TRPG General Chat

hey there @nitsua60

3:06 AM

hey there @ObliviousSage

greetings

how're things going?

doin' ok, hoping the group of friends I'm not currently playing with finishes up their Pathfinder campaign so we can start a Traveller one

supposedly they only have about 3 sessions left, but 2 months ago it was 5 left, so...

been reading a ton of web serials lately

alright here. saw the Red Hot Chili Peppers last night :D

so if anyone is interested in long fantasy or superhero stories, i can point out some good ones

good show?

3:16 AM

@ObliviousSage heck yeah :D

@Shalvenay nice

i'm not much for concerts (OCD or something along those lines means i find it really irritating when the music doesn't exactly match the CD track I'm used to), but i do like the chili peppers

@ObliviousSage they are very good, yes :D

@ObliviousSage you'd think it'd be an interlude between seeing Blind Guardian late last year and Iron Maiden swinging through the area this summer...but not really xD

i'm not familiar with Blind Guardian, what genre are they?

@ObliviousSage epic fantasy heavy metal

3:21 AM

along the lines of Dragonforce or Iced Earth then?

@ObliviousSage yeah

I can endorse Blind Guardian's music.

They've got a 14-minute song about the Iliad, whole albums about the Similarilion, etc.

the big diff between BG and say Dragonforce is that BG can swing into the really epic, almost orchestral stuff at times (Wheel of Time is a great example of this) whereas Dragonforce seems to stick to their speedmetal roots with the occasional ballad tossed in

Blind Guardian has some heavy classical/operatic influences.

@BESW definitely.

3:24 AM

I like it.

not as heavy as say Nightwish, but still definitely there.

Magician

Epica is even more of a metal/opera cross.

@Magician yeah, Epica is definitely even more that way.

on a different sort of music I can endorse...an act from New Orleans called Trombone Shorty opened for RHCP

and oh my gosh -- Trombone Shorty is awesome -- New Orleans jazz and blues mixed with rock

including one of the most wicked trumpet sequences I've ever heard

4:28 AM

Hmm. Pondering of the day: how to turn the original Mary Poppins novels into an RPG.

is this what we are doing next? XD

Nooo.

I'm not even sure it's strictly possible, except maybe in a Lovecraftesqueian way.

This is just a ponderage.

4:50 AM

ah

RollingFeles

5:21 AM

@Zachiel I wish you luck with that :) I need to work at my GMing too.

Check out: Amethyst: Accelerated http://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/157056/Amethyst--Accelerated-Fate-Edition?affiliate_id=144937'

Tweeted by Fate_SRD on January 22, 2017 at 5:19 AM

hey there @RollingFeles

RollingFeles

@Shalvenay hello!

@BESW hey!

@RollingFeles how're things going?

[wave]

RollingFeles

5:40 AM

@Shalvenay Mixed. Friday game was canceled. In 2 hours will be another game and I need time for some prep and for making breakfast. My washing machine doesn't want to work. And I watched The Intern yesterday and that was awesome.

How're yours?

@RollingFeles fine here

6:27 AM

Bleh. Our campaign might be dying. We're finally sick of 5e, but there's one player who's extremely opposed to switching systems. Especially DW which seems to be the group's consensus otherwise.

Unfortunately, sometimes friends don't all want to do the same thing.

The same strategies apply when this happens to RPGs as if it were a board game or a restaurant or a road trip.

yeah

or a play, or a gallery opening

or a normal party or anything like that

You might be able to find a compromise system, if you can identify what everyone else is sick of about 5e and wants out of a new system, and what the one player wants to keep from 5e.

(If his argument is sunk costs, then you have an uphill battle but a new system with minimal up-front costs will help the transfer. If it's because he likes the fiddly bits of the system mechanics, consider a game like Fate where fiddliness can be customised per player.)

It's not exactly that he wants to keep something from 5e, his position is that any change to a character's sheet is mutilating them, making them something else.

That's... interesting.

So I assume he doesn't like leveling up either.

Or changing equipment.

6:33 AM

I dunno. I think he's fine with that since it's natural within the scope of the system.

He's also very much a non-fan of narrative systems, FATE is like anathema to him.

[squint] So he wants only narrative-consistent changes to the character, but doesn't like systems where only the narrative changes the character?

I'm a little lost.

Me too honestly.

Sounds like he wants systems which aspire to both represent and create objective truth through their mechanics.

(eg, falling damage rules don't just describe a fall, they define a fall. If one's personal understanding of falling is at odds with the rules, the rules are describing how physical reality is different in the game.)

