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If I can't punch down, how am I supposed to throw Hadokens?
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Mar 25, 2015 04:36
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bunnielab posted:Now that is reasonable, but how do you apply that to collaborative works, like a play or a film. There are many hands involved, who, in that case is "yourself"? I want to say the director has the ultimate responsibility, but it bears discussing. I find Blazing Saddles to be a great example of this sort of issue, and Mel Brooks in general interesting to talk about in these terms. Suppose I wanted to make a joke about people who like certain kinds of RPGs. Suppose I decide to make this joke about people who like storygames. (Dunno what the actual joke would be, but let's go with it for the sake of example.) If, upon hearing the joke, Pundit would nod sagely and list the latest tobacco he's smoking, I have failed at making the joke. The failure mode of "funny" is, often, "rear end in a top hat".
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Mar 25, 2015 04:38
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bunnielab posted:Now that is reasonable, but how do you apply that to collaborative works, like a play or a film. There are many hands involved, who, in that case is "yourself"? I want to say the director has the ultimate responsibility, but it bears discussing. I find Blazing Saddles to be a great example of this sort of issue, and Mel Brooks in general interesting to talk about in these terms. Blazing Saddles generally gets away with it because the joke is "it's hilarious that white people are wiling to die rather than accept help from this upstanding dark-skinned fellow" and not "it's hilarious that black people exist." Offensive material is generally the latter and generally made by people who don't like unpacking jokes enough to see the difference.
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Mar 25, 2015 04:38
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Simian_Prime posted:If I can't punch down, how am I supposed to throw Hadokens? you're thinking of the yoga flame 
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Mar 25, 2015 04:39
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You don't hit punch until you're leaning right, you're doing it wrong.
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Mar 25, 2015 04:40
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inklesspen posted:The failure mode of "funny" is, often, "rear end in a top hat". The theatrical saying is something along the lines of " at least the worst dramas can be decent comedies". I think in many ways comedy is "easier" but you do look a lot worse when you fail. Are there any funny RPGs, like, funny on purpose?
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Mar 25, 2015 04:41
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Teenagers from Outer Space
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Mar 25, 2015 04:41
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Gaming is a hammer which we use to crush our enemies? I think Burning Sands: Jihad mechanics has the Mahdist players as a covert cell for games set during the early stage of an invasion. Hasn't been updated for a while  It's really weird to think that game came out way back in 2005, before the Arab Spring and everything. Any other RPGs that On the flip side, I always thought Military Assistance Command Faerun Studies and Observation Group was a hilarious way to describe Paladins/Blackguards.
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Mar 25, 2015 04:42
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Rand Brittain posted:Blazing Saddles generally gets away with it because the joke is "it's hilarious that white people are wiling to die rather than accept help from this upstanding dark-skinned fellow" and not "it's hilarious that black people exist." I agree, but people sure do get bent out of shape over that movie.
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Mar 25, 2015 04:45
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Rockopolis posted:Better no gaming than elitist gaming? Huh. I only knew about Senet. Check these out: http://monroi.com/chess-info/44-in/751-the-history-of-chess.html quote:AshtaPada is an ancient Indian race board game played on an 8x8 board with dice. It possibly dates back to the 5th century BC. There were no light and dark squares on the board. There were crosses marked on certain cells. The name has a Sanskrit reference to “spider” - a legendary being with eight legs.  Sounds like the first game that approaches the borderline between a board game and an RPG. quote:Chaturanga (a Sanskrit name for “four members of an army”) was played in India on an 8x8 uncheckered board. According to ancient Indian mysticism, this setup represents the universe. The four sides being the four elements: fire, air, earth and water. The board was called Ashtapada, and had special markers. The pieces were raja (king), gajah (elephant), chariot, one boat and four pedati (foot soldiers or pawns). This game was originally played with a dice.  This looks cool. I would play this. I wonder if it would be an easy app to code. quote:As we discussed in the Chess Queen article, in India, Persia and the Arabic lands, where the game was originally played, all the chess pieces were male: the king, his general called a vizier, and a line of foot soldiers. The game was played with chariots, horses, and elephants, which looked like a miniature army. The words for chess in Old Persian and Arabic are chatrang and shatranj respectively. The Persian word “shah” means king, is thought to be the origin of the English name “chess”. The phrase “shah mat” (means “the king is ambushed”), is the origin for the word "checkmate". 
Helical Nightmares fucked around with this message at 04:50 on Mar 25, 2015 |
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Mar 25, 2015 04:47
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), and in Italy, a standard bearer). Only the king and the pawns remained the same. It is believed that the checkered board with its light and dark squares was a European invention. Chess sets were made out of ivory, stone, wood, or even amber.
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That looks cute, is it much fun to play? I guess Paranoia is funny, if you play it more slapstick. I also just remembered this gem from my youth:  I am like 100% sure I missed a ton of stuff reading this as a teen, I really want to find a copy again.
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Mar 25, 2015 04:48
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I'm not interested in any chess set that doesn't have Jackson-LotR elves vs Jackson-LotR dwarves.
