TRPG General Chat

AncientSwordRage

12:46 AM

@BESW you're never caught up 😜

By which I mean you always have more to share

Yuuki

1:22 AM

@BESW ooo

BESW

1:51 AM

Pidgebbi drew "a druid determined to make the world a greener place and maybe punch a few baddies along the way" (twitter link).

Hot RPG Questions

2:18 AM

2

Q: Is this Bracers of Stored Health magic item balanced?

I was thinking about the similarities between a character I was making and one from the Mistborn series by Brandon Sanderson, when the idea to make a magic item that replicated the effects of one of the powers in that series, Gold Feruchemy, which allows the user to store their health in pieces o...

V2Blast

3:07 AM

@NautArch It's from me. lol. It's a homebrew item from the Princes of the Apocalypse game I'm in

tis private homebrew, but private homebrew's shared by default with anyone the person shares a campaign with.

I did ask about it here in chat a while back, starting here:

Nov 25 '19 at 8:16, by V2Blast

I was going to ask here about whether a homebrew magic item my DM gave me is as OP as it seems, then I wondered if it would be more appropriate for mainsite... but it feels like it'd be opinion-based to ask if a thing is "OP" when I don't know what to compare it against

(it was nerfed a bit after I talked to the DM about it :P)

@NautArch I think you'll be able to view this page if you're in the Stackizen campaign (or another campaign) with me: dndbeyond.com/magic-items/1133964-platinum-tower-shield

Hot RPG Questions

3:31 AM

2

Q: Can clothes be enchanted to change their form?

My question is simple: Can an item(clothes, rings, anything really) be enchanted to change the form of the clothes a person is wearing into other clothes of their decision? I'm new to D&D and want to play a changeling, maybe not this campaign but sometime in the future. The changelings sound awes...

dnd-5e magic-items changeling

BESW

4:06 AM

"Unraveling the linothorax mystery, or how linen armor came to dominate our lives" Johns Hopkins University Press Blog

> We also figured out—the hard way—that the ancients probably cut each layer of linen to the proper shape before gluing them together. For our first linothorax, we glued together 15 layers of linen to form a one centimeter-thick slab, and then tried to cut out the required shape.
Large shears were defeated; bolt cutters failed. The only way we were ultimately able to cut the laminated linen slab was with an electric saw equipped with a blade for cutting metal. At least this confirmed our suspicion that linen armor would have been extremely tough.

> When you wear it for a couple hours, your own body heat softens the glue a bit and makes it conform to your body shape, so it is much more comfortable to wear than rigid types of armor. Our reconstructions weighed about 10 pounds–about one third the weight of bronze armor that would provide the same degree of protection.

TECHNOLOGY.

Linen, rabbit-skin glue, and beeswax, for lightweight comfortable armor with a penetration resistance on par with bronze armor? I love.

NautArch

@V2Blast Ha! I actually think it'd be fine to use in this because combat isn't quite the primary danger here.

Bardic Wizard

@BESW geez. I would not want to try to hit that with a pointy stick.

Nzall

7:18 AM

@HotRPGQuestions Okay, so I attempted to answer this question with "this homebrew item is not a rare quality, but it feels appropriately powerful for a higher power tier", but apparenly that's not a correct answer? Isn't the entire point of power tiers that if your item is too powerful for a low tier, that it might be balanced for a higher tier?

Or am I fundamentally misunderstanding how item quality works in D&D 5e?

Like, isn't part of the "this item is legendary or artifact quality" that it's REALLY powerful and might change the course of campaigns?

Carcer

7:33 AM

@Nzall the DMG will tell you that item rarity is an indicator of how relatively powerful an item is, but in practice it is generally agreed that rarity is extremely poorly correlated with how useful items are

doppelgreener

9:44 AM

:D

AncientSwordRage

@doppelgreener yay

Axoren

Is it possible to look badass on a Broom of Flying? Or will you always just be a halloween-town reject?

Asking because I'm a Macho Elf Double-weapon user in one of the games I'm in, and I need a replacement for my Boots of Flying since I needed to attune something better.

AncientSwordRage

@Axoren surf on the broom

Axoren

My god.

AncientSwordRage

You're now green goblin

doppelgreener

9:49 AM

since you're macho, hang from the broom and use it for chinups during the flight.

Axoren

Okay, so as a result of a few things, I'm an Eladrin Celestial Warlock with floral pink hair. My patron is the Sun (Light Side). No one else wanted the Robe of the Archmagi, so I got it (Jedi Robe). Though some interesting turn of fate, I was also the only one who could make use of the Belt of the Fire Giant, so I went from a Dex attacker to a Str attacker and have 25 STR. And I now have what amounts to a double-ended Sunblade (Light Saber).

