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Evil Mastermind posted:And now Kevin Crawford (of Sine Nomine publishing) is pulling a "how dare people ATTACK HIS LIVELYHOOD?" on G+. By analogue, it would also be attacking an author's livelyhood if a publisher refused to publish a (bad) e-book. A publisher does not have an obligation to let anyone use their storefront, and if Desborough desperately needs the money, the route of independent publishing is always open to him. It's not like he's unknown either, so he doesn't need a publisher to boost publicity among his target audience.
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# ? Dec 4, 2014 22:13 |
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# ? Dec 10, 2024 05:52 |
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Angrymog posted:On the off-chance that Desborough is demoing either of his card games at Dargonmeet, would taking part in a game to post a report here count as touching the poop? Edit: upon further consideration, I revoke my offer, because Desborough is probably suffering from mental illness. ascendance fucked around with this message at 22:30 on Dec 4, 2014 |
# ? Dec 4, 2014 22:24 |
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LatwPIAT posted:By analogue, it would also be attacking an author's livelyhood if a publisher refused to publish a (bad) e-book. A publisher does not have an obligation to let anyone use their storefront, and if Desborough desperately needs the money, the route of independent publishing is always open to him. It's not like he's unknown either, so he doesn't need a publisher to boost publicity among his target audience. That's the catch with freedom, other people have it too.
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# ? Dec 4, 2014 22:26 |
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ascendance posted:I will pay $10 if you pour a beer, sugary soda, or latte on Desborough at Dragonmeet. PM me pics for proof. Also $10 wouldn't cover my train ticket and entrance fee.
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# ? Dec 4, 2014 22:36 |
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Evil Mastermind posted:And now Kevin Crawford (of Sine Nomine publishing) is pulling a "how dare people ATTACK HIS LIVELYHOOD?" on G+. Kevin Crawford posted:If someone's idea of "punching up" is smacking around a hobby-class indie game designer of no perceptible influence who's had to deal with mental illness issues, I have to wonder where exactly they place themselves on the unimpeachably objective totem pole of existence. "Bill Brasky was a son of a bitch." "He harrassed depressed indie designers!" "And he was a depressed indie designer!" "And he hated irony!"
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# ? Dec 4, 2014 23:19 |
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ascendance posted:I will pay $10 if you pour a beer, sugary soda, or latte on Desborough at Dragonmeet. PM me pics for proof. Hey, there's this guy who loves bitching about a conspiracy to silence him and about how he's this great fighter for a cause. Let's physically assault him because that'll shut him up.
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# ? Dec 4, 2014 23:22 |
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Yeah, I gotta agree: conspiring to physically assault him is a goddamn terrible idea, and kind of lovely to boot.
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# ? Dec 4, 2014 23:38 |
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ascendance posted:I will pay $10 if you pour a beer, sugary soda, or latte on Desborough at Dragonmeet. PM me pics for proof. You shouldn't be making that offer in the first place!
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# ? Dec 4, 2014 23:45 |
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If I have learned anything from Fatal and Friends today, it's that we really hate games designers.
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# ? Dec 4, 2014 23:49 |
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The Deleter posted:If I have learned anything from Fatal and Friends today, it's that we really hate games designers. I actually hate the whole industry and hobby and everyone in it.
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# ? Dec 4, 2014 23:50 |
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ascendance posted:Hey, there's this guy. Let's physically assault him because that'll shut him up. Seriously, between this and the ongoing slapfight in the Kickstarter thread, what's going on with this loving forum as of late? I never thought I'd say this, but please post more about Vampire LARPing so we can move on.
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# ? Dec 4, 2014 23:51 |
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Why don't we move the "prove some of Des' conspiracy theories right" discussion to grogs.txt so that it can get shut down again? The Paranoia impasse from the Kickstarter thread can go there, too, and then they can both sink to the bottom of the ocean.
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# ? Dec 4, 2014 23:54 |
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We should leave our trashing of people purely in the verbal realm.
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# ? Dec 5, 2014 00:28 |
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Yeah, it really shouldn't need to be said but harassment is not cool. Don't encourage harassment! Don't do that! Why would you even think that's okay?
