TRPG General Chat

Ben

12:01 AM

@BESW [totally hipster accent] But... like, that's the point man... It's like... a window into your soul... you gotta read between the lines... see the journey... be the journey

Miniman

@BESW I wasn't ever trying to suggest anything about what the poem was about.

BESW

12:14 AM

Could make for an interesting Literature question.

Miniman

@BESW shrug I'm already out of depth, personally.

Chemus

@Miniman ...but all my WBL was tied up in that ship!

Ben

@Chemus Then tp the ship too

Clearly.

Miniman

> "How could you justify spending so much of your wealth-by-level on a method of transportation?" Milo asked. "Everyone knows that not even a high overland speed lets you break the one-encounter-per-trip rule."

Chemus

@Ben Yeah...TP Object totally works for ships...

Ben

12:29 AM

...so what's the problem? :P

Miniman

@Chemus Depends what level you are!

Chemus

Uhh lesee garg/colossal vessel (caravel) is about 20,000lbs (50lb/lv) so CL 400 is about right for that (3.5). and it's a bit bigger than a 10'cube (5e)

And that's a low estimate for an unladen ~~swallow~~ caravel. they can hold roughly 60 tons, IIRC. so CL 800 or so...

Miniman

@Chemus Good point, even this guy is going to have issues with that.

Chemus

Yeah, I sorta feel like telling Unnamed-dude from 3 years ago that CO =/= TO (Character Optimization vs Theoretical Optimization). The one is "How can I get the best mechanics out of (or for) this concept or set of limitations?" The other is "For what the rules say, what's the best that can be done here, regardless of what's actually playable at a table?"

Ben

nitsua60

12:42 AM

@Miniman I don't get it. Was this game written to be played?

Miniman

> It's worth noting that former reading is not suitable for play or practical optimization in any sense. Neither are any of the other caster level loops, even (or especially) the ones that are written more explicitly.

He knows.

@nitsua60 As HeyICanChan put it in the question, the feat was probably only supposed to make Spellthief not completely suck. Which, incidentally, it does. Ambiguous wording meant that it had greater implications.

Ben

Well, normally these rules are defined by the physical limitations of the caster - that is, you can do this and stay alive.

Nothing stopping you from over exerting yourself

Bob: "You remember that guy that tp'd an entire ship?"
Dave: "Wow! Really? An entire ship? Bu the rulebook says you can't do that with anything bigger than a caravan... He must have been super powerful!"
Bob: "Well, no. He was only level 15. And super dead now."
Dave: "..."

Bob: "eeeeeverywhere..."

Miniman

@nitsua60 Incidentally, there was a comment here that I didn't get a chance to read. I don't want it restored or anything, but would you mind telling me what it said?

@Ben Wait, what?

nitsua60

> I remember being 31 feet from myself once. That was a hard day.

2

Miniman

@nitsua60 Heh, nice.

BESW

12:49 AM

Feb 12 '13 at 5:09, by BESW

We also had a guy whose PC got GM-granted telekinesis powers. He went from "lifting small rocks" to "imploding a moon" without any inbetween steps, and was the only one surprised when instead he imploded.

2

Ben

@BESW Exactly hahaha

nitsua60

I would like to fly NYC <--> London some time in August. Anyone have a favorite "find the lowest rate with flexible travel dates" site they want to recommend?

daze413

@nitsua60 mades me laugh, thanks

Ben

@nitsua60 Why was that removed?

Miniman

@Ben Too chatty.

(I assume.)

nitsua60

12:51 AM

@Ben Prolly "chatty"

Miniman

I guess someone with a very odd traumatic experience in their past could have flagged it as offensive?

BESW

I would've flagged it too chatty, yeah.

nitsua60

@Ben Comments have a purpose: improve the post to which they're attached. Comments not obviously directed at that are liable for deletion.

But we don't have any systematic way of doing it. We act on flags, and I know I go around weeding whatever I happen to see.

