I feel like the blush may be off this conversation--it's becoming a blemish on the room.
@JoelHarmon >90% awesome. Kids are doing well, summer's been pretty good, and I scored a couple of personal achievements the last two weekends that hadn't even been on my radar until the days of. On the other hand, my wife's dad is back in the ICU. (He's been in and out of coma and ICU for the last six-plus months at this point.) So the stuff that isn't awesome is pretty not-awesome.
@nitsua60 As always, there's a bit of a mix. Fortunately, no major medical issues in the family. Speaking of which, the kiddo is growing like a weed and manages to astound me every two or three days. The extended family is also healthy and growing.
@JoelHarmon I'm the same way with plenty of chatizens, themselves. I was almost getting to the point where I could tell Rubiksmoose and V2blast apart, then they both won election!
Though I did have a passing thought on that: if I went to Ye Olde Renaissance Faire and held up a sign reading "Ask me about RPG.SE!", what are the odds that I'd meet someone with an account?
@JoelHarmon I'm more interested in a dangerouser question: assuming you do meet someone with an account, what are the odds they're someone who considers their experience here positive vs. negative?
I assume that we get a better sample rate on positive feedback than we do on negative. (And I know it's dangerously easy to dismiss the negative.) I wish I knew better strategies for finding and learning from the negative feedback that I assume we're not getting.
@nitsua60 I'd agree. It's unlikely anyone with a moderately negative experience would bother talking to me. Anyone with a terrible experience might come and try to chew me out over something or other that I was likely unaware of.
So, my Diablo game has been on hiatus for quite a while, primarily due to hitting a road black with the development of the Corruption system, and my focus being forced elsewhere. But I think I might wind it back, take another crack at it, and get this thing going with a simpler system.
@MikeQ Yeah. I'd gotten it to appoint where it as diverse and windy, for complex play, but there was just too much to it. So I think I'm just going to restrict it back to two options, each with 2 or 3 of their own options
@Ben If I were you, I might consider using an single-sheet zine booklet as a template: each complete segment of the subsystem has to fit on one page or two facing pages and there's only eight pages including front and back. That'd give a very concrete physical shape to the subsystem which forces me to keep it small and simple, and it'd prompt me with ideas about how to structure it so it's easy to understand and reference at the table.
So, I had this idea for an albino orc, who was thrown out of his clan for being different, and ended up being raised by some elves. These elves taught him the way of magic, and thus, there was Vajor Galailo, the albino orc wizard.
I usually mess around with HeroForge to create a visual for my ch...
For example, say I have a warlock and want to be able to summon bhuer hags.
This is slightly problematic due to bhuer's having a CR 7, so could I take an upcast Conjure Fey as my 7th level Mystic Arcanum?
This is kind of a fussy question, but I was reading through the stat blocks for some of the demon lords in D&D 5e today and came across a seeming edge case that I hadn't thought of before.
Orcus has a Multiattack feature, like many monsters, and this multiattack is restricted to a specific kind ...
The crown of madness spell states:
The charmed target must use its action before moving on each of its turns to make a melee attack against a creature other than itself that you mentally choose...
I am unsure whether this is its own unique action that the spell forces you to make, similar t...
