@NautArch I'm going to VtC it for now.

NautArch

And that doesn't mean I agree we should be adding DNDbeyond links to old questions :)

Rubiksmoose

@NautArch My opinion is that there is no harm in doing it, but I don't think there is a huge amount of benefit either.

I don't really agree with Miniman's argument though. When has a link ever made a question more confusing? We get plenty of questions already whose answers are obvious from a reading of the text, sometimes even the text OP themselves quotes. I see no difference between an answer being obvious from quoted material and an answer being obvious from linked material.

NautArch

@Rubiksmoose Yeah, I don't see why it's necessary, but I don't see what it's a problem. I asked Miniman to provide evidence as well.

doppelgreener

13:33

Hey D&D 5e folks, what is behind some of the homebrew balance questions being closed and others fine?

4

Is it just frustration and fatigue with some submissions?

Rubiksmoose

^^^^This! I'm so confused!

For example, why is this closed, but this isn't? Same author, same setup, same basic issues and question.

kviiri

@doppelgreener That's my guess, honestly.

Rubiksmoose

@kviiri It is honestly the only reason I can think of.

kviiri

Well, I can think of another, but it's not an excellent reason.

doppelgreener

@Rubiksmoose The frustration & fatigue would explain it, something like: "man, we told you last time that you can't have super OP benefits contrasted with super broken handicaps, that just isn't how it works. Why did you give us a second race that does this?"

Rubiksmoose

13:38

To be fair, I think fatigue is a really bad reason as well. We tell people all the time "Ask as many questions as you want here!" and then downvote and close their questions when they do?

kviiri

Relatively normal homebrew races are rather easy to assume to use the "normal DnD balance metric" - just compare them to the races in the book and evaluate abilities against each other. But races that deviate from the norm sufficiently may be seen as... well, inviting a challenge concerning what does the user even consider to be balanced.

Rubiksmoose

@doppelgreener I understand that, but I would think that the community would more appropriately signal that with downvotes instead of closure votes right?

doppelgreener

Yes

NautArch

It does seem like the original question needs to be closed as well (for the same reasons)

kviiri

And balance is a complex thing, really. There's no single correct definition.

NautArch

13:42

I"m unsure as to how to handle homebrew balance questions in general, to be honest.

I mostly downvoted and stayed away

doppelgreener

@kviiri I've reopened on the basis it's reasonable to compare them against the normal D&D baseline.

But it might mean that needing to express if something's deliberately deviating from that baseline is important.

I'm reopening this (it's answerable) and opened a meta: How should I ask about my D&D 5e Homebrew being balanced?. I would encourage those who are interested in these questions to provide your input in how they ought to be asked in order to be successful and well-received. — doppelgreener ♦ 1 min ago

kviiri

Yeah, the baseline assumption comes to question when something's really unusual. Eg. suppose someone comes offering a Merchant class, who has no combat powers whatsoever but instead a ton of non-combat bonuses and very deep pockets. I'd draw the conclusion that their definition of "balance" itself deviates from mine.

NautArch

@doppelgreener Should we merge Purple Monkeys question into that meta?

doppelgreener

Definitely not :P

Merging is for when the question's identical

I could reference that one from the meta though

NautArch

@doppelgreener heh, okay. It seems like it's a meta question and not a mainsite

Rubiksmoose

13:48

@NautArch It is not really a meta question because it is not asking about RPG.se itself. It is asking about the game so it should belong mainsite IMO.

doppelgreener

It's about gameplay and design, rather than how we operate together as a community

NautArch

yeah, true

nitsua60

@Rubiksmoose I almost never use DNDB so I haven't noticed any. But multiple people whose experience/memory I trust more than mine have complained about differences so I'm comfortable with raising the specter of changed wordings. (cc: @NautArch)

NautArch

it's not how do i ask, it's how do i do

@nitsua60 I think we need to lean on those people and get those specific references. Otherwise, it's hearsay and not helpful.

