|
OtspIII posted:If one cofounder hosed over the other one in the past, that cofounder or their family needs to exist and have some info they're willing to give you for revenge, right? Otherwise, why even tell the GM? Maybe the opportunity is something the players need to pull on other threads to find, or maybe the book can just provide it as a "if the PCs start to flounder, you can use this to hook them back into the action", but if you can't think of a way it could be used in play it feels like a sign you should edit or cut it. Pretty much, yeah. That's the other issue with these histories, they don't really have many hooks in them when they should be more filled with evidence that investigators can use to understand what is happening or how things have changed. Beyond just being the author's personal table fiction.
|
#
?
Oct 15, 2021 05:57
|
|
|
|
| # ? Apr 24, 2024 20:29 |
|
|
megane posted:This ruins a lot of modern "Lovecraftian" poo poo for me; the whole point of the genre was inexplicable oddities that are horrific partly because they don't follow any pattern that humans can discern. Cthulhu isn't scary because he's big and has tentacles, he's scary because his existence suggests that the safe, reasonable, rational world we think we live in is a facade*. Now you can tell Nyarlathotep's about to show up because they start playing his theme music ahead of time. Also comes to mind how a lot of Lovecraft stories did keep in mind that the more familiar and detailed the gribbly monsters become the less scary they are, and so there'd often be an extra twist to them and hints of something that the monsters/aliens themselves fear and don't understand. Like the Yithians having been at war with semi-corporeal beings sealed under their city, the Elder Things fearing whatever is on the Plateau of Leng, and the guy on the plane seeing something out the window as they leave that drives him nuts after they've already dealt with a towering ancient acropolis, angles that don't conform to the laws of physics, Shoggoths and giant albino penguins.
|
|
#
?
Oct 15, 2021 06:21
|
|
|
Ghost Leviathan posted:Also comes to mind how a lot of Lovecraft stories did keep in mind that the more familiar and detailed the gribbly monsters become the less scary they are, and so there'd often be an extra twist to them and hints of something that the monsters/aliens themselves fear and don't understand. Like the Yithians having been at war with semi-corporeal beings sealed under their city, the Elder Things fearing whatever is on the Plateau of Leng, and the guy on the plane seeing something out the window as they leave that drives him nuts after they've already dealt with a towering ancient acropolis, angles that don't conform to the laws of physics, Shoggoths and giant albino penguins. The Yithians might be fighting Shoggoths (in The Shadow Out of Time) but much funnier is the fact that booby-trapped hatches are apparently an effective defense against whatever awful things they're fighting. To paraphrase how Graham Harman puts it, it's hard to remain in uncomprehending horror of something that's susceptible to the Home Alone style of defensive architecture.
|
|
#
?
Oct 15, 2021 06:25
|
|
|
Joe Slowboat posted:The Yithians might be fighting Shoggoths (in The Shadow Out of Time) but much funnier is the fact that booby-trapped hatches are apparently an effective defense against whatever awful things they're fighting. From a like, literary perspective, the point of all of this is to be able to evoke certain moods and tones. (With the added complication of making it fit into an interactive, referee-able game scenario that is, at least, fair if not necessarily "guaranteed to have any kind of a positive ending.") So I think what would be very important for a custom or unique entity is what you, the GM, feel confident in being able to use to evoke those moods and tones. The Lone Badger posted:I've had an idea percolating for a sort of cross between Operation Delta Green and Project Skin Horse. Your charge is to go into the dark places, find the ancient creatures and things beyond man's comprehension, and make friends with them. Point out that this doesn't have to end in genocide or mutual annihilation. Find alternative food sources. Thwart psychopathic investigators carrying dynamite. Set up administrative trusts. Do the hard work that nobody else wants to do. Of course, some of the ancient creatures are dicks, too. If you look at the stock mythos: You could probably cut a deal with the deep ones and the elder things, and definitely the mi-go. But the serpent people, or "sneeple"? No, those guys are going to go get guest appearances on Fox immediately.
|
|
#
?
Oct 15, 2021 06:59
|
|
|
quote:The metaphysical human flour produced in the Grindworks is said to be baked into bread within the Mill. Whatever that means. Mills, named so after the act of beaking bread,
|
|
#
?
Oct 15, 2021 07:18
|
|
|
Pvt.Scott posted:Silent Legions has all the system-agnostic tools you need to conjure up an entire custom mythos! It does artifacts, cults and spells as well. If I run CoC for people familiar with lovecraft stuff, it’s what I’m using to make the baddies. Silent Legions is excellent.
|
|
#
?
Oct 15, 2021 09:20
|
|
|
Joe Slowboat posted:The Yithians might be fighting Shoggoths (in The Shadow Out of Time) but much funnier is the fact that booby-trapped hatches are apparently an effective defense against whatever awful things they're fighting. Flying Polyps. I remember because they were utter bastards in Dark Corners of the Earth. They got wind powers and they're invisible when they want to be, they are jerks.
|
|
#
?
Oct 15, 2021 13:11
|
|
|
Night10194 posted:Flying Polyps. I remember because they were utter bastards in Dark Corners of the Earth. They got wind powers and they're invisible when they want to be, they are jerks. they're perfectly adapted to hunting their prey in that one room with a chasm and a narrow bridge 
|
|
#
?
Oct 15, 2021 13:20
|
|
|
 Seriously, the things people make for this game own. Photo by Kenny Bush. BrikWars 2020 Part 4: Don’t you MOC me! We’re getting into the second book now. This might go faster than the first book, because a lot of the core mechanics of how things work is front-loaded, whereas in the previous book everything was more spread out. You can more easily flick through book 2 and cherry-pick bits you need to use. Future Del Here: This is a lie, there's so loving much. But what is book 2 about? It’s about leveraging the power of the medium you’re working in to build custom units. War machines, mighty beasts, towering castles, or if you brought a Lego City coffee shop or something – now is the time to finally give them some stats and blow them up. And things are going to get maybe a little clever? I think it is, anyway. The book opens on another chapter talking about the game ethos. This isn’t as 2000’s edgy as the first ones we read – this is more focused on why you should be creative. Namely, that it makes awesome pictures, contributes to shared settings, and makes for funny stories. In short, it contributes to a force that BrikWars calls “Ossum”, which is both a real word and presumably the mangled way BrikWars minifigs pronounce “awesome”. I laughed at this, don't judge me posted:But in the larger sense, everything is Ossum. Then we get to an overview of how MOC combat works. The level of combat in the Core Rules could work for potentially any figure, but here we can plug in any brick creation we like. Theoretically this could also just be used for bigger models and toys as well, but that’s less fun. The game then reassures us that: quote:The easiest way to calculate a creation's core attributes is not to bother. And then it gives us a table that’s actually useful. Essentially, you first need to figure out the thing’s size in inches, and then using the table, you can quickly come up with the stats you need to get the model on the table and running. For example, a plane that’s about 3 inches long has d6 armor and moves 15” in a turn. (We’ll get to what Power is shortly). Now, how long is a minifig? An inch, would you say, from head to toe? What’s the default stats of a Size 1 Creature? Bingo. This is the core of how the engine works. This is finally here. Everything* in the game is created from these rules. This is where the magic happens, and it’s not overly complicated and can work for a lot of different toys – not just brick creations, but action figures and trucks and such! This, to me, is one of the great things about BrikWars. Not only can this accommodate any creation or toy, but the rules just give you what you need to play first before opening the engine and letting you tinker with it. *Well, almost everything. The Hero obviously doesn’t fit in this engine, but I can forgive it since in default games there’s only one of each and they’re meant to be weird and powerful. Let’s get away from gushing and into detail. This is going to summarize everything in this book, so we’re not going over each chapter in excruciating detail. Future Del Again: We actually fall short here, since there's still Squad Combat and field hazards, and I also wanna leave the miscellany in the Creatures section for next time since this is getting too long.  Size Matters, or, Matters About Size The core of any Creation is its Size. Size is measured along the longest part of the creation’s central structure (from skull to the bottom of a spine on a creature). It defines how many hits it can take (equal to its Size) and defines how many Enhancements it gets (also equal to its Size). By default, a creation has 1d6 armor and doesn’t move, and has 1d6 for an action die if it can do anything (the same as a minifig). Each Enhancement allows you to buy additional advantages:
You can also claim back Enhancements by adding Impairments from the following:
Let’s go over some of these real quick. Power is a limitation on how BIG your weapons can be. Larger weapons are also measured by their length, and derive their stats from that. The Power rating limits the total size of weapons that can be used in a turn. Unit costs are now measured in unit inches, which means if you have a 2” long speeder bike, that’s worth 2 inches. Heroes are worth 2 inches, by the way. It’s worth noting that structures only have enhancements at Size 1, 3 and 5. Presumably this stops everybody building death fortresses that people can’t break into, or fussing about with what is probably going to be scenery most of the time. So far, so good. Flexible, not too detailed, and essentially slots into the existing rules. Okay, now we need to go over the Half-Mind thing, but first we need to talk about Dice. BrikWars associates each active unit and certain kinds of effect with a die, depending on their strength. Rolling max on the Dice is a critical, and 6 or more is Over The Top. Regular minifgs have a D6 (six sides), specialists have a d8, heroes have a d10. Certain supernatural characters and effects use a d12. There’s a dumb gag where the d20 isn’t used by anyone except their Cthulhu knockoff, further rooting the dire humor of this game in the mid-2000's.  The four-sided dice, the d4, is associated with mindlessness and incompetence. It’s used for fire and other destructive forces of nature, and for any kinds of creature that are uniquely incompetent. The types of Half-Mind are:
When a creation takes damage, its Effective Size decreases by 1". Its Power and Momentum decrease proportionally, and if it would roll more dice in armor than its size that gets reduced too. This doesn't mean the creation gets smaller, only that it gets weaker. If the creation moves, its movement isn't affected, although you can target propulsion systems and blow them off to reduce their speed or force a crash. You can also specifically target small connection points to try and disassemble something, turning it into two separate "creations" that inherit the total damage taken (so small chunks can explode off entirely). I suppose it's worth noting at this point that Momentum, as you've guesses, scales with the Size of the creation, so a size 3 creation moving 15" generates 3d6 momentum. I couldn't find an organic way to bring that up. We're also introduced to the Mechanik:  The Mechanik is another specialist, and he has a weird but fun ability where he can built hasty constructions and repair damage on creations whilst your opponents are taking their turn. I like this, because a) it's Lego, duh, b) it gives you something to do whilst waiting for your turn and c) it makes your opponents hurry up. Weirdly, he has to build Patches when repairing, which have to be 1" bigger than the Effective Size of whatever he's repairing, so he can't just slap on any missing bricks that have been blown off - you have to jury-rig a little patch or band-aid or whatever. There's also a lot of weird sub-rules in here now. We get more suggestions for bad things happening, Overkill rules for large projectiles or attacks that can plough through multiple targets (although this is suggested as an optional rule rather than a must include), and we also get rules for weapons with firing arcs. This is done by holding your hand out, palm flat and fingers outstretched, and using the gap between your fingers as the arc. It's kinda cute. Presumably most of these weapons are supposed to be attached to creations of some kind, but there's no reason you can't make a little 2" flamethrower for a minifig to hold! A similarly kinetic rule is Thrust, where you can put thrusters on a vehicle or subject something and then.... quote:Fortunately, a BrikWars player's instinctive response to Thrust vector calculations turns out to be the correct one: Thrust is handled by giving it the finger. The player places a fingertip at the point of Thrust (either an active Thruster or a point of impact, usually), and pushes the object the appropriate number of inches in the appropriate direction. The model on the table will move and rotate appropriately on its own without any need for further calculation. (Wheeled models may need to be stopped manually at the end of each Thrust to keep them from rolling away forever.) Sigh. We're also introduced to Pilots and Gunners, who are just specialists but for piloting and firing guns. Pilots can use their d8 to attempt stunts and get subject to thrust if they fall short. Gunners use their d8 when firing weapons and can add +1 when helping another minifig fire a big weapon. The game suggests every vehicle gets a free Pilot, every Horse a free Rider, and every mounted weapon a free Gunner, and there's basically no reason not to, so sure.  You may notice that once again, I'm kind of glossing over a lot. I don't think a hugely detailed breakdown of everything is good for a review. It might be interesting to some, but I have to find things to say about them, and a lot of the nitty gritty that's printed here is basically "here's how the creations obey the same core rules as minifigs but more so". I don't think this is BAD necessarily, I just don't find it interesting to talk about and I don't want to copypaste the entire rulebook in here but with different language. I'm also nearing around 2k words on this thing. I think the core creation rules are clever in how universal they are, so they achieve their purpose. That said, BrikWar's attitude of flinging endless amounts of rules at you and then expecting you to give up in frustration is not good. If you don't believe large amount of detailed rules should be in your game, stop putting them in your game! A lot of the rules are just explaining edge cases and how things in the core rules scale up, which can probably be done much faster than how it's currently written. If you just treated creations as really big minifigs and kept in mind how things scaled with Size, then you'd basically have 90% of this book down pat. Next time: In which we're still not over Jar Jar, and also we talk about BASEPLATES The Deleter fucked around with this message at 21:33 on Oct 15, 2021 |
|
#
?
Oct 15, 2021 14:01
|
|
|
This is reinforcing my prior tentative opinion that either the 2005 (or maybe 2010) edition was the definitive one, and everything after that just added unnecessary bloat.
|
|
#
?
