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It's always the ones you least expect.
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Dec 1, 2020 10:54
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A rice cracker enthusiast would be perfectly fine, but he'd do things like sack and burn a city because he'd heard that the king's throne was made out of a type of wood he'd been after to make a better fire to cook superior rice crackers on.
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Dec 1, 2020 10:59
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the 40k rpg book had stories about a wealthy gourmet who got addicted to the scent of burning human flesh and a noble who starts cutting himself in order to better feel the touch of silk scarves drawn on his skin. If you can visualise it, Slaanie will get you hooked on it and show you how to hurt people to get more.
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Dec 1, 2020 11:03
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Also liking that ambition and praise is a key hook for Slaanesh, because that's already a motivation for a shitload of Warhammer characters. If you wanted to get a bit cspammy about it, there's some comparison to be made with the fascist need for aesthetics and gratification over everything else, and the appearance of victory and domination being more important than the reality.
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Dec 1, 2020 11:57
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I'm not interested in space marines but I seem to recall an entire legion falling to vainglory. While the obviously insane torture and murder junkies are much more noticeable, the pride addicted are just as loved by the Prince of Excess.
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Dec 1, 2020 12:06
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By popular demand posted:I'm not interested in space marines but I seem to recall an entire legion falling to vainglory. Just don't read Graham McNeil's Fulgrim, or by the end, "perfection" won't even sound like a real word anymore. Though "don't read Graham McNeil" is generally good life advice. ECs and Blood Angels both <3 art, but ECs missed the whole point, going on the perfection of execution over making a point of imbuing feeling - just like some Twitter fascist named WesternTradition (with a greeg sculpture AV) posting some gothic cathedral and a panelak side-to-side with the caption "which way, western man?" BAs have a much more healthy attitude toward creating and hoarding art. They're also vampires.
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Dec 1, 2020 14:42
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Also in their case its a bit of a coping mechanism too. Considering the Black Rage and all that.
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Dec 1, 2020 15:39
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Blood Angels are a weird case given they have every setup to be the worst kind of edgelords, but apparently they actually tend to be both optimistic at heart and surprisingly humble for Space Marines since they're all too aware of their inherently flawed nature.
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Dec 1, 2020 15:41
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JcDent posted:BAs have a much more healthy attitude toward creating and hoarding art. *stares intently at Peter Fehervari's The Reverie.*
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Dec 1, 2020 16:07
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Nanomashoes posted:The Smoking Ruin Part 5: Overview of Act 1: Curtain Up
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Dec 1, 2020 16:42
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Angrymog posted:Can you scan the map? I thought about it but I'm a little unsure about the legality of this whole thing and don't really want to post anything that's key to running the adventure. If you guys think it's ok to post I can go ahead and post though.
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Dec 1, 2020 17:24
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Nanomashoes posted:I thought about it but I'm a little unsure about the legality of this whole thing and don't really want to post anything that's key to running the adventure. If you guys think it's ok to post I can go ahead and post though. I'd say a segment at most to show how vague it is, but not the whole thing? You explained your issues with the map pretty well.
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Dec 1, 2020 17:25
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Age of Sigmar Lore Chat: Hedonites of Slaanesh Actually Trying To Find God  The Godseekers show up out nowhere in a frenzy of killing blades. They focus on high-speed combat, usually mounted on long-legged steeds that outpace any horse. They especially love to cut down fleeing victims, for they have grown addicted to the chase. Their main target of hunting, however, is Slaanesh. Most Godseekers at least make the claim that they are looking for their missing god, even if in their hearts they know that they're primarily motivated by the exhilaration of chasing and hunting. Still, they are easily the most enthusiastic and confident that Slaanesh can be found and freed by outside forces...and that once they find him, they'll be able to slaughter his captors and earn his favor. Any hint or rumor that has any chance of helping find Slaanesh will bring them running. They easily work themselves and their Steeds of Slaanesh up. Mutations among Godseeker cultists are predominantly related to the sense organs, and huge nostrils or massive olfactory pits are relatively common, along with huge eyes, pointy ears and snakelike tongues. Godseeker senses are often very superhuman - some become able to taste souls, smell emotion, see ideas forming in minds as glowing light or otherwise become able to sense what cannot be sensed. Thus, they can frequently track flying creatures as easily as walking prey, track ships across water or even trace trails through Realmgates. They seek their information on Slaanesh from all manner of sources - tortured captives, yes, but often they achieve their aims by infiltrating high-ranking courts or the entourage of wizards. After all, it is knowledge and power that are most likely to give information about Slaanesh. As a result, the Godseekers don't hunt the poor or weak. Their forces hunt out powerful and wealthy groups, including armies. They especially love to ambush royal processions and caravans, and they don't particularly care about being outnumbered. Godseekers rarely bother with