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I get excited over torpedo calculations in submarine simulators. Let's let people have their passions.
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Aug 4, 2016 05:52
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Yeah guys it's alright to not like Forgotten Realms as long as you don't state it anywhere that Arivia can see you.
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Aug 4, 2016 06:39
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Kurieg posted:Yeah guys it's alright to not like Forgotten Realms as long as you don't state it anywhere that Arivia can see you. It's fine to not like the Forgotten Realms. It's elfgames, you play the ones you like. If someone likes playing in Eberron or whatever, sure. I'm not interested in the kind of misinformed arguments to intentionally malicious attempts to clown on the Realms that pop up around here. Yes, I respond to people lying that Elminster is Ed Greenwood's self-insert because it's completely wrong. So forth and so on. If people don't want to be corrected, then they shouldn't be making lovely arguments in the first place. There are some lovely parts to the Realms and things that can be honestly criticized. Anything written by slade in 2e, for example. Maztica. No one ever talks about them here because you're all too caught up on the trees to see the forest and keep complaining about goddamned Elminster. If anything, you need to grow up about there being a D&D setting you don't like. Let it go.
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Aug 4, 2016 09:44
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Arivia posted:It's fine to not like the Forgotten Realms. It's elfgames, you play the ones you like. If someone likes playing in Eberron or whatever, sure. No one gives a poo poo.
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Aug 4, 2016 09:45
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Milky Moor posted:No one gives a poo poo. Except they keep posting about it. Bye.
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Aug 4, 2016 09:48
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gradenko_2000 posted:I get excited over torpedo calculations in submarine simulators. Let's let people have their passions. You might get excited about sex, but it doesn't mean you should start playing FATAL.
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Aug 4, 2016 09:55
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Jedit posted:You might get excited about sex, but it doesn't mean you should start playing FATAL.
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Aug 4, 2016 10:19
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Terrible Opinions posted:This is going to devolve into people claiming D&D causes brain damage isn't it? Could we stop that before it starts? I wouldn't assign causation to it, but there's some observable correlation.
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Aug 4, 2016 10:37
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Jedit posted:You might get excited about sex, but it doesn't mean you should start playing FATAL. What did Harpoon ever do to you to deserve this kind of treatment? 
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Aug 4, 2016 11:00
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spectralent posted:What did Harpoon ever do to you to deserve this kind of treatment? It rolled a natural 1000, dilated my hamster's anus to 300 times its normal size and converted it into a portal to the Elemental Plane of AIDS.
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Aug 4, 2016 11:48
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Arivia posted:Except they keep posting about it. Bye. No, you keep posting about it, at great length, and people keep telling you you're posting like an rear end in a top hat.
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Aug 4, 2016 13:57
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Arivia posted:Relax dude, it's an elfgames thread. Chill. You're right though, Elminster isn't a self insert. Self inserts generally do not have canonical magic doorways into their creator's study where they're best buds and drink beer. Which is infinitely sadder.
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Aug 4, 2016 14:00
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Arivia posted:Here's a tip: no one on the FR design team was interested in the degenerate idiocy that the character optimization boards made of 3e. The mageduel rules reflect how arcane spellcasters are actually played, both in the rules and in the fiction, and are written for that, not whatever Frank Trollman shat out yesterday. Go away. What thread do you think you're posting in? "degenerate idiocy that the character optimization boards made of 3e" is basically what the thread is about, not "self-police your balance and play in a way that complements the lore". People are pointing out that a lore mechanic based around duels with powerful characters doesn't make sense in the context of what a powerful character is based on the mechanics. That seems like a Murphy to me. I don't know if it exactly counts as a Murphy or just poor design, but I have Seven Strongholds, a supplement about fortresses to use in your campaigns. It features such exciting characters as a level 7 character with 2 cleric levels but only 10 wisdom, and a character described as attractive and personable and using her looks to get ahead... with the same charisma as a character who's described as oblivious, disliked, and bad with people.