And now I'm surfing on a broom like the Green Goblin.

Also, the Sun is evil and wants to consume the planet (eventually), so I'm also evil. The Paladin has suspicions, but my being able to use Sacred Flame has him at least convinced I'm a Cleric.

I have the equivalent of a +4 weapon across all my gear and my spell casting is +12 ATK/DC 20.

AncientSwordRage

@Axoren sounds highpowered but lots of fun

Axoren

We're doing Dungeon of the Mad Mage

And the paladin just got an oversized Holy Avenger.

Just a greatsword that deals 2d8 variant.

We've been getting really lucky on random loot rolls and we've been messing up Geopolitics BIG time

This robe used to have a Manshoon in it.

AncientSwordRage

@Axoren that sounds unfortunate... for Manshoon

Axoren

He seemed pretty chill about it.

My main worry is that by the time we get to the end of the dungeon, we're gonna be too strong for Halaster.

That this whole dungeon is gonna be a big build up to a cake walk.

Haven't run or played this campaign before, so I'm not sure exactly what's in store up ahead, but we're all at Peak right now

And extra levels aren't gonna get us much more

AncientSwordRage

10:01 AM

that can still be very fun

Axoren

Aside from what's in the written campaign, there's a lot going on in our play through. We just vanquished the high priestess of Aruvendar which was the mother of our party's face. We've somehow caught the attention of a parallel universe version of our party and an oncoming confrontation with them is inevitable. And the wizard's familiar became a magical beast outfitted with Demon Armor and a Cursed Vampiric Dagger that is slowly becoming its own political power within Waterdeep.

AncientSwordRage

@Axoren ::slow blink::

Axoren

We also revived Xanathar after killing them and now they're a hot Tiefling woman with a blank slate yet all the political knowledge needed to rise to power as an unstoppable upstart.

We have not made good decisions.

AncientSwordRage

@Axoren C'est le Vie

non?

Axoren

Oui.

But all that stuff is starting to turn Halaster into side dish

AncientSwordRage

10:09 AM

@Axoren I'm sure the GM can bump it up for you

Axoren

Probably. I expect him to.

Like, imagine playing Rise of Tiamat and the thing you consider a bigger threat to the realm is a commoner you slighted back during Level 1 and not the principle BBEG of the underlying storyline.

Someone_Evil

10:31 AM

@doppelgreener Should we put some kind of decoration up? 'Cause that links to this room

doppelgreener

@Someone_Evil I'd string lights or a "happy birthday" sign but I can't find the nails to hang it from.

Or the tape.

Or the wall, actually.

trogdor

lol

AncientSwordRage

2

I thought the cheesier the better

SmokeDetector

11:13 AM

[ SmokeDetector | MS ] Email in answer (77): What are the details surrounding the brass brazier required for the Find Familiar spell? by Ellen Crowdy on rpg.SE (@Rubiksmoose)

Hot RPG Questions

11:41 AM

12

Q: Why are so many languages written using the Dwarvish script?

If you look at the list of Standard Languages, you'll see that most of them use Dwarvish as their script: Common: Common Dwarvish: Dwarvish Elvish: Elvish Giant: Dwarvish Gnomish: Dwarvish Goblin: Dwarvish Halfling: Common Orc: Dwarvish (While that's 5e, I found a similar chart for 3e.) The Fo...

dungeons-and-dragons lore languages

Thomas Markov

1:15 PM

morning yall

[wave]

ahoy hoy

Hoi

1:40 PM

Good day!

AncientSwordRage

2:14 PM

Started playing with D&D Beyond character builder and a) made a character outside of the stackizen campaign which lacked stuff, and b) realised I didn't have much idea of the fine details of the character I had in mind

nitsua60

3:02 PM

@HotRPGQuestions Observation bias. Stuff written in stone just lasts better than written in (pulped) wood or in straw.

2

doppelgreener

> Bugbears, goblins, hobgoblins, and orcs rarely use written words, but those that do use Dwarven runes, as they are too lazy to develop their own and recognize the value of a widespread language.

that physically hurt to read

(from the dwarven lexicon quoted in this answer)

MikeQ

Yep. That's definitely how language development works. Normally, the whole culture organizes a project meeting and plans out their language.

Yuuki

3:20 PM

@HotRPGQuestions Dwarvish script is like the written language equivalent of Chinese. There are so many spoken "dialects" of Chinese that are, in truth, functionally completely different languages but they're all grouped under "Chinese" because "linguistics".

