@JoshuaAslanSmith signup table, we made 1st level chars at the table. definitely not for organized play -- I had my extant 5e homebrew dungeon out, and it went quite well (even though that party got the dubious honor of setting off the dungeon's fire alarm for the first time)
the only positive things I can say about the Dragon Age world is it actually takes a fairly nuanced view toward religion in your conversations with Leliana and alistar
Sonic had pretty good level design when I was a kid, too. When most platformers of the time had linear levels, the branching factor in Sonics was out there. Sadly, it wasn't equally true for all levels, but oh well.
@ShadowKras its a similar design aesthetic as the original genesis games (branching paths at different levels that rejoin and cross over, speed and slow down for tricky platofrming )
theres some new stuff like the jump dash
basically you jump and on landing as a ball surge forward
@JuneShores I just realised that I follow you on G+ even though I know I didn't search for you specifically. It dawned on me when I saw your post and your name here in the space of seconds
True story: i knew my first gf about 5 years before we actually met in real life, and we only realized so when looking through some old screenshots of hers that had me on the same chat room
I left a comment on an answer which I believe is only a frame challenge to the question about imposing a "Limit Curse" on a player. This is what I said in that comment:
This answer is only a frame challenge, and therefore it does not answer the question asked. You are supposed to answer the Q...
@Yuuki that's pretty funny. Years ago when my lab was a puppy she'd escape through the slots in our metal fence. I went with the chicken wire solution. Ugly, but effective. she'd have just figured out a way to eat the spoon.
@eimyr I download this game. You make a correction to it. My friend also downloads this game. We notice the difference and have no idea which version is "right" because we don't remember when we downloaded it respectively. If the inside cover says "version 1.3.0" on one and "version 1.2.1" on the other, we have our answer.
@JoshuaAslanSmith Versioning is always good. If you need it, it saves you a TON of time and effort, if you don't need it, it costs you pretty much nothing.
versioning is a good idea for books and such (at the very least they say "second edition" and so on when they get updated); for larger projects it just becomes critical rather than good
I've come across a question where the querent has some facts majorly wrong, and they seem to be a substantial cause of the problem they're describing.
I know that we refrain from answering in comments, and I could imagine pointing out those corrections in an answer.
How should I handle pointing...
@ShadowKras I found an introduction to a sort of calendar/notebook keeping where at the end of the month, you go over the todos you collected in that month and explicitly transfer them to the following month. It works nicely for me. Something like that?
@Anaphory speaking of the other side -- the other thing I'd like to try sometime is giving something from the Powered by the Apocalypse family another shot, because I had one go at DW but it was a bit awkward considering our DM was learning the system too :)
@JuneShores I could see Monsterhearts working...interestingly, especially with a Gnoll for a character (adding awkward physiology onto the theme of psychological awkwardness)
@Shalvenay For PbtA games it's hard not to mention Apocalypse World, it's the purest, Bakerest rendition of the engine and the game itself is very good. Otherwise, you can take a look at Night Witches, it's very strong too. Monsterhearts is a quirky game, exceptional even for its niche.
Night Witches is about the WWII Soviet squadron of all-female bombing pilots, the challenges they faced both in the air and on the ground, and how their sense of tight-knit community was crucial to their success.
On the other hand, Night Witches is a historically accurate portrayal of the pilots of the 588th Night Bomber regiment, an all-female night bombing division of the Red Army.
It concentrates on the shocking horror of war and the quotidian anxiety of military life with understaffing, underfunding, sexism and the ever-present NKVD all reducing your chances of survival. It's mostly an exploration of the relationships between the pilots.
ah. I think I'd probably have an easier time with DW or Monsterhearts -- Night Witches sounds like a good game, just not quite for me (too close to history)
I have heard very good things about Night Witches elsewhere, as well. I was willing to give AW a whirl and have a lot of fun with it even though post-Apoc wasn't on my agenda, the same might apply to Night Witches and themes of war.