Oct 15, 2021 20:21
|
|
|
Age of Sigmar: Fyreslayers Fyreslayers won the coin flip, so here they are! They are a culture of duardin, as we know, that are wholly dedicated to the dead god Grimnir. Like him, they are rough, aggressive and prone to violence, and to most outsiders they seem utterly obsessed with gold and fighting. Their ferocious nature and skill in battle are famous throughout the Mortal Realms, though few outside their people understand that combat is a religious act for them. They must always be at war, for if they are not fighting, they are not honoring the Slayer God. They frequently work as mercenaries for others, though they must be paid in gold...though it is not out of greed that they demand this. Most people believe it is, and they're happy to allow that to continue so others do not realize the true nature of their quest. It's a lonely thing, and it has left them with few true allies, many enemies, and even more who wish to hire them to kill but do not trust them. Like most duardin, the Fyreslayers are stubborn, quick-tempered, deeply concerned with oaths, prone to holding grudges, and deeply respectful of age. However, they are not like the Khazalid or Kharadron in most other ways. The ancient Khazalid Empire were miners and crafters above all else, fighting to defend their homes or expand their mountain territories but always considering it a secondary thing. The children of Grimnir reject such a peaceful life. While they may excel at smithing weapons and may mine ore to feed the forges, they consider such work to merely support the one true task to which all Fyreslayers are born: combat. The first Fyreslayers arose in Aqshy, where in the Age of Myth they found and dedicated themselves to Grimnir. Some say they were his literal children, others that they spawned from the fiery sparks of his constant rage. Others say that once, the duardin were one people who split into different factions by choosing patron gods. Whatever the case, for as long as they have called themselves Fyreslayers, they have been dedicated to the Slayer God above all else. In emulation of him, they have always forgone heavy armor and indeed most clothing, favoring only a helmet, girdle and loincloth. (And a beard, of course.) It may seem risky, but the Fyreslayers insist that they, like Grimnir, are protected by their burning conviction. They seem to be at least partially correct. In honor of Grimnir, Fyreslayers shave much of their hair, save for a distinctive mohawk crest, which is worn high and spiked with gel. Often it is dyed, and each lodge closely guards the recipe of their hair dye and gel solutions. There is no faster way to piss off a Fyreslayer than insulting their hair. Equally important are the golden runes that they beat into their own skin, hammered in straight from the forge. In battle, these runes glow with fiery heat and light, and the strongest Fyreslayers bear so many runes that they also glow in battle, their beards bursting into flame and their skin smouldering with ash. They wade into combat in a berserk fury, unafraid of any foe. The sound of a Fyreslayer fighting is one of joyous song, shouted insults and the clash of steel, with occasional partially coherent oaths to Grimnir peppered in. Once the battle ends, the Fyreslayers collect up their dead and their payment, then return home to their lodge's fortress. Most often, this is a magmahold under a mountain, though some are based out of forge-temples in the Free Cities. When not in the grip of powerful emotions, most Fyreslayers are pragmatic sorts with little time for politicking or interest in interfering in the affairs of other peoples. They tend to have little sympathy for others without a personal connection and most of their interactions with outsiders are in pursuit of sworn oaths - usually oaths to recover gold. This can lead them to change sides in a conflict quickly, though they never break a contract. They've earned a bad reputation as traitors, disloyal warmongers and even sometimes willing allies of Chaos. It's not a wholly false reputation, either - the Fyreslayers are eager mercenaries and some have worked for terrible, terrible people, including Nagash and Chaos warlords. The true reason for this is gold, though as noted, not for greed's sake. They just know no one would help them if they told the truth: that what they really seek is the soul of their dead god, bound into the gold. Side note, we get a discussion on keys as a recurring symbol of the Fyreslayers. The key is associated with the magic of Aqshy, but more importantly, it is a symbol of their covenant with Grimnir. For the Zharrgrim priesthood, the key further represents the true secrets of their order and the secret quest to revive their god. This is because a key represents freedom granted from bindings and constraints, opening that which is locked. The Zharrgrim carry forge keys made from various metals as symbols of priestly rank, with the most experienced and eldest bearing golden keys. Because the Fyreslayers are still highly practical duardin, the keys all have an actual purpose as well. Runefathers and Runemasters in particular bear keys that open the doors of their forge-temples and magma-vaults, allowing them to access their lodge's most potent treasures. Anyway, back to Grimnir. Grimnir is dead. Grimnir has been dead since well before the Age of Chaos. Indeed, he sought his death even before the Mortal Realms were forged, in the ancient World-That-Was. He went alone into the far north, to close the polar gate of Chaos...but while he had many adventures and he entered the realm of the Dark Gods to fight them, he did not manage to win. And yet, he was so determined that he was not driven mad, and so skilled that he did not die. No one knows how long Grimnir wandered the Realm of Chaos, fighting everything he met. What is known is that the World-That-Was was lost, and one day, Grimnir awoke in Aqshy, surrounded by his duardin kin. He was weak and tired from his endless journey, but he recognized his people and took joy in their presence and his return to mortal lands. Despite his fatigue, he sought to serve the mortals whose voices had called him to his new home. He listened to their pleas for aid, and he set out to hunt and capture Ignax, a mighty godbeast that plagued the land. He defeated the Solar Dragon and bound it to the Land of the Chained Sun, bringing light and fire to the whole realm. However, while Grimnir rested after his fight with Ignax, something happened to ruin his day. No one knows quite what - the duarding speak of the Thagduegi, the Great Betrayal, but even they do not know what exactly happened. They just know that the duardin gods were betrayed somehow and split apart, leaving Grimnir and his brother Grungni in chains at the top of the tallest of Chamon's Iron Mountains. They might have been bound forever, had Sigmar not discovered and rescued them. Both swore to repay Sigmar for his aid, but Grimnir was impatient and demanded he be allowed to do so immediately. While bound, his rage had risen to a boiling point, and he had to release it or be overcome by it. Thus, he asked Sigmar to name a foe - any foe - and he would kill that creature singlehandedly. Sigmar deeply valued the duardin gods as allies since the days of the World-That-Was, and he knew that Grimnir would be insulted if he chose a less than worthy foe. Thus, he named the godbeast he felt would be hardest to defeat - though he would come to regret doing so quickly. That beast was Vulcatrix, the Mother of Salamanders, who had first brought fire to the Mortal Realms. Many stories differ on what Grimnir did before he set out to slay her. Some say he drank a whole keg of ale and declared its quality so great it must have been made by the Bugman family. Others say he had Grungni forge him a new axe for the battle. The Vostarg Lodge claim that Grimnir helped them choose the site of their original magmahold before he set out. Whatever happened, everyone agrees that he didn't wait long before heading out to the wild hills of Aqshy alone, roaring challenge to Vulcatrix as he went and shouting insults at her. When he found the beast, she was large as a river of magma, lying between two volcanic mountains. God and godbeast clashed, the blazes of each impact shining brighter than the stars. The Fyreslayers say that Grimnir struck Vulcatrix a mortal blow, but in her death throes she spitefully spewed forth killing poisons which brought the god low in turn. Their combined energies exploded in a blast of poison gas so powerful that it levelled mountains and created the Plains of Aqshy. The fires of the blast burned off the poison and sulfur that had once left them barren, and the falling embers formed the mountain Vostargi Mont - and, say the Fyreslayers, hundreds of other volcanos throughout the Realms. The explosion ignited the magic of Aqshy itself, alloying the divine soul of Grimnir with the liquid metal blood of Vulcatrix. The two flowed together into a single thing, their essence scattering across the Realms in blazes of fiery debris and meteors across the skies. Every volcano in Aqshy erupted at the moment of their shared demise, a final tribute to them. Where the fragments of Grimnir and Vulcatrix landed, the land itself was changed. These fragments flowed into the earth, fusing with veins of gold. This gold looked just like any other gold, but it was far more potent. Only the Fyreslayers were able to detect this new metal, which they named ur-gold, and they refuse to openly speak of it with outsiders. Since discovering it and its abilities, they have understood their divine quest. To outsiders, they seem nothing but money-grubbing killers for hire. In truth, they are warriors for a divine cause, seeking treasure not to spend it or hoard it but to reclaim the essence of Grimnir. Even the smallest bit of ur-gold is impossibly precious to them, for releasing its power in battle frees the trapped spirit and allows Grimnir to come one step closer to reformation - one step closer to the Doomgron, when Grimnir will lead them into the final battle against all evil. As for Vulcatrix, her essence also suffused the regions where it landed. Black, spherical eggs formed, burning hot, and hatched into the first of the Magmadroths, the beasts that the Fyreslayers prize over all other mounts. Next time: Life in a Lodge
|
|
#
?
Oct 15, 2021 20:33
|
|
|
Nessus posted:Of course, some of the ancient creatures are dicks, too. If you look at the stock mythos: You could probably cut a deal with the deep ones and the elder things, and definitely the mi-go. But the serpent people, or "sneeple"? No, those guys are going to go get guest appearances on Fox immediately. The elder things were assholes, much better to ally with the shoggoths.
|
|
#
?
Oct 15, 2021 21:14
|
|
|
Just invent your own freaky poo poo a la Cultist Simulator. Or use Silent Legions.
|
|
#
?
Oct 16, 2021 20:09
|
|
|
Cultist Simulator has a lot of neat stuff, pity the creator is a sexpest
|
|
#
?
Oct 16, 2021 20:25
|
|
|
 Buck Rogers XXVc: The 25th Century Animal Gennies, Part 4: You Can Call It Ray, or You Can Call It Ray Jay  The Venusian Mantrap is a giant crystal flower that eats people so we’re starting high concept. They were developed by the early Venusian colonists as a kind of “guard” for lowland settlements which already had some wild animals and also bandits and the like. Those colonists eventually gave up on living in the lowlands, and stopped developing the plants, but they’d already pollinated so now the jungles of Venus now just have a bunch of man eating flowers. It’s not clear how the geneticists managed the crystal structure. Now the way this works is kinda confusing given the picture. Mantraps have a central crystal flower but that’s not actually the threat. The threat is the roots, which terminate in flytrap-like mouths on the ground. (When closed the mouths look like rock formations.) These mouths are ten feet in diameter, and when someone steps on a closed mouth it opens up and swallows them, first inflicting 1d10 damage with the teeth, then 1d8 per round as digestive juices get to work. The target can escape getting captured with a Dex check at -4, and if captured can fight their way out with a -2 Strength check, though that steps up by -2 with every failed attempt. Despite all this it still has a stat block, with an AC of 5, 3d8 hp for the central flower and 4d8 for each mouth. It has a THAC0 of 19 despite it not really being used for anything. The big advantage it has in a fight is its crystalline structure which makes it completely immune to light-based weapons, i.e. any kind of laser. Some people value the flower’s crystal blooms, but blooms replanted have a tendency to grow new roots and thus new mouths. There’s a song about this. These hail from the Inner Worlds supplement.  It wouldn’t be sci-fi without giant blob monsters (at least that’s my view.) A Proto is a giant amoeba, and its origin is almost something of a joke. A geneticist at RAM-Gene Corporation put this together on a whim to clean up spills and leftover food and the like, and forgot to do anything to restrict its ability to reproduce. The scientist was fired, and then later disappeared mysteriously when it was discovered several of the creatures had escaped from the labs into the wild. They can be found in the Martian wilds, moving, eating, and occasionally dividing. Each one is around 3 feet in diameter, though they come in three different hit dice, ranging from 6 to 8 d6. Protos move very slowly (fastest is 60 feet per round) and attack by exuding digestive enzymes. They have an AC of 7, their THAC0 ranges from 18 to 16, and damage goes from 1d6 per round of contact to 1d10. They can also suffocate their opponent, forcing them to make a save to stay conscious. They’ve got a tough outer shell which gives them a -4 AC bonus vs. knives, swords, clubs, etc., but monoknives and energy weapons do normal damage. Protos gravitate towards where there’s food so they’re not going to be out in the desert, but they do hang near desert runner enclaves and the like. Martians of all stripes hunt them for sport though it can be a risky affair.  Pandora’s Rats are another “gennie” that wasn’t actively developed by anyone. Years ago the freighter Pandora came to Mercury from Mars, transporting grain and with it a large cargo of rats. Years in the Mercutian warrens exposed the rats to high levels of background radiation, and they mutated into five-foot-long, semi-intelligent monsters. Now they roam in packs and have started to conflict with the miners and their alchemcats. (Sidebar: since someone asked and I hadn’t listed it, an alchemcat is about three feet long.) A Pandora’s Rat has 3d8 HP, AC 6 and THAC0 of 19. They attack with their teeth for 1d10 and a hit means they can latch on, doing 1d10 automatically until either their prey is dead or they are. Their earth-tone skin and fur gives them natural camouflage in the dark warrens, but they’re sensitive to bright light, which can blind them for 1d6 rounds. They typically hunt as a pack and try to ambush their prey (which they can do easily in the mines.) The alchemcats are their only natural predators despite being smaller, but now that they and the miners are aware of the rats’ existence they’ve started to try to hunt them down.  Now I bet you’re thinking, “Yeah those giant rats are good but I want a slightly different flavor of giant rat.” To which I say, try the Ratwurst. First off, A+ pun, good show. Second, while we’ve had animals that weren’t deliberately engineered in this section, this one is a total mystery. They may have evolved naturally in the ruins of Earth, or they may have been bred by a mad geneticist for reasons known only to them. We don’t know. The point is, they’re giant carnivorous rats and they’re a problem. Ratwursts are 5 to 7 feet long and weigh up to 175 lbs. They appear in groups of 3-8, and each one has 4d10 hp, AC 6 and a THAC0 of 17. They have two attacks. They can whip with their tails for 1d4 damage, and if the damage roll is a 4 the target gets knocked over. Their bite causes 1d10 damage and also a victim has to save vs. suffocation or be rendered helpless by the creature’s stench. Why it has to bite you for you to notice the smell I’m not sure. There’s a common theory going around the sprawls of Earth that RAM created the ratwurst to depopulate them. The local gangs will go to great lengths to destroy these critters when they find them.  While all these creatures are weird anomalies in one way or another, this last one is very deliberate indeed. The Jovian Ray was one of the biggest genetic engineering projects in history, taking GennieTek of Mars over five years to complete through all kinds of setbacks. The result- a giant flying manta ray with a wingspan of over 1,500 feet, built entirely to float through the atmosphere of Jupiter with a city on its back. These cities are where the Stormriders live, and while it’s not clear why RAM opted for this instead of… anything else, I guess you can’t argue with results. So yeah, Jovian Rays are huge beasts and while they do have combat stats (200+ d10 hp), you’re not fighting these. The Jovian Ray’s natural defense when attacked is to use internal “jets” to zoom away at very high speeds, inevitably destroying the city on its back. Because of this Stormriders act quickly to repel any attack before the creature even feels it. The other dangerous period is when Jovian Rays breed; their mating period lasts a month, and during that month the resulting tremors cause millions of credits worth of damage. There are also miniature rays which the Stormriders can use as mounts, often attaching weapons. These have up to 10d10 hit points and again no natural attacks. Really the Jovian Ray is just a very cool sci-fi setpiece, you go to Jupiter and see people living on the backs of giant manta rays. (It’s also a nice Spelljammer reference.) The mounted versions are also neat, and I just love the story of this being the genetic engineering equivalent of the Avatar sequels. Extra points for having there be armed Stormrider cowboys. Next time, squids, birds, and two kinds of dog!
|
|
#
?
Oct 16, 2021 22:05
|
|
|
Maxwell Lord posted:
Now I'm going to go find out which one came first Spelljammer or this and that's my project for the next hour.
|
|
#
?
Oct 16, 2021 22:32
|
|
|
It's lame that Pandora's Rats aren't playable.
|
|
#
?