My dad speaks a "dialect" native to his hometown and whenever we go to visit family there, I have no idea what they're saying. And yet that's considered a Chinese "dialect" and not its own language.

I mean, part of that is likely due to the official position of the Chinese government...

GcL

3:36 PM

@Yuuki I too am entertained by dialect vs language. But that's probably Not A Bar conversation.

RevenantBacon

I find it slightly funny that Japanese has basically the opposite situation from Dwarvish. The spoken language is pretty much the same across the islands, not counting local idioms or slang, but it has no less than three separate alphabets.

Four, if you count them incorporating the roman alphabet occasionally

GcL

I think there was a sale on alphabets some time ago. Like a buy one get another 40% off the original cognitive overhead or something.

vicky_molokh- unsilence Monica

@Yuuki Because politics. Linguists seem be less inclined to consider them a single language than politicians are.

@RevenantBacon They're not separate, at least two can be used within the same word together.

They're certainly used all within the same sentence.

That's aside from the distinction between alphabets, syllabaries, and ideographics/pictographic/whatever-is-the-currently-mainstream-way of referring to Kanji.

MikeQ

Hot take: Most western European languages use the Latin alphabet, therefore they are all regional dialects of Latin.

Yuuki

@MikeQ I mean, that's basically the argument. Why are the varieties of Chinese considered dialects when a lot of them are as mutually intelligible as the Romance languages, if not less so?

RevenantBacon

3:51 PM

@vicky_molokh-unsilenceMonica Kanji, Hiragana, and Katakana are certainly separate alphabets. I'll grant that Hiragana and Katakana are interchangeable, as they are both sets of symbols for the same word parts, but that doesn't make them not separate alphabets. And being used in the same sentence doesn't really equate to much, as i could start using the Russian alphabet in this same sentence (I can't because I don't know it, but that's apersonal failing)

vicky_molokh- unsilence Monica

@RevenantBacon They're distinct, but they're not separate in the same way as, say, Arabic, Cyrillic and Latin are in use by Belarusians. E.g. you can find a Belarusian sentence written in a Cyrillic alphabet, or one in a Latin one, or if you search hard enough, in Arabic. But you don't see them [Belarusian alphabets] used in the same sentence side by side the way you see Japanese systems used side by side.

Yuuki

@RevenantBacon That's not quite a proper usage analogy.

I think.

RevenantBacon

@MikeQ You're not really wrong. Spanish, French, Portugese, Italian, Roman, and one other that I always forget, are all derived chiefly from Latin, and in fact share many incredibly similar words as a result

@vicky_molokh-unsilenceMonica I mean, according to the course i took on Japanese, they are separate alphabets. Now, I may have been taught incorrect information, but that was the way it was presented to me, and that's my understanding of it.

They certainly aren't the same like upper-case and lower-case roman characters.

Yuuki

Tangential fun fact, my mom used to be able to read Japanese newspapers when she was younger despite not knowing a lick of Japanese because the newspapers used to use kanji almost exclusively.

Hiragana has become more and more prevalent, likely due to politics, and so she's lost that capability.

GcL

@Yuuki Do their glyph arrangements mean the dame thing? I keep getting shot down trying to assert that England doesn't speak English. Something about being able to communicate effectively in writing. Like they can read, "center of the blue button" and totally know what is being communicated.... despite refusing to follow the directions.

Yuuki

4:00 PM

@GcL Written Chinese is fairly unified across the country.

GcL

Well, that's how you get your dialects then. If they can post letters to each other, it's the same language apparently

I assert that "pudding" only has meaning outside of GB.

So... slowly they'll brexit the English language formally as well.

Yuuki

Written Chinese is so different from other written languages that I'm familiar with such that the comparison seems... wrong.

Like written English is alphabetic while written Chinese is... not.

The spoken and written forms of English are intertwined, such that you can almost derive one from the other (of course with lots and lots of hiccups because English is a monstrous language). I mean, spelling bees are proof for how the two are connected.

Written Chinese, on the other hand, is completely divorced from its spoken counterpart(s). A written Chinese character gives you absolutely no clue on how to pronounce it. It's rote memorization.

Probably why so many different mutually unintelligible spoken languages can agree to use a single written language.

vicky_molokh- unsilence Monica

@RevenantBacon Maybe we have a different understanding what 'separate' means in this context. Because from what I've been taught, they can certainly be used together in ways that multiple alphabets of certain European languages are not used together. For example, "裏庭には二羽庭には二羽鶏がいる。" is a legit sentence which uses them together.

They are certainly distinct systems, but ones that need not be segregated (made separate) the way European languages usually segregate their alphabets.