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# ? Dec 5, 2014 00:31 |
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Part 1: What Faction Should This Game Be Based Around? The Correct Answer is Camarilla. Always Camarilla. For this section, we’re going to talk about the factions you can run a chronicle around. There is a book for the Camarilla, Sabbat, and Anarchs but they aren’t really needed to tell the truth. The first two have some bloodlines, disciplines, thaumaturgy paths, and the Anarch book has some combo disciplines but this is all extra. With the Sabbat guide you get into all the rare and somewhat powerful bloodlines of the Sabbat but they’re not really good for PC’s. Yeah, you could play Kiasyd but you’ll probably never come out of your reading room and to be honest if you want to read, just read because it will be more rewarding than most LARPs. Vampire or Cainite History 101 As mentioned before, Caine was the first vampire. There’s a good deal of stuff in the WoD prehistory that is up for debate but Caine is 100% the progenitor of all vampires. Caine, cursed by God for the murder of his brother uses his curse to embrace the 2nd generation so that he could have a family. Those children embrace the founders of the dark ages and modern clans. This period of time is shrouded in a good deal of ambiguous mystery and what became of many of these figures is of heated debate. Well into Dark Ages: Vampire some of the 3rd generation are still around and active. Most of the 3rd generation set up shop in specific geographic areas and began having children of their own. The 4th generation, methuselahs, are incredibly powerful, detached from their humanity, and known for their capricious natures. An example of this is Mithras, who I posted in the art thread. He claims to be the Mithras, a bunch of other supernaturals do though so no big deal, and he was the leader of London until the Blitz knocked him into torpor. Before the time of the Reformation, vampires often did not hide their true natures and lorded over humanity. This is of course dangerous but mortals be damned, time to be an undead king/queen with all the swagger that comes from being a godlike baller or boss bitch. Humanity though, is beginning to regroup. The social order of Europe is changing as well, the Catholic Church is losing influence over everyday life and the Order of Reason is beginning to be formed. They’re the progenitors of the Technocracy but oddly enough they’re not the catalyst of what happens next. With the founding of the inquisition, the Catholic Church is beginning to find evidence of vampires and other supernatural creatures. The Catholic Church deals with them like they deal with most issues relating to the heretical, eliminating them with extreme prejudice. Elders, realizing that the jig is up begin throwing their childer at the inquisition, hoping that the inquisition will think that they’ve killed the evil vampire lord they’re after. The childer though, don’t like this and the Anarch Revolts begin. I'm tired of your poo poo Pepin! The Anarch Revolts are like the vampire version of the Wars of Religion and the English Civil War. The Brujah initially lead these revolts but it spreads to other clans. Upstarts like the Tremere move to capitalize on the situation, the Giovanni usurp the clan status of their Cappadocian masters, the Assamites get involved, the Lasombra and Tzimisce diablerize their founders, and the chaos of the time leads to great upheaval for everyone. The hostilities are ended by the Convention of Thorns. The Camarilla is founded to act as a vampire Illuminati, to ensure that what had just happened never happens again. The Sabbat is formed by the Lasombra and Tzimisce who don’t want to join the Camarilla, and some less hardcore vampires keep fighting for the Anarch cause though they’re usually considered members of the Camarilla. The Tremere enforce the peace on the Assamites by cursing them and earn themselves a place in the Camarilla. The indepdendent clans remain independent because they’re dirty necrophiliac mobster necromancers, gypsy stereotypes, and Conan villains. Factions What do you mean I have to make a frenzy check for being this close to an open flame? The Camarilla The Camarilla is the standard for a vampire game. Laws of the Night pretty much assumes that this is the faction that you will be going with. They have all the standard clans, they’re pretty average vampires, and they have the most stable structure. Camarilla domains are ruled by a Prince and they usually answer to the Inner Circle, though this is rare. A Prince is served by his Seneschal, Sheriff, Whip, occasionally Scourge, and maintains a Primogen council composed of clan representatives. All of these positions should normally be maintained by player characters but that might require more players than you have. Each of these positions carries different status traits that show your character’s political power. Someone who has more traits is generally considered to be more powerful than another character. Camarilla society also operates on the exchange of boons, favors redeemable for help or aid when asked for it. All and all, it lends itself to less conflict than the other factions. She might look normal but her backstory is