Oct 16, 2021 22:43
|
|
|
Age of Sigmar: Fyreslayers Grim and Grimmer After the death of their god, the Fyreslayers settled in mostly within Aqshy, along the mountain range called the Salamander's Spine. They built the first magmaholds, which were similar in structure to the karaks of the Khazalids, save that they were built exclusively under active volcanoes. They get better and better at engineering and mining in active volcanic regions, eventually mastering the arts of channeling magma, using it to bore tunnels and even using it to form defensive moats. They did not and still do not allow outsiders into the magmaholds - if anything, over time, Fyreslayer culture has gotten more and more isolationist. In the Age of Myth, a small few outsiders were permitted within the holds to see their archwork and halls. These places were far less decorated than the karaks of the other duardin, but no less well-made. They did the work and well, they just didn't see craft as a calling the way another duardin civilization would. Everyone knew the magmaholds were full of treasure, though. The Fyreslayers sought out much gold in their quest to revive Grimnir, after all. Most of the gold was worthless for their purposes, containing little to no divine essence. What ur-gold they found they quickly drained out in battle, leaving mere gold behind. That gold has built up in the lodges over the years, and even the poorest lodge has gold statues, golden death masks and heavily gilded braziers. That kind of wealth draws in attackers, and even before the Age of Chaos began, people tried to raid the holds. It just got worse as Chaos appeared. The karaks of the Khazalid were shattered, broken by wave after wave of skaven, grots, Chaos warriors, daemons and more. The duardin refugees were preyed on as they fled by monsters, gargants, orruks and more. But in Aqshy, the magmaholds held out. Their magmic defenses made them extremely hard to attack, either from below or above...and of course, every magmahold was full of exceptionally skilled warriors obsessed with combat. Some of them were breached, some fell, but the largest withstood the assaults. It was only when the forces of Chaos turned to lies and trickery that they were able to get inside, posing as refugees seeking aid. These foes realized that they could not go after the walls - they had to go after the people. Those people are grouped into lodges, connected sets of Fyreslayer families and households that claim descent from a common ancestor. A magmahold typically contains only one lodge, though there have been times when there were two or more coexisting peacefully in the same hold. Generally, this only happens with lodges that have close blood ties and even then tend to be temporary until the younger branch gets big and strong enough to establish its own hold. The eldest holds are called the first-forged, built by the duardin who had walked with Grimnir before he went to his final battle. No first-forged holds really exists any more, though some of their names live on in those who claim to be their direct descendants, like Vostarg or Greyfyrd. Every lodge is ruled over by a grand patriarch, called a Runefather. He and his direct family control the lodge, and authority passes to male heirs, known as Runesons. Each lodge also maintains a forge-temple run by the Zharrgrim priests. Runefathers with many Runesons must select one to be their successor - and no more than one. Those who are not selected often leave with their closest friends and followers to start their own lodges once their father dies. When a Runefather dies without a named heir, the lodge rarely survives. The Fyreslayers of the lodge must decide on a new leader to follow, must join another lodge or must take up the grimmnyn oath. 'Grimmnyn' means 'fated wanderer,' and those who take the oath have given up hope and rejected home. They roam the world seeking a battle to die in or a new purpose to serve. They are similar to Doomseekers, but less completely fatalist - it's not a permanent oath and they can back out of it if they find a new cause. You may have noticed this is a very male-dominated society. Fyreslayer women are rarely seen by outsiders, and lodge rulership is patrilineal. However, this is as much a matter of rarity as it is sexism. There are disproportionately few female Fyreslayers born in each generation. Fyreslayer women are not less capable than their men - they are bold, fiery and every bit as skilled in battle. Most learn the arts of brewing, healing and command of magmic defenses, forming the last line of defense for their holds. A rare few rise to become true Fyrequeens, who command powers equal to those of the Runefathers. However, most Fyreslayers refuse to speak about the inner workings of their gender relations with outsiders...or, indeed, most of the things that happen inside a hold. The magmaholds that survived the Age of Chaos did so by closing their gates entirely. Many refugees, including those from the Khazalid Empire, tried to gain safety inside the fortresses. Most failed to do so - the Fyreslayers often refused to open their gates to anyone, no matter what. They permitted no one to enter but other Fyreslayers, though they did come out to fight the forces of Chaos fairly often. Fyrds, as their forces are known, would frequently use secret tunnels to exit their holds, refilling these tunnels with lava when they weren't using them. They sold their skill to the highest bidder, taking in massive amounts of gold to protect tribes, clans and cities from Chaos. There was never a time when they couldn't find clients, not in the Age of Chaos. They prospered, in fact, their homes secure and isolated from the outside. Many lodges splintered in hopes of starting new holds, and they quickly spread across the whole of Aqshy. Their contract-seeking and pursuit of ur-gold led them to the other realms as well, and by the end of the Age of Chaos, no realm save the Eightpoints was empty of magmaholds. (Azyr didn't get many, though, since the gates closed fairly quickly.) Whenever possible, the new lodges were built under volcanoes, but other mountains were acceptable when this wasn't possible, such as in the sky-islands of Chamon or the cold peaks of Shyish. They continued to gather gold, primarily by selling their skills but sometimes by mining or theft. However, they were not as secure against Chaos as they thought themselves. Tzeentch's cults whispered to the refugees they rejected, reminding them of the refusals the Fyreslayers had given them when they sought safety. They spread stories of the mercenary Fyreslayers, exaggerating their greed. Many came to believe that even a good deal with the Fyreslayers was one in which the client was hoodwinked and manipulated. And yet, this was not the worst that they faced. That came at the hands of Nurgle. Nurgle decided he was going to get creative, inventing a new disease that would spread by a new vector: gold. Infected gold would spread the disease to any mortal that touched it, inspiring in them an uncontrollable desire to possess the mineral - a desire so strong it would often lead people to kill. This was not a disease that uniquely targeted the Fyreslayers...but it did target a weakness that already existed within them: the glimmerlust, which drives Fyreslayers to seek out as many ur-gold runes as they can, even to the extent of killing other Fyreslayers to gain more runes, that they may continually feel Grimnir's power. Several magmaholds were torn apart by the plague, corrupted by their own gold and driven to kill each other. While the gold-plague has largely burned out in most of the realms, the glimmerlust remains. The Zharrgrim work to temper it as best they can, offering therapeutic services to other Fyreslayers as part of their religious duty. They also oversee who is allowed to take on ur-gold runes, ensuring that each warrior has no more than they can handle and no more than they deserve for their deeds. When the Zharrgrim are unable to guide a Fyreslayer properly, the glimmerlust can take hold. This is especially common among lone warriors, those who survived what killed the rest of their fyrd and who are left with no one to counsel them...and among the Doomseekers, who have pledged to fight until they find a worthy death. Many do remain heroic, but it is definitely a hazard of the Doomseeker oath to risk consumption by the glimmerlust, and many dark tales are told about those who fell to its grasp, like the Axe of Magorth or the Immolated Slayer. These beings are referred to as Doomvarags, and they are seen as vicious beasts for their dark deeds of murder and rune theft. The Fyreslayers of Chamon once worked alongside the ancestors of the Kharadron Overlords, we are told, but that was a long, long time ago. After the fall of the karaks, the Fyreslayers refused to aid the Khazalids who would become the Kharadron. That rejection led the fledgling Kharadron to reject the idea that Fyreslayers were kin to them at all, and these days, they only look at the fiery duardin as potential trade partners who are more likely than humans to uphold the terms of a sworn oath. The Fyreslayers for their part tend to look at the Kharadron only as wealthy customers, having had little communication with them through the Age of Chaos. They could never see eye to eye with a people who rejected their gods, given how important Grimnir is to all of Fyreslayer life. Both sides hold grudges for a long, long time, and they generally do not get on especially well when they must socialize with each other. Open conflict is relatively rare but does happen...particularly in the Granthium Mountains of Chamon, where ur-gold and aether-gold veins sometimes intermingle and see both sides struggle to claim them. Next time: Aqshy From Below
|
|
#
?
Oct 16, 2021 23:27
|
|
|
Nurgle, bored of his own sthick, pretends to be Tzeentch for an afternoon.
|
|
#
?
Oct 17, 2021 01:16
|
|
|
So trip report on the Task Force VALKYRIE one-shot using the Sowers: I went with what I ended up suggesting in this thread, the inciting thing that brought the player group (from our old campaign) to the scene was Tyler Codrington rejecting Azazel's offer and his daughter Evelyn miraculously recovering from an extraordinarily rare childhood disorder I made up for the game. A disorder that is 100% fatal, with absolutely no known cure. The recovery is the talk of the medical establishment, and no one has any idea why or how the disorder suddenly just vanished. TFV took notice, and decided to send a team to give things a look-over, that kind of miracle suggests something funky to the higher-ups. My players investigated the hospital's records first, looking for any other miraculous recoveries or strange medical patterns. What they discovered was an infant mortality rate far, far higher than the national average, and that they were almost all victims of Sudden Infant Death Syndrome. My players learned that a doctor at the hospital, and the city government, briefly looked into the problem but found nothing out of the ordinary. Just an inexplicable tragedy affecting the area. Further investigation of hospital records revealed that several of the mothers of these SIDS victims had undergone psychiatric review, or been recommended for such, due to mental breakdowns. By the time the players decided they needed to check things out in person, a Sower inside the hospital staff had already tipped off the Deacons that the feds were sniffing around, and Brand had Jerry Fredricks preemptively assassinate Codrington. When the players arrived on the scene, the local police had already begun their investigation and ruled out the Sowers due to the Metaphysical Innocence problem. When the players found and talked to Codrington's widow, she was lucid enough to say that Tyler had gotten caught up with 'them' but couldn't explain who 'they' were. She was certain that her daughter's recovery was a genuine divine miracle from God, and pointed the players at the Sowers as the people who turned Tyler's life around. Here's where things started to break down: the head of the group of PCs, from the old campaign into this one, is a gay, Muslim woman. She is everything the Sowers despise, and her leading the investigation - and requesting an interview with Brand - left the Sowers flat-footed. Brand and the Deacons met with the PCs, but their toxic prejudice against the officer in charge of the investigation meant that their Innocence shield wasn't as effective as it could have been. The PCs came away with the impression that Brand and the Sowers were a pack of well-meaning assholes who probably did know more about Codrington's death than they were letting on. The Innocence effect lead the PCs to conclude that the Sowers themselves were probably not responsible, but that they probably did know something about who was. The Innocence effect caused the Sowers (as I described them to the PCs) and their uneasiness to come across as being frightened of someone else. The team at this point decided to stake out the Sowers and bug their offices, assuming that the Sowers were themselves being threatened by someone else. When they encountered the Sowers going on surveillance themselves, they initially assumed that the Sowers were paranoid that their enemy noticed the Sowers talking to the feds, and at this point Mitchell Reimann panicked. The feds are here, they're investigating, they're lead by a Muslim feminazi, and Reimann is more interested in not going to jail than he is interested in Brand's cause. He's willing to do almost anything for Brand, but he did some googling and turned up the PCs' names - he's seen that these people have been involved in strange incidents in the past, even if no one's sure what, and that many of those incidents are rumored to have been violent, even if the official story just makes them out to be a highly competent team of federal investigators. Brand may be crazy but he's not stupid, and when the PCs tried to meet with Reimann in a public place, Brand ordered Reimann's assassination. Thanks to some lucky rolls, the PCs were able to get him away for interviewing, even if they didn't catch or kill Fredricks in the process, and Reimann spilled the beans on the Temptations - he knows about the Feast and the Tower, and knows that there's a third trial that makes you a Deacon that's extremely hush-hush. He's also able to confirm that the same man who tried to kill him is the man who killed Tyler Codrington, even though the Innocence field meant that Reimann was absolutely certain that Brand himself must be innocent. Still, the simple fact that the only interesting stuff Reimann knew had to do with the Sowers, and that that was enough for someone to order a hit on him, got my players convinced that there was some kind of mind magic whammy going on with the Sowers. Out came the high-tech witch hunter toys from the Advanced Armory, and sure enough there's something magical (or hypergeometrical) going on in town and with the Codringtons. Reimann himself is not, and further interrogation reveals the Bound to Jesus spell - and that Reimann hasn't performed it. I decided at this point that the Innocence effect had reached its limit, and the players put together that all of this tied together, including the sudden recovery of Codrington's daughter and the SIDS plague in the city. None of it was enough to start a genuine legal case, just a mountain of circumstantial evidence that something magical and mind-whammy was going on with the Sowers, and the player characters decided at this point that the central church had to go on the assumption that it was some kind of ritual site. The Sowers knew exactly what the team's 'request' for another interview, and a tour of the grounds, meant at this point and started fortifying the church. Cue the gun fight and dungeon crawl, which was fun but mostly not threatening, the Sowers had a few cops and military personnel in their number but nothing like enough to deal with a crack TFV team. I chose to end things with confronting Brand and Azazel in the church basement, where Brand was having a catastrophic breakdown and Azazel explained that he could only take their sin away. Take it away, not remove it, and Brand chose to keep on sinning. The scapegoat ritual never said that someone else couldn't find the second goat. He offered Brand the chance to perform the ritual one last time - with himself as the sacrifice, to expunge his church's sins that had come to light, and would continue to. Then the PCs shot them both. Brand died on the spot and Azazel simply told the PCs that judgment of the Sowers' sins was in their hands now and vanished. Roll curtains to an epilogue of the Sowers falling apart without Brand's charisma, the supernatural innocence effect fading, and the SIDS plague stopping. Whatever magic Azazel had been a part of had stopped, Mitchell Reimann went into federal custody and then witness protection, and Task Force VALKYRIE declared the whole thing case closed, a cabal of mages that had been exposed and expunged, and all data concerning Azazel deeply classified. All's well that ends well, except that after the Sower incident every day a goat would be found wandering the halls of VALKYRIE's headquarters.
|
|
#
?