MikeQ

@Yuuki Everyone in D&D speaks Common due to the historical expansion of the Commoner Empire, who had dominated the planes with their armies of chicken bombs and peasant rail guns

Thomas Markov

Gotta say guys, reading on other stacks really makes me appreciate our "dont answer in comments" policy.

GcL

4:08 PM

@Yuuki I would assert that's pretty true for a lot of English. Back to the brits... "hours' and "herbs" and adding R sounds into words that have no freakin' R's

Thomas Markov

Just read a question on philosophy.se that had no answers, except for a single, long comment that was a brilliant answer to the question.

GcL

@ThomasMarkov I feel like that's very apropos. What is the difference between a comment and answer? What ontological superclass do they both belong to such that we could write an aristotelian definition of each? /S

@Yuuki I think that's the difference between dialect and language. If they can write to each other, same language.

Even if you know in their head they're adding an R sound to the end of "idea" and totally messing up how it's supposed to rhyme.

vicky_molokh- unsilence Monica

@GcL Wouldn't that make at least three American languages into dialects of a single language?

Yuuki

I think Afrikaans is considered a language despite being mutually intelligible, both spoken and written, with Dutch.

GcL

If we're splitting out American languages, I would like to linguistically isolate central Pittsburgh as a penalty for the use of "yins" /S

vicky_molokh- unsilence Monica

4:15 PM

A lot of things are mutually intelligible. Plus, remember you will always have a Ring Species problem. IIRC that's called a Sprechbund in philology?

Yuuki

Also, German and Dutch if we're pointing at written forms.

That both of my examples are European languages (and in the case of Afrikaans, descended from European colonizers) is a nuance that is not lost on me.

GcL

I don't recall being able to read Dutch very well with a rudimentary understanding of German. Maybe I missed the overlap or overlappen

I know a couple Germans I could email and they might respond at this time of day. Is the question, can they read Dutch writing?

ACuriousMind

@Yuuki Written Dutch is not fully intellegible for German speakers (source: I'm a native German speaker)

MikeQ

@ACuriousMind Is spoken Dutch easier to understand for German speakers, compared to written Dutch?

ACuriousMind

No, much harder

With written Dutch you can often get the gist of what it's about

Yuuki

4:28 PM

Is written Dutch easier for German speakers to understand compared to Italian?

ACuriousMind

Spoken Dutch not so much because it's pronounciation is different

Yuuki

@ACuriousMind That seems pretty close then to me.

ACuriousMind

Dutch is definitely the easiest neighboring language to understand in written form for a German speaker because it has a lot of cognates, i.e. words that are just "the same" apart from minor differences, but if a sentence doesn't contain a lot of these cognates you're out of luck

And there are definitely regiolects in the border regions that are somewhere between High German and Standard Dutch

AncientSwordRage

@GcL We add them where?

GcL

I think I notice it the most when it's the end of words, like idea.

Yuuki

4:39 PM

I think you meant to say H in that sentence instead of R.

Because the R in "herbs" modifies the sound of the 'e'.

AncientSwordRage

@GcL Idea-h vs Idea-r ?

GcL

They say the h in herb but not on hour.

Good idea-rs.

AncientSwordRage

I think the UK has some of the most distinct dialects in the world, I think?

@GcL I think it comes down to where that word originated

GcL

They are certainly amazingly different given the relatively small geographic area they occupy.

AncientSwordRage

Sometimes you pin down an accent to a single town or village

Hot RPG Questions

4:42 PM

4

Q: How to adjust PC statistics when undergoing a (semi)permanent transformation into a different creature?

The Monster Manual contains guidance for Player Characters as Lycanthropes (p. 207) or Vampires (p. 295). Is there general guidance on how to handle player characters (semi)permanently transforming into another creature where they could retain their class levels and statistics but also take on ch...

dnd-5e shapeshifter

GcL

@AncientSwordRage It wouldn't surprise me to find different dialects as street over from one another.

AncientSwordRage

@GcL aye

Yuuki

@GcL There's a saying in China that in Fujian, a province with a lot of spoken dialects/languages, you can drive five miles to find a new culture and drive ten miles to learn a new language.

GcL

That's cool. What language is the saying in?

Yuuki

4:58 PM

Multiple? I mean, it's a description of the region.

RevenantBacon

5:08 PM

@vicky_molokh-unsilenceMonica Yes, I think this is probably the breakdown point. They are all distinct alphabets from each other. They each have a specific set of characters, and while all of them can be considered "Japanese", they can be used interchangeably, this does not stop them from being separate alphabets

vicky_molokh- unsilence Monica

@RevenantBacon Just in case I conveyed the wrong idea, I would like to clarify that I wasn't trying to make a point about interchangeability, but rather about the fact that they get used side by side (together) for different purposes in a single text.

