hey there @Emrakul

how're things going?

would be a whole lot better if my PC wasn't suffering from a bunch of post-reboot graphics squirreliness (had a 2 hour power outage overnight last night)

well, I think I found the problem at least -- just have to blow away Xorg and bring it back up though

@Emrakul actually, I'm back already :D

@Emrakul way more straightforward :P

@Shalvenay Squirrely, eh?

LOL

seems like CyberSquirrel1 has finally been captured \o/

hey there @nitsua60

@LegendaryDude I very often have a "developments" table for a scenario on which I'll roll at real-time intervals.

Usually different columns in the table either enter or leave play as the PC's actions defuse or incite things.

@Shalvenay hiya

how're things going?

Good--AL tonight, with the HS kids.

how'd that go?

Good, though it's painfully slow.

how so?

They're not terribly good at following the narrative, so are constantly asking questions to go back over things that just happened, for one thing.

Lots of time spent on "wait, what do I add when I attack?"

ah

hey there @CBredlow

"It's a d20 plus your attack bonus, just like it has been the last 150 times you've attacked."

But, hey, it's how you get new players in. The one kid who's running a table does an awesome job, which is really cool to watch.

(And play with/under, when seating calls for it.)

hey as well @Novak

@nitsua60 good to hear

btw, do you think a "standing" campaign world is a good thing to have on hand?

Hey @Shalvenay

@Novak what's up?

Question to the crowd (which seems to be... three of us?)

What to do when a question has been closed as opinion based, when a good factual (or fact-based) answer exists? Question is not mine.

@Novak point it out that you have a fact-based answer lined up with a comment and VtRO

"take it to meta" is my first instinct (sight unseen)

if what's going on overflows a short comment, then yeah, take it to meta

Considered "Take it to meta," but that seems like a sledgehammer. (If I were to do that, I would wait until I had half a dozen examples and make an ISSUE out of it.)

Comment was my first instinct, but I wasn't sure if comments were appropriate. Not sure what VtRO stands for.

And I should point out it's been edited (not by me) and is eligible for a re-open. I wasn't sure if a comment would be construed as pushing the vote, or if that's fair game.

@Novak vote-to-reopen

@Novak I dunno--single-question metas are perfectly fine in my opinion. I mean, there's a whole specific-question tag....

@nitsua60 I hear you-- I don't really disagree, it comes down to style. If that were the only option I'd feel less hesitation. The question is the "Layers of Story" question, which I think is a great one, that has at least a semi-answer based in psychological studies.

The more we use meta like that, the less "EXTREEEME" such use will be.

Here's the thing: a good answer rarely salvages a poor question.

@BESW Like, after a while it'll be "EXTREEME," then "Extreeme," then "extreme"?

Then mundane?

Good answer/poor question: Maybe, maybe not. But I can't be too enthusiastic about closing questions that actually have good answers.

btw, out of curiosity, what do you think predisposes a table to develop murderhoboes?

In perfect bluntness? Youth, poor social skills, lack of empathy, and general frustration.

(Says someone who's been there.)

ah. I was more asking towards ingame-controllable factors -- all of what you raise is true, but not nearly as feasible to control for in the typical context

@Novak How about challenge-seeking players, depersonalized setting and NPCs, and a reward structure predicated on murder?

@nitsua60 I think that's a big one, yeah -- one of the big things I've noticed about our AD&D table is we are getting XP basically as lump sums per-adventure, irrespective of how we solve it

as opposed to XP-per-monster

By in-game, you mean setting elements that the GM controls, but excluding things like "GM talks to players and says don't do that?"

yeah -- stuff that a GM can do to the game to make it so that things are less predisposed to murderhoboism

@nitsua60 's answer covers a lot of ground.

@Novak ??? (not sure I'm following you)

(Means I agree a lot.) To that, I would add lack of consequences-- legal, social, divine, whatever is appropriate to the game.

Lack of distinction between murdertargets and actual NPCs, which is an aspect of depersonalization.

@Novak yeah, that's a big one right there.

@Novak GOtcha. I wasn't sure if you meant the chat-post, or were referencing some (mainsite) answer.

@Novak This, too.

Thing is, some players STILL won't get it, as evidenced by many popular questions.

And despite my comments on youth and all that, one of my players is... he must be fifty because he's older than me, he's happily married, a family man, good stand up guy and he STILL sometimes reverts to "Fireball in the Town Square" mode, so I dunno

yeah, some of my most memorable scenes have been with NPCs that most people would consider murdertargets

(coming to mind off-hand is one where my elf priestess of Corellon flips a gold coin over to the ogre guarding the bridge when the toll is 1 silver and is like "Toss the change in the bridge repair fund!"