probably that she's a Nazi race doctor or murders special needs children. The Sabbat The Sabbat originally began in 1st edition as bogeymen, shadowy urban legends told to frighten neonates. In 2nd edition, they evolved into gangs of serial killers and in Revised they evolved into serial killer survivalists. The Sabbat believe that they are the true heirs of Caine and that the antediluvians, the 3rd generation, should be killed because they wronged Caine. The Sabbat operate in packs and practice the vaulderie, a ritual where they bleed into bowl as a group and drink from it. This bonds them together as a pack and prevents them from being blood bound. They do have a lower level blood bond to the pack as a whole but they won’t be committed to a single master. A pack is led by a Ductus and there are positions such as the Priest, manages the rites, and the Abbot, who manages their communal haven. Sabbat domains are administered by a Bishop, who answers to an Archbishop, and who in turn answers to a Cardinal. Under the cardinals are a Priscus Council who work as a board of regents like the Primogen. There are positions in between but I won’t go into them because they’re not as important. The Sabbat have many rituals, some festivals, and "games" that they play that are set up like slasher horror movies. Sabbat games are problematic because they attract people who like playing chaotic stupid characters. The Sabbat is also an antagonist faction so they tend to be more broken than the Camarilla and Anarchs. Among the packs they share disciplines, even in clan disciplines like Obtenebration and Vicissitude, and since they work as a group they’re stronger than individual vampires. The Sabbat also has Assamites and pretty much every bloodline you can think of other than Tremere Antitribu, they were wiped out for balance, and because of that they’re a beacon for power gamers. Due to the organization of the Sabbat, you also need a good number of players for an all Sabbat chronicle. "EDIT Addendum: Sabbat Factions" posted:The Sabbat has several factions. How much flair is on that coat? No patches? I don't think you're cut out for this movement. Anarchs The Anarchs are the Washington Generals to the Harlem Globetrotters of everyone else. They once controlled California but got their collective poo poo kicked in by the inscrutable celestials known as the Kuei-Jin, whoever came up with that name deserves to be publicly shamed. Anarchs don’t really follow a set make up though there are usually Barons, who are like warlords, and the domains tend to be made up of gangs. Anarch gangs are usually not as well organized or devoted as their Sabbat counterparts. This is mostly because the vaulderie makes Sabbat vampires into cult fanatics. There are positions under Barons and among gangs but to be honest they don’t really matter. Anarch vampires tend to be neonates as well and most leave by the time they reach higher status. It’s essentially like being that 30+ year old guy at the punk show, getting mad at people for being rowdy, and then leaving after some kid gives you poo poo for a stupid reason. The Anarchs have combination disciplines, called devotions, and though they are cool, they are prohibitively expensive and you’re going to get decapitated by a shadow tentacle wielding a parking meter before you can reach optimum efficiency. Also, you have to find someone who knows the devotion to teach you so good luck with that. RocknRollaAyatollah fucked around with this message at 04:05 on Dec 5, 2014 |
# ? Dec 5, 2014 01:10 |
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Evil Mastermind posted:I actually hate the whole industry and hobby and everyone in it. Darren MacLennan posted:Yeah, I gotta agree: conspiring to physically assault him is a goddamn terrible idea, and kind of lovely to boot. Robindaybird posted:We should leave our trashing of people purely in the verbal realm. Mors Rattus posted:Yeah, it really shouldn't need to be said but harassment is not cool. Don't encourage harassment! Don't do that! Why would you even think that's okay? These are all good posts. Don't do that!
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# ? Dec 5, 2014 08:45 |
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Ettin posted:These are all good posts. Don't do that! Just for the record, I was never considering taking up the dare (it's a lovely thing to do to someone, and I like going to Dragonmeet), but I do want to give his games a go if he's demoing them just to see if there's anything actually playable under there - basically does he suceed as a game designer? Looking at the GG cards, it seems to be some sort of stack building/point comparing game, and I have no idea how the other one is supposed to work at all. Post-con edit. No sign of Desborough or anyone playing either of his card games Convention was good, I played a game of The Quiet Year (map drawing/storytelling game) which was good fun; you get quite invested in your little post-apoc community even though you don't actively play any characters. Angrymog fucked around with this message at 11:37 on Dec 7, 2014 |
# ? Dec 5, 2014 09:14 |
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I can't write worth poo poo, so if anyone wants to review it, here is a fat-fetish rpg.
