TRPG General Chat

doppelgreener

12:48 AM

@nitsua60 the slaadi suggestion made me laff

BESW

12:59 AM

"The Slaadi Suggestion" would be a good name for an adventure module.

Miniman

@doppelgreener I liked "Just give it the Hand of Vecna!", personally.

Javelin

Doesn't everybody have these legendary artifacts at hand?

BESW

In seriousness, I'd probably set it up as a skill challenge that stretches over years.

Javelin

@BESW Like some sort of Time-skip?

Shalvenay

hey there @nitsua60

nitsua60

1:05 AM

@BESW Woohoo--made the "that would make a good name for..." list! (Albeit tangentially.)

BESW

@Javelin If the party's not going to do anything else during that time, then it'd be a sort of "growing up" montage. If the party's continuing to adventure, then it'd be an ongoing skill challenge that gets a new roll every... six months or so, probably, with modifiers based on interactions over that time frame.

nitsua60

@BESW In all seriousness, I think the guy's talking about parenting. I've got three little CN's running around that I'd be happy to loan him =)

@Shalvenay heya

Javelin

And in the meantime, their Palaces will be constructed, of course.

Shalvenay

@nitsua60 how're things going?

BESW

@nitsua60 A years-long skill challenge opposed by the subject's adult skill block.

nitsua60

1:08 AM

@Shalvenay Busy busy busy--the two days off I was supposed to have just had got eaten up by kids' snow days.

@BESW and interminable Will saves...

Shalvenay

@nitsua60 dat snow. looks like you got hit by a Nor'easter up there recently, even

BESW

@nitsua60 And then there's the exhaustion penalties.

nitsua60

@Shalvenay nothing to complain of, though--first real snowfall of the season

Shalvenay

@nitsua60 haha. we got one of our first snowdays this season last week -- (it was bad enough that the city buses were on short-notice cancellation, which meant I took a vacation day myownself as I didn't want to get stranded at work)

also -- I almost want to RP Jherala getting into a close encounter of the third kind with modern Earthlings :P (I wonder what a Dragonborn looks like on a MRI?)

nitsua60

1:36 AM

@doppelgreener turns out it's wrong, though =(

missed the restriction that Slaadi can only do that to humanoids.

Shalvenay

@nitsua60 oh. :p

BESW

@Shalvenay Well, you might see a foreign object near his patella.

Shalvenay

@BESW oh, LOL :P

BESW

"Nowhere did God say 'Thou Shalt Not Cut The Head off Hydas To Make More for Later Resale'" - Rooster the Paladin (aka @ursulav) #dnd

Tweeted by ksonney on February 9, 2016 at 1:41 AM

"We need to find a way to put a saddle on a gelatinous cube." -@UrsulaV #dnd

Tweeted by RebelsHeart on February 9, 2016 at 1:41 AM

nitsua60

So can I ask a question about elections without it being taken as a critique or endorsement of any mods?

(It's about the election process, which is just starting over on WB.)

Smurfton

2:28 AM

@Javelin Satisfied with my answer?

doppelgreener

@Smurfton Upon learning that gems are valued "per gem", I have hatched upon a profit-making plan: Buy one gem. Split it into eight smaller gems. Sell those gems for the price at which you bought the original gem. If you're daring, grind the gem into powder and get into arguments over whether a fine pinch of it is made of a million individual gems.

Smurfton

lol

What's really odd is that you don't find 1,000 GP diamonds

You find 5,000 GP diamonds

@doppelgreener I think that the intent of that table is that this or that is the value of what you find, and that all gems happen to be the same size by default.

I feel like I made a typo, but I didn't.

doppelgreener

This entire question reminds me of an Order of the Stick comic. A wizard sends his lackey off to buy 1,000GP of rubies for a ritual. The lackey comes back saying he's got them, and even better, he haggled the merchant down to 900GP for them. The wizard slaps him and sends him back: "Well, go buy 100GP more of them!"

Smurfton

I remember that

I find it weird that it's more convenient to pay your bills with diamonds

"Aw, snap. Can you break 5,000 GP? No? Guess I'll have to take my business elsewhere, then."

