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Acceptance and Defiance seems like a really cool concept messed up by being mechanically really important.
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Aug 25, 2020 01:59
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Night10194 posted:Acceptance and Defiance seems like a really cool concept messed up by being mechanically really important. Accursed really sounds like a better version of what World of Darkness games were trying to do, with the possible exception of new Mage, and the idea of Acceptance vs. Defiance is already better than any of their morality mechanics.
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Aug 25, 2020 05:06
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Chapter 8: Bazaar, pt. 6 Degenesis Rebirth Katharsys Chapter 8: Bazaar  NEOLIBYANS Hunting Rifle quote:It is said that you can tell a Neolibyan’s wealth from his garb, the good teeth of his followers, and his rifle. Do your party members also get free dental?  Anyway, it’s the fancy-rear end hunting rifle of the African hypercapitalist. Decorated as gently caress. The Specialty allows to install adornments in mod slots for 10K Dinars each. For each instance of bling, you get +1D to interact with other Neolibyans. Finally, a prestige skin that doesn't bring shame! Masterpiece Rifle A mastercrafted rifle  Actually more subdued looking than the Hunting Rifle, but better in every way. Dunno exactly how, as the Specialty is listed as “extremely valuable. Extreme quality.” Degenesis is the first game where you do the TES “carrying three different weapons because of their elemental effects” because one of your guns makes you better at talking to people. Curved Dagger A status symbol, showing a Neolibyan's ties “ties to an ancient Africa where a man was nothing without a dagger.” Specialty says that it can be adorned as well, which probably means the same prices and same benefits as with the Hunting Rifle. Balancer The fancy book that holds all the contracts and other data about Neolibyan's business. quote:Those who can afford it upgrade their Balancer with a Bygone pocket calculator and secure the book with a lock or a trap. Specialty? Nothing for the bearer, but a Neolibyan who steals this gets +4D to all business efforts against the original owner. >Pocket Calculator: gives the Neolibyan +4D to INT+Science as long as numbers are involved. >Lock: demands an AGI+Dexterity (5) roll to look inside if you don't have the key. >Trap: a poisoned needle for those trying to unlock the Balancer lock (no say about any roll to avoid it). Potency 5 poison that drains 1 Ego point per hour. Effect runs out in 4 hours, which makes you very susceptible to drowning. Finally, you trapper-keeper diary is safe from nosy little brothers.  Surge Tank The famous Neolibyan leviathan that makes 40K designs look reasonable. Has space for 12(!) Koms, and it can be augmented with mods. For some reason, the book wants to specify that mod slots can be used for cannons. Trading Ship Either freed from silt or captured (...from who?), there are basically water-going versions of Surge Tank. The same note on modifications. Astrolabe “More beautiful than practical,” still gives +1D to INS+Orienteering. Atlas If the Judge's Codex contains his notes on law, then Neolibyan's Atlas contains his mapping work - “coastlines he corrected and shoals he charted.” Starts out at level I, giving +1D to INS+Orienteering (what, in the middle of Pollen?). Level rises for every three big discoveries.  APOCALYPTICS Blade Bracelet “All the rage among the Apocalyptics,” this is a weapon masquerading as a fancy jewelry piece (you'd think they'd want it to be inconspicuous). The best ones were made by a Raven of the Carrion Birds around 200 years ago. quote:Allegedly the Raven Mother ate his heart when he looked at another woman. And here I thought that Apocalyptics were all “live free, gently caress hard.” Has “Camo” quality (needs INS+Perception (4) to be identified as what it is). Raven-made ones up that check to 6, and give +1 damage, but you need to earn it rather than buy it (though my advice would be to take it off an Apocalyptic's corpse, cos they're the worst).  There's no way in hell the blade fits into the bracelet. Also, the Neolib and Apocalyptic inventory is just two pages of text. This illustration appears over the Jehammedan section. You can clearly feel where the heart of the devs was in this. Harpoon crossbow For dragging Motorbike quote:Motorbikes are not well-suited to the wasteland. Every rock is a lethal danger—and that’s just the way the Apocalyptics like it! ...what about dirtbikes? Anyway, they are maintained by hired or enslaved Scrappers. Specialty? “The Flock’s motorbikes have an additional slot for modifications,” which can be parsed whichever way you want. Apocalyptic Tarot Hey, remember how they told us a few times already that the Tarot is a sham? quote:The cards determine the path of the migrants, merging chance, fate, and the will of the Raven. They are an instrument of power and a tool of contemplation. Every tarot is guided by the most ancient of tarots: the tarot of the Raven Mother. For centuries, the archetypical elements have remained unchanged but were imposed on worldly events, Clans, Cults, or people. Every deck is artfully designed. +1D to CHA+Leadership “in the hands of a Raven.” I guess anyone else would just look like an idiot. Key Ring Literally a ring of keys to Woodpecker establishments – and hopefully, fitting a few other locks besides. When used by a Woodpecker, gives +1D to AGI+Dexterity. Koumaya Dagger quote:The Koumaya dagger is a traditional curved dagger. Young African Apocalyptics wield it to demonstrate strength where there is none. Experienced Apocalyptics like Marabous and Ibises only grin. They were once young themselves and needed something to cling to. Oh make up your loving mind.  Steel Cotters After a successful attack, the victim takes 1 damage per round unless they can pull them out with AGI+Dexterity (3) roll. A “slow and painful death,” but since using it leaves the Apocalyptic unarmed, they're probably set for the same fate. Ibis staff The African Apocalyptics of the Ibis rank uses this fancy and fragile staff as a status symbol, which allows the free passage through Scourger lands. Flyssa Fan-favorite sword of African Buzzards.  Next time: Not-slims and Faux-tians
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Aug 25, 2020 05:32
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Ithle01 posted:Accursed really sounds like a better version of what World of Darkness games were trying to do, with the possible exception of new Mage, and the idea of Acceptance vs. Defiance is already better than any of their morality mechanics. You forgot Changeling: the Lost 
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Aug 25, 2020 13:17
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Falconier111 posted:You forgot Changeling: the Lost Also Promethean. Even Requiem, really.
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Aug 25, 2020 15:38
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I will die on the hill of nWoof 2e being really good.
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Aug 25, 2020 16:05
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Mors Rattus posted:I will die on the hill of nWoof 2e being really good.  I'll even defend Mummy, even though nobody liked it.
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Aug 25, 2020 16:13
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Deviant:the Renegades looks to be doing sort-of-Accursed once it's out, someone (not volunteering, those build-a-conspiracy chapters are looong) should F&F it once it gets out of KS manuscript hell.
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Aug 25, 2020 16:47
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Turns out Chronicles/NWoD 2e is quite good. With one or two significant exceptions.