And they were able to go through most of the Death house already, with some good bits of roleplay negotiating with the spectres inside
I'm especially happy because they told me they really liked the spooky house ambiance, which I was really hoping they would
Although one of the monsters took them by surprise, 2-shot one of them and I had to halve their HP to avoid an early tpk, although they used really good tactics during that fight
My only moment of glory so far "I crit! I can add another spell on top of that, so it amounts to... 175 points of damage!! - How many are electricity? - Umh... 150? - Welp, it's an undead, so he is immune to that, so you do 25, congrats"
Oh we also had a good highlight yesterday : "You open the door into a small and dusty room, there are a few shelves filled with cobwebs and a broomstick" "I search it thoroughly" As you approach the end of the room, the broomstick animates and tries to hit you" *roll* "You dodge, what do you do" "I disengage and close the door"
@Nyakouai Had you been playing Rulemaster, probably you would have had calculate the electromagnetic field it generated, the damage on the tissues from shock, potential explosions, risk of generating a fire etc etc etc :P
@Nyakouai I might steal that and do a similar thing in my campaign, Curse of Strahd is all about corrupting the players after all
Although admittedly it's more about corrupting in exchange for power
but it kinda bothers me that I can't find good encounters about corrupting players... I've got some good ones planned for psychological warfare, but corruption is hard
You have to push them to do something bad, but reward them for doing so. You need to reward them enough so that it is interesting, but not too much so there is still a moral hesitation
Well I don't have much power to gift the actual players in return, yeah I meant characters
@Nyakouai that's exactly it, I want to push them to do something that's borderline evil, because they're too blinded by rewards to see it, but it's not easy
@Nyakouai Yeah that's a pretty good effect, my chars haven't met strahd yet but that's how I see his persona
He's going to be really charming, really polite, and even in anger he's first going to invite them to dinner and formally announce an oath of vengeance against the party
They're new to dnd, but not roleplaying, we've played Naheulbeuk for over a year. They're a half-orc Fighter, a dragonborn Monk, a dragonborn Paladin and a tiefling cleric of Poseidon (tempest)
Oh I don't think they'd try, they've learned to take my threats pretty seriously ;) And if they tried, don't you think a military mastermind like Strahd would have anticipated it ? grins evilly
I don't know much about the campaign. Strahd has a butler, does he have any muscle that could "escort" the party out? Totally respectfully and forcefully
love this line: If all the players wish to have the same element, consider not making it an element at all. That aspect of the characters is now just part of what game you want to play.
Didn't want to make (non-copyediting) changes while over the weekend, as I had multiple sources give feedback, and making changes could cause confusion
Hey, people! Can you give me an opinion? I'm building a website where to host material for my upcoming Pathfinder campaign, what would you put in it? I currently have: one PC page with their avatar, race, gender, class and background information; one NPC page with the same things (I'm considering one NPC page per place they visit); one page for each chapter of the Adventure path where I usually write down the treasure they find.
@Rubiksmoose Well the question is the same, what goes in each Google Drive document, then? I'm trying not to put all info in one file/page because it's hard to reference, but it looks like players still keep me asking "who's this guy again?"
(I have a site like that running for my current campaign)
@Rubiksmoose The idea is that if they're on a list you can search them visually, by avatar, instead of by name - and there's just a blurb of information for each.
One thing I hate about the Pathfinder wiki sites is that you get a list of "Inhabitants of Trunau" and you need to open each one by trial and error to find the one that's actually in charge of warehouses, because I'm bad at names.
The issue now is that one player told me "there are too much NPCs", so I've made a list of NPCs sorted alphabetically but finding who is who is not working for him, nor for me (it works if you know the name and want to know what they do, not to find out who to go talking to).
My initial idea is to have a page with all NPCs you might have seen and known in a day, and then a different one for the locals, who should know more faces.
@NautArch Depending on what you mean, probably. In my previous campaign, the players' guide introduced the PCs to several notables who had no role in the adventure proper.
@Someone_Evil the fact that strain is under the magic section makes it feel (to me) that strain is a magic/spell effect, rather than an Element effect for any Element test.
It is later clarified, but it took me a couple extra glances.
@NautArch In this moment, unless someone comes at me with a dwarf that worships Sarenrae, I have just two sets of informations: people who are familiar with Trunau and people who just arrived in Trunau.
@Zachiel Gotcha. I just often have 'bit players' vs 'story players'. I try and keep track of the story players for the PCs, but the bit players I don't worry about as much. Mostly because if they are unsure of the story players, then they're unsure of what potential paths they can pursue.
@NautArch I think the information overoad was caused by one-off questgivers, named NPCs appearing just once in the story, people mentioning other people in hyerarchical chains, past enemies being mentioned every now and then by other PCs that had a stake in the equation and so on. Lots of names in a city as big as Korvosa
Last session I sent out a brief recap (since we have only been playinga bout 1/month over the summer) that included each existing hook (either hooks presetned by me or opened by player actions/backstories.)
and that was received really well
supposedly one player keeps a doc, but as far as i know he hasn't shared it with the group
@goodguy5 Ehh... the GM narrates. I haven't included a "damage" system, and I'm not sure if I want one (/haven't got one that accomplishes what I want for the system). If you outmanoeuvre someone in swordplay they might have a sword through their shoulder or similar. If you successfully light someone on fire, they are now on fire. I like to assume the consequences of this is intuitable (I am willing to wrong about that).