BESW

@nitsua60 Shoot.

doppelgreener

2:40 AM

@BESW kapow

nitsua60

[bang]

doppelgreener

[staggers dramatically, keels over into the dirt]

BESW

> Sure, the party isn't expecting the local innkeep to make change for a platinum piece... but nobody else can either. It's like trying to pay someone with a barrel of crude oil; sure it's worth a lot, but what is Bob the Fishmonger going to do with it?
Same applies to objets d'art, handfuls of gems, and rare/ancient/foreign coins. Finding someone who can evaluate and buy their stuff could be a fun RP adventure, and there are all kinds of stories you can tell around an auction house.
http://rpg.stackexchange.com/a/22602/4398

doppelgreener

I vaguely recall reading some story recently featuring a dude who'd pay people with gemstones.

Small ones. Little ones. But several of them. The dude in this story was in another place compared to usual, might've been a space travel or time travel story.

nitsua60

So I read in one place that moderators are elected for life, and in another that elections are held at regular intervals. Looking back through the records here I see an election in 2012 (coming out of beta?) where three mods were elected, then an election in 2015 where two were elected. Did Bryan and C.Ross step down in 2015, creating the seats that SSD and Wax Eagle filled?

Smurfton

2:42 AM

Yes.

nitsua60

And if empty seats->elections are controlled by lifetime-mods stepping down, how then are elections "regular"?

doppelgreener

@nitsua60 Moderators are elected for life, some sites like Stack Overflow have an ever-expanding mod team or enough turnover and thus might have elections at regular intervals as far as the community's concerned

BESW

@nitsua60 Elections are not held at regular intervals. Whoever told you that was mistaken. (I know there's at least one guy on rpg.se meta who seems to think it works that way.)

user15026

YEah, they're not regular by any means

user15026

They're as needed

nitsua60

2:44 AM

got it--that makes more sense. Thanks.

user15026

Some sites just end up needing them more often than others

BESW

Elections are triggered by a moderator stepping down and needing to be replaced, or the site expanding to need more moderators total.

Moderators only leave their position when they choose to step down, or are removed for misbehaviour.

nitsua60

(again, just asking because of the election starting up over at WB--please infer nothing further)

doppelgreener

[infers so hard that nitsua60 is incriminated for thoughtcrimes he was merely perceived to have committed]

BESW

It's a common confusion that we had to clear up during RPG.SE's last election too. I don't think inferences would be reasonable.

Magician

2:51 AM

Incriminating Inferences. Band name. Me BESW.

BESW

....You Tarzan.

nitsua60

@doppelgreener probably less of a hassle than being incriminated for my actual crimes....

Smurfton

@BESW The difference, though, is that you can carry a gem around really easily. I don't think I could pick up a barrel of oil.

BESW

They're equally fungible for the average small-town bartender though.

Portability doesn't help a lot.

Smurfton

true. on the other hand, travelling to the city to get it changed is worth it (even if he doesn't know the value). If he doesn't see 1 GP frequently, he can go 10 days at least without losing profit.

BESW

3:03 AM

Mmm, but.

Another point I make in there is that there's a big difference, fungibly, between "I make 50g a day" and "I have a 1g gold piece."

Smurfton

better yet, the players can keep small change on hand.

BESW

Exactly.

Smurfton

Still not worth selling all at once though

BESW

The original problem, usually, is in a mismatch between system bookkeeping expectations and group bookkeeping expectations.

Smurfton

It's not worth carrying two million pounds of gold around.

BESW

3:05 AM

They're trying to ignore a bookkeeping hassle and the GM is trying to punish them for it.

Smurfton

giantitp.com/comics/oots0198.html

This is literally them

Except they have more money

Magician

Relevant.

I haven't kept up with these, but at the start it was all about ramifications of adventurers and abstract wealth rules applied to them on economy.

Smurfton

Somebody is spending a lot of money though.

SOMEHOW magic item vendors do make enough money to live comfortably.

Magician

The real answer is "don't worry about it, people sell things because adventurers need them". Otherwise, do read those dungeonomics articles, they're a lot of fun.

Smurfton

yeah, will do. Not now, I need to drive around for an hour, but soon.

BESW

3:16 AM

Yeah, the D&D "economy" is balanced around usefulness for adventuring, making gold a meta-textual rating of adventuring utility rather than an actual currency.

Magician

3:36 AM

Coming back to yesterday's topic of characters defined by stuff on their sheet, just random thoughts... It's a source of most of My Guy Syndrome issues, I think. "My sheet says I'm a Rogue, so I steal from everyone." That's roleplaying, that is.