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Aug 4, 2016 16:43
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Taciturn Tactician posted:I don't know if it exactly counts as a Murphy or just poor design, but I have Seven Strongholds, a supplement about fortresses to use in your campaigns. It features such exciting characters as a level 7 character with 2 cleric levels but only 10 wisdom, and a character described as attractive and personable and using her looks to get ahead... with the same charisma as a character who's described as oblivious, disliked, and bad with people. is this a d&d supplement, and if so, what edition? if it's AD&D / 2E, that makes a ton of sense, because straight in the PHB from the time, there's a bunch of paragraphs in the first section where it explains the character creation process, about how you shouldn't be obsessed with getting perfect stats and how playing a suboptimal character is actually cool and good because it makes you a better roleplayer; the example is something like a thief named Robert who has mediocre dex and bad everything else but the book is like "no see it'll be memorable to play him because if you win it'll be that much cooler and if you lose who care just roll another dude" my point is that earlier editions had a huge hard-on for ~*~role-playing not roll-playing~*~ so the supplement about castles having NPCs who are hilariously suboptimzed was just how the game was played back then. it was a feature, not a bug
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Aug 4, 2016 19:03
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homeless poster posted:is this a d&d supplement, and if so, what edition? if it's AD&D / 2E, that makes a ton of sense, because straight in the PHB from the time, there's a bunch of paragraphs in the first section where it explains the character creation process, about how you shouldn't be obsessed with getting perfect stats and how playing a suboptimal character is actually cool and good because it makes you a better roleplayer; the example is something like a thief named Robert who has mediocre dex and bad everything else but the book is like "no see it'll be memorable to play him because if you win it'll be that much cooler and if you lose who care just roll another dude" It was released in 2002, so it's 3e. And regardless of character optimization, it's clear that the attractive personable character clearly shouldn't have the same charisma as the oblivious disliked antisocial character, that's what charisma means.
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Aug 4, 2016 19:20
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Was there an edition or some sort of option where you split your Charisma stat into sub categories like "looks" and "personality" or something? I seem to remember having that on a character sheet back in the day but it was before I ever DM'd or really even read rules. It let you decide if your CHA 12 Paladin was all around above average or a golden god in looks who turned into a bumbling idiot when he tried to interact with people. Or play your CHA 12 bard as an ugly lump with a beautiful signing voice and mad skills on the lute. I think we also used a split for manual and physical DEX, so you could play a jumping, dodging, climbing, flipping Rogue who sucked at picking locks and sleight of hand with just a slightly above average dex.
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Aug 4, 2016 19:23
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homeless poster posted:is this a d&d supplement, and if so, what edition? if it's AD&D / 2E, that makes a ton of sense, because straight in the PHB from the time, there's a bunch of paragraphs in the first section where it explains the character creation process, about how you shouldn't be obsessed with getting perfect stats and how playing a suboptimal character is actually cool and good because it makes you a better roleplayer; the example is something like a thief named Robert who has mediocre dex and bad everything else but the book is like "no see it'll be memorable to play him because if you win it'll be that much cooler and if you lose who care just roll another dude" It's for 3rd edition. The cleric who has no business being a cleric is maybe just them making a suboptimal character for... some reason, although remember he's level 7 so it's not like it's his primary class and he's struggling against adversity. The charisma issue though is just statting your character contrary to their own identity, it's the complete opposite of roleplaying.
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Aug 4, 2016 19:26
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GoodBee posted:Was there an edition or some sort of option where you split your Charisma stat into sub categories like "looks" and "personality" or something? I seem to remember having that on a character sheet back in the day but it was before I ever DM'd or really even read rules. There's a well-known system that sub-divides Charisma into Facial Charisma, Vocal Charisma, Kinetic Charisma, and Rhetorical Charisma.
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Aug 4, 2016 19:33
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GoodBee posted:Was there an edition or some sort of option where you split your Charisma stat into sub categories like "looks" and "personality" or something? I seem to remember having that on a character sheet back in the day but it was before I ever DM'd or really even read rules. IIRC, 2nd Edition AD&D had player options involving all the stats split into two distinct forms of the stat in question, that seems like where this is coming from.
