TRPG General Chat

12:16 AM

@doppelgreener I'm figuring that by the time we return to Earth, Colma's undead are locked in a battle with the refugee dwarf army along the outskirts of San Francisco.

(A major theme of Weird Earth is going to be "Weird solutions to Weird problems.")

In fact, that'd be a great setting pressure: Weird problems need Weird solutions.

Smurfton

4:03 AM

@Magician it turns out that an hour is really slow sometimes

But I read your first chapter. It is cool.

Hi Bob!

@Bob looks like you just got the ability to speak in here

How's life?

Bob

Life's alright. Just poking around.

Smurfton

You want to chat about anything?

Bob

No not particularly. I just had seen the chat mentioned and stumbled on a link to it so I thought I would check it out.

Smurfton

You know the stack exchange button on the top left for switching sites?

Bob

I didn't but I see it now.

Smurfton

4:08 AM

Yeah, well, that's where the button for going to chat is

Bob

Right in front of me the whole time, yeah. Well at least it will be easy to find my way back again. :)

Smurfton

Indeed!

Obviously it's not terribly active right now, but conversations between 3+ people do happen.

Bob

I think that describes every chat. I've been the one saying that myself more than once.

It's a very neat site over all. I've spent the idle moments of the last week flipping through questions for game systems I've never even heard of.

Smurfton

Yeah, that's basically what I use it for. I don't actually have a group, so it's nice.

Hello @ObliviousSage

Bob

I hadn't for many years. I just sort of got back into the hobby recently. It's nuts how much it's changed and grown since the 90s

Oblivious Sage

4:13 AM

@Smurfton Howdy! Just dropping in to see if anything exciting is going on in chat. Bout to go to bed.

Smurfton

@ObliviousSage Sorry to dissapoint.

Oblivious Sage

@Smurfton There's people actually talking in here right now, rather than the last post being hours ago, so it's hardly a disappointment.

Smurfton

So, what games did you discover here?

@Bob ?

Bob

Oh I haven't retained any of the names, really. I just found it odd that I'm interested in questions and answers for games I don't play.

I think Numenera was one I hadn't heard of before. There are a couple others that were new to me.

Smurfton

Sometime the rulebook is a good read, though

Bob

4:17 AM

Yeah I used to practically collect them. I still have a shelf full of games I never played but read through.

Smurfton

You heard of Roll for Shoes?

story-games.com/forums/discussion/11348/…

Bob

No that is new to me

Smurfton

Well, that's all of the rules in the blog post. It's pretty fun.

Makes nice one-shots

Bob

That is remarkable. There's a sort of genius there.

Smurfton

Yes

Bob

4:23 AM

Alright I'd better be heading on out again. Nice to meet you Smurfton.

Smurfton

See ya, Bob.

Magician

5:07 AM

@Smurfton Yay!

doppelgreener

5:43 AM

@BESW I love this idea.

BESW

6:12 AM

@doppelgreener Yey!

doppelgreener

@BESW May I enter the spoil-lair?

BESW

Aye.

doppelgreener

@BESW Show this to Dan / the group chat?

BESW

Yes.

And yes, I'm developing this theme that as much as Weird Stuff is threatening civilisation and being generally horrible, there's also a lot of awesome Weird Stuff that's rising up to compensate or actively counter it.

doppelgreener

@BESW This would be a good replacement to our "Using weird stuff so weird stuff doesn't use you" Amaterasu motto.

BESW

6:17 AM

@doppelgreener Weird problems need Weird solutions.

doppelgreener

@BESW yeah.

Well, hm, then again, if we're going off Atomic Robo: sometimes, all you need is enough C4.

BESW

Well. My developing idea for Weird Earth is that there was very nearly a civilisation-ending apocalypse because of solar flares and Weird Stuff... but then other Weird Stuff rose up to help out.

Like the dwarves stopping the Colma undead, or the Knight being created to fight the robot yetis.