@KorvinStarmast That's fair, but if the club were intended to line up with standard rules, it probably wouldn't have been called "Unusual Club of Unusualness". It's not called "A Perfectly Normal Club". =P The Shillelagh spell can only be applied to Clubs and Quarterstaffs, so I needed to invent one of those that had multiple damage dice.
@goodguy5 Do orcs in your world stop protecting their cake if they are on fire? If so, use fire. Do they stop once you have stabbed them to death? If so stab them to death.
Once they stop moving? Loss of head? (Again there isn't a explicit system build in, but something like: an Invocation/Spellcasting caused sufficient trauma and the Orcs failed their (last) Tenacity test to not die is reasonable)
@goodguy5 Do you need to be told? I'm/the system is trusting the GM's intuition to resolve "damage"/injuries. That may be a mistake, but I want to find out.
The problem I see with damage rules/guidance is that it leads to fighting being a few round of each character pounding on them, until numbers have been accrued and bad thing falls over/tries to run away (and gets chased down)
@Someone_Evil Unfortunately, this system looks prone to playing favourites. Dungeon World does too and players still like it, so YMMV.
Context: I've had D&D players that loved to argue for hours that the result of their actions should have resulted in their victory, so I prefer systems with a clear way to determine if one won or not.
@Someone_Evil Using a system where the system itself, or table consensus, dictates the success of an action, instead of having an authority figure calling the results.
That's why I don't really like illusion spells in D&D
@Xirema This would leave me to the old "what actual at table problem are you trying to solve" and the answer would seem to be "there isn't one" since Shillelagh is pretty clear on what it does. (A few days back I recall that you had a spread sheet with weapons that were color coded ... I am guessing these two are related?)
@Zachiel They are still a pain to adjudicate, and were as far back as the first Illusionist I can remember back in OD&D / Strategic review days. (And for that matter, Phantasmal Force has often had difficulty in implementation for that same reason ...)
@KorvinStarmast There was an article I had read several hours before that question was posted by me that had asserted that Shillelagh would turn a 2d4 weapon into a 2d8 weapon because of how it was worded, I wanted to sanity-check that claim.
But A) There are no 2d4 weapons, and B) Clubs and Quarterstaffs don't have multiple damage dice.
@Zachiel In my campaigns it's been one page listing all the PCs, one page listing NPCs, and a folder of pages for session notes. The couple of maps/artifacts we scan in live at top-level. Pretty flat, but the right structure to hold what we actually create collectively.
I suppose it might have been an easier question if I'd have instead written "Suppose this character has a feature where the Shillelagh spell can be applied to Greatswords; what happens?" but that seems even more contrived.
@Xirema Yes. I am still bummed that the great club is not a two handed, heavy, 1d10 weapon since otherwise, why not just use a quarterstaff? Both simple weapons. Arrgh. :) It would seem to be a perfect "one setp down" from Great Axe from the martial to simple weapons matrix.
So, a guy I know says that all D&D "streams" (Critical Role and the like) that are not boring are those where actors play out things that would never happen in a real game.
I think it is fair to say they play out things, other might not have [whatever ability coverns that] to do, and so things happen in those games and not in others. There is nothing magical in the camera
@Zachiel I mean, I think that any statement trying to say that "all D&D streams" are any X is going to fail especially when X is something extremely subjective like "not boring".
But I get what you are getting at.
One of the things I find very interesting (and was talked about here not too long ago) is the prevalence and popularity (and, as far as I can tell, success with both audience and other players) of "My Guy"s on actual plays. It is something I've been thinking a lot about recently.
@NautArch loose rules and people just doing the things that work, scripted combat, and generally making it look like it's easy to get a good game out of the rules.
@Rubiksmoose conflict can create drama. I don't really listen to streams, but when experienced actors are doing something, they can take a ' my guy' places that those of us with no training can't.
They're also more likely to roll with decisions because to argue on camera ain't helpful or good for ratings.
@Rubiksmoose The guy thinks that those shows create the illusion that the game provides an experience so unreachable that players end up feeling inadequate, and it's not just the actors being good at creating consistent characters.