their own safety in their singleminded pursuit of their god. After all, even if they die, they die in pursuit of their own addiction, and thus come closer to Slaanesh. The Keepers of Secrets that lead the Godseekers believe that true power will only be achieved through Slaanesh's favor, and that their best way of earning that will be from freeing him and becoming his confidante. This is honestly not particularly true - Slaanesh is innately an unfaithful being, and when he was free he kept favorites only briefly. Godseekers rarely admit this to themselves, even those old enough to know better, because...well, hope springs eternal. They are also quite fond of summoning up Slaanesh's Wheels of Excruciation, immense flocks of bladed, living discuses that fly through people and tear them to bits. The Godseekers have been hunting for Slaanesh for centuries, if not millenia. They have never found him. The reason is simple: the god is nowhere in the Mortal Realms. The aelf gods did well in hiding him, and finding the prison is practically impossible in normal circumstances. Obviously, no simple cave or chain could hold a god, so they had to be very, very careful. The Godseekers have generally chosen not to think very hard about this. That would mean stopping, after all, and in a way, they have come to deeply savor the despair that they feel whenever their leads turn out to be wrong. They like wallowing in it, and they like feeling the slow growth of hope once more. Recently, however, they have found some very useful information. They've been gathering en masse in Ulgu, sensing something has changed in the shadowy realm. The traces are weak - so weak that almost no one else has noticed. They found a very, very faint trace of Slaanesh, and now they scour Ulgu for more. Next time: Horny Jail
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Dec 1, 2020 18:43
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quote:This is honestly not particularly true - Slaanesh is innately an unfaithful being, and when he was free he kept favorites only briefly. Godseekers rarely admit this to themselves, even those old enough to know better, because...well, hope springs eternal. They are also quite fond of summoning up Slaanesh's Wheels of Excruciation, immense flocks of bladed, living discuses that fly through people and tear them to bits. The bits meant to sell new stuff - in this case Endless Spells - stand out like a sore thumb. Though probably the worst of it was the 8E Custodes codex, where each chamber/organization of custodes just so happened to be described as
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Dec 1, 2020 19:10
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Mors Rattus posted:CANT STOP WONT STOP Now I want to see a race between the slaaneshites and whatever the AOS equivalent to the orks Kult of Speed is.
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Dec 1, 2020 19:16
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"we love speed and slaanesh and have huge nostrils. doomrider? cocaine? never heard of them. we just smell things really well."
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Dec 1, 2020 19:27
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Carbon 2185 Part 1 - The Actual Review  The art is generally competent Carbon 2185 is a 2019 roleplaying game by Robert Marriner-Dodd and published by Dragon Turtle Games, a company he founded in 2016. The premise is that you play Cyberpunks, “rebels refusing to live life by the rules of the oppressive megacorporations”, using a modified version of the Dungeons and Dragons 5th edition Open Game License. Carbon 2185 was first funded by a successful Kickstarter started on January 2019 that was a Featured Project, raising $190,000 from 3,000 backers. A follow-up kickstarter for a second printing of the core rulebook is still ongoing, and has already raised an additional $240,000. Based on the wildly successful kickstarters Carbon 2185 is fulfilling some need in the RPG market, and Dragon Turtle Games has fulfilled all of their promises in a timely and honest manner. Unfortunately, that’s the only nice thing I have to say about this game, because it is a painfully hack-ish and lazy game without any redeeming qualities. It’s not a bad game, in the sense that it makes the world worse by existing or never should have been published. But it doesn’t positively contribute to the world either, and it makes me very mad.  The OGL doesn't let you use the words 'Dungeons and Dragons' Carbon 2185 fails the painfully low bar of a Fantasy Heartbreaker, as there is no single element that is interesting, innovative, or sparks joy. If you were bound and determined to play Shadowrun in D&D you would be better served by re-skinning abilities as cybernetic implants and pretending ‘Longsword’ refers to a pistol a la Baz Luhrmann’s Romeo + Juliet. At least then there would be some creativity involved, and you would probably end up with a better final product. Usually I wouldn’t be so vitriolic and dismissive towards an RPG, or any other creative work for that matter. But Carbon 2185 is a massively successful DTRPG best-seller, was singled out for attention by Kickstarter as a Featured Project, and (as they proudly declare on their website) featured in Forbes and New Scientist magazine. I’m not punching down, and I’m not picking on a hobbyist creator - this piece of hack work is one of the most popular cyberpunk RPGs around. The issue with Carbon 2185 isn’t that it’s based on D&D 5e. While 5e isn’t my favorite edition of D&D and has some serious design issues, the core resolution mechanic is perfectly serviceable and the massive popularity has some inherent justification. The issue is that Carbon 2185 is incredibly lazy with… well, everything. Mechanically, the changes made to the OGL feel inconsequential and arbitrary, without any real consideration of how they support or detract from the game’s goals. Let’s take a look at a tiny example that, I think, shows a whole lot about what I mean. The traditional Six Attributes are ported in almost directly, except ‘Charisma’ is renamed to ‘People’ and ‘Wisdom’ is renamed to ‘Technology’. This doesn’t feel like an intentional choice, a bit of commentary about how technology and artifice have replaced wisdom and awareness. It feels like they wanted to have a Technology Attribute and Wisdom seemed like the easiest to erase with the minimum adjustment to any of the other rules. A better game would have examined STR/DEX/CON and how they might be adjusted in the transition from fantasy to science fiction, and a more honest game would have left the Sacred Six as they were and worked around that. Instead Marriner-Dodd recognizes that INT would be an overloaded stat, more so than usual, and goes about fixing it in the laziest way possible. Eraser, pencil, done.   