So the masquerade is shattered and the old status quo is gone forever, but the world avoided an apocalypse by getting really Weird really fast, and it's still reeling and trying to figure out what the new status quo will be.

doppelgreener

Hmmm. So, I am a little out of the thought-loop on account of having seen zero warehouse 13 and x-files, as you know, and I know Hellboy employs weird stuff, but Atomic Robo is just as happy to solve weird stuff with some good old knowledge of counterintelligence, computers, guns, and a several-ton robot who carries a punch like a tank shell.

BESW

Yeah.

And sometimes that'll be enough.

But sometimes you'll get compelled that Weird problems need Weird solutions.

doppelgreener

Alright. :)

Oh, hey, also, part of my thought behind picking up the Alchemist girl, I think I've only mentioned it to trogdor: Stellata's a lot of fun to play, but I'm also interested in playing someone relatively normal. I'll give her some exceptional knowledge of magical stuff and alchemy, but she's otherwise a pretty regular human being. I'd like to try out a character who doesn't make the situation relatively dramatic simply by standing there. ("It's a plant girl! Whoa")

And, speak of the ~~devil~~ ~~dragonman~~ firepony(?)

... dodgy evil past life... I just decided her third mode, Baker's gonna get a new Intrigue buddy capable of burglary and stealth.

trogdor

6:36 AM

@BESW I actually have this as part of my idea for my 3-4 session mini arc thing

there is still plenty of weird stuff in it that is outright threatening, but there happens to be at least a couple of possible allies or benefits mixed in

@doppelgreener who are you talking about? :P

doppelgreener

@trogdor you! of course, you're not the devil, though that's part of the original saying, and you are also presently not a dragonman.

trogdor

7:18 AM

lol

yeah I would switch my avatar to a dragon but Derpy would murder me XD

lol

anyway, gotta go for a couple hours

oh the joys of having a job and a night class

doppelgreener

7:34 AM

@trogdor ... is Discord a dragon?

Derpy

8:00 AM

@trogdor you are free to switch to Spike.

Magician

8:48 AM

Gail Simone's encounter with Magic Happy Room and King Buttermilk.

Polyducks

9:16 AM

@Smurfton RE: Bureaucracy rolling chart. I haven't. I'd only managed to read the player book before we ran the game until [REDACTED] sent me a copy of the proper thing. Which of course I didn't download and didn't read.

Good morning everyone :)

Can someone change my opinion on dragonborn? How are they not a special snowflake race, how are they not dragonkin, and how were they bought about?

Legitimate question. I'm going to be a player in a game with one and I don't want to spend the whole game sneering at the player.

BESW

I'm fond of the trifold legend for dragonborn in 4e.

There are three different origin stories, all conflicting and all more or less flattering of some individual or group.

Dragons say that dragonborn sprang forth from drops of blood sprayed when the original dragon god Io was split in two.

Dragonborn say they were created by Io after he made dragons, and he learned better how to balance the elemental with the astral so they're more reasonable and less temperamental.

And most everyone else says dragonborn are just the descendants of folks whose parents were a dragon and a humanoid.

(Well, except dwarves. Dwarves have the same origin for dragonborn as the dragonborn, except they say Io had to borrow the dwarf template from Moradin for the job.)

And in the 4e default setting, almost every humanoid race is prejudiced against dragonborn, especially humans, because nobody's forgotten the legends about a very ancient dragonborn empire that was super racist toward everyone else.

(This is why the most recent human-founded empire in PoL, Nerath, treated all the major playable races as equal, except dragonborn which were second-class citizens.)

But I have no idea if that's helpful to you, because I don't know why you think they're a special snowflake race, or what "dragonkin" means to you or why that's bad.

Polyducks

@BESW to be perfectly honest, I don't really understand why I hate them so much or how to resolve it.

BESW

Well, in 3.5 most dragony playable races were silly and/or overpowered.

Polyducks

I used to play a lot of text-based RPG and the bad players had descriptions of humanoids mixed with non-humanoid creatures.