PubicMice fucked around with this message at 14:54 on Dec 8, 2014 |
# ? Dec 8, 2014 14:51 |
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PubicMice posted:I can't write worth poo poo, so if anyone wants to review it, here is a fat-fetish rpg. I think I found up one on YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VMnjF1O4eH0
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# ? Dec 8, 2014 15:18 |
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PubicMice posted:I can't write worth poo poo, so if anyone wants to review it, here is a fat-fetish rpg. I have gazed too long into the abyss. quote:Umbral Servant (Legs and Butt):
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# ? Dec 8, 2014 16:32 |
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Yeah, I read the opening story. I am too deep in loli fetish RPG to get started on fat fetish RPG right now, but holy goddamn hell that's just some insane shenanigans. I honestly enjoyed how the villains were basically magnified insane stereotypes, but the part where the main character is hiding and randomly has to drink her own breastmilk to keep hiding was a little bananas (is that a table someone rolled on? Or is the GM supposed to just constantly be saying gross fetish prompts? Fetish gaming is so weird).
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# ? Dec 8, 2014 16:51 |
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Yeah, that doesn't need an F&F writeup. Or summaries. Or excerpts. Let it stay where it belongs, inside the dark shadows of swollen thighs.
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# ? Dec 8, 2014 16:56 |
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Oh hey - the Quiet Year! I heard about it a couple years ago, thought it sounded really cool - and completely blanked on it's name, so I couldn't find it until now.
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# ? Dec 8, 2014 17:09 |
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I didn't want to be cruel to the guy who was writing up Black Tokyo, but I really don't want to see more of that kind of thing. James Desborough worked on some notable titles early in his career, but since then the fuss he kicks up online is the only thing keeping him relevant; he's a D20 shovelware maker trying to hack it a decade too late. I'm glad PubicMice brought Wobble Girls to our attention so we can laugh at it, but, for like five minutes.theironjef posted:Fetish gaming is so weird).
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# ? Dec 8, 2014 17:15 |
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Halloween Jack posted:What I find weirdest about it is that much of it seems to be done in D20 or a similarly bean-counting system. That's probably just because most people start in those systems. Lowest common denominator and all. Plus I bet that the more fiddly math they deal with the better they are at hiding the fact that sexual titillation among like-minded fetishists is pretty hard to do without being creeps at each other. If you were trying to play "Drink your own breastmilk out of your squirtgun sized nipple" in FATE, you'd be more regularly forced to confront the reality that you're just saying sex stuff, out of your own mind, to Don, who you have to play Magic with later this weekend. With D20, at least you can say "Sorry Don, the chart says you have extra dank sweat and automatically slide past the door of the donut shop into a pile of turkey offal." What I want to see is the non-fetish equivalent. Just a straight up vanilla hetero sex RPG. Just roll to insert penis, save vs. early ejaculation, do you want to change positions? It's a three deep feat chain to get to reverse cowgirl. Your refractory period is equal to 45 - your CON in minutes. That's what these fetish games are, after all. They're a group of people deciding to sit down and verbally act out the mechanics of the thing that gets them off. It's so weird that they seem to think a good game could develop from three hours of quietly trying to recross their legs while dumb jokes are told and blueballs are developed. theironjef fucked around with this message at 18:16 on Dec 8, 2014 |
# ? Dec 8, 2014 18:12 |
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theironjef posted:That's probably just because most people start in those systems. Lowest common denominator and all. Plus I bet that the more fiddly math they deal with the better they are at hiding the fact that sexual titillation among like-minded fetishists is pretty hard to do without being creeps at each other. If you were trying to play "Drink your own breastmilk out of your squirtgun sized nipple" in FATE, you'd be more regularly forced to confront the reality that you're just saying sex stuff, out of your own mind, to Don, who you have to play Magic with later this weekend. With D20, at least you can say "Sorry Don, the chart says you have extra dank sweat and automatically slide past the door of the donut shop into a pile of turkey offal." Isn't that just FATAL? Have we truly come full circle?
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# ? Dec 8, 2014 19:05 |
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RocknRollaAyatollah posted:Isn't that just FATAL? Have we truly come full circle? The truth is we never left.