Ben

Pff

:P

nitsua60

But a bunch of upvotes tends to stave off deletion.

IOW you can make a joke, but it better be a good one if it's to survive =)

Miniman

12:54 AM

@nitsua60 I generally use wotif, but when I've experimented with comparison, it seems like most if not all the websites actually offer exactly the same rates.

nitsua60

@Miniman Umm... that looks like it's hotels in Australia?

Miniman

@nitsua60 Huh, never realised it's Auspecific.

nitsua60

WP says it's an Expedia subsidiary.

So maybe it accesses all that data, but keeps you with the wotif frontend?

BESW

We just use a travel agent, because travel from Guam tends to be rather complex.

It's nice to have someone to sort things out for you when you're stuck in Seoul.

nitsua60

@BESW "Stuck in Seoul" would be a good name for a 200-word RPG. If I knew anything about Seoul, that is.

3

daze413

1:08 AM

Just witnessed an MMO GM hesitate to 'silence' a guy for saying something racist, "I'm warning you." "Don't make me repeat myself", "Don't make me do anything drastic". "Last warning!"

nitsua60

Harumph... getting below $600 seems to require flying out of Newark =\

daze413

afaik, he didn't get banned or nothin'

Ben

@daze413 wuss

@daze413 Them. Not you

@daze413 Don't hurt me

daze413

@Ben I think it was a her? Rule no. 1 tho...

@Ben never baby

Ben

@daze413 [purrs]

Adeptus

1:13 AM

@daze413 In related news... I just read the FCBD Secret Empire comic. I wish I hadn't.

nitsua60

I don't think I'll ever fly enough to really get time zones. It takes 12 hours to get there, but only 3.5 to get back? What sorcery is this?

daze413

I was laughing cause the player said something like, "Why are all <ethnicity> all <offensive label> in this server?!"... When confronted by the GM, that labeling a whole ethnic group as <offensive label> for the actions of a few is badwrong, he says: "I didnt say all, I said 'in this server' lol." I was like. wut

Ben

daze413

@nitsua60 maybe it passes through the bermuda triangle or something?

or less gas stops for the 3.5 one?

@Shalvenay can probably answer that

nitsua60

@daze413 I dunno... I spent a class today convincing the kids that Michaelson-Morley tells us there's no luminiferous ether. Kayak.com has me doubting myself.

Adeptus

1:17 AM

BESW

@nitsua60 I can leave my house on Monday, travel for 25 hours, and arrive at my aunt's house on Monday.

nitsua60

@Adeptus Yes, a TARdIS would be easier =)

@BESW We get it! The roads are bad, because Guam's a second-class territory! Show me the Guam-statehood candidate and I'll vote for them!

Ben

The benefit of living in Aus - you ARE the future

nitsua60

@BESW =D

daze413

@BESW trick question. You arrived on the next monday.

Miniman

1:20 AM

@daze413 That would be 168 hours :P

Ben

@daze413 previous*

Adeptus

@Ben When we travel ~~back in time~~ to the US, we get the same day twice. But when we come home, we lose a day.

daze413

@Miniman he could have lounged around for the 143 hours not traveling?

Adeptus

What if that doubled day was a bad day? What if the missed day would have been a good day?

Miniman

Oct 14 '15 at 12:37, by doppelgreener

Plot seed: UTC+13 is the furthest-forward time zone we know, belonging exclusively to some small clusters of isolated islands in the Pacific, except during the daylight savings time of some other countries. It's the occasional subject of a joke that people with a greater UTC adjustment are literally in the future, and events will take a proportionate amount of time to progress into time zones set further back.

nitsua60

1:21 AM

@Adeptus That's because you foolishly reverse course. If you just went ~~east~~ ~~west~~ back in time both times you'd keep getting extra days.

What happened to our proposal for task/mood-based time zones?

Miniman

@nitsua60 Nothing.

nitsua60

@Miniman it got stuck in the "maybe tomorrow" timezone?