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Aug 4, 2016 19:47
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Splicer posted:everexpandingironicat.gif That would be an example of bad writing from slade, probably the #1 worst FR designer ever. That's a good bad thing about the Realms to bring up! I'd highly recommend you ignore it. Taciturn Tactician posted:What thread do you think you're posting in? "degenerate idiocy that the character optimization boards made of 3e" is basically what the thread is about, not "self-police your balance and play in a way that complements the lore". People are pointing out that a lore mechanic based around duels with powerful characters doesn't make sense in the context of what a powerful character is based on the mechanics. That seems like a Murphy to me. That's a fair point. I disagree with that outlook but you're right it is the purpose of the thread. My bad, I'm sorry. GoodBee posted:Was there an edition or some sort of option where you split your Charisma stat into sub categories like "looks" and "personality" or something? I seem to remember having that on a character sheet back in the day but it was before I ever DM'd or really even read rules. CCKeane already identified Player's Option: Skills and Powers for 2e as what you were probably using. I'll add that a Comeliness score (so physical beauty, to complement Charisma) was popularized by Unearthed Arcana for 1e.
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Aug 4, 2016 19:58
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CCKeane posted:IIRC, 2nd Edition AD&D had player options involving all the stats split into two distinct forms of the stat in question, that seems like where this is coming from. Yep, Skills and Powers.
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Aug 4, 2016 20:14
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Neat. I remembered playing with those a couple of times but didn't know where they came from. It's entirely possible no one had the actual book and had just copied those sheets off someone else.
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Aug 4, 2016 20:47
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GoodBee posted:Neat. I remembered playing with those a couple of times but didn't know where they came from. It's entirely possible no one had the actual book and had just copied those sheets off someone else. that is something that you don't get now-a-days, rules that someone at the table heard from a friend of a friend of a friend's brother who read a book that no one presently owned but everyone just accepted that's how the game worked. every gaming group had their own weird little ecosystem of house rules grown from an urban legend-style amalgamation of things that were only half remembered like some kind of fever dream. uh no gary of course males of any race get +1 STR and CON and females get +1 WIS and CHA that's just in the rules why are you being weird about this edit: some kind of expensive metal reflected all magic (gold? platinum?) and it was always a big sub-plot in any adventure to try and get enough money for the fighter to get a very expensive suit of all gold/platinum/XYZ-metal armor Freaking Crumbum fucked around with this message at 22:30 on Aug 4, 2016 |
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Aug 4, 2016 22:28
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homeless poster posted:that is something that you don't get now-a-days, rules that someone at the table heard from a friend of a friend of a friend's brother who read a book that no one presently owned but everyone just accepted that's how the game worked. every gaming group had their own weird little ecosystem of house rules grown from an urban legend-style amalgamation of things that were only half remembered like some kind of fever dream. At least that's better than the actual rules when differences came up like that (usually females get penalties and no bonuses).
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Aug 4, 2016 22:31
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Kwyndig posted:At least that's better than the actual rules when differences came up like that (usually females get penalties and no bonuses). They get to experience the joy of roleplaying through pregnancy. Let me pull out my table of trimester penalties.
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Aug 4, 2016 22:49
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Kurieg posted:They get to experience the joy of roleplaying through pregnancy. Let me pull out my table of trimester penalties. I know you're joking but I actually had a GM pull that on me once. He thought it would be fun to roleplay the challenges. In 3.5 D&D.
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Aug 4, 2016 22:51
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Oh lord, I could write pages on the pregnancy rules in Blood of the Wolf, particularly the reactionary slut-shaming with unihar.
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Aug 4, 2016 22:53
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Kurieg posted:Oh lord, I could write pages on the pregnancy rules in Blood of the Wolf, particularly the reactionary slut-shaming with unihar. Meanwhile, in Weapons of the Gods, you could spend like one point and be able to completely ignore being pregnant right up until the baby is born, up to and including while Kung Fu fighting. That's more rules working as intended though.
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Aug 4, 2016 23:16
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Arivia posted:I know you're joking but I actually had a GM pull that on me once. He thought it would be fun to roleplay the challenges. In 3.5 D&D. And now I'm sad that this fact is taking up perfectly good brain space.