Rubiksmoose

@nitsua60 Yeah I'm not disputing the point perse, just saying that it seems unhelpful to leave a vague claim up there without substantiation. Though I really think that we are reading more into your one line than other answerers currently are. It is not inherently vital to your question it seems.

If there are differences though, I would actually like that discussion to be had since that is important info for all of us to know. And speaks to the worthiness of the source itself.

nitsua60

13:52

@NautArch I disagree. If what comes out is "be sure that what you link matches the author's referent" then that's okay.

NautArch

@nitsua60 We can put the burden on the user of the resource, but that goes for everything always. However, making a claim that there IS a problem without actually proving there is isn't useful. It's making a source out to be a problem when it may not actually be one and then asking for a solution to a nonexistent problem.

nitsua60

@doppelgreener I don't interact (read, vote, answer) often with homebrew, but one challenge I see is that obviously bad homebrew questions are pretty easy and clear to answer. But as the homebrew gets closer to reasonable then the "weight" of tweaks and differences contribute more to POB.

NautArch

DNDbeyond is functionally equivalent to the printed resources (it's stated by WoTC as "an official digital toolset for use with the Dungeons & Dragons fifth edition rules").

@nitsua60 If we need answers to have a baseline to vote on, how do we determine 'balance' objectively?

Rubiksmoose

@nitsua60 I guess another way to put it is, how are we supposed to interact with that statement in your question with our answer? We can't dispute it since claims haven't been made but we also can prove a negative ("there are no mistakes on DnDB"). So, it just kind of sits there as something that is not contributing to the discussion or is interactable with it.

doppelgreener

@NautArch isn't balance laid out by the established races and the advice on creating new ones?

NautArch

14:00

@doppelgreener Is that actually sufficient, though? I've never homebrewed so I don't know if the advice provides a true 'grade' for homebrewing balance or if it's just suggestions and not an actual tool to determine if it's balanced.

And established races give a baseline, but if you've diverged massively from it, I don't know if it's applicable. Or if you pick non-standard boons/penalties that aren't equivalent to existing races.

nitsua60

@NautArch I'm not following that.

I also fear "balance" is being widely used--not in this conversation, but mainsite--as a fig leaf. Querent (or editor) knows you can't ask if a race is "good," so they just swap in the word "balanced" without actually putting in the work to specify what their goal for a homebrew is.

doppelgreener

That could make sense, which would mean the way to ask a question that's balanced is to define what you want to achieve out of it, but that merely asking if it's balanced is not feasible

like "on par with the other races in terms of power" is a thing you want to achieve

clearly in the case of the Marble and the Terran they have completely diverged from standard construction and know it

nitsua60

@doppelgreener I think "what's the table-goal?" is missing from a lot of them. "I want this player to get more involved in roleplaying scenes." "I want combat to be less static." "I want to inject some more variety into my all-dwarf campaign."

Otherwise we're left with "I wanted to make this cool thing." "Okay, you did that." "Well, is it going to 'break' my game?" "I don't know. What are you trying to do in your game?"

doppelgreener

14:17

I've updated my comment to link back to this conversation.

Hmm, it doesn't want to onebox it. :(

nitsua60

62

Q: The second draft of our Code of Conduct is available for feedback and review

You provided us with some really helpful feedback on our first draft attempt to expand our 'Be nice' policy into a formal code of conduct, and we're extremely grateful for your time, patience and insights. This was not an easy discussion to have and we are extremely proud of the civility and insi...

discussion featured code-of-conduct

A common question I've seen: Do you expect anything to change in day-to-day moderation? Is this intended to change behavior, or just codify the rules we already enforce? — Undo 22 hours ago

@Undo This just codifies the rules that we already use, moderation is still at the discretion of the individual moderators, and we've clarified that in this revision. — Tim Post ♦ 22 hours ago

Second draft of Stack Exchange Code of Conduct up for review.