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Aug 25, 2020 17:03
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In a fit of misdirected simulationism, the equipment list contains twelve different types of The Deck of Encounters Set Two Part 48: The Deck of Guards and Skullduggery 238: Map It Out The PCs are strolling along when a man with “striking white hair” thrusts a scroll into the hands of the party wizard, shouting about magic and riches beyond one’s wildest dreams. Then he dies. “A dagger has appeared in his back.” So wait, who threw the dagger? And why? What just happened? Who was this guy? No comment from the card. Anyway, the card suggests that if you have an adventure (read: dungeon) that you want to run, the map can lead the PCs to it. Otherwise it’s a tomb about two weeks away. Finding the entrance might take days. There’s a jammed door and a spectre guarding 1,291 gp, a bunch of potions, two of which are still good (of vitality) and a pearl. I.. don’t think so. I would have to make up so much for this encounter to make any sense, that I might as well have just not drawn a card at all. Pass. 239: City Guards, Part 1 of 3 The party is going to enter a city. There’s a line. Guards are doing aggressive customs interviews and charging very-high-for-peasants fees. The guard captain calls them “fancy-dan adventurers” and warns them sternly about “large magical fires or bloody barroom brawls.” They’re tailed by guards the whole time they’re in the city. It continues in the next card. P.S. This gets points just for the phrase “fancy-dan adventurers.” 240: City Guards, Part 2 of 3 The PCs are still in town for several days, and guards are still following them around, trailing them and such. But one night, the guards aren’t following them any more. “The PCs can take advantage of this to conduct any underhanded business they have.” But then on the way back to their inn or whatever, they find a dead body of a guard, one of the ones who was tailing them before! He’s been killed with a knife treated with rare southern assassin poison. Unless they get out quick, a patrol of ten guards will find them and they’ll be charged with murder. Presumably they’ll still be suspects #1 even if they flee that evening. 241: City Guards, Part 3 of 3 Everything having gone exactly as the card designers planned, the PCs are wanted for murder. Their descriptions are being spread around town, unless they killed all the guards in the previous part. The card suggests that they can try to climb a city wall to get out of town; it’s not too heavily guarded and they have a reasonable chance of making it out. Alternatively, they can try to investigate. “They can question a subdued guard, possibly even the murder victim.” (#D&D) Or they can use guild contacts, or whatever. They’ll learn that the guard and the captain “have argued frequently” (about what?). Confronting the captain won’t do any good, but they’ll find a vial of poison hidden in his chair leg if they search his office. So presumably the captain murdered that guard because he.. knew something? About something? These cards really want to be a whole (railroady) adventure, but there’s just not enough there. Pass. 242: I Dare You While they’re relaxing in a strangely egalitarian tavern or inn (which includes “laborers, guardsmen, a few nobles, and more than a few adventurers”), the best fighter among the PCs is challenged by Hern Trollsfoe, another fighter equally as well-known as them. He’s trying to shore up his own reputation as the best around. He’ll accept a non-fatal duel, or one to the death. His stats are “a virtual carbon-copy” of the PC’s, but one level higher, with the same HP, and without their magic weapons. There’s an EXP reward if the fighter wins, and there’s the chance to win a couple hundred GP by wagering on the side. If the PC declines, he is roundly mocked by the patrons... specifically, with the “Brave Sir Robin” song from Monty Python and the Holy Grail (with the PC’s name inserted, of course.)  Anyway, two fighters hacking at each other is pretty dang boring in D&D, but I guess it helps sell the idea that the PCs are making a name for themselves? Keep and maybe come up with some quick rules to determine who wins that aren’t “full combat to 0 HP.” 243: A Lovely Sea Voyage In a port town/city, the PCs are targeted by crimps trying to kidnap them to serve on Captain Griling’s viking-style longship. They try to drink the PCs into unconsciousness, claiming it’s payday and offering to buy. (There’s a briefly-described subsystem here involving Constitution rolls and four states of intoxication). People who refuse to party are jumped at the first opportunity, and beaten with sticks. I always question this kind of encounter being aimed at a stereotypical D&D adventuring party. Who looks at a burly, heavily-armored dwarf warrior, an elven priest proudly bearing the symbol of the Goddess of Justice, a frail sorcerer, and a 60-pound halfling and thinks “yes, those look like good, unproblematic people to get drunk and enslave for hard labor”? I suppose it’s okay to keep, if I'm ready to do the improv necessary for when the PCs assault Captain Griling's ship to deliver a righteous rear end-kicking. Honestly if I was going to do it, I might have the kidnappers focus their attention on some hapless NPCs rather than the seems-like-trouble PCs.
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Aug 25, 2020 17:58
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 Chapter 7: Adventures in Morden; Conclusion Anyway, Chapter 7 rounds off the book with GM advice, some okay hooks, and a substantial story arc with enough adventures to cover several sessions but not enough to structure an entire campaign around. I won’t cover the last two, since I’d say they fall under “things you should buy the book to read”, and most of the GM advice has already come up elsewhere in the review. All that’s left is a note that Accursed are balanced against humans enough to make mixed parties (  ), the backer list (because of course this was a Kickstarter thing), and that’s that.You know, funny thing is, I wanted to think of something to say about this book that I haven’t already said, but I think I’ve covered most of it. If I had to summarize Accursed, I’d call it exactly the sum of its parts. It has its own intriguing setting, movie monsters as PCs, Savage Worlds mechanics, interesting villains and monsters… It all stands alone well enough, but while none of its parts seriously detract from each other, they don’t gel, either. It feels a bit disjointed, like all of its ideas were spilled out onto the page and had some cursory editing done to make it fit together (and towards the end that editing got ESPECIALLY cursory). Even the little booklets that serve as sourcebooks just add more of the same in every manner.  I’ve seen some discussion in this thread comparing Accursed to WoD positively, and I can see that. Its relative brevity keeps it from committing a lot of the mistakes WoD did and the Fate Track is more concrete than going after Gehenna and whatever. It looks like I made this game look good, and I’m glad, because it’s a solid game. But internally it doesn’t have the thematic pull that WoD lines bring to the table or the mechanical diversity it would need to stand out in the market. Accursed contains the seeds of something truly excellent – a standout setting, interesting classes, a unique morality stat. But the setting, while unique in its technological spread and situation, lacks enough inbuilt hooks to get players invested in the lands they protect; the Witchbreeds, while conceptually interesting, suffer from uneven development and don’t always stand out; and the Morality Stat, the Fate Track, is deeply unbalanced in a way that undermines its mission. From what I’ve been able to glean between that interview and other research, it looks like the guy behind this game did exactly that – he poured his ideas out onto paper and threw in enough editing to get it to kind of cohere. I really liked these ideas when I first read the book through, but looking at it critically, they don’t really add up to anything special. This is the sort of book you buy to cannibalize, and if it’s on sale you probably should if what you read sounds interesting. It’s a deeply creative book, but one that fell flat when it came to execution, enough to prevent it from being truly great. But… eh. It’s a very B+ book; doesn’t have the spark to get an A, more than competent enough to avoid a C.  Ah well, review over. Next time I’ll do Chicago monopoly. I’ve mostly finished at the first post already and over half of it is me ranting about local food.