District 5 is the worst and District 1 is the best, obviously The game is filled with these quick, obvious fixes without any hint of thought or real consideration of game design. Carbon 2185 has ‘Origins’, races with the barest coat of paint on it, because the OGL has races and Marriner-Dodd couldn’t be bothered. In the Hacker class, you can almost see where he crossed out “Spells Known” and “Spells Per Day” and wrote “Exploits” and “Botnet Uses” above it - creating actual Hacking rules that everyone could use would require thought, effort, and design. Of course, creating a spell list is also hard, so Marriner-Dodd quits after writing a half-dozen generic situational ‘exploits’. The combat and equipment still feel like D&D, which is about as damning a statement I could possibly write about a futuristic sci-fi RPG. I can’t talk about the Lifepath-esque ‘Background Generation’ system without it taking over the whole review. It’s the only original element of game design, and it’s Lifepaths but worse, executed in the most poorly-conceived and laziest way possible. All it does is tell me that Marriner-Dodd is familiar with Cyberpunk 2020 or Traveler and learned absolutely nothing from them.  There's another page of words about Not-Musk under this image In terms of setting and themes, well, guess what! It’s an incoherent and boring mélange of other, better creative works. I got more enjoyment out of ‘Spot the Influence’ than anything else. Oooh, look, The Expanse! Page after page is dedicated to one hundred and fifty years of setting history, which bored me so much I could barely skim it, and doesn’t contribute anything to the game. Hey, I remember that from Deus Ex! 19 megacorporations are detailed, with a page or so dedicated to their CEO, their corporate culture, their history, and so. Completely useless for providing any context to players or plot hooks to GMs, of course. I enjoyed Blade Runner as well. The geography of San Francisco is on par with Zybourne Clock’s City5, and it doesn’t resemble the real San Francisco so much as it does Night City. MAD MAX! Thematically… okay, I don’t know Marriner-Dodd, I don’t know anything about his politics or his life experience. But it feels like Carbon 2185 includes themes of oppression, inequality, and dehumanization because that’s what Cyberpunk has. These themes rest like adornments, included for aesthetics, utterly saccharine and insincere. It has all the authenticity and energy of the BLM tag in my twitter bio. Remember the Occupy Movement, the dichotomy between the 1% and 99%? Well in Carbon 2185, .5% of the population control 99.5% of the wealth! You know how in Altered Carbon Meths grow more powerful and disconnected with the rest of the world as they live effectively immortal lives above the clouds while everyone else toil and die down below? Got that here too, except it’s poorly implemented and supported by the structure of the game!  So she's mired in debt but has money for face mods? JK everyone looks like that. At times, the disparate ‘influences’ work at cross-purposes to each other. Wormers are a race you can pick and represent refugees from the off-world colonies, like the Belters in The Expanse. But a ticket to the off-world colonies is an extremely expensive item you can purchase, and the off-world colonies are described as pristine worlds that the wealthy use to escape for the Earth’s collapsing ecology, like (let’s go with…) King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard’s Infest The Rats’ Nest. A more generous critic could perhaps think this was intentional, but it’s not. Marriner-Dodd failed to blend his sources together to make something new, and you can still see the seams where he stitched it all together. For all of the talk of playing rebels who fight against the oppression of the megacorporations, you don’t. A Cyberpunk is someone drummed out of their chosen career after a bit of bad luck, who turned to crime to make a living, and might as well be the typical adventure party in a dungeon with some neon bits stuck to them. It’s as punk as a rebellious white boy in Prince George’s County and the technology is as dehumanizing as an iPhone with a paired iWatch. You would get a more authentic and timely Cyberpunk experience from the Billy Idol album.  The SFPD Retirement Squad (!) and a malfunctioning 'Pleasure Synth' (!!!!!!!!!!!!!!) I often get excited by the better game inside the game I’m reading, my creativity sparked by some stray thought or interesting mechanic. There is no better game inside Carbon 2185. It is completely hollow, and I think poorly of everyone who boosted it into prominence. Next Time: That's the review, but I probably still need to vent about Lifepaths
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Dec 1, 2020 23:39
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I'm glad my impression of Carbon 2185 was exactly on point without ever having to actually get the book. I'm less glad for how popular and profitable it's been on account of it, but... well, that's the business, I guess. Wouldn't be the first "cyberpunk" game to hit both of those despite being a pile of dealbreakers.
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Dec 2, 2020 00:18
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Ugh, I thought this was a new thing when I saw it on Facebook. Laughed when i saw it was for 5E.
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Dec 2, 2020 01:00
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Huh for assume reason I thought it was OSR. The name is intriguing and the art is fairly good, but I never got around to really looking into it. Too bad, but ultimately not surprising.
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Dec 2, 2020 01:14
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How does it compare to Genefunk 2090? That was another cyberpunk 5e clone crowfunded recently.
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Dec 2, 2020 01:23
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Carbon seems somehow less cyberpunk than goddamn Star Trek.
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Dec 2, 2020 02:00
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NGDBSS posted:How does it compare to Genefunk 2090? That was another cyberpunk 5e clone crowfunded recently. That Old Tree posted:Huh for assume reason I thought it was OSR. The name is intriguing and the art is fairly good, but I never got around to really looking into it. Too bad, but ultimately not surprising.