BESW

@Adeptus I know someone who gets legit disturbed at the idea that there's no way to objectively be sure the day she wakes up is the day after when she fell asleep.

Adeptus

@nitsua60 I got confused converting between Work Time Zone and Sleep Time Zone. Also, what TZ do I use when I'm at work but goofing off?

Ben

I only just realised... That was a terrible joke

I am officially going to hell

Adeptus

1:25 AM

:37339174 9th of November? That day was OK

@Ben Save me a seat

Ben

@Adeptus The "Me TZ"

nitsua60

@Adeptus [chat] TIME, BABY!

"At work, but goofing off." That was my election strategy, man.

Adeptus

1:36 AM

@nitsua60 I'm resisting the urge to make statements about politicians...

BESW

2:15 AM

I have never laughed so hard in my LIFE https://t.co/QGQNBNHUYS

Tweeted by volsairine on May 11, 2017 at 7:53 PM

Ben

@BESW Not a bad idea

BESW

@volsairine Publisher: "This entire book is just characters aimlessly wandering a forest, finding nothing." Author:… https://twitter.com/i/web/status/862842987708989440

Tweeted by DiceProphet on May 12, 2017 at 1:32 AM in reply to volsairine

Ben

@BESW aaaand there's the plothole

Chemus

2:49 AM

@Ben Spot plothole's not on my sheet. Can it be used untrained?

@Magician:

Magician

Chemus

Wow! I must be a wizard almost all the time then!

Miniman

@nitsua60 You get space, I'll get time? :P

nitsua60

@Miniman I'd normally be happy with that division, but I started teaching special relativity today. Now I can't tell the two apart.

2

Miniman

@nitsua60 Also, your comment seems to imply that there's a use for multiple unseen servants other than fulfilling your Fantasia fantasies. I am confuse.

Magician

2:59 AM

@nitsua60 The game is about lying you're stuck in Seoul.

Ben

Favourite meme I have made to date

Miniman

@nitsua60 I do like that all 3 answers cover different aspects of the limitations, though.

Ben

@Miniman Lemmings

nitsua60

@Miniman I was imagining being the caller at a square dance.

Shalvenay

hey there @nitsua60 and @Ben

Miniman

3:03 AM

@nitsua60 Also, thanks for inadvertently reminding me that I'd done my maths wrong >.>

nitsua60

"1: promenade ad infinitum with 2 in six seconds. 2: promenade ad infinitum with 1 now. 3: round the back of 4 in six seconds. 4: turn 3 now. ...."

Ben

@Shalvenay hiyo

Shalvenay

how're things going?

Ben

same as they were a few hours ago haha.

Shalvenay

ate out -- had some rather nice ribs at a local steakhouse (which is actually a pretty sweet place to eat all in all -- awesome food, strong service, great atmosphere too: think classical steakhouse with a bit of a medieval-monastary theme thrown in)

Ben

3:11 AM

@Shalvenay Well now you've made me hungry

Miniman

@nitsua60 So, in fact - space, time, and a third answer, that transcends both space and time to find the real truth.

nitsua60

relativistic QM

Shalvenay

@nitsua60 eheheh. or what happens when it starts raining Oh-My-God particles ;)

nitsua60

@Shalvenay Are those, like, personalized Higgs bosons from etsy or something?

Shalvenay

Oh-My-God particle

The Oh-My-God particle was an ultra-high-energy cosmic ray detected on the evening of 15 October 1991 over Dugway Proving Ground, Utah, by the University of Utah's Fly's Eye Cosmic Ray Detector. Its observation was a shock to astrophysicists (hence the name), who estimated its energy to be approximately 3×1020 eV or 3×108 TeV. This is 20,000,000 times more energetic than the highest energy measured in electromagnetic radiation emitted by an extragalactic object and 1020 (100 quintillion) times the energy of visible light. Therefore, the particle was an atomic nucleus with a kinetic energy of 48...

nitsua60

3:23 AM

Oh, yeah... I've read about that before.

