...okay but O this is a transhumanist setting I can sink my teeth into because it's all about families and ties of obligation and what that means in a collectivist caste society where nobles can have their ancestors' personalities talking to them through implants, and your great-aunt might be the space station you're living on, and the cleaning-bot might be working to buy its way out of indentured servitude.
@trogdor There's a short Xuya story about a bot cleaning up a warship after a battle, and finding a surviving enemy who's violently anti-transhumanism but needs to convince the bot to smuggle him to safety.
Xuya is a far-future setting about a interstellar empire based on Vietnamese culture, written by Aliette de Bodard.
It's got a strong transhumanist element, with the ability to transfer human consciousnesses into artificial bodies, to genetically engineer human-born people designed to be permanently bonded with spaceships and space stations as their controlling entities, and to preserve personalities as brain-interface implants. And it explores how those themes interact with a caste society that places great significance on ancestor veneration and family obligation.
@V2Blast One of the big issues is that the rule seems to state that whenever A could see B, in theory, B can't be hidden from A, which has all kinds of wonky outcomes.
And that seems to me to totally invalidate camouflage by crypsis, and while I think realism only has a second-class citizenship in DnD rules, this is an unusually large simplification.
There's a lizard in that image, and I probably wouldn't see it if I didn't know it was there, but I still can see it. Seems strange that it couldn't try to hide from me.
Transhumanism isn't limited to just removing a human consciousness from its fleshy brain and inserting it into digital media.
It's the vast array of possibility within the concept of using technology to deliberately assist the human body and mind to "evolve" beyond their current limitations.
@BESW I'll add her to my list of shortstory-a-day, which is currently mostly composed of the Clarkesworld Magazine Podcast. Which should last me another half a year, I guess, but that doesn't mean I can't read something else somewhere in there.
There's different ways to approach it, but I think one of the clear lines we can draw is that a story is a transhuman story once humanity takes control of its own physical condition & evolutioin. Artificial body components are one part of that, being able to transfer one's mind is another.
There are probably ways to approach transhumanism which don't resemble that at all, too.
I have a story that's half written only (And at this pace, it will always be half written). The world is kinda sorta post-apocaliptic. Humans built an AI that went bonkers (not exactly), that could control sub-atomic bots designed to improve human's quality of life. Cue in long war and arms race, and eventually the AI commits "suicide", but it's bots have already permeated everything. So everything and everyone is intermingled with bots that are *mostly* blank. Coders can write applications that install on peoples bodies and can do several functions. The bots can intercept the information f…
There are also some interesting RPG podcasts running around--some are Actual Plays, but some are more like talk shows with guests and such, about various aspects of RPGery.
A few years ago I listened to some about design.
(That's one of the first places I heard of Dog Eat Dog.)
I'm currently consuming that medium for short stories. At some point I'll be looking for 10- or 20-minute RPG podcasts to listen to on my way to work and back. This is not the day.
@Helwar Yes. I listen to my short stories at the end of the day, when going to bed. Other times my concentration on text is elswhere, on code or papers (or here).
Tonight we had boring sandwiches and smoothies, but I made a hot mustard using yellow mustard as a base, with wasabi paste, Worcestershire sauce, garlic powder, honey, and ginger salabat powder.
We made some homemade wine too, it turned out pretty good. But ginger ale is where the money is for me. Alcohol doesn't really interest me that much, but ginger drinks aren't really a big thing around here and making it oneself is the best way to get the good stuff :)
(I'd been having a lot of trouble finding wasabi paste that doesn't have high fructose corn syrup, but it turns out there's a bento-box lunch place that sells little packets of non-high-fructose wasabi to put on your musubi or whatever.)
My favorite is this one really spicy 0.5% ABV by Fentimans, but it's over two euros for 33 cl here and available in only a few specific stores that I know of, so I'm trying to replace that with home-made stuff.
The Fanatic badge is for people who wake up with trembling hands already reaching for their phone and racing to tap the RPG.se shortcut on their home screen
@kviiri I just tackled the help-pile you pointed out, but I think the flag may have registered as "declined" since I didn't actually delete the comment to which it was attached. So's you know: I found it "helpful."