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Dec 2, 2020 02:17
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Age of Sigmar Lore Chat: Hedonites of Slaanesh The World's Dumbest Chastity Belt Slaanesh has been trapped in the Uhl-Gysh for a very long time. He's missed out on a lot - for example, during the Age of Chaos, he wasn't really able to actually make use of Sigmar's absence to advance his plans. He's been stuck swinging between utter rage, masochistic pleasure, plotting and mindlessly shouting swears for that entire time. Every soul removed from him to become a new aelf pains him, both physically and spiritually, on a level few other beings could understand. The physical pain is hundreds of times worse than, say, getting your small intestine pulled out. The spiritual pain is on par with the death of a beloved child. And that's every time. Were Slaanesh any other being, he would have been unable to survive this treatment and would have dissolved into maddened particles of Chaos. The thing is, Slaanesh is addicted to sensation. His very nature is to thrive on intense and powerful experience, even pain. For several decades early in his imprisonment, he was entirely occupied with relishing the horrific pain he was going through, being tortured by it, and seeking enlightenment within it. Once that eventually became somewhat familiar, however, a part of Slaanesh's mind dissociated from the physical experience of it all and began probing his prison for weaknesses or ways to gain advantage. Slaanesh theorized that he might be able to use the location of his prison, hidden by the aelven gods, to find new weaknesses in the Mortal Realms, which no other could access. If he could find a way to defeat the enchantments binding him, none could escape his power. In the meantime, his physical body was reduced and weakened by the experience, taking on the form of a whirling vortex of soul energy, starlight and pulsing darkness. He didn't care - he had a chance, however slim, to turn his defeat into a triumph. For several centuries, Slaanesh projected the small fragment of himself that had dissociated and thus was able to pay attention to things besides his pain, rage and masochism. He was too tightly bound for more than a tiny part of his power to be usable, but he could grant dream visions to some of his more favored Hedonites, particularly powerful daemons and sorcerers. He released many of the mortals he had imprisoned within the six circles of his realm, sending them forth as maddened servants to punish the world in his name. No single contact was ever more than a few moments, however, and most of those he was able to reach concealed the knowledge of it so they could profit from it without sharing. Even so, Slaanesh was able to seed hundreds of possible plans to help him towards freedom. He was able to briefly reach out and pluck thoughts from the minds of scholars studying him and his history in Hysh and Ulgu. These scholars thought him long gone, defeated in times past, and so that it was safe to gaze into the abyss of his nature. They gave him a foothold. The chains that bind Slaanesh are not physical things, but creations of light and shadow magic, pure and untainted, from the very edges of Hysh and Ulgu. They were devised by the genius of Teclis, strengthened by the will of Tyrion and forged in the shadows of Malerion and Morathi. No part of any of them was resonant with Chaos, for the aelf gods knew that even a single bit of dark magic might allow Slaanesh freedom. However, because they are made of magic, they must obey certain laws, and Slaanesh is very good at abusing and twisting law. He realized that with sufficient magical force against his chains, they might be unmade. He was sure there had to be a weakness, because as a creature of Chaos he knew that for things to remain static forever is unnatural. There would inevitably need to be some way for entropy to enter the system. He was unable to find it, though, due to the shadows and illusions that Malerion had woven around the chains. He would have to rely on the works of his greater daemons, hoping that they might find the secrets where he could not. Across the Mortal Realms, Slaanesh reached out to his favorites, sending them hints and visions of what he wanted. His most loyal Keepers of Secrets began to hunt for the lore of the aelven gods, though they were not brave enough or foolish enough to attack the gods directly. Instead, they could target the acolytes of those gods, especially those set to guard the ritual obelisks of the Hidden Gloaming and the mages who maintained the Uhl-Gysh. These aelven wizards were powerful but mortal. Even the wards raised around them could not allow them to last long in the presence of a Chaos God without going mad. They could only work for a time, then be replaced by new guardians, returning to Hysh or Ulgu to recover before their next round of serving as wardens. They became vulnerable in that moment of the shift changing, when they were weakened by Slaanesh's nature and leaving the hidden prison. Slaanesh's influence in Hysh, thanks to the efforts of his daemons, was strong in many places. The Keepers of Secrets still roamed in the fractal plains and deserts of the realm. Ulgu's nature of shadows and lies likewise was a natural home for Slaaneshi servants. These daemons worked to isolate the aelven seers and mages from their fellows, ambushing them and prying into their minds to discover what the mages most sought to hide. This was easier than finding lesser secrets, as by obsessing over their duty, they left themselves more open to the methods of Slaanesh than they'd realized. The daemons were able to learn much, and the seers, each thinking themselves alone and the sole victim once they escaped their tormentors, kept silent out of a mix of Slaaneshi influence and fear of punishment - particularly that of Malerion and Morathi, renowned for their spite. Surely, even if one chain might be compromised, the others would last. Thus, Slaanesh was able to learn more about his prison through his daemons. Each chain, he learned, could theoretically be unmade, as all spells are able to be undone if one finds the exactly correct counter. The aelven gods were unable to bypass this law. Instead, they had made the god-chains in a manner that their counters were each nearly impossible to achieve. Each chain could be broken only by a great paradox, for they were made from shadow and light at once, an inherent contradiction. They were masterpieces of design, but Slaanesh has nothing but time on his hands and tons of servants to call on in dreams. Slaanesh discovered his first hope in centuries - and his first resurgence of gloating pride. It took years to learn the weaknesses of the chains, of course. From the daemon Glittus, Slaanesh learned that the Chain of Pure Hatred could only be broken by the being who most despised the Dark Prince. The gods that forged it had probably believed that would be one of them, having lost most of their people to him and hating him very, very much. However, they had forgotten that there was one being who hated