TRPG General Chat

Thomas Markov

00:16

@BESW I request your wisdom.

BESW

BESW

00:45

"Finding the Fun in Making—Not Playing—A Game" article by Melissa Brinks for Sidequest. Melissa Brinks explores the unexpected joy of making a game through playtesting and developing her cousin's homemade game.

"The tides we've yet to sail" article by Dyl Briones on Ko-Fi about working on Gubat Banwa

"Malaysian Tabletop RPG Game Reaches Kickstarter Goal In Less Than 30 Minutes" article by Alleef Ashaari for Kakuchopurei.

BESW

01:05

"Blades in the Dark unofficial hack adds Beyblades into the RPG" article by Alex Meehan for Dicebreaker. Spenser Starke, producer for the actual play series Critical Role, has created an unofficial hack for the TRPG Blades in the Dark.

3

BESW

01:31

Oooh just got new playbooks from the Pasión de las Pasiones Kickstarter.

I love that El Vividor clears conditions by giving other characters opportunities to indulge their secret passions.

Oh gosh, La Usurpadora is brilliant, you get to play as somebody who's replaced an existing character and nobody notices unless you tell them.

La Venganza looks like a lot of fun to play. Every session you choose someone to get revenge on and roll to get hold on your plan to do it. When you run out of hold, you get bonuses to act desperately or flee.

Thomas Markov

01:48

@BESW great idea, cuz I have a question about Lady Blackbird.

BESW

@ThomasMarkov I'm gonna walk away, if it's a question for me I'll answer it when I come back.

linksassin

→ 96 messages moved to Here There Be Dragons

Thomas Markov

@BESW I’ll bother you another time.

linksassin

02:10

→ 14 messages moved to Here There Be Dragons

BESW

@ThomasMarkov I'm sketching on a deadline, but can spare some brain. What's up?

Thomas Markov

@BESW I’m putting the kids to bed now, another time.

Trish

Better than the Ventrue today... eh... wait, what disciplins allow to remove a vampires heart without destroying the vampire?!

(but for serpentis)

Trish

02:35

...which actually is a good stack question, even if it is a rather... distasteful one possibly.

Hot RPG Questions

03:37

3

Q: What would be the effects of giving out ten times the expected gold?

Given the treasure tables and advice in the Dungeon Master's Guide and Xanathar's Guide to Everything, characters have an implied wealth per level. An approximation of this is shown below, copied from this thread on D&D Beyond. In converting a number of modules from BECMI/OD&D to 5e I've noticed ...

Hot RPG Questions

06:34

7

Q: Higher level casting in NPCs

A Green Hag (MM p177) has an innate spell casting ability including the spell "Vicious Mockery". Its description states You unleash a string of insults laced with subtle enchantments at a creature you can see within range. If the target can hear you (though it need not understand you), it must s...

dnd-5e spells npc hit-dice

Gloweye

09:18

@Mods, I have a deleted answer of my own on rpg.stackexchange.com/questions/192877/… . Is there a way to permanently delete it? I don't see the point of being reminded of my own stupidity every time I view that question. (FWIW, "Not an answer" applies as close reason)

Thomas Markov

@Gloweye I imagine the frequency with which you view that question will drop off significantly in a day or two.

BESW

← 3 messages moved from Here There Be Dragons

← 1 message moved from Here There Be Dragons

Trish

@Gloweye Even SPAM doesn't get destroyed and can be seen by privileged users years later.

The Oracle

09:48

0

Q: GIFs, pictures and Copyright

Recently we had a question that uses a gif to describe what happens when a caster acts. The gif was made from an excerpt from Dragonball, and I don't see how it is fair use. In fact, none of the fair use factors but one is in the favor of the commenter: The purpose and character of the use, inc...

discussion citations copyright

Gloweye

10:07

True, it'll drop off.

BESW

Yeah, sorry, the Stack Exchange overlords don't like to let go of any content, ever.

AncientSwordRage

10:27

@Gloweye it's possible, but I don't think your situation is a regular use case for that tool?

Gloweye

11:40

Eh, don't think so. Nothing offensive or anything (Shouldn't be, it's my own writings). Just misread the question, and therefore the answer is a bit of a non-sequitur. (I blame lack of coffee)

BESW

Happens to us all, eventually!

