Ok, I think I bitched on here a little while ago about usernames with the word "girl" in them

like gamergirl

or things like that

well now we have a new user

gamer boy

This deeply upsets me.

@shatterspike1 well, stop whining about it.

Well, alright

That was all the whining I needed to do

Good.

Howdy all

Hello

@mxyzplk yo

how was thingy

Not sure if this is the sort of question that would be open ended/inspire debate, but; What exactly is the purpose of alignment/morality systems in games?

to satisfy some DMs' compulsive need to punish players for not behaving the way the DM thinks they ought to

I mean... what's the designer's INTENDED purpose?

@BrianBallsun-Stanton Very good, bushed now though

@shatterspike1 to give a stick of "you should play your character this way"

@mxyzplk yeah, I hear that

well, no, it's intended purpose is to say "look, it's not a moral problem if you kill X people"

Are morality system mostly artifacts, or do they have a real use?

the designer's intended purpose for alignment is to control what kinds of stories are told with their system: "the following things are things that we do not like, so we are building our system such that stories involving them cannot be told; we are the designers, we know what kinds of stories you should and should not tell"

@shatterspike1 I've only seen one I kinda like. But they've been mostly obsoleted by personality models

@ObliviousSage Seems like that goes against the cardinal rule "RPGs are supposed to be fun"

@BrianBallsun-Stanton Are we talking Unknown Armies type models here?

madness systems, where committing horrific acts progressively turns your character into a lunatic/sociopath, can be useful, particularly in dark drama or horror settings; morality systems have no use

@shatterspike1 Madness, or personality flaws, or what have you

Unknown Armies has a very good system

@shatterspike1 s/fun/satisfying/

Ars Magica's flaw system works... acceptably

Ars Magica's system was more about guidelines, wasn't it?

yes

Of course, you could take a "Greedy" flaw or something and then never roleplay it

@shatterspike1 yes, it does go against the cardinal rule that RPGs are supposed to be fun; the thing is, some designers & DMs dislike it when someone uses an RPG to have fun in a way they don't personally consider fun, so they design/use system mechanics, particularly alignment/morality, to discourage those forms of fun

See, I'm not so certain about that, especially not with games like D&D 3.5. It's a decently common thing in my group to say the 3.5 designers were asleep at the wheel.

Of course, that's only talking about alignment. nWoD morality system is another thing entirely

I also ran into a bunch of people on RPGnet who apparently find nWoD morality fun, so there you go. Damned if I understand it, though.

WoD's morality system is a little iffy, but is mostly a decent (if overly simplistic) madness system

i've played WoD games where the morality system was a poor fit, and I've played WoD games where it was a good fit

I have issues with it

I'm not personally a fan of it for games where the PCs are humans, but it works relatively well for vampires & werewolves

It makes sense in Changeling, though, I'll say that much.

Mostly, my issue is the whole "moral person = sane person" deal

@shatterspike1 ::STABSTABSTAB::

sorry, the professional philosopher in me is ... slightly allergic to WoD

it causes me to break out in STAB

@BrianBallsun-Stanton what don't you like about WoD?

The ontological imparitives to cause angst presume a universal morality that just... doesn't work.

basically, they approached their "humanity" system by "how can we make it dark and angsty"

And bleh.

I can't deal with it

of course they approached their humanity system that way; it got them the "poncey emo/goth poser" demographic, which was (unfortunately) large enough to push them up to being 2nd only to D&D in terms of RPG success

unfortunate that there are that many of that sort of people, not that White Wolf achieved such success

yes...

oh, I know why they did it

and I can't disagree, I just can't use it.

To feed the drama llama

Also because a good/evil morality in a world which is good/bad is a drama magnet, like feeding Nietzsche to 14 year olds.

@SamuelRussell yep

thankfully, most 14-year-olds are don't have the patience to absorb Nietzsche

@ObliviousSage yep

It is also designed to stop a reservoir dogs violence spiral to give you time to emote

@SamuelRussell ::muttermuttermuttermutter::

If I woke up feeding on blood and could drive people mad, I'd get a big tank of cow blood and kill everyone remotely responsible for the situation. Ooops: if I do that I become an NPC

@SamuelRussell yeah.

Though weirdly the werewolf humanity path is designed to prevent a douche fest of partying. Which leads to refluff clone, Frat: The Douchening.

it will be interesting to see where this goes

@ObliviousSage Kind of like what happened when Slovene fine artists said, "What if we redid pop songs as deadpanly serious fascism?" youtube.com/watch?v=wwdOX19_ETI

@SamuelRussell i don't expect it to get that treatment, though I certainly wouldn't complain if it did

I'm a particular fan of the "I'm serious. No only joking. Except I'm not." kind of delivery. Which is why Dark Dungeons looks so good

Also it would make a great companion film to eXinstenZ (big X big Z)

@BrianBallsun-Stanton The stab wounds weren't entirely necessary, because I agree with you.

@shatterspike1 tis an allergy :)

An allergy that causes others to break out in stab wounds?