Slaanesh more deeply and for longer than any being in existence: Khorne. Not that Khorne would ever willingly help Slaanesh, and Slaanesh would never consider asking for Khorne's aid anyway. Instead, he sent a vision to one of his great servants, the Infernal Enrapturess Allegaria Sen'sathra, instructing her to steal the sacred axe Eigngrom, which Khorne could not ignore. She did, and Khorne sent his three-headed hunting dog Karanak to destroy Allegaria and take back his axe. The two chased each other across the Mortal Realms as Slaanesh prepared himself, twisting his form to bring the Chain of Pure Hatred to the forefront. When the two daemons finally confronted each other in the Serrated Peaks of Aqshy, Allegaria proved the stronger, slaying Karanak and enraging Khorne. His fury exploded through the universe, so loud and potent that it awakened billions of dreaming mortals with sudden nightmares. Khorne knew Slaanesh was to blame for his loss, and his rage was fully directed at his ancient enemy. The blast of furious power that reached the Uhl-Gysh was so great that it shook the obelisks that held the secret realm in place and shattered the Chain - just as Slaanesh had hoped it would. He quickly created a false, illusory replacement for it, gambling on the fact that his captors were too busy with their own people to notice. He was lucky - by the time Malerion's mastery of illusion was brought to bear, Slaanesh ahd perfected the chain so that even the Shadow King could not detect it, and even Teclis could not see the truth. Next, he focused on the Chain of Utmost Betrayals. This could be broken only by the deaths of thousands of uncorrupted souls by their own righteous protectors - a deed the aelven gods considered so contradictory that it would be impossible. It certainly wasn't easy - it was years after Sigmar's return with the Stormcast that there was even a chance of it. The Free Cities had risen and expanded, and in them, hierarchies formed. Trade, commerce, nobility, capitalism, pride - a self-perpetuating order in which wealth defended itself and the gap between rich and poor widened. Discontent grew naturally into hidden plans and secret meetings, with rivalries, schemes to enrich the schemers further spread throughout society - a playground Slaanesh deeply understood. In the city of Vindacarum, the violent justice of the Celestial Vindicators had convinced hundreds to reform for fear of death...and hundreds more to simply get better at secrecy. As the people of the city came to fear their own protectors and seek ever more humble lives in hopes of proving their own virtue to the Stormcast, a hidden counterculture rose up. The Hedonites fanned it into a cult of secret luxury, called the Silken Revel. They recruited across the Free Cities - including in Hammerhal Aqsha, where the sorcerer Redomir headed a conspiracy to undermine the Cinderfell District and spread worship of Slaanesh. In Hysh, Slaanesh's daemons pushed a once friendly rivalry in the City of Prisms to new heights, encouraging the mages involved to seek victory at any cost. They took advantage of the efforts of Tzeentch's cults in Excelsis to spread rebellion against the guards and Stormcast, and the Nurglite cults in Invidia and Verdia that sought to escape Nurgle's plagues. Thanks to their work, all these crises came to a head at once. Dozens of cults of Slaanesh, Tzeentch and Nurgle rose up in the Free Cities - and as Slaanesh knew they would be, they were met with extreme measures by the Stormcast. In the Purge of Vindicarum, the Celestial Vindicators infamously slaughtered three fourths of the city's population in the belief that it was the only way to expunge the taint of Chaos. They put to death every citizen with even a hint of hatred or malice in them. Simultaneously, the Knights Excelsior had to fight the Battle of Excelsis, and they chose to kill every citizen that had risen up against them, regardless of the reason. The Hammers of Sigmar in Hammerhal Aqsha went into open war against the Slaaneshi cults, and in their efforts to take down all of the criminal conspiracies they were involved with, the Stormcast went too far and took innocent lives. In this single day of horrors, the souls of the unfairly slain cried out in rage, weakening the Chain of Utmost Betrayals to its breaking point. Again, Slaanesh used an illusion to hide it, and as the Stormcast realized what they had done and turned to trying to fix the damage over several decades and make it so they would never perform such acts again on their own people, Slaanesh decided to wait another few decades, perhaps a century. Even he did not expect the next to break. (It is unclear exactly how much time lasted between the Chain of Utmost Betrayals and the Necroquake, incidentally, but based on other books I'd assume it was nearly a century.) When the Necroquake happened, it shook the entire universe - including the Uhl-Gysh. The Chain of Cosmic Law was bound by the nature of the realmspheres themselves, for the aelf gods had thought that no one would ever manage to alter the laws of the cosmos all at once. The inversion of Shyish, with all its wide-ranging effects, managed to do that, and while Slaanesh didn't plan for it, he'd gotten good at hiding the broken chains with illusion and took advantage of it. Three chains broken, one step closer to freedom. It is possible that had he not been so busily working to free himself, the chains would have weathered the necroquake better...but he was, and so not only did one chain break, but the webs of illusion hiding the place also tore. Indeed, it was only because of Malerion's immense skill that they didn't dissolve entirely. In the wake of this, Slaanesh was able to learn the secrets of many chains damaged by the unravelling illusion, memorizing them so he would be able to work on them even once the damage was repaired. Slaanesh remains bound by 63 chains, but he has learned the secrets of dozens of them, and he has found his strength growing with each break. The wounds left by the removal of the aelven souls he devoured so long ago has filled him with a terrible hunger, and his cults are spreading and active, even if they aren't quite listening to him directly. Eventually, there will come a moment when Slaanesh is strong enough and hungry enough to break all of his bindings by might alone. He plans, on that day, to pass through into Hysh and Ulgu via the same conduits that were used to bind him in the first place. These two realms, he has decided, will be added to his domain in their entirety. If he can manage it, it will place a full quarter of the Mortal Realms under his control, making him by far the greatest and most potent Chaos God that has ever existed, and likely preventing him from ever being taken down by his rivals. Next time: The Daemons of Slaanesh
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Dec 2, 2020 03:28
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I just noticed that it appears that you skipped a chunk of the Books lore. You went from the Intro to Slaanesh's area in the Realm of Chaos. Skipping from page 5 to page 12.