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Mar 25, 2015 04:48
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bunnielab posted:The theatrical saying is something along the lines of " at least the worst dramas can be decent comedies". I think in many ways comedy is "easier" but you do look a lot worse when you fail. Toon? Edit: Bunnies and Burrows Edit2: 
Helical Nightmares fucked around with this message at 04:55 on Mar 25, 2015 |
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Mar 25, 2015 04:52
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bunnielab posted:The theatrical saying is something along the lines of " at least the worst dramas can be decent comedies". I think in many ways comedy is "easier" but you do look a lot worse when you fail. Hackmaster 4th Edition was contractually obligated to be a parody of older editions of D&D. It was the only way they could get the licenses they did under their settlement with WotC.
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Mar 25, 2015 05:00
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I would like to say that generally, I think people should be allowed to enjoy whatever they want, as far as media goes. But people should also be critical of what they consume, recognizing flaws and not making excuses. I like a lot of socially backwards things. My favorite genre of movies is probably horror. It's not all bad, but there are some classics of the genre that are grossly misogynistic. Watching and enjoying them doesn't make me an rear end in a top hat, but it would if I watched them with no self-awareness and got mad when other people criticized them.
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Mar 25, 2015 05:04
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Helical Nightmares posted:Toon? Toon is a good pick, as are Paranoia and TFOS. I'd add Murphy's World, HOL, Tales From The Floating Vagabond, and Ghostbusters to the list as well.
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Mar 25, 2015 05:05
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Isn't Bunnies and Burrows the GURPS game with Bunnies wielding chainsaws against dogs?
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Mar 25, 2015 05:07
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Helical Nightmares posted:Isn't Bunnies and Burrows the GURPS game with Bunnies wielding chainsaws against dogs?  There was even a sequel (Wabbit's Wevenge)
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Mar 25, 2015 05:10
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bunnielab posted:Are there any funny RPGs, like, funny on purpose? Paranoia. Unless you discover your group is filled with the kind of people who play Paranoia as serious business. Those are terrible people. bunnielab posted:That looks cute, is it much fun to play? Teenagers from Outer Space is a blast, even if you're not into all of the things it references. Highly recommend it.
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Mar 25, 2015 05:29
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depending on your sense of humor, fiasco might qualify
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Mar 25, 2015 05:35
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Tollymain posted:depending on your sense of humor, fiasco might qualify Man, my group's Fiasco games always end up hecka comedic. Like not even black comedy, wacky stuff. And then everyone fucks up and dies at the end, because it's still Fiasco. It's fun, but I'd like to be part of at least a semiserious Fiasco game sometime. I'm just doomed to do the Screwball Coen Bros. with it.
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Mar 25, 2015 05:39
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Tollymain posted:it's who, not whom. you wouldn't say "him is a fair target", would you? 
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Mar 25, 2015 05:47
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I feel like a danger with making a funny RPG is related to the other big reason I kind of hate CaH--way too much of the 'humor' ends up coming from the cards themselves rather than the ways the players are using them. CaH suffers from a bunch of rounds where the winner just ends up being the player who draws the weirdest most inherently-funny/shocking card, to the point where how the cards are being used tends to be kind of overshadowed. An ideal funny game is one that gives the players the tools to be creative and funny themselves, and that's way harder than just writing something about making GBS threads in a bucket on a card and calling it a day. Alternately, I also kind of think that all RPGs are comedy RPGs. Like, you might end up with moments of intense and emotional seriousness in a well-run game, but the norm RPG mood I've experienced is just surrealist comedy.
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Mar 25, 2015 05:52
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I've got a serious, if rather poorly worded question. Are there any games that deal with, like, predestination? Not necessarily time travel, but maybe a game that runs backwards, where you begin at the end and play to uncover each step that lead to it. I think it reflects how I usually design characters; I figure out what their backstory is by their actions and what hints they drop. Divination is a skill/spell that pops up frequently in games, and I'm always fascinated by it, but most of the time it's either not supposed to be used or just doesn't have any effect. This is related to something I always wondered about in video games, where you combine elements of chance with the ability to save and load the game. How would you resolve this contradiction? I figure to embrace savescumming, you'd play as Cassandra, with foresight so strong it functions as your saving/loading or time travel mechanic. And then I'm not sure how you'd design a story around it, other than going loopy because you're Cassandra. Poor Cassandra.  I guess what I should ask, is there a Doctor Manhattan RPG? Helical Nightmares posted:Huh. I only knew about Senet. Hipster chess. It doesn't sound hugely difficult, but I never really have time or motivation to program anymore. edit Aren't druids obligated to punch up, to the point of stereotypically swapping sides to maintain punching direction?
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Mar 25, 2015 05:56
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GrizzlyCow posted:In the forums, there was an update in the middle of last year, but yeah, it seems fairly dead. Or pathetically sluggish. Beyond that, there may still be some activity on their IRC chatroom. Yeah, but that update was weird for me. It's the one which made it so you didn't add your BAB to AC anymore. Instead, you add your level. I kind of get it because spellcasters are arse in Legends -- which is shocking considering it's a 3.5 derivative -- and martials are the best, but it felt odd to me.