At the same time, one can have a multi-faceted character defined entirely by a race. If I say my character is a dwarf, that implies a lot: he likes wealth; he holds grudges; he's rough and hard-working; he has a beard; he doesn't much like elves and hates goblins; he loves beer; etc, etc. One can enjoyably roleplay a stereotypical dwarf.

It helps, though, to have other hooks, like class or background. Is that the key to having interesting characters, then, to have several hooks for different "parts" of the character: cultural background, profession, past experiences?

A dwarf in Fate can simply have Dwarf as an aspect, or they can have Beer Enthusiast, Goblin Hater, Wealth Hoarder, etc. Just because the system offers multiple "slots" for characterization hooks, doesn't mean they will be used for different things.

I'm fishing for some common rationale here, in this disjointed rambling.

nitsua60

@Magician I try to replace all instances of [race|class|background] with "person" in my talk at table. I get some weird looks, but it means that someone's got to get to know my character before they can think they know anything about my character. (And it means I can't take the shortcuts, either.)

As in: "What are you?" "A person." "No, I mean, what do you do?" "Well, I like seeing the world...."

Magician

Heh

Thing is, these "shortcuts" are not necessarily bad. An evocative hook is great to have. That's why AW works so well.

There's a whole class-based/classless thing lurking around the corners here, too.

nitsua60

3:52 AM

sure

Magician

I'd almost argue that Fate is class-based, with classes you define each time.

nitsua60

Key to interesting characters, for me, is the character having things they care about, and things that motivate them.

Preferably with some sensible reasons why on both fronts

BESW

One of the things I love about reading different Fate iterations is how they approach categorising aspects.

Core's concept/trouble/phases is just one way of doing it.

ARRPG has you define three areas of competency and make an aspect for each.

Umdaar asks what drives you.

Magician

@nitsua60 Right, and those things are rarely if ever defined by class/race/whatever. Unless they are! A wizard has his college or master they care about. Dwarves have extended family. Elves... Elves hate indiscriminately.

I have this, perhaps unfair, concept of classless systems: in them, characters are a pile of skills, mechanically. Everything else is up to roleplaying. But I guess that's not necessarily true.

Eh, lets not.

nitsua60

m'kay.

(probably a good call)

@Magician haven't played many classless

Magician

4:02 AM

@BESW It is, indeed, an interesting way to signal what sets your Fate game apart, what is emphasized in it.

@nitsua60 Neither have I. GURPS scared me.

nitsua60

Is it the idea of being both "generic" and "universal"? That kind of commitment to vagueness intimidates me... =)

Magician

Hah. Sort of, yes. I think, at least at the time, I found its lack of in-built characterization hooks bland. I could make any character I wanted! Except all of them would be simply a pile of skills.

I wouldn't be a wizard, I'd be a dude with high Magic skill.

nitsua60

I've never GURPSed--I think 1-sec. combat shooes me away. (I like old-school 1-min. combat rounds.)

Guiding Light

@nitsua60 What about 1-day combat rounds?

nitsua60

@GuidingLight I don't have that kind of attention span =)

Javelin

4:10 AM

do you mean 1min in-game or out-of-game

nitsua60

I had meant 1-min in-game, which was the ODD standard. But then I made the obvious joke and conflated in-game and out-of-game =(

Javelin

I am sorry, that went right over my head

Im feeling kind of down right now, you see

nitsua60

sorry to hear it

Magician

@Javelin Feeling like you've been tossed around one too many times?

Javelin

@nitsua60 That was a double entendre.

Magician

4:13 AM

(i'm hoping you made a joke, otherwise sorry to hear it too)

nitsua60

@Javelin (and I meant "obvious" as in "You [nitsua60] are a hack for making the joke," not as in "you [audience] are foolish for not getting the joke.")

Magician

Hehehe

Javelin

Im listening to The Doors on loop to try to feel better

nitsua60

[can't... resist...] so, like a revolving door?

5

Javelin

@nitsua60 I want to star that, but I should not star irresponsibly.

BESW

4:15 AM

It's okay, @irresponsibly isn't here. You can star @nitsua60.

Javelin

Dammit, I just got that^

BESW

Hope you feel better soon.

@MunchyWilly Hi!

nitsua60

@Javelin Can't fault yourself for lagging behind BESW: quad-core processor and all.

