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Xiahou Dun posted:Are you actually gonna make me list retarded D&D terms or are you just that shot sighted? Please ignore Plutonis to maintain a harmonious forum environment.
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Apr 17, 2015 05:02
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quote:Mages in both oWoD and nWoD have Atlantean Soul Shards that give them their powers. Still clinging to his incredibly idiosyncratic conception of ~vaporware~. He even puts scare quotes around "game" when referring to Mummy. Coherent, well-typed crazy is my favorite. And then I found the Den's Blades in the Dark thread. quote:I'm surprised that Arkane Studios hasn't sued yet and gotten the production shut down. It reads so close to the setting of Dishonored that at first I thought they had licensed it. quote:Well we'll find out. I emailed Bethesda & Arkane and let them know they might want a lawyer to look the page over. If it gets to publication then they decided not to litigate. quote:Incidentally, I wasn't expecting followup contact from Bethesda so fast, but they contacted me yesterday, asked some follow-up questions, and then thanked me profusely and said that because of the nature of potential legal actions they couldn't comment any further on the subject. quote:Of course there's no lawsuit. And I didn't say there would be. I said that Bethesda's legal team was going to investigate, and that I, as a fan of Dishonored, was legitimately confused as to if this was licensed IP or not. I doubt that anyone has gone over anything in the last... 16 hours or so. I didn't say they would so totally get sued, I just said I was surprised they haven't been sued yet! quote:Yeah, after browsing the KS page I am very interested in how this plays out legal-wise because that author has definitely visited the Limbo-of-the-Lost-School-of-Game-Inspirations. And, of course: bears bears bears bears quote:Oh good, it even uses failing forward mechanics. What a clusterfuck of terrible.
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Apr 17, 2015 07:14
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Wait, what's wrong with fail forward?
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Apr 17, 2015 08:18
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GrizzlyCow posted:Wait, what's wrong with fail forward? It can't be fun if loving up a dice roll or a similar game mechanic cannot result in game grinding to a halt and forcing you to abandon the current character/scenario/entire game.
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Apr 17, 2015 08:25
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GrizzlyCow posted:Wait, what's wrong with fail forward? The grog misinterpretation of what fail forward means* makes them think that it renders the game irrelevant: "why roll for stuff, why play at all if it means you're going to  go forwards regardless?"* to be charitable, it should probably have been called "fail sideways" or maybe "fail interestingly", but grogs being grogs that wouldn't stop them from decrying it as bad.
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Apr 17, 2015 08:30
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GrizzlyCow posted:Wait, what's wrong with fail forward? A bunch of people are convinced that "fail forward" means that success and failure have no appreciable difference, not realizing that "forward" refers to the plot of the game not stopping dead on its tracks because the thief didn't manage to unlock the door.
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Apr 17, 2015 08:32
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gradenko_2000 posted:What is THAC0? What does a saving throw even mean? How are the different schools of magic differentiated from each other? THAC0 is archaic and not used anymore. The magic schools are differentiated with easy to learn names and saving throws are dice throws you do to save yourself, what is hard about that?
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Apr 17, 2015 08:36
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paradoxGentleman posted:A bunch of people are convinced that "fail forward" means that success and failure have no appreciable difference, not realizing that "forward" refers to the plot of the game not stopping dead on its tracks because the thief didn't manage to unlock the door. This in general, and the Den's particular flavor of crazy interprets "fail forward" to mean the GM constantly makes up monkey cheese random haha bullshit because that's obviously what these rules encourage. Frank spent a good handful of posts, including a little essay, trying to look clever "deconstructing" fail forward by demonstrating how it results in bears just coming out of loving nowhere all the time. One of his complaints was seriously along the lines of "it requires creativity to improv all the time instead of obeying extensive written rules  "
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Apr 17, 2015 08:57
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The Gaming Den is built around the idea that the DM will always - always - use the most uncharitable and meanspirited understanding of the rules in every situation, and thus you have to beat him by finding loopholes and miswordings, proving your understanding of the rules to be greater. Likewise games require the most complex and ironclad rule systems possible to ensure players can weaponize them against their GMs. Doing anything in-game that doesn't have explicitly support or answers in the rules is just playing pretend and is thus merely a "magic tea party" - WHERE THE DM CAN SCREW YOU AGAIN!!! Trying to get a really popular kickstarter sued and shutdown entirely out of spite is a pretty new low for them, admittingly.