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# ? Dec 8, 2014 19:10 |
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RocknRollaAyatollah posted:Isn't that just FATAL? Have we truly come full circle? No, FATAL isn't deep enough down the rabbit hole. FATAL has rules for combat, hit points, trading a sheep to a troll for a wagon, poo poo like that. I'm not talking about a game that has an unusually comprehensive (and ludicrous) set of sex rules included in the gestalt. I'm talking about Sex: D20 - The Sex Roleplaying Game. Nothing else to do in it. No way to hide the fact that you're sitting down with other alive people to play Sex: D20 - The Sex Roleplaying Game. No going into an abandoned castle to slay a lich but also for some reason there's a lot of charts about whore vagina in the back of this thing. Whore Vagina is just the title of Chapter 2. Because to me, that's what the fat fetish RPG is. It's someone's fantasy sex life, with some rules for character creation. (Note: I don't want any of this)
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# ? Dec 8, 2014 19:18 |
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theironjef posted:That's probably just because most people start in those systems. Lowest common denominator and all. Plus I bet that the more fiddly math they deal with the better they are at hiding the fact that sexual titillation among like-minded fetishists is pretty hard to do without being creeps at each other. If you were trying to play "Drink your own breastmilk out of your squirtgun sized nipple" in FATE, you'd be more regularly forced to confront the reality that you're just saying sex stuff, out of your own mind, to Don, who you have to play Magic with later this weekend. With D20, at least you can say "Sorry Don, the chart says you have extra dank sweat and automatically slide past the door of the donut shop into a pile of turkey offal." But I do agree that the reason so many fetish games run on d20 is because that's what people expect from tabletop RPG. People use d20s for Pathfinder, for D&D, for this and for that. And the people who get into the hobby for the first time, they get brought in through those mainstream d20 games. God knows my first game was playing a barbarian in 3.5. I play Pathfinder Society. And I keep finding so many indie games that give me the experience I really want. Pathfinder Society ends up just being the adventures of a traveling mob of poo poo-kickers and if you don't build a character who could kill, you don't do much. And there's mechanics and clunk to d20 systems, modifiers and probability curves, feats that aren't worth poo poo and feats that split the game in two. There are much better, lighter systems to run fantasy adventure games through. I love indie games because they're generally by people who want the emotion and story delivered through lighter gaming means. But they're not necessarily the games you get introduced into the hobby from. The folks who end up making their own homebrews often end up adopting the trappings of d20 because they A: know it and they B: know d20 sells, especially with the licenses. And they imitate the trappings of it so well that you end up with useless feats, overpowered feats, clunk and numbers. It's kind of sad and unfortunate, really. Fetish games, original ideas, doesn't matter. There's better ways to make and play what you want.
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# ? Dec 8, 2014 19:22 |
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pkfan2004 posted:You could probably get more out of a diceless/low dice storygame where you're talking and telling stories. Something where it's more about story and emotion than fetishistic gratification. Because you need that more than you need just numbers and luck and "I do this." "You succeed doing that." One of the things that comes up a lot for me when reviewing licensed games is the silliness of adapting combat from a film and giving the players a big chance of failure. For example, Chewie fixes the hyperdrive by roaring and throwing wrenches around and getting bonked on the head for 30 seconds but in the game it takes a month and a bunch of high skill rolls. Indiana Jones rolls to whip the Nazi but instead whips his own eye real bad and has to take three weeks of gametime off. I feel like it'd be even worse for fetish gaming. "You see a big fat chick and are totally hot for her." "I roll for boner....7" "You fail to get bonered up and, I guess... what I guess she leaves or something. Roll for ... I guess another great big fat chick comes up, I wrote all these notes!" Basically, who the heck is this target market that wants to play fetish games but also wants a reasonable chance of failing? It's like porn with a chance that the one you're watching will be the one where the actress bonks her head on the door on the way in and they just shoot b-roll of the room and the man's gruntface for the day.
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# ? Dec 8, 2014 19:40 |
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theironjef posted:Basically, who the heck is this target market that wants to play fetish games but also wants a reasonable chance of failing? It's like porn with a chance that the one you're watching will be the one where the actress bonks her head on the door on the way in and they just shoot b-roll of the room and the man's gruntface for the day. You know that this too is someone's fetish.
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# ? Dec 8, 2014 19:45 |
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Kai Tave posted:You know that this too is someone's fetish. I suppose ultimately that's the big answer to any question about fetish games.
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# ? Dec 8, 2014 19:48 |
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theironjef posted:I suppose ultimately that's the big answer to any question about fetish games. You know that one guy at the gaming table that just can't stop rolling dice like a nervous tic, even when combat's long since over and there's nothing going on but the GM narrating descriptions and people having conversations and stuff? Yeah.