Miniman

@nitsua60 So have I! (Only because of xkcd, of course.)

Wait, where's the "Oh-My-God particle in popular culture" section?

Chemus

@Miniman Yep. xkcd, ejumacating us masses.

nitsua60

@Miniman [rummages for WP login, unused since I created an SE account....]

@Miniman Is that linked in a What If?

Miniman

@nitsua60 what-if.xkcd.com/20

nitsua60

(I'm still sad that WhatIf.SE got quashed.)

My first thought when you mentioned xkcd in connection was this one:

A long time in the future, in a galaxy far, far, away, astronomers in the year 2008 sight an unusual gamma-ray burst originating from somewhere far across the universe.

Miniman

3:27 AM

@nitsua60 Isn't that what wb.se is?

nitsua60

@Miniman I, personally, was trying to stop WB.SE from being that.

So much random blather, so little worldbuilding going on over there....

11

Q: What if there were a What If?

I think it'd be nice to have a place to steer some of the most-obviously off-topic "What If," as I mentioned earlier. Turns out, there was a proposal in Area 51 for some type of speculative-yet-science-based Stack. Curious as to its fate, I sent this e-mail to the community managers: Hello al...

Miniman

4:01 AM

@nitsua60 Every time I see an xkcd drawing of Luke Skywalker, I can't help but think "OK, his fringe is dumb, but it's not that dumb."

> In the middle of this fight the PCs get time-locked, to be saved by their powerful NPC friend who begins draining the wraith of its time-manipulation powers.

Gah.

Chemus

@Miniman Isn't there a song titled Mary Sue?

Miniman

@Chemus It's not necessarily a Mary Sue.

Ben

@Miniman wow. Way to steal the limelight

Miniman

Just, GMs often freeze the PCs in place so that an NPC can save the day. This is just the most literal implementation of that trope I've come across.

Chemus

OK, but it's still "I wanna be a hero too...even at the expense of my players' heroness"

Adeptus

4:22 AM

Hey @Miniman, which NWN expansion did you say was good?

Miniman

@Adeptus Hordes of the Underdark!

I'm very much not a fan of Shadows of Undrentide, but opinions do vary.

Chemus

Sheesh I oughtta re-reinstall that and play it...

Adeptus

@Miniman Ah, I thought so. My daughter & I tried it last night. We got killed by a dragon pretty early on... Any character build advice?

(or play advice)

Miniman

@Adeptus Hmmm...where did you find a dragon?

Adeptus

(apart from "don't fight dragons")

Miniman

4:24 AM

I don't remember that at all...

Ben

It could have been a Wyvern

Adeptus

down the well, through the first gate, left before the bridge with the coloured lights, then... left again? past the room with a few drow

Miniman

@Adeptus Also, did you import preexisting characters who had beaten either the OC or Shadows?

@Adeptus Hmmm...blue? It rings a faint bell.

Adeptus

@Ben Nope, blue dragon, lightningbolt-ing our sorry carcasses

Miniman

@Adeptus Also also, classes?

Adeptus

4:27 AM

@Miniman no, new characters. It makes you level up to 15 before you go anywhere, though (which takes quite a while... 14x the normal "level up" process in a row)

Miniman

@Adeptus Yep. Problem is, you'd normally be playing with ~level 18 characters, as well as better gear.

It's not insurmountable, just makes it much more difficult.

Adeptus

@Miniman I was bard/dragon disciple, she was rogue

Miniman

Ooof. Ok, that's gonna make it tough.

Adeptus

heh

Miniman

Did you resurrect Daelan?

Chemus

4:29 AM

DD is a trap, usually :)

Adeptus

@Miniman yes, and we had... kobold guy

Miniman

@Adeptus Ah, Deakin. Good times.

I mean, I hate to say it, but you're gonna find it really hard with the classes you've picked.