RevenantBacon

@Yuuki I suspect this this is one of the main factors that has led to English being the dominant trade language across the world. Speaking it and reading it go hand in hand. The letter "v" makes this particular sound, every time, the letter "c" makes this other, distinct, particular sound every time (except when it doesn't, because reasons).

Granted, it's probably minor in comparison to the fact that a large portion of the world was also ahem "colonized" by the English in their quest for spices.

Yuuki

Isn't that the case with most European languages?

I don't think it's something unique to English.

vicky_molokh- unsilence Monica

@RevenantBacon English actually compares very badly against many (most?) Latin European and (at least East) Slavic languages on that front.

RevenantBacon

@vicky_molokh-unsilenceMonica That's only because it's derived for, ya know, basically all of them. It truly is the mutt of languages

kviiri

5:22 PM

I was just going to say the same as Vicky. English pronunciation is unusually de-coupled from other languages using an alphabetic script

@RevenantBacon Yeah but it kinda... doesn't help with the point of "why English is dominant" does it?

Of course there's a reason, significant or trivial, to everything, but that doesn't really change what things actually are and English is... well. Not easy in terms of connecting written and spoken forms, compared to other European languages.

RevenantBacon

@kviiri Yeah, I guess the more I think about it, it doesn't

vicky_molokh- unsilence Monica

German seems okay to read or write too. And I've read that Icelandic is too.

Polish is hard to write for a silly foreigner, but is mostly readable despite having a lot of expansions beyond the 26 'default' letters.

RevenantBacon

Anyways, what I was going to say (before being sidetracked) was: It breaks down like this: Kanji are generally single symbols that represent what would be a full words or concept in English, while Katakana and Hiragana are both syllabaries of Kanj, with Hiragana being a more simplified version of katakana.

vicky_molokh- unsilence Monica

@RevenantBacon I was with you until "while Katakana and Hiragana are both syllabaries of Kanj, with Hiragana being a more simplified version of katakana". Are you sure?

kviiri

An oft-neglected point in favor of non-alphabetic scripts, especially those of Chinese (due to the historical Chinese empires controlling vast breadths of linguistically diverse populations) is that the symbol not being tied to the pronunciation can actually help the same message be understandable between peoples who might not even understand each others' spoken language

RevenantBacon

5:28 PM

Mostly. With only a few minor exceptions, each one is broken down to single syllables of the Japanese language

vicky_molokh- unsilence Monica

AFAIK Katakana is derived from simplification of manyogana, but Hiragana is developed independently and locally.

kviiri

I thought hiragana pre-dated katakana

RevenantBacon

Consisting of either a vowel "a, e, i, o, u" a consonant followed by a vowel "ka, ke, ki, ko, ku" or the single consonant "n"

kviiri

Oh, checking wikipedia, the current hiragana aren't the same as the original ones

vicky_molokh- unsilence Monica

N being a consonant in Japanese is a bit of a contentious topic . . .

(At a minimum, it is a full-syllable sound, and that would require it to be a vowel . . .)

RevenantBacon

5:31 PM

I call it a consonant, but technically, it can be either a consonant, or a vowel depenging on the word. It's like the English "A, E, I, O, U, and sometimes Y"

Which I think is actually a pretty good comparison now that I've had that thought

vicky_molokh- unsilence Monica

Hmm. According to the wiki I'm wrong about Hiragana's independent development. Can a mod kindly please add strikeout to my message?

RevenantBacon

@vicky_molokh-unsilenceMonica You can edit within 5 mins

vicky_molokh- unsilence Monica

@RevenantBacon English Y represents two different sounds. Three-four if you count use in Turkish, Slavic and similar languages.

@RevenantBacon Edit button no longer available.

RevenantBacon

@vicky_molokh-unsilenceMonica Japanese "n" represents 3. It can be "n", "m", or even "ng" like the nasal sound

@vicky_molokh-unsilenceMonica sadtrombone.wav

kviiri

In Finnish, "ng" and "nk" are pretty much the only major exception to words [that aren't foreign loans] having a pronunciation where each letter doesn't map to a particular sound. (I think linguists say there are more cases but they're generally not noticeable except by very careful listening and are easily lost under the much more powerful layers of obfuscation like dialects)

vicky_molokh- unsilence Monica

5:37 PM

@RevenantBacon Hmm. Point. Anyway, as you can hear here, the n in Za.n.ko.ku is a whole syllable, thus bearing a vowelly quality, that was what I was trying to convey.