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# ? Dec 8, 2014 19:50 |
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theironjef posted:I feel like it'd be even worse for fetish gaming. "You see a big fat chick and are totally hot for her." "I roll for boner....7" "You fail to get bonered up and, I guess... what I guess she leaves or something. Roll for ... I guess another great big fat chick comes up, I wrote all these notes!" Probably the weirdest part of that Fetish RPG isn't the fact that it's basically "I Like Big Butts and I have -15 to Deception Rolls", but the list of fat-superpowers is extensive and based around the flimsiest logic I've ever seen. Like, some people call boobs Headlights, so now your breasts can emit one of two colors of light, but only those two, chosen when you get the power. Some people are so fat that they can literally only wiggle around on their rear end, so now your butt works like suction cup tank treads and you can rear end-wiggle up walls. You can tell the author's getting off on this somehow but I can't even really perceive the specifics.
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# ? Dec 8, 2014 19:55 |
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Robindaybird posted:Oh hey - the Quiet Year! I heard about it a couple years ago, thought it sounded really cool - and completely blanked on it's name, so I couldn't find it until now. Quiet Year is pretty cool - it could probably also be adapted to creating your setting before you play for games that have small communities as their centre.
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# ? Dec 8, 2014 20:04 |
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RocknRollaAyatollah posted:Isn't that just FATAL? Have we truly come full circle?
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# ? Dec 8, 2014 20:04 |
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theironjef posted:One of the things that comes up a lot for me when reviewing licensed games is the silliness of adapting combat from a film and giving the players a big chance of failure. For example, Chewie fixes the hyperdrive by roaring and throwing wrenches around and getting bonked on the head for 30 seconds but in the game it takes a month and a bunch of high skill rolls. Indiana Jones rolls to whip the Nazi but instead whips his own eye real bad and has to take three weeks of gametime off. It also doesn't help that sex is super awkward to handle in games, especially in games that meet in person. I had a guy who kept joking that every time my character was getting healed with a wand of cure light wounds, it was being put in my character's rear end. I've got nothing against anal but it's like "man I don't know you, don't loving tell me you're putting stuff in my character's rear end to heal me, even if you're kidding that's just weird because I don't know you and you just think you're being funny". If you want to include ~MATURE THEMES~ in a game you just gotta really sit down and talk to everyone about their limits and that can be awkward too! Everyone's got their own kinks and hangups and they would mostly like to keep them to themselves, so asking them to lay them bare for the purposes of a group game is kinda on par with asking intimate details. And is any of what's going to happen in the game real? Hell no. But our own boundaries can stop us from having fun, just like real intimate contact. It's hard. It's hard to make a game more than just "I see the fat girl. I am aroused by the fat girl." "Roll for arousal." "Can I add my CON modifier?" "Sure". Using a storygame means you have to open up to each other and talk to each other and respect boundaries, and if one person isn't on board or is offended and you're not playing with people who are open-minded (or at least tolerant) then that can spiral out of control fast. But playing Point-Counter gently caress Master: The Penetrating, while being a lot more clinical and subdued and doesn't necessarily lead to as much vulnerability and exposing of your desires and personality, isn't that healthy either because you're trivializing something important and objectifying it. It's hard to find a comfortable middle ground. But I guess that's why it's so easy to make fun of Black Tokyo and furry fetish RPGs and this and that. They're already doing the job of making what they like seem so weird and finicky and trivial that it feels like they aren't taking their own interests seriously.
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# ? Dec 8, 2014 20:13 |
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theironjef posted:What I want to see is the non-fetish equivalent. NSFW, but: here you go. Some people take the "Universal" idea in GURPS a little more seriously than most.