Adeptus

oh wait, not daelan... I forget her name, but the bard lady

Miniman

@Adeptus Sharwyn.

Adeptus

that's the one

Miniman

4:31 AM

Oooooooh, I've never done it on multiplayer - do you both have a Relic of the Reaper?

Adeptus

So... better to go with full casters?

Chemus

If your daughter wants a rogue, try Warlock + Rogue + Arcane trickster.

Adeptus

@Miniman no I think only I did... with 5 tokens (so far)

@Chemus not sure if NWN has warlock or AT

Miniman

@Adeptus Easiest with 2-hand fighter or paladin, cleric is also pretty straightforward.

@Adeptus Only with the PRC (not recommended).

Chemus

@Adeptus I know NWN2 has those... Sorry it's been a while.

Miniman

4:34 AM

In general, most fightery builds and spellcastery builds shouldn't struggle too much...rogues and bards are, not to put too fine a point on it, probably the most difficult things you could have picked.

Adeptus

We only tried HotU because the main campaign save files keep failing... gets a bit boring repeating half of the last session all the time. Autosave works fine though (go figure), so just need to remember to set it, and copy the save to a new slot after finishing.

Miniman

@Adeptus Weird. Did you get the GoG version?

(I remember that used to happen to me a lot, but hasn't lately.)

Adeptus

no, one set was bought all separately as each module came out, the other was Diamond version on DVD when it was on sale. Running the server .exe separately, because it used to crash way more when I was hosting via the client

Miniman

I really don't know much about how the multiplayer works, so I can't help you there :(

I do recommend the main campaign if you can get it to work, though, it's pretty great. Not as good as Hordes, but still.

Adeptus

I looked at NWNX, a 3rd-party server exe, but that's way too confusing. Also, seems to be designed more for PWs than simple LAN multi

Ben

4:42 AM

Waaaaaaiting in the rain.... just waaaaaiting in the rain!

Miniman

@Adeptus Yeah, PWs are probably what NWN is used most for these days.

Ben

My limbs are losing their feeeeeeling...

Adeptus

@Miniman We've restarted chapter 1 a bunch of times... when I was playing solo, I only got part way through chapter 2 (there's a trial where you have to prove the person innocent... I kept failing that & eventually stopped playing)

Ben

I can't wait to get back inside agaaaaain

Miniman

@Adeptus That trial is really hard. But it doesn't actually matter if you fail! Also, it's in chapter 3.

Adeptus

4:48 AM

Oh! I got further than I thought, then

Miniman

I really don't like chapter 2 much, although it's actually legit messed up how little of chapter 2's content you need to complete.

Whereas chapter 3 is awesome! You've got spoiler, spoiler, and spoiler.

I'm kinda amazed that you'd make it through the slog of chapter 2 and then give up on chapter 3 XD

Adeptus

It was a while ago... it might have been when my HDD died, too

Miniman

Ah, that's always an enormous pain in the posterior.

Chemus

@Ben can we suspend aussies for bad singing?

Ben

No.

We judge them.

Loudly.

Adeptus

5:09 AM

Miniman

@Adeptus It bothers me sometimes how often I don't get Auspecific jokes.

Ben

@Miniman eurosong-contest.wikia.com/wiki/Douze_Points!

Whelp. That failed miserably.

Miniman

@Ben What failed?

Ben

It's a reference to Eurosong. It's a phrase they use when awarding another country with 12 (the maximum) points

@Miniman that link I posted

Miniman

@Ben I read it!

Ben

5:18 AM

So it didn't fail?

Miniman

@Ben But yeah, the exclamation mark dropped off the end of the url.

Interesting.

Ben

OK. Cos yeah, when I clicked it, it brought up 404

Miniman

For some reason, an exclamation mark on the end of a url doesn't get included in the hyperlink.

Ben

Huh.