Oct 17, 2021 02:57
|
|
|
 Ninja Burger: The Role Playing Game - Part 4 Expansion Content Some complete bastard, not naming any names, sent me scans of the three supplements published for the first edition of Ninja Burger. How the hell did such a trash tier, racist, unfunny game get three published supplements? Beats me. Do they improve the game any? I've never actually read them before, so let's find out together!  The first of the three is called Iron Ninja Burger Monkey. Ugh. Off to a great start already I see. Print quality appears to be basically the same as the base game, which is to say basically a zine. Interestingly, the primary writer appears to not be Michael Fiegel. Instead, the supplement credits Daniel Landis as the content writer. I'm not going to bother researching him, but he's also listed as one of the creators of the BEER engine used by the core game. The special thanks section contains another dig at the woman who was badly scalded by superheated MacDonald's coffee. You already did this joke on your menu in the core game, was it necessary to duplicate it in this supplement? Also, good work punching down. MacDonald's really needed your help there. Does this supplement actually include rules that let you mimic some sort of Iron chef style ninja food delivery competition? It does not, don't be silly. That might accidentally be useful and fun! Corporate Operations The first section of this supplement deals with the internal corporate environment of Ninja Burger. Each Ninja clan has a particular corporate field they specialize in, with each speciality having associated secret goals. Prior to a mission, any Ninja can declare they will attempt to complete a clan goal. They should not specify which goal, since that would reveal their clan and cause a loss of honour. This is another of those things where I question how it would work in play, since, if you all know which goals are associated with which clan, you will immediately know what clan someone belongs to as soon as they complete a goal. I enjoy Paranoia style secret missions, I just don't think the implementation is great. Credit where it's due though, this is at least trying to implement secret missions as something available in every mission and supported by the rules. Hidden Ranch: If you witness another PC Ninja complete a goal, you can tell your boss that it was only a success due to your supervision. You gain a point of honour. No mention of the presumed loss of honour by the other Ninja for having their clan effectively revealed. 1,000 Islands: Specializing in HR, you can reduce honour loss, once per mission, by one point. You do this by filling out paperwork. Apparently it is important to know this takes exactly one turn, during which you cannot do anything else. This doesn't really seem like a big deal, even in the weird pseudo tactical boardgame concept they seem to want you to play instead of a fun ninja delivery game. Blue Trees: Marketing. Deliver leaflets to two non-clients during the mission. If you do, you regain a lost point of honour. This is totally mechanically distinct from the loss reduction offered to the 1,000 Islands ninja. Wait, I just thought of something. The core game established that your honour score is directly represented by your character's fingers. So, if you gain honour, or retroactively prevent honour loss, do you grow those fingers back? Keepers of the Secret Sauce: Accountants, who believe that the best way to grow profits is to eliminate the competition. This clan also gets to regain a point of honour at the end of a mission, but they gain it for murdering an employee of a rival chain. If a mission doesn't have any? Tough luck I guess? Gaijin: "Secretarial" and mailroom workers. At the start of the mission you get handed a sealed envelope to deliver to someone. If you succeed you also get to regain honour. Lo Cal: Internal security consultants. Seems a bit of a stretch that they'd have an actual acknowledged role for a clan whose members are supposed to be killed on sight. If you see another Ninja fail a secret goal, you gain a point of honour at the end of the mission. Employee Perks You gain these by completing deliveries successfully. This adds a sort of progression system to the game.  Personal Day: You can use a personal day to gain 1d6-1 Ki or Hits. This can temporarily boost you over your max in that stat. You can bank personal days, but you can't use more than one between missions. The game feels it necessary to state that once you use a personal day it is gone. Shocking. Employee Discount: Once per mission you can pull a bag of Ninja Burger food out of your pockets without having to roll. Benefits: At the end of a mission, roll 1d6-1 and regain that many Hits. I feel this implies that you don't normally heal off damage between missions. Training: Gain a new skill mastery. Semi-random and the game still insists on screwing you if you roll a mastery you already have. Still not sure why they're so insistent on effectively punishing players due to totally random chance. Vacation: You only ever get to take a single vacation. You gain three stat points, which you can split between your stats however you see fit. I would speculate that the optimal strategy is simply to drop all three into your highest stat. Gold Watch: You have a watch that can stop time for everyone but you for one turn. You can use it to interrupt another player's turn, including the GM. Promotion: You are promoted out of the ranks of delivery Ninja and into corporate management. Make a new character. I appreciate that they attempted some sort of character advancement mechanic, but the implementation is frankly super boring and none of the benefits are that great. Other than a turn of time stop I guess. The game certainly seems to think that a turn worth of actions is very valuable. Time Travel Apparently Ninja can travel through time. In a move that I actually agree with, the logistics of this are handled by saying "don't think too hard about how this works, it just does, okay?" In a move that is much more in line with the overblown way these rules are written, the book takes a full page to say that. This page also makes a joke about avoiding "wan-ton killing". Boo! Also, wonton are Chinese, not Japanese. I see they are sticking with broadly assuming the entirety of East Asia is culturally homogeneous. Then we get more text that looks like they were trying to directly copy Paranoia. I’m going to just put an image of it here, because I don’t feel like typing out a half page of over-written junk that could have been summarized in one sentence. In fact, the last sentence of the section would have been fine. I get the feeling that they had so few actual game rules, or advice for running a game, that they had to pad all these things out in order to make them appear like an actual book.  Seriously, it even uses the whole "compliance is mandatory" phrasing. Ancient Weapons and Equipment When travelling to the past, ninja must select their starting weapon from the ancient weapon list. Likewise, there is a separate chart of ancient gear to use when making rolls to pull items from your pocket. The list of weapons is very bland feeling for the most part. It’s not bad exactly, just a lot of different swords and knives with slightly different stats. I think this is a result of the stat/skill system they used. Each stat having five skills means that Strength, being the fighting stat, needed to have five categories of weapons. That means the authors felt like they needed to make lots of slightly different weapons in an attempt to justify that design decision. This was further exacerbated by the need to stretch the list of weapons to fit a 2d6 chart for random rolls. I feel like it would have made way more sense to just have weapon entries for things like Knife, Sword, Spear, Cooking Utensil, or what have you. Each sword can have the exact same stats, and you just list a few possible options for what kind of sword you want to carry for narrative reasons. However, I will give the author of this book credit for clearly attempting to make the weapon entries slightly more interesting. Most of even the generic styled weapons have special tags that at least attempt to interact interestingly with the rules. For example, you can have a bottle rocket that has splash damage rules (Which, on consideration, should have been in the core game instead of endless paragraphs of early 2000’s internet humour). Of note, this supplement has rules for using chopsticks as a weapon, something that I feel also probably should have been in the core game. Seriously, the skill listing governing their use literally lists that it applies to chopsticks, but then doesn’t include their stats in the main game. We’re supposed to be playing food delivery ninja drat it! If you’re going to give me a chart of weapon stats, at least make it mostly food related items! You want your game to be silly, why have your PC’s carry swords when they could all be going full Kung-Fu Hustle with spatulas, chopsticks and cleavers?  I’m not going to cover all of these, but let's look at a few highlights. Comb: This appears to be a reference to Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon. It causes a “pretty young Asian girl with a green Tai Chi sword” to chase and attack the Ninja. There is no comma between the words “pretty” and “young”. You either end up having to surrender the comb, and lose a point of honour for some reason, or kill her. Kind of a dick thing to do to the character of Yu Jialong frankly. Who, again, I will point out is Chinese, not Japanese. Eyepatch: Makes you a stone cold badass, giving you boosts to Strength and Agility, as well as corresponding debuffs to Ki and Extraneous. This one feels a bit Munchkin, but I actually like it in the context of this game. It fits the theoretical Saturday morning cartoon vibe. Just had a thought, how does this interact with the equipment rules as written in the core game? You can only carry two items, one in each hand, and the game explicitly doesn't have any other type of equipment slots (with a single exception for a weapon sheath on your back that you can use for your primary weapon). So, can you wear an eyepatch on your head or do you have to carry it for the bonus? Can you just Naruto the poo poo out of these and slap them wherever? Ninja Burger Meal: I mention this one because it uses the following phrase: “At first, Ninja would attempt to explain the multitude of choices available to their customers but their primitive minds were unable to comprehend them all.” I’m not sure that the writer understands that people in the past were not drooling morons and were perfectly capable of making choices. Ancient Ninja Wujenitsu Different from the modern variety apparently! In reality, these are just some additional spells you can cast. I will point out that this means that they used a full page of the supplement on abilities that work off of a single skill, attached to a single stat. I’m sure they see a ton of use, even when all PC’s can technically cast all of them. I also want to take the opportunity to mention that I love how the rules for casting make you worse at it the more you use it. I’m being sarcastic of course, rules that screw even the character who tried to specialize in them are dumb. I’m going to skip the presumably bad Japanese names and just use the English ones. Flying Eagle Claw: Gives you a charge attack, with a three square range. Doing this increases your attack difficulty by 2, does 2x4 damage, and possibly requires you to pass an Agility roll or take 5 damage yourself. Note, you could simply have moved (3 squares only requires a minimum Extraneous score of 5, which is well below your average stat roll) then attacked with a weapon (Like, say, a regular rear end sword. Which does 7 damage.). The move action would not have required a roll, and the attack action would have been made at only +1 difficulty, rather than +2. Further, you wouldn’t have risked having to make a difficulty 4 Agility test to avoid face planting into a wall. Whirlwind Leap: Grants a 50’ vertical leap to Ninja. This one if fine and should have been in the base game, given that it’s a staple of wire-fu martial arts films. Slow Time Kata: Take an additional turn, immediately after the current player’s turn is finished. Wait, can you interrupt other player’s turns? I don’t remember any rules for that. And if not, why is this spell worded that way? I’m just going to assume this was an odd way of saying you take a second turn when you’ve completed your current one. This spell is cast at difficulty 4 and requires spending two points of Ki, which presumably means they think it’s powerful. I’m honestly not certain because hosed if I’m going to crunch the math on that one. Actually, thinking for a moment; if you had a high Ki score you could probably just chain a bunch of these and move actions to sprint through an entire mission before anyone else gets to go. Endless Queue Kata: Tap into the “Hell of Endless Red Tape” funnelling raw bureaucratic energy at a foe. Oh good, back to squishing China and Japan together. Plus, you managed to fit in another problematic joke about Chinese spiritual beliefs! It’s even funnier because my understanding of Chinese culture is that red is a lucky colour, so “red tape” probably wouldn’t even have the same connotations! The spell basically just makes people line up single file. It lasts until the victim makes a difficulty 2 Ki roll. Note that the text specifically says “makes a 2 die Ki roll”, not “succeeds on a 2 die Ki roll”. I know, that’s being pedantic of me. I just hate how poorly worded and edited this commercial product is. New House Rules Oh good, more “optional” rules that are clearly intended to always be used. Bill-san & Ted-san’s Excellent Adventure: Once per game (Again, the game never actually defined what the keyword “game” means. Presumably a single play session, which might consist of multiple missions. Seems like something you might actually include in your rules though.) you can “find” one item left for you by your future self (Obviously, you can only use this while in the past). You lose a point of honour to do this, so it immediately sucks. It’s like the game is terrified of players actually using any of the potentially fun abilities it gives them, so it tosses penalties everywhere. Also, this rule requires you to spout faux fortune cookie lines when you use it. Firstly, that sounds super annoying. Secondly, the menu in the first book has an entire goddamn screed about how Ninja Burger doesn’t do fortune cookies because they are Chinese, not Japanese. Hey, Isn’t that a Ninja: Due to a couple of paragraphs of dumb justification that I’m not going to reproduce, being seen by a peasant in the past causes you to lose two points of honour, instead of 1. Basically, some butterfly effect bullshit. Also, apparently peasants enjoy a good fight (?) and will immediately call the town guard. Okay, but what happens in places where peasants aren’t a thing? Or like, if you get spotted by a knight or merchant? Do you lose one honour or two? What happens if you aren’t in a town? Why did the author not think through the way this rule was written at all? Again, I know I’m being pedantic. You can assume a degree of saturday morning cartoon time travel rules. I just think that your rules, which are the product being sold, should be written clearly and in a manner so as to prevent possible confusion.  Good suggestion game, I could be playing chess instead of Ninja Burger. Oh My Buddha! They Killed Kenny-san: Nope. gently caress you game. Urgh, fine. This is literally the butterfly effect rule. If you kill a commoner (wait, you used commoner here, but decided to use peasant in that last entry? Why not just use the generic commoner in both?) in the past, roll 2d6. If you roll a 2, the person was the ancestor of one of Ninja Burger’s enemies. The GM chooses a time travelling foe and removes them from play. Also, presumably you just became Snake Eyes, at least according to the core game rules. Not sure how that impacts your whole ancestor thing. Anyhow, if you instead roll a 12 you managed to kill an ancestor of a Ninja Burger employee. Roll another 1d6, because this game loves dumb cascading rolls, and count that many seats to your left, ignoring the GM. That character dies. So, you not only have an easily triggerable instant death, but it can just gently caress someone elses character randomly. Fun! Revised Corporate Policy: This one doesn’t even really appear to be a rule exactly? You are expected to maintain the exacting standards of Ninja Burger whenever you are on the clock. If you break policy you will suffer consequences. I mean, yes? There were already rules for losing honour by loving up? Bonus though, this entry also says that if you try to cover up your mistake and get discovered by management, you have to roll on the Horrible Disgrace chart with no way of preventing it! What are the rules for management noticing you? There aren’t any! So basically whenever the GM decides they don’t like you I guess. Storm Shadow: Oh, here we go. The promised additional special GI: JOE special ninja rule. If your character would die from honour loss, you can instead convert to the Lo Cal clan. What about the 1 in 6 chance you are already part of that clan? You aren’t allowed to use this rule and you die. Seriously, this game has a shocking number of rules that seem to want you to not be allowed to touch them. Anyhow, you pick another PC and declare your family to have an ancient grudge against them. You have to stand, specify the grudge, bow, then sit back down. I’m sure the author doesn’t picture anyone doing a Belushi samurai impression while doing this. Then the other players all vote if they liked the grudge. There are no tiebreaker rules for some reason. If they vote in favour, you join Lo Cal. You get a cool white outfit and a new mission to avenge yourself against your target. If they vote against you, you die. There is a side note that if another PC is currently Snake Eyes, you must declare them the target and automatically succeed the vote. Given that once someone rolls a result of 2 on 2d6 they become Snake Eyes, odds are good this is the usual result of this rule. Particularly since once someone is Snake Eyes, the party will always have a Snake Eyes in it unless that character dies. Ancient Dishonourable Disgrace Just what we needed, more 2d6 charts to roll on! Especially 2d6 charts that are basically just slightly different themed rules for a chart already in the core! Warning Issued by Time Cop: “A washed up Dutch martial artist” tickets you for paradoxical dishonour. Cool reference bro. Crushed by a Falling Telephone Booth: Honestly, thought this was going to be a Dr. Who reference. Instead, it appears to be a Bill & Ted reference because this book needed a second one of those. You take 6 damage. Morlocks Attack: There’s literally a line in this entry implying the author had to stretch to come up with eleven entries for the chart, so went with a rift that sucked back some Morlocks from the future. You have to kill them before they cause trouble. There is a stat line for them. The stat line includes no rules referencing their problems with strong light. Also, Morlocks are implied to have come from “lower classes”, so we’ve got more rules requiring your players to murder lower class victims! Mugged by Time Bandit: You get mugged. You suffer three damage, plus they steal your weapon. I would have thought that sucking that badly as a ninja would result in further honour loss, but I guess not. Whacked Paradoxical: Take four damage as something flies through a rift at high speed and smacks you in the head. Not sure why you wouldn't get a chance to dodge. Also, they used six and