I'm also concerned with the whole "Horror Game with Black and White moral system"

Oh but in the expansion there are fourteen different alternative black/white morality systems.

Because they're all ten point normative scales with a "decent" of forbidden practices?

descent

Why use the morality systems at all?

Why not gut them and put in a modded version of the Unknown Armies madness system?

To prevent instant reservoir dogs, and to encourage drama llama over the progressive "giving in."

Why not do that... without the system?

They wanted very badly to sell a lot of books to adolescents?

Ah

Oh white wolf. Why don't you understand that all you need is to keep up the work with the artwork in Exalted books

shh, I'm busy permuting cheap Jungian archetypes over adolescent identity issues, and filling in the spare space with normative morality and a loose skill system.

This is getting too weird for me. I think I'll just stick with my completely overpowered supers game, if it's all the same to you.

@SamuelRussell Nights: The Dreaming?

I was actually thinking of Fanboy: the NEETening. Different fans compete for control over the collective internet consciousness, using various fad themed powers, based largely around the year of introduction to internet culture. The morality scale is a 10 point scale varying from 10: Abject (fully NEET) through to 0, which represents a return to normal society. Later I can release an expansion pack: Otaku: The Hikkening. covering the ancient fan subcultures of the mysterious orient.

This does make MLP fandom the Sabbat.

Hmm... and what of the Touhou fandom?

You know how in some end of world scenarios Tremere are still infected with Salout?

Ideally you'd LARP it at a Con, where the LARP scenario was a LARP at a Con.

That's so meta I think my brain just turned into a klein bottle

I think it cuts too close to home for the target market, "Roleplay the exciting life of shut in nerds, fighting for esteem in the community of shut in nerds!"

Smartphones

you don't even have to be a shut in to be completely antisocial

In other news: I still haven't received my PDF from Indie Press Revolutions. Does anyone know why this is an issue?

Don't you know that daylight seriously impairs the NEET and causes them to burn upvotes in order to continue functioning?

what

I'm riffing too much off the joke WoD fan game.

Ah

Has anyone else had trouble with getting PDFs from Indie Press Revolutions?

@SamuelRussell not enough meta! Keep abstracting!

One of the Fanboy: the NEETening factions is closely based-off /tg/ from 4chan, whose powers are almost entirely meta-rpg themed. Their mission inside the LARP is to LARP a LARP; this puts them at odds with the team inside the LARP in LARP whose LARP mission isn't to LARP a LARP but whose LARP LARP mission is to LARP a LARP. The lol-randumb faction is given a sequence of suggested stage lines comprised entirely of Swedish Chef style LARP LARP ejaculations.

Done correctly Players ought to confuse themselves with their characters.

@SamuelRussell aaggggghghhhgh

The problem with irony is that it is a cankerous infection that eventual metastasises.

If only I could concentrate on the malloc lab in time for finals...

Last session ended pretty well. The Fighter currently think he is invisible, the druid is currently a bat with weak eyesight and can't tell the fighter he's not, and they are both headed into a room filled cultists worshiping a Demon Prince in the service of an evil god. This is going to hell...

Morning!

@Cat morning

@waxeagle Hey there! :)

@shatterspike1 an important part of concentration is looking forward to the thing that follows

grr, both new users in the 4e tag are just not making an effort

@waxeagle is that the high-traffic site equivalent of first world problems?

@Problematic yes

quality issues are something that will arise more and more as we grow. See Arqade, and SO for an extreme example

a good 50% of SO's daily questions are of the "halp, I can't get my sql to run" variety

I think I have something of the opposite problem. I'm intimidated by the quality of existing content and it's a deterrent from asking questions or adding answers of my own.

@Problematic that's a good problem to have. We want people to think long and hard before they ask a question and post an answer.

I think there's probably a sweet spot somewhere in the middle ground.

@Problematic yeah. I don't post a question until I've though long and hard about it. I don't post an answer unless I have a better one or different angle than the existing ones...I don't post a lot, but when I do I try to make it good

hello

@JoshuaAslanSmith good morning

I feel like the Chtulu question is even more of a straight list at this point since the asker refined his question to simply be give me all the Call of Chtulu games published.

@JoshuaAslanSmith lists aren't bad if there is a finite set

they are bad when there are infinite (or near infinite) possibilities for the list

they still aren't good. but they aren't terribad

true he did add in a request for an opinion on the differences

@Tynam you around? any firm plans for that everway demo this weekend?

Hmm. to Violate the first law of D&D 3.5 Spellcasting or to not Violate the first law of D&D spellcasting

O_o

Well more a Commandment than anything.

Thou Shalt not Lose Caster Levels.

close this

Ive asked enough dud questions to know that aint a question.

Im also debating the merits of playing a +2 LA Tiny Fey.

Not small enough to hide in peoples hats.

small enough to lulz at the giant.

@waxeagle Your wish is my command master

anyone got anydice set up for 4d6 reroll 1's?

I aint got that one figured out yet.

@Novian anydice.com/program/222a

a reroll on one is simply a step down in dice with 1 added

It somehow output 19.