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Aug 4, 2016 23:43
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Lottery of Babylon posted:There's a well-known system that sub-divides Charisma into Facial Charisma, Vocal Charisma, Kinetic Charisma, and Rhetorical Charisma. Is this an honest-to-god LoB post? I'm not sure what to think about this.
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Aug 4, 2016 23:55
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Splicer posted:
Arivia posted:That would be an example of bad writing from slade, probably the #1 worst FR designer ever. That's a good bad thing about the Realms to bring up! I'd highly recommend you ignore it.
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Aug 5, 2016 00:08
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Kurieg posted:Oh lord, I could write pages on the pregnancy rules in Blood of the Wolf, particularly the reactionary slut-shaming with unihar. Fortunately 2e walked that way the hell back and got rid of unihar entirely.
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Aug 5, 2016 00:23
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Samfucius posted:Is this an honest-to-god LoB post? Simple: Don't. Dwelling too much on it would be quite FATAL.
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Aug 5, 2016 00:25
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GoodBee posted:Was there an edition or some sort of option where you split your Charisma stat into sub categories like "looks" and "personality" or something? I seem to remember having that on a character sheet back in the day but it was before I ever DM'd or really even read rules. The edition/book was already identified as AD&D 2nd Edition's Player's Option - Skills and Powers. What happened was that you rolled* your six abilities, but then multiplied your ability score by 2 and distributed that result over two sub-abilities. So if you had a 14 Charisma, you had 28 points to distribute between Leadership and Appearance. Leadership controlled Number of Henchmen and Henchman Loyalty, while Appearance controlled Reaction Modifier for monsters/NPCs encountered. If you had 15 Dexterity, you had 30 points to distribute between Aim and Balance. Aim controlled Missile Attack Modifier, and Pick Pocket and Open Locks bonus for Rogues, while Balance controlled Surprise Modifier, AC Modifier, and Move Silently and Climb Walls bonus for Rogues. * If I'm not mistaken, this book was also the first time that a point-buy system was officially supported: 75 points distributed over the six ability scores (with Exceptional Strength costing 1 point for every 10 fractional Strength over 18/01 for Fighters). There was also this weird hybrid "rolled point-buy" where you rolled a 2d6 to determine how many points you had to allocate, and the less points you had, the higher your maximum assignable score was. Getting a 2 on the 2d6 meant only 68 points to play with, but you could assign scores of up to 18. Getting a 12 on the other hand meant 80 points to play with, but with a cap of 15 on any single ability score.
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Aug 5, 2016 00:49
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That's sounds familiar but I'm sure we weren't playing RAW. I do miss the lawless old days of my high school group play AD&D where pretty much only the DM had any books, aside from the odd player splat book here and there. Like, I liked playing an Elf Ranger, so I'm buying the Elf and the Ranger splat books. Everything was DM's approval though, as an understood term of the game. We showed him stuff we liked and he tried to work it in. Being a dumb kid was fun and rules were optional. All my best gaming stories are from them. On a side note, I was at the game store a couple of years ago when a couple of guys who had been playing together since the late 70s/early 80s came in. They'd gotten the group back together for the weekend and rented a B&B so they could all stay there and game after what sounded like a pretty long time. They were buying their DM a set of fancy Crystal Caste dice and picking up some Chessex sets for some of the group that didn't have any anymore. We found some character sheets online for them and printed them out for them. The whole situation was super  They were so excited.
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Aug 5, 2016 01:49
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Kwyndig posted:Meanwhile, in Weapons of the Gods, you could spend like one point and be able to completely ignore being pregnant right up until the baby is born, up to and including while Kung Fu fighting. Weapons of the Gods is also a game where you have to opt-in as a player for the world to treat you weirdly for being a woman kung fu master, so there's that too. Weapons of the Gods kind of rules.