@Shalvenay Disclaimer: I have not played it. I think that if you won't like the premise you might get an idea that all PbtA games are like Monsterhearts - which is decidedly not true.
@Shalvenay Disclaimer: I have not played it. I think that if you won't like the premise you might get an idea that all PbtA games are like Monsterhearts - which is decidedly not true.
@Shalvenay This is probably in reference to the PCvsPC play style that the game wants you to adopt. Players aren't out to "defeat" the others, but they are encouraged to play somewhat adversarial way toward each other. This is in contrast to AW, where that only happens occasionally, and Dungeon World, where the game leans toward party cohesion.
@Anaphory A lot of people would follow this "logic": Monsterhearts is thematically hipsterish, with teens, drama, love, sex and monsters + Monsterhearts is PbtA = All PbtA games are hipsterish
@JuneShores ah. yeah -- I think that it wouldn't be a major problem for me as I have enough exposure to DW to know that PbtA generally does not enforce any sort of adversarial relationship between party members
Yeah, if you have a warped idea of what the indie scene is about it's easy to get a feeling that every indie game is going to tackle coming of age issues or mentalhealth/sexuality issues covered in a bit campy pulp adventure dressing
@eimyr And if you then start looking at looks/special moves in AW, gendered playbooks in Sagas of the Icelanders and maybe other things as well … (Although that's truely more a case of “these genres have those tropes in there, so of course authors have to make them explict”)
@Zachiel I'm not expecting anything particularly awesome out of myself playing Monsterhearts anyway :P (although a floofy, genderswapped Friar Tuck figure adding to her studies would make an interesting humor piece in context I reckon)
@JuneShores -- how many sessions would be good for a short-form Monsterhearts game for that matter?
@Zachiel If I search "labyrinth rpg" I get a digital collectible card game dungeon crawler. Which seems... not quite right, since it's in response to my saying I'm interested in playing more RPGs which use a standard deck of playing cards.
And I'm just cursing people who said "we're back to your location in the game tonight, we can finally play together" that turned into "yes, but only after dining". At 10 PM.
Heads up to our UK fans:
Pre-order Dresden Files Accelerated from @leisuregames_uk and avoid overseas shipping: https://leisuregames.com/collections/pre-orders/products/dresden-files-accelerated-complimentary-pdf-preorder
been working on a second, combat-heavier, 5e dungeon to go into my standing dungeon portfolio along with the first one I created, which is being tweaked as well
Question. What would you think of a DM who made a decision to completely incapacitate one PC for the entire first session of a new campaign without giving the player a heads up?
user15026
@Hypersapien I'd feel really let down if it was my character, it would feel like I wasn't included/wanted
The session was split up into two scenes. In the first, as soon as combat started she was grabbed, and for the first half of the battle she was being dragged off the map.
In the second scene, we were rescuing her, while she was under some kind of suspended animation.
Her character seems to play some kind of pivotal role in the campaign.
No. She was kind of annoyed/disappointed that she didn't get to do anything other than try to break the grapple that it was decided ahead of time she wouldn't be able to.
OK. yeah. it does smell some but I suspect intro flubs are not uncommon in campaigns (I've been in two so far where the opening events involved the whole party being captured, but that was more agreed-upon-ahead-of-time)
There's a common smell test for character empowerment: does the character go to places, or is she brought to places? Failing this doesn't always indicate a lack of plot agency but it's a good warning sign--especially in games like D&D where plot agency is more associated with physical empowerment than social empowerment.
I left a comment on an answer which I believe is only a frame challenge to the question about imposing a "Limit Curse" on a player. This is what I said in that comment:
This answer is only a frame challenge, and therefore it does not answer the question asked. You are supposed to answer the Q...
I've come across a question where the querent has some facts majorly wrong, and they seem to be a substantial cause of the problem they're describing.
I know that we refrain from answering in comments, and I could imagine pointing out those corrections in an answer.
How should I handle pointing...