RevenantBacon

The fact that Katakana tends to see different uses that Hiragana and Kanji also helps keep them considered as separate alphabets

kviiri

minor quibble, none of them is technically an alphabet :)

RevenantBacon

@kviiri Yes, technically correct.

But I always forget what the correct term is

and "character set" takes longer to type

kviiri

Syllabulary (for katakana and hiragana) and... logograph? I think for kanji

Then there's also abjad which is like alphabet but consonant only. Some linguists consider them to be a subfamily of alphabets, some consider them to be a category of their own

RevenantBacon

Also, anyone who doesn't know what a Syllabulary is will know what you mean when you say "alphabet"

vicky_molokh- unsilence Monica

5:40 PM

@kviiri And abugida, which is about halfway between alphabet and abjad IIRC.

RevenantBacon

@kviiri Oh god, I can't imagine speaking a language with only consonants

kviiri

@RevenantBacon Oh the languages themselves have vowels, they're just not represented in writing (eg. traditional Hebrew and Arabic)

RevenantBacon

@kviiri Ooohhhhhh, so how do they know how to say a word? Like "live" and "love", with no vowels, are indistinguishable in written form.

Man, languages are hard

kviiri

@RevenantBacon Sometimes they don't – probably the best-known case is the Tetragrammaton, which is the name of God given in the Judaist Bible / Old Testament

vicky_molokh- unsilence Monica

@RevenantBacon Their stems tend to be 3-consonant(ish), and each stem being associated with a specific meaning. Vowels will vary more depending what part of the sentence the word is and other additional factors.

MikeQ

5:45 PM

If a language's alphabet has an alternate form where each letter is written differently (such as cursive english), is that a different alphabet? Or a different font?

kviiri

or I mean, each group knows which pronunciation of YHWH they want to use, but the point I'm making is that the fact that the vowels need to be supplied by the reader makes way for the controversy between groups on how it's pronounced

RevenantBacon

@kviiri Huh. I suppose it's no different from "read" and "read", and you just have to have context to know what's going on.

MikeQ

@RevenantBacon In biblical Hebrew the inferred vowels are simply memorized, not always derived from context. Although the meaning doesn't vary.

RevenantBacon

@MikeQ That must create problems

kviiri

well, it occasionally does. A rather minor example, but this is one of the reasons why Muhammad has so many different spellings in Latin alphabets... we insist that there is a single form that captures the pronunciation perfectly, but what if there's no single correct pronunciation?

MikeQ

5:49 PM

(i.e., even if you don't know the vowel pronunciation, you can still translate the word, or at least get a good-enough translation if you recognize the basic consonants.)

kviiri

But yeah, differences in alphabet have created a lot of issues, little or small – or rather, the lack of support for non-English use cases, due to English being a very central language in science and tech. It amuses me how eg. sports contests of 2020 still can't type the names of our athletes correctly on screen

GcL

@MikeQ typeface?

kviiri

6:02 PM

Typeface-alphabet distinction can be quite tricky

GcL

Both used to be hard pressed for print?

kviiri

Eg. I'd say the modern Roman typeface and fraktur are both representations of the Latin alphabet

but knowing one doesn't let one read the other (yes, with some caveats it does – context and the few letters that look similar enough will eventually get you up to speed at least when moving from modern typefaces to fraktur, I assume it works similarly the other way around)

GcL

6:54 PM

I feel like we can cut the chase with this entire conversation and go straight to talking about wingdings.

Thomas Markov

Im surprised more people dont have the disciplined badge.

Only 204 awarded

GcL

@ThomasMarkov I only ever made it to 19. I have a sensitive tushy. /S

Thomas Markov

its totally cheesable

Yuuki

Has anyone in a zombie apocalypse considered biting the zombies to turn them into humans?

GcL

@ThomasMarkov The trick is realizing that all the badges are cheese.

Thomas Markov

7:01 PM

I wonder if anyone's ever had more silver badges than bronze badges

I could do it by getting 46 necromancer badges

GcL

I would imagine you have something better to do with your time.

I think you have to get some number of votes, so just answering isn't enough to get the badge.

Thomas Markov

Score of 5

Mark Wells

@MikeQ The word you're looking for is probably "script".

RevenantBacon

7:23 PM

Font, Typeface, and Script are all basically synonymous, and I think only differ in use cases, rather than actual substance

i.e. font is generally only used in regards to computers, typeface is generally used in computers and print, and script is mostly used for hand-written characters, but they all basically mean the same thing, aka letters with different flourishes for minor appearance changes

Mark Wells

@RevenantBacon Generally, yes, though I'm rankled a bit by "only differ in use cases" since the difference between any two words is "only" use cases :)

RevenantBacon

@MarkWells Well, "Father" and "Dad" are synonymous with identical use cases, but we still have both. I dunno man, languages are hard

AncientSwordRage

7:56 PM

@RevenantBacon they denote the same, but connote differently

Mark Wells

@AncientSwordRage If your use case is, say, reciting the Nicene Creed, they don't even denote the same.