a half lines of text to list a rule where the only outcome is that you take four damage. Beaten with a Super Sonic Screwdriver: Oh, here's the Dr. Who reference. Dude in a long scarf beats you up. So not even a good Dr. Who reference, since physical violence is pretty much explicitly not the Doctor's thing. You take six damage. It's different than the previous entry because you take six damage instead of four! Hit and Run: Everyone in your current square takes four damage, everyone adjacent takes two. You know, I just realized that I don't think the game ever established if movement is only along the vertical and horizontal axis, or if diagonals count as adjacent. Glad they didn't include rules clarifications like that and used the space to make bad, long winded jokes. I also find it weird that this entry specifies that you get hit by a silver sports car. Were you worried that saying DeLorean would get you sued or something? Bored by a Time Lord: Man, I guess they really couldn't resist. More Dr. Who, this time you encounter the Master. He monologues at you and you have to test to not sleep. If you fail, you are "at his mercy for two turns". Two whole turns! No, the rules will not specify what the hell he will attempt to do during those turns. Probably just punch you and deal automatic damage, given the prior entries. Caught in a Police Call Box as it Materializes: Holy crap, could you really not think of any other time travel media to reference? Like, the internet existed in 2001, just loving Google it. You get to try to dodge this one. If you fail you take five damage and lose a hand, along with any remaining fingers/honour points associated with it. Make a Quantum Hop: I'm just glad to see a reference that isn't Dr. Who at this point. You exchange bodies with the closest commoner. You now have a commoner stat line and ten fingers. You retain access to all skills, but no longer have any equipment. If you complete your mission, your manager puts you back in your profit body. The game states that the commoner you swap with is now considered one of your ancestors. Though it doesn't elaborate on this, I assume this means if anything happens to them or their body, bad things happen to you. Sliding into Second: Sliders reference, in case it wasn't clear. Seems a waste of a possible food pun. You are shifted to an alternative Earth and your character is removed from the game. Whatever, more relevant is this line: "Three men (one fat, one African American and one geek) as well as a woman are deposited at your feet." Gotta love the implication being fat, African American and a geek are all mutually exclusive. Fortunately, that's the end of the player facing rules! They aren't any improvement over the core game, but they do seem to be trying a little more at least. Sadly, there's still a GM section left. Maybe it gets good there (I bet it doesn't). New Enemies Kung-Pow Fried Chicken: "You no do chicken right, I do chicken right!" loving hell. Did you have to write in the lovely racist accent? They're KFC, they make dry chicken spiced with gunpowder. They are a racist caricature who sounds like they could be illustrated by Dr. Seuss in the style of his WWII propaganda. Their leader, General Tso, originally ran a drug cartel.  Never mind, this was on the next page. General Tso Assassin: There's a whole running "joke" here about "tsouth east Asia", still that's fun. Otherwise, generic sounding 80's movie assassin. I think the description was parodying something specific, but I didn't pick up on it and I don't care enough to research it. Attack Chicken: Mutant chickens used as attack and guard animals. Find, I guess? If the rest of the game sucked less, these would probably be worth a small chuckle in game. Tservice Associate: This whole extended thing of adding the letter T to words starting with S is super tedious. Underpaid inner city youths acting as grunt workers. I would think we are supposed to be sympathetic to them, since they are clearly being exploited, but I expect the game intends you to bisect tons of these guys. Also, some low key racism here with the connections between fried chicken, drug cartels and "inner city". I mean, I say low key, but… Tsoldier: Rank and file soldiers, armed with "MSG SMGs". What are those, aside from a meaningless gag? No idea, the game didn't provide stats for them. In fact, the stat line for these guys has them carrying a sword but no guns. Ancient Enemies I want to mention that the game lists all the enemies as narrative entries, then has a list of stat lines after. This is annoying formatting, in part because the stat lines often have information that isn't in the text block. No idea why you wouldn't just include the stats in each entry. Governor: Generic corrupt despot. Functionary: Nobody knows what they do. Thanks game, that's helpful. I'm glad that you added an entry for an enemy that explicitly has no information. Also, I sense a degree of libertarian disdain for government seeping through again. Inept Guardsman: Described as basically Keystone Kops. Their stats are almost all average though. On the other hand, ACAB. So, no moral problems here. Inept Sergeant: Basically a regular guard, but fatter and with better pay. Yup, that tracks. Less Inept Captain: Has an entire paragraph of flavour text that will probably never have relevance to the game and that most players are technically never even supposed to read. You can loot an eyepatch from them, though it's not clear if it gives the same bonus as the one you can pull from your pocket. I think you could argue some unconscious classism here as well, with the officer being inherently more competent than the stupid lower class guards. If there wasn't so much other problematic crap in this game I probably wouldn't even consider that possibility. After all, it's a classic trope to have boss enemies be both metaphorical and physical in nature. This game doesn't get the benefit of doubt from me though. Scow-Ling Monk: Really stretching to make that pun there. These are Kung Fu monks. They have "joined the governor's tyrannical regime". Wait, is there some sort of meta plot going on here or something? Like, when you travel back in time you always end up in the same city, run by the same evil governor and with the same monks? Peasant: Oh, we're back to peasant instead of commoner. Okay. The GM is told that if a PC kills a peasant you should enforce the rule about possibly killing an ancestor. Again, aren't those technically supposed to be house rules?  Even the "good" art in this book looks as though it got run through a photocopier a few times before they added it to the layout. Adventure The remainder of this book is an adventure module. The premise is that your party of Ninja are sent back in time to stop the racist KFC parody from assassinating a particular target. You also need to eliminate three assassins. Everyone also gets assigned a delivery target in the past. Then you get possible secret clan goals. These are slightly more inventive than the ones in the core game adventure. They range from swapping out leaflets, to stealing objects, to assassination. There are rules for moving around the buildings by climbing or jumping between rooftops. These are fine I guess? It doesn't hurt to include them as guides, but that kind of vertical movement should just be more intrinsic to playing the game to begin with. By that, I mean that I think that they should be so clear that you don't need to include them here. You are supposed to be playing ninja after all. Then you get rules governing the actions of the three assassins. Then rules for the Iron Ninja, who is written as some sort of pseudo superhero. The Iron Ninja is not a robot, but does have a strong stat line. He gets a pseudo random goal, generated by rolling 1d6. These goals all pretty boil down to saying what location on the map he moves towards. You also get rules for his female sidekick, Burger Monkey. I hate it. There is an Emissary from the Emperor's court, sent to kill the Iron Ninja. He is seven feet tall and fights using giant, flappy sleeves, which he can use to shatter brick. Having apparently covered off all the important characters, you get a bunch of locations in the style of D&D dungeon maps. There is the governor's mansion, a guard barracks, a large silo (where the assassin's attempt to set up a sniper rifle), a restaurant and a hospital. There is also a promenade with several booths selling products, all of which are dumb pop culture related jokes. Given the info provided, these are the only buildings that exist in this town. Commoners don't need houses if they just pop out of existence when you aren't looking at them I guess.  The level of quality you can expect from the maps in this, a commercial product sold for money. The detailed maps/descriptions of the buildings themselves continue to mash up details of Chinese and Japanese culture. I don't want to go too deep on these, since I only have surface level knowledge myself. Still, even I can see the total lack of effort to get anything even partially correct. As an example, this whole module is clearly supposed to be vaguely Chinese themed. The mansion has bonsai trees in it. A quick internet search tells me that bonsai trees are strictly a Japanese thing. While a similar art form exists in China (and other parts of South East Asia), it has a different name and style. Of course, the real answer here is that I think the author may literally not comprehend that these are distinct, if related, cultures. Also, the scale on these grid maps makes no sense. Building interiors contain significantly more squares than the exterior should allow. Since movement is grid based and determined by your stats, this means that your ninja evidently moves something like three times faster, in terms of physical distance, when outside. Anyhow, let's start by looking at the mansion. There are seven numbered locations, each with a breakdown of different things located in the section. There are a bunch of details here, and a small amount of interactivity between locations, but I honestly don't see how 90% of it would ever bear relevance to your game. The interactivity is almost entirely things like "if you make noise in this room, the guard in the next room will check it out." There are various suggested skill checks to accomplish things like opening a door silently or hiding behind a particular object. Again, given you are playing ninja, I feel these actions should be so integrated into the game that specific advice like that shouldn't really be required. Of note, the mansion has a bedroom where the game really wants you to know that the governor's middle aged wife is in the middlr of loving a young male functionary. There are rules for making sure they don't notice you, which would cause them to raise an alarm. That is gross, it's basically a situation in which the GM is told to describe a sex scene to the group, then make them interact with it in a way that discourages them from interrupting. Small blessings, the book doesn't get graphic with the description. The barracks includes four locations, across two levels. They are all boring, pointless and lacking in interactivity. The silo is a grain silo. That's it. The assassins will attempt to set up a sniper nest here. The restaurant is likewise boring, wasting a ton of space describing a regular rear end restaurant with no real distinguishing features. The hospital has a solid gently caress you to any PC attempting to walk inside. You make a difficulty 3 Ki check, if you fail you fall asleep for two rounds due to the overpowering smell of incense. You also lose a point of honour for sleeping on the job. Presumably you will also get tagged with more honour loss for being spotted, since you just fell asleep in front of multiple potential witnesses. There is no way of detecting this in advance. And that's all. There are lots of details in individual rooms, but they tend to be things like: "two guys are arguing here". There is never any additional context provided for entries like this. Nor is there ever anything particularly interesting or unexpected in any of the buildings. The entire Iron Ninja deal is never expanded upon and adds nothing. Twelve pages of this book are dedicated to maps and location descriptions. You could read them and have essentially no more information that would be useful to run a game then what I have already listed. Even the information that is there would require on the fly work from the GM to actually do anything with. Conclusion So, did this supplement redeem the base game in any way? God no, it is terrible. I mean, was there ever any doubt? It was titled Iron Ninja Burger Monkey after all. There is a modicum of effort given to make the additional rules more interesting, but they still suck. Plus, the game line continues to add racist content, despite the different writer. Up next: Teenage Mutant Ninja Burger.
|
|
#
?
Oct 17, 2021 04:57
|
|
|
Symbaroum: Karvosti, the Witch Hammer, Part 1. Hello folks, welcome to my write-up of the second book in Symbaroum’s metaplot adventure path, Karvosti, the Witch Hammer. Whereas the first book is more of an introduction of the various players and plots/themes, it isn’t until this book that we really start digging into the metaplot surrounding the Throne of Thorns. Let’s get started shall we? The book begins with a fairly dry history/gazetteer of the Kavosti plateau. To save you (and me) a lot of time, he’s a picture.  As you can see, it’s a big rock plateau that sticks out of the spooky forest of Davokar like a sore thumb. Because of its location and unique geography (look at how easy it is to defend for starters), Karvosti has served as the closest thing the Barbarian clans have to a capital city. The High Chieftain of the Barbarian clans is elected and resides here year-round, along with an elite guard called the Wrathguards and the Huldra (highest ranking Barbarian witch) and their followers. As a quick side note, the position of high chieftain is mostly ceremonial these days and he really doesn’t have power beyond that of a mediator. In more desperate times (like when the spider people declared all humans must die right now) they lead the united clans in war, but these days he’s not very busy. Karvosti mostly has existed as neutral ground for the various clans for centuries.  The Ambrians are relatively new to Karvosti, having only been there for a few years. The first few exploration parties were either killed or enslaved, and the Ambrians mostly kept their distance. That is, until an explorer who called herself Sunflower climbed the sheer rock walls and was able to do some scouting. The sun symbols along the walls of Karvosti’s ruins caught her eye, and the Sun Church of Prios was also quite interested to learn this. After a bloody battle (in which the Ambrians greatly underestimated the Wrathguard), a delicate accord was struck. The Ambrians were granted access to the Plateau, so long as they kept the peace. That’s what it’s been like for the past decade. Generally speaking, the Wrathguards don’t get involved with crime unless it directly threatens the stability of the plateau. Otherwise, disciplining bad actors is left to the rulers of the various factions in Karvosti. Everyone is welcome atop Karvosti, so long as they are not obviously severely corrupted or carrying anything that would mean bad news for the settlement. The Wrathguards keep the only path up very secure, and anyone attempting to scale the cliff will inevitably run into the system of very thin wires placed along the cliff. When disturbed, they ring the nearby belltower that they’re linked to, and the Wrathguard come running. Karvosti is established enough to have an economy of sorts, with the exception that many things (like comfortable beds for travelers) are quite pricey given the location. Next is some information on two of the Barbarian clans that have territory near Karvosti, it’s not bad and might be relevant for Barbarian PCs, but it’s not really relevant to the adventure so I’ma skip it. That’s basically it for player facing information, the rest concerns GM-facing secret history/what really happened with regards to more commonly known. The first bit being what the deal with Aloéna is. This is her.  In the Core Book, Aloéna is a bit of an enigma. Besides being quite fearsome and mysterious, nobody seems to know exactly who/what she is (aside from the book saying some people suspect elfish ancestry) or what she’s up to. She’s also frighteningly powerful, so aside from the few that earn a very quick death at the end of her claws, most folk tend to stay very far away from her whenever she leaves her grove. In this book, we’re told that Aloéna is one of the Eternity Elves. A quick reminder, Elves in Symbaroum have several life cycles based around the seasons. After a time spent in each stage, the Elf enters a hibernation stage and emerges as an Elf of the next season, or dies. Each successive season has less and less Elves survive the process, and takes longer each time. Spring Elves are Pixies, small, chaotic beings that zip around like mad and love loving with people. Summer elves are man-sized and passionate/hot blooded (especially when compared to later Elves), and perceive time like most other mortal beings. These elves compromise all PC elves and most rank and file NPC elves. Autumn Elves tend to be commanders and diplomats, they’re more level-headed and begin to take a longer view of time, living less in the moment and more in the future. Winter Elves are generally the equivalent of minor royalty, for example the Winter Elf Eeano currently commands the entire Iron Pact. However, Winter Elves have difficulty actually quickly as their perception of time expands even further than Autumn Elves. They’re great at making centuries-long plans, but not so great at planning what they should do tomorrow basically. They’re also not very stable, and as they age some begin to become rather mentally unstable. This becomes a possible plot point in the fourth book. However, if a Winter Elf survives long enough to enter its last hibernation (and survives it) they emerge as an Eternity Elf, an immortal pinnacle of Elvenkind. They have vast mystical powers, a towering intellect, and potent physical capabilities. (although a prepared party of PCs could take one out without too many issues tbh, a flaw of a system that doesn’t scale well) There aren’t that many of them, but Aloéna is one. The reason for her residence on Karvosti begins centuries ago, long before the fall of Symbaroum. The giant (and last of his kind we’re told) Garavarax resided atop the plateau, alone. Then the humans came over the Ravens (eastern mountain range), so the Giant started killing all these interlopers in his lands. After some good fun (in which he was wounded more than he liked to admit) the humans broke and begged to be spared. In exchange for gifts worthy of a god and a promise not to ever rise up against him, Garavarax agreed to show mercy. The book hints that while the humans largely respected this pact, the desire to overcome beings like Garavarax might have spurred their efforts into mastering magic and defying nature. Eventually Symbaroum falls, and aside from a few refugees that respect the pact, the giant keeps everyone else out of his lands. Then comes the elves. One assumes they’re around trying to clean up fallen Symbaroum’s messes. At any rate, they stray into Garavarax’s territory, and he’s not a fan of these arrogant assholes that refuse to bow down like the humans did. So, for some reason he goes to war with them alongside all the blighted Abominations and Demons running loose. Given that these creatures tend to be insane lunatics that hate and kill anything not wholly corrupted (and Garavarax was not) it seems kinda