MunchyWilly

Howdy

Magician

So. Over in another room, and later on twitter, I proffered an alternative to lovecraftian fiction. A literary tradition in which puns, not obscure words, signify otherness. Seeing the true nature of the world doesn't drive people insane - it makes them pun. Pun of Cthulhu, all that. Which is to say, you're all gibbering cultists.

nitsua60

4:19 AM

@Javelin Second that, btw: be well. This, too, shall pass.

BESW

@Magician This says something very disturbing about dad jokes.

Javelin

@BESW Dad jokes are the essence of the universe

BESW

Javelin

We will all be great parents, obviously

Protect your Æons everyone

BESW

@Magician Lovelaughtian, perhaps?

nitsua60

4:21 AM

I take it back. One-fourth of BESW isn't finding these images, it's one of those street-performing super-fast artists. Because I refuse to believe ^^ existed before this conversation.

Magician

@BESW Laughcraftian.

Javelin

@nitsua60 Im afraid to say you're mistaken. I know exactly what that is...

nitsua60

only because the time-travelling fifth (and unnamed) one-fourth of BESW went and put it back in your past.

BESW

Octodad: Dadliest Catch

Octodad: Dadliest Catch is an independent adventure video game developed and published by Young Horses. It is a sequel to the 2010 freeware game Octodad. The game consists of controlling the protagonist Octodad in completing chores typical of the mundane suburban father, but complicated by the fact that he is an octopus in disguise. == Gameplay == Octodad: Dadliest Catch requires the player to control the protagonist, Octodad, as he maneuvers his way through increasingly complex challenges all while attempting to hide the fact that he is a cephalopod in human clothing. The player can control one...

Magician

@nitsua60 Ah, the Fifth BESW. A title many have laid claim to over the years.

BESW

4:25 AM

There's a "multipass" joke in there somewhere.

nitsua60

@Magician So, one of the things that always annoyed me about Lovecraft was his habit of putting the last "twist" line of the story into italics. (And, of course, that may just be the editor of the editions I have.) The thought that it's a punch-line, not a spooky-reveal, is now entrenched in my head-canon. And I'm lovin' it.

Magician

@BESW There is, but I was originally going for a Beatles joke.

BESW

...none of Lovecraft's stories that I've ever read had the twist contained within a single final line, when there was a twist at all.

Magician

So... Can any one of you cultists make up an example of laughcraftian fiction? Simply replace "squamous and rugose" words with horrible jokes.

nitsua60

Maybe not even a twist, but trying to put a bow on it or something. Lemme go look....

BESW

4:31 AM

Well, here's the summoning ritual:

5

Magician

Perfect.

nitsua60

4:53 AM

night, all

Javelin

@nitsua60 good night

Adeptus

@Smurfton We played a mission (published, I think) where the Troubleshooters were sent to "the Outdoor sector". New clones were delivered in pods launched from a cannon. Which sometimes required the sending of more new clones...

(there was a chance of the incoming pod hitting one of the other PCs, and a chance of the pod's occupant dying on landing)

Smurfton

@Adeptus Impressive.

Adeptus

@Magician I have played GURPS a little. Even though it's classless, I made a few characters to fit stereotypes that typically define classes... I had a Conan-style barbarian character, with the traits/flaws giant, bloodthirsty, ... and who used a battleaxe (mostly because it was so much cheaper than a two-handed sword)

The GM made me regret taking "bloodthirsty" and wish I'd taken "berserker" instead

BESW

5:14 AM

"Waiter, there's a dead god in my soup!"
"He's not dead, sir, just dreaming."

Magician

@BESW Good, but not quite right. It's a horrible joke about Cthulhu, rather than a description of Cthulhu that relies on horrible jokes.

A very specific literary tradition, this.

BESW

Mmm. I can't really dad-joke on command. It just happens.

Magician

Yeah. I'm not sure this form of literature has much of a future, but I'd like to see it nonetheless.

BESW

Azxanthothian.

Magician

"Ia, Ia, Cthulhu Fhtagn," chanted the cultists, "Ia, Ia, Gesundheit."

Javelin

5:21 AM

@BESW That sounds like the kind of stuff that gets put on my so-called Wall of Shame

or rather, how it gets there

BESW

You have a Wall of Shame?

....I just get starred a lot.