Far from thinking less of you, I just notice that you were quick to recognize and correct your oops.

nitsua60

@Gloweye Redacting information out of a post (making it visible only to SE staff going forward) exists but is limited to sensitive information--generally when someone has posted personally identifying information, inadvertently or not. This meta.SE post says basically the same, and is a distillation of some more verbose guidance given to us by SE in mod-tool documentation.

@Gloweye I've got handful of those in my wake, where I've written up some seems-to-me erudite answer, read the next answer that comes along, thought "well, that's not much like my answer at all," and realized I'd misread the question or read something onto it... <facepalm>

Joel Harmon

12:37

@Gloweye The one that always gets me is that time I mixed up the answer box and the comment box, thinking I was commenting on another answer.

Golokopitenko

13:05

good morning people

BESW

[wave] Been a long time.

Golokopitenko

wow, do you remember me?

BESW

Distantly!

Eimyr hasn't been around for a long time, I remember you talked together a lot.

Golokopitenko

yeah... it's been a while

I was just thinking that the chat link is a bit obscured, being at the bottom of the page and all

I had to resort to my old bookmark, I could not find it lol

Thomas Markov

There's also one in the "burger menu"

Golokopitenko

13:19

oooooooh I completely missed that

Thomas Markov

I always forget about it and scroll to the bottom of the page anyway lol

BESW

Whereas I forget it's at the bottom of the page.

Golokopitenko

what have you guys been up to

BESW

I've written a few games

Currently writing copy for an entry to the Pocket Places Jam.

Having fun with overblown prose.

Golokopitenko

oh wow!

someone's been a busy bee!

BESW

13:25

I'd set myself a goal of publishing one TRPG-related thing a month, then 2020 hit and, well. I'm trying to get back into the groove now.

Golokopitenko

I know people who force themselves to publish stuff in a certain amount of time and it doesn't turn out that great though

BESW

Part of it is learning to match ambition and scope.

AncientSwordRage

@BESW I feel seen

BESW

@AncientSwordRage Several of my games were originally written to fit on an A4 zine-fold. They ballooned a little, but forcing myself to adhere to the first draft that size really helped focus on what was necessary, and make sure my indulgent additions were the ones that really made me happy.

AncientSwordRage

@BESW I've been trying to practice drafting (partly in response to watching some Brandon Sanderson lectures) as well as something I guess I'd have to call ramping up? Practice pieces?

Something Sanderson said tripped him up was that he'd write a draft for a novel, then have to revise it and feel like it'd be easier to start over - I've had that feeling, and it put me off writing drafts to being with

BESW

13:41

I'm kinda fond of John Rogers' technique.

AncientSwordRage

That and some advice from John Green when he wrote Zombiecorns:

> "I'm increasingly convinced that while no great book can be written in a month, no great book can be written in a first draft no matter how long it takes you to write it." – John Green

NaNoWriMo!!!

►

I think the point was.. a draft is a good start

BESW

I re-wrote Goblin Court so many times.

This thing I'm working on now, though? It's barely gonna be getting a clarity pass.

AncientSwordRage

The ramping thing is rather than trying to run before I could crawl, I'm trying to really hard visualise the steps to get to the last stage, which is hard cos of executive dysfunction... planning is hard and off putting

@BESW as a child I literally cried when we were told we would visit a nature park for school, the reason being is that I had been several times before and I couldn't stomach the boredom I imagined I'd face

so yeah I've long had an issue with reworking stuff

BESW

I recommend also writing things that are just practice. Like doodling loops to warm up before drawing.

AncientSwordRage

so to ramp into a full blown web app, I'm making little toy apps, warm up projects

@BESW YES Exactly

they used to be anathema to me, and my distaste of 'reworking'... not seeing the bigger picture

BESW

13:47

Like, there's making the sketch of the scene before you paint the picture... and then there's just drawing your sandwich on a napkin.

I think that with writing it's especially hard to get into the mode of practice, draft, revision, etc., because as audiences we don't see it as much, the way we can look at da Vinci's notebooks and Picasso's one-liners.