Gotta reroll that one.

@Novian anydice.com/program/222b

that caps out at 18

fine then, a hard one: 4d6, re-roll 1s, drop the lowest

Jhonny has 4 Apples and gives one away.. Calculate the mass of the sun.

a Warlock with 10 Charisma. not a bad thing.

Not a good thing but not so bad.

@ObliviousSage that's what I wrote

I assumed he wanted that for chargen so I did

@Novian: in what edition? a 4e warlock can get by just fine with a 10 CHA as long as he's got a good CON

@waxeagle oh, haha, so you did; my javascript whitelist was preventing anydice from loading your program properly, so i saw it just generating 3d4 and calling it quits

@ObliviousSage lol

@ObliviousSage 3.5

@Novian then that's going to be somewhat problematic, yes

Nah.

See the only invocations that need Cha are the Save allowing ones.

Even then Cha Boosting items even that out.

but save-or-something-bad-happens-to-you is the best kind of ability in 3.5 (well, other than something-bad-happens-to-you-even-if-you-save, but those are pretty rare)

I miss having No save bad things happen to you.

Warlocks aint wizards.

not the last time i checked, no

Hmm. No Petal for Melee Locks.

-8 STR is bad.

Petal is a good race for warlock if you can deal with +2 LA for -8 STR +10 DEX +4 CON +4 INT +4 and CHA +8

and Tiny Size

at that point i'd say give up on warlocks entirely and make a sorceror

Clerics arent Charisma based are they....

hmm.

they have some charisma stuff (turn undead IIRC), but theyre mostly about wisdom

Hmm. So id have to put a decent Number into wisdom but a Petal Cleric.

i'd still go for something cha-based to benefit from that +8

sorceror is a good pick because you can also grab a lot of fun ray stuff to benefit from the dex boost

Meh.

I Think Id rather play Cleric, Might just be I need a better race for it, even then the stat boosts would be helpful to cleric. Dex boost mainly but the INt and CON help too,

Favored Soul is a Cha Based Divine Caster.

Like Cleric but Sorcererererery.

thats probably an even better choice

I actually see nothing wrong with Favored Soul.

Looks good to me.

as an added bonus, you eventually get flight

I think lack of domains is the one downside vs clerics.

actually, isn't favored soul casting split? one attribute for bonus spells, another for spell DCs?

Weird yes.

....:

Hmm.

that is the weirdest thing to do to a class.

Gonna need ta buy a wis increasing item.

I Dont see my Cha needing a boost any time soon.

@ObliviousSage yes, but it's still a pretty nice class, especially when combined with a few levels of Paladin

Lessee my Level 8 Petal Favored Soul currently has +17/+12 with ranged Weapons.

if the need arises that I attack.

28 Dex goes a long way.

@Novian wow ... why?

Roll an 18 and +10 to dex. I initially rolled 4 18's by hand. then decided to scrap a few in the interest of fairness.

why wouldnt you put your 18s in your casting stat(s)?

Because, I can compensate.

@Novian yeah. I had a player do something like that once. He was very overpowered compared to the other players

especially in D20 Future with no real way to raise your stats

and 20 Dex just isnt as pretty as 28

@C.Ross Thats nothing. 6 18's in a row. on the table in front of people. I then scrapped all but two 18's in the interest of sanity.

No better way to piss of your DM than to roll like that.

that sort of thing is why my group uses point buy now

Point Buy is limiting. I cant have enough in any stat to build anything.

Want an 18? suck at everything.

if the whole group feels that way you can always just allot more points (which my group does)

humanity continues to depress me: newsfeed.time.com/2013/05/01/…

@ObliviousSage Me too.

Hmm if i read Favored Soul right it has another advantage to clerics.

Spellcasting isnt alignment restricted.

though generally that pans itself out.

Oh good guy using enemy skeletons with animate undead? Bad! Bad Divine Caster.

Nothing innately wrong with animating the dead in my opinion.

Time to go a huntin for a deity. I need to know what weapon they have as favored weapon.

any suggestions?

is this a big discussion about 3.5 class balance?

Not really.

gotcha nvm

@Tynam I'm EDT, but willing to stay up late Saturday night if needed

@Novian: I usually start at the other end. Decide what kind of person your cleric is; that lets you know what ideals he/she would worship.

@Tynam my free time basically runs from about 7pm EDT (12a your time, 10a his time), until...

Works for me. (Assuming it's OK with Brian.)

@Novian Also think about allowed domains.

And then fall back to the "Cleric of Good" option when you don't find one that has both desired domains :P

I Wish there was a way to fix the dual casting of Favored Soul to just Charisma.

I mean great saves/ good BaB./ Spell progression of a sorcerer/ not so bad.

Dual casting/A Headache to compensate for.

a Periapt of Wisdom will only go so far.

Hmm, Does Rapid Reload or the Quick loading Weapon property work with repeater Crossbows in 3.5?

My DM brought up a good point. 1D1's are the dont feel bad about yourself Die.

Is an armor with +1 Armor bonus halved when made for tiny creatures