Javelin

I keep certain posts on my skype wall for all to see

it's become the wall of shame because one man says the darnedest things and just keeps moving the posts up

Adeptus

5:43 AM

Skype has a wall?

Javelin

Yeah, they call it the "mood message"

you can see your contacts' mood messages on the home screen of Skype

Magician

Ah. That's what they've been doing instead of fixing messages arriving out of sync or not being marked as read. Lovely.

Javelin

They fixed that, and the mood message thing has been around for years o-o

Magician

Nope, I still have two "unread" messages in my client, they've been there for a month now.

Javelin

Thats strange

Magician

5:50 AM

It is! I don't require much of my chat client, but displaying messages in correct order, marking them as read and not showing me ads is on the list. Which is why I'm only keeping Skype for when my grandmother calls. But if it works for you, great.

Javelin

That sounds as bad as Chrome not working on my friend's laptop

BESW

Wait, don't people know armadillos carry leprosy?“@sarahbrodsky: Bay County man contracts leprosy from an armadillo http://bit.ly/1nUgxp6”

Tweeted by UrsulaV on February 9, 2016 at 5:48 AM in reply to sarahbrodsky

@timon Hi!

Tashio

If you right click on current and say mark as read not clear it?

Magician

It did, huh. Thanks! Simply opening the chat window did nothing.

BESW

**Cool RPG stuff:** [Bundle of Holding](http://bundleofholding.com "buy RPGs cheap in bulk, support charities & indie designers!");
[Apocalypse World 2nd Ed](https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/226674021/apocalypse-world-2nd-edition "streamlined Hx, a whole new set of battle moves, a threat map instead of fronts");
[playtesters wanted for Unbound](http://lookrobot.co.uk/2016/01/31/unbound-playtesters-wanted/ "a quick-burn universal pulp action RPG with a focus on bringing story and player creativity to the forefront");

Adeptus

5:57 AM

@Magician Skype keeps spontaneously starting up on my laptop. Not immediately at boot, either, unless it's got a long background pre-start process. It used to have a "don't start automatically" option, I can't find that any more.

I'm considering uninstalling it, I pretty much never use it.

BESW

Fate More is in the last 48 hours, BTW.

Javelin

@Adeptus I think they left start-up options to the OS

Tashio

I use skype for too many things but it's a pain, crashes for me on startup under windows 10 so often which is crazy as MS owns Skype

BESW

I have a few minor quibbles with the interface, but I use it extensively with no major issue.

Magician

I've switched almost entirely to Google's Hangouts.

Tashio

6:05 AM

Yea once it is up and running I don't have problem but it does freeze up when loading for me pretty often

BESW

Hangouts gives my laptop hot flashes.

Javelin

I migrated to Skype after I was told Msn was being taken down

Tashio

I had both so the merging helped reduce the number of clients I had to run at a time

Javelin

and I would probably still prefer Msn actually, but I got my Skype to stay in line

BESW

I use the text chat feature on Skype, Hangouts, WhatsApp, and Facebook Messenger, whichever that particular contact prefers. My RPG group has a Skype text room for coordinating and keeping in touch between sessions.

Tashio

6:09 AM

Skype chat rooms are nice

BESW

...Magician's still in it, from that one time he ran 13th Age for us.

Magician

@BESW I've simply muted it, there's a lot of chatter going on there at all times :P

BESW

In my experience, social contact outside of game time is a significant tool for group cohesion and on-task-ery during game time.

So--yes, chatty.

doppelgreener

6:34 AM

@Magician I'm glad that's not just me getting that.

Telegram ought to be the most perfect client ever, 'cept it's also tied to telephone numbers and I'm not sure that's a good thing.

but you could try that one. :D

Magician

Haven't even heard of it. Hangouts is working fine for me right now.

doppelgreener

It's a lightweight privacy (as in encryption) oriented chat client.

Which makes the phone number coupling quite strange.