We tend to see the finished piece with all the work invisibly smoothed over already.

I'm treating this Pocket Places jam project as an opportunity to goof off.

> The Original Orrery: The Desk Planetarium of Sir St James
Notorious inventor, astrologer, and radicalist Sir St James of Milton-on-Wheat (c. 1425-1770*) is credited with improving the orrery designs of Giovanni Dondi dell'Orologio and inventing the field of astrohagiography in the process. Sir St James clockwork prognostications are sadly overshadowed by the partisan rumors which accumulated around Sir St John after his disappearance, but the Desk Planetarium was nonethless coveted by collectors for centuries. Like its creator the device eventually vanished from record; this time in the T…

nitsua60

14:20

Occasional poke-a-mod reminder: elected moderators can remove a question from the Hot Network Questions list. If ever you see something hit the HNQ which you feel isn't a good representation of the site, feel free to poke a mod (either in chat or via a flag).

3

bobble

14:35

@BESW they've permanently purged at least two questions from the database

AncientSwordRage

14:54

@BESW I sense much goof :D

Are there meant to be both Sir St James and Sir St John? Can you even be knighted and sainted? I guess being patronised might make you feel benighted?

I love this bit: "Milton-on-Wheat" :D

I'm not following where "Desk Planetarium" comes from though... it sounds like a replica of the original orrery?

> Like its creator the device eventually vanished from record; this time in the Third Great Fire where it was presumed lost to the conflagration.

is a little hard for me to parse? I'm running on fumes atm, so may not have mental capacity to critique or be a good benchmark for what's parsable

AncientSwordRage

15:11

@bobble weird

this prompted me to ask this (warning ELU stack)

2

bobble

15:46

@AncientSwordRage s/dome/come?

AncientSwordRage

@bobble yes

The Oracle

17:46

1

Q: Delete an unanswered question if I no longer need the answer?

I wrote the following question: Can Ride be used to Push a mount/animal companion? containing multiple questions. I was asked to separate them out, so I did. Once I separated out the question When pushing an animal, how long will it perform the trick it doesn't know?, the separate question was an...

discussion

Glazius

@AncientSwordRage when people last-name themselves after saints they go hard. "St James" is the singular last name. See also Jill St John

If Jill St John went on to become a saint, and then had a street named after her, it would be St Jill St John St

doppelgreener

@AncientSwordRage better: Sir St John's full name was Sir John St John, and he was the second son of a man also named Sir John St John, making him technically Sir John St John Jr and his father technically Sir John St John Sr.

He had several kids and his second son was also named Sir John St John, so it goes all the way down another level.

Akixkisu

18:06

This looks like a good historical lock candidate rpg.stackexchange.com/q/108252/44723

Thomas Markov

18:32

@Akixkisu What advantage does that have over closure?

Akixkisu

@ThomasMarkov It is the end state for highly popular questions that are off-topic and used to be on-topic.

Instead of reviewing it again, it is time to let it rest.

Tbh, step 4 is not something that we need in the lock process. It should be enough that the post is in queues again.

Especially when the posts meets 1-3.

Thomas Markov

what are these steps

Akixkisu

74

A: What is a historical lock, and what is it used for?

What is a historical lock? A historical lock is a mechanism by which moderators can mark posts as historical artifacts. Questions which are historically locked feature the following post notice: Locked. This question and its answers are locked because the question is off-topic but has historica...

"The post does not meet the current guidelines for a good, on-topic question, and
The post is stellar, in spite of its off-topic nature, and
There are a large number of views, upvotes and inbound links on the post, and"

Thomas Markov

Ah, thanks

Yeah, we fail to meet 4 so far, methinks.

Akixkisu

@ThomasMarkov I'd flag it anyway - if I could.

Thomas Markov

18:44

I got you.

@nitsua60

Who needs flags when the sheep is back in chat

@Akixkisu mmmmm Ive got a counterpoint

the link to the interview in the answer is unavailable, if someone finds an alternative link, it would be nice to be able to edit that in there.

Akixkisu

@ThomasMarkov Unlikely, as it was a private one, but possible - that is reasonable.