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Apr 17, 2015 10:10
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The fact that people looked at Blades in the Dark and saw a Dishonored-ripoff instead of a Thief-homage is sad and ironic. I think it might be a meaningful piece of performance art or something.
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Apr 17, 2015 10:26
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Frank having a complete and total break from reality over anything and everything Onyx Path is barely grog at this point. He's clearly reporting from an alternate reality. I wonder what he thinks of those bright red flying molluscs that bring him new RPG books.
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Apr 17, 2015 10:35
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Sage Genesis posted:The fact that people looked at Blades in the Dark and saw a Dishonored-ripoff instead of a Thief-homage is sad and ironic. I think it might be a meaningful piece of performance art or something. I haven't played Dishonored yet (it's still free to PlayStation Plus users!) but did whaling really play a big role in the game, to the point that Blades' leviathan stuff is the same kind of direct
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Apr 17, 2015 10:42
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Plague of Hats posted:Please ignore Plutonis to maintain a harmonious forum environment. Running away from conflict might have worked enough for you on EX3 but not on real life.
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Apr 17, 2015 10:44
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DigitalRaven posted:Frank having a complete and total break from reality over anything and everything Onyx Path is barely grog at this point. He's clearly reporting from an alternate reality. I wonder what he thinks of those bright red flying molluscs that bring him new RPG books. Now that I think of it, did oMummy even have "soul fusion"? I recall it having you be more traditionally spiritually/physically continuous mummies.
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Apr 17, 2015 10:45
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Plague of Hats posted:I haven't played Dishonored yet (it's still free to PlayStation Plus users!) but did whaling really play a big role in the game, to the point that Blades' leviathan stuff is the same kind of direct
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Apr 17, 2015 10:49
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The problem with Star Wars roleplaying is that there just isn’t enough support for people who want to play as slavers.quote:I always love posting the slaver specialization idea... I find it humorous. Not the actual idea of slavery, which I bet most people allow to happen in their daily lives, but that it it so much worse than playin a murderer for higher or drug runner.
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Apr 17, 2015 11:33
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Plague of Hats posted:Now that I think of it, did oMummy even have "soul fusion"? I recall it having you be more traditionally spiritually/physically continuous mummies. Of his drivel: * oMage had "soul shards", but they weren't Atlantean. * nMage doesn't have "soul shards". * nMummy doesn't have "soul shards". * oMummy does have them, but only in one of the three versions (Mummy: The Resurrection). A fragment of an old and powerful Egyptian soul bonds to the soul & body of one of the recently dead and offers them a chance at rebirth. * nDemon doesn't have "soul shards". * oDemon doesn't involve "soul shards". A demon jumps in to a human at the moment of death, replacing the soul. * nHunter doesn't have "soul shards", and is perfectly readable. A drat sight more than After loving Sundown, anyway. * oHunter doesn't have "soul shards", people hear the Messengers for other reasons. If you take the Time of Judgment book as gospel, it's because they're reincarnations of Solar Exalted. Nobody does, though. So out of the eight games he references, only one and a third involves "soul shards".
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Apr 17, 2015 11:48
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DigitalRaven posted:Of his drivel: It's got soul stones. Maybe that's what he's thinking of? Nothing like what he's describing, of course, but it might explain where he's getting the kernel of the idea that he's twisted so far out of shape.
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Apr 17, 2015 11:58
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Plague of Hats posted:I haven't played Dishonored yet (it's still free to PlayStation Plus users!) but did whaling really play a big role in the game, to the point that Blades' leviathan stuff is the same kind of direct Nah. Whales are used for their oil to power machines (think gasoline) and their bones as well to a lesser extent. But that's a setting detail with no impact on gameplay or the story. It's a bit like saying Dishonored is all about the lumbering industry just because the buildings have wooden support beams.
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Apr 17, 2015 12:24
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Sage Genesis posted:The fact that people looked at Blades in the Dark and saw a Dishonored-ripoff instead of a Thief-homage is sad and ironic. I think it might be a meaningful piece of performance art or something. John Harper himself calls out Dishonored as a "media touchstone" to Blades, though, and the Duskwall/Dunwall thing is very deliberate, so seeing that first over Thief isn't really all that out there. It's the fact that the Den thinks this is something that could ever conceivably be worth a lawsuit over that's groggy.