Maybe. Languages are hard.

vicky_molokh- unsilence Monica

@RevenantBacon Their use cases are not identical. Have you ever seen a government form with a 'dad' field? I haven't.

RevenantBacon

@vicky_molokh-unsilenceMonica I haven't but then again, I haven't filled out many government forms that needed a parents information.

Mark Wells

I filled one out a couple weeks ago. Birth certificate application :) Though I'll note that it said "Other Parent", not "Father".

AncientSwordRage

@MarkWells valid

RevenantBacon

8:09 PM

@MarkWells Interesting... Was the first one "Mother"?

Or was it "Parent"?

kviiri

Parents are trees who make reliable golfers.

Mark Wells

@RevenantBacon I think "Mother".

Thomas Markov

8:44 PM

Should this question be closed? It appears to ask about a class feature that doesnt exist but is pretty obviously referring to the barbarian's reckless attack.

Mark Wells

@ThomasMarkov No.

Thomas Markov

Why?

Mark Wells

Theoretically it's unclear. Actually it's not unclear. Therefore, it should be theoretically, but not actually, closed.

Thomas Markov

Why does that reasoning apply here, but is invalid when it's the game system that isn't named?

Is it only because we have a policy about game systems, or is there a categorical difference between this question and one which does not specify a game system?

Mark Wells

As you can see, that question is entirely answerable in its current form.

Thomas Markov

8:58 PM

It isn't though, it requires you to assume that the question is actually asking about something not written in the question.

kviiri

@MarkWells I don't really want to comment on the issue in general, but... that's kinda begging the question isn't it?

Mark Wells

@kviiri Also begging the question: "Why is that reasoning invalid when it's the game system that isn't named?"

kviiri

@MarkWells I don't see how

Thomas Markov

@MarkWells That's not begging the question that is a question.

RevenantBacon

well, I'm off for the night, see you chaps later

Rubiksmoose

9:01 PM

@ThomasMarkov That logic is actually why many people on the site are against the system policy. Precisely because it treats systems as something super special and not like any other thing on this site. That system policy is the outlier, not the other stuff.

kviiri

Well ok, it's past my bedtime already, but I'll give you this much. DnD (and many other RPGs) have been translated into many different languages and requiring players to perfectly reproduce the names of in-game features would be an unreasonable expectation.

There has to be a bit of leeway. See also, "Attack of Opportunity" that keeps getting mentioned a lot in DnD 5e questions despite not being a term used in the game.

Mark Wells

The policy we have now is a political compromise. It's not based on the application of any consistent principle.

Thomas Markov

It should either be closed or edited to say reckless, another user already rolled back an edit that changed it to reckless.

@MarkWells I suppose then you would be alright with just editing in reckless?

@Rubiksmoose probably your call though since its been back and to once already.

Mark Wells

@ThomasMarkov I'm very skeptical of messing with the language of a question, simply because I've seen questions get edited into forms that are completely unhelpful.

Thomas Markov

Right, but I'm proposing changing a single word to something you already said was clearly what was intended.

Rubiksmoose

9:08 PM

@ThomasMarkov Just as a response to one of your comments: I think we should avoid generalizing principles based on the system policy. Like I said before, that policy is the weird thing on this site, we shouldn't extrapolate it to other things. It was a specific policy to address a specific issue that was much more present years ago.

Mark Wells

Maybe that would have been the right move before we had people edit-warring in the text of the question. This is where I'd flag it for a moderator, express my concerns, and then step away.

How I'd handle it as a moderator I don't know. I'm not a moderator and shouldn't be one, for several reasons.

If we ever have an opening for an extremerator, let me know.

Rubiksmoose

FWIW I'm looking at it now. I'm a bit conflicted and thinking what to do.

Thomas Markov

@MarkWells Yeah, that's why I'm talking about it here, I approved the original edit that changed it to reckless.

GcL

@Rubiksmoose Delete question and pretend it never existed?

Rubiksmoose

Delete site. Problem solved!