Adeptus

6:14 AM

Running my 3.5 Age of Worms game this weekend. Bit frustrated with one player who keeps overthinking things... and the rest of the party who seem to be following her lead... Sure you've got a puzzle you don't fully understand yet, but you've also got 3 (apparent) paths forwards! Maybe they will lead to answers! :P

(I say apparent, because one is just a trap... but they would figure that out if they tried it)

Miniman

I find it really fascinating how the personality of the most "dominant" (not exactly what I mean, but I can't think of a better term) players tends to shape the party's decisions.

Now that I think about it, this is probably a concept that's been studied a lot in the general context of group dynamics.

@Adeptus I do sympathise with this, though - if there's a puzzle in front of me, I'm going to want to solve it before moving on, as well as (probably) assume that it's supposed to be solved before moving on.

Adeptus

Brief summary - there's a room with lanterns in the 7 "rainbow" colours, 2 of which are missing. There's a picture they found earlier that shows them all lit (which opens the way forward). They found one of the missing ones on the way here. (The other is through one of the passages that lead onwards.)

Also, they're all unlit, except one that has an everburning torch in it. They haven't investigated to find out why it's lit when all evidence is that nobody's been here in years, either.

Miniman

Ok, yeah, there's no excuse to not go look for the missing ones.

Adeptus

The other annoying thing is "It could be [such-and-such]" "Don't give the DM ideas!" (when they know I'm running a pre-published adventure...)

(though that one could be at least partly joking)

Miniman

Well, that one's inevitable. You could be a bot and that would still happen.

trogdor

7:01 AM

@Adeptus so what is this thing?

BESW

@JuneShores [wave]

Ben

@Adeptus I am guilty of the "don't give him ideas" as well as receiving it

JuneShores

Hi hi.

BESW

What's new?

JuneShores

Not much. I made some excellent pancakes today.

Adeptus

7:15 AM

2 hours ago, by Ben

It's a reference to Eurosong. It's a phrase they use when awarding another country with 12 (the maximum) points

(eurovision song contest)

trogdor

oh

thanks

BESW

@JuneShores Pancakes are fun. I used to make whole wheat pancakes with rolled oats and wheat germ.

A few months ago I started experimenting with sweet potato pancakes with Greek yogurt instead of milk.

Ben

@BESW I forgot to tell you, my gf and I made Jesse and James from team rocket in SURGADORES

BESW

Cool.

Ben

The reason we became SURGADORES was to protect the world from devastation, and to unite all peoples within our nation, respectively

trogdor

7:25 AM

lol

JuneShores

That sounds amazing, @BESW.

BESW

@JuneShores Throw in some walnuts, top with a scoop of vanilla ice cream drizzled with molasses...

JuneShores

gawd, that sounds good

BESW

Sometimes we do "dessert dinners" with pancakes, fruit, and ice cream.

JuneShores

I made chocolate-cinnamon syrup to go with it. It tastes like apples.

BESW

7:38 AM

Nice. I usually just use honey, molasses, and/or fruit jam/preserves/jelly.

(The darker the molasses the better, of course.)

...hm. Maybe next time I'll make my peanut butter and Greek yogurt dressing as a pancake topping.

trogdor

@BESW makes all the best food that you never thought to make

4

BESW

[grin] Low-cholesterol vegetarian cooking on a budget on a Pacific island without a lot of time means I have resources and challenges that don't often come up in cook books.

So there's a lot of looking at what's around and improvising.

trogdor

yes, you put in the effort to experiment that none of the rest of us have

I eat what my family buys (and makes, admittedly sometimes I am the one who makes it) and what I can get quickly during work lunch break XD

BESW

I want your mother to teach me her magical garbanzo ways.

trogdor

7:53 AM

ugh

she uses those in almost everything

I used to like them too, but I have overloaded on them

BESW

Heheh.

eimyr

9:02 AM

@BESW "Low-cholesterol vegetarian cooking on a budget on a Pacific island without a lot of time" sounds like a name of a hotly discussed indie movie.