Trish

19:24

@ThomasMarkov It's a Sherson, not a sheep! also, not a Sheeple.

@ThomasMarkov swordandlaser.com/home/tag/r.a.+salvatore ?

I assume it is the 2013 video that is in question there.

Thomas Markov

20:22

Just noticed that I wrote my 1000th answer today.

AncientSwordRage

21:05

@ThomasMarkov 🥳

Stop Being Evil

@ThomasMarkov grats!

Thomas Markov

I've also visited the site on exactly 600 days

nitsua60

21:36

@ThomasMarkov wazzup?

Thomas Markov

@nitsua60 we were discussing a candidate for historical lock

It has a dead link but Trish may have found a replacement, gonna look into it.

nitsua60

got it. feel free to ping when it's "ready."

Thomas Markov

If the link is good, it may be a good candidate for locking.

Trish

@ThomasMarkov not a replacement - it just explains that the interview happened and when, not the actual interview

Thomas Markov

@Trish Ah.

Trish

21:38

sadly, that seems to be the one and only copy I could find, but it was the original source's original embedding

(which I btw mentioned at the question itself...)

Glazius

22:20

Today I learned that the optical telegraph was actually a thing and not just something PTerry made up as a fantasy analog to the Internet. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Optical_telegraph

Trish

22:34

@Glazius Ships and u-boats up to the 1960s ran light signalling crews regularity and flag alphabet signaling with directions is still a navy tradition.

Question: is asking to be provided explicit quotes on an answer that tells repeatedly "I think" "I believe" and never points to sources bad conduct?

V2Blast

@Trish I don't think so, as long as the request is presented politely. (Not every answer needs quotes to prove that it's right, but the answerer should be able to support that what they're saying is correct.)

Trish

I pointed to explicit lack of sourcing and pointed out how it could provide sourcing to back up the claims. What do I get back? I am called to wage a personal war

Why do I have the feeling that I am a magnet for being bashed this week?!

Stop Being Evil

22:51

Whoa

Yeah this is why I VTCd and moved on

Trish

Yesterday, I got bashed on over a misunderstanding based on incomplete information sets and bad wording. Today, I am called to wage a personal war because I want to improve the stack?!

Thomas Markov

@Trish I think they’re saying that you have already waged war against the question.

Hot RPG Questions

5

Q: When pushing an animal, how long will it perform the trick it doesn't know?

Here is the text for "Push an animal" for the Handle Animal skill: To push an animal means to get it to perform a task or trick that it doesn’t know but is physically capable of performing. This category also covers making an animal perform a forced march or forcing it to hustle for more than 1 ...

pathfinder-1e animals

Trish

@HotRPGQuestions Sorry bot, mind not interrupting?!

Thomas Markov

@HotRPGQuestions A+ title for the imagery it conjures in my head.

Stop Being Evil

22:54

Wow that was timely... :P

Trish

@ThomasMarkov What about my comments that point out a substantial problem with the one answer - which by the way is the very type of answer that is my concern, because it is all "theory" and "guessing intentions of X" is that?!

@V2Blast which in that case... they are not - would the Citation box help?

Stop Being Evil

@Trish Now that I've looked at it... If you feel that it's a serious enough issue to act on, and the other party won't hear you (both of which I think are the case here), that seems like it's time to flag down a mod. It could just be that they're not open to pushing the issue in comments

Thomas Markov

Move along then unless you think it needs moderator attention, then flag it.

Trish

@StopBeingEvil I did flag. I am wondering how to phrase an answer pointing to the Good/bad subjective..

Good Subjective, Bad Subjective

Robert Cartaino on September 29, 2010

Stack Exchange is about questions with objective, factual answers. We’ve been crystal clear about this for as long as I can remember, even back to the earliest, pre-beta days of Stack Overflow. It’s right there in the standard Stack Exchange FAQ: What kind of questions should I not ask here? Avoid asking questions that are…

Ben

So a bard that is actually undead, and uses their skills for the occult, and goes by the name of Robert (the) Zombie

Stop Being Evil

23:03

@Trish If it's an answer to this question, I think it's a doomed effort, hence my vtc

@Ben I'm barely familiar with the artist but I already love the image

Trish

@Ben I prefer the ferrous-metal Warforged bard in the shape of a young female, and the other warforged bard from refined ferrous metal and carbon alloy that has not engaged in prurient activity.