weird that they seem to accept him as an ally. It doesn’t work out for him in the end though, because the elves dial up Aloéna, who with, “great cunning, mighty hymns, and brute force, single-handedly brought Garavarax down.” For some reason (either he was truly immortal or she chose to spare him, the book doesn’t confirm the exact reason) Aloéna let him live, luring him into an eternal slumber in the caverns deep under the plateau. Only the Huldra (head witch) and a few select leaders of the Iron Pact know this truth, there’s a few barbarian legends of a giant creature named Aravax who lived in the region ages ago, but even fragments like those are rare tales. Aloéna is mostly considered by the residents of Karvosti to be a passive observer, which is good, considering how bad a ten-foot-tall horned beast that kills with provocation could be for business. This isn’t entirely an accurate statement. Aloéna acts on instinct, eliminating anyone she feels might be a threat to Garavarax’s continued slumber. The first time this happened in recent memory, he brutally murdered three otherwise innocent people in broad daylight with hundreds of witnesses. After the Huldra offered a few suggestions (cause that kind of display gets things like monster hunters sent after you) Aloéna now prefers to kill more subtly. She enters people’s minds while they sleep, driving them to suicide. If anyone is strong enough to resist her there, she waits until they leave and then kills them in the forest below. Karvosti was also where the Iron Pact was founded. Up until the visit of the elven Prince Eneáno, the elves had tried to enforce the laws against loving with the ruins of Symbaroum/spooky parts of Davokar with lethal force. The forest keeping the darkness of Symbaroum slumbering was new at this time, and they were worried that the humans would inevitably gently caress things up again. However, this approach was not very effective, I’m not an expert but I’d say it probably had a lot to do with there being a lot more humans than elves for starters. At any rate, the elves figured if we can’t kill them all, let's try negotiating with them. Prince Eneáno and the Huldra/High Chieftain of the time forged a treaty called the Iron Pact, the elves promised peace so long as the Barbarians stayed away from the ruins of Symbaroum and the dark parts of Davokar. This held for quite a long time (mostly thanks to the influence of the witches) but these days the Barbarians both help the Ambrian treasure hunters and doing their own fair share of looting. As you can probably guess, the younger elves have noticed and aren’t the biggest fans of this change in Barbarian behaviour. It’s a shame that the leader of the Iron Pact can’t react quickly to changing events, and that he’s also probably losing his mind as well. One of my favourite lore tidbits is what really happened to the former High Chieftain Karlaban. All that’s publicly known is that suddenly a well-respected and otherwise upstanding Barbarian leader instantly turned into an abomination, fled Karvosti, and returned to attack it at the head of a small army of blight beasts. The witches then summoned a glowing champion, who was able to kill the former High Chieftain. That’s all true, but I think how this guy turned into a magically corrupted hell-beast is honestly kinda funny. "Basically a big red button that says do not push” posted:The reason for Karlaban's transformation into an abomination was his inability to curb his curiosity. At the top of the first High Chieftain’s residence – the tower which was later built into the stronghold and now looms at the back of the Great Throne – is a chest, the content of which was lost in legend. Like his successors, all Karlaban knew was that the chest must never be opened; that it contained an artifact of immense power, which must be guarded and kept hidden at all costs. Karlaban, who was under constant attack by the Saars and the third incarnation of the Blood-Daughter, concluded that the warnings surrounding the chest were false and that the artifact inside could be used to defend the cliff. He was mistaken… Yeah, so the chest contained something called a seed capsule, basically concentrated corruption. For some reason the elves gave this to the humans to seal the pact or whatever. When Karlaban opens it, BAM! Instant chaos spawn!. The chest snapped shut right away so nobody else could get with the same wave of corruption, but Karlaban was beyond saving. When he returned with his blighted army, only the intercession of Aloéna saved Karvosti. She provided a certain ritual to the witches, which infuses a willing target with powerful fire abilities. This person was able to kill Karlaban, however the ritual itself was a death sentence. It took her a full day to finish burning to death. That entire series of events is so dumb it makes me laugh, I mean what the gently caress did the elves think would happen? That no human would ever open the ornate magical chest that all but screams “open me?” Anyways, the current High Chieftain is Tharaban, and on the eve of his “coronation” someone tried to assassinate him with a bow. Publicly it’s not known who the assassin was, and that they were never caught. This is not actually the case, for the assassin was none other than Thraraban’s sister Tirba! Apparently she was born under an evil moon (spooky barbarian omens!), so Tharaban’s kept her a secret while they put her through all sorts of trials in the attempt to purge the corruption from her soul. While she was kept in the dark, Tharaban was out there gaining glory and whooping it up as a cool barbarian dude. Whether Tirba was actually corrupt or if it was her grim childhood that warped her mind is left kinda up in the air, kinda like the whole “Butcher of Blakiven” plot in the Witcher stories. She escaped the family about ten years ago, and while she was assumed dead, the family quietly suspected her hand in various accidents that befell the family over the years. And then she tried to skewer her brother as he assumed the mantle of high chieftain. She actually was caught and placed within a cell below his keep, where she remains to this day. The second last-bit of lore tells us that the story surrounding the death of the last Huldra (the commonly known version of the story is that she turned into an abomination and the current Huldra Yeleta slew her in self-defense) is a bald-faced lie. Oryela (the previous high witch) entered into a compact with an Elf who unbeknownst to her, had chosen to become Undead to better fight the forces of corruption. This pact gave the undead elf Iel the ability to speak with her remotely and even force her to act in certain ways. When Yeleta brought a certain artifact to Karvosti, the undead elf felt such fear he caused Oryela to lash out at the Keeper Deadorna (another witch who happened to be holding it at the time) and did something to the statue. The text itself is frustratingly vague here, I think this is a situation where the translation fails us. A later sentence implies that the statue is gone, but previous sentences never say if the artifact statue was destroyed/teleported/or absconded with. It just says that the witch lashed out at the statue and killed the other witch thanks to some friendly fire. After Deadorna’s death Yeleta became sure that Oryela was losing her poo poo, so she overthrew her and locked the former Huldra in a magically warded prison. Yeleta knows that the voice that sometimes speaks through Oryela is an ally against corruption, but it’s so twisted by hate/anger that enacting its plans would only make things worse. She’s considered just killing Oryela, but wants the other voice to tell her what they did with the statue first. The last GM secret is that the explorer Sunflower never existed. It turns out that the Odaiova (Barbarian clan) just straight up told the Ambrians everything in exchange for them backing off their land and ceasing military operations against them. If word ever got out that the Odaiova sold out the other clans in exchange for the security of a few settlements, well there would be hell to pay for them.  The next bit is mostly just a quick summary of the various factions and they slot into Karvosti, (basically everyone is represented here in some fashion) as well as some metaplot agnostic adventure seeds. Then there’s a bunch of tables for randomly generating ruins and treasure (and considering that “Ambrian Treasure Hunter” is a default starting point for PCs it really seems like these rules should have been in the core rulebook), as well as some new artifacts, a few new basic enemies like cursed termites, and a really basic ruleset for politicking. It’s literally just roll Persuasion and maybe get a bonus if you say/do something that a particular faction likes, and you aren’t allies with their enemies. It’s honestly so basic, I wonder why they even bothered writing it down. I’m not goona go into any real detail here, it’s kinda dry and I want to get to the adventure already. Actually, that’s kind of a lie. There’s a couple things I wanna go over before I start reviewing the adventure proper. First, there’s this lovely little tidbit, I actually thought this wasn’t revealed until the 4th adventure. ”A GM about to get their throat punched” posted:The ritual used to create changelings was developed by the Morphantics of ancient Symbaroum. It is a process teeming with corruption, and entails grave violations against Wyrtha’s laws. Nonetheless, the elves of the Iron Pact have reluctantly embraced it, thinking that the goal justifies the means. Deep within the Halls of a Thousand Tears sit seventeen winter elves who would have been thoroughly corrupted a long time ago, had it not been for the protective runes covering their bodies, and the hymns being chanted around them. These elves are the ones who deformed fairies into Siraphs, known to humans as Changelings, and they have the power to control and influence their children – see what they see, hear what they hear, even speak through their throats. In this way, the elves have kept an eye on the humans since long before the clans were formed. (Read more about Changelings under the Create Siraph heading on page 60.)  Just take all that in. If you’re a Changeling PC, some random Elf secure in his magically warded fortress can just indefinitely seize control of your character, no save, and there’s no form of protection that can stop it. There is absolutely zero indication that this is the case in any of the player facing material ( or even GM material up until now), and honestly I don’t think that there’s a way for PCs to find this out regardless because you’re not even aware it’s happening for fucks sakes. If you’re playing PCs not on the side of the Elves (like maybe you’re power hungry bastards who enjoy flipping the laws of nature the bird) and there’s a Changeling in your party, this will torpedo the entire campaign if your GM even so much as touches it. I honestly can’t get over just how big of a steaming pile of poo poo this ritual is. “Whoops you picked the wrong race, now the GM can just assume complete control of your character at any time. Guess you maybe shouldn’t have decided being a minor shapeshifter was cool eh?”  Lets cleanse the pallet shall we?  Fffffffffffffffff Then why the gently caress bring them up here? These “Sir Appearing-in-a-later-book-so-please-buy-it” moments are really dumb too. It’s been a while since I read this book the first time, but I’m pretty sure that the Night Elves aren’t even a thing in the next 3 metaplot books, with the last one hinting that they’ll be a thing in the final book. gently caress it, that’s it for now. Next time, the actual adventure begins.
|
|
#
?
Oct 17, 2021 12:05
|
|
|
Lemony posted:Also, the scale on these grid maps makes no sense. Building interiors contain significantly more squares than the exterior should allow. Since movement is grid based and determined by your stats, this means that your ninja evidently moves something like three times faster, in terms of physical distance, when outside.
|
|
#
?
Oct 17, 2021 16:49
|
|
|
Age of Sigmar: Fyreslayers The Broken Lands of Flame Before the battle between Grimnir and Vulcatrix, the continents of Aqshy were easier to travel between, connected by bodies of water and relatively simple to cross. The explosive conclusion of that battle changed the landscape, however. Some of the lands became blasted wastes due to the force of the combat, and the Age of Chaos led to several more continents fragmenting under the ruinous magic unleashed. At this point, crossing the seas of Aqshy or the blasted lands is often more difficult than using a Realmgate to hope over somewhere else and finding a way back in. Even so, the Fyreslayers continue to search for gold under Aqshy's surface. They are still strongest in the Realm of Fire, not least because there are more magmadroth nests and ur-gold deposits there than anywhere else. The First-Forged holds were built along the Salamander's Spine mountains, though no one can agree on how many original holds there were, and due to the high volcanic activity in the region, the landscape no longer even slightly resembles its ancient self, so no one can go and check. However, all lodges trace their lineage back to this region eventually, and the forges of the first holds were lit by the Zarrkhul, the mystic firestorm that blazed across Aqshy's sky when Grimnir and Vulcatrix died. There are almost no holds left in Salamander's Spine, despite originating there. Most of the First-Forged were destroyed, and what few remain have been raided and picked clean many times over. It's not rare in Aqshy for civilizations to decline, collapse and remake themselves, however, and the Fyreslayers are no exception. They have thrived, even though the First-Forged are no more. The original Vostarg lodge was the Vosforge, the greatest of the Salamander's Spine holds. More lodges claim descent from the Vostarg than any other, and today hundreds of Vostargi-descended lodges exist. The one that still bears the name Vostarg is based out of Furios Peak, the largest volcano in the Cynder range, and claims descent from the ancient Runefather Urgom-Grimnir, who first climbed the Thousand Stairs and first mined the mountain. The Greyfyrd, one of other elder names in the lodges, originate from a place they called the Harrworld, though they refuse to speak of it. Somewhere in that region, they lived in the magmahold Greygrend, but it has long been levelled and destroyed. The descendants of the Greygreynd's inhabitants disproportionately suffer the glimmerlust, which is probably part of why the Greyfyrd and their kin do not speak of their origins. What Greyfyrd Lodge commands today is the Gateswold in Chamon, along with a number of Aqshian lodges like Asharak of the Bright Mountains or the Emberhalls near Hammerhal-Aqsha. They once ruled the Scarred Isle, but Archaon destroyed it in the early Age of Sigmar. Chaos has destroyed its share of First-Forged holds as well. Grymdar Lodge fell this way - their ancient hold of Karadrum held against disaster and internal strife, but was laid low by the armies of the Dark Powers. They swore eternal vengeance, and the survivors of the invasion swore to retake their home and release those kept prisoner within. When they returned to Karadrum, however, it had been ruined beyond all repair by the battles fought there. The remaining Zharrgrim chose to deliberately trigger a volcanic eruption, burying their dead in a protective shell of magma. Hermdar Lodge has founded by the refugees and survivors, and they have ruled over the Grymhold ever since, built under the tallest mountain of Aqshy's Adamantine Chain. They sell their services primarily to the human peoples of the Flamescar Plateau, who always need their help against Chaos. The Drakendreng Lodge were famous monster hunters among the First-Forged, lining the gates of Drakenhal with their trophies. No one is sure if it was their hunting or their magnificent treasure halls that called down the fyre-serpent Nagwroth, child of the godbeast Nagendra. However, something did, and even the Drakendreng could not defeat such a monster. Nagwroth was large enough to encircle the entire mountain, and the battle against it destroyed the Drakenhal. The royal family was slain in the battle, and the survivors split off to form what is now the Lofnir Lodge. They abandoned the ruins of Drakenhal, chasing the wounded Nagwroth to Ghur. There, they swore vengeance against the beast and made a home under volcano Crownpeak, which they named Rufhal. The Lofnir have hunted Nagwroth ever since. These days, the center of Fyreslayer activity in Aqshy is the Cynder Peaks, the most volcanically active range in the realm. The constant eruptions ensure that new veins of ore are found frequently, spat out from the depths of the earth, and many lodges keep watch on eruptions to test their aftermath for ur-gold or magmadroth eggs. The Vostarg command much of the region, and also control the ancient volcano Vostargi Mont on the Flamescar Plateau. Vostargi Mont was formed by the falling debris of the battle of Grimnir and Vulcatrix, and the Fyreslayers have been mining it out since the Age of Myth. It is open to all lodges, but the Vostargi rule over the lodge that is housed there now, and the local humans tend to think of it as the central hiring location for Fyreslayer mercenaries.  Vostarg Lodge is an ancient name - a name of the First-Forged. Only the Vostarg have retained a name that old, though they have had to move to the Cynder Peaks from the Vosforge. They are one of the oldest lodges in Aqshy, and for many people they represent the archetypal image of the Fyreslayer. They are known to be brutal in combat and afraid of nothing, willing to fight anywhere. The Vosforge was the largest of the First-Forged holds and the last one to be lost, having withstood countless sieges through the Age of Chaos. What it could not survive was greed and internal division. The final Runefather of the Vosforge, Thorgar-Grimnir, slew a Bloodthirster in single combat to drive off a Khornate horde. However, he died of his wounds after the battle, and he had chosen no heir from among his twelve Runesons. The Vosforge may not have fallen in battle, but it could not survive the war within. Each of the Vostarg sons believed they were the worthy heir. To protect the lodge, if not the magmahold, the Vostarg Runemaster took the ur-gold of the Vosforge and divided it into twelve lots. He asked each son to take their followers and their share of gold and go their own way. Thus, the Vosforge was abandoned by all, and the Vostarg scattered to across the realms. In the time since, the Vosforge has been sacked and raided many times, becoming lair to all manner of evil things. The lodge that now bears the name Vostarg descends from one of the twelve sons, Zhafor, who kept the old name rather than make his own. He is honored every year at Ghuzfest with loud cheers and much alcohol. The modern Vostarg are the largest of the Fyreslayer lodges, and they practice a war doctrine focused on aggression over all else. It has won many battles, and they are renowned for having had many successful Runefathers who sired many, many sons. Thus they are sometimes called the All-Fathers, as many lodges have been founded by the sons of a Vostargi Runefathers who did not inherit. The current chief of the lodge is Bael-Grimnir, who has ruled from his ruby throne for several centuries and who has over fifty children. He has a long and storied career as a warrior, having brought in more gold than many mortals will ever see - second only to his ancestor, Thorgar-Grimnir. Even those who bear no relation to Vostarg Lodge respect Bael-Grimnir for his courage and skill. Next time: Other notable lodges
|
|
#
?