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Aug 25, 2020 19:03
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Hey, a B+ is a pretty good grade in the end. It certainly sounds like a fun game that might be something I'd enjoy messing with.
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Aug 25, 2020 19:10
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I like the idea behind Accursed and the game does what appears to be a good job of mixing the different monster classes together, despite I'm sure a few exceptions. Also, yeah I like nwod too and I definitely think it's gotten better over the years, but the morality mechanics were never the strong point and Acceptance vs. Defiance seems a better implementation.
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Aug 25, 2020 20:17
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Night10194 posted:Hey, a B+ is a pretty good grade in the end. It certainly sounds like a fun game that might be something I'd enjoy messing with. Yeah, I've done a lot and had fun with, like, way lower grade stuff. Accursed seems pretty all right.
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Aug 25, 2020 20:18
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It's not something that appeals to me personally but major kudos for keeping the whole thing solid and simple unlike just about every system that's built for playing monsters.
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Aug 25, 2020 20:38
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Hey, I'll take a B+. I've gotten worse grades for better work.
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Aug 25, 2020 20:57
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CroatianAlzheimers posted:Hey, I'll take a B+. I've gotten worse grades for better work. How could you leave the lucrative world of tabletop RPGs behind?
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Aug 25, 2020 21:11
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LeSquide posted:How could you leave the lucrative world of tabletop RPGs behind? I mean, when the work was there I made good money. If it'd been more consistent I wouldn't have left. Well, probably. By the end I was pretty sick of nerds.
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Aug 25, 2020 21:13
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CroatianAlzheimers posted:By the end I was pretty sick of nerds. I've got some bad news about this thread
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Aug 25, 2020 22:01
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MOTHERSHIP PLAYER’S SURVIVAL GUIDE - Part 6: Mercenaries It’s time for more Mothership. In this post, we’ll cover mercenaries. A mercenary is an NPC crew member you hire for your adventures. Like hirelings in other OSR games. MERCENARIES’ STATS The NPC stat block in Mothership is simplified, compared to the one the players use.
There’s a card for mercenaries that allows you to record stats for a whole crew of NPCs.  There’s also a blank version, but this one was a .png I could strip out of the PDF PAYMENT Mercenaries get a signing bonus when you hire them, followed by a monthly salary. The book mentions they might negotiate shares of the profits in addition to this. Signing bonuses range from 40 to 2,000, with monthly salaries ranging from 100 to 8,000. I have no idea if these prices are reasonable or not, because the game has no treasure tables, no rules for salvaging things for money, and no indication of how much a job taken from a client should pay. HIRING MERCENARIES Hiring mercenaries is done with an Intellect roll, modified by the terms of the agreement.  An average Scientist player character hiring mercenaries under the best possible circumstances (not dangerous, own quarters aboard ship, giving them a share of the treasure, hiring four or more, hiring for a month or more) has a 55% chance of successfully hiring mercenaries. Anyone else has significantly worse odds. The book softens the blow by allowing the players to offer “additional remuneration” to get the mercenaries on board. EXAMPLE MERCENARIES The game offers twenty stat blocks for mercenaries, ranging from Pilots to Researchers to Marines to Priests. Most of them come with the same equipment packages as the players, to streamline things. NPC Marines get the Exterminator loadout, NPC Asteroid Miners get the Excavation loadout, etc. There are a lot of scientists listed by research specialty, from Archaeologists to Sophontologists. Not every specialty is covered, but it’s easy to use this section as a template to make other NPCs by just picking the closest pregen and swapping out the skills. MERCENARY EXPERIENCE Mercenaries can level up, but at a rate slower than the player characters - they get 1 XP per session survived, compared to the players’ 10. We’ll come back to earned XP later. The book mentions that you can use mercenaries as backup player characters, rolling them up with a full stat block when you “adopt” them. MERCENARIES IN COMBAT Mercenaries always go last in the turn order. They’re either controlled by the player who hired them, or by the Warden. SCUM If you fail to recruit mercenaries through an Intellect test, the Warden has the option of offering you Scum instead. These are cheap (100 credits up front, 200 a month), have garbage stats (15 Instinct, 15 Combat, 3D10 Loyalty, though the game doesn’t tell you how many hits they can take), and a collection of obnoxious character traits. There are ten of them, so let’s roll 3D10 and see who we come up with. Mothership, Page 23 posted:
MERCENARY MOTIVATIONS For each mercenary, the Warden has the option to roll a D100 on a secret backstory table, to find out why the mercenary agreed to join the players’ crew. There’s a 50% chance of an innocuous reason, a 31% chance they’re secretly looking for someone, and a 19% chance of a reason that poses a danger to the players. Let’s roll 3D100 and see what motivations we get:
 THOUGHTS ON MERCENARIES This section is weird. The amount of detail and page space makes it clear that hiring NPC crew is intended to be an important part of the game. But the game does not give the players a good chance to do so mechanically, nor a compelling reason. I’ve read a handful of modules for Mothership (Ypsilon 14, Dead Planet, Pound of Flesh) and none of them assume the players have mercenaries as part of their framing. The vast majority of the mercenaries on-offer are not helpful. Some of them have special skills like Piloting or Gunnery, which you might think would be great if your group doesn’t have those. But remember that mercenaries are built using a simplified version of the chargen rules. They only have Instinct, Combat and a couple Skills. The Pilot has 25 Instinct and the Piloting skill, which adds an extra 10% for an effective total of 35%. That’s only 5% better than the average player character’s Speed score, which is what’s used for flying ships. The Doctor has a similarly miserable 35% effective First Aid, a whopping 5% better than the average player’s Intellect score. Combined with the high cost of hiring these jokers, the poor stats call into question why they’re in the game at all. Why would I hire a Captain? Why would I pay a guy 8,000 credits to tell me what to do and fly the ship 50% of the time? A player character can do all that stuff for free. The book gives the example of hiring a Captain if you hire a group of Teamsters, but why would I hire a group of Teamsters? First of all, there’s not actually an NPC Teamster stat block. And second, there’s already a player character Teamster that’s better in every way. There’s nothing in the book that requires large numbers of crew, and a couple big things that punish it (which we’ll cover when we talk about space ships). The one thing I can see players actually buying in bulk (or at all) is NPC Marines, who can action-economy the enemy to death through weight of numbers. The one mercenary that has something you absolutely need, and might not have among the PCs, is the Android. Androids are necessary for Faster Than Light travel because they’re the only ones who can stay awake during an FTL jump without going insane. Everyone else has to sleep in the cryocaps. We’ll discuss this more when we get to the section on ships and space travel. But for now, hiring an Android requires an advance payment of 1,000, and a salary of 5,000. A literal character tax in order to play the game. Speaking of going insane, next post will be the much awaited Stress and Panic system.