@NautArch Absolutely. I am constantly amazed and impressed what training, quick thinking, and full-trust in your fellow players can result in. Especially when combined with an excellent editor.
@Zachiel Depends on the show. Some shows were absolutely against any sort of plot information being given to players(TAZ for example). Whereas I'm sure others are much more loose, especially the more collaborative ones.
@NautArch that's what this guy thinks. He feels like that, not being Story Now games, the only way for them to be interesting is to be scripted (or very lucky streams for an extremely prolonged time).
@Rubiksmoose Which one is TAZ? I'm not following any of those shows.
@Zachiel I think there is definitely something to this at least in that I think players certainly sometimes come into the hobby with expectations and assumptions that aren't and sometimes realistically can't be fulfilled at your normal RPG tables. And some of those certainly come from listening/watching actual plays. I've had a couple of players who suffered from this.
@Zachiel I mean I'm sure I could expand on them (running my mouth fingers is always something I'm prone to ;) ). Is there any particular aspect that you would like me to elaborate on?
@Zachiel I am not sure what you mean by "a real game"
@NautArch I believe that you nailed that one. ;)
@Zachiel I think there is a big flaw in that argument, whomever is making it. The DM has the ability to make things less boring .... and Mercer seems to be very good at that.
I watched the first episode of Matt Coleville's streaming game and he came under criticism for running a railroad in that "cut scene" opening to the campaign. (Some of it deserved)
Also, the pacing was abominably slow, so I chose not to watch a second one.
I love how they are drawing more people into the game, but I think the way they run their tables makes it hard for folks to transition to actually playing and possibly creates more issues than it solves.
(1 of 2) Predicament: I intend to run a one-shot for Halloween this year, specifically Strahd Must Die Tonight!. I will be inviting some new and inexperienced players, as well as one or two veterans. To make things more thematic and also easier for the new players, I plan to use pregenerated characters with some blanks for the players to fill in themselves.
@G.Moylan (2 of 2) Aside from obvious things like name, character traits, gender, etc., what would be resonable for me to expect new players to be able to decide for themselves, while still allowing players to feel like they've made the character "theirs"?
It's probably something to be keenly aware of, and take up during session 0 as part of the expectations for the game. Possibly something WotC should address with future versions of their books. (as they are pushing gameplay streams a fair bit themselves)
@NautArch I've not, but I know that two of them are very busy and don't have ready access to the character creation content. They are more likely to agree to play if they don't hav eto build their own characters
@NautArch the adventure is mostly about raiding Castle Ravenloft and killing Strahd. I don't expect a lot of RP but I still want players to make informed decisions based on how they feel their characters would act, so I feel that it's important to have traits worked out
@G.Moylan Hmm. I'm not usually on the "assume players want pre-gen" track, but a quick read of the one-shot and they do generally seem to recommend that. Maybe start with asking them what type of character they want. They dn't need to build, but they can still choose a class/race and then you can build.
@goodguy5 I've got a player who went from binging Critical Role to DMing and now this is his first time playing a PC. He's my most problematic player.
@NautArch my original plan was to provide several to pick from in more of a template style. "Here's an Oath of X paladin, choose your race, some descriptive details, and pick a name. Here's a list of some equipment to pick from, choose from these options. These are the spells they know, please read them."
@goodguy5 Metagaming monster knowledge/communication during combat. More creative use of rules than Im comfortable with. Tends to push boundaries and be a My Guy sometimes.
@G.Moylan Suggest you pick the backgrounds as there are skill and tool and languages to choose. For the new plaers, I am not seeing value added in making them think through that if they are short on time.
@NautArch Ever give the player this response: You spent so much time talking that you did not take an action, so you got to dodge this turn Next person? Not sure if that would work for you, but I use that (sparingly) in a game I ran with people who would not make a decision.
As an aside: I hate how Mercer's group makes each round of combat into an invitation for the Gettysburg address. Combat IMO needs to be and feel fast and furiuos.
@KorvinStarmast It's less that and more about speaking to another player when they're not actually in a place to be able to communicate it as characters.
@G.Moylan Do you think the players would be up to choosing race/class? And then you build the character and they can add some flavor to their characters (bonds/flaws/ideasl, etc.)? Or you could even roll those and they play the overall generic race/class but then take the direction you give them for the other bits.