It definitely comes down to RP over mechanics

BESW

4e just said "Hey, here's some dragony folks to go with your catty folks and your fairy folks and your demony folks."

Polyducks

9:29 AM

We're playing in 5E for this game. At least I have the benefit of being a curmudgeony druidic hermit

Don't get me started on tieflings

BESW

Heh.

Polyducks

One of those is joining the party too

BESW

I also like 4e's tiefling lore, which I understand was removed from 5e.

Polyducks

What's that?

Please tell me more. I know very little of the lore from later editions

BESW

Tieflings are the descendants of totally normal human rulers who were so terrified by all the scary monsters in the Points of Light setting that they made a hereditary pact with devils for the power to unite and defend their kingdoms. The physical transformation and the minor supernatural powers are a manifestation of that pact.

In fact, in the early days of the tiefling empire, it was explicitly a pro-human, anti-everyone-else political climate: all non-humans were second-class citizens or slaves in an empire ruled by tieflings. So tieflings, in their early days, were commonly understood to be human. (This is the empire that spread the anti-dragonborn propaganda.)

Polyducks

9:33 AM

What of 5e? What happened there?

BESW

I don't know 5e lore.

I suspect it's similar to 3.x, though.

In 3.x, tieflings were folks who had a demon or devil as a very distant ancestor, and the diabolic or demonic blood surfaced in them.

(There were also aasimar, which were the same but with angel blood.)

And the folks called "dragonborn" in 3.5 were... humanoids who underwent a rebirth ritual where they got chosen by dragons and stuck in an egg for a long time and then hatched out as a part-dragon creature.

Polyducks

I'm struggling to separate this from angsty myspace accounts in my head.

BESW

I was never very fond of tieflings or assimar in 3.5, and dragonborn were just weird.

Polyducks

I think I'll just play to the fact that my character has been in the woods for 35 years to hide my bias.

BESW

But I thought it was very nice of 4e to create reasonably powered, interestingly flavoured draconic and demonic races who didn't have to be defined by their inhuman heritage.

Polyducks

9:37 AM

and hope that the players can roleplay so well that it can change my mind. They're a good group, so it's possible.

BESW

I'd have a problem with any PC whose character was defined wholly by his race or class.

Polyducks

if they don't have to be defined by their inhuman heritage, why would anyone play them at all?

BESW

...because there's a difference between being defined by a particular trait, and being influenced by it.

3

Being a dragonborn or a tiefling is part of the character, but not its sum total.

Polyducks

I'll let you know how it plays out. I'm going to try and remain positive

BESW

Good luck.

Polyducks

9:41 AM

o> Thanks boss

better get back to pretending to work

BESW

ttfn

Ask Lovecraft- Gothic Role Playing

►

BESW

10:05 AM

Spells are the essential backbone of what makes D&D feel like D&D.

eimyr

10:17 AM

Hello.

BESW

[wave]

eimyr

How's life?

BESW

Rough.

You?

eimyr

Bumpy but progressing.

I was meaning to ask about your dad for a while, hoping he's better now.

Magician

@BESW I've thought about this before. Dwarves and elves and whatnot offer very strong, iconic roleplaying hooks. So do most classes. It's trivial to get lost in that. And, depending on the experience of the group and desire for characterization or lack thereof, "elven rogue" could be the entirety of a character. Humans, by contrast, don't offer such hooks. They are plain as bread.

err, i'm intruding on a different conversation, sorry.

BESW

10:25 AM

@eimyr Oh. Thanks for the kinds thoughts! Unfortunately his disease is progressive. The best we can hope for is extended plateaus.

eimyr

@BESW Then this, or an unexplained medical miracle is what I wish for you.

BESW

@Magician This is one thing I like about games like Fate, or even salves like 4e's traits-and-background: by providing more slots for information, they force players to dig a little deeper into characterisation.