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Aug 25, 2020 22:43
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The first time I ever felt like a Chicagoan was when I learned that some adults still put ketchup on their hotdogs. Like, I felt actual, visceral disgust. That’s the sort of poo poo you wean children off of before they hit double digits, why would you do that as an adult? What the gently caress? What is wrong with you? I found this creature in my basement cleaning it out a few days ago. I couldn’t honestly tell you where it came from. Did my family buy it out of some misplaced sense of communal pride? We clearly opened it, since it was out of the plastic and everything was scattered around inside. It was lovely Chicago monopoly, I can’t imagine us playing it. But I decided to review it, and so I goddamn shall. Chicago-in-a-Box: Chapter 1 Issue is? No rulebook. Either we lost it or whoever printed this didn’t bother including it since they figured nobody cared enough to play it. But that’s uncharitable, so I’ll stick with the first conclusion. Now, if there WAS a rulebook it probably contained details on the city-specific stuff scattered through the game, but, well, it isn’t there. So as not only a proud Chicagoan, but one with a degree they earned in part through knowledge of the town’s history, I’ll make it my sacred duty to guide you through the culture and history of our  [Obligatory warning about low quality hand-taken photos here.] This is the board. It is a Monopoly board . Contingency orange cards up there are just boring mechanical stuff, but the green cards (“Big Fun!”) have stuff I will cover. Worth noting: I’ll mostly limit myself to stuff I’m familiar with, but I’ll make a note of things I missed later on.Another note: I’m probably going to miss things I shouldn’t as the review progresses. Chicago is an enormous and spectacularly diverse city, even compared to others, and I’ll get into why that happened later; I’ll definitely attribute something incorrectly. If you spot anything, feel free to yell at me about it, because what could be more Chicagoan?  The player pieces, of course. Each of them references something specific about our city. Clockwise from bottom left: Star: our city flag is the most marketable in the US. We are very proud of this, we slap it on everything. It stars represent important historical events and, in spite of what this piece looks like, they all have six points with (theoretically) their own meanings:
The Catcher’s Mitt: oh man, is baseball a thing here. I mean, organized sports is a thing everywhere, but baseball is a symbol of our culture and history no other sport can match. I mean, people love the Bears and the Bulls, but not like they identify with our teams. The Cubbies represent the north side of the city and the White Sox represent the south side, though there is some overlap; I grew up on the north side and had one friend who was a White Sox fan. Just one. Pretzel: of all the food you could take to represent Chicago, why on earth would you choose the pretzel? I mean, pretzels are a thing here, but compared to other options it’s nothing. We take our food seriously. You can tell whoever designed this wasn’t a Chicagoan because they only brought up food here and in one Big Fun! card. gently caress that, have an essay on a few local standouts:
Yeah, uh, I think I’ll make this one shorter than it could be, because if I tried to cover the rest of the pieces here it might double in length. Next time I’ll polish off the pieces (including the piece) and move on to the actual board. Falconier111 fucked around with this message at 01:27 on Aug 26, 2020 |
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Aug 26, 2020 01:21
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(except for the last one).
. The proper hot dog is a Vienna beef on a poppyseed bun with mustard, chopped onions, relish, a couple sport peppers, a dill pickle spear, and a bit of celery salt, preferably cooked over charcoal (they call it a chardog). According to Wikipedia you should add sliced tomatoes, but I’ve never seen that happen in person 
. You don’t have to include all of that, though, you can eat it plain just fine, just no ketchup you filthy loving barbarian. You won’t lose friendships over it or anything, but if you order ketchup on a hot dog in a Chicagoan’s sight you will be openly and continuously mocked. Chardogs, good as they can be, pale in comparison to their superior cousin, the Polish sausage (usually just called a polish); it’s meatier, thicker, has a tougher casing, and goes excellently with spicy deli mustard and a pickle spear. I order nothing else if I’m in the mood for a dog. If you want something even bigger with a more porky flavor, you can get a kielbasa, but it’s a specific taste some people enjoy and some absolutely don’t.
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Nice to know New Yorkers aren't the only people who take widely available dishes and try to recast them as some exotic local specialty, then violently object to others enjoying them the "wrong way"
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Aug 26, 2020 01:34
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Falconier111 posted:
Fun fact: even if the restaurant isn’t run by a member of the Unification Church they probably buy their fish from there. True World Food supplies fish to the overwhelming majority of sushi restaurants in the continental US.
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Aug 26, 2020 01:47
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Going to be disappointed when Chicago Monopoly doesn't have the option to upgrade your hotels into murder castles.
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Aug 26, 2020 02:06
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I feel like if most of the people I know played this, they'd kick off the monopoly shitstorm by arguing over who got to be the tommy gun.
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Aug 26, 2020 02:20
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Chernobyl Peace Prize posted:Going to be disappointed when Chicago Monopoly doesn't have the option to upgrade your hotels into murder castles. [Jim Butcher is bad at research]I want to upgrade Wrigley Field by adding a huge parking lot to it[/Jim Butcher is bad at research].