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Dec 2, 2020 03:35
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MonsterEnvy posted:I just noticed that it appears that you skipped a chunk of the Books lore. A bunch of that is illustrations and timeline. And, like, I've been over the timeline like five times, we don't have to do 'this time, from a Slaanesh perspective.'
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Dec 2, 2020 03:37
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Mors Rattus posted:A bunch of that is illustrations and timeline. And, like, I've been over the timeline like five times, we don't have to do 'this time, from a Slaanesh perspective.' True enough Though I do like it bringing up the fact Slaanesh has more potential then the other Chaos Gods cause Slaanesh is not empowered by an emotion like they are, but instead by their degree. Even the obsession's the other chaos gods and their followers have with their gimmicks will empower Slaanesh.
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Dec 2, 2020 03:43
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NGDBSS posted:How does it compare to Genefunk 2090? That was another cyberpunk 5e clone crowfunded recently. Genefunk basically took wizards and renamed them hackers, and justified it by everyone having a nanocomputer running throughout their entire body that other people can hijack and rewrite your brain with. If you want to no be a walking security exploit, you can refuse it, but it means you only heal 1 hit point on a long rest because ~balance~. It also has two different classes for unarmed combat and they're both as bad as monks. 5e hacks were a mistake, is what I'm saying.
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Dec 2, 2020 03:48
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 Cyberpunk RED, Part 3: Savage Streets Alright, let's do some chargen. And that means starting with lifepaths. Anyone with a copy of Cyberpunk RED will immediately notice that I'm doing these chapters out of order; the lifepath chapter actually comes before the character creation chapter. Personally, I think R.Talsorian made some seriously questionable choices with where they put some of the game's chapters. I think this should've been put right after the character creation chapter, or even just included as part of it, and the skill chapter (which includes role abilities) should've been put right alongside the character creation chapter, too, instead of after the cyberware chapter. And the chapter with all of the game's gear probably should've been closer to the actual rules and character creation instead of being stuck in after all of the lore chapters and right before the GM advice chapter. Anyway, let's start with Tibalt posted:Billy Billionaire, an augmented street samurai who looks like a FDNY calendar model and has a soft spot for the geeky hacker type. First, let's figure out Billy's background culture.  We rolled a 6, so it looks like Billy's family originally came from sub-Saharan Africa. Considering how wealthy Africa's grown by the time of Cyberpunk RED, that's not a bad background for someone called Billy Billionaire. Next, his personality. An 8 means he's "sneaky and deceptive." For "dress and personal style," another 6 means he goes for Bohemian clothes.  Yeah, sure, okay. Hairstyle gets a 5, meaning he's bald. A 1 for affectations means he's sporting some tattoos. What Do You Value Most? 3: Your word. How Do You Feel About Most People?: 6: Every person is a valuable individual. Things You Value Most?: 9: A personal hero. Most Valued Possession?: 9: A toy. Family Background: 1: Corporate Execs. Home Environment: 10: A corporate luxury "starscraper." Family Crisis: 6: Your family was killed, and you were the only survivor. Friends: Billy's got two friends. One's an old enemy, and the other is like a younger sibling to him. Enemies: Lucky him, he doesn't have any. Lovers: He doesn't have any former lovers, either. Keep pining for those geeky hacker types, I guess! Life Goals: Cause pain and suffering to anyone who crosses you.  Next, we get something that wasn't in CP2020's lifepaths: role specific paths. What Kind of Solo Are You?: A corporate or freelance black ops agent. What's Your Moral Compass Like?: Always working for good, trying to take out the bad guys. What's Your Operational Territory?: The territory of a single corporation. Who's Gunning For You?: A rival Solo who sees you as their nemesis. As always with lifepaths in R.Talsorian games, they're totally optional and you're free to just pick the options you prefer, or just not roll at all. Now for Billy's stats:  And his skills:  Plus, Billy's also gonna get 4 in a language based on his cultural background. In this case, we're going with English. His weapons and armour: Assault Rifle Very Heavy Pistol Heavy Melee Weapon Basic VH Pistol Ammo x30 Basic Rifle Ammo x70 Light Armorjack Body Armour Light Armourjack Head Armour And the rest of his gear: Agent Leisurewear: Footwear x2, Jacket x3, Mirrorshades, Bottoms x2, Top x2 Biomonitor Neural Link Sandevistan Speedware Wolvers Method 1 is just that quick and easy. Now for Nessus posted:Riss Sagiri, a pissed-off rockergirl with an excellent haircut and a grudge against overmilitarization of the street. quote:Family Background: East Asian For Riss's stats: quote:INT 4 Looks like Riss is pretty good with her hands, stubborn, quick on her feet, and really good at clicking with people. Doesn't hurt to be lucky, either, though she's not gonna be wowing anyone with her brains. For skills, Riss just gets the same skills a Rockerboy using method 1 would've gotten; only difference is we get to set the exact value of each. quote:Athletics 4 Lastly, we've got LatwPIAT posted:Naomi Watts, a bony public watchwoman Lawman with a long coat and glasses, whose authority derives from a mandate issued by the local community worker's council that can be instantly revoked in a direct democracy vote of no confidence. (No relation to the actress.) quote:Family Background: Western European. Cut out the equipment on these last two because this post's going on long enough as is and there really isn't anything terribly interesting about it. As far as lifepaths go, I'm not (and never have been) a fan of the "cultural background" part; it really seems to neglect mixed race and other broadly intercultural people. Next time: Cyberware Pussy Cartel fucked around with this message at 01:52 on Dec 3, 2020 |
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Dec 2, 2020 05:18
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Tsilkani posted:Genefunk basically took wizards and renamed them hackers, and justified it by everyone having a nanocomputer running throughout their entire body that other people can hijack and rewrite your brain with. If you want to no be a walking security exploit, you can refuse it, but it means you only heal 1 hit point on a long rest because ~balance~. It also has two different classes for unarmed combat and they're both as bad as monks.