@BESW Yes; based on my modest play experience with an Archfey Warlock, sprite familiar has a sweet spot with scouting and being invisible. (We only got to benefit from the "figure out something's alignment" skill once. That campaign is dormant, likely dead.
the worst I did was to call an interface module that had the ungrateful duty to work with an old, bug filled, poorly written repository... "public class HazmatGlove"
@Shalvenay As written, alignment is not an optional rule. If you look in the PHB, it guides the player to choose an alignment. What mechanical impact alignment has is limited to such things as the Sprite's ability, a few of the legendary items that do damage to you if you are the wrong alignment, and so on.
@doppelgreener That's one of the best comments on cannibalism in RPG that I've seen. A keeper, thanks.
@kviiri What terms do you use when you flag a help pile?
The most helpful way to do it is flag the most recent problematic comment and leave a custom message directing us to what to look at. For example, "Comments up to here can go."
@doppelgreener Yeah, someone (apparently not kviiri) flagged the first comment in a chain saying "hey, maybe trim out the help-pile" which I agreed with. So I deleted a bunch of other comments but left the flagged one, which I expect would auto-mark as declined when it really was helpful.
@NautArch Thanks! It was that discussion on dimension door and contingency that made me think of it actually. And the fact that this is actually something that I am thinking about doing in my own campaign. :)
@NautArch Actually it was just a tangential conversation nothing to do with combining magic items and DD. It was actually about whether DD could be used with contingency at all
@NautArch That is the way I would rule as well. But because of 5e's... fantastic policy of not defining terms that really should be it is a bit ambiguous.
@Secespitus I'm leaning toward allowing it. It's just annoying as hell that misty step has a "statblock" range of self and teleports you up to 30', where DD has a statblock range of 500' and teleports you to that point. And teleport has a range of 10 feet and teleports you and up to 8 other creatures via ranges further discussed.
I mean nowhere is that actually stated or defined to be fair (what the targets of the spells are). But I absolutely see no reason that it should not be allowed.
To me, DD is giving you the range that you can move yourself to. You are clearly the target of the spell. I don't think Self needs to be on the target criteria (for instance, Bless would be a legit Contingency spell)
IIRC, misty step conjures ephemeral mist that surrounds the target (you) and transports it up to 30 feet. Dimension door creates a quasi-wormhole between you and a point you target up to 500 feet away. The range of teleport only applies if you're targeting an object, in which case it must occupy a 10-foot cube.
@NautArch Right, but then we get into the murkey waters of -> target == anyone affected by the spell -> All creatures in AOE are targets -> weird interactions with certain rules based on targeting.
@NautArch Hence the difficulty here. Some AOEs actually explicitly refer to the creatures in it as targets (eg fireball). And some aspects of the rules strongly imply this interpretation is true for all AOEs as well.
@NautArch Best not be stealing my follow up questions ;P
@Rubiksmoose "A bright streak flashes from your pointing finger to a point you choose within range and then blossoms with a low roar into an explosion of flame. ". That sure seems like you are targeting a point.
@NautArch "Each creature in a 20-foot-radius sphere centered on that point must make a Dexterity saving throw. A target takes 8d6 fire damage on a failed save, or half as much damage on a successful one."
@NautArch Would this question happen to be about Ioun Stone casting and material components?
@Rubiksmoose Components in general and i included ring of spell storing as well. I don't know how many other items include identical language, but yes.
@Rubiksmoose Yeah, I'd probably be okay with that. Espeically since you'd most likely destroy the stone as well. A stone has AC 24, 10 hit points, and resistance to all damage.
Good chance that a fireball will drop more than 20 hp.
@NautArch Wait are we talking about casting this from an Ioun Stone here? Because I was just talking about casting it normally. Also, who would include themselves in the area of their own fireball unless they had that evocation ability.
@MikeQ That's a good question :), but items that have a specific AC/HP and damage properties I'd rule would be considered objects. Do any objects have saving throws?