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# ? Dec 8, 2014 20:18 |
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Sorry, things have gotten hectic what with Christmas and all, but I'm determined to finish this before New Year's! Part 7: A Journey to Boar's Town This is the second Introductory adventure (there's a third... sort of – we'll get to it later) and it's... well, it's about as "Introductory" as The Gun Bunnies. Boston, or Boar's Town as it's now called, has not had any contact with anyone to its south for years. That's what makes the radio broadcast from there so surprising; a burst of static, then six hours later there's a broadcast from a pretty scatterbrained scientist calling himself Doctor Vincent (His first name is either Lance or Wilbur, he can't seem to remember which... as I said, he's pretty scatterbrained). Inbetween his crochety ramblings and arguments with some kind of AI, he claims to have found a solution to all those pesky animal mutations, right before his broadcast cuts out. Naturally, this grabs everyone's attention. And yes, everyone knows. The scuttlebutt mostly agrees this is a trick by either The Empire (unlikely, as it's too far north for them) or Wolf Barbarians (more likely, because everyone knows how brutal and evil those assholes are). Either way, Cardania can't just ignore the message, which is where the party comes in. The book suggests either the PCs investigate this on their own initiative, or they get ordered to by Cardania. CRAZY OLD MAN WILBUR WANTS YOU DARN KIDS TO GET OFF HIS LAWN His real name is Dr Wilbur Vincent, and he really has figured out a way to reverse mutations – all it would take is a few artificial viruses and every mutant would be wiped out. However he doesn't really want to destroy all mutant life; he's completely pacifistic, and he only made that radio broadcast so people would know about his breakthrough, that's all. Yes, that is a really stupid reason, but the book states outright that he's "a bit schizophrenic". In all fairness, he is 136 (he looks about 60 years younger) and has been on his own for a while (he prefers his own company, but will discuss anything with the PCs if they ask, and talk to them as equals) so it's only natural that he's ended up a bit... odd. He won't share his findings with The Empire, but it's unlikely that they'll ask politely. Add a couple hundred pounds, and you've got every goon in a decade or two. Oh, and the AI he was arguing with... you remember Inspector Gadget? You remember that computer that looked like a book? Well, that's pretty much what Wilbur was talking to. It's actually a bit more than "just" a computer; it's a full AI with a somewhat prickly personality, and is more inclined to listen to Wilbur, but will communicate to anyone else (obeying their commands is another matter entirely). The book wasn't made by Wilbur, it's just some experimental pre-Big Death tech that he found one day. It has the blueprints for the viruses in its system, but any attempt to hack it will activate a failsafe to delete the files. Speaking of The Empire, they'll be horning in of course, and they'll be doing it in Another group to worry about will be the Wolf Barbarians living in Boar's Town. Well, “living in” isn't quite right... more “ruling with an iron fist over the surrounding area”. However, once they know The Empire is on their way to wreck their poo poo, however inadvertently, they'll side with the party, although their leader (a lynx named Kristopher) has no experience fighting anything close to what The Empire has in store. They seem a nice bunch. There's also The Cult Bears; as they name suggests, they're bears living a lifestyle that's a cross between your average monk (they wear hooded robes) and the Amish (they're really anti-technology, to the point where they don't believe radios can even exist) who worship “Saint Hugh of Conner, a figure credited with martyrdom in the defense of the bears of the north”. This is probably a reference to something, but I honestly don't know what. They love Wilbur, but only know him as “The Book Man”, and will try to protect from any possible threat, no matter what they claim their intentions to be. If you can convince that “The Book Man” is in danger, then they'll send somebody to warn Wilbur, and will help fend off The Empire and their “evil demons”... although they won't be armed with anything more advanced than a staff, due to their technophobia. I've heard of sameface, but samewaist? You thought The Empire was bad enough? Wait till you meet One-Year, a fanatical Free Cattle spy who's been charged by his elders with killing Wilbur, no matter what. He'll try and snipe the lovable old fellow with a crossbow, and woe betide anybody who even thinks of getting in his way. There are specific instructions for the GM to scare the PCs with some arrows flying out of nowhere and hitting the scenery before they actually meet One-Year. I could see Playmates turning this into a decent action figure. Again, there's no real resolution beyond “People show up and start poo poo, try not to get a TPK”. Next time: Clem's Big Adventure & Aerial Supremacy! Eldad Assarach fucked around with this message at 20:47 on Dec 8, 2014 |
# ? Dec 8, 2014 20:30 |
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# ? Dec 10, 2024 05:52 |
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Eldad Assarach posted:You thought The Empire was bad enough? Wait till you meet One-Year, a fanatical Free Cattle spy who's been charged by his elders with killing Wilbur, no matter what. He'll try and snipe the lovable old fellow with a crossbow, and woe betide anybody who even thinks of getting in his way. There are specific instructions for the GM to scare the PCs with some arrows flying out of nowhere and hitting the scenery before they actually meet One-Year. Early Palladium, where a crossbow is just a bow held sideways. Also you're totally right, that guy has the perfect proportions to be an old TMNT figure.
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# ? Dec 8, 2014 20:39 |