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Dec 2, 2020 05:56
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Nessus posted:Do they literally have spell levels and slots and poo poo?  Yes. edit: there's also ritual hacks, "upcasting" hacks, etc SkyeAuroline fucked around with this message at 06:11 on Dec 2, 2020 |
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Dec 2, 2020 06:07
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Oh wow. I recall there was a spy RPG based on 5e that got kickstarted semi-recently too. I was kind of interested in how they were planning to mechanically support more realistic espionage fiction (since that was something they were advertising), and their answer was essentially that they weren't; the realism was just going to be flavour rather than mechanical. 5e is an OK game; I prefer earlier editions in many respects, but it's a game I can easily enjoy. I can even see how the mechanics can be adapted for over the top spy action. I would not want to use its mechanics to run something that's supposed to feel like a Le Carre novel; particularly not without any kind of mechanical changes to disincentivise getting into firefights completely unprepared.
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Dec 2, 2020 07:13
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SkyeAuroline posted:
lmaoooooooo
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Dec 2, 2020 07:16
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Midjack posted:lmaoooooooo It is truly exemplary of the 5e design ethos. My friends tried to convince me to play in a game of it and I hate them a little for it. Like, the 'genomes' (races) are unbalanced as gently caress. Be an Unmodified, with +1 to two ability scores, a feat and one extra skill, and one of three lackluster benefit packages! Or be a Spartan mod, with +3 to Str, Dex, and Con, low-light vision and Perception Proficiency, and +2 hitpoints every level. Who the gently caress cares that you die young and look weird?! EDIT: Oh gently caress, the Espion mod is even more batshit. +2 Dex and Int, +3 Cha and Wis, Insight as a free skill, double proficiency bonus on Insight checks, make an Insight check against someone to receive advantage on rolls against them until the end of your next turn, and advantage on impersonation checks. No downsides! Tsilkani fucked around with this message at 07:32 on Dec 2, 2020 |
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Dec 2, 2020 07:28
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That said, being a living hackable Internet of poo poo node is still hilariously on point.
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Dec 2, 2020 09:03
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SkyeAuroline posted:
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Dec 2, 2020 09:19
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Cyberpunk RED, Part 4: Hard Wired So I said before that this part would be covering the cyberware chapter. The good news is that's technically true. The bad news is that the cyberware chapter is actually incomplete; it gives a basic rundown on how cyberware works, the basics of humanity and humanity loss, how cyberware fits in in the world of Cyberpunk RED, and gives a list of cyberware. The bad news is that, just like with the lists of gear and weapons in the previous chapter, it's incomplete, with the full list of cyberware (along with detailed descriptions of how each implant works) is close to the end of the book, along with the full rules of both temporary and permanent humanity loss, how to get humanity back, non-cyberware sources of humanity loss, cyberware installation, bodysculpting, and therapeutic cyberware. In reality, this chapter is just a direct continuation of the character creation chapter, throwing in separate charts for starting cyberware for new characters made using methods 1 and 2. In light of all this, I'm going to be borrowing the cyberware-relevant rules and info from later in the book just so this post actually makes sense. I seriously hate the goddamn layout of this book. The chapter also begins with what has to be the single worst piece of art in this book.  You really hate to see it. Anyway, just like in Cyberpunk 2013 and Cyberpunk 2020, cyberware in RED has a humanity cost. Not all cyberware this time around, but most of the stuff your average PC is going to be taking. There are two exceptions to this: fashionware, and medical-grade cyberware. Fashionware is a category of implants that's mostly (but not entirely!) aesthetic, and medical-grade cyberware is a generic term for implants that replicate the functionality of natural organs or limbs without offering any enhancements or modifications above or beyond them. The cost of medical-grade cyberware is included in the cost of hospital care in the event of a critical injury that requires a character to get prosthetics. Also just like in previous editions, we still have psycho squads around to take care of anyone that goes cyberpsycho, though because of how messed up the world is in the aftermath of the Fourth Corporate War, many of these squads are either corporate or even community-organized. As for why cyberpsychosis is a thing, the book explains it like this: quote:Cyberpsychosis comes about when the subject begins to compulsively alter the body beyond the human baseline. Seeing the body as a thing — a form of Dissociative Personality Disorder — they change it without thought. quote:It is generally not normal to voluntarily cut off a limb or remove a functioning body part. Putting in an earring involves some self-harm, but on a level that is barely discernible to the person doing it. It also does not require the removal of a body part. However, voluntarily choosing to replace a working part for no other reason than aesthetic or functional advantage requires that the user already be able to get past the qualms of cutting up one's body voluntarily. Now, Humanity defaults to 10 x Empathy, and a character's effective Empathy is equal to the tens digit of