Magician

@BESW Can confirm, Fate is great for that. Multiple times I've found myself making an NPC, giving them a concept aspect, then realising I had no idea for even one more aspect they could have. Forces me to make more interesting NPCs :)

BESW

@eimyr Thank you. (There's a very tiny study which suggests that small amounts of an extremely expensive cancer medicine might reserve the effects of his disease, but only while it's being taken. And it's probably at least a decade away from being tested widely, if ever. [sigh])

@Magician This is why Master Appa-Tax turned out to be Recently undead.

Magician

But coming back to dwarves, I think that's what humans lack in most settings: roleplaying hooks.

trogdor

10:30 AM

@Derpy lol

eimyr

@Magician Humans, not being as compelling, get the favour of the writers who add some cultural background to humans, but then they get trapped into the race for the subrace specificity.

trogdor

@doppelgreener he is sorta probably part dragon

eimyr

@BESW @Magician so how does one make a compelling but generic character?

BESW

Define generic.

Magician

Another random idea: if we're not frequently playing in a setting, it's perfectly fine to play a character that's 99% dwarven wizard, at least to start with. We haven't experienced dwarven wizards before, why not.

eimyr

10:31 AM

@trogdor Actually, just a dragon.

trogdor

honestly I feel like an avatar of Discord would be pretty appropriate for me XD :P

@eimyr I deserve that XD

BESW

"Compelling but generic" immediately makes me think of Major from iZombie.

trogdor

lol

eimyr

@BESW Humans are supposed to be very mutable. Their racial features exemplify the everyman aspect of choosing a human and do not suggest much of a narrative. In my book a generic thing is such that it provides a framework for a certain playstyle without enforcing characterisation of that thing.

E.g. a Fighter class is quite generic, whereas a Druid is not.

BESW

Yeah, but that's a general statement about the play option which implies the ability to --indeed, the expectation that you will-- drill down into specific compelling elements with a given character.

eimyr

10:35 AM

Well, I just recognised I departed from the officially accepted definition of "generic" as a synonym to "plain" or "average". Welp.

BESW

A specific human fighter isn't expected to stay generic.

eimyr

Very true.

Magician

I almost feel like you play human in D&D if you have an actual idea for the character.

(or want that sweet sweet bonus feat)

eimyr

But as @MAgician pointed out Human Fighter is much more generic than a Dwarven Wizard.

BESW

Aye; you make generic off-brand character choices in order to drill into an idea that isn't supported by the other more ready-made brand options.

Magician

10:37 AM

Contrast this with, say, Apocalypse World which gives you extremely flavorful playbooks to choose from. You can deviate and interpret within one, but you can't go with a "generic" option.

Or Fate that goes "Ok, you are human but that's hardly important; also a Fighter, that's one aspect, fine, now make 4 more."

eimyr

Same with Burning Wheel. The whole idea of past paths of life tears down any genericity that you might want or need.

Or actually have you start with an extremely generic character each time.

probably both

Magician

Fate suggests you discover character aspects in play, but given how much effort it usually takes to make ones you're happy with, we've never done that.

eimyr

In World of Darkness you generally are limited to some pretty specific options (vampire clans, mage traditions etc.) but you also can go with the generic "clanless" option, and though it has some characterisation implications there is still less assumptions made than with specific choices.

BESW

> Concept: Ordinary hoomman named Juck
Trouble: Boring normal person like you

@Magician We're doing it with increasing regularity, and it often takes several sessions before something comes to mind.

Magician

@BESW A dragon is attacking your village. Unfortunately, you're a Boring Normal Person and potato won't gather itself. Damn your luck.

6

eimyr

10:42 AM

> Stunt Unspecified characterisation You get +2 to any action, as long as you can't clearly assign it to exactly one skill.

BESW

@Magician "Hello, neighbour. I have forgotten which end of the garden-stick goes in the ground. Such an ordinary thing to forget, right? ha ha."

eimyr

@Magician I love potato jokes in RPGs.

Magician

@BESW Weird Skill: Tentacle Concealment.