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Aug 26, 2020 02:53
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...This is kind of humiliating, but I’d rather admit my faults and fix them rather than fake it and fall on my rear end: does anyone know what that heart stands for, if anything? That specific shape rings a bell but for the life of me I can’t find any information on it  Chernobyl Peace Prize posted:Going to be disappointed when Chicago Monopoly doesn't have the option to upgrade your hotels into murder castles. You just upgrade your hotels into keys to the city. I wont be covering them because they are personified
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Aug 26, 2020 03:10
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Falconier111 posted:...This is kind of humiliating, but I’d rather admit my faults and fix them rather than fake it and fall on my rear end: does anyone know what that heart stands for, if anything? That specific shape rings a bell but for the life of me I can’t find any information on it
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Aug 26, 2020 03:13
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Thoughts of Darkness, the end This is the last update and it'll be a short one because there's not much more to say. In the last segment we rescued Annitella, Drassak, and the rod of houtras. Drassak immediately takes charge of the party and commands that we need to break into the High Master's personal library and rip up the manual of the Apparatus. Even though the Apparatus just exploded he wants to be certain no one can ever rebuild it. After that we'll try to finish off both the High Master and the elder brain of Bluetspur. Before we go on our merry way Drassak at least proves his leadership potential by full healing the party and using his own psychic powers to remove brain-washing or madness from any party members. Maybe he's not so bad after all. We head over to the High Master's personal cave and wonder what's the worst that could happen? There are no NPCs left to gently caress with us and the mind flayer second in command('s body) is leading us so the slaves and mind flayers should leave us alone so this should be easy going right? Wrong. We come across a trap that just oozes signs of being some DM's personal gently caress-you to their players. The trap even has a name "The Pit of Cold Death" so you can tell the author was really jacking off over getting to use his trap. The Pit of Cold Death begins with your PCs walking through a hallway that slopes downward, ahead of you is a regular pit filled with water, as you get close an ice storm triggers and you slide down into the pit of water, once you're in the water a cone of cold triggers and freezes the water solid with you inside it (as well as inflicting 12d4+12 cold damage to anyone hit by the spell). Any unfortunates trapped in this oversized ice cube tray have Constitution score / 3 rounds to get out before they die from drowning. Okay, now obviously there are a lot of ways to get out of this trap or circumvent it. In fact, the pit isn't even disguised in any fashion so you can clearly see it before you get close and ask yourself if something is wrong. A basic detect magic will reveal the contingency spells that trigger the trap, but why is this here? We're about five seconds away from the big boss fight that will end this adventure and the writer just tosses in a death trap. The only reason we're even going towards the trap is because the plot NPC has his own mission and commands us to go through with this so he can steal a book. This is bullshit. Fortunately, this trap is the only encounter and once you're done with that you can loot the High Master's study for a cache of diamonds and fine tapestries (total value of 50,000gp) which is about the only treasure you'll find in this dungeon. On to the final showdown. With all the NPC missions completed you can go fight the elder brain. Drassak commands the party to get ready and then he teleports the whole party to the lair of the elder brain, approximately one mile below the surface of Bluetspur. As soon as you teleport into its home the elder brain is ready to throw down - if the High Master's plan was to join the elder brain's spawning pool and vampirically drain its power and makes himself the new master of Bluetspur it didn't work* because the elder brain is strong as gently caress. All PCs immediately make save vs. spells at -10 (not a typo). Failure means a voice in your head commands you to kill yourselves and PCs immediately attack themselves with their strongest melee attacks, automatically hitting. The DM is instructed to read some smarmy bullshit about the irony of surviving this far only to perish by your hand. After two rounds of self-harm Drassak has the wherewithal to combine his psychic powers with the artifact-level plot device rod of houtras and he begins to generate a static field that blocks the elder brain's powers. Okay, now we get to the final fight? Yes, but not for you. Drassak wrestles with the elder brain and calls on the PCs to protect him against the slaves of the elder brain - that's what you'll be fighting instead. Twenty drow fighters (15th level), eight drow wizards (16th level), 5 mind flayers, and 5 mind flayer mages (8th level). The difference between the difficulty of the drow and the mind flayers is absurb. Drow mages are 16th level wizards with a full spread of battle spells and magic gear so juiced up they have a -5 AC. On the other hand, mind flayer wizards are 8th level wizards and have an AC of 5 which is a full 10 points higher than their elven counterparts. The only advantage the mind flayers have is slightly more hp. Oh, yeah, Bonespur is here to if you didn't kill him already. No idea why. I guess the author just really likes this guy - why else would have to fight him six times in this adventure? *This is actually because the elder brain knew about the plan the entire time and allowed it happen as part of its own amusement. Just to give you an idea of how insignificant the PCs are in the final battle the elder brain doesn't even have stats. If you attack the elder brain you can only do so while safely behind the barrier created by Drassak and it's completely irrelevant to the fight. If you go anywhere near the elder brain it dominates you (automatically) and you're devoured by illithid tadpoles. Instant death, no save. You have to survive for 1d4+3 rounds, after this the elder brain shatters the barrier created by the rod of houtras and you become dominated again causing you to attacking yourselves. Drassak then takes his final (and also his only) action in the fight. He rushes toward the elder brain and leaps on top of it, staking it with the rod. There's a flash of light, an explosion, and when you can see again you're on the surface of Bluetspur. All of the NPCs from before, except the elder brain, are with you and Drassak is down. Also it's night time. For the next four rounds the PCs are pummeled with lightning bolts that do 8d6 damage on a failed save vs. wands and half that on a successful save. Given that they're in a loving death trap the NPCs all immediately scatter and decide not to fight unless you force them to. After four rounds the lightning stops as dawn breaks. As this happens the module has the audacity to suggest that if the PCs are still fit enough to fight that the DM ambushes them with five vampire mind-flayers. No reason why, they just here to fight you. Vampire illithids have the usual mind flayer psionic blast, but stronger so you take a -4 penalty on the save. They also have four attacks a round that drain two levels on a successful hit. Okay, so, you just survived like thirty higher level drow, ten mind flayers, an elder brain, a lightning storm, and five vampire mind flayers all in a row. That's it. Game over. Drassak is dead, the rod of houtras is .. missing? There is literally no mention of what happens to the rod after Drassak tries to stake the elder brain with it, and Annitella mourns her dead boy friend. She resists any attempts to resurrect him or fix her mutant shape and instead you can finally leave Bluetspur having accomplished absolutely nothing. This is supposed to be what Ravenloft considers a high-level adventure. A story with no deviation from the track and no relevance to the PCs who are, at best, side characters for NPCs. The entire adventure is filled with antagonistic DMing, arbitrary mechanics designed to cripple your characters' ability to utilize their at-level abilities, and contrived ambushes dictated by teleporting enemies who sneer at your insignificance. Everyone has failed to accomplish their goals, even the NPCs. Annitella failed to rescue her love and his rod, Drassak failed to defeat the elder brain - instead only wounding it, Lyssa von Zarovich failed to usurp Strahd (actually she might have come the closest to succeeding given that she did create the vampire illithids), and the High Master failed to eat the elder brain and take its place. Most of all the players failed to impact any of this. If this adventure is supposed to fill in the question of "What do I do with Bluetspur, the mind flayer domain?" then the answer is: Nothing. You do nothing with it.
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Aug 26, 2020 05:05
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...and then all the players take turns giving the GM a swirlie for wasting their time for like a month.
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Aug 26, 2020 05:12
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Everyone posted:[Jim Butcher is bad at research]I want to upgrade Wrigley Field by adding a huge parking lot to it[/Jim Butcher is bad at research].
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Aug 26, 2020 05:32
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NGDBSS posted:What's going on here? It's been years since I stopped paying attention to Dresden Files stuff and I don't remember that bit. And I've never been to Chicago except for the airport. In one of his books Butcher put a massive parking lot next to Wrigley, in defiance of all reality. People still give him a hard time for it.