their Empathy stat. Mechanically speaking, cyberpsychosis in Cyberpunk RED kicks in when a character's Humanity drops low enough to give them an effective Empathy of 2 or less. At an effective Empathy of 2, a character is said to have "borderline dissociative disorder" and should "roleplay accordingly." At 1, a character is supposed to express at least three traits from the Hare Psychopathy checklist (which CPRed "helpfully" includes), and at 0 they're said to have full-blown cyberpsychosis, exhibiting at least five traits from the checklist. Lastly, if a character has an effective Empathy of 0 and negative Empathy, they descend into extreme cyberpsychosis and become an NPC in the GM's control. Humanity can be regained by going through psychotherapy, which takes a week and restores either 2d6 or 4d6 Humanity (depending on how much they spent on the therapy). However, each piece of cyberware permanently lowers a characters maximum Humanity by 2, including individual options for those pieces of cyberware that have them. But hey, at least you don't have to pay for surgery when you get cyberware. Now for the cyberware categories. First up is Fashionware, which mostly consists of cosmetic stuff like colour-changing lenses for your eyes, light-up tattoos, luminiscent, colour-shifting hair, and subdermal watches and biomonitors. As said before, none of this has a Humanity cost. Next, Neuralware. This consists entirely of the neural processor that acts as the brain for all kinds of cyberware, and a host of options for it, including brain-computer interfaces, reflex boosters, skill chip sockets, and pain blockers. The infamous chipware socket from previous editions is back, but this time around it's been seriously nerfed. Now it can only hold a single skill chip at a time, and each skill chip has a Humanity cost that has to be paid the first time it's slotted into a given socket. Cyberoptics consist of cybernetic eyes and all of the different options that can be taken for them, ranging from the usual image enhancement, IR/UV, low-light, and telescopic zoom options, to things like AR overlays, targeting scopes, radiation detectors, and HUDs. Cyberaudio includes the underlying cyberaudio suite and its options, including the likes of amplified hearing, level dampers, radio communicators, voice stress analyzers, radio scanners, and music players. Cyberlimbs come in both arm and leg varieties, each with their own set of options. Arms can choose from the likes of different kinds of retractable blades, medscanners, pop-up weapons and even shields, while get things like various kinds of feet (including stuff like retractable roller blades). Both include a few different aesthetic options, offering the choice of a simple plastic coating, shiny chrome, or synthetic flesh. The Internal and External Cyberware categories include a pretty wide range of stuff, including things that were classified as bioware in previous editions. Enhanced antibodies, gills, skin weave, subdermal armour, and even the infamous Midnight Lady and Mr. Studd implants from past editions (and just like past editions, they can't even bring themselves to say anything meaningful about those last two.) Lastly we get the Borgware category, which really only consists of implanted linear frames, a pair of flat rabbitear antennae that gives a bunch more cyberaudio options on top of the base, an array of multiple cyberoptic implants that allow you to take even more cyberoptic options. For players who can't afford all of the cyberware they want for their character during character creation, the game again offers the option to sell out. With the GM's permission, a player can get a free Neural Link and an additional 1500eb worth of cyberware for their character. However, unlike previous editions, the player can only get the benefits of this option if they can convince all of the players to take this option. Just like previous editions, this means having spent time in a covert military unit, or having sold out at some point to a corp or organized crime, and also means there's something being held over the character's head, like hostages, blackmail, a killswitch, or more. Because antagonistic GMs are still in vogue for some people.  Me after trying to deal with this poo poo. Overall, the cyberware rules in this edition are a bit of a wash. It's good that they've included therapy rules in the core this time around instead of leaving them for sourcebooks, and it's nice that they finally dropped Humanity costs for medical-grade and therapeutic treatments (the medical chapter even specifically mentions SRS as something that would never incur a Humanity cost), but labelling cyberpsychosis as a cross between dissociative personality disorder and psychopathy is just stupid, and they probably would've gotten away with clinging to their Humanity rules better if they hadn't tried to apply a thin, pseudoscientific veneer to them. Next time: skills.
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Dec 3, 2020 01:50
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I actually love that art. It perfectly illustrates that dissonance between the fantasy of cyberpunk/human augmentation and the harsh reality. That dude is walking the street all “oh yeah I’m the fuckin cyber master race!” while everyone else’s crosses the street to avoid him. Gatto Grigio fucked around with this message at 01:56 on Dec 3, 2020 |
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Dec 3, 2020 01:53
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double post
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Dec 3, 2020 01:54
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Yeah I think image could've been done a lot better. It also feels like it's a kind of awkward photoshop thrown together in a hurry towards the end of production. There's just something awkward about it and I think I've seen the head part before elsewhere but I could be wrong.
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Dec 3, 2020 02:11
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