Ben

guess-the-inspiration

Trish

@Ben Robert Bartleh Cummings

Ben

A bard/barb that uses his ax as both a weapon and an instrument, with a large bithmark of one eye in the shape of a Star - Child of the Night Sky

Though his real instrument is his voice, let's be real

Trish

@Ben Starlord... or Starchild, Anywy, Kiss

but who are the warforged bards?

Ben

23:15

No clue

Trish

the most common ferrous metal is iron and steel is an alloy of iron and carbon. A person not engaging in any prurient activity is a virgin. And a young female is a maiden. So Iron Maiden and Virgin Steel

BESW

Campfire by will jobst. the anthology horror storytelling game

Imaginary Worlds podcast "Episode 185: Rerolling Role-Playing Games"

"Five Latin American RPG designers make their mark in LATAM Breakout collection" article by Chase Carter for Dicebreaker. The five-title bundle wants to prove there’s more to tabletop games than the Global North.

Someone_Evil

@Trish A question and a comment: Do you know of any ferrous metals other than iron (genuine curiosity thinking I'm missing something)? And steel is used for basically any iron based alloy

Trish

@Someone_Evil any iron alloy is a ferrous metal.

BESW

Define 'ferrous,' first, because it means different things depending on context.

Ben

23:20

@Trish I should let you know that for me, it's still morning coffee o'clock, so brain is yet to clock in to work. Lol.

Someone_Evil

Define metal and alloy too, because I'm not sure we're understanding them the same

Trish

@BESW true, titanium is also a ferrous metal

BESW

And "contains iron (II)" and "contains iron" are not the same properties in chemistry.

Trish

alloy: any metal that contains more than one element.

BESW

(in chemistry if it contains iron(III) then it's ferric, not ferrous)

Ben

23:22

@StopBeingEvil I actually came up with the idea on the way to work haha

Someone_Evil

And generally if it contains either II or III it isn't gonna be very metallic

Ben

@BESW [insert coffew wolf]

BESW

[coffee wolf inserted]

Ben

Efficient as ever 👌

Someone_Evil

And under what definition is titanium ferrous? *confused chemist noises*

Trish

23:28

@Someone_Evil I am stumped too actually, but... TWI Global lists it together with Pig Iron... I guess that the list actually is meant to be alloying stuff....

Someone_Evil

Link?

Trish

twi-global.com/technical-knowledge/faqs/what-metals-are-ferrous

BESW

It is also functionally ferrous for some practical applications.

Trish

in some degrees, titanium behaves like a ferrous metal under stress, at least in failure mode iirc.

BESW

So it sometimes gets 'grandfathered' into lists of materials that were originally ferrous, and the profession just makes it an honorary ferrous material instead of revising their categories.

Someone_Evil

23:31

@Trish That has it listed under the header "Alloy Steels and the Alloying Elements"

Trish

@Someone_Evil yea, that's what I meant some mins ago too.

anyway, back to guess who's it:
Lycantrophic vampire bards

Someone_Evil

Also, to clarify a possible point of confusion (for future ref), I would've said that metals refers to the pure (metal) elements, and alloys to mixes of them, or deliberate mixes of them. Which made me stumble a bit on the metals are alloys statement

@Trish Maybe just me, but get a bit of a edgy-teenager vibe off that...

Trish

@Someone_Evil or mid-30 guys from germany that sing a whole half song in church latin with a text that is pretty much sacrilege.?

Someone_Evil

That feels like a reference I'm not getting

Trish

Powerwolf: Coleus Sanctus.

Ben

23:40

@Trish I think a lot of people have ymfah to thank for discovering Powerwolf

Trish

@Ben tell them, I saw them at Wacken 2015, and then booed out Bloodbath with the other gang while waiting for a part of a rider's armor for the feet.

Ben

On a completely separate note... Gavin Free finally got a haircut

Andras Deak

23:59

@Someone_Evil don't you consider steel and brass and bronze etc. to be metals?

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