@KorvinStarmast I mostly let it go. It's not that big of a deal, but if it is I'll stop them and say you can't do that.
and they generally comply, but doesn'ts top them from the future
this is the guy who tried (and mostly succeeded) in turning my plan of providing them with Baker Street Irregulars for support into enemies (for a short-term.) Now, they have to consider working for the mafia boss.
And who tried to steal items from a wagon currently being watched by guards in the middle of the day.
@NautArch I really just want them to come and have everything take place that night. I'm facing enough work as it is for prep, theming, and the chracter templates, I'm not sure I'm up to dealing with a bunch of back-and-forth with people that don't know what they want.
@G.Moylan Typically for one-shots I have people build ahead of time and I give them basic guidelines and that's it, but this time around I know a couple people aren't likely to be able to do that, and I want to also appease the vets by letting them still have some agency in ow the characters are built. Idk, maybe it's easier to just use full-blown pre-builts and let them only pick flavor stuff. Provide like 8 to pick from for a group of 5
I just want to avoid grumbling. Requiring the new players to build will cause grumbling, and forcing the vets to play pregens will cause grumbling. I'm trying to find a happy medium.
I'm worried that if I allow the vets to build and I pregen the newbies that the pregens will be underpowered. Maybe I'm just overthinking it. Maybe that's the way to go.
@G.Moylan That's totally fair, was just thinking of a middle ground to give them some more agency. You can skip that step and just ask them for race/class and then give them the sheets when they arrive (or earlier, but that's up to you to manage questions or complaints.)
I personally don't see a real issue with allowing the vets to make their own if they want and providing pre-gens. Bounded accuracy makes things pretty even and you aren't going to make bad characters.
Heck, you could even have chatizens help make your pregens :)
@G.Moylan Since the vets (presumably) can create their characters quickly, possibly let the vets create their own while you help the newbs flesh out their pregens?
@NautArch I'll process what guidelines I want and I'll report back
@JohnP yeah I'm thinking just let them split. Since the concept, presumably, is the newbies just want to play and don't want to get bogged down in the build details, I don't think they'll care if the veterans build their own.
I went into this with the template idea in my head so that's what I was stuck on for a while. But I think mixing the build options is just a better way to go
@G.Moylan I'd still find out what the vets are playing and organize the pregens accordingly to fill in gaps.
And I think asking the noobs what race/class gives them some connection to the players you'll (we'll) generate.
Giving the pregens ahead of time is a double-edged sword. GIves them to come up with RP ideas and learn spells/attack actions, but also presents opportunity for change requests.
@G.Moylan I would consider also supplying a 'cheat sheet' of actions for the pre-gens.
@G.Moylan Provide like 8 to pick from for a group of 5 This would appear to be the best compromise, and ask the vets for help with the pregens so that get to do some building?
@Zachiel But that's I think the point that needs to be made. Each game is a different instance of the game that is dependent on the people present, not the ruleset and the dice. If some people can't handle that, and it bothers them, have them go and play a computer game.
@G.Moylan Nice. WhenI first started playing I made myself a cheat sheet for possible actions/bonus actions and the dice/damage rolls. Made learning my character a lot easier.
although dndbeyond does a really nice job of that, too if using online access.
@G.Moylan Yeah, I hear you. Just saying that dndbeyond did a really nice job digitally. And their digital conversion to paper stinks. There are MUCH better paper sheets out there.
The new Mobo/CPU is an upgrade from my previous build. Only the hard drives, the PSU and the case remained the same. Case is starting to fall apart and I needed to add an 8th drive. So decided to get a new case and move everything over and make it clean.
It is unclear what name could be used for a PC from Cormyr. There is no such nation in the PHB. What names do Cormyr's people use?
For example, say I have a warlock and want to be able to summon bhuer hags.
This is slightly problematic due to bhuer's having a CR 7, so could I take an upcast Conjure Fey as my 7th level Mystic Arcanum?
The crown of madness spell states:
The charmed target must use its action before moving on each of its turns to make a melee attack against a creature other than itself that you mentally choose...
I am unsure whether this is its own unique action that the spell forces you to make, similar t...