BESW

6:54 AM

Huh.

trogdor

8:06 AM

@doppelgreener that is a very strange combination

and I assume you have to couple them to use it

I mean, encryption is nice, but it isn't worth anything as soon as someone breaks it

and there are plenty of people out in the vastness of the internet who take enjoyment out of doing that and seem to have too much free time XD

Derpy

@trogdor and yet, sometime, there is that feeble, evil mastermind voice inside me that keeps repeating me "We also have many dirty roads around the country, can't you see the common solution?"

trogdor

mm we have the same issue here

though the bigger issue here is that the roads go largely un-maintained or repaired

and it's taken like, close to 70 or so years for them to re build them

though it seems like it might be less of an issue soon,.... maybe

maaaaaayyyyybbeeeee

BESW

8:25 AM

MONDAYE THE ROLEPLAYINGE GAME Rules of the game: 1. Yower onlye attribute ys bemused dismaye 2. Minus 5 to all rolles

Tweeted by LeVostreGC on February 8, 2016 at 5:54 PM

A daye wythout anachronism ys lyke Emily Dickinson wythout her misfit crew of space pyrates.

Tweeted by LeVostreGC on February 6, 2016 at 3:44 AM

doppelgreener

8:48 AM

@trogdor in any modern decently-implemented cryptography, breaking the encryption is not a feasible option.

so, correct, but that doesn't make encryption not worth anything, because "as soon as someone breaks it" is not a very likely prospect.

trogdor

mm I said it isn't worth anything as soon as someone breaks it, not before that

but I will concede not knowing enough about it to know how easy or hard it is

I will concede that all day

not really but you get the picture

doppelgreener

modern cryptography's based on the idea that by the time anyone manages to crack the data, it'll be virtually useless. so, at least thirty years or so.

trogdor

10:45 AM

mk

fair enough

eimyr

11:28 AM

yo

Polyducks

Hi guys, I've got a question about a game system.

Tim B

you're probably in the right place then :) assuming it's an RPG game...

eimyr

Here we go

it's Paranoia

Polyducks

Nope

It's about F.A.T.A.L.

My question is...

..."WHY!?"

eimyr

someone has visited 1d4chan...

Polyducks

11:38 AM

I've known about it for a while, but I want to know the origin

eimyr

hmmm

Polyducks

Thought I'd ask you guys because it'd be a fun topic.

eimyr

the origin?

I'm afraid discussing FATAL might be considered in breach of "Be Nice"

Polyducks

haha

Like, was it made as a joke, or a serious project?

eimyr

It was serious, AFAIK.

Polyducks

11:40 AM

Author is Byran Hall. I think you're right.

I'll return with more info later. Ta-ta!

eimyr

There are more like this.

And they are rarely jokes.

Polyducks

11:53 AM

I've read it over and come to the conclusion the author was incredibly sincere.

eimyr

How do you feel about it?

I'm not entirely sure what was the author's intention. Who would play this game? Especially in the age of easily-accessible sexual content of superior quality and engagement?

What surprises me is that someone thought a gathering of people intending to roleplay their fetishist fantasies would benefit from having an RPG formalise the experience.

Polyducks

12:12 PM

Well, I've only read through 1/5th at a scanning pace, and I've come to the conclusion there are a lot of unnecessary mechanics. The disgusting parts aside (and they really are something only a serial killer could've come up with), there are some really interesting tables.

Things like origin of birth (village/city etc) and drunkeness

The rest of the tables so far have been... something I don't want to repeat.

eimyr

Pretty much.

I have not read the book as I don't really enjoy this sort of things.

but I am sure for the most part the book has been written one-handed.

Ahriman

Because written by a one-armed bandit?

eimyr

I really don't want to explain that joke.

hi @Ahriman

long time no see

Ahriman

12:36 PM

[waves]

Raelly?

Also, what's the joke? ;)

eimyr

No.

I will not.

Ahriman

[insert-puppy-eyes-here]

Feelf ree to take it as literal as you want

eimyr

My gf is a vet.

Puppy eyes is something I expect to find in her purse.

Ahriman

Time to dig up the nurse horror stories of my velp

eimyr

I honor of @BESW's name-spotting abilities, enjoy some handy statistics. So far RPG.SE chat has generated 23 great names, 149 good names and 1 awful name. I think we're doing well.

3

Ahriman

12:45 PM

@eimyr As mentioned, earlier: was it really that long?

eimyr

Well, you seem to be around, but we didn't share a conversation for a while now.

Ahriman

ah

eimyr

So, what's new?

Ahriman

in general digesting the mod drama, and trying to get a piece of hardware to behave (just so that I can wreck it again)

eimyr

Yeah, it caught my attention too.

I'll better stay outside of that mire of filth, especially that it never affected me personally.

How's your game, @Ahriman?