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Aug 26, 2020 05:38
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Falconier111 posted:The first time I ever felt like a Chicagoan was when I learned that some adults still put ketchup on their hotdogs. Like, I felt actual, visceral disgust. That’s the sort of poo poo you wean children off of before they hit double digits, why would you do that as an adult? What the gently caress? What is wrong with you? I've seen what Chicagonians put on a hot dog and the ketchup thing is some real "loading stones into an automatic baseball pitcher and firing randomly through my glass house" poo poo.
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Aug 26, 2020 06:04
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Dallbun posted:230: Little Knowledge It's just that Fallout 3 quest about helping fill out a survival guide. Cythereal posted:Reminds me of Valley of Dust and Fire over in Dark Sun. Almost impossible to get there, nothing you really can do once you get there, and most of the description of the big bad is 'And here's how he cheats to counter anything the PCs might try.' I loving hate this kind of adventure design, since I'm sure that the dev feels very smug about being able to defeat the PCs while having the power of God in his hands and thus being able to do anything in the setting*, and because there's bound to be at least two smug grogs that will say "AKSHALLEE, it's a test for true gamers, and if you don't like it, you're a babby casual" *seriously, it's almost like being smug that you're outwitting/overpowering the characters in a book that you're writing.
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Aug 26, 2020 06:51
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mellonbread posted:Nice to know New Yorkers aren't the only people who take widely available dishes and try to recast them as some exotic local specialty, then violently object to others enjoying them the "wrong way" which isn't much because I don't like hot dogs 8one6 posted:I've seen what Chicagonians put on a hot dog and the ketchup thing is some real "loading stones into an automatic baseball pitcher and firing randomly through my glass house" poo poo.
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Aug 26, 2020 07:13
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Zereth posted:I will put whatever I want on my hot dog. Isn't the whole point of all those different strongly favored condiments to destroy the taste because hot dogs are pretty much made from the gross/garbage meats? "Hey Steve, what should I do with all these pig anuses?" "Just stick 'em in the hot dog maker. With all the crap people slather on those things nobody'll even notice."
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Aug 26, 2020 08:32
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  Chapter 5: Casting Spells and Other Enchantments Earlier Edits: For those reading along, I wanted to mention that I overlooked one little thing regarding equipment. The rules proper show up in Chapter 6, but heavy crossbows and firearms dispense with the need for a regular attack roll. Instead, the marksman saves against their Dexterity score, or half their score if the target is taking the dodge action, is behind cover, or is more than 50 feet away. If successfully saved, damage is applied normally. This means that such weapons are still useful besides the classic bow option, particularly if the wielder has a very high Dexterity score and the enemy is otherwise hard to hit due to a high Armour Rating. From spells to magic items, this chapter covers all things magical in the world of the Nightmares Underneath. The spells which mortals can cast are in fact sapient formless beings from the distant realm of magic, and desire to be used as such. There are other forms of magic beyond that which is known (aka the stuff monsters and NPCs can do), but PC-friendly magic functions under a set of commonly-known rules. All (non-divine) mages make use of spellbooks which contain all of their known spells, and its presence is required when in the process of purifying corrupted spells. Spellbooks come in all shapes and sizes, but ones made by Chaotic casters tend to have unsettling supernatural tinges to their foundation (weighs too heavy for an object of its mass and material, throbs when touched, written in human blood, etc) while ones made by Lawful casters are often scientific, formal, and beautiful works of art treated with care. But their universal feature is containing a collection of written formulas, usually a number equal to caster level for the tomes of NPCs. Divine casters, meanwhile, have no need for such things but typically have holy symbols which aren’t strictly necessary but often carried out of a sense of obligation. Characters with a relevant Profession and/or subclass automatically learn new spells as they level, chosen randomly, but can choose for a specific spell if they have a spell formula on hand of the desired spell or can find and pay a mentor willing to teach them a specific spell. Spells in TNU are similar to that of other OSR/D&D games, but with a few exceptions. One, barring the exception of Champions of Chaos, there are no class-specific spell restrictions. Second, spells are not limited to a Vancian per-day formula, and casters can cast spells of any level. While mages can theoretically be cast an infinite amount of times per day, every attempt they must make a save against their casting attribute, known as Controlling a spell (half their score if casting a spell of higher level than their own level). Spells that are miscast have a d8 table of general unintended consequences: they’re cast on a different target, the spell has the opposite effect, is cast at half power, etc. Furthemore, knowledge of that spell becomes corrupted, meaning that every time the caster casts it again they take 1d4 damage to a random attribute score, to a minimum of 0.* Corrupted spells can be purified in hours or days,** representing meditation, consulting occult matrices. In short, casting spells can take a potential toll on the caster’s mind and body, and higher-level spells are more difficult to control and purify. *which typically means falling unconscious, becoming invalid, or death in the case of Health. **the duration being longer for spells higher than one’s level. Edition Changes: In 1st Edition, the Vancian system was still in place. Spells cast normally due to one’s Profession were limited in how many spells they could memorize to cast per day, and were ‘prepared’ via a ritual lasting 1d4 hours. The maximum amount being the caster’s level plus their Intelligence modifier. Once a spell is cast this way, it is gone from the caster’s memory, much like typical D&D mages. Additionally, scholars and wizards used to have the ability to learn new spells from formula via reverse-engineering it and paying time and money in research. Now in 2nd Edition they have to wait until their level-up just like everyone else. Another addition to 2e includes a new miscasting table pertaining specifically to spells involving spirits: that dearly departed ancestor you planned on contacting may instead bring a demon’s attention! Spells can also be cast from formulas, which are akin to scrolls in being magical written text and anyone can cast from them, although they also have chances of miscasting and corruption (the formula itself becomes corrupted). The third way that spells can be cast is as rituals, which can be done normally or via a formula. The spell takes a number of hours per spell level to finish casting, but can never be corrupted as a result of being cast this way, and having assistants equal to spell level grants advantage on the save to control it. The arcane/divine division still exists in TNU, albeit the divine option is presented as an optional ruleset that all classes (even scholars) can choose. The text doesn’t outright state it, but heavily implies that you cannot be Lawful when the source of your magic comes from an otherworldly patron*. Said patron can be a deity in the traditional sense, but can also cover spirits of various kinds, demons, lovecraftian entities, and so on. Being a divine caster comes with benefits and drawbacks: on the downside said caster cannot create or learn from spell formulas** and they can only give consumable magic items to people in service to their patron. But on the plus side they gain advantage on controlling spells when casting rituals and auto-succeed on said attempt if they have a number of assistants who worship or are allied to said patron equal to the spell level. Additionally they can delay the effects of attribute damage from corrupted spells while performing tasks and quests given to them by their patron; the damage comes all at once after the caster completes or defies said task. They also don’t use spellbooks, and instead have holy symbols or sacred texts which are tangential to the need to work their magic. *Edition Changes: 1st Edition was explicit under the hindrances list. **but can still cast them while reading aloud. As there is no “save vs spells” in TNU, all six attributes are used: Dexterity for when swiftness is in order; Health for resisting necromancy, disease, and the like; Willpower to avoid enchantment and involuntary shapeshifting, and so on. Ferocity is even used, to break out of magical bindings or avoid incapacitation by such things which sounds rather limiting in scope. Furthermore, characters who are under the effect of an enchantment have various means of ending it beyond just waiting out the duration and saving throw: a variety of options are given, such as being confronted with direct evidence contradicting the spell’s reality, applying anti-magic substances to oneself, voluntary possession by a spirit antithetical to the enchantment’s nature, etc.  