Thomas Markov

9:17 PM

@GcL hmmm I should just repost the question but change the word

Rubiksmoose

There we go:

I've edited to change "relentless attack" to "reckless attack" because there is no such thing as the former and your description fits with the latter (and there doesn't seem to be anything else it could be referring to). If this is wrong please feel free to edit to clarify! — Rubiksmoose ♦ 42 secs ago

GcL

Seems right. Reckless attack is a good guess. Glad this wasn't the system where they'd said something but left the word "edition" or "e" off the 5 and then we could have torn our hair about if we could guess the system /S

2

Rubiksmoose

hah! you aren't wrong.

Thomas Markov

@GcL The shade you just threw is cool and refreshing.

Rubiksmoose

It's always good to remember that this is a site populated by many experts. We should avoid creating barriers to using that expertise to help people within the bounds of the site's systems unless absolutely necessary.

We shouldn't be terrified of ever being wrong, if it happens, there are ways to clean things up.

(naturally we should strive to be as not-wrong as possible though)

Thomas Markov

9:34 PM

Weird, I just got five upvotes on different question in two minutes

Someone_Evil

Yeah, there's something/someone going around the stack upvoting posts to award badges. Nothing to worry about

GcL

They'll be caught and punished soon enough... people these days.... upvoting. Hmph. I blame the cats and the music they listen to.

Thomas Markov

weird.

Hot RPG Questions

5

Q: Are these Yuan-Ti's osssra rules balanced?

I am DMing a homebrew campaign and I created an exotic island ruled by Yuan-ti. I read the Serpent Kingdoms 3rd edition manual and I tried to adapt the osssra table (page 150). In 5th edition the condition Poisoned tries to simplify the effects of poisons, even if in DMG (pages 257-258) some diff...

dnd-5e balance homebrew-review poison yuan-ti

Thomas Markov

@HotRPGQuestions ouch, those tables are awful on mobile.

The Oracle

9:51 PM

0

Q: What does it mean for a question to be closed?

My question just got closed! What does that mean? How do questions get closed? What do I need to do to get my question reopened? This Q&A is our specific one to expand on the guidance in the built in help center article.

support closed-questions faq-proposal

Mark Wells

Going to try to run some tests for a really bad 5e house rule: Melee attacks always hit.

Someone_Evil

GWM is your best friend

Mark Wells

You roll the attack to determine if your target gets to counterattack you.

Someone_Evil

How does crits work?

Mark Wells

Same as usual.

Someone_Evil

9:59 PM

Hmm... rogues?

Mark Wells

What about them?

Someone_Evil

Well, getting additional attacks on other turns makes Sneak Attack a lot better rather quickly

Mark Wells

yep.

Good that you bring it up, I'll include a rogue in the playtest

Someone_Evil

Monks probably get the worst of it (typically having the worse individual attacks, at least at low levels)

Thomas Markov

Inflict wounds would like to know your location.

Someone_Evil

10:03 PM

You can't take rx attacks with it, can you?

Thomas Markov

@Someone_Evil pharmacy attacks?

Someone_Evil

@ThomasMarkov Sorry, chemist. We end up writing "reaction" a lot and thus get used to abbreviating it (no idea what relates it pharmacies)

GcL

@Someone_Evil Rx is usually prescription.

Thomas Markov

Rx is a symbol used to denote that a particular drug requires a prescription, so it’s often used in branding for pharmacies.

Someone_Evil

Neat, that'll be useful to know in case I ever get a prescription written in english

And "rx" is apparently from the latin "recipe" meaning "take"

Thomas Markov

10:12 PM

I’m still not convinced my doctor writes my prescriptions in English. He very much embodies the “doctors can’t write” stereotype.

GcL

Function of taking notes in med school I think. At least, that's what I blame... and the cats.

Mark Wells

If you're ever unsure who to blame for your problems, blame birds.

2

Someone_Evil

I'm given to understand the bees are also often co-culprits

BESW

10:36 PM

Now available for pre-order: Hearts of Wulin by Lowell Francis and Agatha Cheng is a tabletop roleplaying game of wuxia melodrama, Powered by the Apocalypse.

The Five Powers Jam hosted by WuDeRPG. Starts in two days. Create something for 五德 - The Five Powers.

Jordan Palmer asks on Twitter "What are the most useful physical tools and aides you've ever used at the table?"

Elizabeth Simoens asks on Twitter about accessible idea generation tools/processes.

BESW

11:19 PM

Robots & Rebels: A Star Wars-Inspired Honey Heist Hack by TheSamwisest. Sentient Droids. Space Rebellions. Toast. (twitter link to files hosted on Google Drive)

LuchaLibris wrote a twitter thread about their vision of "borderpunk" as both a genre and the game they're writing. "Borderpunk is about existing in between worlds, specifically re: Mexican/American identity. It must be political (like all art) or it's just an aesthetic and not punk."

2

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