Ahriman

1:58 PM

Okish

Doing a malkavians-who-think-they-are-assmites short story

Trying to find the next time to play Cthulhu

That's about it.

eimyr

Cool.

Are you still using Revised edition?

Ahriman

Yes

BESW

Which Cthulhu?

Call, d20, Trail?

Ahriman

2:17 PM

Call 6th

Never got the d20 version, too much number crunching to my taste

eimyr

How is Trail different from Call, if you don't mind some exposition?

BESW

Mm. I'm inclined to think that d20 and Mythos aren't a good match regardless of one's opinion of bookkeeping.

@eimyr Call is a percentile skill-based system that runs on a failure-for-tension platform.

eimyr

and Trail?

BESW

Trail is an investigative system that responds directly to Call's failure-as-tension platform by saying that failure tends to stop stories cold.

It's a d6-pool skill/ability system which grants automatic successes wherever the advancement of the plot would be jeopardised by failure.

eimyr

I see.

BESW

2:22 PM

As an investigative game, that means simply spending time at a scene when you have the right skill gives you the minimum clues you need to move forward.

eimyr

a bit like Gumshoe?

BESW

It is Gumshoe.

Call is equally comfortable in combat-heavy or investigation-heavy scenarios, and in both it has a heavy emphasis on the luck of the roll.

Trail supports occasional combat-heavy scenes, but for pulp Mythos play it needs to get adjusted a bit (the manual includes help on doing this).

Call uses BRP as its engine; Trail uses GUMSHOE.

eimyr

oh

BESW

2:39 PM

You sound very disappointed.

eimyr

Not really, no.

I just didn't realise Trail is Cthulhu with Gumshoe.

It would have rendered my question unnecessary.

Gumshoe is on my short list of RPGs to read.

BESW

There's also Achtung! Cthulhu, which has iterations for BRP, SW, and Fate.

And CthulhuTech, which uses Framewerk. And Cthulhu Dark, which is its own little thing.

eimyr

Achtung! Cthulhu causes an involuntary fight or flight response in me.

Not sure if that's intended.

BESW

I picked it up mostly because I really wanted to see how they did Mythos horror in Fate.

eimyr

Did it work?

BESW

2:45 PM

Haven't used it, and actually haven't really had time to read it carefully.

eimyr

Excuse me, wörk?

I see.

BESW

The system's divided across two books, both of which are very heavy on flavour.

eimyr

You seem to be using ARRPG as your Fate flavour. Do you care to explain why?

BESW

It's very good for long-form games for my group. We use other flavours for shorter games.

ARRPG has a lot of moving parts and fiddly bits pre-made, as well as the usual "make it up yourself" formulas very well-explained.

This means it caters to a wide variety of play styles in my group: a la carte vs hack-your-own, and simple broad mechanics vs deep fiddly bits.

The aesthetic of Atomic Robo is appealing to my whole group, and the power level is fun.

eimyr

Would you recommend it for fantasy games too?

BESW

2:52 PM

Additionally, ARRPG codifies several Fate hacks and playstyle ideas that I'm incorporating in all my other Fate games too now, including Marvellous Initiative, and a GM reserve replacing the usual Refresh balance.

@eimyr It'd take some hacking depending on what you want to do with it, but yes.

A Hellboy game would work almost out of the box, just re-fluffing the "science" skill group to "magic."

eimyr

You may remember I did a Courtly Intrigue game once.

BESW

If you want something more like Spelljammer or He-Man or Harry Potter, there are Worlds of Adventure better suited to those.

eimyr

It ended because of spatiotemporal constraints.

I would like to do something like that again, but... well.

The players, to my surprise and delight were very happy about the game as a whole. They were disappointed and combative when I announced the my early retirement.

Hoever, I was only partially satisfied.

BESW

@eimyr Ah, then maybe look at House of Bards. It's a "fantasy political drama" World of Adventure.

eimyr

Many Fate mechanics did not work as planned, the skills were bogging the game down a bit and we were unable to embrace the sandboxity of the game fully.

Hmmm

Would you recommend Core or Accelerated in that sort of scenario?

BESW

2:56 PM

Probably skills.

So, Core.

eimyr

(I love the title though. The only way it could be better is if it said House of Thrones)

BESW

House of Bards lets you use Contacts and Resources to attack and defend.

Spread rumours, buy smear campaigns.

eimyr