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Apr 17, 2015 12:34
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I just read a wiki summary of some of Dishonored's setting, and now I know "someone, somewhere, for some reason, wants to assassinate an imperial ruler" is an incredibly unique piece of IP.
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Apr 17, 2015 12:45
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gradenko_2000 posted:John Harper himself calls out Dishonored as a "media touchstone" to Blades, though, and the Duskwall/Dunwall thing is very deliberate, so seeing that first over Thief isn't really all that out there. Fair point. It's just that Dishonored is itself rather a bit Thief-inspired so I think more in this terms I guess. But yeah, definitely not worth a lawsuit.
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Apr 17, 2015 13:41
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gradenko_2000 posted:It's the fact that the Den thinks this is something that could ever conceivably be worth a lawsuit over that's groggy.
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Apr 17, 2015 13:46
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Plague of Hats posted:This in general, and the Den's particular flavor of crazy interprets "fail forward" to mean the GM constantly makes up monkey cheese random haha bullshit because that's obviously what these rules encourage. Frank spent a good handful of posts, including a little essay, trying to look clever "deconstructing" fail forward by demonstrating how it results in bears just coming out of loving nowhere all the time. One of his complaints was seriously along the lines of "it requires creativity to improv all the time instead of obeying extensive written rules
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Apr 17, 2015 15:21
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The Sin of Onan posted:Even if you take class and concept as synonymous, and even if you accept his apparent belief that only moral people make viable RPG characters, there's still plenty of ways that someone can learn a thief's set of skills and still be a moral person.
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Apr 17, 2015 15:55
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GrizzlyCow posted:Wait, what's wrong with fail forward? If you fail your foraging roll and have to fight/sneak past a T-Rex in order to get water for you and yours it's a communist conspiracy to destroy games.
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Apr 17, 2015 16:13
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You don't find any supplies, but you discover (plot hook goes here). I think it's safe to say he's arguing in bad faith. Or he has never, ever in his life brushed with a creative DM. I'm not sure which scenario is sadder.
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Apr 17, 2015 16:59
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moths posted:I think it's safe to say he's arguing in bad faith. Or he has never, ever in his life brushed with a creative DM. I'm not sure which scenario is sadder. It could be both.
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Apr 17, 2015 18:11
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moths posted:You don't find any supplies, but you discover (plot hook goes here). It's Frank. Bad faith is the only way he knows to argue.
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Apr 17, 2015 19:10
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I like fail forward as a GM cause it lets me think of interesting stuff and stops me having to sit there and wait while people gently caress up doing something over and over when its just like a locked door or some poo poo and its boring for everyone involved. Plus for me it covers kind of a gap in a lot of pnp RPGs, in that in the real world there's not much to stop you sitting there forever and trying to pick a lock over and over, especially if its in some turd basement in a ruin. So really you could just 'abuse' the rules and roll lockpick over and over and over and over until you get a natural 20. With fail forward I can move the plot along and explain why they can't just sit there trying to pick a lock over and over (eg you set off an alarm spell while picking the lock, a patrol of relevant enemies shows up to investigate, you fight em, they have a key or something) Plus I improv most stuff anyway, cause I don't like to do a lot of prep, I come up with a rough outline then respond to what the players are doing, cause it's never what you plan them to do. I guess if you write your games as an intricately crafted SAW-style trap for your players you might not like fail forward.
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Apr 17, 2015 23:37
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Nihilarian posted:loving sold. BRB, designing a system where every action you attempt has a chance of causing bears to appear.
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Apr 17, 2015 23:55
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Weird thing is, I think I know where the "bears bears bears" complaint comes from. The book uses an example where a party tries a cliff and, as the price for failure, the noises they make during the climb wakes up a hibernating werebear. So the "fail forward" rules created a werebear. Except it doesn't need to. There is nothing in the example saying the werebear spontaneously materialized as a result of the failed climb checks. For all we know that werebear already existed in the DM's notes. The rolls just woke it up. Why not? Who says you can't pre-define some fail forward scenarios in your adventure planning? Here is a locked door, DC 20 to pick quietly, failure means it opens but the alarm goes off. This isn't rocket surgery. And it doesn't have to offend old school sensibilities either. (In fact, old school random encounters tend to conjure up monsters and gangs out of thin air. They are easily even more magic make believe than 13th Age, except replace the whims of the DM with the whims of RNG and charts.)