BESW

@Magician [scribbles furiously]

eimyr

Be ordinary human. An dargon attacks your village. Welcome him with potato. Pleasant afternoon in friendly company.

doppelgreener

10:46 AM

(markdown won't work in multiline.)

eimyr

(just noticed)

BESW

such markdown. very multiline. so edit. fail.

eimyr

Poll: how do you pronounce Doge?

Doh-ge, dodge or dozh?

Derpy

@eimyr You never saw the old Japanese commercial for Lunar, didn't you?

eimyr

@Derpy nope

BESW

10:50 AM

@eimyr Like it's supposed to be pronounced, because it's an actual word.

eimyr

I know! The problem is that me and my mate are fans of Crusader Kings and we use the word for Venetian ruler in a casual conversation often enough to need clarification.

Derpy

@eimyr Forgive the poor quality, only one I could find

eimyr

I actually pronounce it "doh-ge" specifically to avoid misunderstandings.

BESW

But what is that? Dough-gi?

eimyr

dough-geh

with a flat e as in "earth"

Magician

10:53 AM

@eimyr subtle

BESW

"Git Along Little Doges?"

eimyr

You ain't nothing but a

@Derpy I don't know what to say. I watched it and... I have no idea how that ties to anything said today. Am I too gaijin to understand?

BESW

@eimyr It's the idea that pulling tubers isn't necessarily incompatible with a martial approach to visiting dragons.

eimyr

@BESW I actually think the way Elvis pronounces "dog" in that song is the perfect representation of the word doge.

Oh.

I get it now, thank you!

BESW

[hires himself out as an English-to-English translator]

Derpy

10:59 AM

@BESW Actually, it just that the potato thing with the dragon reminded me of the tuber one (I think that it may actually be a daikon), but yep, you are right :P

Polyducks

@Magician you're welcome to join the conversation on races, btw

Magician

@Polyducks Doges have taken over it

eimyr

Next game I'll roll a half-doge.

BESW

@eimyr "so adventure. such stab. very treasure. I am enthused to be joining your mission, good friends!"

Polyducks

FYI, it's officially pronounced douj

It came from a homestar cartiib]

*cartoon

eimyr

11:04 AM

@Polyducks it's pronounced TROG-DOOOOOR

Polyducks

nice meme

Friend Computer would like you to know that doge is now a normie meme. Using the meme (or any meme) in Alpha Complex will immediately demote you to INFRARED clearance.

eimyr

@Polyducks I think you would enjoy playing as Technocracy in Mage Ascension

Polyducks

I think so too. That does sound fun

eimyr

@Polyducks they have a concept of mutualism which ranges from "be nice" to "think alike" to "embrace the hive mind mentality".

Polyducks

@eimyr I really like the cold, unemotional logic of fictional AI. It is uniform, logical, and can be corrupted to all kinds of purposes.

eimyr

11:09 AM

@Polyducks also, they consider 1984 a cutesy tale about exaggerated outcry about fairly lax community policing.

Polyducks

@eimyr do you mean 1984?

doppelgreener

@eimyr I d-oh-g. Same sorta sound as robe, no fancy pronunciation tricks.

BESW

→ 8 messages moved to Not a bar, but plays one on TV

eimyr

yep, sorry

Polyducks

haha I love it

What is Mage Ascension about?

eimyr

11:10 AM

man, are you in for a half an hour lecture...

Polyducks

I'll be reading while writing some CSS.

eimyr

In a modern world the players are mortal magicians whose extraordinary will allow them to bend the laws of the universe. Unfortunately the world is governed by the power of belief and the majority of the world believes magic is not real. Meanwhile, the oppressive Technocracy reinforces a non-magical technological paradigm while eradicating the last remnants of glamour and whimsy. The world is broken and you are there to fix it.

Polyducks

The Technocracy reminds me of the Erisian Greyface. Is this a good analogy?

eimyr

It is also my main thing and you have no idea how much I had to restrain myself not to produce a huge wall of text.

[googling furiously]

Polyducks

Greyface can be summarised thus:

Trust in me, Universe, I will deliver
The promise that no-one shall ever,
Turn their mind to games or play
for Serious Order is the way.