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Mar 25, 2015 06:37
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Rockopolis posted:I've got a serious, if rather poorly worded question. Are there any games that deal with, like, predestination? Retrocausality might be your thing. EDIT: I haven't actually played this so I can't really describe it or say for sure it's relevant, but it was made my a poster in this thread and the stuff people say about it makes it sound super cool so it's probably worth checking out either way. I have a super powerful consumable magic item I drop in games sometimes that seems to do nothing when you first use it, but then after doing stuff for an hour or so you suddenly shoot back in time to when you used it and realize it was all just a vision of the future. You then get to go either "yeah, we do exactly that" and fast forward through just doing all that stuff again exactly or pick a point in time to diverge from the vision and just start playing again normally from there. It works okay as something that shows up EXTREMELY rarely, or possibly as a quest item, but it's not something that'd work as a Vancian spell or 1/day ability.
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Mar 25, 2015 06:51
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yo is there any reason to play a game these days that doesn't involve some form of collaboration of setting design / explication between the players and the gm
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Mar 25, 2015 12:06
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Captain Foo posted:yo is there any reason to play a game these days that doesn't involve some form of collaboration of setting design / explication between the players and the gm Some players are uncomfortable with having to do any amount of setting-building and react poorly when asked to collaborate, and so are more comfortable playing games that come with a 400 page campaign guide.
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Mar 25, 2015 12:37
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Captain Foo posted:yo is there any reason to play a game these days that doesn't involve some form of collaboration of setting design / explication between the players and the gm Some players trust their GM to come up with decent background fluff and actually enjoy some of the pre-made settings? I'm not sure why we need to have this weird hate on people who're happy to offload most of the pre-game creative work to the GM and/or a setting book. I mean, can't we just be cool both with the more collaborative writing games AND the more traditional ones?
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Mar 25, 2015 12:44
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Ningyou, I'm really sorry I yelled at you last night. There was no excuse for that.
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Mar 25, 2015 12:46
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Captain Foo posted:yo is there any reason to play a game these days that doesn't involve some form of collaboration of setting design / explication between the players and the gm I used to write up these elaborate setting descriptions and places for the players to explore and they didn't seem to really be all that interested. Probably my problem. But I started listening to some podcasts where the GM would be like "well, what have you heard is around here?" and started trying that and everything fell into place. Hell my players came up with their own adventure seeds on more than one occasion, and would constantly bring in new and weird stuff for me to work with. I think if you have the right players in the right mindset, a collaborative game can be awesome. At the same time, some people are shy or just not all that creative and are totally cool with the GM doing all the heavy lifting or getting it all from a book. There's nothing wrong with that approach either, so long as everyone is having fun. As my grandpa would say: different strokes for different folks.
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Mar 25, 2015 12:55
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When I GM I try to have the players add a lot of setting info but mostly only if its related to their character's background 
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Mar 25, 2015 12:55
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Captain Foo posted:yo is there any reason to play a game these days that doesn't involve some form of collaboration of setting design / explication between the players and the gm UnCO3 fucked around with this message at 14:20 on Mar 25, 2015 |
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Mar 25, 2015 12:59
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These days I enjoy a mix of both. Creating a setting to sandbox around in is fun, having players make up things in that setting is also fun, have your cake and eat it. I'm more and more leaning towards formalizing that stuff into character creation and putting acquaintances and close family and so on right there on your sheet with the implicit understanding that I can't just mess with them arbitrarily. Part of the reason games have such a messed up relationship is people abusing that sort of creative power. Someone comes up with a family in your D&D? Dragon Magazine had an article telling you to totally abuse that for cheap drama! Wait, why are your players not making families for their characters anymore? Sure, it's easy to say "play with better people", but formalizing the social contract a little bit with some rules and implicit agreements doesn't hurt. That, and getting to call on family connections to restore your character's status when you are resting in your home town is legitimately neat. Basically I stole the entire thing from Mouse Guard.
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Mar 25, 2015 13:00
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The one time I let my players do that one of them implemented capitalism in his Birthright realm. Never again. I am the law.
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Mar 25, 2015 13:07
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Rulebook Heavily posted:Basically I stole the entire thing from Mouse Guard.
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Mar 25, 2015 13:12
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TheLovablePlutonis posted:When I GM I try to have the players add a lot of setting info but mostly only if its related to their character's background I do this too, and now one of my players' daughters is an empire-spanning manufacturer of Warforged horses, weapons and armor. It owns.
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Mar 25, 2015 13:24
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The Real Foogla posted:The one time I let my players do that one of them implemented capitalism in his Birthright realm. Never again. I am the law. Low Law, high Guild, hang all characters with Bloodlines so they can't interfere with the Invisible Hand of the Free Market?
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Mar 25, 2015 13:30
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In my experience players will default to ask the GM for setting details anyway, so it's pretty easy for the GM to balance how much they're going to bounce the question back at the players with a "I don't know, what do you think?" And you can do that without explicit rules for player participation in the setting.
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Mar 25, 2015 14:11
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Seems like an easy way for your players to try and trick you into thinking their basketweavers are useful.
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Mar 25, 2015 14:20
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