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Apr 18, 2015 00:00
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Charts don't have whims, they're objective arbiters of a perfectly accurate fantasy world simulation 
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Apr 18, 2015 00:25
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quote:So, The video in question.
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Apr 18, 2015 05:05
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EIDT: I am dumb ignore me
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Apr 18, 2015 06:14
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Sage Genesis posted:Weird thing is, I think I know where the "bears bears bears" complaint comes from. The book uses an example where a party tries a cliff and, as the price for failure, the noises they make during the climb wakes up a hibernating werebear. So the "fail forward" rules created a werebear. I think it speaks to lack of willingness to let any one part of the game leak into another, like a person fussy about the food on his plate. For him, the way I would read it if I were inclined to be charitable to his viewpoint as regards the example, he may say in his ideal mode of play that the bear either is or isn't there, period. The failure state of of climbing is falling, not making noise. Because the players are climbing, not moving silently, they wake up the bear if it happens to be there no matter what happens with the climb, unless they specified they were going out of their way to climb quietly. I am not feeling particularly charitable however, gaming is not reality, and attempts to model it as such are ultimately futile. That way lies rolls for anal circumference and dying from infection because you failed to clean a minor scratch you got while traveling through the bush. Without all the sensory information that you would take in during a real situation, players can hardly be expected to react appropriately. remusclaw fucked around with this message at 13:03 on Apr 18, 2015 |
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Apr 18, 2015 12:33
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remusclaw posted:I think it speaks to lack of willingness to let any one part of the game leak into another, like a person fussy about the food on his plate. For him, the way I would read it if I were inclined to be charitable to his viewpoint as regards the example, he may say in his ideal mode of play that the bear either is or isn't there, period. The failure state of of climbing is falling, not making noise. Because the players are climbing, not moving silently, they wake up the bear if it happens to be there no matter what happens with the climb, unless they specified they were going out of their way to climb quietly. I know you're not disagreeing with me, but the fundamental disconnect is right here. 13th Age doesn't have a climb skill. It doesn't have climb checks. All it has are checks to overcome an obstacle in a timely fashion without further complications, and climbing might sometimes be a part of those. The bear didn't wake up due to "noise" it woke up due to "too much noise". There is a difference. The former assumes that sound is a binary issue, whereas the latter shows a scenario where the PCs were fumbling around so much that the noises of their efforts eventually proved too much. In a strange kind of way, I find that this sort of "messy" organic resolution leads to more believable outcomes than the so-called "realistic" crunch of vanilla D&D.
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Apr 18, 2015 13:32
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Again, remember who is making the complaint. The Gaming Den takes the idea of an antagonistic DM to be holy writ; their whole schtick is that you need to use the rules to fight the DM. There's nothing bad faith in every argument. Because then they WIN!
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Apr 18, 2015 13:51
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Sage Genesis posted:I know you're not disagreeing with me, but the fundamental disconnect is right here. Plague of Hats posted:This in general, and the Den's particular flavor of crazy interprets "fail forward" to mean the GM constantly makes up monkey cheese random haha bullshit because that's obviously what these rules encourage. Frank spent a good handful of posts, including a little essay, trying to look clever "deconstructing" fail forward by demonstrating how it results in bears just coming out of loving nowhere all the time. One of his complaints was seriously along the lines of "it requires creativity to improv all the time instead of obeying extensive written rules
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Apr 18, 2015 14:25
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Sage Genesis posted:Weird thing is, I think I know where the "bears bears bears" complaint comes from. The book uses an example where a party tries a cliff and, as the price for failure, the noises they make during the climb wakes up a hibernating werebear. So the "fail forward" rules created a werebear. Yeah, it's funny because it's really just a case of epistemological confusion. There's really no difference between a hidden set of notes somewhere, a monster closet, or literal beings being conjured out of thin air. I've always wondered if there's some old grog-mine I've missed about the epistemology of roleplaying. It's all navel gazing but it would be fun to see someone write a full thesis about some sort of perceived difference between the two to any player group.
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Apr 18, 2015 15:43
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