Spells and Spell Schools There are 100 spells and 10 schools of magic in the Nightmares Underneath. For the sake of brevity I’m not going to cover each one, instead covering the broad diversity of choices by school. We have quite a bit of iconic D&D options (Charm Person, Detect Magic, Magic Missile, etc) but also a few familiar entries have interesting twists: Protection from Evil, for example, doesn’t provide a static bonus vs. a being of Evil alignment but rather imposes disadvantage on all forms of intentional harm directed against the caster. Edition Changes: Generic spell descriptors such as duration, effect, & range are much more detailed, with their own entries and typical designations on what they plausibly cover. In the case of Range’s example, Infinite denotes no limitations on distance, Senses means being able to see, hear, touch, or otherwise reliably detect the target, etc. Additionally, some spells have an additional sentence or two in clarifying previously-vague territory or have been altered to be more or less powerful. School of Battle is more about improving one’s ability to inflict and resist violence as opposed to direct damage spells. Its spells include effects such as granting a single weapon (or entire squad) advantage on attack rolls, allow a weapon to strike targets as though they were unarmoured, grant immunity to non-magical projectile weapons, the ability to manifest and throw eldritch darts, and so on. It’s a very good school on account that even its lower-level spells can make a big difference in the party’s ability to harm the opposition. School of Divination lets the caster know about things they wouldn’t or shouldn’t It includes limited scrying (only locations the caster knows to exist or an unknown place beyond a door they know of), the ability to detect evil intentions rather than the alignment itself, the ability to detect poisonous items, creatures and poison in a person’s system, the ability to detect traps which include natural hazards and shoddy construction provided that someone is intentionally planning to use said hazards against others, the ability to detect the corruptive influence of nightmares and those tainted by them, among other things. Divination is another solid choice, and has a lot of utility depending on how the caster makes use of it. School of Enchantment includes spells that affect one’s emotional state. It includes the classic Charm Animal/Person/Monster array (which all end immediately if the caster betrays the target), the ability to instill fear in a target, grant immunity to all forms of fear, and can allow a target to re-roll their Disposition or Psychic Armour (or add Caster Level to current Disposition is the result is lower), and force a target to tell the truth and they cannot choose to remain silent if engaged in conversation, as but a few options. I do have to like that the “restore hit points” spell is enchantment rather than healing, although the School of Healing covers attribute loss and proper Wounds. School of Evocation covers the creation of things, but unlike summoning (which mostly creates sapient beings) evocation focuses on items and energy. It includes the obvious blasty holdovers like throwing magic missiles, rainbows that deal random energy damage, and spraying acid at targets, but also includes spells that can create bridges and inanimate objects, a pair of ghostly hands to safely touch things at a distance, and the ability to make a touched object shine (which the caster can choose to make permanent until dispelled if desired).* It’s a good mixture of offensive and utility effects, although the results feel a bit unfocused in comparison to other schools. *a massive boon considering that infravision/darkvision isn’t really a thing PCs can get barring an appropriate magic item, and most nightmare incursions are dark and dreadful places. School of Healing focuses on purging maladies from the body and soul. It’s purely a defensive school, containing spells that can heal wounds, regenerate lost body parts, cure instantaneously and make said target immune to a specific disease for a year, remove non-magical poisons and other impurities from food and drink, restore someone’s Disposition at a cost to the caster’s own, and even raise the dead but no more than 1 day/caster level! This school is always a solid choice. School of Illusion confounds the senses much like Enchantment confounds the mind. In addition to the detection and creation of illusions of various sizes and senses, the school also contains a renamed Mirror Image (Duplicate Images), the ability to blow itchy, sticky, or blinding faerie dust over an area, making an object appear more valuable than it really is, the ability to send a message (words, images, or even emotions) to a known person or location regardless of distance, and of course the vaunted invisibility which lasts until the affected target commits a harmful attack/spell or has said spell dispelled. Illusion is broadly useful in utility, although unlike D&D none of the options have a Phantasmal Killer style effect that causes damage from sensory shock. It’s a purely utility school, but a strong one. School of Law relates to holiness and the protection of others from malign influences. A surprising amount of spells involve the immobilization of targets, whether it be summoning constricting chains or the Immobilize Animal/Monster/Person chain of spells. It is notable for having one of the few 9th level spells in the book, Forlorn Encystment, which imprisons a target in a time-frozen prison deep within the earth. Its other spells include a selective multi-target dispel magic centered on the caster, and Protection from Chaos/Evil.* But its most broadly useful spell is the creation of Holy Water: with one flask per caster level created, this sacred liquid can harm nightmare, undead, and non-lawful and non-good extraplanar creatures. But that’s not all! It can give advantage on saves to control spells if used as a consumable in the casting of a spell! School of Law is all over the place; a good amount of its spells involve restricting a target’s mobility in some way, and two protect the target from harm. Holy Water is perhaps the most broadly useful, as advantage on controlling checks is a very strong option for any spellcaster no matter their specialization. *The former imposes disadvantage/grants the affected target advantage on beings of Chaotic alignment, a rather odd feature in comparison to Protection from Evil which is ‘intent not alignment’ in function. School of Quintessence is a peculiar school. In post-AD&D terms it would be known as ‘metamagic,’ as it pertains and relates to the enhancing of existing spells. As such a caster who knows spells only from this school is of limited use in a proper campaign, a PC whose spell options are only Quintessence can reroll their results. Quintessence spells are often cast as part of, before, or after a spell of another school is cast. Quintessence’s options range in effects from being able to ignore range restrictions when using objects that were part of or have significance to the target, can have a spell trigger later based upon a contingent event, the ability to counterspell magic afflicted upon the caster, the ever-useful Dispel Magic, and the ability to double a spell’s area/duration/damage/etc in exchange for suffering 1d4 attribute score damage. Quintessence’s usefulness widely depends upon the spell array of a caster, but is quite broad in application. School of Summoning edges a bit into Evocation’s territory in that a few of its spells can create items, but are more restrictive: Create Food and Drink vs Evocation’s broader Create Object. But it’s strong suit is summoning NPC allies of various sorts to aid the caster. From the humble invisible servant who can also telepathically communicate with and fight to defend the caster, to elementals and a broad Summon Monster, the duration of said summons are often keyed to the relative power of the being. A steed to ride upon lasts for 1 hour per caster level, while elementals last for 1 turn.