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Aug 5, 2016 05:50
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GoodBee posted:Was there an edition or some sort of option where you split your Charisma stat into sub categories like "looks" and "personality" or something? I seem to remember having that on a character sheet back in the day but it was before I ever DM'd or really even read rules. The best version of D&D, Hackmaster, does indeed tack on a seventh main stat, Comeliness, and leave Charisma entirely to personality and mannerism. High Charisma does give a bonus to Comeliness, though, because sometimes a smooth talker can make up for a rough face.
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Aug 5, 2016 20:55
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kafziel posted:The best version of D&D, Hackmaster, does indeed tack on a seventh main stat, Comeliness, and leave Charisma entirely to personality and mannerism. High Charisma does give a bonus to Comeliness, though, because sometimes a smooth talker can make up for a rough face. I knew I recognized the term Comeliness from somewhere, but I couldn't remember where. Hackmaster is it!
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Aug 5, 2016 21:08
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Comeliness was also a separate stat in AD&D 1st ed for a good chunk of its life. (First showed in Unearthed Arcana.)
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Aug 5, 2016 21:29
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I had the book right next to me so you're getting a breakdown so I can avoid work. Comeliness was another 3D6 stat, but if you had a low charisma it got modified down, and if you had a high Charisma, it got modified up. (Comeliness was meant to map if you gained or lost Charisma, too.) Other races got comeliness modifiers: Half-orcs -3, dwarves and gnomes -1, halflings and humans +0, half-elves and sylvan elves +1, gray elves and high elves +2. This was explicitly only between the, ahem, races, so gray elves were at +0 relative to each other. Comeliness could go negative, but down to -8 people would just think you're disgusting. From -9 to -15 you would never be accepted as a good person, only by persons of evil alignment, who would find your hideous mug to be positive. At -16 or lower, you would induce quantifiable horror in the target - unless you and the target were both evil in which case they would find you to be very appealing! +1 to +6, your face is ugly but you can overcome it with extended exposure. At +7 to +9, you're still ugly but you can get over it quicker. +10 to +13, no effect. +14 to +17, "reaction adjustment increased by a percentage equal to the comeliness of the character," and "individuals of the opposite sex will seek out such characters, and they will be affected as if under a fascinate spell unless wisdom of such individual exceeds 50% of the comeliness total." From +18 to +21, you are simply so smexxy that you get an even larger reaction bonus, you get the fascinate effect unless the target's wisdom exceeds 2/3rds of your total comeliness, and if you reject people you get treated as if you had half your comeliness score in negative terms. i.e. if a +20 negs someone hard, that someone will have an effective -10 to that person -- though it's unclear if they'll still accept you if they are evil alignment. +22 to +25 is the same but even more so, but if you come at someone they're going to fall for you unless their Wisdom is 18 or higher. Rejection, same deal as above. +26 to +30 requires you to be an alien being from another plane. Fascinate power is automatic unless the target has a Wisdom of 19 or higher (in other words, nearly impossible to actually get). Fascinate here is a 2nd level Illusionist spell, which basically works like Charm person. However, in a precursor to other things, this is not a magical effect, so Dispel magic won't save you. If you're wondering: Use of simple or basic-rear end illusion magic can give you +1 or -1 comeliness. Polymorph can let you get that to +2 or -2. Shapechange (a different, even better spell) gives you the full enchilada of being Hunkor, +20 Comeliness of Masculinity. You can also make Comeliness checks on people you've fascinated to get them to do things for you, but if you push your luck you get that rebound effect. Boy that's a nasty rebound effect! It occurs to me on reflection here that you now have an infallible way to sense evil alignment if you have access to an extremely attractive person. Have them ensorcelate your target with their sexy bods, and then deliberately treat them like garbage. If the target does not react with disgust and outrage after a few applications, they're clearly of evil alignment! I suspect that this was not the intention of Gygax, although there is a certain Calvinist simplicity in suggesting that people we might consider 'weak willed' or 'dependent' to actually be 'of evil alignment.' It also ignores the existence of homosexual desire, but as the book was written in 1985 I suspect this was oversight, not malice. Nessus fucked around with this message at 22:01 on Aug 5, 2016 |
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Aug 5, 2016 21:57
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