Oct 17, 2021 17:16
|
|
|
Ninja Burger: The Role Playing Game - Part 5 Expansion Content So, while Iron Ninja Burger Monkey was the supplement for playing in the ancient past, Teenage Mutant Ninja Burger is the supplement for modern day play. Is it any better than the core game, or the previous supplement? I'm writing this review as I read through it for the first time, so let's find out together. (It will definitely not be, but I can hold out hope.)  The book was written by Daniel Landis and Christopher O'Neill. Just so we know who to blame. The special thanks section is full of unfunny bullshit, but none of it seems to be aggressively problematic. Score one for this supplement I guess. The introduction indicates we will be seeing more to do with Lo Cal in this book. Apparently he had an evil plan to convert the world to vegetarianism! So evil! Reminder, there is a total of one item on the Ninja Burger menu that is not already vegetarian. The same paragraph talking about this evil plan literally references the fact that Ninja Burger uses soy! Security Systems These exist. If a PC attempts to disarm one and fails, they must act as though they think they succeeded. I think that's the first time the game has acknowledged a specific failure state for a skill roll. As Ninja study their targets, the GM is told to provide map details to the players on a given device's area of effect and type. However, you shouldn't tell them what the actual effect will be, because that will make it funnier. Security Cameras: Multiple paragraphs to tell you that security cameras are cameras and probably have a control room. If you damage one, someone will probably check it out. Tripwire: Okay, I'm fine with the stats for difficulty in not setting off the trap, or for disarming it. However, apparently everyone moving over an active tripwire needs to make a skill check, regardless of them knowing about it! So, if you see the wire tied across the door, it is exactly the same difficulty as someone who just blissfully strides through the door unaware. This is just a very frustrating level of pedantic. Motion Detector: What it says on the tin. Can be spoofed by moving at half speed and making a successful skill check. I can already tell that all of these things will have no real useful details. They could have just been a short list with an attached block of skill check difficulties. Who is reading this book and needs a paragraph long explanation on what security cameras are? So, that being the case: There are entries for heat detectors, sound detectors, laser grids and pressure plates. They all have one or two options for skill rolls to avoid them. The fiction is different for each one, but the game mechanics are only different in that different skill rolls are called for. There is a rule entry that the rule against being spotted while on a mission also applies to possible recorded proof by security systems. Modern Weapons A list of guns. Mainly exactly what you'd expect. Amusingly, the taser is listed as the first entry. On a 2d6 chart, that means you can't actually pull one of these out of your pockets. So, you can only be equipped with one by taking it as your primary weapon when starting a mission. More amusingly, going by the descriptions, they have conflated tasers and stun guns. Both are on the chart, but with swapped descriptions. Excellent editing there. There are SMGs, conspicuously missing from the prior book despite an enemy being listed as carrying them, assault rifles, flamethrowers, shotguns, rocket launchers and explosives. Pistols and revolvers have separate entries, with revolvers having a Dirty Harry rule. There are new explosive AoE/deviation rules that apparently supersede the ones from the prior supplement. There's also a chart for critical failures that one of the new weapon tags can produce.  There is a new chart for making ninja pocket rolls. It starts off strong. Black Noise Eliminator: Nope. Nope. Nope. Nope. Nope. Nope. Nope. Nope. They helpfully included a footnote specifying that black noise is noise made by someone with a propensity to wear black and who is trying to not make any noise. Come on, there's no way you didn't know what this item name sounded like. gently caress you and gently caress your game. The majority of this new list is just items specifically intended to assist in your attempts to foil individual specific security systems. As a result, they are all super boring rock, paper, scissors crap. Black Demon Magic The ancient forbidden techniques. Which is to say, more spells for those who want to interact with that subsystem. As with the last time, I will be skipping the Japanese titles and just use the included English ones. Fruitless Quest for Mall Parking: So, the physical sign you do for this one involves sitting on a chair and mimicking participation in a 200 meter wheelchair relay. That seems totally okay and not offensive at all. Oh poo poo, I just read the actual entry. I'm just going to quote it in its entirety so you too can experience your jaw slowly dropping further, and eyes opening wider, with every word. "Channeling the blackest forces of capitalism, the Ninja lays down a blanket of mystic energy that makes it impossible to find a parking space. Any currently open parking space sprouts tiny blue signs bearing the Ward of Parking (a large blue kanji on a white field) that makes it impossible to park in the warded space." gently caress me, I dunno why I'm so surprised after all the casual racism they've already included. There's just a really cruel and uncaring vibe in this entry. Hell of a Thousand Screaming Bells: You curse your target for 1d6 turns in which they are targeted by random telemarketers. The calls will be made to any nearby phone, regardless of owner. The game effect is a debuff. Not sure why dealing with ringing phones for like thirty seconds would have that much impact, but whatever. The telemarketers are specifically noted to mangle your name, so I think we can probably toss this on the racism pile as well. Calling of a Ravaged Spirit: This causes a chosen target within 5 squares to take 2d6 damage. Casting this causes you to lose a point of honour and requires a difficulty 4 skill check. So, assuming you can pass the skill check, an average of 7 points of damage. I will remind you, that is the same as a sword, but with the very real possibility of only doing 2 damage instead. Sure, it works at range, but why not just walk over and stab them? The True Power of the Dark Side: This takes two turns to cast. It doesn't bother to list what happens if someone tries to interrupt you during this period. One the first turn, you drain all electricity from your current room. What happens if you are outside? Who knows! After all, thinking through the rules you are writing is hard work, you can't expect a game designer to do that! On turn two, you shoot two bolts of lightning at a target, both doing 1d6 damage. You also need to make an additional skill roll in order to actually hit your target. The difficulty to cast this is reduced by one if you offer to rule the galaxy with your target first, just in case you didn't get the joke. These all suck. The idea of a power that just fucks with access to parking is potentially entertaining, but not the way they wrote and presented it here. The combat powers all seem mechanically worse than just stabbing someone.  Okay, I'll admit I don't totally hate this illustration. It's a bit charming, in a "doodled in my notebook while in junior highschool" way. If the whole game successfully pulled off that vibe, I'd have far fewer negative things to say about it. House Rules Here we go again, more forced pop culture references plastered over "optional" rules that the rest of the game assumes are always in play. I have to wonder if the designers actually understand what "house rule" means. PC Parmesan: When you generate a ninja PC, if they end up in the Lo Cal clan, they can choose to be a PARM. These haven't even been introduced by this point in the book. I assume these are the mutant animal/ninja turtle knockoffs. You roll on a mutation chart, which the book at least provides a page number for. You reroll all your stats (why not have everyone roll for clan before stats and avoid this entirely?). You don't roll for skill masteries and you only get access to PARM skills. Not sure how this would work with the whole keeping your clan membership secret thing. "Oh, no, I'm just rolling the dice a bunch more and rewriting chunks of my sheet while referencing an entirely different section of the book for absolutely no reason." So this book doesn't seem to have the whole GM section warning about players not reading it. However, the actual content is still split the same way. The chart this rule references is on a page in what would be the GM section. If you assume that rule applies, any player utilizing this rule would immediately be smacked with honour loss. Given the usual quality of the editing in this game, I honestly don't know if they purposely did not add the warning in for this reason or if they just straight up forgot it. My, What Big Eyes You Have: All PARM's are members of Lo Cal and therefore kill on sight for Ninja. They are presumably visually distinct, but are allowed to attempt to disguise themselves with a difficulty 4 skill check. This just seems to make the option of playing one of these even worse. As soon as you flub that roll the other players will just pile on and try to murder you. The Ring: A Ninja who allows themselves to be recorded during a mission, and does not retrieve or destroy said recording, loses 1d6 points of honour. This apparently accounts for a point lost per person who views the tape. If anyone views it during the mission, you have to kill them or suffer honour loss. Seems like a tedious thing to track and also redundant. There were already rules for how you weren't allowed to be spotted. Proof of Purchase (The Firefly Rule): If a Ninja retrieves a recording proving the existence of Ninja, you are granted one additional point of honour, to a max of ten. You apparently do get a finger reattached when this happens, glad we sorted that out. Any honour, and fingers, gained this way are deducted from the Ninja who was caught on film. For the next mission only, the retrieving Ninja also starts play with cool urban camo and a rocket launcher. Man, out of the three GI: Joe ninja rules so far, this one is definitely the least connected. They've all been kinda lame, but at least the Storm Shadow one was trying. Mahjongg-Ohs The new opponent faction added in this supplement. It's directly controlled by Warlord Lo Cal. They guarantee delivery in thirty minutes or less and have been encroaching on Ninja Burgers market share. Their pizza is vegan, including a near perfect vegan cheese substitute. I am constantly confused about this dude being the big setting villain, he seems chill and concerned about the environment. I'm not going to stop eating cheese any time soon, because it's delicious and healthy (in moderation). However, if someone managed to make a perfect facsimile that didn't require animals? Yeah, I'd say it would be ethical to use it. The pepperoni is made of Oni, which might be an issue, but they are evil demons after all. Supposedly, the reason the chain has a perfect delivery track record is because they secretly kill anyone who received/witnessed a late delivery. While the company doesn't experiment on animals, they have discovered that when an animal consumes the cheese substitute it mutates into a martial artist who will stop at nothing to obtain and consume more pizza. These are the PARM's referenced previously, Pets Affected by Radioactive Mutations. I'm not 100% certain, but I'm pretty sure that would properly be Effected, making them PERM's. Feel free to correct my grammar though. All PARM's get recruited by Lo Cal to become anti-ninja killing machines, to be used in a hostile takeover. Since they only get two weeks of training, they do not receive any skill masteries, plus they are only able to learn a limited number of Ninja skills. There are six types, as shown on this 1d6 chart:  Each rolls more or less dice for each of their four primary stats, depending on their specialty. Chicken PARM: Mutated from birds, generally used as drivers/transporters. Below average Strength and Ki, average Extraneous, high Agility. You get vestigial wings that reduce the difficulty of climbing, jumping, falling and tumbling. Veal PARM: Mutated from cows, used as enforcers. High Strength, medium Extraneous, low Agility and Ki. You have horns on your head, which make it hard to hide your appearance. In return, you get a 5 damage weapon that does not use a hand slot. Unless the whole group is playing PARM'S, this probably sucks, since it just makes it more likely you get discovered quickly. Eggplant PARM: I guess this stuff also mutates plants somehow? Commanders and accountants. High Ki, medium Extraneous, low Strength and Agility. You don't breath or eat, instead you can sit in the sun for an hour per day. Since that ability is functionally worthless in a game like this, they also make you immune to poisons, suffocation and starvation effects. Pork PARM: Obviously pigs, the newest addition to the stable. Belligerent and snarky, they don't appear to have a generally assigned role. High Strength and Ki, low Extraneous and Agility. You hooves make it hard to disguise yourself, similar to the Veal PARM. You probably get a bonus against electrical attacks. I say probably, because they say this is the case but then fail to list any actual rule governing it. Your hooves also function as a 5 damage weapon. Furry PARM: Mutated cats, dogs, hamsters and so forth. Any kind of average North American family pet basically. Other PARM's dislike them, but they are better able to pass as normal humans. Slightly better than average Agility, medium Strength and Ki, low Extraneous. You have opposable thumbs, which I guess implies the other variants don't? The only in game benefit to this is making your disguise rolls easier. Sushi Parm: Fish or amphibians, frequently goldfish. High Extraneous, medium Agility, low Ki and Strength. You are immune to fire effects and cannot fail swim rolls. I would assume this means you auto pass those checks, but the wording of the rule is vague as always. Do you still roll? Who knows! Wait. Oh my god. I just realized something. PARM's are restricted to a limited number of skills. Which skills they can access are specific to each type. The way skills work in this game, you are literally not allowed to attempt any action in which you do not possess a skill. Do you see where I'm going with this? Sushi PARM weren't given access to the swimming skill, the one they can't fail. Their special ability can literally never trigger, because they aren't allowed to even attempt the skill check. How did they not catch this in editing? (I'm going to go out on a limb and say it's because they never bothered with an editing pass.) New Generic Enemies Going to more or less skip over these. It's basically just a list of different types of police forces and private security/military types. Nothing particularly noteworthy, except that Ninja apparently have a degree of respect for SWAT. Maybe it's because of the shared disdain they apparently have to the average citizen. According to the game it's because SWAT has an appreciation for the importance of wearing black. LoL. There is a list of new employees for Mahjongg-Ohs. The text takes the opportunity to again dump on minimum wage service employees. Somehow the way that they are treated is different than how your Ninja are treated? I mean, you are playing minimum wage employees of a company that views you as expendable drones. Is this game secretly about how you should rise up and assassinate your managers? (No, it isn't.) Oni Oni Parcel Service also has developed new mutants, using the experimental cheese, to fight Ninja. We get some more casual dismissal of genuine Chinese religious beliefs by adding some more joke hells that the demons come from. I mean, these joke hells wouldn't be that bad if it wasn't for the whole "making a joke of a real culture that the authors aren't part of" thing. Sample Delivery Of course, the book wouldn't be complete without eating a ton of pages on a half baked adventure module. You have received an order from some scientists at UnFood, the corporation owned by Lo Cal and the backers of Mahjongg-Ohs. They are sick of veggies and yearn for the hand fried goodness only a Ninja Burger can deliver. A burger that, I will remind you for the umpteenth time, is made of soy and contains zero meat. Your delivery Ninja are also instructed to steal a stash of Pepper-Oni from the UnFood vault. Each Ninja PC gets assigned a specific scientist to make a delivery for. These scientists are so fleshed out that the game doesn't give them names, just number and letter designations. I love how this food delivery game doesn't give a single shot about the actual process of delivering food.  We see here another instance of detailed mapping of the air duct system. Real value for money. Hilariously, there are a couple of paragraphs dedicated to how the only entry point is the front door, but gives rules for climbing the building just in case. I mean, you have already shown a giant, mapped out air duct system. It seems reasonable to assume there must be intake/outtake for that system somewhere on the building, presumably the roof. However, that's just par for the course for the degree these writers think things through. I also love how the two maps appear to be very slightly different sizes, so the grids line up in a really strange way. As with the core game's mission, we are provided with a pile of specific rules governing acting in and around the vents. If you spend a full turn in a hallway, you have to roll on a random encounters table. These are all basically either some kind of guard patrol or some random worker. Nothing on the chart is exciting or interesting. They also duplicate a bunch of stat lines here for no apparent reason. There is also a list of the security systems in the building. They also duplicate a bunch of the rules information here. I'd go through the various locations, but there is seriously nothing particularly interesting in any of them. They are just turbo bland. Honestly, it all just feels like stuff you could come up with very easily on the fly. As always, there is very little interconnectivity between locations and there is no weight to anything you actually might do or not do in the mission. They didn't even include clan specific secret goals, beyond Lo Cal ninja being assigned to prevent the theft of the Pepper-Oni. The book ends with an add for the Ninja Burger card game, from the designers of Munchkin. That's how you know it'll be good. Unlike the RPG, I have actually played this game once! It was boring and not super well designed, at least as far as I remember. There is also an add for Origins, which feels a bit strange honestly. Next Time: Burger Tech, the futuristic setting expansion.
|
|
#
?