* Summon Monster lasts for 1d8 rounds or until the being completes an assigned task from the caster, whichever comes first. Summoned minions can be of variable level as well, depending on the spell in question. Given that action economy is a boon in just about every RPG with combat, and there’s no limit to how many summoned creatures a caster can have at once, it’s a very strong school. *10 minutes, a common descriptor in pre-3.0 and OSR games. School of Transformation involves the alteration of people and objects which already exist. It spells include the ability to transform non-magical items into other items of the same relative mass, allow the target the ability to effortlessly walk on walls and ceilings, cause two objects within sight to become strongly magnetized to each other, shapeshift into an animal and gain its features (but no bonus damage or venom), and make a creature suffer double damage against a specific source of harm. Transformation is a very good utility/buffing school, and has a nice “double damage” debuff which I expected to see under Battle. The animal shapechange ability is pretty good, and the “item-alteration” spells are instantaneous in duration meaning that they may as well be permanent. The only limit is the player’s imagination... and perhaps the laws of conservation of mass.  Magic Items Edition Changes: This entire section has been added in 2nd Edition. The 1st Edition section was a mere 1 page of brief guidelines. It wouldn’t be a proper retroclone without magic items for PCs to loot as treasure, and the Nightmares Underneath does not disappoint! The setting does have a few key differences than others: one, alignment-restricted magic items are strongly discouraged. They might grant a better bonus in the hands of a shared alignment, but ones which are practically nonmagical in anyone else’s hands aren’t really a thing in the Kingdom of Dreams. Secondly, while there aren’t Magic Item Marts, PCs are capable of crafting magic items to a limited extent. Formulas and spell containers specifically, the latter being a catch-all term for potion-like consumables. Casters need to spend a number of days or weeks (respectively) equal to the imbued spell’s level and pay a number of cyphers times the level depending on the quality of materials they have at hand. Outright permanent magical items cannot be crafted by the PCs, only found or taken. Edition Changes: Crafting magical formulas is much quicker in 2nd Edition, in days times the spell level rather than weeks. Although the Kingdoms of Dreams are making great strides in (arcane) magical research, the majority of magic items lay within the ruins of the Vale of Serpents. Even in such enlightened times most people assume that magic items in general are instruments of chaos, even if they’re not… ...which kind of makes the whole “go to court to earn the right to use forbidden magic” mini-game a lot more difficult and hindering of a game mechanic than it needs to be. There are six types of magic items. Arcane Accoutrements, which provide a +1 (or +2 for alignment-appropriate wielders) to various common rolls or attribute scores; Arcane Tools, which grant advantage to rolls related to the item’s purpose (weapons apply to attack and damage rolls, tools to saving throws for their related skills, etc); Charged Items which contain a spell within and can be cast/miscast and are recharged via obscure measures (buried in a grave, fed fresh blood in Wounds, submerged in expensive alchemical fluids, etc); Spell Formula, which are scrolls save that anyone can read and use them;* Spell Containers, which the creator “casts” ahead of time and whose effects (and miscast) takes effect once the imbiber makes use of it; and finally, Unique Magic Items, which are special enough to have a category all their own. *unless specifically encrypted via code. Unique Magic Items are a catch-all category for gear that are mostly either permanent in function or always-active barring a rare few exceptions. We have a d100 table of results, with instructions to cross out a result rolled and replace it with one of the GM’s own creation to ensure that each item is truly one-of-a-kind. I won’t go over all of them, but there’s quite a bit of cool entries such as: An amulet that can prevent Wounds via siphoning the wearer’s Willpower at a 1-1 rate. Plate mail which rings when struck, dealing damage to those who hit the wearer in melee. Incense which if smoked communally creates a telepathic bond among the users. A keffiyeh which if thrown over the top of the wearer transports them to the land of Faerie. A self-repairing orb which if broken can change the weather to that of the breaker’s choice. A life-draining horn which if blown can send violent vibrations that can destroy a wall or standing building. A portable kitchen in a box which compresses an entire meal’s worth of food into a highly-nourishing pellet. A flare gun whose noxious gas forces disadvantage on all rolls to those who breathe in its fumes. An animated suit of plate armor that can carry objects for the attuned wielder and instantly surround said wearer’s body via command. A waterskin perpetually full of water, but whose elemental spirit will be violently offended at not being drunk if used for other purposes. Thoughts So Far: The magic system of the Nightmares Underneath is both recognizable and quite different than the Vancian system to which most gamers are familiar. Still, I overall like the changes; getting rid of spells-per-day in favor of making casting inherently risky still places a limit preventing frivolous use of sorcery. Keying spell level to character level is a choice that I like, and wish base D&D did this rather than the confusing array used now: “Wait, so I need to be 5th level to cast 3rd level spells?!” The spell selection is broad and versatile, and there’s enough magic items to populate a campaign’s worth of dungeons for enterprising adventurers. I don’t have many criticisms or negative things to say about this chapter besides the public association of magic items in general with the forces of Chaos. Which seems a bit odd with the initial setting, which has anti-undead lightning rods in Geth and spell formula and containers being something casters in general can craft. Add the fact that scholars are a celebrated occupation who take well to magical knowledge, and one cannot help feel that the Nightmares Underneath is trying to have its cake and eat it, too. Join us next time as we get into the nitty-gritty of dungeon-delving and various rules in Chapter 6: Raiding the Nightmare Realms!
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Aug 26, 2020 08:35
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Everyone posted:Isn't the whole point of all those different strongly favored condiments to destroy the taste because hot dogs are pretty much made from the gross/garbage meats? That review posted:mustard, chopped onions, relish, a couple sport peppers, a dill pickle spear, and a bit of celery salt ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
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Aug 26, 2020 08:58
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mellonbread posted:Nice to know New Yorkers aren't the only people who take widely available dishes and try to recast them as some exotic local specialty, then violently object to others enjoying them the "wrong way"
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Aug 26, 2020 09:32
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At least when as per local tradition I soak my fries in vinegar, I know there's not much potato flavor that's getting covered up in the first place. That's part of the point of french fry condiments, to impart actual flavor to what's otherwise starch and cooking oil. Meanwhile weird hot dog variations exist all over. I'd probably try most of them if given the opportunity, because gently caress it why not! There's no one right way to cook nearly everything. (NB: 0 != 1)
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Aug 26, 2020 09:37
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