5

Mike Q

@nitsua60 Will you be available tomorrow for a TOA game?

Maximillian

15:17

Code of Conduct is up again? Letsee what's on the new draft...

Derpy

@Maximillian noting really worth worrying. Just rewording and clarifying things.

If you can be nice without someone telling you how to, then probably you don't need it.

Sadly, it seems that some people like to argue on the CoC a lot, and so we get daily arguments about stuff like "is using HE as a genderless pronoun inclusive enough?"

while in the meantime we have people telling female devs to "just drop programming and start knitting instead" in answers and comments (yep, this actually happened)

Basically, a lot of users are now very scared that the CoC will result in thunders, lighting and blazing fires, with mods suspending people while riding black wyverns and laughing madly ....

when all they probably were thinking was just "please people, try to just be nice. It is simple, you know"

NautArch

15:36

@nitsua60 I think you hit what I was trying to saying with what you typed immediately after.

David Coffron

16:43

1

Q: Is there a Dragon-level threat to the Dragons?

I've been thinking about one of the great staples of Dungeons and Dragons. No, I'm not talking about the Dungeons. In mortal civilizations, few things are as feared and iconic as the Dragon. There may be more powerful beings, but few of them are well-known. The Dragon is decent on land, a powerf...

monsters dungeons-and-dragons dragons fantasy

Goodness. How ridiculously powerful would this have to be. The average dragon can defeat a few dozen of the average human in seconds. The average dragon takes the strongest humans to be parity. This means the average of whatever super-predator would have to be more powerful than Tiamat...

Maximillian

Ah yes the dread dragon-dragon.

doppelgreener

@DavidCoffron Or it would be Tiamat, being a god and all.

David Coffron

@doppelgreener eh. God's have limited powers (at least in the forgotten realms). 5 or 6 ancient dragons could take Tiamat

doppelgreener

5 or 6 seasoned adventurers can take a dragon :)

NautArch

@DavidCoffron Is this also glossing over (either purposefully or accidentally) that a dragon predator may be a pack creature?

Maximillian

16:58

Aren't well equipped adventurers dragon level dragon threats?

doppelgreener

:O

but are they like that on their own?

i mean, a sufficient number of bull-ants is as threatening to me as a dragon would be.

Rubiksmoose

heck 6 liters of water can be as dangerous to me as a dragon is lol

Maximillian

Now I'm terrified of how many bull ants it takes to be a serious threat to a dragon.

Sun-blocking ball of ants.

Hmm. The question seems to infer single-entity, so humans and ants in number are a non-issue.

Also the question is now on hold, but remains fun to think about.

Rubiksmoose

1000 dragon sized ants or 1 ant sized dragon?

I do really like the question

Sir Cinnamon

to fight or to keep as pets?

NautArch

17:02

@Maximillian I"d also imagine illithids are a predator? I mean, the dragons teamed up with the gith to take them out.

Rubiksmoose

hah! fight

Maximillian

Illithids are a good predator, but their maws are designed to prey on medium size creatures.

Dragons tend to have super long necks and a really big head. Illithids are gonna need to air-drop or get a really big ladder.

David Coffron

@NautArch well there are certainly dragon predators. I meant an apex predator style thing

doppelgreener

@Maximillian and a spoon (to be polite)

Rubiksmoose

Time is the apex predator for all things.

David Coffron

17:05

@Maximillian psychic abilities are more powerful than brain devouring for the illithid

Maximillian

The thing about time is he always passes initative.

NautArch

@Maximillian D'oh. I was thinking of "things that can kill" and not "things that will eat"

that also may be why PCs aren't really included.

Maximillian

Mmm, Illithid magical might could work? Not sure.

NautArch

but I'm guessing Illithid's would love to feast on dragon brainz

Maximillian

If they dropped a dragon it'd be a buffet table for sure.

Only other thing I can think of is a Phoenix.