(said ogre was guarding a bridge that kept getting wailed on by spider-cultists)

I'm not sure this counts as GM-controllable, per se, but genre expectations probably have something to do with it, too.

@Novak that is true -- murderhoboism does seem less likely in genres where the party is lower-powered WRT their world

@Novak It counts: that's one of the things a session zero is for.

Certainly the GM's got influence there, if not control.

@nitsua60 fair enough. It might be a slow influence, but it is there. A number of players, myself included, were thoroughly disabused of our ideas of what were and were not murdertargets in a long-running Amber game. But it did take a while.

Hi hi.

hello

I gots a problem.

do tell

There's this Black Hack hack I'm writing, but I don't have people to play it with.

That is, indeed, a problem. No regular gaming group to inflict it upon?

Not a single one.

It's Final Fantasy themed thingy, with people management bits and spirit magic. drive.google.com/drive/folders/…

Hah, I know nothing of either Black Hack or Final Fantasy

Is cool.

Today in Your Fantasy World Isn't Weird Enough:

@JuneShores Are you looking for RL victims playtesters, or will online ones do? I ask because if you wanted online ones you could certainly plst a "call for players" and ask BESW to pin it for a period.

How much does a mithril chainmail corslet cost?

@Mazura mithril chain shirt...depends on what world you're in xD

there are some worlds where mithril isn't a thing, others where it's worth more than the rarest metals on our planet, and others yet where it's relatively common

@Shalvenay - Tolkien's Middle-earth. Aren't there player guides that list it?

@Mazura no idea, not familiar with any LoTR-set TTRPGs

@BESW [takes notes]

@Mazura there are many tabletop RPGs set in middle earth, and no reason to presume their pricing for a given item would be faithful and accurate to the source material.

@GMJoe Talk to me, man. What is it that you are looking for? I may have misunderstood your comment.

@Shalvenay About 30 years ago, Iron Crown Enterprises made an extensive Middle Earth game. I may still have a few of the source books.

@KorvinStarmast ah. hey there btw @KorvinStarmast, how're things going?

@Shalvenay Well enough. Weather has taken a turn for the better, the missus and I will be taking the dogs on a long walk in about a half an hour. Pretty day.

@KorvinStarmast nice. I've been OK here. got into a RL AD&D table, and my character is surviving L1 OK, so that's a good sign

@Shalvenay Just call me jealous. Would love to play AD&D 1 e again...

@KorvinStarmast playing a gnoll monk/cleric of St. Cuthbert in that campaign

Neat combo, but I am sadly too old school to play gnolls as PC's. Volos, for me, was a great disappointment. I do understand that folks like to stretch, and play from the PoV of one of the enemy races. It's just not for me.

@KorvinStarmast yeah, I prefer to mix things up myself -- especially as a DM and worldbuilder

I found Volos to be disappointing re: gnolls and orcs, as it focused exclusively on Yeenoghuan and Grummshite versions of the respective races

it did a very good job with kobolds and hobgoblins though

you could actually see a society there, not just a bunch of RAARGH KILL

Volos is for me too much like Fiend Folio, added to a few Elminster "the ecology and sociology of Giant, Beholders, and Mind Flayers" ...

Those articles were better in the Dragon Mag .... the bloviation in Volos is, to be frank, bad editing as an example.

@KorvinStarmast ah. yeah, I'm not sure what you'd do with some of the scenes I've cooked up in the past -- like the one time I had the party run into a Orc family who was driving their herd of sheep down the road

Most PC parties would leave them alone, or talk to the father if they though he had useful information, back when I was playing 1e. We were big on "mission focus" and "digging all intel out of the NPC's possible."

Of course, if there was a High Elf in the party, he might just slaughter the orcs out of hand. Racial antipathy is a thing.

yeah -- it turned out to be a case of two ships passing in the night more or less in play

I tend to model Orcs off real-life herdsfolk cultures/peoples (it makes them being short-fused make more sense than just making them all RAARGH GRUUMSH or pure "barbarians" for that matter)

(interestingly enough -- in the current iteration of the world I'm working on, it makes for a split between the elves too -- the Wood Elves get along with the Orcs fairly well as a fellow "live off the land" sort of people, while the High Elves can't stand the Orcs)

hey there @nitsua60

hey there @daze413