@DrRDizzle Hi!\

Dr R Dizzle

@eimyr Hi there!

eimyr

I don't think we've met before, I'm eimyr.

Dr R Dizzle

@eimyr I'm Dr R Dizzle, but most people on here just call me Dizzle.

(By "here", I mean SE in general, not just this chat. I don't think I've been on this chat long enough for people to call me anything)

eimyr

That's cool.

So what are you playing at the moment, if anything?

Dr R Dizzle

I'm preparing to DM my first ever game of 5E with 5 friends. In the past, we've played Roll for Shoes and a little 4E.

How about you?

eimyr

9:13 AM

I'm running Dogs in the Vineyard and I think once that's finished we'll go back to Night Witches, I think, with me as a player.

Dr R Dizzle

@eimyr I've never heard of either of those. I'm pretty much completely new to TTRPGs.

eimyr

These are indie games, unlike DnD

Dogs in the Vineyard is a western, in the pioneer era, set in Mormon mid-west

Dr R Dizzle

@eimyr I tried to run a Western themed Roll for Shoes a few weeks back, but handling combat was difficult in a world where gunshots are the main form of damage, and pretty dang lethal.

eimyr

the players are kids who are supposed to travel from town to town and fix deep-running issues with the community and to do they they are given a book, a gun and a coat.

BESW

Thematically, DitV is about a group of young adults with absolute moral authority making difficult choices about how to keep tiny villages from falling apart.

Dr R Dizzle

9:17 AM

@eimyr Do they stand on each others shoulders and wear the coat to make them look like one tall person?

BESW

It forces the characters to answer questions about what they're willing to risk, or compromise, in order to achieve their goals.

Night Witches is about the WWII Soviet squadron of all-female bombing pilots, the challenges they faced both in the air and on the ground, and how their sense of tight-knit community was crucial to their success.

eimyr

On the other hand, Night Witches is a historically accurate portrayal of the pilots of the 588th Night Bomber regiment, an all-female night bombing division of the Red Army.

trogdor

@BESW not sure I ever even heard of the second one there

Dr R Dizzle

Both of those sound really interesting.

BESW

@trogdor I picked it up in a bundle or something a while back; it's very interesting, but not really something I thought our group would latch onto.

eimyr

9:21 AM

It concentrates on the shocking horror of war and the quotidian anxiety of military life with understaffing, underfunding, sexism and the ever-present NKVD all reducing your chances of survival. It's mostly an exploration of the relationships between the pilots.

trogdor

@BESW fair enough

BESW

(Partly because it's Powered by the Apocalypse.)

trogdor

there is a lot of material out there we might not ever use

@BESW ah that does explain it a bit

BESW

(@DrRDizzle in case you haven't seen that phrase before, "Powered by the Apocalypse" means a game is based on the mechanics of apocalypse-world. A lot of people have heard of the D&D-like Apocalypse game, dungeon-world.)

(People will also talk about games in the Apocalypse World family as "*Worlds" because so many of them use the "____ World" format for their titles.)

Dr R Dizzle

@BESW Like I said, I'm as green as grass when it comes to TTRPG's. I'd wager 99% of the terminology used here is going to go straight over my head.

BESW

9:25 AM

Feel free to ask if anything's unclear or confuzzling.

eimyr

@DrRDizzle That might be because we're insufferable elitists and like flaunting jargon to prove to each other we know better.

Dr R Dizzle

@BESW Will do

BESW

Most people here take the lucky 10,000 attitude toward learning, and delight in sharing things with folks; no judgement for ignorance need apply.

Dr R Dizzle

@BESW That's good then.

In that case, I have a question: when D&D says "Roll a D20", does that mean rolling 20 dice? /s

eimyr

nope

it's rolling a one twenty-sided die

Dr R Dizzle

9:30 AM

I don't understand, dice are 6 sided. /s

/s intensifies

BESW

@eimyr I think he used a sarcasm slash.

eimyr

@BESW Today I'm in the 10k

trogdor

lol

BESW

eimyr

When I end my lines with /s, that means my fingers have slipped.

trogdor

9:31 AM

@DrRDizzle I had to tell myself you already play D&D XD

eimyr

BTW what's the point of using a sarcasm slash if people are not familiar with it?