Or a god going, "You know what, Dragons were a bad idea." and just undoing them entirely.

Fantasy planet 1.2b patch notes: Dragons removed due to balance issues.

doppelgreener

17:10

I misread something and now I'm contemplating an illithid magical girl.

Rubiksmoose

@doppelgreener Oh I didn't know the new season of Puella Magi Madoka Magica had come out ;)

Maximillian

@doppelgreener Transformation triggers sanity damage.

doppelgreener

hahaha :D

Maximillian

"What are you going to do with that little heart/moon wand?" "Mordainkens Disjunction." "OH CRAP."

Do not taunt the magical girl Illithid.

Little red bows on each mouth tentacle.

doppelgreener

@Rubiksmoose puella mindeater [untranscribable noises] is an exciting new season

Rubiksmoose

17:14

XD

Maximillian

You know, my roommate and I sat and watched Madoka start to finish a few months ago. Had never seen it, friends hitting anime cons this summer INSISTED we watch.

I have new opinions on small white cat creatures.

doppelgreener

oh boy

Maximillian

And now I understand our mutual friends, "Don't lose your head" Madoka shirt.

Rubiksmoose

So many opinions.

Maximillian

@doppelgreener Putting too much thought into this. The outer planet girls are now outer-realm creatures or elder things.

Can you put a fuku on a Migou? We'll find out.

Rubiksmoose

17:21

I love all of this seriously

Maximillian

Fantasy planet 1.3 patch notes: Removed the one dragon we overlooked. One dragon left was way worse than the state of dragons in 1.1. Fixed.

David Coffron

17:46

Stupid Crawford ruling of the day. The rules never say this...

Sir Cinnamon

@DavidCoffron I was going to say the only problem with allowing that is that it makes Rituals potentially strong

but I can't even see a ritual that opens up much abuse that way

So... I'd just allow it personally

Maximillian

kickstarter.com/projects/russrmc/… Dog adventurer minis.

NautArch

@DavidCoffron I want to see that's consistent with other rulings/rules about needing to expend a spell slot

@SirCinnamon tiny hut on demand?

argh, reopen votes when there has been no input/change/update/clarification from OP.

David Coffron

18:02

@NautArch it's probably bc it says it takes up space based on slot used and not on spell level. Which means if the space it takes up is undefined (no spell slot), we can't know if it fits so we assume it doesn't.

NautArch

@DavidCoffron that's a darn good reason

Colin Gross

@NautArch "The level of the slot used to cast the spell determines how much space it uses." Yeah, no slot means no space which means it's not stored in the ring.

David Coffron

@NautArch I would prefer an errata to make it so it uses spell level and not slot (bc that's dumb), but I'll take it for now

Colin Gross

But that's totally non-obvious.

@DavidCoffron errata on that would be very nice.

David Coffron

@ColinGross either make it clear that a slot needs to be used (if that's the intent) or fix it

David Coffron

18:25

So I accidentally made an NPC that I planned on making a PC character sheet for and I accidentally said it was an Oni (wanted a weird race that I could homebrew between sessions), but I forgot Oni are large... any way to salvage?

It's a party of 4 adventurers. A High Elf, Aasimar, Kua-toa, and an Oni...

reason I need PC sheets is we often have 1 player missing and am planning on doing one shot adventures with this party if the remaining 4 want on those weeks

Sir Cinnamon

18:43

@NautArch Hnady but... not OP

ACuriousMind

@DavidCoffron Just make it...not large? :P

David Coffron

@ACuriousMind but they fought an Oni recently... would be weird

I had to improvise because they did something drastic I didn't expect and now im... stuck

(Namely, made a deal with a powerful demon and brought him directly to the capital through a teleportation circle. Had to have some reason that the demon didn't immediately kill the king, hence high power adventuring party was present.)

ACuriousMind

@DavidCoffron Sooo...strike through Oni and write something else in there?