However silly that sounds, I think he's very DnD-lawful in regards to systems. Because he wants as little modfications to rules as possible, no switching mid-campaign, etc.

And the GM just snapped and went "No games for at least a month. The campaign's probably over."

Bleh.

Rules-as-video-game-mechanics, then?

6:39 AM

Yes, I think so.

I've run into that.

The response has depended strongly on the individual and the group.

Like, 4e is strongly video-game-esque in combat, but outside it has hardly any rules at all. So that was a good way to switch play styles between scenes in the same session.

Oh yeah, the player mentioned that he might only settle for 4e. So maybe we'll do that after some deliberation.

But a player who lays down ultimatums is not going to be good for the group or the game in the long run.

Indeed.

That's a friendship-level thing which needs to get addressed outside of game time.

There's probably a relephant Friendship is Magic or Steven Universe episode.

6:44 AM

Probably. Could remind him of that since he watches at least one of those :)

For your part, and the rest of the group, it's important not to lay down ultimatums of your own. Demonstrate compassion, and be honestly willing to help find a solution that everyone's cool with even if it's not your personal dream game.

That's a given, yeah, but thanks anyway :)

My dream games are 4e and Fate, at least for long-running stuff. I've yet to play a Fate game on that channel and it's been long since 4e, but I'm okay with it.

I also wanted to play Earthdawn (I think that's what it was called) but that's probably never gonna happen.

Hm.

Maybe I should talk to trogdor about how to make Fate fiddly, because that seems to be what the player wants.

And I recall you mentioning trogdor doing just that.

Aye.

The Fate SRD has some good resources, especially the Toolkit and Atomic Robo.

If he likes splat (pre-made expansion material) you can allow just about any of the SRD in any campaign if it makes sense.

Just keep the meta-level currency roughly the same for everybody, and it doesn't matter much where they put it.

And if he likes making up homebrew, Fate will let him do that.

7:02 AM

Because when we asked the player about what his problem with DW is he says that "you take a character, throw all the saves, skills, proficiencies out and replace them with a bunch of 2d6s". Which is weird. As for homebrew, the problem is he's opposed to that on principle even when he can agree it's good.

@trogdor Can you give some pointers on how to make a narrative game (Fate in your case, but general advice would be cool as well) have fiddly mechanical bits?

Right, so an hour later we figure out that he's not inherently opposed to DW, just opposed to porting the character.

Ah well. We'll figure something out.

I hope.

Gots to go now.

Magician

@BESW Have you read LoEG?

7:27 AM

@UristMcDorf me? give advice on how to make a narrative game have fiddly bits?

I have not made systems

I mean, Fate technically already has some fiddly bits

it has stunts

and technically aspects could be considered in that way to a degree

I have technically made some conjectures on adding magic items

do you know what Refresh in Fate is?

Refresh's the amount of fate points you start with each session, no?

Well, I meant point me in the right direction if you haven't made stuff like that.

BESW mentioned TOolkit and Atomic Robo on the SRD, but maybe you know more.

I don't exactly know more than BESW

my Fate experience is the same as his, just from a different point of view

Ah ,ok.

Atomic Robo is great for it though

I liked it, and at least from the description, your friend was skeptical of Fate for the same reasons I was

I like Fiddly bits too, and Atomic Robo was great for adding those in

I like the Atomic Robo system a lot

as long as you can be as creative and flexible with it as it expects, it will give you all the fiddly bits you want

it's got Megastunts and some interesting kinds of equipment rules

so it has my personal recommendation from a guy who happens to like fiddly bits in his RPGs but also likes narrative capacity

Well the problem is he doesn't seem to like narrative capacity yet the rest of us, well, do. I dunno. We'll figure it out.

7:39 AM

yeah, that is a problem

I like both things

so it was not a huge problem for me to trust my group when they wanted to move from 4e to to other things, like Fate for example

but also, because I liked the fiddly bits, I pretty quickly fell in love with the Atomic Robo system

but it does go for narrative stuff too, and if your friend doesn't like that, I don't know what to do other than try something

and the best recommendation of a system that has both things, if a little biased on my part, is indeed Atomic Robo

Alright, will keep in mind. Thanks!

I have no idea if that will work though, cause it sounds like your friend might be a more stubborn person than me

8:22 AM

@Magician I'm not sure what that stands for.

Ahriman

8:52 AM

League of Extraordinary gentleman?

LEGO of Enormous Girth?

Land of Everlasting Gobstoppers?

Lean out, Eustace Grubb.

9:30 AM

Logic of Equal Gains.

Loudness of Equatorial Guinea.

Lair of Evil Giants. I'd put my money on that (no).