Erik

Education, I guess.

eimyr

I don't know anyone who has ever used it. I'd sooner understand the use of an interrobang.

Erik

We know now :)

BESW

People who spend a lot of time in a particular corner of the Internet tend to develop blind spots about which behaviors are shibboleths.

Dr R Dizzle

9:35 AM

@eimyr Sorry, I assumed that most people knew what it was.

eimyr

I guess.

BESW

This is one reason I use narrative brackets. They may not be commonly used, but they're relatively easy to interpret without schema.

trogdor

5 mins ago, by BESW

eimyr

@BESW narrative brackets, as in [snort] ?

BESW

Aye.

And *snort* requires special formatting to avoid being read as markdown in many places--like this chat.

(To tell chat not to read something as markdown without flagging it as code, use \ before the character.)

eimyr

9:40 AM

BTW, I've recently encountered a major difficulty: no one I know meets the following criteria: a) has an interest in RPG design b) is familiar with the Witcher franchise c) has a non-trad-adventure-RPG-fan perspective.

trogdor

@BESW never! XD

eimyr

\e\s\c\a\p\e \a\l\l\ \t\h\e \c\h\a\r\a\c\t\e\r\s

Erik

Wish I could help @eimyr but I guess I fail b) :P

eimyr

anecdotal proof

Dr R Dizzle

@eimyr Ironically, "escape the characters" is the slogan of any DM with troublesome players.

doppelgreener

9:43 AM

escape all    he cha
ac    e
s

Escape character

In computing and telecommunication, an escape character is a character which invokes an alternative interpretation on subsequent characters in a character sequence. An escape character is a particular case of metacharacters. Generally, the judgment of whether something is an escape character or not depends on context. == Definition == Escape characters are part of the syntax for many programming languages, data formats, and communication protocols. For a given alphabet an escape character's purpose is to start character sequences (so named escape sequences), which have to be interpreted differently...

you need to be careful which characters you escape :D

trogdor

yeah, early on learning code I escaped too many characters

and by early on I mean earlier this year XD

eimyr

lol

@trogdor "too many" - I escape everything because I can't be arsed figuring out which I don't need to

trogdor

lol

it doesn't help when you escape the wrong thing though

which I did do

a lot

BESW

@doppelgreener I did!

doppelgreener

@BESW Yay!

trogdor

9:48 AM

that took three jumps to follow

( I only did it because it was you two :P)

( the unspoken joke is I suspect you both of plotting against my ultimate conquest of all things)

I have done it, I silenced the chats! 10 points woo!

sorry, I am insufferably happy to be done with this particular work week

eimyr

stupid easterners and their time travelling islands

BESW

"Friday at last, by Crom!" growled Conan as he strode into the kitchen. "What spiteful god put the best day at the end of the week?"

Tweeted by ConanSalaryman on April 14, 2017 at 11:00 AM

eimyr

so recently I discovered a bit of cultural divide between myself and my fencing partners

trogdor

@eimyr I do feel sorry for you time shackled ones, it is a sad thing to think not all are as free as we are

eimyr

namely, that they consider Conan and Conan movies to be great and have nostalgia attached to them

trogdor

9:58 AM

@BESW all of this yes

eimyr

meanwhile, to me it was just another fantasy flick, remarkably cheesier and less interesting than its competitors

BESW

"Dog!" roared Conan, ripping his sword free. "My shift is done. Fall from my way lest I split your skull!" The manager hastily stepped back.

Tweeted by ConanSalaryman on March 30, 2017 at 11:04 PM

trogdor

@eimyr I have never actually watched any at all

eimyr

@BESW That sounds like Chad Vader, Day Shift Manager

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