NautArch

@SirCinnamon WOuld casting time still be 1 minute? If not, then spending an action mid-battle to get it up could be OP.

doppelgreener

@DavidCoffron there's that thing where sage advice and crawford's rulings are just advisory

but it does seem to assume a spell slot gets used, so behaviour is undefined for non-slotted spells

Colin Gross

18:58

@ACuriousMind I like the strike out Oni and write in something else.

Maybe name the character "Honey" and just claim that the characters must have heard it wrong.

@doppelgreener That one is undefined in a potentially busted way. Assuming the non-slot spell takes up no space leads to either: A) Can store infinite ritual spells or B) non-slotted spells cannot occupy space in the ring thus they can't be stored in there.

@nitsua60 I'm disappointed that the CoC draft isn't done in markdown.

NautArch

19:20

Pursuant to tall the questions around time...I'm thinking time needs to be an external counter.

There are too many problems if it's tied to a person/place

And what happens on planes that don't have a passage of time at all?

Colin Gross

No relativistic effects. Absolute time!

Colin Gross

19:35

@DavidCoffron Why do you still need it to be an Oni? If you just told the players, you could just admit that you made a mistake and switch it

Sir Cinnamon

@NautArch "While wearing this ring, you can cast any spell stored in it. " sounds like cast time is not affected

NautArch

@SirCinnamon Cool, that limits the pop-up tiny hut

Sir Cinnamon

@NautArch So allowing storage of ritual'd spells only really saves you a spell slot in advance which is really just what rituals do anyway

Colin Gross

@NautArch Casting time of ritual to put it in the ring is 10 minutes, but casting from the ring would only require 1 minute

I think that's as pop-up as it gets

Rubiksmoose

@ColinGross technically 11 minutes to cast as ritual right?

Colin Gross

19:49

@Rubiksmoose Is it 10 plus the casting time?

Ahh.. you're correct. "ten minutes longer"

Rubiksmoose

@ColinGross Well I'm bound to be correct every once in a while ;)

Colin Gross

@Rubiksmoose Just like a cup of coffee

Rubiksmoose

Nope you lost me lol

Colin Gross

I like my [gender of choice] like I like my coffee... just right all the time.

I don't actually know where I was going with that one.

Rubiksmoose

hahaha

well that makes two of us but that is ok.

NautArch

19:52

[insert inappropriate Airplane! joke here]

Rubiksmoose

@NautArch Surely you could be talking about any of the jokes in Airplane!

NautArch

@Rubiksmoose I could, and please stop calling me Shirley.

Rubiksmoose

[the setup and the dunk!]

David Coffron

@ColinGross I'm not against switching but i kind of like the backstory I set up for him.

Colin Gross

@DavidCoffron I would expect the modification to the backstory would be less drastic than trying to have a pygmy version of a race and modifying characteristics to match a medium creature.

You want a centaur tower? cause that's how you get a centaur tower!

David Coffron

19:57

@ColinGross thats why i asked the question on stack. Magic Jar works well

Colin Gross

Dunno why people don't like the question.

Haters gonna hate.

David Coffron

@ColinGross wait people don't?

(Not that I really care)

@ColinGross Centaur tower is dumb. Not going that route for sure

Colin Gross

Dunno why else they'd downvote the question

NautArch

i'm not seeing downvotes?

Rubiksmoose

20:51

they are secret downvotes. Illuminati downvotes.

David Coffron

@Rubiksmoose I secretly downvote every one of your answers while logged out @Rubiksmoose. You'll never know...

(Kidding, xD)

Rubiksmoose

@DavidCoffron [wipes away tears] I knew that. XD

BESW

22:22

@Maximillian Notes for patch 2.1: Planet unbalanced due to dragon issues.

BESW

22:52

Patch 2.3: Planet removed due to dragon balance.

Patch 3.2: Dragons now balance on heads of pins floating through infinite void.

trogdor

23:26

Can't wait for the patch where dragons get the cool new laser eye move

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