Oct 19, 2021 02:18
|
|
|
 Beast & People This is the section that has every monster, NPC, and character in the book. I’m rearranging the entire thing into five updates for a simple reason: the organization SUCKS. See, every NPC is sorted into one of five factions: Unaligned, Red King, Heart Queen, Pale King, and Colorless Queen. These factions are highly hierarchical and mostly feudal in organization. Being able to understand this organization is apparently important! Every entry is strict alphabetical order. This means that you jump randomly between factions, important NPCs are scattered randomly, and relationships are obscured and hard to understand. So I’m breaking them into factions and doing each faction all at once, to be SUPER fair to Zak’s poo poo rear end book and awful NPCs. Before we get into the bestiary though I have to talk about an elephant in the room: Vampires. Because Vampires are the majority of NPCs you’ll encounter, and they are all loving awful. See Zak doesn’t want to like, just say “this is supposed to be ran with low combat” so instead he makes the majority of NPCs Vampires and overtunes the poo poo out of them to make Vampires absolute nightmares to try and deal with in any combat situation. So, Vampires in classic B/X D&D are already very nasty and I want to compare and contrast them to illustrate how the specific new vampire rules are just meant to make them even more a pain in the rear end. First off, B/X Vampires are generally high level and high power. They have really good armor, 7 to 9 HD, and are generally beefy as hell late game undead enemies. This is fine, because you’re not expected to run into gangs of vampires. You fight maybe a few, but they should be leading lower level undead mooks as a rule. In RedPleas, almost ALL NPC’s are Vampires from the no name mooks on up to the faction leaders. Now the biggest thing is this: Vampires in A Red and Pleasant Land can ONLY die permanently from Sunlight or a Stake through the Heart. Getting Staked is a specific mechanic. How it works is you either need to roll a Natural 20 on an attack with a Stake Weapon on the vampire, or roll a modified 22+ to Hit on a vampire that’s being actively restrained. You get a +2 bonus for each limb restrained, but also the vampire will use any powers or abilities it has to transform at first opportunity and escape the grapple. These are the only ways to permanently kill a Voivodjan Vampire. Now in Plain B/X D&D? Vampires are really tough yes: They regenerate HP constantly, they’re immune to non-magical attacks and poisons, etc. But, they die in sunlight, being staked, being immersed in water, and most importantly they die if reduced to 0 HP and they no longer have a Coffin to retreat to. That’s a noted change: in B/X vampires at 0HP turn to mist and retreat to their coffin to regenerate. They HAVE to rest in a coffin during the day or lose HP. If they don’t have a valid coffin to retreat to, they die. While in a coffin they’re helpless and can be staked. This makes vampires tough as hell, and something you can’t just kill in a straight fight, but they’ve got vulnerabilities and can be sabotaged and beaten by clever characters as befitting your Draculas! Voivodjan Vampires don’t have coffins. Every Vampire has an ability where if they hit 0 HP they will turn into Something (every type of vampire turns into a different thing, a swarm of flies or a fish or a shadow or whatever, it seems basically random) and runs away at some speed (the more powerful the vampire the faster) and then turns into another thing (Relating to their gimmick. “Red Pawn” vampires turn into chess pawns, etc.) where they regenerate HP in this form. Now this would be fine, except in this form they are explicitly invulnerable. You cannot kill them while they’re regenerating. You have to either wait until they return to Vampire form and stake them in another fight, or find them and drag them into the sunlight to kill them. Vampires give no XP for being defeated until permanently killed. This means that it’s very possible to just… not ever kill the majority of NPCs in this module. Now other powers are sort of a wash. They can’t level drain on just a touch, requiring a grapple or charm to succeed, and then to bite the target next round. But it’s also worse cause the stolen levels are now given TO the Vampire so they get more powerful by draining your levels. Also if you die from this you’re turned into a vampire within 42 hours. Other stuff is a wash, but a lot of it also doesn’t matter. Zak seems to forget that doing HP damage to his vampires is far far less useful than in D&D. So he makes convoluted ways to caused damage that no PCs will bother with cause that wont’ contribute to killing vampires. Holy water just does HP damage. You can put the tongue of a virgin into their mouths to do more damage. These don’t matter cause… why would you do that instead of staking them? Damage on D&D vampires is good cause then they go to their Coffin and are helpless, but these fuckers are invincible while regenerating so it’s just a waste of time and also you had to mutilate a virgin for no reason! Also Voivodjan vampires are not repelled by Garlic or Holy Symbols so they’re even more of a bastard. So we’re starting with Unaligned Characters today! Animals, Ordinary In a shocking act of coherent game design, most animals are given a simple coherent stat block if they’re dangerous, and small non-dangerous animals have no stats at all cause you don’t have to roll to hit a mouse with a sword. Still there’s some annoyances: mainly that he has to inject Wonderland stuff everywhere so that all dangerous animals can talk and serve the Vampires which… okay. Sure, anything dangerous is probably actively hostile cool. Harmless animals are all sentient, for some reason fiercely democratic and constantly have elections and caucuses, and need Speak With Animals to speak with. Or you need to shrink to mouse-size, of which there are no mechanisms yet in these rules for doing so. I guess it’s a stock Legend of the Flame Princess spell to shrink people. Decapitated Lords Obnoxious vampire lords with convoluted mechanics! So the Heart Queen decapitated the Kings and Queens of the Spades, Clubs and Diamonds which apparently immobilizes them. This is the only place that rule is mentioned, but I guess decapitating a vampire SHOULD immobilize them? Or do you need to do something else to petrify them? It’s not explained. Anyway, their bodies are all in the Heart Queens castle, but their heads are hidden in GM Decide Yourself places cause god forbid you give some hints or adventure hooks Zak. The heads are unrecognizable beyond gender so it’s a blind guess to put the right head on the right body explicitly. Nobody knows what they look like and there’s no portraits to help in the entire kingdom. If you put the right head on the right body, they revive as a high level Vampire with HD20, plate armor, and stats as 12th level Fighters. They’re immune to arcane magic too! They instantly get magical control over all the inferiors of the same Suite, and presumably begin an instant civil war with the Heart Queen. Now there's some issues: 1, there aren't’ guidelines here for what that actually looks like or how that works out, leaving the vampire civil war entirely up to the GM to adjudicate and manage. 2, remember that bit about “right head on the right body”? Well the issue with that is as I said there’s 0 way to know which head goes on which body, so you gotta blindly guess. So it’s a random 1 in 3 chance you match it up right (gender is obvious but that still means 3 bodies for each head) and if you get it wrong you just get hosed on! Did a big quest to get the head? Infiltrate the Queens castle to find the bodies? Great, hope you randomly guess which body the head goes to or gently caress you! The mis-matched monarchs don’t get the magic control over their underlings so no civil war for you. They also get some new lovely awful behavior that now that high level supervamp does to you!  So that’s one where they try to instantly maim and kill you. One Secret Kill You Gotcha monster. Two long term obnoxious antagonist behaviors that are bizarre and probably impossible to actually run and will derail a campaign. One save-or-die trap. And the Guests one…. Whoof. Guests come up later: theyr’e loving Demons and Devils. An infinite horde of demons and devils if you don’t manage to kill this high level supervamp within three rounds. Great Grub It’s Caterpillar, but a Carrion Crawler. It acts like the Caterpillar, smoking hookah, lazy, smug, will give you one piece of useful info a day hidden in rambling inanity and riddles. Lives on a mushroom that if you eat will let you Shrink or Grow (Finally something that does that!). He can be any size seemingly randomly or depending on what the GM wants to have the players meet. Statwise it’s a way overtuned Carrion Crawler that is massively tougher than the standard D&D monster, and paralyzes you for an hour instead of 2d4 turns meaning it’s just flat a “you’re out of the fight” move. Guests So these are Demons. Like he’s being cute and twee but they’re edgelord demons.  So statwise who the gently caress knows. They have either d12 HD or d100+10 HP. They have insane AC equal to Plate+Shield+2. They do +d20 To Hit and do D20 damage. They have a 50% spell resistance to any magic cast by someone with a lower HD or HP/5 than their own. Everything else is completely random. That’s the biggest thing, everything is random. Is a Guest a 1HD +1 to Hit +1 Damage wimp? Or a 12, 20, 20 nightmare gamebreaker? RANDOM! There are 5 pages of tables for Guests. One d4 table for the Type of Guest that defines what you roll on the rest. A table of Guest Colors. A table of Guest Purposes (BUY VORNHEIM), a d100 table of physical attributes, and a d100 table of special abilities and powers. To make a guest you need to make well in general well over a DOZEN rolls to randomly generate the drat thing. So imagine doing that every round, as under the Decapitated Lords description. Guests suck, a lot.  Sample of the powers, so you can see how loving bizarre and stupid so many of them are. I hate guests. So much. This is one of the worst implementations of Summonable Demons i’ve ever seen just for how much stupid random busywork you have to put into making the drat things. Horses Horses, thank god something simple. There’s three kinds of horses you can find in Voivodja. The Gyorslan Quarterhorse is a small Pony. To virgins and clerics they look like animated rockinghorses. I have no idea why that detail matters. Statistically they’re just a Pony. Voivodjan Warlander are the normal vampire steeds. They’re heavy warhorses that fight alongside their riders in combat and are surprisingly tough. Also if you kill their rider, they will try to eat you cause they’re carnivorous. Osc Lithicum Stalking Horses are weaker than the Warlander and used by the Colorless Queen’s forces. They can swim well. When you kill them an undead horse-ghoul bursts out of their guts and attacks all non-vampires within 7 feet at +6 to hit for 2d10HP by strangling them with horse entrails, then instantly dies. So they’re weird land mines as horses basically. Jabberwock  I hate how everything is written. Twee is the worst thing a book can be to me. Anyway the Jabberwock is a super overtuned Red Dragon statwise. Like, it has double the HD, the best armor possible, and a ton more attacks. It’s another weird randomized monster in that it gains attacks and HP based on the roll of a d8, which you reroll every time you encounter it cause Time is Wonky Here. If you kill the Jabberwock this… lets you know exactly how long the Slow War has been going on. This has… benefits that are totally up to the GM to adjudicate and there are no suggestions. Thanks Zak! Real useful! Anyway it has a bunch of awful special attacks too where it grapples y ou and does tons of damage, like 3d12 HP tons. It also has an unavoidable Confusion attack that makes anybody in 200’ have a 50% chance to do the opposite of whatever action they wanted to do. Whatever this means! It lasts as long as the Jabberwock spends an attack Burbling, which if it rolls high on the Age d8 it can do infinitely easily! Also it causes constant d10 damage within 10’, save Vs. Magic to avoid. This isn’t an attack, it’ s just constant. So this is weird cause it’s meant to be fought, there’s no other use for it, but it's an INSANELY scary and overtuned monster. There’s no way any PC group would ever want to fight the drat thing unless it rolls low on the d8, and so it’s just… gonna be random whether you can fight it or just get wiped. This isn’t game design, this is laziness mixed with disdain. Jub It’s a vulture-sized blue bird that rides on a cat-sized lizard. The bird casts Fear, the Reptile makes you vomit, they share HP between them. Nothing special to talk about really. Little Crocodile Crocodiles, but small. They live in the Gardens, are 4’ long, and are black, white, or grey. Their hides are “highly prized'' and worth 1200GP. Nageire It’s those flowers with human faces, but they’re giant and aggressive. Depending on the flower they can do different things to you but it’s nothing interesting, just some grapple or save or suck powers. Ozwick A gryphon and incredibly complicated and stupid. This is because this is a loving tie in to VORNHEIM AGAIN. Yes this is a monster from Vornheim as well, so BUY MY BOOK! He’s just an old gryphon who can’t fight or fly and is a useless drunk. I have no idea what the point of him is, except he’s friends with the Pseudoturtle who will come up in another update. Puddings Right so instead being just Oozes these are… intelligent tasty oozes.They still destroy armor and dissolve flesh, but also are Intelligence 15. They can’t dissolve porcelain or anything covered in saliva and so… the idea is you grapple them and then eat them. Also if you’re looking for evidence of any misdeed, the next pudding you kill will have proof inside it. Sphinx Christ I’m sick of these sorts of NPCs. So this is a plot device that… has no plot or use as a device. The Sphinx hunts the Unicorn but can never find it. She thinks all other life forms are unthinking random animals. She’s explicitly super intelligent and knows everything. She can cast several mind affecting spells by telling jokes, riddles, or making a heartbreaking sob story. There is no reason to actually fight her, as far as I can tell she’s there to answer whatever questions the players want to ask, presumably after helping her catch the Unicorn. Tove Long slimy lizards that live wound around sundials or buried underground or up in trees. They grab you, then burrow inside your body to eat one of your organs.This does d12 damage per round if they successfully hit you. Unicorn It’s a unicorn. It finds everything except virgins horrifying, and loves cake. It can teleport around trees in the woods, its hair is incredibly valuable, and the horn makes you immune to poison. That’s it for the Unaligned creatures! Next time we hit the first faction, the Pale King!
|
|
#
?
Oct 19, 2021 23:29
|
|
|
Wapole Languray posted:Little Crocodile 1200 gp??? Lamentations is based on a silver economy (so xp is based on sp found) and 1 gold equals 50 silvers. A single crocodile hide is worth 60,000 xp, assuming that's not a typo. Those vampires won't stand a chance once the party hunts a couple dozen crocs. Hell, even if it's only 1200 sp, that's a lot of cash and xp for comparatively little risk. Pvt.Scott fucked around with this message at 01:38 on Oct 20, 2021 |
|
#
?
Oct 20, 2021 01:36
|
|
|
Red and Pleasant Land is on the Gold Standard because Vampires so silver coinage is super rare so sadly you don't get that much XP. Also it says "in good condition" so probably that means a bunch of GM May I bullshit to kill it and get a good skin.
|
|
#
?
Oct 20, 2021 01:43
|
|
|
Wapole Languray posted:Red and Pleasant Land is on the Gold Standard because Vampires so silver coinage is super rare so sadly you don't get that much XP. Also it says "in good condition" so probably that means a bunch of GM May I bullshit to kill it and get a good skin. The way around GM May I here is to roll up an Expert and put all of your skill points into Bushcraft. By level 2, you'll only fail a skinning job if you roll boxcars.
|
|
#
?
Oct 20, 2021 01:47
|
|
|
I have an unsupported theory that Zak’s only contribution to 5e after the consulting advice was edited down was that spells are organized in alphabetical order instead of the obviously more useful level order.
|
|
#
?
Oct 20, 2021 19:07
|
|
|
DalaranJ posted:I have an unsupported theory that Zak’s only contribution to 5e after the consulting advice was edited down was that spells are organized in alphabetical order instead of the obviously more useful level order. I recently wrote a chonker of a post in Lithuanian on why you shouldn't play DnD 5E and navigating the PHB spell list to hunt down Cantrip effects (to illustrate the options a lvl1 wizard has vs. what a fighter does) was absolutely vonkers.
|
|
#
?
Oct 21, 2021 07:19
|
|
|
Hipster Occultist posted:Symbaroum: Karvosti, the Witch Hammer, Part While ASSUMING DIRECT CONTROL elf infiltrators are a cool idea, any spell that takes decades to take effect (you make changelings out of children plus they only live 30-40 years) is entirely out of place in a standard elfgame.
|
|
#
?
Oct 21, 2021 07:22
|
|
|
DalaranJ posted:I have an unsupported theory that Zak’s only contribution to 5e after the consulting advice was edited down was that spells are organized in alphabetical order instead of the obviously more useful level order. I’ve long since discarded my books for it so I can’t check, but my strong recollection is that 3/3.5 did this too. At least in part because spells weren’t consistently the same level for different types of casters (like a spell might be level 3 for a wizard and 4 for a bard or whatever). I’ve never played or read the 5e books so I dunno if they kept that part but it seems pretty likely to me that they kept that order because 3/3.5 did it.
|
|
#
?
Oct 21, 2021 07:38
|
|
|
Ultiville posted:I’ve long since discarded my books for it so I can’t check, but my strong recollection is that 3/3.5 did this too. At least in part because spells weren’t consistently the same level for different types of casters (like a spell might be level 3 for a wizard and 4 for a bard or whatever). I’ve never played or read the 5e books so I dunno if they kept that part but it seems pretty likely to me that they kept that order because 3/3.5 did it.
|
|
#
?
Oct 21, 2021 07:43
|
|
|
JcDent posted:While ASSUMING DIRECT CONTROL elf infiltrators are a cool idea, any spell that takes decades to take effect (you make changelings out of children plus they only live 30-40 years) is entirely out of place in a standard elfgame. I'd probably be more favorable to the idea if it at least had some sort of workaround or protection ritual for PCs, no save indefinite duration mind control really sucks. It also kinda sucks that a key aspect of a PC race isn't in any of the core books. Also yeah it really doesn't need mechanics. If you bought this book you're most likely running the adventure path, and if that's the case you're not operating on the timescale that this ritual requires. Hell, even if you aren't playing the AP you're still probably not playing a game that lasts decades. 
|
|
#
?
Oct 21, 2021 13:36
|
|
|
Hipster Occultist posted:I'd probably be more favorable to the idea if it at least had some sort of workaround or protection ritual for PCs, no save indefinite duration mind control really sucks. It also kinda sucks that a key aspect of a PC race isn't in any of the core books. This ritual reminds me a little of the Universe Creation power in first edition Aberrant. That power was never going to be actually used. It was just included to explain what happen to the game's over-powered NPC snowflake, Divis Mal. Figure this ritual was included as something some NPC used in the past so the PCs can learn why these weird shape-shifting people are trying to kill them.
|
|
#
?
Oct 21, 2021 14:15
|
|
|
Ultiville posted:I’ve long since discarded my books for it so I can’t check, but my strong recollection is that 3/3.5 did this too. At least in part because spells weren’t consistently the same level for different types of casters (like a spell might be level 3 for a wizard and 4 for a bard or whatever). I’ve never played or read the 5e books so I dunno if they kept that part but it seems pretty likely to me that they kept that order because 3/3.5 did it. Yup, and also 2e had definitely done it the other way - sort the spell section by caster type and level, instead of alphabetically. I'm going to say that, having dealt with both, alphabetical order is vastly superior for me. It's way easier to look up a spell just by name instead of having to find what level it is before searching for it if you don't happen to know that out of hand. There's a lot of needing to do that outside character creation or leveling-up, such as for magic items or monster abilities that don't necessarily get sorted by level.
|
|
#
?
Oct 21, 2021 16:13
|
|
|
That said, it's really really dumb when like Acid Arrow is under A and Improved Acid Arrow is under I.
|
|
#
?
Oct 21, 2021 16:17
|
|
|
Ultiville posted:I’ve long since discarded my books for it so I can’t check, but my strong recollection is that 3/3.5 did this too. At least in part because spells weren’t consistently the same level for different types of casters (like a spell might be level 3 for a wizard and 4 for a bard or whatever). I’ve never played or read the 5e books so I dunno if they kept that part but it seems pretty likely to me that they kept that order because 3/3.5 did it. This is the case. Mechanically the alphabetical only issue is a consequence of having multiple partially overlapping spell lists, as it does not occur in 1st edition where weaker spell casters inherit the entire spell list of their base class, or in 4th edition where each class has a completely independent ‘spell’ list.
|
|
#
?
Oct 21, 2021 16:50
|
|
|
|
| # ? Apr 24, 2024 20:29 |
|
|
Halloween Jack posted:That said, it's really really dumb when like Acid Arrow is under A and Improved Acid Arrow is under I. Arrow, Acid, Improved Arrow, Magic +1 Arrow, Patriot
|
|
#
?
Oct 21, 2021 16:57
|
|