@Rubiksmoose Casting fireball to go with Contingency?
hummm, the way I ruled it in my games (that's not RAW nor RAI but my own bias) is that AoE didn't harm Ioun stones, just because otherwise they would be destroyed every time you tried to use one in combat
> While an Ioun stone is deployed (circling) it is considered a worn item except as noted otherwise. So it would not be damaged by area-of-effect spells, etc.
@Rubiksmoose I think it is, but i'll let the community decide (or another gold badge.) And while I think it is unlikely components are required, I'llt ake my downvotes because I think it's possible that these items are different.
@NautArch That is fair, though personally I think it would be a pretty awful ruling. Material components are bad enough to track once. Making them be tracked again seems painful. Also very much against the flavor of the item IMO.
@NautArch You make a good point, the specific language of "as if you cast the spell", carries with it some questions about what parts of casting a spell are included
Consider the case of the caster who stores a spell to use it themselves later. They have to pay again even though they actually did cast it the first time!
@Rubiksmoose @NautArch another concern is with Spellcasting focus. If I cast a spell into my RoSS, can I use my wand for the "recast"? Is it still a wizard spell? And does that mean if I cast the spell into my cleric's RoSS he would need to use the default components on the 'recast' or could he use a wand since it was originally cast as a wizard spell?
@Rubiksmoose Yeah, I don't think it's likely the intent, but i could see a case for it that it is. YOu don't need to spend a spell slot again, but you do need the components. I dunno.
@DavidCoffron per the language, the spellcasting modifier/type is from the original caster and not whomever is casting it out of the item.
@Rubiksmoose that's a good question. Given that the glyph doesn't talk about spellcasting atttack/dc, etc. I'd say it's more like Contingency in that the spel lhas been cast, it's just waiting to be released. But I could also see a case that that is the same mechanic for a Ring of Spell Storing/Ioun stone.
@NautArch When you get a chance, I've posted a "players available" for ToA in the Chatizen's forum with my weeks available. Hope the kids made you pancakes for Father's Day breakfast. (Heh, I had to make my own breakfast, as everyone else was asleep and I figured I'd just get my day started ... early riser am I)
@NautArch It could also mean that per the spell description, you have to expend a spell slot even though you normally don't have to. Might be worth it's own question. I.e. "If I use contingency with a racial spell, do I have to spend a spell slot?"
@DavidCoffron Contingency requires a spell, and the general case is spell slots; being able to cast the spell is what's needed. Treat your race spell as having a racial slot and Bob's your uncle. Seems to me you are making this overly complicated.
@NautArch I know that part but it says I have to cast a spell (something i can do with my race) and expend a spell slot (so.ething I have from my class). Can I just lose the spell slot so as to use my racial spell for contingency?
Are class spells their own resource? Are they their own pool of spell slots? I say yes because you have the same issue with Magic Initiate when you have spells from another class. That slot is a separate resource from you class spells; it's not a MC thing.
@DavidCoffron right, but contingency requires a spell slot to be expended. If there's no slot expended, then there's no contingency (or so that theory goes.)
A 10th level Drow warlock (for instance) has the following racial ability in addition to it's warlock spellcasting abilities:
Drow Magic (PHB p.24)
You know the dancing lights cantrip. When you reach 3rd level, you can cast the faerie fire spell once per day. When you reach 5th level, you ca...
Universe: "I see that you are attempting to cast an infinitely recursive contingent contingency. Proper recursion includes a base case, so please try again."
Well, if you're going to be houseruling that contingency doesn't consume a spell slot for the contingent spell, you aren't going to be playing that campaign for much longer.
@DavidCoffronI think your question is too many questions :)
My problem is, I'm not sure my answer to Rubik's question is clear enough taht there is a path not allowing this and has opened the door for your question.
A 10th level Drow warlock (for instance) has the following racial ability in addition to it's warlock spellcasting abilities:
Drow Magic (PHB p.24)
You know the dancing lights cantrip. When you reach 3rd level, you can cast the faerie fire spell once per day. When you reach 5th level, you ca...