I will not rest until it is done
Rules will be made for everyone
All shall know order and its graces
and just like me, shall be greyfaces.

-creed of Greyface I made for an in-character play once.

eimyr

11:16 AM

not quite then

Polyducks

Oh :(

I thought they were about destroying whimsy?

eimyr

It's Reasonable Mages hell-face-turned into actual technological geniuses meets Men in Black and The Adjustment Bureau.

With hints of Dr. Moreau and Elon Musk.

They are, but in a slightly different way. It's less NO FUN ALLOWED and more OUR FUN IS SUPERIOR YOU WILL BE ASSIMILATED.

Polyducks

Oh sweet. Like the borg?

eimyr

To some extent.

I have been gathering movie examples of Mage concepts and both Agent Smith and the dudes from The Adjustment Bureau fit. Borg fit one of the factions too,.

Polyducks

When you say agent Smith, you don't mean Will Smith from men in black?

eimyr

11:21 AM

Both, actually.

Matrix and MIB.

Polyducks

We need to get back to that fate intro game soon

BESW

@Polyducks Now I have the Endless Loop song stuck in my head. Thanks.

Polyducks

@BESW which song is that?

BESW

This one.

> It’s a song of sweetness, a song of joy,
Made for ev’ry girl and for ev’ry boy!
Sing of love, ’round the world,
‘Til your breakfast you’ve hurled!
And it’s in an endless loop!

[CHORUS:]
Singing in an endless loop,
Feel your eyelids start to droop,
’Til your brains have turned to poop!
It’s an end-less loop!

Hear the puppets sing, see the puppets dance,
‘Til your mind dissolves and you soil your pants!
All your synapses fried,
And you wish that you’d died!
And it’s in an endless loop!

[repeat CHORUS]

eimyr

@Polyducks sure

@Polyducks is your GF better now? I'm reluctant to take your time when there are other pressing issues at hand.

Polyducks

11:30 AM

@eimyr not quite yet. She's got this week off and went for blood tests this morning. I took your advice and made her a chicken stew overnight :)

eimyr

Cool :)

Polyducks

To be honest, most of my time should be spent on writing code and drawing a map for my parents, but I spend it playing gauntlet endlessly because I don't like to face my problems

@BESW Is... is there an audio version?

BESW

None that I've noticed.

eimyr

@Polyducks gauntlet?

Is that something you play or an idiom I need to learn?

Polyducks

@eimyr It's a remake of the arcade game. Endless dungeon delving. I finished it ages ago, but I just join random games and help out noobs

Derpy

11:33 AM

@BESW Emergency Loop Remover

eimyr

How do you feel about procrastinating over Borderlands 2 instead?

BESW

Derpy hooves - HERPY DERPY - MLP 1 HOUR

►

That'll scrub your brain like steel wool.

Derpy

@BESW At least it is not Flutterwonder

Polyducks

I don't own Borderlands 2. Is it replayable?

eimyr

Well...

I'm about into my 6th run-through or so

It's about as replayable as Diablo 2 is.

The story is the same, the gameplay does not change, but there is something that just clicks every time.

Magician

11:40 AM

At that point, might as well play an MMO.

It's purely subjective, of course, but I'd started Borderlands 2 a bunch of times with various groups of friends, and only once did we finish. It's fun, but very same-y.

eimyr

Sure.

I never did any of the DLC, but I sort-of want to play one nice full run on UVHM. I never completed everything at once.

Magician

We'd started on the D&D DLC, but even there the novelty wore off quickly.

eimyr

I'm a simple man, there is a unicorn called Butt Stallion pooping legendary-quality items, I press like.

Polyducks

Nice.

I really like random loot generation

Especially when there is a chance of uber rare items

eimyr

Unfortunately, as always random loot generation can create 68 million items, out of which about 17 are actually useful

trogdor

11:54 AM

@BESW but at what cost?

BESW

@trogdor Deep steel-wool grooves.

trogdor

what cost indeed

BESW

Rich was muttering it at work for months.

Polyducks

Whispering madness

BESW

Good name for a band.

Polyducks

11:56 AM

It's when you can hear voices on the edge of your hearing, like those awful ASMR videos.

They give me the creeps. It reminds me of when I used to hear voices as a kid.

trogdor

@BESW I can hardly believe he even listened to it

BESW

@Polyducks I hear faint voices when I'm sleep-deprived. I also hear faint voices when my father leaves the radio on with his headphones plugged in, which he does multiple times every day.

doppelgreener

@eimyr Like awesome scoped weapons!

Polyducks

haha

Reminds me of the schizophrenia voice simulation. That's a proper whispering madness.

Auditory Hallucinations - An Audio Representation

►

bbl, meeting

eimyr

@doppelgreener or magical shotguns! nerfnow.com/comic/748

BESW

12:00 PM

...I remember shotgun sniping in Halo.

Miniman

@BESW I remember killing tanks with shotguns in Halo.

eimyr

@Polyducks deeply disturbing

doppelgreener

@eimyr oh my gosh i totally forgot about this webcomic

@BESW I have not heard of this.

BESW

The original Halo game had a physics engine with almost no wobble or randomisation at all.

The same shot from the same position hit the same spot every single time.

And bullets didn't arc with gravity.

eimyr

hah

It reminds me of how certain shotguns on Anarchy Gaige can shoot backwards, because their angle of spread might sometimes exceed 180 degrees.

BESW

12:04 PM

I had a friend who could stick a plasma grenade on a moving target from all the way across a medium-sized map.

Our favourite game setting was "Big map. 10 minutes. No shields. Every weapon is a shotgun."

...Although we were also fond of "Small map. 5 minutes. Full shields, full shield powerup. Infinite grenades. Every weapon is a rocket launcher."

Derpy

@eimyr There are the somehow funny references of Fallout computers, and then the not-so-fine ones of Borderlands.

doppelgreener

@BESW We liked "tiniest map, all swords, invisibility" and "medium most obstacle-ridden map, all rocket launchers, full shield powerup."

eimyr

@Derpy Borderlands favours crude humour altogether. With the otherwise over the top characterisation and presentation and all-too-common innuendo you are thrust into a truly penile game experience.

BESW

@doppelgreener Oh, yes. Invisible Swords.

[squint] Not sure if typo, or pun.

doppelgreener

A friend of a friend's gaming group was a fan of Halo, and they all just settled into sniper rifles. In Halo 2 they were playing Coagulation sniping each other from opposite walls.

BESW

12:11 PM

I could never get the hang of sniper rifles.

In H1 I just used the pistol.

doppelgreener

I can't manage that level of accuracy with a gamepad. They can. Our two gaming groups had a duel day one day, and we mostly played relatively enclosed maps with a high amount of obstacles because... you can imagine why.

If it were large open spaces, things would be pretty one-sided.

BESW

Human pistol was better than the sniper rifle for most anything mid-to-long range, and the H1 Covenant pistol was brilliant for short-range.

(H2 removed the rapid-fire option on the Covenant pistol, and I was sad.)

Miniman

@BESW You mean the RoF limited only by your click speed?

BESW

@Miniman [crocodilian-wide grin] Why, yes.

Miniman

@BESW It's such a mystery why they changed that...

doppelgreener

12:15 PM

In H1, the pistol was the best weapon hands down. In H2, sniper rifle won out if you could spot someone, scope in, and fairly reliably headshot them from the opposite side of the map. In H4, brute shotgun + spike gun was my favourite weapon combination, but there were sparingly few maps that put them in close proximity.

BESW

If I started rapid-firing at the maximum range I could be sure to hit the target, and ran straight at him, he'd be move-locked while I ran up to him. The pistol would overheat exactly when I reached punching range, and his shield would conveniently be down.

Miniman

@doppelgreener To be fair, in H1 the sniper rifle and the pistol were both 2 shot kills.

BESW

In H1 the sniper needed 1 headshot to kill, and the pistol needed three.

doppelgreener

@Miniman But you didn't usually spawn with a sniper rifle. 8)

Ok, maybe it's a close tie.

Miniman

@BESW I remembered it as 2 for the pistol, but yeah - I was assuming body shots with the sniper rifle since you guys were saying the pistol was better.

BESW

12:17 PM

(I might be wrong about the sniper, but I know the pistol needed three headshots to drop someone. I was the one doing that.)

doppelgreener

One of my housemates just got extremely good at the assault rifle, since it was the weapon you always spawned with. He didn't waste time hunting down his weapon, he spent it taking out the people still looking for theirs. >:)

eimyr

Meanwhile at the PCMR camp [crickets]

BESW

I couldn't hit a barn door with a sniper rifle, but I rarely needed more than three shots with a pistol.

Miniman

@eimyr PCMR?

BESW

@doppelgreener Oh, man. I loved maps that spawned me with a plasma pistol for that exact reason.

eimyr

12:19 PM

@Miniman PC Master Race

doppelgreener

@eimyr I am a generalist uninterested in the petty squabbles of console vs console vs PC. (Unless it's an xbox, which has amazing games, but is The Worst Console.)

Miniman

@eimyr Lol. I'm PC master race 4 life.

BESW

....I grew up running all my favourite games by shutting down the GUI to get a DOS prompt.

I've never owned a console and I've never made a computer purchase decision based on gaming potential.

doppelgreener

I've had the wii with and without the U on the end, and between parents, housemates, and eventually my own purchasing power, I've played on every version of the playstation since the first one.

BESW

(Besides, Halo was released for Windows and OS X.)

doppelgreener

12:26 PM

I never had the purchasing power for the first xbox, the second xbox I wrote off completely on account of its flaws (anything that can destroy the games you put in it is not something I want running my games), the third xbox is not worth having when I have the other two consoles.

Polyducks

@doppelgreener You mean WiiU and Dreamcast, right?

doppelgreener

Never had a dreamcast.

Polyducks

I love my WiiU

doppelgreener

And no, I mean PS4 and Wii U in that last message.

Polyducks

if only for drawing pictures on Miiverse

doppelgreener

12:34 PM

@Polyducks my friend plays Splatoon a lot and we have fun doing those drawings for it. :)

Polyducks

:O!

I LOVE Splatoon

I've given it a break for a while - just until I figure out if I'm a squid or a kid.

That's the kind of stuff that keeps me up at night.

doppelgreener

Why not both?

Polyducks

D:

[mind blows]

I've managed to corner the market on classic pacman artwork

d3esbfg30x759i.cloudfront.net/pap/WVW69ia78hYDobO3_G

trogdor

@doppelgreener you are either a squid now or a kid now, not both at the exact same time XD

doppelgreener

@trogdor i have never actually seen that ad and i decline its propaganda

trogdor

12:39 PM

lol

it was both hilarious and annoying at the same time

doppelgreener

@trogdor i suspect i was lucky to have missed that ad

Polyducks

I haven't ever seen it either

I've seen clips and references

brb going to ruin my perception of the game

...wow, that was cringe.

Wii U - Splatoon "Squid Kid" TV Commercial

►

BESW

Polyducks

Octodad has easily the best soundtrack of all games ever.

trogdor

@doppelgreener you probably were

@Polyducks I really like it myself

it was a great game, as long as your definition of that could include frustratingly hard but loving it anyway

eimyr

12:56 PM

@Miniman I have outgrown the PC vs console discussion. I actually think owning a console would be nice just for the exclusives, but it's hard to justify 400£+tv spend just to get The Last Of Us.

Miniman

@eimyr I'm entirely uninvested in it; you brought it up :P

eimyr

@Miniman Oh, I know. I was just casually remarking, as I am considering upgrading my PC now and maybe, just maybe, include a console purchase.

Or maybe not.

Miniman

@eimyr I mean, as long as you know why you're making the decision, and have actual reasons, it's the right decision.

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